Metamorphosis & (trans)migration:
spiritual aspects of gender transition
THE REVD DR CHRISTINA BEARDSLEY
HEAD OF MULTI-FAITH CHAPLAINCY,
CHELSEA & WESTMINSTER HOSPITAL, LONDON, UK
‘THE LEGAL STATUS OF TRANSSEXUAL AND
TRANSGENDER PERSONS’ CONFERENCE, 6-7
SEPTEMBER 2013, CENTRE FOR MEDICAL ETHICS AND
LAW, THE UNIVERSITY OF HONG KONG.
1: Introduction
 [IMAGE of figure crossing river on stepping stones]
 What is meant by gender transition?
 The terms will always seem awkward/inappropriate/
imprecise compared to the person’s lived experience
Gender Transition
 [IMAGE of a ‘time line’ for transition including
Preparation, Real Life Experience, Transition at
Work, & post Transition stages]
 It may be inappropriate to speak of ‘changing’ gender
but the effects of the process can be life-changing,
life-enhancing and …. spiritually significant
 If all goes well, a negative spirituality is superseded
by a positive spirituality
Chris Dowd’s research 2013
 ‘Several .... felt that their gender variance and their
struggles to become themselves had been an
important part of their spiritual journey. It had led
them to places spiritually that they would not have
found without the struggles they had experienced
and the questions that they had to answer.’
(UK doctoral research project based on interviews
with 12 transgender people)
spirituality
 [IMAGE of spirituality as search for personal truth:
‘Who am I?’ ‘How do I make a difference?’ ‘Is there
something more?’
 The focus in this lecture is on spirituality rather than
religion
Spirituality and religion
 [IMAGE of Wordle illustrating the range of meaning
of spirituality]
 Spirituality embraces generic qualities like meaning,
value, transcendence, connectedness, hope, purpose
(Swinton 2001-2006: 36-38 )
 In religion spirituality takes specific forms
Metamorphosis & Migration
 [IMAGE of a human male in a diving pose whose

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spine has metamorphosed into a reptilian shape;
image of a herd of migrating animals]
Two metaphors to illustrate and illuminate the
spiritual dimensions of gender transition:
Metamorphosis – has ancient & modern resonances
Migration – already used for gender transition
Both metaphors relate to the person who is the
subject of the concluding case study
2. Athens & Jerusalem
 [Book cover of the book entitles When Athens meets
Jerusalem: An Introduction to Classical & Christian
Thought by John Mark Reynolds]
 Rationale for beginning with classical mythology
 Paucity of biblical material: ‘there is general
acceptance that there are no biblical texts that can be
seen as addressing transsexualism as such’ (House of
Bishops 2003: 228)
 Also, the correlation of biblical revelation and
classical philosophy and art in Christian theology &
culture
Diana & Actaeon – ancient & modern
 [IMAGE of Titian’s painting of Actaeon disturbing
Diana and her maidens bathing; image of a playful
modern photographic reconstruction]
 Ovid’s
poem Metamorphoses has been a
portmanteau of classical mythology for generations
 Its stories were immortalised in works of art like
Titian’s great ‘Poesie’ canvases, painted for King
Philip II of Spain, and in much European literature
The Death of Actaeon (detail) by Titian
 [IMAGE of ‘The Death of Actaeon’ by Titian]
 Actaeon, transformed into a stag, is devoured by his
own hounds as punishment for disturbing Diana’s
toilet
 Christian approaches to transsexual people that
ignore the imaginative and mythological are likely to
perceive them as a problem
3. Metamorphosis
 [IMAGE of a young woman who has emerged from a
white cocoon]
Ovid by Luca Signorelli
 [IMAGE of the poet Ovid]
‘My mind is bent to tell of bodies changed into new
forms’
(Ovid,
1997,
Book
I,
ll
1-2)
 [Book cover of Ovid’s Metamorphoses with young
woman turning into a tree]
 Metamorphoses, the Greek title of Ovid’s Latin
poem, means changes of form
 It begins with creation and is dynamic and
‘evolutionary’
 The opening words are in the heading of this slide
Biblical metamorphoses
 [IMAGE of biblical transformations: Lot’s wife;
Aaron’s rod; water into wine]
 Unlike the Bible, people in Ovid’s poem transform
into animals, birds, trees and inanimate objects
 They also change sex …
Tiresias – modern Japanese image
 [IMAGE of Tiresias]
 Tiresias, the most famous example, changes from
male to female and back again
Iphis
 [IMAGEof Iphis & Ianthe captioned ‘Ianthe did not


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
suspect that Iphis was a girl’]
Camille Paglia (1991) describes Iphis as ‘a girl raised as a
boy who falls in love with another girl and is relieved of
her suffering by being changed into a man.’
