There is actually a Gospel passage where Jesus has commissioned 70 missionaries to go out to towns around, and Jesus specifically gave instructions on how they were to behave. If they were rejected by the locality, they were to leave, and "Shake the dust of the town off your feet" and wiggle their fannies on to some other town. The story says that they all returned pretty darned happy, so I believe they all found acceptance some where, if not everywhere.
The subject of acceptance in my life began with something other than my GD, although I now know it was working there too. 50 years ago at age 16 I found myself totally unable to take the Bible literally. I love the Bible and have read it through several times in several versions but it is a story of men searching for Right Relations with a deity who can keep a whole world of people together in spiritual harmony. Political harmony will follow naturally to spiritual harmony. I know that may sound like a ton of other religious teaching, but to me it does end up with that goal. Taken with a bit of ancient history from non Christian Church sources, the so called clobber passages thrown out by non-Trans*/GLB -tolerant folks, these were religious practices of other religions in the neighborhood and Jews and later Christians, wanted to keep their worship practices and their adherents out of the bad stuff the church on the other side of town did. The passages did not have a relationship to the home-life of Christians, only the public worship life.
To me, my non-literalistic views have lead me to find that my being Trans* gives me a spiritual view that Cis Folk cannot have, and I have developed a peacefulness with that thought. I am a practicing member of a major U.S. church whose Constitution & Canons say that I as Trans* am welcome in all areas of the church life and ministry. My views are free to be spoken and my spiritual experiences will be listened to without condemnation. I shook dust from another spiritual community off my feet half a century ago.
