Article published November 14, 2009
Gender identity is film topic
Transgender pastor also to be on panel
By DAVID YONKE
BLADE RELIGION EDITOR
The story of an individual with gender identity questions and struggling to find a place within a faith community will be the subject of a movie and panel discussion today in Sylvania.
The Rev. Malcolm Himschoot, an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ now serving a congregation in Minneapolis, is the subject of the documentary Call Me Malcolm, which will be shown at Sylvania United Church of Christ.
After the movie, Mr. Himschoot will participate in a panel discussion.
The event is being sponsored by Equality Ohio, a nonprofit Columbus-based agency that advocates for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender citizens.
"We need to do more, especially in the area of gender identity, and this is an effort to reach out," said Kim Welter, Equality Ohio's director of programs and outreach.
The film and discussion are also intended to raise support and awareness of the Equal Housing and Employment Act, or House Bill 176. The measure, passed by the Ohio house, was sent to the senate and calls for nondiscrimination protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity to Ohioans."People need to feel safe in their jobs, in their housing, and in their community," Ms. Welter said.
Transgender people who are involved in church and faith groups are too often wrongly criticized as being homosexual, which is "an entirely different phenomenon," Ms. Welter said.
She said people struggling with gender identity are stung by such comments as, "You should stay the way God made you," or, "You're mutilating what God created."
Call Me Malcolm is a movie that follows the journey of Malcolm Himschoot beginning in his final year at Iliff School of Theology in Denver.
As a child, Malcolm was known as Miriam but felt that he was a boy just like his two brothers, he said. "But other people perceived me as a girl and I couldn't really correct them. It made me feel like I wasn't there."
The messages he heard in the pews seemed to indicate that God hated him, he said in a press release, and eventually he became estranged from family, friends, and church. It was at seminary that he began the process of "gender transition" and took the major step of asking people to "call me Malcolm."
A camera crew followed Mr. Himschoot as he traveled around the country before the start of the school year, meeting a number of transgender individuals including singer Calpernia Addams; Sgt. Stephen Thorne of the San Francisco Police Department, and Major Griffin-Gracy, a member of the world's first all-transgendered gospel choir, the Transcendence Gospel Choir.
Mr. Himschoot, 33, is an associate minister for outreach at Plymouth Congregational Church in Minneapolis.
More than 100 hours of footage of Mr. Himschoot's story was edited into the feature-length documentary, which was produced by Filmworks, Inc., and the United Church of Christ.
"Call Me Malcolm" will be shown at 10 a.m. today, followed by a panel discussion, at Sylvania United Church of Christ, 7240 Erie St. A free-will offering will be taken.
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