Published May 3, 2025
The Anthropological Revolution and Its Challenge
by Theresa Farnan and Mary Hasson
Pope John Paul II’s encyclical Veritatis Splendor begins with a prophetic warning about the “systematic calling into question of traditional moral doctrine, on the basis of certain anthropological and ethical presuppositions.” His warning, written well before gender ideology permeated law, education, and culture across the developed world, was amplified decades later by Pope Benedict XVI, who recognized the crisis now at hand: “It is now becoming clear that the very notion of being—of what being human really means—is being called into question. . . . According to this philosophy [of gender], sex is no longer a given element of nature, that man has to accept and personally make sense of: it is a social role that we choose for ourselves. . . . The profound falsehood of this theory and of the anthropological revolution contained within it is obvious.”
Gender ideology, the anthropological revolution warned of by Pope St. John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI, emerged on the tailwinds of the twentieth century’s sexual revolution. It was endorsed by powerful interests, promoted by Big Business, Big Tech, and the arbiters of culture, and quickly became the dominant ideology in medicine and education. With the backing of powerful interests, it swept quickly across Europe, the Americas and Australia, then diffused throughout the Caribbean and parts of Asia. In its wake, it left devastating, ongoing harm. (Parts of Africa and the Middle East have eluded its powerful reach, for now.)
Recognizing the dangers it posed, Pope Francis too rejected gender ideology, often quite forcefully. He decried its deconstruction of sex and condemned the lies taught to children, that “everyone can choose his or her sex.” He called its distorted claims “ugly” and “wicked,” and its beliefs “dangerous,” which indeed they are. Premised on a godless autonomy, gender ideology asserts the individual’s right to self-determine an identity that rejects the meaning and permanence of sex, to alter the body according to one’s sex-rejecting desires, to displace one’s natural family with a “chosen family,” and to pursue sexual gratification unconstrained by moral norms or natural obligations. But gender ideology is “dangerous” not just because it is based on lies, but because it is a belief system meant to be lived out. Put differently, faulty anthropological premises lead to faulty moral conclusions, and, eventually, to devastating harm.
The past decade has seen an astounding rise in “LGBTQ” identification: 23 percent of Gen Z (31 percent of young women and 12 percent of young men) identify as “LGBTQ+,” as do nearly 10 percent of American adults overall. “Transgender or gender diverse” identification in U.S. teens also skyrocketed, rising to nearly 10 percent of U.S. teens (Pediatrics 2021). These changes are driven by culture, not nature.
Embracing gender ideology hasn’t produced more happiness, but has only increased risk of poor mental health and other “negative health outcomes.” At gender clinics worldwide, identity-distressed children and adolescents are subjects of experimental interventions that harm their healthy bodies, impair fertility, shrink genitals, stunt emotional growth, disrupt healthy functions, worsen mental health—and, in some cases, lead to amputated breasts or genitals. Despite a more tolerant and inclusive legal and “social environment,” “psychological distress and suicide behavior” among “sexual minority” youth is “worse” than in prior generations. Religiosity and spirituality are low, and declining, among people who identify as “LGBTQ+.”
In short, the world needs the truth, and the support to live it faithfully.
During Pope Francis’s papacy, however, some in the Church portrayed doctrinal fidelity as a barrier to pastoral care, a stumbling block to loving accompaniment, even though it was clear that pastoral outreach detached from the truth neither frees people from the harms of gender ideology nor provides guidance to pastors on the front lines of gender ideology’s “anthropological revolution.” Unfortunately, despite reaffirming the teaching of the Church on this crucial issue, Pope Francis added to the general confusion with a series of well-meaning but confusing pastoral gestures.
First, Francis’s photo ops and public meetings with “LGBTQ” activists sent contradictory messages that undermined his teaching on gender ideology. The media predictably spotlighted these meetings, portraying them as implicit support for gender ideology or outright encouragement for changes to Catholic teaching, an impression reinforced by activists. Francis himself added to the confusion at times through off-the-cuff comments and his clumsy use of wrong-sex pronouns for transgender-identified persons.
After his death, Francis’s past meetings were exploited to suggest he had set in motion an irreversible process that would culminate in changing Catholic teaching on sexuality. Even the pope’s unwillingness to change Catholic teaching on homosexuality has been presented as merely a question of timing, because, as Fr. James Martin, S.J., told ABC News, “there are some places in the Church that aren’t ready for . . . same-sex relations.”
