The Roman Catholic Diocese of Des Moines, Iowa, has just issued a thoroughgoing rejection of the fashionable gender identity madness and provided a strong defense of sanity. In future ages, when the history of our Age of Absurdity is written, the diocese will be seen as one of the few voices that spoke out for truth and common sense amid the pandemic cowardice.
On Monday, the diocese issued “Gender Identity Guide and Policies” that tackle head-on the falsehoods and fantasies that the Left demands that we believe and accept on pain of being charged with “bigotry” and “hatred.”
It begins by saying that it did so in response to numerous requests for clarification on these matters: “Parish and school leaders asked Bishop William Joensen to provide guidance on how they should welcome and minister to those coping with gender dysphoria while following Catholic Church teaching. After two years of study, prayer, listening, and consulting, a policy was developed that provides a comprehensive explanation of how to interpret and apply Catholic principles to daily life within our faith communities and schools.”
This is refreshing in itself as all too many Christian leaders today, including many Catholics, are only too happy to throw Christian principles in the dumpster and follow the prevailing cultural winds. The Diocese of Des Moines is a welcome exception. According to a Tuesday report in the New York Post, its new guidelines involve “forbidding puberty blockers, cross-dressing and even preferred pronouns on its property.”
This is because, the guidelines explain, “Respect for creation includes respect for one’s biological sex.” It quotes, of all people, Pope Francis, saying “the acceptance of our bodies as God’s gift is vital for welcoming and accepting the entire world as a gift from the Father and our common home, whereas thinking that we enjoy absolute power over our own bodies turns, often subtly, into thinking that we enjoy absolute power over creation. Learning to accept our body, to care for it, and to respect its fullest meaning, is an essential element of any genuine human ecology.”
This means accepting reality and not losing oneself in fantasies. “The Holy Father’s concerns,” the document explains, “are grounded in divine revelation and the Church’s teaching that our identities as male and female are established as part of God’s providential plan for humanity. The mystery of human sexuality as a key component of personal identity is received as a gift created by God that we are not authorized to seek to change.” Indeed. As if we could change it anyway.
On a practical level, the guidelines come down firmly on the side of common sense: “No person may designate a ‘preferred pronoun’ in speech or in writing when related to ministry activities of any kind, nor are parishes, organizations, or institutions to permit such a designation.” And “all persons must use the bathroom or locker room that matches their biological sex.” Drag queens can go elsewhere: “All persons are to ordinarily present themselves in a manner consistent with their God-given dignity.”
Drugging unsuspecting children into compliance with the Left’s agenda is forbidden as well: “No person is permitted to have on-site or to distribute any medications for the purpose of gender reassignment. Also, students and those entrusted to the care of the Church are not permitted to take ‘puberty blockers,’ even if self-administered, on parish or school property, with the purpose of a potential or actual ‘gender reassignment.’” This is because “the diagnosis of gender dysphoria does not merit the alteration of one’s body through drug-induced hormone therapies or surgery; rather, one is entitled to receive unconditional love and support, as well as psychological and pastoral care.”
Related: The Rhetorical ‘Double-Bind’: How LGBTQ+++© Activists Rig the Discourse
Iowa State Sen. Claire Celsi (D-Of Course) was enraged, writing on Facebook: “Diocese of Des Moines codifies ostracism of transgender kids. These schools want public dollars and want to treat kids in a way that might cause them to commit suicide. This is not what Jesus would do.”
The “suicide” threat is a classic example of the Left’s emotional manipulation, demanding that we acquiesce to insanity and accommodate it at all costs or the negative consequences will be our fault. Is Jesus really an emotional blackmailer? Claire Celsi certainly is. And of course, the usual chorus of Leftist officials joined in to slam the diocese for standing up for sanity.
So far, however, the diocese is standing firm amid the criticism. We can only hope it will continue to do so. Some young people may be saved from lives of emotional confusion and physical misery as a result.
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