A priest talks about transgendered and gay children

Pastor Jimmy Bartz discusses the intersection between homosexuality and religion and shares advice for parents.
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A priest talks about transgendered and gay children

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Sometimes when folks are wondering how to engage the idea that their child is gay or lesbian or transgendered, that can bring up a lot of old religious, spiritual feelings. You know, my basic advice as a priest and a pastor is to look toward the nature of God. If we really have some sense that the nature or the identity, the true character of God is love, then the most important environment that we can create to nurture the authentic identity of our child, whether he or she is gay or lesbian or transgender or just expressing a more normal gender identity, the most important cultural familial context that we can create for them is a loving supporting environment, because that's the nature and character of God. So if God is love, then our families should be exuding love too.

Pastor Jimmy Bartz discusses the intersection between homosexuality and religion and shares advice for parents.

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Jimmy Bartz

Priest

Jimmy serves as rector of St. John’s Episcopal Church in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Prior to coming to Jackson, he was the founder and priest at Thad’s, an emergent Episcopal Church in the Santa Monica, California, in the Diocese of Los Angeles. He has also served as the Campus Missioner at the University of Texas in Austin, at All Saints’ in Austin, Texas, and All Saints’ Parish in Beverly Hills, California. He is a graduate the University of Texas at Austin and Virginia Theological Seminary. Presently, he serves as the Chair of the Board of the Episcopal Evangelism Society, and in years past has worked with Red Bull High Performance teaching athletes spiritual disciplines, with Naval Special Warfare working to create systems for character development within special operations teams, and was a speaker at TEDx, Venice Beach.
Married to Cindy and dad to Jas and Jade, the Bartz family loves to spend time outside mountaineering, skiing, fly-fishing, hunting and surfing.  Jimmy is currently writing a book on the spirituality of risk.

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Transcription: 
Sometimes when folks are wondering how to engage the idea that their child is gay or lesbian or transgendered, that can bring up a lot of old religious, spiritual feelings. You know, my basic advice as a priest and a pastor is to look toward the nature of God. If we really have some sense that the nature or the identity, the true character of God is love, then the most important environment that we can create to nurture the authentic identity of our child, whether he or she is gay or lesbian or transgender or just expressing a more normal gender identity, the most important cultural familial context that we can create for them is a loving supporting environment, because that's the nature and character of God. So if God is love, then our families should be exuding love too.