Growing up in rural Western New York, Micah Cronin couldn’t have imagined his present role as dean of the Episcopal cathedral in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He was raised in more conservative churches, and as a young adult, “I did not feel that I fit there,” he said, because they were not fully accepting of him as a transgender man.
At the same time, Cronin’s faith was as central to his identity as his gender, and he told himself, “I don’t think it’s feasible to me to not be Christian.”
Then at age 19, he began attending worship services at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church, a small congregation in Olean, New York. “They welcomed me immediately and beautifully, so I said, I guess I’m Episcopalian now,” Cronin said.
Now 30, Cronin has followed his spiritual calling to the priesthood, and in August he began as dean of All Saints’ Cathedral, an LGBTQ+-affirming congregation in downtown Milwaukee with an average Sunday attendance of about 70. He is thought to be the first transgender dean of any Episcopal cathedral and also one of the youngest.
His top priority is settling in with his new congregation, though he also sees himself and other transgender Episcopal leaders as playing a vital role in at a time when the Trump administration and many of its Republican supporters have vilified transgender people in both their rhetoric and their policies.
“Just by me existing as a trans person and as a priest, I get to have conversations with people that very few people get to have,” he said. “I think we have a chance to preach the gospel in places it wouldn’t otherwise be heard.”
Other trans Episcopalians are celebrating Cronin’s new role as dean.
“It is so moving how the Episcopal Church has been a place where [Cronin] could follow Jesus authentically and step more fully into his vocation as a human being and a priest,” said Cameron Partridge, rector of St. Aidan’s Episcopal Church in San Francisco, California, who is active in the group TransEpiscopal.
Partridge, in a statement for this story, noted that Gari Green, a founding member of TransEpiscopal, was a priest in the former Diocese of Milwaukee until her death in 2024, the same year that the state’s three Episcopal dioceses reunited as the Diocese of Wisconsin.
“I think Gari would see this moment as a true sign of hope and transformative possibility for our church and our world.”
Aaron Scott, the Episcopal Church staff officer for gender justice, also invoked Green’s legacy as one of the church’s first openly trans priests. He said Cronin and All Saints’ Cathedral are showing “what it looks like when Christians remove those stumbling blocks, so that God and the people can simply call the right person for the job.”
Being the first transgender cathedral dean underscores for Cronin how he and other transgender Episcopalians feel at home in their denomination. The climate outside the church, however, is much different. Cronin called it “unnerving” to see the United States backsliding after progress over previous decades toward greater acceptance of LGBTQ+ people.
The political attacks on trans people have been particularly shocking.
“Trans people are kind of being used as a sort of bogeyman,” he said. “I am really proud of how far the Episcopal Church has moved to welcome and include,” he said. —Episcopal News Service
