SALISBURY, Md. – They are two powerful images. Each symbolizing strength and determination but in very different ways. Bruce Jenner was the example athletes looked up to. He was the world's greatest. Today, *he is now a *she and her name is Caitlyn. Today, Jenner is not on a Wheaties box, instead she graces the cover of Vanity Fair, a symbol of strength and determination that sets an entirely different example.
The executive director of Camp Rehoboth, a non-profit aimed at promoting community cooperation thinks Caitlyn's story is a positive one for the transgender community. "It brings this issue to the forefront and the ability for us to talk about the struggles that people who are transgender are having, makes it easier when its somebody that's well known.”
Robert Reinert, the pastor at Faith Baptist Church in Salisbury, doesn't share the same views as Elkins. He says Caitlyn's story concerns him but doesn't surprise him. “God created male and female in his own image,” Reinert says, “and he didn't make a mistake when he did that.”
Reinert says, at times, the Christian view on transgender men and women comes across harshly. He says that is not the proper way to address what he says is a growing separation between society and the church. “There is no set standard of what is right and what is wrong once you leave the word of God”, says Reinert.
Reinert says the message to those in the transgender community needs to come from a place of love. And not focus on the wrong, but instead focus on the individual.
