Quote:A teachers’ union in Scotland outraged Christians by promoting a controversial play that depicts Jesus Christ as transgender.

The Education Institute of Scotland (EIS), a union that claims to represent approximately 80% of the country’s lecturers and teachers, is holding a Pride event that will feature excerpts from the play titled “The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven,” according to The Christian Institute.

“The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven,” was written by Jo Clifford, a transgender person who used to go by the name John. It is slated to feature at “School’s Almost Out! Celebrate Pride,” on June 17 and “invites us to imagine Jesus coming back to Earth in the present day as a trans woman,” according to the EIS.

Clifford, who identifies as female and Christian, explained to the BBC in 2015 that “the play imagines a transgender Jesus coming back to the world today. She pitches a sermon and tells a few very familiar gospel stories.”

“She has a communion, shares bread and wine with the audience, which is really a gesture of solidarity in the face of death and she gives a blessing,” Clifford added. “So it’s a very important, very intimate show.”

“I think it’s very important to get across the message that Jesus of the Gospels would not condone or want to promote prejudice and discrimination against anybody and to try to convey a message of compassion and love and understanding of everybody,” Clifford also said.

“No matter what their belief, no matter what their gender, orientation or sexuality.”

The Christian Institute’s Education Officer John Denning said, “This play deliberately re-imagines Jesus as a trans woman and puts words into his mouth that he never said, misrepresenting him. That’s deeply distressing and offensive for many Christians who value him and his teaching above all.”

“It is hard to see how a teaching union justifies using the subscriptions paid by its members, many of whom are themselves Christians, to promote this play,” Denning added.

Pastor Jack Bell, who pastors Zion Baptist Church in Glasgow, claimed in 2009 that Muslims would not tolerate Muhammad being subjected to such a depiction, and said Collins is abusing freedom of speech as an excuse to blaspheme.

“If this play had treated the [Islamic] prophet Muhammed in the same way there would have been a strong reaction from the Islamic community, but that just wouldn’t happen,” Bell said. “You can’t blaspheme God and use freedom of speech as an excuse for that. True biblical Christianity is becoming marginalized through political correctness.”

Many were also outraged in 2016 when the play was performed in a Church of England church, prompting rebukes from some bishops. Michael Nazir-Ali, the former Church of England Bishop of Rochester, said: “It is quite clear from the Gospels that the identity of Jesus is male, his ‘mum’ is Mary and he always refers to God as ‘Father,’ so to suggest otherwise is contrary to Christian teaching.”