New Jersey
— The Episcopal Diocese of Newark is hosting a
first-of-its-kind spiritual retreat for transgender
people this weekend in Elberon, a section of Long Branch
in Monmouth County.
"The purpose of this
retreat is to get to know each other, share our spiritual
experiences, our hopes and expectations of the church and
to discuss what, if anything, we want to do to educate
the church about transgender people and issues," wrote
event organizer Donna Cartwright in an e-mail.
Cartwright, a
male-to-female transsexual, was inspired to host the
retreat after having several conversations with
transgender people across the nation on a listserv she
created as part of the diocese's Oasis ministry,
which caters to the needs of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual,
Transgender (GLBT) community and their
families.
Since the listserv's
inception in January, the online community has grown to
about 30 regular participants from across the nation,
Cartwright said.
About a dozen
individuals, hailing from the Midwest to the Northeast
will attend the event, which takes place today and Sunday
, she said.
"Community and fellowship
are important to us because we are still small in numbers
and scattered," said Cartwright.
"And those of us who are
religious are often fearful of being stigmatized or
rejected in traditional faith communities."
Despite the Episcopal
Church going through a very public and contentious debate
this year over the role of homosexuals in the ministry,
Cartwright said she did not encounter resistance from the
diocese when she brought up the idea of hosting a formal
retreat.
"The Diocese of Newark
<http://www.dioceseofnewark.org/>
has a reputation for being supportive to the LGBT
community," she said.
Justin Tanis, a
female-to-male transsexual, pastor and author of the book
"Transgendered: Ministry, Theology and Communities of
Faith" (Pilgrim Press: 2003) will facilitate the retreat.
The transgender community is in need of events like this,
he said.
"People struggle with
their own sense of worrying about whether being
transgender is part of God's plan for them," Tanis
said.
"When I was doing
research for my book, I was really struck by similar
stories of people saying, 'I was struggling, was in
despair and at the moment where I felt most despair I
heard God saying to me, 'I love you. I made you this way.
You're fine.'"
One of the purposes of
this retreat is to try to identify ways for "people to
tune into the voice of God that they perceive inside
themselves," he said.
Additionally, Tanis said,
due to the growing visibility of the transgender
community, churches and communities are beginning to open
their doors and hearts to the transgender
community.
Hopefully, he said, that
means events like this weekend's will become more common
in the future.
"I think that people are
recognizing that when their churches make statements
like, 'Our church welcomes all people,' that means all
people, and people are beginning to recognize that
transgenders are part of the diversity of
humankind."
