Bishop Gene Robinson, first openly gay Episcopal bishop, preaches defense of McBride

WASHINGTON (RNS) — Bishop Gene Robinson, the first openly gay man elected to be an Episcopal bishop in 2003, preaching at the Washington National Cathedral on Christ the King Sunday (Nov. 24), took the opportunity to heap praise on a new LGBTQ+ trailblazer: U.S. Rep.-elect Sarah McBride of Delaware, the first openly transgender person elected to Congress.

“I couldn’t admire her more as a human and as a child of God,” Robinson, who was preaching a sermon about baptism with texts from the Bible’s Book of Daniel and the Book of Revelation, said of McBride.

The sermon doubled as a theological rebuke of Republicans who have responded to McBride’s election by trafficking in what activists have condemned as transphobia. Since her victory, members of the GOP majority have implemented a new rule barring anyone from using a bathroom in the U.S. Capitol and House office buildings that does not correspond with their sex assigned at birth.

Robinson’s homily, delivered from the pulpit of a cathedral that regularly hosts inaugural prayer services and presidential funerals, was remarkable for a churchman, who, despite a career as a prominent bishop and activist, has avoided the public eye in recent years.

But Robinson said his connection to McBride is personal: On Sunday, he recalled how he officiated McBride’s marriage to a transgender man, Andrew Cray, shortly before Cray died from incurable cancer. Robinson, who held hands with loved ones and LGBTQ+ activists who were in the room as Cray died, lauded the newly elected congresswoman, who is an ordained Presbyterian elder in a Wilmington church, as “brave and strong and fully present to her beloved husband.”

Explaining he was not “talking politics” but rather “morality,” Robinson voiced deep frustration with McBride’s critics and politicians who have maligned the transgender community, including President-elect Donald Trump during his recent campaign.

“The transgender community has been used and mocked and demonized throughout this campaign using misinformation to stoke up fear and promote animus towards this vulnerable minority who already experiences unheard of levels of violence,” he said. “And why? For political gain.”

Some, such as House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Southern Baptist, invoked faith in the lead-up to the change in restroom rules. Asked by a reporter last week whether he believes McBride is a man or a woman, Johnson initially demurred but later approached a group of reporters to clarify his position.

“A man is a man, and a woman is a woman. And a man cannot become a woman,” Johnson said, before adding, “that’s what Scripture teaches, what I just said.” Johnson did not immediately respond to questions about which Bible passages he was referring to.

Robinson, in an interview with Religion News Service, rejected the speaker’s interpretation of Scripture. “That is absurd,” Robinson said. “I would love to follow up with him and say, ‘Look, where would I find that?’”

Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina, who championed the rule change, has introduced legislation that would mandate a similar requirement across all federal properties and those owned by the Washington, D.C., government. Mace, who attends Sea Coast Church in Mount Pleasant, has justified both proposals by appealing to concern that transgender people could assault women in bathrooms.

Without mentioning Mace by name, Robinson rejected Mace’s assertion on Sunday, saying, “There is no evidence anywhere of men posing as transgender in order to sexually assault women in their bathrooms. None.” He dismissed arguments invoked by her and others as “paranoid.”

Robinson said the solution to the bathroom question “is not a restrictive bathroom ban but rather a good therapist — not for the transperson, but for the paranoid one,” he said. “Or maybe they just don’t know any better. But listen: willful ignorance can be a way of hating, too.”

Mace did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Robinson’s remarks.

Robinson’s tradition, the Episcopal Church, is one of several Christian denominations in which member churches can openly affirm LGBTQ+ identities and relationships, as well as ordain transgender people. The Episcopal Church, United Church of Christ, Presbyterian Church (USA) and Evangelical Lutheran Church in America have all ordained transgender priests, pastors and bishops in recent years, and traditions such as the Metropolitan Community Church have spent decades advocating for LGBTQ+ people.

The Rev. Claudia Aguilar, director of engagement at More Light Presbyterians, a group that advocates for LGBTQ+ inclusion within the Presbyterian Church (USA), McBride’s denomination, said in a statement that her organization was “thrilled to hear that Sarah McBride has been elected to public office.”

“We find Rep. Mike Johnson’s ruling on bathrooms is completely unacceptable and against the commandment to ‘love your neighbor as yourself,’” she wrote. “Using the Bible as a tool of oppression and discrimination goes against everything Jesus stood for: an ever growing circle of followers committed to care for their neighbors — all neighbors.”

Aguilar was echoed by Jesy Littlejohn, More Light’s director of operations, who argued Johnson and Mace “would serve their constituents and Congress better if they allowed themselves to see Representative McBride as their neighbor, created in the image of God, rather than trying to demonize and scapegoat her and other Transgender individuals for governmental shortcomings.”

Speaking to RNS, Robinson noted that while many have defended McBride, some activists have expressed frustration that she didn’t fight harder against the bathroom policy before announcing she would comply with the rule last Wednesday, saying she is “not here to fight about bathrooms.” The bishop noted that McBride, who previously worked for the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign, had taught him “what I needed to know in order to be in the right kind of relationship with transgender people.”

Robinson said the moment felt familiar to him. “It reminded me of when I was in the news for being the first openly gay bishop,” he said. “On the one hand, you want to be a team player, right? You’re doing this because you want to fulfill the office to which you’ve been elected. And at the same time, you’re also representing your community. It actually turns out to be the perfect storm — it’s a classic Catch 22.”

Robinson suggested he would support McBride regardless of how she decides to approach her role.

“Whatever she decides, I would say to the other group: You do the work that she’s done to get yourself where she is, and then you get to make this decision. But for now, she gets to make this decision,” he said.

Either way, Robinson expressed hope that other people of faith would stand up for transgender people and that Christians would model a more compassionate approach.

“When all else fails, try love, right? Or better still, try love first,” he said. “The point of my sermon yesterday was that, as Christians, we believe that we know how this is going to turn out — all of this, all of life — which is that love wins, and because God is love, God wins.”