A natural question arising from the DDF response to Question 1 (which I was surprised wasn't addressed in the response) is: if transgender-identifying individuals are to be baptized, what name are they baptized with? Is he or she to be baptized with the name given to them in accord with their actual sex, or with their post-transition nam…
A natural question arising from the DDF response to Question 1 (which I was surprised wasn't addressed in the response) is: if transgender-identifying individuals are to be baptized, what name are they baptized with? Is he or she to be baptized with the name given to them in accord with their actual sex, or with their post-transition name? Will Jimothy be baptized as Stacey? Will Barbie be baptized as Ken?
The name thing actually matters (especially since the person's name is explicitly stated as part of the formula), and I can imagine that baptizing a male individual ("Jimothy") with a socially-female name ("Stacey") would be a cause for scandal and thus impede the imposition of the sacrament.
people are baptized under the name they choose. it really would be a pretty clear dick move to require trans people to use names "socially" linked with their sex assigned at birth. if that causes a scandal for some people, then maybe those people need to stick their noses elsewhere.
I think you're smart enough to know what the point I'm making is, and you're missing it. Obviously one can "choose a name" in the sense that, for example, if I were to enter RCIA I could be baptized "Matt" or "Matthew." And a woman named "Thelma" could (in theory, only because there's no canon to explicitly preclude this) prefer to be baptized as "Louise" (although even then, that is an exceedingly uncommon and far more complicated situation than you make it out to be).
But if you honestly think that if a woman named "Lucy" attempts to transition into a man and wants to be baptized as "Ricky," that could never possibly create public scandal (considering the Church has a pretty clear and defined anthropological understanding that humans are a male-female binary determined by biological sex) and imply a tacit affirmation by the Church to something heterodox, then you are not to be taken seriously.
I once knew a set of twins who, at baptism, the priest accidentally swapped the names of the two little baby boys. The parents didn't just say "meh, the name thing doesn't really matter and anybody can choose anything," or "let's just do it again with the correct names," they actually went through the process of legally changing the names of their twin boys to match the baptismal reality. A middle schooler could understand that the name matters because baptism imparts a permanent indelible mark and bestows an identity that cannot be wipe away. Even taking on a religious name in vows doesn't change that identity. In Christ, you are and always will be Joseph.
And don't give me the cheap "well it's none of your business" crud; it is my business since, theologically, we are made one body in Christ, and practically, because what you choose to be named affects other people who interact with you or speak about you (don't people complain about "deadnaming"?)
I understood you perfectly well. as I said before, my view is that if it causes "scandal" to some, I am willing to let them be scandalized. I don't have any level of sympathy at all for your desire to micromanage the lives of trans people.
Joseph, your feelings and insistence for personal autonomy is standard op in the non-Catholic world, but to enter the Catholic Church requires surrendering the commonly held individualistic independence of US society. It's a serious thing to become Catholic. You promise obedience to the teachings of the Catholic Church. One is constantly asked through the years if you still believe in the virgin birth, the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, in life after death. Outside the Church, scandal is fun. It's a goal, even. Inside the Church, scandal is heartbreaking. One is disappointing Jesus and making it harder for others to live as Christ wants everyone to live. But there's nothing like the freedom I found in becoming Catholic. I hope you will look into it more. But it's really different!
lmao, what are you doing now, questioning my Catholic cred? I'm not any less Catholic than you because I take a different view of what should be expected of transgender Catholics. causing scandal is inherent to being a Christian- if you're not "sending the wrong message" to some, then you're not imitating Christ. and I do not object to the articles of the creed you mention, but there is a place in the Church for dissent on some topics.
Here's what makes this more complicated: names have historically traveled between the sexes. We've had guys named Mario and girls named Josephine for many centuries. You can actually honor and take patron saints who don't share your sex, and take their name. The fact that we now have this social innovation introduces new cases where the intent is wholly different from the historical use: whereas my grandmother may have named my mother Jean in honor of St John the Baptist, my daughter may be naming my granddaughter Jon as a denial of the truth of biological sex.
If we try to write a law to address the second case, how do we do so without either invalidating the historical practice or introducing some kind of mind-reading or at least a legalistic "orthodoxy pledge" (like having the parents sign a statement that they are not using this name as a denial of reality?)
I actually think leaving it up to the pastor's judgment is probably the least bad option here.
People give their little girl babies masculine names with some regularity, and what happens over time is that the perception of the name changes from "boy" to "neutral" to "girly" and eventually people don't use that name for little boy babies anymore. So I don't think we should panic too hard about baptismal names. God adopts sinners into His family on a pretty regular basis, and none of them fully understand how much He is going to ask of them (in spite of that Gospel reading about "hey don't try building a tower until you have budgeted for it, and don't fight a big army with a little one although we did kind of just read about that in Maccabees because that's not what I'm talking about" we do not actually calculate the cost, which is literally everything and I mean literally.) If someone recklessly has himself or herself baptized as a Catholic without actually holding all of the truths of the Catholic faith, he or she is kind of asking for it (I don't know what will happen - potentially, sainthood, which is the kind of adventure that only a fool would sign up for, such as young St Teresa of Avila toddling off to ask someone to martyr her), and if the instructor did his/her job then it's not the instructor's fault, but if the instructor also does not really hold as true everything that is true, then the instructor should hold onto his/her hat also, because God is not going to build the Four-Story Mistake (shoutout to Enright fans, if any) if He can get away with doing a lot more.
