GAY TRUTH

The California Court of Appeals ruled that a transgender patient can sue a Catholic hospital for refusing to perform a hysterectomy. Yesterday, the California Court of Appeals issued a truly remarkable opinion in a truly remarkable case. It held that a Catholic hospital could indeed face legal liability for failing to perform a hysterectomy as part of a female-to-male “transition” — even though its policy broadly bans sterilization surgery generally (not just for trans individuals) and even though the hospital referred the patient to a non-Catholic facility in the same network. The patient obtained the hysterectomy a mere three days after the originally scheduled surgery date and sued anyway. The facts of the case are simple . The plaintiff, Evan Minton, initially scheduled a hysterectomy for August 30, 2016, at Mercy San Juan Medical Center (part of the Dignity Health hospital network) as a treatment for gender dysphoria. Mercy is a Catholic hospital, and the day before the

In January, Jionni Conforti sued St. Joseph’s Regional Medical Center in Paterson, New Jersey , because in 2015 the hospital would not remove her uterus. Conforti, 33, identifies as “transgender” and wanted the surgery as part of trying to become a male. She had already had a double mastectomy. In June 2016, the Catholic hospital refused. Conforti v St. Joseph’s Conforti had the hysterectomy performed at another hospital, but still sued. She is asking the court to force the hospital to perform sex-change or “gender-reassignment” operations in the future and award her damages. Her legal counsel, the homosexual organization Lambda Legal , argues that the hospital refused to perform “routine surgery” that was “medically necessary treatment for his gender dysphoria.” The refusal was “dangerous and humiliating” and violated both New Jersey law and the Affordable Care Act. Lambda Legal also claims the surgery was needed to reduce the risk of cancer from the hormonal treatment she was