The group of trans women from South Jakarta dressed in their finest. They wore feathers, silk, glitter and long eyelashes. They all wore rosaries around their necks.
“Pope Francis deserves our best attire,” said Elvi Gondhoadjmodjo, as the group prepared to see the pope on Thursday during his visit to Indonesia.
For many trans women living on the margins of society here, the Catholic Church is a safe haven, and Pope Francis, with his messages of tolerance and openness toward the LGBTQ community, has become a personal hero. They were excited about his four-day visit.
“When Francis was elected pope, I realized that God was really listening,” said Mami Yuli, a community leader and a devout Catholic who has a rosary tattooed on her chest. “It is not the pope but God himself who visits us.”
At the shelter where many of them live, the group of 10 trans women piled into two rental cars and headed to Jakarta’s Bung Karno Stadium, where the pope was to hold a Mass later Thursday. They did not have tickets to enter, but they hoped to at least catch a glimpse of the pope from outside.
His enthusiasm and the long-standing closeness between the trans community and the Catholic Church in Jakarta contrast sharply with the less favourable attitudes of the Church in other countries and with the positions expressed by some church officials. But it also shows how Francis’ message of tolerance has resonated in some corners of the Catholic world thousands of miles from the Vatican.
“Pope Francis has asked us several times not to judge them,” said the Rev. Agustinus Kelik Pribadi, a priest at St. Stephen’s Catholic Church in South Jakarta. He was referring to the pope’s famous question “who am I to judge?” about gay priests, which many saw as reflecting his general attitude toward the LGBTQ community. “We must listen.”
Catholics are a very small minority in predominantly Muslim Indonesia. But dozens of transgender women who were not born into the Church have been baptized in Jakarta in recent years. They came from almost every corner of the country, according to the Rev. Adrianus Suyadi, a Jesuit priest at Jakarta Cathedral.
The ties between the Church and Jakarta’s transgender community are the result of the work of the city’s archbishop, Cardinal Ignatius Suharyo Hardjoatmodjo, the priests said. The cardinal instructed priests to welcome transgender people into their parishes as part of an effort to respect human dignity. Mami Yuli, the leader of the transgender community, also lobbied the church.
The result was a rare and endearing bond.
“I often went to the salon and got my hair cut with his group,” Father Pribadi said.
But overall, the transgender community continues to face rejection and discrimination in Indonesia. Many remain homeless and others turn to sex work to survive, community members say.
Once a month, more than 50 trans women attend a prayer meeting at the cathedral, Father Suyadi said. Many attend cooking classes organized by the church, and two have become instructors.
“When I go to church, no one judges me,” said Gondhoadjmodjo, 40, who was baptized in 2022 and said she began volunteering as a teacher because of the Church. “That makes me more confident that I want to be Catholic.”
Mika Horulean, another 26-year-old trans woman, attends Catholic trans counseling meetings, where they discuss their experiences, every Friday on Zoom. “Romo is amazing,” she said, addressing Father Suyadi with a word that means father in Javanese.
Church teachings oppose gender transition, but Francis has long urged clerics to welcome LGBTQ Catholics into the Church. He hosted a group of transgender women at the Vatican for a luncheon. He approved a Vatican document making clear that transgender people can be baptized and declared that laws criminalizing homosexuality are “unjust.”
But Francis has also walked a tightrope between his personal call for greater openness on the part of the Church and the defense of Church doctrine.
The Vatican recently published a document approved by Francis stating that the Church believes that transition surgery is an affront to human dignity. The Pope also recently used a slur to refer to homosexuals, an episode that highlighted the Church’s complicated relationship with gender and sexuality.
Still, South Jakarta’s transgender community has focused on Francis’ positive message and openness.
“For us LGBT people in Indonesia, there has never been someone so high-profile sending a message of inclusion,” said Mami Yuli.
“He is much more courageous than the other popes who preceded him,” she said, standing next to his small shrine at the shelter, with a statuette of Mary and a picture of Jesus. “His message is a message of love and of paying attention to ordinary people.”
There remains some resistance among Indonesia’s Catholic bishops. Father Suyadi said his proposal to the local bishops’ conference to allow Mami Yuli to meet the Pope was rejected.
Bunda Mayora, a 37-year-old trans woman from Maumere, a town in Flores, in eastern Indonesia, is also involved in the local Church. She was watching live on television as the Pope met with Indonesian bishops on Thursday.
She was disappointed that LGBTQ Catholics had not been invited to the Mass led by the Pope.
The disappointment extended to the stadium on Thursday. A few hours after the group of trans women demonstrated in front of the stadium, police prevented them from remaining at the stadium entrance with their Francis banner and colorful clothing. The group headed home even before the Pope arrived.
“They can’t welcome us here,” said Devine Selviana Siahaan, one of the trans women at the stadium. “But I can still talk to Francis in my dreams.”
#Pope #finds #fervent #supporters #Indonesias #transgender #community
