Transgender Mormons struggle to feel at home, in religion

Syracuse, Utah (AP) — Sixteen-year-old Grayson Moore had no label, only metaphors, to describe the disconnect he felt between his body and soul.

It was like car sickness, he said, when your eyes and inner ears disagree about whether you are moving.

"It makes you sick," Moore said, according to The Salt Lake Tribune. "That's the same with gender."

When Moore's mother gave her then-daughter a vocabulary for the feelings — "gender dysphoria" or transgender — there followed an immediate sense of relief and recognition.

And, he said, God confirmed that he was not just a tomboy. He was in the wrong body.

Such moments come in the life of all transgender persons — times when vague feelings of general discomfort with their identity crystallize into that realization.

Annabel Jensen was deciding whether to serve a Mormon mission. Sara Jade Woodhouse was married and had fathered a child.

In these three cases, their Mormonism — with its emphasis on the physical link between bodies and spirits and its insistence that gender is "eternal" — initially made it tougher to acknowledge what was happening inside of them.

Since switching genders (though none has had sex-reassignment surgery), all three said they have found psychological and theological peace, even divine approval, and a surprising welcome from their local LDS leaders and congregations.

They are among a growing but little understood minority in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Transgender Mormons in Utah have formed a support group, march in gay pride parades — though most are not gay — and talk openly about their experiences. A weekly "Family Home Evening" group routinely draws about 30 participants along the Wasatch Front.

Efforts to bring awareness are crucial, they believe, because most members of the Utah-based faith know little or nothing about what it's like to be transgender. And many judge and reject transgender loved ones.

Even LDS apostle Dallin H. Oaks acknowledged recently that Mormon leaders "have not had so much experience with (transgender persons). ... We have some unfinished business on that."

Still, the faith does have policies in place, saying elective sex-reassignment surgery "may be cause for formal church discipline," according to the church's Handbook.

In some Mormon missions, including Thailand, with its many transgender persons, missionaries ask would-be converts if they are in their "original gender."

An official LDS document, "The Family: A Proclamation to the World," written and approved by the faith's top leaders, states that "gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose."

"Because of this," church spokesman Eric Hawkins writes in an emailed statement, "the church does not baptize those who are planning transsexual operations. If a person has already had such an operation and wishes to join the church, they may be baptized only after an interview with the mission president and approval by the First Presidency.

"The church does not ordain transgender people to the priesthood or issue temple recommends to them," Hawkins adds. "Church leaders counsel already-baptized members against elective transsexual operations, and bishops may refer specific cases to the stake president for possible resolution at that level or by the First Presidency.

"We have faith that ultimately, the emotional pain that many of these people feel will be addressed by a loving God who understands each individual's circumstances and heart."

Hawkins declined to comment about the church standing and prohibitions for those who have had only hormone treatments.

Many active LDS transgender persons accept the church's statements about gender being an essential characteristic and are willing to live with some restrictions.

Still, despite how comfortable transgender Mormons are in their new skin, the LDS Church is a very gendered place — men go to priesthood meetings, women to Relief Society; men officiate at rituals and general meetings, women lead auxiliaries; men sit on one side in the temple, women, generally, on the other — and that complicates their lives inside the faith.

Growing up in Davis County — or "Mormonopolis," as Moore calls it — the young Latter-day Saint girl named Grace had severe panic attacks beginning in late elementary school and continuing through junior high. By high school, says the 22-year-old math major at the University of Utah, his distress — including physical symptoms such as nausea — was so extreme he hardly could function.

Moore's mother, Neca Allgood, took him to various doctors but no one could diagnose his problems.

Trained as a molecular biologist and a scientist by instinct, Allgood had a suspicion that her daughter might have "gender dysphoria."

When Allgood asked Moore if he was a girl in his body but a boy in his brain, the young man simply said, "not just my brain — in my soul."

With that recognition, Moore's life, at last, made sense to him.

"There's a word for it," he remembers thinking, "I'm not crazy."

That night, Grace Moore knelt in prayer, asking God, "Am I your son?"

He said he got a powerful spiritual affirmation that he was, indeed, a boy and that "it was going to be OK."

His mother essentially received the same message.

"The answer to my prayers was to love him and help him live as a boy," she said. "It increased my testimony and understanding of the Holy Spirit."

Mother and son talked it over and decided he needed to transition quickly.

During six weeks of his junior year in high school, Grace became Grayson, tossed out all the girl clothes, and began identifying as male.

Allgood was supportive, but worried about her son's safety.

"There was a bigger risk in not transitioning," he said. "Living that lie was killing me."

When he prayed about whether to begin taking testosterone treatment, he says the answer was to "wait," which he did. By college, however, he says he got the divine go-ahead and has seen a change as his body has become more male.

Moore has not yet had surgery but doesn't rule it out.

He attends an LDS singles ward, where he has the full support of his Mormon bishop. He goes to the male-only priesthood meetings but hasn't been ordained — and, under current church policy, won't be.

He's still listed as a female on LDS membership rolls.

By Peggy Fletcher Stack, The Salt Lake Tribune. Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

The Gayly – April 3, 2015 @ 11am.