“Gender Ideology” and the Catholic Morality of Gender-Enhancing Treatment and Sex Change

This chapter aims to sociologically unpack and clarify the Catholic Church’s concept of “gender ideology” and analyze the morality of gender-enhancing treatment and surgical procedures in light of Pope Francis’s synodal inductive approach. It argues that the traditional philosophical moral approach grounded in natural law theory is inadequate to morally analyze these contemporary sexual issues. It recommends the sociological approach of inquiring into the motives and not just the meaning of these “unnatural” external acts before passing moral judgment, and applying the principle of double effect to understand the morality of transgenderism, gender-enhancing treatment, and transgender sexuality to resolve the moral panic of “gender ideology” in the Catholic Church.