Pastor to Scot Govt: ‘Biological sex no mere social construct’

A Free Church of Scotland pastor has told the Scottish Government that Christians cannot be silent on the truth of biological sex, amid its push to make changing legal sex much easier.

Revd Stephen Allison said: “The Bible clearly teaches God created us male or female. We believe that sex cannot be reduced to a mere social construct but is a core part of our humanity.”

The Scottish Government’s proposals on changing legal sex include removing the need for applicants to provide any medical evidence, reducing the two-year waiting period to three months and even allowing those as young as 16 to legally alter their birth sex.

Being human

As a spokesman for the Free Church of Scotland, Allison stressed that: “Proposals to allow changes to sex or gender have a major impact on what it means to be human.”

He urged Holyrood to “think very seriously before changing these definitions, which will have widespread implications across society”.

“As Christians, we are called to care for all people who are made in the image of God, but we are not convinced that always affirming someone’s beliefs is the right way to care for them.”

Public opposition

Allison’s comments coincided with concerns voiced by women’s rights groups.

For Women Scotland Director Marion Calder said it was “utterly shameful and disrespectful that in the final weeks before this Bill is published that the government should go through a tick-box exercise — meeting women’s groups, cramming meetings into a few days — to claim they have consulted women organisations representing the views of many”.

Opinion polls have indicated that the reforms are unpopular with the Scottish public, with a December poll of more than 1,000 over-16s finding that 71 per cent opposed self-identification for changing gender.

And earlier this week, women’s rights groups took the Scottish Government to court over its move to change the meaning of “sex” in the March 2022 census. The groups say the change to include men who identify as women would prevent accurate data collection and would remove single-sex spaces.