Should a Christian use a person’s preferred pronouns?

Aug 21, 2023 -

This Sunday, I finished a sermon series addressing questions that people in our congregation are asking. The underlying principle of the whole series was that we are supposed to behave in line with the character and command of our Lord in every situation, but it is sometimes hard to discern what Christ would have us do. Thus, I invited the congregation to submit questions that they had so that we could (a) explore what the Bible had to say about those specific questions and (b) discover the tools and processes by which the common parishioner can bring Scriptures to bear on the various situations and questions they face.

Our congregation did not disappoint. We had questions ranging from whether or not a believer should get a tattoo to how we should respond to people who do not believe the Bible is accurate, much less authoritative. Each week, the question allowed us to weigh the will of God in a specific situation someone was facing, and each week we were able to learn a bit more about the process of interpreting the Bible for ourselves.

Even so, the final question of the series was a doozy: Should a Christian use a person’s preferred pronouns? By preferred pronouns, of course, we are talking about the biological man who chooses to be addressed as she/her/hers, the biological woman who would rather be referred to as he/him/his, and the person of either gender who prefers to be called they/them/their.

Even those who have not yet personally encountered this situation have heard at least some of the debate surrounding the matter in the Church. As Bible-believing Christians, we believe that God knit us together in our mothers’ wombs (Psalm 139:13), and he doesn’t make a mistake. Yet, there are plenty of people in this world who do not subscribe to such a view. According The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, (DSM5), somewhere between 5 and 14 out of every 100,000 biological men identify as female, and somewhere between 2 and 3 per 100,000 biological women identify as male (src: https://www.therecoveryvillage.com/mental-health/gender-dysphoria/gender-dysphoria-statistics/). There is, however, substantial evidence that those numbers are profoundly low. In fact, a Dutch study of approximately 8,000 participants found that 4.6% (i.e., 4600 per 100,000) men, and 3.2% (i.e., 3200 per 100,000) women described themselves as “ambivalent to their specific birth gender” and “equally able to identify as male or female according to their internal perception of self” (src: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.3109/09540261.2016.1125740?cookieSet=1?cookieSet=1). Moreover, as transgenderism becomes increasingly normalized, most experts agree these statistics will grow even larger.

Simply put, then, if you have not yet encountered someone who would prefer that you refer to them using a pronoun other than the one corresponding to their biolgical gender, you will. Therefore, I thought I would take a moment to share the information I found and the conclusions I reached in the hopes that it will help someone facing the question of whether or not they will use a person’s preferred pronouns.

The options

There are three primary schools of thought on whether or not a Christian should use a person’s preferred pronoun. These may be easily identified as “Absolutely not,” “Absolutely yes,” and “Can we find a third way?”

The first of these, “Absolutely not,” may be summarized simply: A Christian should never use a pronoun that does not align with the person’s biological gender. Proponents of this view will cite numerous Bible passages, but the main support can be found in Isaiah 5:20: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness, who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter” (CSB). They reason that, if God made people and God does not make mistakes, then men should be men and women should be women. One’s gender identity, then, becomes a moral issue because identifying as something other than what your biology indicates is (a) a lie and (b) defamation of God (i.e., you are saying that God, who does not make mistakes, made one in your case). Moreover, the believer who uses a pronoun that does not align with someone’s biological gender is (a) agreeing with their lie (and thereby lying themselves), (b) allowing the person to persist in their defamation of God, and (c) endorsing sin (i.e., calling evil good) and so inviting woe upon him/herself.

This first school of thought has a number of pros and cons. In the positive column, we must recognize that members of this school have a strong, positive view of God which insists that he made people and does not make mistakes. We also must acknowledge their earnest desire to maintain a clear testimony. Conversely, this camp overlooks numerous factors which contribute to a person’s decision to identify as a gender other than what their biology indicates. For example, a 2018 study published in Clinical Obstetrics & Gynaecology found that between 20 and 50 out of every 100,000 babies are born with ambiguous genitalia. It is not immediately apparent whether they are male or female. So also, there are myriad genetic, hormonal, and environmental factors which may affect our sense of gender identity.

This camp also fails to consider how integral gender and sexuality are to a person’s identity. In fact, many people today consider gender and sexuality to be the primary component of a person’s identity. Refusing to use a preferred pronoun, then, is often equated to hating the person. This leads to a profound rupture of the relationship and so dramatically reduces the chance of ever effectively witnessing to that person.

The second school of thought, “Absolutely yes,” may also be summarized simply: A Christian should honor a person’s choice of pronoun in order to earn an opportunity to tell that person about Jesus. Like the first school, there are again numerous Bible passages that may be cited to support this, but the bottom line can be found in 1 Corinthians 9:22: “I have become all things to all people, so that I may by every possible means save some.” The members of this school begin with the assumption that Christians are called to win people to the Lord. They further assert that respecting one’s pronoun preference does not equate to explicitly endorsing a sinful lifestyle. On the other hand, refusing to use a person’s preferred pronouns almost guarantees they will be unreceptive to the gospel, and we cannot expect non-Christians to conform to biblical standards anyway. Therefore, believers should offer what Preston Sprinkle calls “pronoun hospitality” and use someone’s preferred pronoun as a sign of respect for them and as a way to keep the door open for relationship and spiritual conversation.

