The following letter from LGB Christians was published in The Tablet on 12 April 2024, in response to their 4 April 2024 article I couldn’t keep it to myself
Dear Sir,
We were heartened by your article on Hannah Barnes’ book, ‘A Time to Think’, and by her interview. We are a newly formed network of lesbian, gay and bisexual Christians and supporters and our friends.
We would like to applaud her tenacious journalism in an industry that has largely been captured by gender ideology, faced by a trans lobby that does not hesitate to ruin careers whenever opposed.
For us too, the stories of gay and lesbian youths seeking sex-changes because they have been converted by gender identity pseudo-science have become all consuming. We do not see ourselves as moral crusaders, but cannot keep silent in face of the insertion of this theory, of its concepts and vocabulary, into our education system, all the way down to primary schools.
This reinvention of what it means to be boys or girls has irreparable consequences for LGB teenagers. These are particularly insidious in religious schools and done under the guise of safeguarding.
When confronted with and often taught the Christian view that their romantic feelings and longing for intimacy are directed towards an objective evil, condemning them to a life of involuntary celibacy, transitioning can all too easily appear to be a solution.
It is no coincidence that transition is many a conservative religious society’s way of dealing with same sex attracted men and women.
Though, there now seems to be some possible causes for hope, with GIDS’s imminent closure and Dr Hilary Cass’s review, the problem will not go away so easily. The notion of ‘trans children’ needs to be abandoned altogether, as most gender non-confirming youths will grow up to shrug off their confusion if they are allowed to grow through puberty.
(Revd) Lorenzo Fernandez-Smal
(Revd) Canon Dr Mark Bratton