Catholic bishops vote to ban gender transition treatment at US hospitals

The Catholic bishops of the United States voted Wednesday to officially declare a ban on gender transition treatment for transgender patients in Catholic hospitals.

The bishops, meeting in the ballroom of a Baltimore hotel, overwhelmingly approved revisions to their directives for the thousands of Catholic institutions and health care providers in the country, formalizing a years-long process for the American church to address treatment options for transgender people.

Bishops will have the autonomy to turn the new directives into law for their dioceses.

According to the Catholic Health Association, more than one in seven patients in the United States receive treatment each day in Catholic hospitals. In some areas, Catholic hospitals are the only medical centers available.

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Most Catholic healthcare institutions have not offered gender transition treatments, including hormonal, psychological, and surgical treatments.

“With respect to gender ideology, I think it’s very important for the church to make a strong statement here,” Bishop Robert Barron of Minnesota’s Winona-Rochester diocese said during public discussion of the revised directives.

The Catholic Health Association thanked the bishops for incorporating much of their feedback into the new directives.

“Catholic providers will continue to welcome those who seek medical care from us and identify as transgender,” the organization said in a statement. “We will continue to treat these people with dignity and respect, which is consistent with Catholic social teaching and our moral obligation to serve all, particularly those who are marginalized.”

The new directives incorporate previous documents on gender identity from the Vatican last year and from the U.S. bishops the year before.

In the 2023 doctrinal note titled “Moral limits to technological manipulation of the human body,” the bishops stated that “Catholic health services should not perform interventions, whether surgical or chemical, that aim to transform the sexual characteristics of a human body into those of the opposite sex, nor participate in the development of such procedures.”

But some parishes and priests welcome transgender Catholics, while others are less accepting.

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“Catholic teaching upholds the priceless dignity of every human life, and for many trans people, gender-affirming care is what makes life livable,” said Michael Sennett, a transgender man who is active in his Massachusetts parish and serves on the board of New Ways Ministry, which advocates for LGBTQ+ inclusion in the Catholic Church.

New Ways Ministry hosted a meeting last year with the late Pope Francis to discuss the treatment of gender transition.

The group’s executive director, Francis DeBernardo, said that for many transgender Catholics he has spoken to, “the transition process was not just a biological necessity, but a spiritual imperative,” adding: “If they were going to live as authentic people in the way they believe God made them, then transitioning becomes necessary.”

Also on Wednesday, as American Catholic bishops discussed gender identity, the heads of several progressive religious denominations issued a statement in support of transgender people.

“At a time when our country is subjecting its lives to increasingly serious threats, there is a shameful misconception that all people of faith are not affirming across the gender spectrum; many of us are. Let it be known, instead, that our loved ones are created in the image of God, holy and complete,” read the statement from the 10 signatories, including the heads of the Unitarian Universalist Association, the Episcopal Church, the Union for Reform Judaism and the Church Presbyterian (USA).

In addition to the Catholic bishops’ discussion of gender identity, they overwhelmingly approved a “special message” condemning the Trump administration’s immigration agenda.

Catholic leaders have criticized the president’s mass deportation agenda as fear of immigration raids has reduced mass attendance in some parishes.

Earlier this year, the federal government revoked a directive from the Biden administration for immigration agents not to conduct enforcement operations in sensitive areas such as churches and hospitals.

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“We are disturbed when we see among our people a climate of fear and anxiety around issues of profiling and immigration enforcement,” read the bishops’ Wednesday statement. “We are saddened by the state of the contemporary debate and the vilification of immigrants. We are concerned about the conditions in detention centers and the lack of access to pastoral care.”

Several bishops also rose to speak in favor of the declaration during the final discussion of the afternoon.

Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich even recommended stricter language around mass deportation, and his fellow bishops agreed.

“That seems to be the core issue we face with our people right now,” he said.

The updated text now states that the American Catholic bishops “oppose the indiscriminate mass deportation of people.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.