By overwhelming majorities in both the House of Bishops and the House of Deputies, the Episcopal Church scored an historic first, brokering transsexualism into church law. With the passage of the "transgender twins," resolutions D019 and D002, it's now against church law to exclude people who have had sex-changes from the life of the church at any level. America and the world anxiously awaits the Episcopal Church to ordain its first ever "trans" bishop.

In a similar vein, both Houses gave a resounding thumbs-up to gay-marriage, breaking with Scripture and twenty centuries of Christian tradition, to authorize rites for same-sex blessing. "I Will Bless You and You Will Be a Blessing" hit the pews on the first Sunday of Advent, December 2, 2012.

The consequences of these resolutions have cost the Church dearly. Its numbers have tumbled into the abyss. Recent figures reveal that overall membership has dropped by 30% and will continue to drop. Sunday attendance has dropped by a third; child and adult baptisms have dropped by over a half, with one official report saying that "in significant parts of the United States, TEC has ceased or will soon cease to have a meaningful presence."

But sex (in all its variations) remains the centerfold of TEC's raison d'etre. It's as though every church member was being built up in their most holy faith with copies of the Kama Sutra and not Scripture. The Episcopal Church has, over time, descended into sexual anarchy.

Before he fled The Episcopal Church for the ACNA, South Carolina Bishop Mark Lawrence wrote this:
"These changes to our Church's canons mark an even further step into incoherency. They open the door to innumerable self-understandings of gender identity and gender expression within the Church; normalizing "transgender," "bi-sexual," "questioning," and still yet to be named - self-understandings of individualized eros. I fail to see how a rector or parish leader who embraces such a canonical change has any authority to discipline a youth minister, Sunday school teacher, or chalice bearer who chooses to dress as a man one Sunday and as a woman another. To embrace an understanding of our human condition in which gender may be entirely self-defined, self-chosen is to abandon all such norms, condemning ourselves, our children and grandchildren, as well as future generations to sheer sexual anarchy."

This latest decree by Curry will push the church into a deeper enveloping darkness. Transgenderism is the new (but not necessarily) final frontier of sexual aberration. For those of us who have watched the pitiable decline of TEC over sexuality issues, we are not surprised at seeing this coming. We at VOL paid attention because we have been monitoring cultural trends for decades, even those way out on the fringe.

Transgenderism is no longer on the cultural fringe, it is right in the Church and TEC has embraced it. If it can happen to a cultural icon like Caitlyn (Bruce) Jenner, then it can't be really that weird! Unlike homosexuality, it has not touched most people and so most people just shrug it off.

But the church cannot and should not embrace this new sexuality.

A former trans-female, Walt Heyer says he knows. The military should not be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail, he says.

"When I discovered Congress voted earlier this month to not block funding for transgender-related hormone therapies and sex change surgeries, I wondered if it considered how devastating this will be to the fitness, readiness, and morale of our combat-ready troops. Paying for transition-related surgeries for military service members and their families is beyond comprehensible.

"Perhaps they have forgotten that our military was forged to be the world's strongest fighting force, not a government-funded, politically correct, medical sex change clinic for people with gender dysphoria."

Gender dysphoria, he says, is the common diagnosis for one who feels at odds with his or her birth gender. "It develops from prolonged anxiety and depression. People are not born that way."

The "proof" for a diagnosis of gender dysphoria is having strongly held feelings--but feelings can and often do change over time, he writes.

"The military is expected to prepare its members in warfare: to kill, destroy, and break our enemies. The most important factors in preparing a strong military are not hormone therapy, surgical sex changes, or politically correct education. We need psychologically fit, emotionally sound, highly trained troops to protect our nation from its enemies."

"I myself was fully sex-reassigned from male to female, and eventually came to accept my birth gender.

"I have over 70 years of firsthand life experience, eight years of living as a woman, 20 years of researching the topic, and 12 years of helping others who, like me, found that transitioning and reassignment surgery failed to be proper treatment and want to restore their lives to their birth gender."

"Transitioning can be expensive--up to $130,000 per person for numerous body-mutilating and cosmetic procedures over many months (or years) to fashion the body to appear as the opposite sex.

"No matter how skilled the surgeon, or how much money is spent, it is biologically impossible to change a man into a woman or a woman into a man. The change is only cosmetic."

"The medical community continues to recommend this radical "treatment" in the absence of scientific evidence that people are better off in the long run. This population attempts suicide at a rate of 40 percent.

"Even after the full surgical change, they attempt to end their lives, or tragically succeed.

"Over 60 percent of this diverse population suffer from co-existing mental disorders. Consider Bradley Manning (now Chelsea Manning), a former Army soldier who was so psychologically and emotionally unbalanced that he stole confidential documents from the military and forwarded them to WikiLeaks.

"The Military Is a Fighting Force, Not a Gender Clinic. The military should not provide sex change surgery.

"Some service members will come to regret having undergone the surgery and will want to detransition. Where will the military be then? Will the military pay for the sex change reversal procedure, too?

"Failed sex change surgeries are not uncommon and will drive up the cost to care for the military transgender population above the projected $3-4 billion 10-year cost.

"Beyond the financial cost, there's the question of the service member's military readiness during their transition or detransition, as the process often comes with a great deal of anxiety and emotional instability.

"I know of many who have struggled to adapt to the new gender role for years after reassignment surgery.

"In my view, as a former trans-female who works every day with regretters, allowing the military to pay for sex change surgeries will make a mockery of the U.S. military."

"As a person who lived the transgender life for eight years, I can attest that assisting, affirming, or paying for hormone therapies and genital mutilation surgeries would not have strengthened our military. They would only have brought adverse long-term consequences, both for individuals and for our armed forces as a whole."

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