Jesus and the bathroom

Despite reassurances to the LGBTQ community that President Donald Trump is “respectful and supportive of LGBTQ rights,” the Obama administration’s 2016 guidance on transgender students has been rescinded by the Departments of Justice & Education.

Susan Thistlethwaite writes in the Huffington Post:

As a transgender friend of mine told me yesterday, “It was just a matter of time before the Trump administration went on the attack against the transgender community, as we are the weakest link of the LGBTQ community.”

Is the “T” silent in LGBTQ, asked the writer of the article cited above, and as my friend worries? Who will stand for justice when some are under attack?

Another friend, Rev. Susan Russell, an Episcopal priest and activist, knows solidarity, both when it is tested and when it is essential.
She just tweeted,
“This is about bathrooms the way that was about water fountains. #StandWithGavin #protecttranskids #transrights #Resist #LGBTQ
– Susan Russell (@revsusanrussell) February 23, 2017

My transgender friend knows well her stake in this struggle. She worries, based on personal experience, that there will not be solidarity in the LGBTQ community. Trump can sniff out the “least of these” very will [sic]. So will ‘divide and conquer’ work to weaken the struggle for transgender equality?

She continues with the connection to Jesus’ teaching and our living:
“As a Christian pastor and someone who teaches people at Chicago Theological Seminary to be religious leaders, I find it very clarifying to ask the Jesus question, especially in this time when the Trump administration is trying to talk the talk of Christianity and violate the teachings of Jesus at every turn.

The Jesus question is always very concrete, very specific. When did we see YOU? Not somebody like you, or somebody to whom I should feel charitable, or somebody represented by an organization to which, if I have time, I will send a small donation.

No, actually YOU.