Lux Lucet

Transgender Caitlyn Jenner accepts ESPY’s Arthur Ashe Award for Courage on July 15, 2015 in Los Angeles. (AP photo)

Ideas have consequences. Indeed, only ideas have consequences, for ideas alone are the basis for all our actions. Everything you and I do is done because of some prior idea we have in our minds.

Many times, a person’s ideas will have consequences he never foresaw. Eve had the idea, planted in her mind by the serpent, that she would not die from eating of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. She induced Adam to follow her in her sin. And the rest, as they say, is history. It is doubtful that either one of them had any idea about the disastrous chain of events that would result from their decision to disobey the clear revelation of God. Caiaphas held that it was better for one man to die than for the whole nation to perish. Of course, he was quite correct in what he said, but just not in the way he meant. His idea had consequences other than what he intended.

This tendency of ideas to go in directions unanticipated by their originators was brought to mind recently by a story I read about a dust up involving noted feminist Germaine Greer. Greer had been invited to deliver a talk at Cardiff University in Wales, but has since cancelled her appearance as a result of a petition circulated by Cardiff University women’s officer Rachael Melhuish. The petition accused Greer of heretical opinions on the subject of transgenderism, saying Greer, “has demonstrated time and time again her misogynistic views towards trans women [N.B. a trans woman is a biological man who has had medical procedures done in order to take on the physical characteristics of a woman], including continually misgendering trans women and denying the existence of transphobia altogether.”

What prompted this outcry of anguish?, you may ask. Apparently, at least in part, it was Greer’s less than enthusiastic endorsement of Glamour Magazine’s decision to name Bruce Caitlyn Jenner as one of its 2015 Women of the Year. According to an article in the Guardian, Greer opined to the BBC that Jenner, “wanted limelight of female Kardashians.” Things continued to going downhill for Greer when in the same interview she let it be known that transgender women are “not women,” and that they do not, “look like, sound like or behave like women.” Greer even claimed to see misogyny at work in Glamour’s decision. Said Greer, ” I think misogyny plays a really big part in all of this, that a man who goes to these lengths to become a woman will be a better woman than someone who is just born a woman.”

Let’s see. A feminist icon acknowledges what has been the common opinion mankind since the time of Adam – that men and women are different and that those differences cannot be erased no matter how many surgeries one receives – and Cardiff University has a collective philosophical freak-out. It’s hard to fathom, but such is the world we live in. How did we get here?

Feminism’s Attack on Biblical Teaching

At its root, feminism is an attack on the Biblical doctrine of creation. The Scripture’s clear teaching on the origin of man – “So God created man in his own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them” (Genesis 1:27) – and the relationship between the two sexes – the Bible is unapologetically patriarchal – has been replaced in the minds of most with the opinions of men. No longer are men and women viewed as indelibly different yet complimentary bearers of God’s image. Rather, any perceived differences in behavior or achievement between the two sexes has come to be seen as a “gap” that must be overcome via intrusive legislation and strident sensitivity training.

Interestingly enough, the feminists are quite selective about which “gaps” deserve attention. We’re constantly regaled about the horrors of the pay gap, but almost no one talks about the life expectancy gap. In the United States in 2005, women’s life expectancy was 5.3 years greater that of men. Men can just go ahead and kick the bucket already. It’s natural. Nobody cares. But were that figure reversed, doubtless there would be no end to the caterwauling about the savage unfairness of the patriarchy’s oppressive abuse of women, robbing women of their very lives. There would be Congressional hearings. There would be marches in the streets, with billions if not trillions of dollars spent to right the heinous injustice.

Patriarchy – or as some feminists like to call it “the patriarchy” – has become a swear word in our time. But patriarchy is God’s plan for the human race and has been so from the beginning. The apostle Paul states two fundamental reasons for patriarchy in his first epistle to Timothy: 1) priority of creation, Adam was formed first, then Eve, and 2) Eve was fooled by the serpent but Adam was not. .

Let a woman learn in silence with all submission. And I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man, but to be in silence. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived, fell into transgression (1 Timothy 2:11-14).

The Bible is not a feminist document. The brighter feminists understand this and vigorously attack its teaching. The duller ones, or perhaps those who are less honest, imagine that they can reinterpret the Bible by giving it a feminist reading for the purpose of making the Scriptures appear to say something they do not.

Feminism’s Reductio ad Absurdum

By their denial of the only true record of the origin of man, the feminists have placed themselves in a philosophically hopeless position. Not only is it impossible for the feminist to understand the proper relationship between men and women, but their theories lead straight to absurdities such as the transgender mania that now grips the West. Feminism, through its denial of the differences between men and women, implies homosexuality. It is no accident that second wave feminism, a movement kicked off by the publication of The Feminine Mystique in 1963, was quickly followed by the rise of the modern homosexual movement in the late ’60s. After all, if sex roles are merely social constructs with no basis in God ordained differences between men and women, there is no reason not to sanction homosexual acts.

Transgenderism is simply the next step in the same chain of reasoning that began with feminism’s denial of the Biblical teaching about men and women. The Scriptures identify two sexes, men and women. There simply are no such persons as women trapped in men’s bodies or men trapped in women’s. There are, however, in Scripture badly confused persons whom God has punished by giving them up to the unclean and vile passions of homosexuality and transgenderism. One of these people, apparently, is Bruce Jenner, who has become the poster boy for feminism’s reductio ad absurdum.

Conclusion

The sight of a former men’s Olympic champion being honored as a Woman of the Year is so jarring that even a feminist heroine of Germaine Greer’s stature is moved to point out the absurdity. Greer even implicitly acknowledged that there are inherent differences between men and women with her comment that transgender women do not “look like, sound like, or behave like women.” This is certainly true. And while Greer and other feminists with the good sense and courage to ridicule specter of Bruce Jenner in a dress deserve praise, unfortunately none of them to my knowledge have jettisoned their feminist assumptions and embraced the Biblical teaching about men and women. But the fact that some feminists can spot the foolishness of transgenderism – speaking of transgenderism one prominent feminist scholar actually stated, “everywhere in the world you find this pattern in ancient times: that as a culture begins to decline, you have this efflorescence of transgender phenomena. That is a symptom of cultural collapse.” – at least indicates they have some grounding in reality. Perhaps there is yet hope for them.

Regarding those who are struggling with sin of transgenderism, as Christians we certainly can pray that God would change their hearts. But we never can agree with how they live.