But transition is not a heterosexual resolution of samesex attraction
Iphis’s story sounds like a modern trans man’s narrative
That narrative can often raise particular spiritual issues
The Golden Ass by Apuleius
 [IMAGE of Lucius, the hero of Apuleius’s Latin novel
– a man who has been transformed into a donkey]
 The notion of being ‘trapped in the wrong’ body,
criticised philosophically in relation to transsexual
people, has a long history as a literary trope – The
Golden Ass, Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s
Dream
 In Ovid’s poem Io, turned into an heifer, is troubled
by her voice – as trans people can be. Her father
laments the loss of grandchildren – as trans people’s
parents can do
Io saved by Mercury
 [IMAGE of Io - her ‘minder’ Argon asleep - about to
be transformed back from heifer to human by
Mercury]
 Io’s relief and satisfaction resembles trans people’s
accounts of transition as the emerging of their ‘true’
or congruent physical identity: ‘No trace of the heifer
is left in her save only the fair whiteness of her body’
(Book I l 743).
Kafka The Metamorphosis
 [IMAGE of Kafka’s head and image of Kafka’s head with
insect body]
 Kafka’s novel - the most famous modern exposition of
the concept
 Depicts an involuntary transformation – Gregor Samsa
becomes ‘a monstrous insect’.
 Recent interpretations suggest Gregor’s metamorphosis
is a feminisation of sorts: no longer the bread winner,
and removed from public view – characteristics of older
stereotypes of masculinity – even his voice assumes a
higher register (Glover & Kaplan 2009: 111)
Edward Watson’s metamorphosis
 [IMAGES of dancer Edward Watson in the ballet version
of Kafka’s Metamorphosis]
 The pleasure Gregor feels in his ‘new’ body has been
noted.
 In Arthur Pita’s dance-theatre adaptation the contortions
of the semi-naked dancer Edward Watson, whose white
body is gradually covered in dark oil, conveys this
sensual, animal enjoyment of Gregor’s metamorphosis.
 Gender transition often requires a shift of attention to
bodily needs and feelings; being ‘at home in one’s own
skin’ is a familiar post-transition catchphrase.
Metamorphosis & the family
 [IMAGESof dancer Edward Watson as Gregor with
his sister & mother; image of Gregor (as insect) in
bed ‘surrounded’ by the calls of his family]
 Gregor’s family reject him, not just because of the
physical changes but because he is unable to work
and to support them financially
 Transition too can entail loss of family &
employment leading to deep soul searching
 Overwhelmed, some people chose the role of victim,
others become gender warriors (Feinberg 1997)
‘Unconscious’ factors
 [IMAGE of female in flagrante with giant insect]
 Like Gregor’s transformation, gender transition can
cause massive upheaval compared to the routine and
order of the trans person’s former life, and has a
momentum of its own, often experienced as
irresistible and inevitable. Gregor’s bourgeois family
resists, afraid of the animal, the primitive, the
unconscious.
4. (Trans)migration
 [IMAGE of birds in formation against the
background of the moon]
Transmigration of souls
 [IMAGE of a bust of Pythagoras; image of the
transmigration of souls]
 In the final book of Metamorphoses, Ovid has
Pythagoras expound the doctrine of the
transmigration of souls, or reincarnation
 Though held by many religions, reincarnation is not
a Christian doctrine
 However, the image used in the poem is of wider
application, including to gender transition:
Pythagoras on the transmigration of souls in
Ovid’s poem
 [IMAGE of wax marked with a seal]
 ‘And, as the pliant wax is stamped with new designs,
does not remain as it was before nor preserve the same
form, but is still the selfsame wax, so do I teach that the
soul is ever the same, though it passes into everchanging bodies.’ (Book XV, ll 169-70)
 [Gender] change is one of form rather than essence.
 My punning reference to (trans)migration is to
emphasise that the metaphor of migration, which
follows, is about a soul journey as much as bodies in
motion.
5. Migration
 [IMAGE of book cover of Exceptional People: How
Migration Shaped Our world and Will Define Our
Future by Ian Goldin, Geoffrey Cameron & Meera
Balarajan]
Exodus & Migration
 [IMAGE of the biblical Exodus; IMAGE of the
Chinese character for migrate]
 Migration as a biblical image & its ambiguity in the
Bible – a paradigm of liberation but also (in the
settlement of Israel) controversial: issues of
displacement, cultural assimilation & ethnic
cleansing
 The growth of migration in the modern world & the
reaction
 Migration as a well-established metaphor of gender
transition:
Dave King (2003)
 ‘Both gender and geographical migrants often see
themselves as beginning a new life; social
membership and identity has to be reworked and
negotiated; a new way of life has to be learnt; the old
one has to be left behind. Migrants of both kinds are
often regarded as undesirable and threatening; the
legitimacy of settlement in the new country/gender
may be denied; the granting of citizenship and other
rights may be refused. The consequence may be that
the migrant permanently occupies a position of
marginality rather than full integration.’
