The decline of transgenderism in public life does not mean the ideology is defeated. The church must not rest while young lives remain in captivity to this destructive movement.
Think back to the summer of 2023. The Los Angeles Dodgers invited a blasphemous group of drag queens known as “The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence” to perform at their pride night. Men identifying as women danced with their fake breasts exposed on the White House lawn during its pride celebration. Richard Levine, a man donning a dress and caked with makeup, going by the name Rachel, was the US Assistant Secretary of Health, and both Target and Bud Light were the objects of significant boycotts due to their full-fledged support of transgenderism.
Two short years ago, the transgender movement was everywhere. Both politically and culturally, there was a full-court press by the powers that be to mainstream this ideology. And across Christian and conservative culture, this was the hot-button issue that everyone was talking about.
The Retreat of Transgenderism
Since the re-election of Donald Trump last fall, it has been noted that the cultural craze of transgenderism seems to have gone into retreat and is on the verge of vanishing entirely. In a far cry from its 2023 counterpart, June of 2025 featured both poorly attended and flat-out canceled pride celebrations in cities across North America, along with a number of corporations beginning to back away from the rainbow—pulling sponsorships of pride parades, refraining from changing their logos on social media, and relegating LGBTQ merchandise to less prominent positions on store shelves were all subtle means of responding to the cultural shift.
More significantly, several states have begun to outlaw so-called “gender affirming care” for minors. In the wake of all these changes, many conservatives have been eager to declare victory over the entire ideology, and thus have relegated it to the back burner as immigration and foreign wars have become the new issues of the day.
It is clear that transgenderism, in all its absurdity, has fallen from its brief moment in the mainstream and has become politically toxic. However, its decline in popularity has seemed to correlate with a disengagement not only on the part of conservative culture warriors, but also of the church. As this enemy of truth has seemingly lost its public zeal, so the zeal of those fighting on the side of truth has faded. Yet the church must not allow this to happen.
The Minneapolis Tragedy
The tragic shooting at a Catholic church in Minneapolis by a transgender-identifying man, killing two school children, underscores why Christians must not follow the political trends and back away from this issue in the name of a shallow, cultural victory. It has been easy to conclude that the public retreat of transgenderism marked a final defeat.
Yet in the wake of this shooting, leftists both in office and in the mass media have snapped right back into their most radical positions, insisting that this is the moment to unwaveringly support the “trans community,” condemning anyone who brings up the adopted identity of the shooter, and even obscuring this identity while insisting that the motive remains unclear, and of course respecting the murderer’s preferred pronouns.
These realities make it abundantly clear that there has been no genuine move away from the radical LGBTQ agenda on the part of the Left, even if there have been some political recalculations. If they were back in power, they would continue to push forward the same perverse and destructive policies we saw in the early 2020s—as indeed many Democrat run states are still actively doing.
Beyond Politics: The Church’s Responsibility
However, these political considerations are beside the main point. After all, politics are ever-changing based on the moods and whims of an ungrounded and reactionary populous. The real concern is that the church does not follow these whims and neglects addressing the urgent problem that transgenderism still poses. The Minneapolis shooting serves as a tragic reminder of this urgency in at least a couple of ways.
Transgenderism as an Enemy of God
Transgender ideology is and continues to be more than merely a mistaken anthropology—it is a great enemy of the Creator God and His gospel; in case anyone forgot this, the circumstances surrounding this shooting should be a grave reminder. The target itself—a Catholic church—makes this obvious even on a surface level. Yet as the disturbing details of the crime have emerged, the nature of this enemy has been even more clearly revealed.
The extensive video and journal entries left by the shooter expose the legitimately demonic nature of this belief system. In these, he mused over his targets, specifically determining to go after Catholic children and fantasizing over them begging him for their lives. In one of the videos, a picture of Jesus was hanging on a target, apparently the object of his shooting practice.
On his rifle magazines were written various overtly anti-Christian messages, such as “Where is your God?” and “Take this and eat,” and one of his journal entries featured a drawing depicting himself as a demon. It would seem that this man was undoubtedly under the influence of demons, which is unsurprising given that he was a disciple of a religion that denies the Creator, despises the body, and demands actual physical mutilation.
It is a short road to travel from the explicit hatred of God, such that one hates and destroys his own body made in God’s image, to the hatred and destruction of others bearing that same image and worshiping the God who made them.
