It is a difficult time to be a parent in America if you do not want your child to consider chemical sterilization and so-called gender reassignment surgery. All the institutions of learning seem to be against you. Kindergartners in Seattle are taught about transgenderism by a man with a high-pitched voice wearing a purple hat and earrings. ‘Drag Queen Story Hours’ are ubiquitous across American libraries. And I can tell you from personal experience that local children’s events in my own (politically conservative) town have explicitly encouraged my toddler to check out the bouncy house at our local Pride Day celebration.
Things can seem, if it’s possible, even worse at the collegiate level. Pursuing the secular institutions in the top fifty on the U.S. News and World Report rankings of American Universities, it is easy to find ‘trans-affirming’ statements on each website. Even the one so often championed by conservatives as a bastion of open dialogue, The University of Chicago, is quite clear about where it stands on this issue. Biblical precepts aside, religiously-affiliated schools hardly fare much better. Catholic universities like Notre Dame, Boston College, and Georgetown all put significant resources towards ‘welcoming’ and ‘affirming’ students with gender dysphoria, i.e., encouraging them to ‘identify’ as trans and consider undergoing irreversible chemical and surgical treatments. (The Baptist Wake Forest and Methodist Emory are, unsurprisingly, in the same boat.)
Of course, students who suffer from gender dysphoria are to be welcomed as fellow human beings. Especially at Christian universities, they should know that they are loved and cared for. But that care cannot mean lying to them. Just as it is a lie to agree with a starving anorexic woman when says she is fat and hideous, so it is a lie to tell a man he is a woman or a woman she is a man. In addition, it is hardly ‘medicine’ to permanently prevent a person from having children (or even experiencing orgasm) and put them on a road to ever intensifying physical and psychological distress.
Thankfully, there are some American colleges and universities that recognize this fact. If we are in need of encouragement about the prospects for children in the West, we ought to familiarize ourselves with these schools and, if possible, find ways to support them.
Causes for hope
There are a number of religiously-affiliated American colleges and universities that have spent decades ensuring that their schools reflect the moral tenets of the faiths they wish to encourage in their students. Hillsdale College, Liberty University, and all the schools on the Newman Guide for Choosing a Catholic College are excellent examples of this type of institution.
Perhaps the most high-profile example is Yeshiva University, an excellent Modern Orthodox Jewish school that is in a fierce legal battle over its opposition to sexual activity contrary to the moral law as revealed in the Scriptures, which the administration will not allow to be promoted on campus. The fight concerns the existence of an LGBT club within the school. Yeshiva seems to be trying everything, even ceasing activities for all clubs at the school in hopes that it will satisfy the progressive leviathan. Ultimately, the university may be forced to choose between having an LGBT club or ceasing to be recognized as an educational institution (and paying a hefty 230 million dollars of federal money back). The idea that the state holds this kind of power over thousands of Jewish academics and students is frankly terrifying, but thankfully the university shows no signs of bending the knee to the god of sexual aberrance.
But to my mind, the schools that we should most applaud are those that, though they may have waffled in the past, are today attempting to re-affirm their commitment to the reality of human biological sex. A recent example is Houghton University, a small liberal arts school in upstate New York. Houghton is affiliated with the Wesleyan Church, which has retained its Biblical teachings on sexuality as many Protestant denominations have jettisoned them.
Houghton, with only around 900 students, is a little-known school. Located on a bucolic campus, the school was until recently known as Houghton College. The name change signifies that the school intends to continue growing and cement itself in the higher education landscape at a time when many schools are facing dwindling enrollment and economic hardship.
Unlike universities such as Georgetown, Houghton seems to believe that the way forward is to re-affirm its Christian identity. The school does not officially recognize students’ (or staff’s) ‘pronouns’ when they contradict their biological sex. Houghton’s leadership sees any other course of action as dishonest to the people under their care and potentially harmful. According to its website, the Wesleyan Church holds that “adult gender nonconformity [is] a violation of the sanctity of human life,” and the university dutifully agrees.
Last month, it was reported that two staff members were dismissed from their positions at least in part due to their refusal to remove their ‘pronouns’ from their email signatures. Raegan Zelaya and Shua Wilmot had been employed as residence hall directors, and were thus tasked with facilitating a welcoming Christian culture on campus. They saw their signatures as part of fostering a welcoming atmosphere. School administrators, however, disagreed, seeing the ‘pronouns’ as implicitly condoning transgender ideology, which they deem counter to Christian teaching.
In a time of increasing political polarization, it is tempting to see this as little more than a cynical game to win political brownie points with potential students and their parents. But the school is not interested in playing games, and nor is it acting ideologically. The “What We Believe” section of its website explicitly states that it is neither “liberal” nor “conservative,” but “solidly Biblical.” It continues:
Sometimes, this means affirming positions currently called conservative. For example, we privilege the understanding of marriage as between a man and a woman, and the sanctity of life from conception to natural death. At other times, Houghton’s positions look less conservative: for instance, we affirm that God calls both men and women into pastoral ministry, and that we have significant work to do in healing the scars of racism in America.
Depending on the moment in history, or indeed the part of the world, certain aspects of Christian moral teaching are harder to live out than others. For instance, in the American South during the days of slavery, it was more difficult to live out the truth that every human person, regardless of race, possesses dignity and is in need of love. Similarly, it is difficult today to stand up against transgenderism and the attendant mutilation of human bodies. Thus, it is important to encourage those who stand up against transgenderism, in whatever way we can. For those who are able, giving a small donation to schools like Houghton is a way of showing support. For those of more limited means, writing a short note to the administration encouraging them in their dedication to Christian moral teaching is an easy way to do the same.
Most importantly, though, those of us with faith should pray for schools and other institutions that form our young. They are in need, not just of courage, but of grace. They battle not just against flesh and blood—that is, not just against puberty blockers and ‘reassignment’ surgeries—but against the rulers, the authorities, the powers of this dark world and the spiritual forces of evil.
