Last Day?

By Valerie Nicole Green

Valerie Nicole Green is a transgender woman who was active in her ward of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Missouri until September 6th 2024 when she tendered her resignation from the church. Before transitioning, she was married for 34 years and is now widowed. She is a parent to five children and grandparent to six grandchildren. After five decades of waiting, she fully socially transitioned on January 1, 2019. She loves tennis and pickles (and her family when they’re behaving).

Last day? 

It’s August 25th and I’m getting ready for church. I haven’t been in a couple of months while I recovered from jaw surgery. It feels like a return, or at least it should. Instead, every step of getting ready this morning felt like the last. That wasn’t my conscious thought, but I could feel the message that my body was giving me. I wasn’t sure if I was attending because I had to do it one last time, but I was determined to be there.

Earlier in the week, the church released their new policy for transgender members. Let me just state up front that it’s a horrible policy. I’ll discuss the various aspects as we go along but the important one for this part of the story is that transgender members who have transitioned in any way, even something as simple as a pronoun change, can only attend gendered meetings according to their “biological sex assigned at birth”. That meant that the 4+ years that I have enjoyed the privilege of attending Relief Society meetings and activities had come to an end. If I wanted to attend a second hour class on those Sundays, I would have to attend Elders Quorum. I can assure you that I will never set foot in an Elders Quorum meeting again.

I got ready knowing it was Relief Society Sunday and I would not be going to that class. That is especially painful. When I first transitioned, I was barred from any gendered class, meeting, or activity. At the time, I could accept that because I was holding out hope for change. I felt compelled to remain active to let others know that LGBTQ members were striving to be there and that coming out or transitioning did not affect our beliefs, our faith, or who we were. 

Change came in February of 2020. Between the time I transitioned at church in the fall of 2018 and when the policies were issued in 2020, I had Relief Society sisters who were advocates and supporters. They wanted me in Relief Society even though the church would not allow it. In seeking compromise, they made a point of inviting me to anything that wasn’t official. That was an act of inclusion that was wholeheartedly welcomed and quite admirable. When the 2020 policy came out, my Relief Society President was the first person on the phone to the Bishop advocating for my inclusion. She called me second. Less than a week later I was formally invited to Relief Society.

Some have suggested being defiant and/or feigning ignorance and attending Relief Society until they explicitly ask me to leave. That’s not my style. Their meeting, their rules. They can own it and not attempt to justify their behavior by pointing to mine and gaslighting us with “see… transgender people are disruptive.”

My body wanted to cry as I drove to church. I willed it not to. My will wasn’t enough. I did manage to walk into the building with dry eyes after a few minutes sitting in my car and composing myself. 

It became an experiment. Hold it together and treat it like a normal Sunday; at least what normal felt like for the last four years. Let the experience of NOT going to the second hour just happen and then analyze it.

Success? Of course not. I wrote the start of this during sacrament meeting. Hey, I did the “no second hour” thing for my first 18 months after I transitioned until the 2020 policies came out. Now I had questions for myself. Will it be the same? Do I have the same determination now that I had then? What will I do if someone comes over and encourages me to go with them to RS? Will that even happen? Is anyone even aware of what this day is like? Why would they?

Someone online commented that it doesn’t matter where you are in the building if you’re there for worship. I can imagine that same person roaming the halls telling people to get to class. The comment felt invalidating and privileged. 

I thought about the lines from the opening song.

“Welcome, Welcome, Sabbath Morning”

That’s the last thing I felt.

“Now we rest from every care”

I don’t think so. My cares were mounting and this is the place that was giving them rise.

“By the Savior’s Golden Rule”

That Golden Rule just did not seem to be part of what was happening. “Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them.” I could not believe that the exclusion being directed towards transgender members was what cisgender members wanted to have applied to themselves.

When I started this journey I would often state that we needed to separate the Gospel from the institution and the doctrine from policies. On this day, I wanted to focus on separating the policies from the attitudes of my fellow congregation members. I want to believe that the people in my ward would not agree with these policies.

After sacrament meeting I left the building and went home. I felt done. Again I was asking if this was the last time. One sister texted me from Relief Society class and let me know that I was missed. It felt good to know that even one person had some understanding of what was happening. She asked what she could do as an ally. Honestly, I don’t know. Part of me would be honored if allies also refused to attend if I could not. But a couple of people in one ward is not going to get policy changed. I would rather they were in the meeting themselves. 