The Broader Impact of Transgender Ideology
Even when it is not taken to this sort of violent extreme, this seething hatred of God undergirds transgenderism. Taking the original Satanic confession, “Did God really say?”, from the academic, theoretical realm of atheism and moral relativism, transgenderism seeks to extend its Creator denial into every sphere of life, consistently applying its relativism to the physical world, reducing itself to the most profane absurdity.
Any ideology so desperate to erase the fingerprints of the Creator and so bent on making the individual a god that it calls for grotesque bodily mutilation and a life sold out to lying is plainly demonic. This does not mean that every person in this movement is literally possessed or oppressed by demons—though some certainly are—but when a person believes and lives out the doctrine of demons, we can expect to see a demonstration of demonic behavior from them, as witnessed by the Minneapolis shooter.
The Church’s Call to Action
With all this firmly in our minds, the church must also soberly acknowledge and take up its responsibility to meet this demonic enemy with the one weapon that can defeat it: the gospel of peace and reconciliation. Transgender identifying individuals are indeed enemies of God, as we all once were. This means that they, like us, must be called to repentance and faith and so be freed from the grip of the false gods they are serving.
The obvious nihilism, discontentment, and radical desperation of transgender identifying people make them a prime target for Christian evangelism. Not only do they demonstrate a willingness to sacrifice for what they believe in and to fully buy into their religion, but their desperate and gruesome attempts to find peace and happiness betray a profound disillusionment with the modern world.
A person who is willing to suppress the truth to such an extreme degree and who is in his person experiencing the horrifying consequences of that suppression needs a straightforward, hard truth. Such an individual is seeking clear direction and a confident voice to guide them in that direction.
The Influence of Online Radicalism
Unfortunately, there is no shortage of willing voices competing for the impressionable hearts and minds of deeply lost and troubled young people, especially in the online world. Apparently, this young man was highly influenced by this online radicalism, with references to the “Free Palestine” movement, anti-Zionism, and anti-Semitism, and other religio-political movements that enjoy a popular following in the virtual world found in his writings.
What is worse is that the shooter also apparently expressed a desire in his writing to “de-transition,” to renounce his transgender identity, yet did not do so for fear of the social cost. I suspect that many caught in the LGBTQ movement are experiencing similar regret and disenchantment as the devastating reality of what they have done to themselves settles in.
And these people lost in wickedness, stewing in their regret and resentment, are ready to follow after those claiming to have the absolute truth, the answer to all of modern society’s problems, and the antidote to their personal anxieties. It is the church that must step forward to provide these answers and proclaim the truth.
The Power of the Gospel
Transgenderism is extraordinarily wicked, and its consequences are extremely destructive. This reality makes repentance from it—renunciation and turning away—all the more difficult. When a person has literally destroyed their body for the sake of an evil and false ideology, how does he turn back from this?
It is easier to move on to the next most radical movement—if such a thing is possible—or to simply finish the job already begun by transgender mutilation and kill the whole body, possibly taking others along the way. The gospel alone is a message powerful enough and thoroughly truthful to deliver one from such deep darkness.
Christians must be intent on not leaving those demonically oppressed and physically devastated people to the predations of increasingly vile ideologies which lead only further down the road of death and destruction. We must be the light in the darkness, seeking out those in captivity and proclaiming to them the glorious liberty won for us by Christ. And even to those who have sought to tear down God’s handiwork in their own bodies, we can proclaim redemption now and the hope of future glory and full restoration in eternity.
A Call to Vigilance
None of this is to say that Christians are somehow responsible for the actions of this shooter. This was a wicked man carrying out the evil desires of his perverse heart. Yet this should be a tragic reminder to Christians that the issue of transgenderism is still a live one, and it requires our attention and intervention.
Do not fall for the conservative line that transgenderism is a conquered foe. Of even more importance, do not neglect the many victims it has already claimed. A large portion of our younger generation has given itself over to this damnable destruction. If we wish to avoid more of this sort of fallout, the church must seek out these hardened sinners and proclaim to them Christ’s message of hope, victory, and glory.
Luke Griffo is an elder and member of leadership at Redeemer Church of South Hills in Bethel Park, PA. Click here for more RCSH Blog posts.
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