America’s first major denominational transgender bishop, professing to be a “they,” was consecrated in San Francisco this past Saturday amid religious and political officials in a hyper politically correct rite claiming precedent with biblical eunuchs.
This transgender bishop signifies liberal Protestantism’s ongoing rejection of not just traditional Christian sexual teachings but also of physical reality, as part of God’s created order, to be replaced with the primacy of self-created identity.
The Rev. Dr. Megan Marie Rohrer was installed on September 11 as the fifth bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s (ELCA) San Francisco-based Sierra Pacific Synod. The synod includes 200 congregations across northern California and northern Nevada.
The ELCA remains the largest Lutheran body in North America at 3.26 million members, despite shedding more than 1 million members — or 25% of membership — across the last reporting decade, down from 5,288,048 members at the denomination’s founding in 1987.
ELCA Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton served as the lead consecrator and preacher at the service hosted by the Episcopal Church’s Grace Cathedral, of which the ELCA is in full communion.
Ordained as a minister in 2006 as “the first openly transgender/non-binary person to be ordained by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America” the new bishop has now been touted by the synod as the first transgender person to be elected to that position. Rohrer, a biological female, neither identifies as a woman nor as a transgender man and uses as a pronoun the singular “they”.
Because the ELCA did not ordain transgender persons before 2009, Rohrer and six other gay and transgender pastors from the Bay Area were ordained by Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries. Those ordinations were recognized by the ELCA in 2010 after the Churchwide Assembly voted to allow partnered gay persons (Rohrer previously identified as lesbian) to serve as clergy.
Saturday’s service began with a “land acknowledgement” declaring “the land where we live and worship in this place is stolen land.”
“We are on the unseated lands of the ones we know today as the Ohlone people,” stated participant Janet Katari. “We acknowledge the historic violence and genocide against indigenous siblings and ancestors as well as the harm that the U.S. government continues to perpetuate. We pray that this church’s continued work towards justice and the necessary cessation and dismantling of the colonial structures we continue to inhabit.”
Participants in the ceremony atop San Francisco’s historically wealthy Nob Hill neighborhood were encouraged to “find concrete ways to make reparations to the original stewards of these places and their descendants.”
Congregants were invited to stand as clergy gathered around the orchid-festooned baptismal font, giving thanks as decanters poured water from the Sacramento and Garcia rivers, Lake Tahoe and the San Francisco Bay as acolytes waved blue streamers overhead.
“You, oh God: Parent, Child, and Holy Breath. You are the water we crave,” Eaton pronounced. “You, oh God: Rain, Estuary, and Sea. You are life for us all, now and forever. Amen.”
The service welcomed numerous local political officials, including California Lt. Governor Eleni Kounalakis, a California state senator, San Francisco’s Police Chief, Fire Chief, and San Francisco Democratic Party Chair Honey Mahogany, the party’s first transgender leader.
“This is a feast day of the first transgender saint, St. Theodora,” introduced San Francisco Supervisor Rafael Mandelman, proclaiming himself a gay Jewish agnostic, personal friend to Rohrer and one of several elected officials present for the installation. “Bishop Rohrer is the first transgender bishop of a mainline Christian denomination in the United States, and for all the fear and tragedy of the last 20 years, it is undeniable that there has been light in changing social notions and laws within institutions religious and secular throughout this country and world. So it brings me a lot of hope and joy to celebrate history of another kind on this day.”
A theme of eunuchs began with a scripture reading of Acts chapter 8 in which Philip meets the Ethiopian eunuch. Rohrer earlier this year criticized the Council of Nicea, tweeting in May about the fourth century council that set parameters of Christian doctrine.
“The first council of Nicaea’s first action was to try to limit the leadership roles of trans pastors and bishops,” Rohrer wrote, an apparent reference to Canon 1 from the council declaring eunuchs can be priests unless they castrate themselves. “I’m grateful the Lutherans of the @sps_elca are beginning to dismantle this and some of the other hurdles BIPOC and LGBTQ pastors encounter.”
In her sermon message, Bishop Eaton noted that Jesus Christ’s identity as both fully human and fully divine were not an “either/or” but a “both/and”.
“This bishop [Rohrer] is sometimes a paradox themselves. This bishop one would automatically consider [to be] some crazy, radical person. But how do we, when we try to sort into either/or, square that with the fact that they are a chaplain with the San Francisco police department?” Eaton asked. “This chaplain, your bishop, stands with them and prays with them.”
Eaton challenged those viewing the installation service remotely to continue watching in the months ahead.
