By Emma Bubola
The group of transgender women in South Jakarta were putting on their Sunday best. They wore feathers, silk, glitter and long eyelashes. Each one draped a rosary around her neck.
“Pope Francis deserves our best outfit,” Elvi Gondhoadjmodjo said, as the group got ready to catch a glimpse of the pope Thursday during his visit to Indonesia.
For many trans women living on the fringes of society here, the Catholic Church is a safe haven, and Pope Francis, with his messages of tolerance and openness toward the LGBTQ+ community, has become a personal hero. They were excited by his four-day visit.
“When we got Francis as the pope, I realized that God was really listening,” said Mami Yuli, the leader of the community and a devout Catholic who has a likeness of a rosary tattooed on her chest. “This is not the pope but God himself visiting us.”
At the shelter where many of them live, the group of 10 trans women squeezed into two rental cars and drove to the Bung Karno Stadium in Jakarta, where the pope was going to hold a Mass later Thursday. They did not have tickets to enter but hoped they could at least get a glimpse of the pope outside.
Their excitement, and the yearslong closeness between the trans community and the Catholic Church in Jakarta, is a stark contrast with less-favorable attitudes from the church in other countries, and with positions some church officials have expressed. But it also showed how Francis’ message of tolerance has echoed in some corners of the Catholic world thousands of miles from the Vatican.
“Pope Francis has called for us several times not to judge them,” said the Rev. Agustinus Kelik Pribadi, the priest of the St. Stephen Catholic Church in South Jakarta. He was referring to the pope’s famous “Who am I to judge?” question about gay priests, which many felt reflected his general attitude toward the LGBTQ+ community. “We must listen.”
Catholics make up a very small minority in Muslim-predominant Indonesia. Still, dozens of trans women not born into the church have been baptized in Jakarta in recent years. They came from nearly every corner of the country, said the Rev. Adrianus Suyadi, a Jesuit priest at Jakarta’s cathedral.
The ties between the church and the Jakarta trans women community are a result of the work of the city’s archbishop, Cardinal Ignatius Suharyo Hardjoatmodjo, the priests said. The cardinal instructed priests to welcome trans people into their parishes as part of a push to respect human dignity. Mami Yuli also lobbied the church.
The result was a rare and fond bond.
“I often went to the salon and have my hair cut with their group,” Pribadi said.
But overall, the trans community still faces rejection and discrimination in Indonesia. Many are still homeless, and others do sex work to survive, community members said.
Once a month, more than 50 trans women attend a prayer meeting at the cathedral, Suyadi said. Many frequent cooking classes organized by the church, and two have become instructors.
“When I go to the church nobody judges me,” said Gondhoadjmodjo, 40, who got baptized in 2022 and said she had started volunteering as a teacher thanks to the church. “That makes me more sure I want to be a Catholic.”
Mika Horulean, 26, another trans woman, attends Catholic trans-counseling meetings, in which participants discuss their experiences, on Zoom every Friday. “Romo is amazing,” she said, addressing Suyadi with a word that means father in Javanese.
Church teachings oppose gender transition, but Francis has long urged clerics to welcome LGBTQ+ Catholics. He hosted a group of trans women at the Vatican for lunch. He approved a Vatican document that made clear that trans people can be baptized and declared laws that criminalize being gay to be “unjust.”
But Francis has also walked a tightrope between his personal urging for more openness by the church and upholding church doctrine.
Recently, the Vatican issued a document approved by Francis stating that the church believes that transition surgery is an affront to human dignity. The pope also recently used a slur word to refer to gay people, an episode that highlighted the church’s complicated relationship with gender and sexuality.
Even so, South Jakarta’s trans community has focused instead on Francis’ positive messaging and openness.
“For us, LGBT people in Indonesia, there is never someone as high profile who sends a message of inclusiveness,” Mami Yuli said.
“He is much braver than the other popes before him,” she said, as she stood by her small shrine in the shelter, with a statuette of Mary and a picture of Jesus. “His message is a message of love and to pay attention to the little people.”
Some resistance remains among Catholic bishops in Indonesia. Suyadi said his proposal to the local bishops conference to let Mami Yuli meet the pope was rebuffed.
Bunda Mayora, 37, a trans woman in Maumere, a city in Flores, in eastern Indonesia, is also involved with the local church. She was watching on live TV as the pope met with Indonesian bishops Thursday.
She was disappointed because LGBTQ+ Catholics had not been invited to the Mass led by the pope.
The disappointment extended to the stadium Thursday. A few hours after the group of trans women rallied in front of the stadium, police prevented them from standing at the stadium’s entrance with their banner of Francis and colorful clothes. The group headed home even before the pope arrived.
“They cannot receive us here,” said Devine Selviana Siahaan, one of the trans women who was at the stadium. “But I still can talk to Francis in my dreams.”
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