Dear Pastor __________,
I am looking for a church home and would like to discuss a possible affiliation with __________. For you to make an assessment of our compatibility, I would like to share some important background information.
As a youth I was raised Catholic and had many spiritual questions but the church offered no vehicle for open discussion and resolution of those questions. I couldn't just pretend to go along because I felt so hypocritical. Eventually the combination of restrictive dogma and guilt caused me to leave the Catholic Church. I didn't attend any church on a regular basis for many years.
Eventually I found a charismatic Christian church that served my needs well for several years. The worship services provided a safe place for me to release a lot of the emotional and religious baggage that I had been dragging around most of my life. Through their home fellowship program I had an opportunity to discuss many of the spiritual issues and questions that I had. Although many answers continued to elude me, I felt the freedom to openly discuss them without fear and without constantly bumping against walls of immovable dogma. Unfortunately, the assistant pastor who led our fellowship group died, and the head pastor became a rather controversial figure and once again I found myself un-churched.
Although I had resolved most of my emotional and spiritual issues, one significantly painful item remained and I embarked on an effort of understanding it. It took several years but I have finally found myself at peace and ready to rejoin a church. The difficulty is that this issue is somewhat controversial and I am uncertain how it will be received. Nonetheless, it is clearly a part of me and I won't continue to hide it. So here it is -- the label society would apply to me is transvestite or cross-dresser. I believe that God accepts the truth about me, and I need a church home that can do the same.
I have included two items that might help you achieve a clearer understanding of the situation. The first is a poem from my book, The Bliss of Becoming One!, (that has received excellent reviews throughout the cross-dressing community) that puts my cross-dressing into a more balanced perspective. The second is an extract of an article of mine that addresses the Scriptural viewpoint. I hope they add some valuable perspective.
So my requirements for a church home are basically two:
It encourages open dialog and discussion of religious/spiritual questions and
It can accept me as I am, a cross-dresser.
I am very willing to discuss how we might approach this situation. We can meet privately and I will dress conventionally. My wife would likely attend services with me even though she herself is Jewish and wouldn't officially join the church. Although I live in Walnut Creek, for confidentiality I have used my cross-dresser name and address. Please let me know how we can proceed.
Sincerely,
Rachel Miller