A slate of new policy changes restricting the involvement of transgender Latter-day Saints in their congregations could further stigmatize those individuals within their worship communities while cementing their “second-class” status within the global faith, scholars and those impacted by the updates warned Monday.
“It’s egregious and onerous,” said Laurie Lee Hall, a former stake president and temple architect who was excommunicated from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for living as a transgender woman. “We’re in a far worse place than we were yesterday.”
The updates — released Monday along with additional guidance on temple garments, a new responsibility for teenage girls and other topics — reaffirm the church’s stance that gender, which it defines as biological sex at birth, is “an essential characteristic in Heavenly Father’s plan of happiness” and that leaders should discourage individuals from transitioning in any form.
At the same time, the latest edition of the online “General Handbook: Serving in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints” reiterates that the faith “does not take a position on the causes of” individuals feeling as though their assigned sex at birth does not match their gender identity.
Policy changes: transgender individuals
What that means for the day-to-day involvement of transgender Latter-day Saints has depended in many instances on the leanings of bishops (lay leaders of congregations) and stake presidents (lay regional leaders). The handbook update clears up some — albeit not all — of this gray area through the following clarifications:
• Individuals are instructed to attend gender-specific meetings and activities that align with their assigned sex at birth. Any “rare” exceptions must be approved by the Area Presidency.
• Individuals who have transitioned in any way — whether surgically, medically or socially — cannot work with children, serve as teachers in their congregation or fill any gender-specific assignments, such as president of the women’s Relief Society. Instead, “they may receive other callings or assignments that provide opportunities to progress and serve others.” The church defines social transitioning as “intentionally identifying and presenting oneself as other than one’s biological sex at birth, and may include changing dress, grooming, names or pronouns.”
• When it comes to gender-specific overnight activities such as youth camps, individuals can attend only those that align with their assigned sex at birth.
• In the case of other overnight activities, such as For the Strength of Youth and other youth conferences, those who have transitioned in any way will be released at the end of the day to a guardian responsible for arranging accommodations.
• These same church members should use a single-occupancy restroom when available. If unavailable, they can counsel with leaders to find an alternative solution. Examples suggested include people using the restroom that aligns with their assigned sex at birth or one that corresponds to the individual’s “feeling of their inner sense of gender, with a trusted person ensuring that others are not using the restroom at the same time.”
Additional language was further added to guidance around the use of preferred names and pronouns, explaining that “local leaders should not determine or prescribe how members address an individual.” That matter should instead be left to “individuals and their family, friends and church members.” As before, a preferred name may be noted in the person’s membership record.
Also unchanged was the instruction that all soul-saving rituals, including baptism and temple rites, must be received according to a person’s assigned sex at birth.
Only those who have not transitioned in any way can be baptized and confirmed, although possible exceptions can be made by the governing First Presidency.
Individuals who transition in any way cannot receive the recommend needed to enter the church’s temples, where the faith’s highest ordinances are performed. They are also forbidden from receiving or exercising the all-male priesthood. The handbook leaves open the possibility of other restrictions not enumerated within the document.
The removal of restrictions requires the approval of the First Presidency.
(The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) President Russell M. Nelson poses with his counselors in the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Dallin H. Oaks and Henry B. Eyring, at a small gathering in honor of his 99th birthday in his office at the Church Administration Building in Salt Lake City on Friday, Sept. 8, 2023. The trio reserved the right, in the latest version of policies given to local leaders, to make final call in key decisions in specific instances regarding the involvement of transgender individuals.
Ultimately, leaders navigating this issue should “seek spiritual guidance” and “treat individuals and their families with love and respect,” the handbook emphasizes, while also ensuring that “the church’s doctrine on gender is not undermined or misunderstood.”
‘Dehumanizing and degrading’
Laurie Lee Hall said she hadn’t been to church in some time but grew emotional when she thought of the impact these new policies could have on those she knows within the trans community, including young people, who continue to make the church their spiritual home.
“It’s dehumanizing and degrading to have to have a chaperone clear a restroom before you can use it,” she said, explaining that few Latter-day Saint meetinghouses have unisex restrooms — a fact she gleaned during her years designing the buildings.
(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) Laurie Lee Hall, shown in 2017, calls the church handbook changes on transgender individuals "dehumanizing and degrading."
Hall, author of the forthcoming “Dictates of Conscience: From Mormon High Priest to My New Life as a Woman,” also pointed out that preventing transgender members from working with children and youth puts them in a category with sex offenders.
Taken together, the policies “contribute to fears that their presence is a danger to others” while giving into “right-wing fearmongering,” said Taylor Petrey, a Latter-day Saint historian of gender in the church. “None of these have anything to do with church teachings about priesthood, temple or long-standing customs of gender-specific classes.”
(Taylor Petrey) Latter-day Saint historian Taylor Petrey says the handbook changes on transgender individuals cave in to "right-wing fearmongering."
Just as “devastating” as the policies themselves was the language used to frame them, argued Kate Mower, a nonbinary scholar of gender who attends church in Utah, California and Romania. The handbook repeatedly uses the phrase “biological sex assigned at birth,” Mower said, in a way that undermines the framing for many in the LGBTQ community of sex as a legal rather than a biological distinction.
Moreover, the document “doesn’t even take nonbinary people into consideration,” contributing, Mower said, to a sense that “we don’t exist.”
(Kate Mower) Kate Mower is a nonbinary Latter-day Saint who earned a doctorate in history of science from the University of California Riverside. The new policies, Mower says, skip over nonbinary Latter-day Saints entirely — like "we don't exist."
Policy changes: garments, sealings and more
Transgender issues were not the only hot-button topic to receive additional attention in the updated handbook. After a rash of internet debate driven largely by women around the wearing of the sacred undergarment donned by faithful Latter-day Saint adults, the church has added new language granting a pass to members with medical conditions or medical devices “that may make it difficult” to wear their garments.
“Members should seek the guidance of the Spirit in such situations,” the update instructs. “In some cases, it may be best to lay the garment aside temporarily and wear it again when conditions allow. When a member cannot wear the garment because of a medical condition or device, his or her religious status is not affected.”
(Screengrab) Church-approved photos of temple garments, which faithful members wear beneath their clothes. Updated guidance allows for members to "temporarily" remove the otherwise required underclothing in cases of medical issues.
Meanwhile, going forward Young Women will be responsible, under the guidance of the bishopric, for organizing the youth of their congregations to welcome visitors as they enter the chapel. It marks perhaps the first time these young female members have been given a formal role for Sunday services.
Other changes include codifying guidance given in 2024 for congregations to limit Christmas and Easter services to sacrament meeting only.
Amy Watkins Jensen, Latter-day Saint advocate for greater female inclusion in congregations, applauded the shift giving Young Women a “visible and consistent role” in sacrament meeting, as well as stewardship over their male peers.
“Which is something,” she said, “we don’t often see.”
Neylan McBaine, author of “Women at Church: Magnifying LDS Women’s Local Impact,” echoed the sentiment, while noting the change did not extend to serving the sacrament, or Communion, itself.
“I understand it is likely an effort to respond to boys blessing and passing the sacrament,” she said, “but I would probably rather girls just be included as passers.”
Finally, the newest edition of the handbook adds language to the section relating to sealings, or the faith’s marriage ritual, explaining that no person will be obligated to remain in a relationship with another person “throughout eternity against his or her will.