The material below is a small passage from a book by a Roman Catholic author on the subject of sexual morality. This specific passage offers an interesting moral examination of changing sex. Not quite what I expected when I started researching it - a decent treatment of a difficult subject.
Sexual Morality: A Catholic Perspective, by Philip S. Keane, S.S.
NIHIL OBSTAT: Peter F. Chirico, S.S., S.T.D. Censor Librorum
IMPRIMATUR: Raymond G. Hunthausen, Archbishop of Seattle.
Citation: Keane, P. S. (1977). Sexual Morality: A Catholic Perspective. New York, NY: Paulist Press, pp. 178 - 180.
"Sex-Changing Surgeries and Related Processes There are two major types of cases in which sex-changing surgery is an issue. The first type of case concerns persons born with both testicular and ovarian tissue (hermaphrodites), and person who are of one sex but in whom hormonal imbalances have produced characteristics of the opposite sex (pseudohermaphrodites). Related to this category would be the situation of persons whose sexual organs are in some way defective (e.g., men whose semen is discharged at the base of the penis instead of the tip). In all such cases, the best moral judgment has held for some time that if medical science can find a means of correcting these problems (through surgery, hormone therapy, mechanical aids, etc.), all well and good. 15 The question, of course, is whether medical science has at its disposal techniques that are really suitable (from the medical viewpoint) to correct the kind of difficulties just described. Some of the problems, such as female pseudohermaphroditism, can be quite successfully treated through hormone therapy and surgery, whereas in other cases the prognosis is not as good. 16 Fortunately, true hermaphroditism is very rare. Ongoing medical research into hermaphroditism and other physical defects in the sexual organs certainly seems to be called for.
The second major type of case involving sex-changing surgery is the case of the person which physically normal sex organs who wishes to be or sincerely believes that he or she is a member of the opposite sex. As we mentioned earlier, persons who fit into this case are usually called transsexuals. Traditional moral theology used to categorize all sex-changing surgery for transsexuals as immoral. Today, using the principle of proportionate reason, it might be argued that, if all other means of dealing with transsexualism (counseling, etc.) have been exhausted, sex-changing surgery might be used as a last resort. Not a great deal has been said in print on this subject by Catholic moralists, but the number of Catholic moralists who would at least privately accept transsexual surgery in certain circumstances seems to be growing. 17
A moral perspective that must enter into our assessment of sex-changing surgery for transsexuals is the perspective of how successfully such surgery can be accomplished. Obviously no perfect means of sex-changing surgery (e.g., enabling reproduction) is now available, but it does not seem that a totally perfect change of sex would be necessary to justify sex-changing surgery for transsexuals. What can be said is that, as of now, the sex-changing process form male to female is much more satisfactorily accomplished than the change from female to male. Hence , as of now, it seems best to apply the last resort justification of transsexual s urgery to the case of males who wish to be or believe they are females. If more effective female-to-male surgeries become available through additional medical advances, these surgeries might also be used.
The notion that seems to underlie the argument for the morality of last-resort sex-change operations for transsexuals is the notion that the human mind is an even more complex and mysterious reality than the human body. The implication is that when there is a major dissonance between the human mind and the human body, it may be easier (and perhaps more moral) to change the human body than to change the human mind. Obviously there are limits as to how far we can go in our efforts to change either the human mind or the human body, but some changes (operations, psychotherapies) are clearly agreed to be moral and ours is a position of continuing reflection on what humans may morally do to themselves with modern science. 18
Notes:
15. Thomas O'Donnell, MM, pp. 259-261. (MM : Morals in Medicine. By Thomas O'Donnell. 2nd Ed. Westminster, Md.: The Newman Press, 1959.)
16. Cf. K&L, pp. 41-42, 106-109, 334. (K & L : Herant A. Katchadourian and Donald T. Lunde. Fundamentals of Human Sexuality. 2nd ed. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1975.)
17. One Roman Catholic moralist who has expressed an openness to such surgeries is John F. Dedek, CME, pp. 77-80. (CME : Contemporary Medical Ethics. By John F. Dedek. New York: Sheed and Ward, 1975.)
18. A subject somewhat related to (but still clearly different from) transsexual surgery is transvestism, the psychic need to wear clothing that will cause one to be perceived as a member of the opposite sex. Older moralists used to condemn transvestism as immoral (cf. Thomas O'Donnell, MM, p. 261). While research on this phenomenon (which may or may not mean that the person wishes to belong to the opposite sex) is very limited, it would seem at present that no one really knows why the disposition to transvestism exists in some persons or how to cause this disposition to change. Hence the moral approach to transvestites would seem to parallel the moral approach to homosexuals. They should be treated with understanding and compassion. Possibly there could be some situations in which the evil of transvestism is an ontic but not a moral evil. "
You can buy a copy of the book at amazon.com or abebooks.com