I spent the rest of the day binging a television show so I didn’t have to think about things. 

What has changed?

So let’s look at the policy. I’m not going to go through it in detail because each person can read it for themselves. If you visit the transgender policy section of the handbook at 38. Church Policies and Guidelines you’ll find an innocuous hyperlink with the text “guiding principles” that leads to a PDF at Church Participation of Individuals Who Identify as Transgender

I found it cowardly that they would put this policy in a separate document rather than putting it directly in the handbook and just owning it. It felt like something they didn’t want people to know about unless they were really looking. Who’s going to click on a hyperlink with that text? You’d expect to find some generic guidelines about serving and loving. Your casual reader, even someone who was actively curious about transgender people in the church, might never see these policies. 

I also find it distasteful that they refer to it as “guiding principles” and then use very specific language about what can and cannot be done, including a note that exceptions to these guiding principles should be rare and would require Area Authority permission. Rare will be the local leader who will not follow this to the letter. 

The opening to the document lists some general guidelines and one of them is “consider the needs of the individual and other ward members”. It might as well read “give preference to the comfort of other ward members”. That is exactly what I  expect will happen in most cases and I think this policy will be seen as permission to be as exclusionary as possible.

I find it funny (not “ha ha” funny) that they have a section named “Preferred Names and Pronouns” and the very first sentence in that section enforces the recording of sex at birth on all official church records. I don’t know how that’s related to names and pronouns. But then it goes on to tell local leaders that they should not determine or prescribe how members address an individual. This is blanket permission to allow other members to dead name transgender members and to use incorrect pronouns rather than even suggesting that they try to honor the names and pronouns of these members.

The next section is “Gender-Specific Meetings and Activities” where they put into writing that transgender members can only attend meetings based upon their “biological sex at birth”. I can’t imagine that they would want transgender men in Relief Society and transgender women in Elders Quorum. Sometimes I don’t think that people really understand the ramifications of their own rules. It seems like those situations would create the very distractions that they purport to be avoiding. Besides, I also can’t imagine those individuals wanting to attend those meetings.

In the “Overnight Activities” section, the policy requires attendance at gendered activities to also be based upon “biological sex at birth”. They offer as examples Young Women camps and Aaronic Priesthood camps. The most remarkable thing I find about this is that the younger generation does not care about these issues. It is their parents who seem to believe that something horrible is going to happen or that transgender members are somehow contagious or dangerous. This is further emphasized when it goes on to talk about overnight activities that are not for specific genders. In those cases, a transgender person must actually leave the activity overnight. What transgender member is going to want to go to a conference if they have to be singled out by leaving it every night? It’s demeaning and dehumanizing. 

To further emphasize the church’s belief that transgender members are somehow dangerous, they introduce a “Callings and Assignments” section in which any transitioned member is not allowed to have any gender-specific calling, serve as a teacher in any capacity, or have any position that works with children or youth. I cannot say that I enjoy being associated with an organization that would treat me as though I were some sort of predator. The more times I read this, the greater my disdain and the more convinced I become that it is time to leave 

Finally, they introduce a bathroom policy. Again, I don’t know what they’re thinking would be the actual result of implementing this policy. They want transitioned men in the women’s restroom and transitioned women in the men’s restroom. Oddly, they don’t put any restrictions on those situations. But if a transitioned person were to enter the restroom that aligned with their gender expression they would be required to have it cleared and guarded to ensure they were in there alone. It really doesn’t make any sense. Some transgender members have reported discussions with their local leaders in which these policies were described as being for safety. I can very much assure you that the only person in danger in any of these circumstances when forced to follow these policies would be the transgender members themselves. 

Reactions and Decisions

I’ve seen comments by many allies saying that they would gladly accompany a transgender member to the class that aligns with their gender expression and would stand guard at a restroom for them. I appreciate the hearts and minds of those allies and their willingness to do what they can. Personally, I would never accept such an offer. The offer would be welcomed, but the need for the offer assaults the dignity of the transgender member and is both humiliating and dehumanizing.

My local leaders have been generally pretty good. I’ve considered myself lucky. The day after this new policy was published, I sent a copy to my Stake President, my Bishop, and my Relief Society President. I sent them this query: “I would like to know where this leaves me with the renewed emphasis on sex at birth determination for meetings, activities, and facilities use.”

