Here is Australia’s first transgender priest
Jo Inkpin is the first out transgender priest in Australian history.
In an interview with ABC, Dr Inkpin discusses how she used to wear clothes she found in her grandmother’s house in London.
Dr Inkpin says she used to wear the “gorgeous dresses” way before she figured out her own gender identity.
Now the first Anglican priest in Australia discusses how she wore a Norman soldier costume for a fancy dress made by her father.
She says this was “part of the story of my life”, adding that she was “trapped in a false costume, encased in something that doesn’t fit my spirit”.
Dr Inkpin decided to come out and transition in her 50s.
And the Anglican Church in Australia currently say it is fine for Dr Inkpin to serve as a priest, at least from the time being.
The Church was divided over the same-sex marriage debate.
But the priest says she can no longer hide her true self.
She says she felt “a great sense of peace” when she was ordained in 1986, and that there are also benefits to being a priest.
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Adding: “I think that was a space where sometimes you can exist in a way between sexes — in previous centuries they called it the third sex. And I could mix with women and be more feminine and express myself in different ways.”
In the interview, the rector-in-charge for Auchenflower-Milton in Brisbane went on to say that her wife, Penny Jones, once found a pair of knickers in their bedroom and Dr Inkpin had to explain that they were hers.
She goes on to say that she only recently began to change her mind on her trans identity and that she initially thought she had a sexual fetish.
Dr Inkpin said she was affected by the story of Carol Stone, the first trans priest in England to come out.
She also says her marriage to Penny Jones got more intimate since she came out as transgender.
The priest also said she got to Paris on a flight during which she watched a
Speaking to ABC, Dr Inkpin said: “The film reduced me to tears, it was like a dam burst.
“As soon as I stepped off that plane I knew I was coming home, to myself.”
As she tells this part of her story, she starts gently crying.
“I didn’t want to upset my parish or my family. My counselor said, ‘You are thinking the worst-case scenario, that everyone will reject you’ … I thought, ‘You don’t know churches, they can be awful’.”