Also like the first school, this view has a number of pros and cons. On the positive side, those holding this view generally do show respect to people of all types and their right to believe things that may not align with Christian values. That is, this position accounts for the pluralistic culture in which we live. It also is rooted in an earnest desire to forge relationship and bear an effective testimony for Jesus.

On the negative side, there is a very real chance that the pronoun hospitality will be mistaken for an endorsement of transgender lifestyles. More concerning is the possibility that people who embrace Christ only to then be told that their lifestyle is sinful may view this as a sort of bait and switch tactic. Further, there are some who insist that using a person’s preferred pronoun is nothing short of sin (e.g., Rosaria Butterfield, src: https://www.reformation21.org/blog/why-i-no-longer-use-transgender-pronouns-and-why-you-shouldnt-either).

The third school of thought seeks to find a third way, a compromise between the polar opposites of the first two camps. Essentially, the members of this school of thought insist that a Christian could avoid the whole pronoun debate by using a person’s proper name. Again, they may offer a variety of biblical texts to support this assertion, but none are better than Genesis 32:28: “‘Your name will no longer be Jacob,’ [God] said. ‘It will be Israel because you have struggled with God and with men and have prevailed.'” The argument rests on the fact that, in biblical times, a name spoke of a person’s character and core identity. It represented who they were, and who they were going to be. Jacob’s name, then, was a big deal: Jacob means “deceiver” or “trickster,” and this is exactly the role he lived into. When God changed his name to Israel, however, his new name meant one who strives with God, and from this moment forward, Jacob would not try to use tricks and manipulation to get his way, but he would follow after the Lord.

The reasoning behind this school of thought, then, proceeds like this: Using a person’s preferred pronoun may be perceived as endorsing their behavior. On the other hand, not using a person’s preferred pronoun may cause significant offense. Thus, one may avoid confusion and offense by using a person’s proper name.

This makes sense, and at least initially, it would seem that using a person’s proper name would allow the believer to circumvent both the confusion and the offense of (not) using a preferred pronoun. However, it does not account for the growing trend of of the dead name.

If you are not familiar with the concept of a dead name, it is what happens when a person rejects his/her birth name and embraces instead a new name that aligns with his/her gender identity. In this case, using a person’s dead name will often cause great offense, but if we use someone’s preferred name, are we not doing exactly as those who would offer pronoun hospitality?

Other factors to consider

As Christians, the Bible must be our primary source for direction. Yet, as a Wesleyan, I must recognize that there are often other factors which help to illuminate Scripture. In the case of preferred pronouns, there are several.

We must consider, for example, the ongoing evolution of the English language. While many languages throughout history have been strongly gendered, featuring nouns that are strongly masculine, feminine, or nueter, the English language has never been so. Outside of living creatures, most nouns in English are “it,” and over the last four decades, our language has become even less gendered. Consider, a half century ago, it was common practice to refer to the prototypical person as “he,” but since the 90s at least, it has become increasingly common to refer to that same abstract person as “they.” Indeed, Merriam-Webster named the singular pronoun “they” its 2019 Word of the Year (src: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/10/us/merriam-webster-they-word-year.html#:~:text=Merriam%2DWebster%20announced%20the%20pronoun,whose%20gender%20identity%20is%20nonbinary.). The result is that gender is increasingly meaningless in our language.

Consider also the inconsistent egalitarianism present in our culture. We often say that men and women are equal, yet our culture continues to act otherwise. Case in point, we still say that someone who is weak or helpless is “like a little girl,” and have you seen the way the media portrays men as bumbling fools? Is it any wonder that people would want to be something other than their biological gender?

We must recognize the role played by rigid gender stereotypes. Everyone knows that little girls are made of sugar, spice, and everything nice, while boys are made of snips, snails, and puppy dog tails. It is no wonder, then, that men are expected to be rough, tough, dirty, smelly, and outdoorsy while women are expected to be pretty, compassionate, homemakers. But what of those who do not fit those molds? For centuries, men who enjoyed children, cooking, and crafts have been considered strange, and women who like sports, outdoors, and manual labor were weird, even repulsive. It should not surprise us that these would prefer to identify with the gender that more closely aligns with their interests. Moreover, we must accept that the Church has been a key proponent of these stereotypes!

We must own the damage that our reactions have caused, particularly in the case of youngsters experiencing rapid onset gender dysphoria. This term describes what happens when a person – generally a teenager – suddenly identifies as a different gender, usually in conjunction with one or more peers. Of course, adolescence has always been a confusing time, with kids trying to figure out who they are in a rapidly expanding world. They are attempting to make sense of hormonal surges, chaotic emotions, childish impulses, and the unrelenting drive toward adulthood and independence. It should also be recognized that there is little to no data on how many of these decisions will persist into adulthood. Yet, well-meaning parents often react in ways that are counterproductive. I fear that history will look back with deep regret upon the way some parents rushed to affirm a phase while others overreacted and so compelled their children to dig in their heals.