Second, omissions by Pope Francis created ambiguity, confusion, and even pain. He failed to correct misrepresentations of his conversations, even when these misrepresentations were used to undermine Church teaching. Despite repeated public meetings with transgender-identifying persons, including a meeting with the co-director of a U.S. gender clinic, he has never publicly acknowledged the grievous medical harm such gender clinicians have inflicted on vulnerable young people. Where were the photo ops with de-transitioners who lost their breasts or their fertility? Where was the warm embrace for mothers and fathers whose children are still caught in the grips of gender madness? He also failed to publicly encourage same-sex-attracted Catholics committed to chastity. These omissions left these faithful Catholics, already suffering for their fidelity to the truth, bereft of the Holy Father’s comfort and support.
Third, Francis’s inconsistent approach toward pastoral care in matters of identity and sexuality created a culture of ambiguity and confusion. Although Dignitas Infinita (DDF 2024) declared that “any sex change” interventions violate human dignity, Cardinal Fernández “clarified” Dignitas Infinita in a recent speech, seeming to permit such interventions when the person suffers “severe” gender dysphoria or “suicidality.” In a matter of months, the DDF under Francis moved from acknowledging the intrinsic evil of repudiating God’s gift of sexual identity to permitting an evil (“sex change interventions,” “gender transition”), justified by misguided “compassion.” But authentic compassion is always aligned with the truth. Gender ideology leads vulnerable persons toward moral, spiritual, and physical harm, and farther from Christ.
We are indeed in an anthropological revolution, one that subverts the truth and leads persons away from Jesus and toward harm. So what now? Does the Church have the will to confront this revolution? Do the cardinal-electors have the will to select a pope who will uphold the truth about God and the truth about us?
As the cardinals take stock of the state of the Church today, they might consider the following. Our next pope should convey the Church’s beautiful teaching about the human person and human sexuality, clearly and persuasively, emphasizing that these foundational teachings provide the stability necessary for human flourishing. The pope must be willing to acknowledge the brutality and futility of “gender transition,” the disfiguring interventions that alter the body’s appearance and function in a vain attempt to reject one’s sex.
This moment requires realism; the stakes are high. The core of “transgender” identification is the rejection of the givenness of creation, including sex. (“Male and female He created them.”) There can be no compromise. Pastoral care must be grounded in the truth of our given identities, embodied male or female from conception. Pastoral care also must recognize that affirming false identity beliefs leads to suffering, including the collateral damage to others who are compelled to affirm the lies of gender ideology.
The next pope can take concrete steps to communicate the truth about the human person effectively and persuasively. First, use language that reflects reality and affirms the truth. Avoid the language of gender ideology—ideological terms like “transwoman” or “cisgender”—and the misuse of language, for example, pronouns that misrepresent a person’s sex. Terms such as “transgender people” or “LGBTQ people,” intended to be inclusive, instead validate an erroneous anthropology that defines people by sexual desire or felt “identity,” and suggests that a different set of moral teachings apply. The Church must communicate the truth that human beings are much more than their desires, including sexual desires. A desire that is disordered (meaning not ordered toward the good) does not make a person disordered. But unless we can acknowledge that some desires are not ordered toward God, we cannot take action to order our lives toward God. This counter-cultural message requires a pope who is courageous, kind, and an effective communicator.
Finally, the Church faces continued efforts to “queer” its theology. In Germany, for example, the episcopal conference approved documents from their “Synodal Way” that call for rethinking Christian anthropology and including transgender-identified persons in ordained ministries. The Church must speak with authority on this issue, perhaps confronting this anthropological revolution with an encyclical on gender ideology, as Cardinal Eijk previously suggested. This encyclical would give clergy, educators, parents, and others the courage to share the Church’s teaching, confident that Catholic teaching illuminates the way to happiness.
“When people ask the Church the questions raised by their consciences, when the faithful in the Church turn to their Bishops and Pastors, the Church’s reply contains the voice of Jesus Christ, the voice of the truth about good and evil. In the words spoken by the Church there resounds, in people’s inmost being, the voice of God who ‘alone is good’ (cf. Mt 19:17), who alone ‘is love’ (1 Jn 4:8, 16).” (Veritatis Splendor 117)
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George Weigel, Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, is a Catholic theologian and one of America’s leading public intellectuals. He holds EPPC’s William E. Simon Chair in Catholic Studies.
