The Supreme Court of Virginia recently ruled in favor of a public school teacher fired for refusing to use male pronouns for a transgender student. Lower courts had dismissed the teacher’s lawsuits against his former employer, but the state’s highest court reinstated his right to sue them. The Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a Christian conservative public interest law firm representing the teacher, hailed the court decision as a significant victory for religious freedom.
The teacher asserts using the male pronouns for a student he knew had been born female violated his religious rights because doing so forced him to lie. In other words, for this teacher, maintaining a clear conscience was paramount. What apparently matters most to him is that he can go to bed feeling good about himself at night, regardless of its effect on the student in question. The ADF sees ensuring Christians can do this is worth the tens of millions of dollars they raise each year, the considerable work they put into such a lawsuit, and the impact such actions have in the broader world.
I see it quite differently.
Christianity Isn’t About What’s Best For Me, But What’s Best For The Other
First, as an evangelical, Bible-believing Christian, I believe one of the core tenets of our faith is being more concerned for the other than for myself. The great self-emptying of Christ illustrates this.
“Who, existing in the form of God,
did not consider equality with God
something to be grasped,
but emptied Himself,
taking the form of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
He humbled Himself
and became obedient to death—
even death on a cross.” – Philippians 2:6-8
The Apostle Paul directed the Philippian Christians to “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility, value others above yourselves.”
I have difficulty seeing what the teacher did here as being more concerned for his student than himself.
It Comes Down To Reciprocal Respect
Whether one accepts the basic concepts behind the transgender experience or not, it seems only common courtesy to respect a person’s preferences for how they wish others to identify them.
For example, a young person may not want someone older to call them a “girl” or a “boy.” A doctor may not want to be called “Mr.” or “Mrs,” and a customer may not want to be referred to by their first name. Of course, in the teacher’s case, one might argue that there is no matter of conscience or religious conviction in such instances. I see it otherwise.
Some religious groups consider titles to be flashy, braggadocious, and nothing more than expressions of human pride, one of the seven deadly sins. According to the teacher, his legal team, and now Virginia’s highest court, schools must allow teachers not to use nouns, pronouns, and even titles preferred by others but to substitute their preferences based on their private religious convictions.
If a student doesn’t like being called a “boy,” but the teacher sincerely believes that the student’s age and sex are “truly” those of a “boy,” rather than, say, a young man or a young person, by that reasoning the Virginia constitution protects the teacher in persisting in calling the student a “boy,” or even a “child,” notwithstanding it upsets the student.
What’s Good For The Goose Is Good For The Gander
Similarly, suppose the title the school superintendent prefers is “Dr.,” but a teacher believes that’s sinfully prideful, and using the title would validate sin. In that case, the teacher can disrespectfully call the superintendent whatever he wants because it is his religious right.
A second element is the question of whose feelings win over the other. In this student-teacher case, the teacher asserts that, in the end, it’s his feelings that trump the students’. The teacher litigating in Virginia believes what matters is that he can rest easy having hewed to his convictions, regardless of the impact on the student, the student’s family, the wider student body, other faculty members, school leadership, and the community.
In other words, according to the teacher, what matters most in all this is not the needs of others but his own need–for a clear conscience.
Bonhoeffer Weighs In
The highly respected and widely-regarded World War II-era moral philosopher, Christian ethicist, German Evangelical theologian, and eventual martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer decried “moral fanaticism.” In a 1942 Christmas letter to family and close friends (now known as the essay “After Ten Years“), he wrote, “There is the one who determines to take a stand in the world by acting on his own freedom. He values the necessary action more highly than an untarnished conscience and reputation. He is prepared to sacrifice a barren principle . . .”
The historical context is, of course, resistance to Hitler’s Third Reich terroristic dictatorship, genocide, and pan-European war, so it’s not perfectly analogous to what we’re talking about here. However, there is something we can extrapolate from Bonhoeffer’s line of reasoning. Some things are more important than protecting ourselves against moral quandaries, second thoughts, or even guilt. For him, that thing was ending the massive human loss and suffering perpetrated by the Nazis on Germans, Jews, Roma, and a host of other innocents, including homosexual persons.
In our time, transgender persons are some of the most rejected, marginalized, and endangered members of society. Guarding one’s conscience at the expense of the vulnerable who is suffering further insult or even physical injury due to targeting is contrary to the model, mission, and ministry of Christ. The religious moralists of Jesus’ time wanted him to condemn and punish the woman caught in adultery, but he said, “I don’t condemn you.”
Bonhoeffer addressed the outcome of the teacher’s misguided and legalistic religiosity, “This or that person may well attain the sanctuary of private virtuousness. But he must close his eyes and mouth to the injustice around him. He can remain undefiled by the consequences of responsible action only by deceiving himself . . . he will. . . turn into the most hypocritical of all Pharisees.”
It’s Always For The Benefit Of The Other
Jesus both said and demonstrated that the most crucial factor in any moral equation is the person in need or being hurt. Alleviating that person’s suffering is the only responsible action. When rebuked for healing the sick on the Sabbath, he said the Sabbath was for the benefit of human beings, not the other way around. Similarly, he defended his disciples for not washing their hands when religious rules required it.
“And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition?” He asked his critics. “For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother’ and ‘Anyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death.’ But you say that if anyone says to his father or mother, ‘Whatever you would have received from me is a gift devoted to God, he need not honor his father or mother with it. Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. You hypocrites! Isaiah prophesied correctly about you:
‘These people honor Me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from Me.
They worship Me in vain;
they teach as doctrine the precepts of men.'”
Some Teaching For The Teacher
Virginia’s Supreme Court may have theoretically gotten the teacher’s case right, but the teacher called it wrong regarding human relations. In every encounter with the socially marginalized, Jesus was their advocate. It was the religious hypocrites who treated the marginalized as if they were threats to their own social status.
My questions to the teacher are, How do you view this student? As a test of your moral purity, a measure of your conscientiousness, a threat to your standing before God–or your coreligionists? Or is this person known and loved by God? A fellow sinner with you who is a candidate for the same grace you have received? A companion in imperfection with every bit of dignity and inherent value you possess?
Your answers will dictate how you treat this person.
Regardless of how the court decides this case, the overarching rule that seems to apply to this episode is the Golden one, “So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.”
Do To Others As You Would Have Them Do To You
If the teacher in this case (a male French instructor) wants his students to call him “Mr.” or “Monsieur,” the masculine title of respect, along with the attendant masculine pronouns, he should treat his student with reciprocal respect. Only then can the teacher expect genuine respect–and perhaps–be asked by his student what motivates his selfless humility.
Should the teacher maintain that preserving his rights and clearing his conscience are the only things that matter in the end, all he is likely to be asked is what motivates his contempt.
“In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.” – Jesus, in Matthew 7:12
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