“You’re going to see a grace-filled, Gospel preaching, Jesus-loving servant of the Word serving everyone, all people. You’re gonna see someone and a synod being transformed in order to invite people into the complete, the infinite, and the intimate love of God,” Eaton predicted. “We’ll continue to work for those on the margins … we do it surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses and we do it by a God who was not either/or but both divine and human, seemingly weak but unbelievably strong, seemingly marred and humiliated but creating an act of indescribable beauty.”
Immediately following her presentation as the ELCA’s newest bishop, Rohrer recited paraphrased words of the poet Maya Angelou: “They may write me down in history with their bitter twisted lies, trod me down in the very dirt, but still like dust, I rise, rising from the past of history’s shame out of the past of all the things that bring shame, I rise.”
Gesturing to quilts hanging from cathedral arches, Rohrer named Episcopal, Presbyterian and Methodist ecumenical partners demanding medications during the AIDS crisis, marching to end racism, housing refugees and rebuilding homes destroyed by wildfires.
“You knew God’s up to something — not because I sit here with a bigger hat now, but because courageous people voted a new way: ‘behold a new thing is happening.’”
The service concluded with Rohrer celebrating Holy Communion, unfencing the table by inviting all present to participate.
“I hope that my body reminds you that nobody is unwelcome from this table,” Rohrer pronounced. “All are welcome to celebrate communion with us.”
The full service can be viewed on YouTube here:
Comment by Tom on September 15, 2021 at 9:41 pm
So apparently the ELCA decided it wasn’t losing members fast enough?
Comment by Diane on September 16, 2021 at 6:24 am
“In the morning when I rise, give me Jesus…..”
I awoke at 4 am, not able to sleep. While my body needs to sleep – I am dealing with a flare up of a connective tissue condition that makes walking difficult and rest/sleep helps restore me to walk again – I unexplainably chose to turn my bedside night light on, pick up my iPhone and search “Juicy Ecumenism”. I found this feature story and watched the entire video. I have stitched AIDS Memorial Quilt panels for those I served as a care partner in decades past. What an extraordinary witness this service was to the transformative power of God’s live in Jesus!
Thank-you so very much for offering this gift, this testimony to the radical embrace of God!
In the morning when I rise, give me Jesus…..
Again, my gratitude! Thanks be to God and may God’s healing, gracious peace be with you.
May it be so….Amen and amen!
Comment by Steve S. on September 16, 2021 at 8:23 am
Yes, of course, all are welcome because no one is coming to the table of the ELCA. They preach to their own echo chamber while the denomination slowly and predictably withers into nothingness. And why is it fading into nothingness; they do not believe in anything.
Any self-identification outside of Christ is delusional. I will end with Joshua 24:15.
“And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the LORD, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.”
Comment by floyd lee on September 16, 2021 at 3:57 pm
Much thanks to Jeffrey Walton for courageously reporting on this — I’m honestly sorry to say it this way — this National Disaster.
I choose not to look at the YouTube video just yet. I will view it soon, because I believe in being an informed Christian. But not right this minute. Need a tiny bit of prep time.
There’s still hope for our nation, in Christ. But the clock does seem to be ticking.
Comment by Dan W on September 16, 2021 at 5:42 pm
Diane – praying that your body heals and you are able to get the rest you need. I am very familiar with that type of health issue. Sometimes just being able to take a walk outside is the greatest blessing!
Comment by Diane on September 17, 2021 at 12:23 am
Thank-you so very much for your kindness and empathy, Dan. May the peace of God be with you and yours.
Comment by Stephanie Jenkins on September 18, 2021 at 9:36 am
Good grief
Comment by Walt Pryor on September 18, 2021 at 11:01 am
The human mind is easily manipulated. What we read, look at, and hear can massage our minds into thinking what we do is right.
The only standard we have is the Bible. God always tells the truth not man. God does not need us we need Him. Therefore anything we think, say, and do which does not conform to God’s standards is wrong and may keep us out of heaven.
Crippled people were not allowed to enter the Temple of God. Unclean people were not allowed to enter the Temple of God.
All humans have a choice. Follow what God says or follow man’s changing culture?
Comment by Palamas on September 18, 2021 at 4:25 pm
So, the ELCA has gone full apostate and embraced its inner Gnostic. Good to know.
Comment by Mike on September 18, 2021 at 7:53 pm
‘A New Thing is Happening’. Yes, but is God in it? I think not. Neither does the Bible recognize this “New thing”.
When a “Christian” group ordains a person that is so mentally challenged that he/she/it doesn’t even know how to refer to himself/herself/itself, that group loses all claim to be termed Christian by any historical standard.
Comment by Diane on September 19, 2021 at 3:04 am
I’ve long used the pronoun “they” in referencing individuals or a group before folks in the past decade or so starting choosing “they” as a pronoun. Perfectly acceptable and considered the “old English” standard. So it’s not a new thing.