Finally, we must consider the threat of suicide. A recent study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association examined suicide rates for transgender persons in Denmark (src: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2806531?guestAccessKey=458dc50a-ea74-489c-bc68-c0128d48a4e3&utm_source=For_The_Media&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=ftm_links&utm_content=tfl&utm_term=062723). By examining the personal records of more than 6.6 million people born in Denmark, researchers identified 3,759 as transgender through hospital and administrative registers. (There were certainly more transgender people in the group; they were just never officially registered as transgender.) Among these, there were 92 suicide attempts and 12 actual suicides between 1980 and 2021. Put another way, transgendered persons were 7.7 times more likely to attempt suicide, and 3.5 times more likely to succeed in committing suicide, than the general population, and it is not difficult to understand why. Transgendered persons are keenly aware that they do not fit in, and one can only imagine that refusing to use a preferred pronoun may be the proverbial straw that breaks the camel’s back.

My best guess for today.

These factors are not nothing. Yet, as I said, we are called to follow Christ as he is revealed in Scriptures. Therefore, I would offer three passages to help us find our way. Before I do that, though, I would offer this disclaimer: Others will no doubt offer different passages and approaches. I am not claiming that mine is the only way, much less the right way. Rather, I would call it my best guess for how I think Scriptures are leading us to respond to the question of preferred pronouns.

First, John 1:14: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. We observed his glory, the glory as the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” The Word here represents the Greek philosophical concept of the one constant underlying the entire universe. Many in the first century, including John, equated this notion to God, and when John later identified the Word as the man Jesus Christ, he was effectively saying that Jesus is God become human. Somehow, he was able to hold both complete deity and complete humanity in perfect tension.

Moreover, Jesus came full of grace and truth. This is particularly remarkable for our discussion because truth confronts, but grace communes. Like it or not, truth is unwavering. It is an unrelenting, in-your-face sort of thing. Grace, on the other hand, looks for ways to overcome faults, failures, and disagreements to have a relationship anyway. Jesus embodied both grace and truth equally, fully, and we need to fight our natural impulse to favor one or the other in order to do the same.

How do we do that? We find a hint in John 4, where Jesus met a Samaritan woman at a well outside the village of Sychar. From the beginning, John hints that something was not right with this woman. He notes that Jews did not associate with Samaritans, and she came to the well about noon, the absolute hottest part of the day, to avoid other people. We learn through the story that she has significant gaps in her knowledge and understanding of Scripture, and in verses 16-17, we discover that she has had five husbands and is currently living with a man to whom she is not married.

To be fair, we do not know the circumstances surrounding those five past marriages. Typically, we assume she was unfaithful, but in reality, husbands in the Ancient Near East could divorce their wives for virtually any reason. She may have been a bad cook. Alternatively, because men tended to be older when they married, and generally lived shorter lives than women, she may have been widowed five times. in either case, we begin to understand why she was living with a man who was not her husband. She may have been deemed unworthy of marriage, so she had to settle for whoever would take her. Alternatively, she may have been perceived as an angel of death, cursed so that anyone who married her ended up dead.

This is where the woman’s every interaction with the locals began, but it was not where Jesus began. He knew all along about her marital status, but he did not confront her at the outset of the conversation. Instead, he started from a position of weakness, need, and humility by asking her for a drink. From there, he struck up a conversation and allowed her to lead it wherever she liked. Eventually, he did allow her to uncover her greatest spiritual need, but that is not where Jesus started.

We find in this an important truth. Most people do not need us to point out where they do not conform to God’s standard. They are already keenly aware. What they need is someone to come along humbly, strike up a conversation, and show them that they are worthy of respect, love, and ultimately grace.

Indeed, Paul would agree. In 1 Corinthians 5:9-10, he wrote, “I wrote to you in a letter not to associate with sexually immoral people. I did not mean the immoral people of this world or the greedy and swindlers or idolaters; otherwise you would have to leave the world.”

To be clear, it was not just sexual immorality that Paul concerned Paul. Elsewhere, he advised his readers to steer clear of anyone who persists in any kind of sin. In verse 10, however, he provided further clarification. He was talking specifically about people who claim to be followers of Jesus and yet persist in sin. After all, Christians are supposed to be in the world but not of it. That is, we are not supposed to be of the same character or behavior as the rest of the world.

However, people of the world – those who do not claim to believe in Jesus and are making no effort to follow him – are going to act in immoral ways because they do not know any better. We should expect no different, and so we should not flinch when someone tells us they prefer another pronoun. Rather, we should honor that preference in order to build a relationship with that person, so that we can share the gospel with them, so that they may eventually place their faith in Jesus and be delivered from all their sin.

Now, once they have placed their faith in Jesus, we do need to engage in real discipleship, teaching them to obey all of Christ’s commands. And we should not be surprised if that gets messy. Really messy.

But again, we will need to navigate that process with grace and truth. Truth is clean and easy because it is objective, regardless of what anyone has to say. Grace is often messy because it deals with people, emotions, and relationships. Jesus was full of both grace and truth, and we must be, too.

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