Pray That It Gets Better

 
I mentioned recently that I reluctantly wrote a letter to a conservative Christian organization saying that they could no longer use our facilities. I didn't want to do so, but the strongly negative view of LGBT "behaviour" held by this organization working with youth led to my decision. A recent incident in the States makes me rest easier about the letter. Here is the report from the BBC:

"If you are reading this, it means I have committed suicide and obviously failed to delete this post from my queue."

So starts a suicide note written by Leelah Alcorn, a 17-year-old transgender teenager who died this week in the US state of Ohio. Alcorn scheduled the note to be published several hours after her death.

In the letter posted on Tumblr, she said she killed herself after years of struggling with her strict Christian parents' refusal to acknowledge her true identity as a female.

"There's no winning. There's no way out... People say 'it gets better' but that isn't true in my case. It gets worse. Each day I get worse," Alcorn wrote in the post which has since been reblogged more than 196,000 times. The hashtag #LeelahAlcorn also went viral, with more than 243,000 mentions over two days.

Alcorn ended her note with a plea: "The only way I will rest in peace is if one day transgender people aren't treated the way I was... My death needs to mean something. Fix society. Please."

Heart-breaking. Let's pray that 2015 will be a year of greater understanding and compassion in every facet of society. Is it too much to ask that Christians will lead the way?