God created them, male and female. Bible doesn’t say “male or female”. Huge difference, especially knowing God is referred to in Scripture as having attributes of both male and female. I think all of us are created in this female/male image….some more clearly so than others. And of course, approximately 1% of the population (about the same percentage of redheads) are created intersex, with sex chromosomes, hormones and reproductive organs not at all neatly aligned with the “male or female” assertion.
Comment by Didaskalos on September 19, 2021 at 10:15 am
The ELCA, having jettisoned all allegiance to biblical truths, also proudly professes willful ignorance of biological reality.
“The first assertion—that sex is dimorphic—conforms to the tenets of evolutionary biology. There are only two sexes, male and female. Males produce sperm; females produce ova. No human being, including those with difference in sex development (DSD), also known as intersex, has ever produced both types of gametes. Adding or removing body parts surgically does not change the sex.
“The second assertion, therefore, specifying a difference between identifying and being something, conforms to the principle of linguistic precision, which facilitates common understanding. Assertions to the contrary—that self-identity equals being—are based in unscientific theory and magical thinking: what might be characterized as ‘gender mysticism.'”
— Unsporting: How Trans Activism and Science Denial are Destroying Sport by Linda Blade, Barbara Kay
Comment by Mike on September 19, 2021 at 1:22 pm
Diane, I don’t know where you get your figures from, but I consulted several websites, including some that deal with intersex issues favorably, and the figure for those “created” with intersex attributes and far less than 1 %, maybe .1% or lower. And the idea that “male and female” would allow for a third choice is just no justified, grammatically or otherwise.
God may have attributes of both male and female, but He can never be referred to as “She”. He is the giver of life, which is a male perogative. Women give birth. Men give life. I’m sorry to end your delusion, but the Bible does not allow for such abominations as the subject of this article.
Comment by Mike on September 19, 2021 at 8:23 pm
I realize that this will open a can of worms, but at this point I quote I Cor. 11:7, “For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man” If you look at the second part of that verse, Paul says that men are “the image and glory of God”. He does not attribute that to women.
By claiming to be a woman, the person referred to in this article has lost that quality of being “the image and glory of God”, which would automatically disqualify a person from the pastoral role. Women may have many attributes which make them suited for the role which God gave them, to be the “helpmeet” of the man, as the faithful KGV puts it, but they must not step over the line. Neither should a man leave his role, as a man, to pretend to be a woman. There is more than one reason why the Bible forbids a man to wear women’s clothes, and vice versa.
Comment by Diane on September 20, 2021 at 12:05 am
Mike,
Re, “Men are the givers of life”.
Are you serious? I read comments to an article on another site the other day, where religion was repeatedly being cited as harming society because folks are still adhering to concepts from the Bronze Age.
You could probably debate that. The Bible does indeed witness to men as the givers of life. There could never have been a female Saviour in a system that defined men as ultimately the givers of life, not women. Those biblical folks lived in a pre-scientific age, where it made sense to them that men had the seed of life (sperm). Women were flowerpots, fertile or barren soil in which the seed was planted. The Bible uses the language of barren, fertile. It’s still used today, though today men can be spoken of as infertile.
In the 1800s it was discovered that men and women contribute equally to the giving of life. Scientists discovered women produce an egg…without the egg, men can’t be defined as givers of life. Without sperm, women can’t be defined as givers of life. Takes two to tango – today the tango can be performed in a petri dish.
Your defense of men, not women, as the sole givers of life is an example of antiquated religion that’s still being preached in 2021. It won’t fly among folks who aren’t so ignorant. Women have eggs – which is not biblical. It’s science. As Jesus was fully human, he was unaware of that, too.
Just sayin
Comment by Mike on September 20, 2021 at 9:05 am
Diane, I don’t know why I bother, but as usual you are operating by your liberal bias. Anyone in the medical field knows that the blood of the infant comes from the father, and the Bible makes it very clear that the life is in the blood. That was why God required that blood be shed for the forgiveness of sins, culminating with the death of His own Son.
Men produce sperm, which have life on their own, and give that life to fertilize the egg. Women’s eggs, on their own, do not have life. They are part of a woman’s body when she is born, whereas men’s bodies produce sperm on an as-needed basis. I’m surprised that you, as a woman, do not know these things.
Comment by Pastor Mike on September 27, 2021 at 9:15 pm
Diane. Jesus is God. Jesus was fully human and is fully Divine. God the Father. God the Son. God the Holy Spirit. The Holy Trinity. The Godhead.
Stating the following; “As Jesus was fully human, he was unaware of that too” – (quote by Diane) is a heresy.
“looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ…” – Titus 2:13.
Just sayin.