What's Happening

May 9, 2025, Adrian, Michigan – “Oh, Sister, I’m not hungry for food. I’m hungry for talk. I’m hungry for somebody to listen to me. I’m hungry for somebody not to judge me.”

Those were the words of Dawn, a transgender woman who, in 1999, spoke to Sister Luisa DeRouen, OP, a Dominican Sister of Peace, asking for understanding and spiritual accompaniment. This conversation propelled Sister Luisa to move from her ministry with gay and lesbian people to ministry with the transgender population.

Sister Luisa spoke of this experience and what she has learned about transgenderism in her presentation, Ministering with the Transgender Population. Her April 30, 2025, talk – transmitted via Zoom to Weber Center on the Adrian Dominican Sisters Motherhouse Campus and via livestream – was one of a series of presentations offered by the Congregation’s Office of Racial Equity and Cultural Inclusion. 

Speaking to an audience that included Adrian Dominican Sisters, Sister Luisa began with her hope: “I hope I can give you language today so you can speak up for [people in the transgender population] with more suitable language. You may have transgender and nonbinary people in your families.”

Sister Luisa explained a new understanding of sexuality. “Being transgender is a neuro-biological issue,” she said. “It is a biological issue, not a moral or psychological issue.” She said five criteria determine a person’s sex: genitalia, chromosomes, hormones, internal genitals, and the brain. “For most of us, they all line up, but for transgender people, that is not the case,” she said. “Being transgender is for real. It’s a real condition, and transgender people need appropriate, professional medical care.”

Sister Luisa asked Catholic Sisters to be a helpful resource for the spiritual dimension of the lives of transgender individuals. 

“For trans people, the primary process is transitioning,” Sister Luisa said. “I walked with them through the transition, and who they are on the other side of the transition. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that it’s a spiritual transition,” though one that’s experienced differently, and that entails different components for each person.

Sister Luisa spoke of the grace that’s available to transgender individuals when they go through transition – whether socially with a change in clothes or hairstyle or medically with hormones or surgery. Once they transition, she said, they often need to renegotiate every aspect of their lives, from relationships with family and friends to their jobs. 

“They’re in a liminal, unknown place – and that is the most profound place where we find God,” Sister Luisa said. “They experience the grace of God’s spirit – self-hatred turns to self-love …. They still have problems like we do, but they can deal with life’s challenges from a place of integrity and honesty and much deeper self-knowledge, knowing how precious they are to God.”

She addressed the issue of the use of hormone therapy for children, with many arguing that children don’t know who they are and that hormone therapy would not be right for them. Until last year, she said, children who believed they were transgender had to have parental consent up to the age of 18 for hormone treatment or surgery. That age has been changed to 16, she said.

Some arguments claim that “any kid can walk up and say they’re transgender,” Sister Luisa noted. “But the norm is to go slowly and very carefully” before prescribing hormone therapy or surgery. “If the child is persistent, consistent, and insistent for [only] six months, it doesn’t make the criteria” for transgenderism. “It’s judged case by case.” Some children might have been misdiagnosed. “There are not enough doctors trained well enough. But for the most part, transgender children are getting the appropriate care.”