Intersex Theology

Anywhere between 1-1.5% of humans are born with ambiguous biological, sexual parts. Somewhere around .1 or .2% of births are so sexually ambiguous that they receive medical attention and often surgery. This does not seem like a huge number, but taking into account the millions of births each year, humanity is taking in thousands upon thousands of people who are intersex, often known as hermaphrodites (though true hermaphroditism is only known in the non-human animal kingdom). The parents of an intersexual person truly face a difficult decision. They may be encouraged to have the newbor undergo surgery in which they choose the sex of the child and raise her/him as that gender. Some may choose to allow that child to grow up and choose on their own which gender they will choose to live as. Either way, this is an incredibly difficult decision. It is not uncommon for a child whose sex was chosen for them by their parents to grow up and be raised as that gender, yet later struggle immensely with their sexual identity, possibly identifying with the other gender. If the parents choose to allow the child to grow up as intersex, the child is very likely to face severe ostracism from the world around them.

We live in an incredible gender dualistic world. It is important to note that there are some societies where intersex people are not only accepted, but honored, namely in societies where sexually ambiguous or intersex deities are revered and worshipped. In the western world, however, intersex people are often thrown into the sexually deviant (and misunderstood) realm, along with homosexual and transgendered people. Though this gender and sex dualistic view is supported by many, many segments of society, religious or not, I would like to focus specifically on the mainstream Christian theology surrounding intersex people. Western Christianity, in particular evangelicalism, along with conservative Catholicism, is obsessed with gender. In the American context, books like Wild at Heart and Captivated, gender specific Bible studies, male bonding, girl's nights out, and a obsession with dating and marriage are incredibly common and form much of the thread of American Christianity. In American Christianity, there is no room for sexual ambiguity- there are men and there are women. God created it this way. It is part of God''s order.

A person who is intersex is born intersex. It is not a disease or a handicap. It can be considered a birth disorder, but most would agree that is a very loaded term. Intersexuality is a natural thing, as being born with a mental or physical disability is natural (I compare intersexuality to mental and physical handicaps because handicaps are ony handicaps because they are not the norm- if everyone was born without legs or with Down's syndrome, being born without legs or with Down's syndrome would not be a handicap. A handicap is a handicap because that person cannot thrive in a world where their condition is the exception, not the rule). It seems as if American Christianity has moved past ascribing handicaps or most birth abnormalities to some presence of sin in the world. It is not uncommon to even hear language such as "gifts" and "blessings" when speaking of people who hold physical or biological characteristics that are not the norm, in particular people with mental disabilities. Yet it seems as if American Christianity has not come to the point where a person who is born with an ambiguous sexual identity is considered beautiful, or even a gift. Why is that? It is highly likely, in my opinion, that this is because "these people" do not fit into the American Christian worldview, propogated by prominent Christian leaders and groups, of a gender and sexual dualistic world, where men are men, and women are women- anything that challenges this "natural order" is only met with confusion at best, ignoring as common, and ostracism and labelling as-a-result-of-sin-in-the-world at worst.

Intersexuality is natural in the same way that autism, Down's syndrome, and physical deformation are natural. They are only handicaps and disorders because they are different.* Yet if an intersexual person were to enter into mainstream American Christian circles, my guess is that they would eventully begin to pick up hints that they were somehow a violation of God's established order. But how could they be if they were born this way? Another part of God's order that seems to be pushed is the idea that humans should, for example, work and play and talk. How then, could a person who is born in a vegetative state be part of that order? The simple answer is that people tweak that so that that person can be included- as a "gift", as a "blessing", though maybe "in disguise".

Jesus came from and dwelt in the margins of society- where the sick, poor, handicapped, and otherwise God's-order-violating lived. Because this is where Jesus, who is the Gospel, came, this is where theology must come from. Theology, to be Christian theology, cannot be born in the established, whole, powerful segment of creation. Those who are intersexual are at the margins of most societies today, with American Christianity certainly being no exception. They are the exception, not the rule. If mainstream American Christianity has no room for the intersexual person, whether they have chosen a gender or not, and whether they fit into that gender's societal "role" or not, then the theology of American Christianity is not a Christian theology at all. A gospel that only has good news for the healthy, whole, and otherwise "normal" is not good news at all. Let those good news continue to be that we are all created in the image of God, exactly as we are.

by: Rod


*My intent here is not necessarily to critique the concept of a handicap, and at the same time it is not to advocate the sociological designation of people as handicapped- that is an entirely different discussion, and one worth going into, I might add. For this discussion, I am going with the mainstream perceptions of people as disordered and handicapped, though I am certainly not ascribing any negative connotations to these words.