Galileo Church in Fort Worth, Texas has launched a nonprofit organization to pay families and children to travel out of state and receive gender mutilative surgeries, cross-sex hormones, and puberty blockers.
The North Texas Transportation Network (NTTN) allows individuals from the 19 counties within the Dallas Fort Worth Metroplex— Collin, Cooke, Dallas, Denton, Ellis, Erath, Fannin, Grayson, Hood, Hunt, Johnson, Kaufman, Navarro, Palo Pinto, Parker, Rockwall, Somervell, Tarrant, Wise—to apply.
NTTN’s $1,000 travel voucher application requires the applicant to be a “gender diverse” or “transgender” minor within the DFW Metroplex.
They also say that this process relies on volunteer donations and will likely take more than two weeks to complete, so NTTN warns that this is “probably not a suitable option for urgent care.”
Applicants, families, donors, and leading committee members are also not required to have any “religious participation or belief.”
Galileo Church, founder of NTTN, sees child gender mutilative procedures as “healthcare” and believes, “Health care is a human right, and withholding necessary care for trans kids is state-sponsored cruelty.”
NTTN was launched this summer after Gov. Greg Abbott signed Senate Bill 14, which bans child gender mutilation procedures, into law.
However, because the law does not define child gender mutilation as child abuse, Galileo Church’s program does not explicitly violate the law.
Galileo Church is described on its Facebook page as a “quirky, LGBTQ-friendly church seeking spiritual refugees in Fort Worth, Texas, and beyond.”
The “church’s” missional priorities are listed on their website as:
- We do justice for LGBTQ+ humans, and support the people who love them.
- We do kindness for people with mental illness and in emotional distress, and celebrate neurodiversity.
- We do beauty for our God-Who-Is-Beautiful.
- We do real relationship, no bullshit, ever.
- We do whatever it takes to share this good news with the world God still loves.
Church administrators explained on their website that their first missional priority—“do justice for LGBTQ+ humans”— is why they launched NTTN.
NTTN’s website links to several LGBT-affirming organizations as sources for gender-dysphoric children “seeking help.”
The first source is LGBTQ Saves. This organization aims to “provide safe and brave spaces for social and personal development of LGBTQ youth.”
They also include several resources on gender mutilative surgery providers, where to get cross-sex hormones and puberty blockers, how to change names and gender markers, and housing if a child does not feel “safe” at home.
The Trevor Project, a controversial nonprofit focused on LGBTQ youth suicide prevention, is also listed as a source on NTTN’s website. The Trevor Project offers advice about sexual orientation and gender identity and hosts online chats between LGBTQ teens and adults ages 13-24.
Finn’s Place is the last source NTTN’s website provides to children. Its website defines Finn’s Place as a “community center in Fort Worth, TX for trans and gender-diverse people to gather, grow, and flourish.”
Finn’s Place is partnered with several LGBT+ organizations and HIV/AIDS advocates including LGBTQ Saves, TransVive, Our Sister’s Closet, and Transcendence International.
According to CBS News, there have been two applicants so far. One family’s application has been accepted and the funds provided.
“The North Texas TRANSportation Network provides travel grants for North Texas families seeking out-of-state health care for trans or gender-diverse minors,” Galileo’s Reverend Katie Hays told Texas Scorecard. “Galileo Church is the founder and coordinator of NTTN, because Jesus calls us to be good neighbors to vulnerable people.”
Texas Family Project President Brady Gray told Texas Scorecard, “Any church that would support the destruction of a child made in the image of God is no church at all.”
“To subvert the law for these evil intents goes against everything the Bible teaches,” Gray continued. “The Texas Family Project will continue the fight against these reprehensible organizations to defend children and ensure they know that they are fearfully and wonderfully made, just as God intended.”