The problem really isn't about the names so much as the intention.
Besides the ambiguity in boy vs. girl names, there are a lot of nuns who take the names of male Saints when they make their vows. They are making a statement about their identity, but NOT about their gender identity.
Personally, I expect that a transgender person who truly rejected transgenderism, would not want to keep a name that they had assumed for the purposes of identifying as the wrong gender. Whether they choose to return to their original name or to pick a new name (there was a custom in the early Church for people with pagan names to choose a new name at baptism), totally up to them. I can also imagine a situation in which a person might legitimately want to keep their changed name, but I don't think that will be typical, and would probably bear some looking into by their priest/catechist - more likely that the person hasn't received sufficient formation to convert (regardless of whether that is anyone's fault) than that they have a correct understanding and intentions in that choice. This is less about the name, and more about helping a person who needs it. Think generosity, not the mere meeting of obligations.
As far as changing their names *legally* is concerned, that is a PROCESS, and shouldn't cause a delay in baptism.
People who ignorantly do not agree with all of the truths of the Catholic faith get baptized all the time. It hurts them to believe a lie, sometimes gravely, but unless their ignorance is deliberate or due to negligence, it's not a sin. People who knowingly reject Church teaching and get baptized have a much bigger problem: they are in mortal sin for the heresy and they have committed sacrilege as well (against Baptism, and Confirmation, and the Eucharist, all within minutes of each other). They do not receive the graces of being within the Church, because they are spiritually dead. Of course, sin can be followed with repentance and ultimately holiness. But there's very good reason to do that before baptism, rather than someday maybe.
I was a evangelical Christian til I was 45 when I converted (long story of course). I've now been Catholic over 2 decades. I find there are STILL nooks and corners that come to light that I must tussle over to see if they can be converted at last. I love the Church because people have been so patient with my residual protestantism. It's like I'm a tree. All that protestant wood is now overlaid with a nearly equal amount of Catholic wood, and it's wonderful.
As a cradle Catholic, I expect there will always be nooks and corners, and occasionally whole rooms that somehow got overlooked, that need converting. "Tussle" is a great word for it. The cure is sometimes worse than the disease... but being cured is always far better.
A natural question arising from the DDF response to Question 1 (which I was surprised wasn't addressed in the response) is: if transgender-identifying individuals are to be baptized, what name are they baptized with? Is he or she to be baptized with the name given to them in accord with their actual sex, or with their post-transition name? Will Jimothy be baptized as Stacey? Will Barbie be baptized as Ken?
The name thing actually matters (especially since the person's name is explicitly stated as part of the formula), and I can imagine that baptizing a male individual ("Jimothy") with a socially-female name ("Stacey") would be a cause for scandal and thus impede the imposition of the sacrament.
people are baptized under the name they choose. it really would be a pretty clear dick move to require trans people to use names "socially" linked with their sex assigned at birth. if that causes a scandal for some people, then maybe those people need to stick their noses elsewhere.
I think you're smart enough to know what the point I'm making is, and you're missing it. Obviously one can "choose a name" in the sense that, for example, if I were to enter RCIA I could be baptized "Matt" or "Matthew." And a woman named "Thelma" could (in theory, only because there's no canon to explicitly preclude this) prefer to be baptized as "Louise" (although even then, that is an exceedingly uncommon and far more complicated situation than you make it out to be).
But if you honestly think that if a woman named "Lucy" attempts to transition into a man and wants to be baptized as "Ricky," that could never possibly create public scandal (considering the Church has a pretty clear and defined anthropological understanding that humans are a male-female binary determined by biological sex) and imply a tacit affirmation by the Church to something heterodox, then you are not to be taken seriously.
I once knew a set of twins who, at baptism, the priest accidentally swapped the names of the two little baby boys. The parents didn't just say "meh, the name thing doesn't really matter and anybody can choose anything," or "let's just do it again with the correct names," they actually went through the process of legally changing the names of their twin boys to match the baptismal reality. A middle schooler could understand that the name matters because baptism imparts a permanent indelible mark and bestows an identity that cannot be wipe away. Even taking on a religious name in vows doesn't change that identity. In Christ, you are and always will be Joseph.
And don't give me the cheap "well it's none of your business" crud; it is my business since, theologically, we are made one body in Christ, and practically, because what you choose to be named affects other people who interact with you or speak about you (don't people complain about "deadnaming"?)
I understood you perfectly well. as I said before, my view is that if it causes "scandal" to some, I am willing to let them be scandalized. I don't have any level of sympathy at all for your desire to micromanage the lives of trans people.