It’s been over two weeks since I sent that and the only thing I’ve heard was a reply by the Stake President that he had received my email and would get back to me. I was disappointed that there was no compassion and no empathy expressed in that email. I’m disappointed that I haven’t heard back from either of the leaders in my own ward. That includes when I was physically in the building with them and I received zero acknowledgment. I had much higher hopes for them. (I should note that my current Relief Society president is not the one I talked about above.} Is it innocent and am I being impatient? Possibly, but I also know how I would respond to someone who had been given news like this. This is not it. 

One of the statements in the policy is that any exception to the new rule about gender specific meeting or activity attendance must be approved by an Area Presidency. I’ve thought long and hard about that. My conclusion is that I would never seek such an exception and if someone did so on my behalf, I would not accept it. The very idea that some exception has to be granted just feels horrible. Does it come down to who you know? Does it come down to who has the better advocate? Does it come down to classifying the “good” transgender people versus the “bad” transgender people? I can’t accept an exception as long as an exception is required. The very thought that I would get one while others don’t is demoralizing. 

Several transgender members have reported conversations with their local leaders. One leader described this policy as a “reasonable compromise”. I don’t know where they see compromise and I don’t understand their definition of reasonable.

One transgender member had their Stake and Ward leaders suggest that they felt comfortable maintaining the status quo regarding attendance in meetings.  Although it’s none of my business, I can say that I was glad to hear that this member replied that they would need to know that the Area President had granted an exception based on this policy. I would not and will not begrudge anyone who seeks, obtains, and uses such an exception. All power to them. I just know that I can’t do that myself.

Since the policy came out, I have been asked to appear on one podcast and to attend two allies meetings. Each of those events left me with some immediate feelings of hope. They lifted some of the darkness as cisgender allies expressed their love and concern for transgender members and their families and their disdain for these policies. I’ve walked away from those meetings feeling lighter and that maybe I could move forward with a hope that these policies would be reversed just as the 2015 policies for the LGB community were reversed just three and a half years later. I just don’t know that it’s light enough and I don’t know if I’m willing to wait with a hopeful attitude. 

I have also read many social media posts and comments. Some ideas suggested are that these are guidelines rather than policies and, as such, they would be as subject to leadership roulette as things were before the new policy was published. I just don’t see the majority of church leaders seeing this as anything other than policy written in stone. If someone had a leader who was not already acting in a progressive way, this policy will definitely give them cover for avoiding anything progressive. 

One transgender member I know had a Bishop who read the policy document when it was provided to them but said they couldn’t find it in the handbook. They were choosing to not follow any of it since they couldn’t find it in the handbook. Can I welcome such positive willful ignorance? I would love to see it throughout the church from all leaders. I just don’t expect it.

As for the social media suggestions that these are merely guidelines rather than policy (because of the name of the supplemental document and the text on the hyperlink that is used to link to it), I just don’t think that’s going to fly. Given the internal wording on the supplement itself, I just don’t see leaders treating it as anything other than policy and I don’t believe for a second that the leadership who created this document expects it to be anything less than policy.

I happen to be a founding board member of the Emmaus LGBTQ Ministry. One of the things we do at our weekly board meetings is to conduct a check-in to see how each of us is doing in life. The day after this policy came out I told them that I think I’m done. This feels like the last straw. When I first transitioned, I felt a calling to be a light on a hill. All I feel right now is a desire to drop a bushel basket over my light and let others take on the fight. As I write this I am about 95% certain that I will be removing my name from the records of the church. It is the one place in my life where my gender is dishonored and where I voluntarily participate while being treated as though I were a danger. I don’t know that I have it in me to continue being generous while waiting for change that is positive toward the LGBTQ+ community, especially for transgender members.

I recognize that I am bitter about this and I even believe that I could force myself to be understanding and forgiving. I just don’t think I want to.

I still don’t know if August 25th was my last day at this church.

Note

(Note: It was. I wrote the first draft of this on September 4. On September 6, I submitted my resignation letter to my Bishop and Stake President. I received a respectful and compassionate response later that day. Apparently, my Stake President and Bishop had been meeting on the very night that I made my decision. Neither they nor I believe that was a coincidence.)