A passport to ...
 [IMAGE of a UK passport]
 In the UK the passport is a key identity document
and can be changed following legal name change
 The new passport, like any passport, not only
facilitates the initial crossing of the gender boundary,
but also states unequivocally the gender ‘nation’ to
which one belongs, consolidating one’s gender
identity.
 A ceremony often accompanies change of nationality
 Some trans people ask for a ceremony to mark
transition
Transition Rite UK
 Name changes in the Bible indicate or precipitate
personal growth
 Christianity recognises the spiritual import of
changing one’s name
 In 2013 a local parish church
in the UK publicly celebrated
a rite for trans woman Susan
Musgrove to mark the
completion of her transition.
Colonisation
 [IMAGE of personified versions of European nations tugging
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at a map of Africa]
Colonisation as the most contentious term
The accusation of colonisation & the exclusion of trans women
from women only spaces because of their male socialisation
Resistance to this on the grounds of the intersecting nature of
oppression
E.g. in January 2012, the Cutting Edge Consortium, a UK
collaborative of faith and secular organisations formed to
combat homophobia and trans phobia, especially in religious
organisations, held a Women’s Group Public Meeting in
central London entitled ‘Feminism, Faith & LBGTQ Women:
Is Anybody Listening?’ The invitation was [see next slide]
‘Open to anyone who identifies as a woman’
6. Metamorphosis & migration: case study
 [IMAGE of deer on a mountain top with rainbow)
Sonia/David Burgess
 [IMAGES of David; IMGAES of Sonia]
 Sonia was a friend – spirituality brought us together
 We both belonged to Sibyls, Christian spirituality for
transgender people
 David was ‘the finest immigration lawyer of his
generation’ & had represented trans people at the
European Court of Human Rights, but Sonia did not
speak of these things to her trans friends
 Few of David’s work colleagues had met Sonia
 Sonia’s gender history and transition were fairly typical
for someone of her age in the UK
Sonia
 [IMAGES of David, Sonia and the stages of the
butterfly’s development]
 In 2010 her friend Ian Baker felt that Sonia had
finally found ‘a resolution of what had obsessed or
troubled’ her from the beginning, adding, in a phrase
worthy of Ovid, ‘I think he was in his chrysalis stage
for a long time, and I think Sonia was the butterfly
that emerged.’
 Her care for her mentally ill murderer and the issue
of boundaries - trans people and the liminal
(Cornwall 2009:16)
Forgiveness & fullness
 [IMAGE of Nina Kanagasingham; IMAGE of Sonia
with her daughter]
 Chris Dowd’s study notes the theme of forgiveness in
trans people’s narratives
 Sonia’s spirituality lives on in her children, who said
at the trial:
‘This was not what our father wanted. She was trying
to help Nina. Ideally we would like Nina to recognise
the harm she has done to so many lives, but we hope
that she can one day reach such a place so she can
live life in fullness as our father would have wanted.’
Sonia as inspiration
 [IMAGE of David/Sonia Burgess as LGB&T History
month Hero]
Bibliography
 Cornwall, S., 2009. ‘Apophasis and Ambiguity: The “Unknowingness of
Transgender’, in M. Althaus-Reid
Trans/formations, London: SCM
&
Lisa
Isherwood,
(eds.),
 Day, E., http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2011/jan/09/david-burgess-
sonia-lawyer-death
 Dowd, C., 2013, unpublished doctoral research into trans people and
spirituality
 Feinberg L., 1997 Transgender Warriors: Making History from Joan of Arc
to RuPaul, Boston: Beacon Press
 Glover, D. & C. Kaplan. 2009. Genders, 2nd Edition, Abingdon: Routledge
Bibliography 2
 House of Bishops 2003 Some issues in human sexuality: A guide to the
debate. A discussion document from the House of Bishops’ Group on
‘Issues in Human Sexuality’ London: Church House Publishing.
 King,
D.,(2003), ‘Gender Migration: A Sociological Analysis (or The
Leaving of Liverpool)’, Sexualities, 6(2): 173-194.
 Ovid 1997, 1984 Metamorphoses Harvard University Press
 Paglia, C., 1991 Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nerfertiti to
Emily Dickinson, London: Penguin
 Swinton,
J., 2001/2006, Spirituality and Mental Health Care:
Rediscovering a ‘Forgotten’ Dimension, London: Jessica Kingsley
Publishers