I'm saying the individual referred questions to the House of Justice before going on with Sexual Reassignment Surgery, was not only allowed but encouraged to follow his or her own best interest and medical advice but was allowed to re-register his or her Baha`i identity with the new name. I do not think that gender information is actually recorded in this country on their Baha`i registration.
In the event that a marriage was involved, and one partner to the marriage filed for divorce because of it, the faith would honor the divorce. Would a divorce be required? Well, there is no such thing as 'precedent' in Baha`i jurisprudence so it would depend entirely upon the specific circumstances, and should it come up twice the second case would be judged on its specific circumstances.
Prognosticating which way the House would respond in any given circumstance is a waste of time--since no precedent exists in Baha`i
terms.
Regards,
Scott
"Jeanine H." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
"Jeanine H." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Interesting! The case of hermaphrodites and other physical conditions
would seem to me to be a different subject.
Are you saying you know a case where the Baha'i Administration did not
invalidate a marriage where one partner changed physical gender? That
would also be interesting to know. Perhaps there is, or will be, a
compilation or further guidance about how the House has dealt with this
subject.
Without admittedly knowing the full issues involved, I am trying to
imagine what would happen if my spouse decided to become a woman. If I
could get to the point of compassion about what suffering would cause a
person to take such a drastic step, there would still be the issue that
*I* do not wish to be married to a woman. There would be a disconnect
between the physical relationship of marriage and the fact that s/he
would still be the father to my children. Sounds like a long forum
discussion with GLAAD would be in order, tho' Baha'is still won't be
operating from the same set of assumptions...
Jeanine
Scott Saylors wrote:
> It won't invalidate a marriage. I know a transgender individual who
> was born with ambiguous gender, fairly. There are also cases of
> 'pseudo-hermaphroditism" which is a chromosomally male individual
> whose body does not change to male when testosterone is produced by
> the developing fetus in the womb.
>
> One must realize that ALL human fetuses are female in the womb. Until
> the chemical magic of response to hormones is complete and any where
> along that tortuouse route abnormalities can occur.
>
> The physical identification of gender is not really an either or
> situation.
>
> Regards,
> Scott
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