I've been waiting for some news before posting about this, and I finally got the news, so here it goes.
I've gone to a camp for the past seven years of my life, three of which were leadership programs, so I know most of the staff pretty well by now. It's a non-denominational Christian camp. Now that I've finished the leadership programs, I applied for a job as a service crew member and informed the man who hires people that I intend to start openly identifying as Dean this summer. It took me a LONG time to build up the courage to tell him, but I knew that I'd regret not applying. I knew that I couldn't bear to delay transition any longer, so I had to chose between not applying or coming out to them.
I sent an email coming out and anxiously awaited a response. (I sent it out right after their Christmas vacation began, so I was waiting a while)
And when I finally got a reply from this man who knew me for a long time, he was extremely respectful and addressed the email to Dean. I even got invited in for an interview.
When I went in for the interview, everyone was extremely respectful and nobody slipped up and used my birthname, which meant an incredible amount to me. The interview also included talking about how being trans would affect my being at camp and such, and they made it very clear that IF it affected my being hired, it would be out of my own personal safety among the other staff rather than any of their personal beliefs. (They explained that they strongly adhere to being a non-denominational camp, and thus acknowledge that while their own personal beliefs may be one thing, they do not represent the beliefs and goals of the camp itself and hire accordingly; the main focus of the camp is to teach campers to love as Christ loved). They also mentioned that they had received several applications by other people in the same leadership program I went through there, and there were only two positions available.
I finally heard back about the job yesterday. Sadly, I did not get it, but I feel pretty confident that the reason was not a prejudice against transpeople. Maybe they decided they were too worried for my personal safety or maybe they simply decided the other applicants were stronger, but I know that even if I had not come out, there was still a good chance I wouldn't get a position since there are only two.
I just wanted to share this over here because I always love seeing other Christians behave in a loving and respectful way, especially to people whom are stereotypically attacked by religious people. It means so much to me to see Christians out there who don't question or judge, they simply respect someone's identity.