Joseph, your feelings and insistence for personal autonomy is standard op in the non-Catholic world, but to enter the Catholic Church requires surrendering the commonly held individualistic independence of US society. It's a serious thing to become Catholic. You promise obedience to the teachings of the Catholic Church. One is constantly asked through the years if you still believe in the virgin birth, the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, in life after death. Outside the Church, scandal is fun. It's a goal, even. Inside the Church, scandal is heartbreaking. One is disappointing Jesus and making it harder for others to live as Christ wants everyone to live. But there's nothing like the freedom I found in becoming Catholic. I hope you will look into it more. But it's really different!
lmao, what are you doing now, questioning my Catholic cred? I'm not any less Catholic than you because I take a different view of what should be expected of transgender Catholics. causing scandal is inherent to being a Christian- if you're not "sending the wrong message" to some, then you're not imitating Christ. and I do not object to the articles of the creed you mention, but there is a place in the Church for dissent on some topics.
Here's what makes this more complicated: names have historically traveled between the sexes. We've had guys named Mario and girls named Josephine for many centuries. You can actually honor and take patron saints who don't share your sex, and take their name. The fact that we now have this social innovation introduces new cases where the intent is wholly different from the historical use: whereas my grandmother may have named my mother Jean in honor of St John the Baptist, my daughter may be naming my granddaughter Jon as a denial of the truth of biological sex.
If we try to write a law to address the second case, how do we do so without either invalidating the historical practice or introducing some kind of mind-reading or at least a legalistic "orthodoxy pledge" (like having the parents sign a statement that they are not using this name as a denial of reality?)
I actually think leaving it up to the pastor's judgment is probably the least bad option here.
People give their little girl babies masculine names with some regularity, and what happens over time is that the perception of the name changes from "boy" to "neutral" to "girly" and eventually people don't use that name for little boy babies anymore. So I don't think we should panic too hard about baptismal names. God adopts sinners into His family on a pretty regular basis, and none of them fully understand how much He is going to ask of them (in spite of that Gospel reading about "hey don't try building a tower until you have budgeted for it, and don't fight a big army with a little one although we did kind of just read about that in Maccabees because that's not what I'm talking about" we do not actually calculate the cost, which is literally everything and I mean literally.) If someone recklessly has himself or herself baptized as a Catholic without actually holding all of the truths of the Catholic faith, he or she is kind of asking for it (I don't know what will happen - potentially, sainthood, which is the kind of adventure that only a fool would sign up for, such as young St Teresa of Avila toddling off to ask someone to martyr her), and if the instructor did his/her job then it's not the instructor's fault, but if the instructor also does not really hold as true everything that is true, then the instructor should hold onto his/her hat also, because God is not going to build the Four-Story Mistake (shoutout to Enright fans, if any) if He can get away with doing a lot more.
The problem really isn't about the names so much as the intention.
Besides the ambiguity in boy vs. girl names, there are a lot of nuns who take the names of male Saints when they make their vows. They are making a statement about their identity, but NOT about their gender identity.
Personally, I expect that a transgender person who truly rejected transgenderism, would not want to keep a name that they had assumed for the purposes of identifying as the wrong gender. Whether they choose to return to their original name or to pick a new name (there was a custom in the early Church for people with pagan names to choose a new name at baptism), totally up to them. I can also imagine a situation in which a person might legitimately want to keep their changed name, but I don't think that will be typical, and would probably bear some looking into by their priest/catechist - more likely that the person hasn't received sufficient formation to convert (regardless of whether that is anyone's fault) than that they have a correct understanding and intentions in that choice. This is less about the name, and more about helping a person who needs it. Think generosity, not the mere meeting of obligations.
As far as changing their names *legally* is concerned, that is a PROCESS, and shouldn't cause a delay in baptism.
People who ignorantly do not agree with all of the truths of the Catholic faith get baptized all the time. It hurts them to believe a lie, sometimes gravely, but unless their ignorance is deliberate or due to negligence, it's not a sin. People who knowingly reject Church teaching and get baptized have a much bigger problem: they are in mortal sin for the heresy and they have committed sacrilege as well (against Baptism, and Confirmation, and the Eucharist, all within minutes of each other). They do not receive the graces of being within the Church, because they are spiritually dead. Of course, sin can be followed with repentance and ultimately holiness. But there's very good reason to do that before baptism, rather than someday maybe.
I wonder how many people have been denied baptism by refusing to accept the Church's teaching on labor unions?
Given that it's a prudential moral teaching, probably none.
it is not a prudential teaching, but binding on all Catholics.
Refresh my memory, please.
Rerum Novarum
Perhaps something more specific and brief, that could actually be put to a catechumen?
CCC 2430
I was a evangelical Christian til I was 45 when I converted (long story of course). I've now been Catholic over 2 decades. I find there are STILL nooks and corners that come to light that I must tussle over to see if they can be converted at last. I love the Church because people have been so patient with my residual protestantism. It's like I'm a tree. All that protestant wood is now overlaid with a nearly equal amount of Catholic wood, and it's wonderful.
As a cradle Catholic, I expect there will always be nooks and corners, and occasionally whole rooms that somehow got overlooked, that need converting. "Tussle" is a great word for it. The cure is sometimes worse than the disease... but being cured is always far better.