The firmly established default Christian proclamation on the "question" of homosexuality is that being inclined toward it is no different from being inclined toward any other kind of sinful behavior.
"We're all sinners," runs the refrain. "We all struggle to overcome our sinful ways. Homosexuality is a sin. Just like all of us must strive to control our sinful behavior, so the homosexual must strive to overcome his or her sexual predilection. Even if a person is born gay or lesbian -- even if homosexuality is genetic -- a homosexual must still strive to overcome the ungodly behaviors toward which he or she is inclined, the same as we all must overcome our lower nature in order to realize our highest."
That proposition is so logically flawed it should embarrass any Christian who hears it, let alone says it. It completely ignores the crucial, absolute difference between homosexuality and the other sins people typically struggle against committing, which is that committing virtually every kind of sin except homosexuality objectively and tangibly hurts someone. If you lie, steal, cheat, rob, have an extramarital affair, are too greedy, are too selfish, waste your family's money, and/or do any other kind of sin you can think of, someone, in no uncertain or abstract terms, gets hurt. That rule never changes, and it has as much to do with theology or philosophy as a brick to the head has to do with architecture.
But you take the Bible out of the equation, and what grounds is there for determining that homosexuality is wrong? Who does such love hurt? When two men are affectionately holding hands, who is getting hurt? When two women are snuggling together on their couch watching TV, who is being hurt?
Virtually all other behaviors Christians typically considered sinful can be readily understood as objectively and clearly wrong without any reference to the Bible. But you take the Bible out of a Christian's hands, and he has no arrow left to shoot at the gay man or lesbian. He's without recourse, justification, argument. Without his Bible to quote from, he has virtually nothing upon which to base his claim that homosexuality is wrong.
A dim-witted child could see that homosexuality isn't the same as other kinds of sins. It's distinctly, absolutely, categorically different. It's like placing a robot in a pen with a bunch of farm animals, and then claiming that what makes the robot a farm animal is that a book you believe says that robots are farm animals. That's cool for you, but it doesn't change the objective, empirical fact that robots aren't farm animals. You've made the mistake of claiming that a subjective truth of yours is equal to an objective truth of everyone else's in the world. It's not. A robot shouldn't be classified as a farm animal, because it doesn't meet the first, most important criterion of being a farm animal, which is being an animal. Similarly, homosexuality shouldn't be classified as a sin, because it doesn't meet the first, most important criterion of being a sin, which is manifestly causing harm.
I'm a Christian, and no two ways about it. But I can't be a Christian so severely lacking in logical powers that I don't notice the difference between homosexuality and all the other kinds of sins anyone's always doing. The latter hurts people; the former doesn't. They're that far apart.
Also, it's high time Christians were honest about the fact that asserting that homosexuals should stop acting homosexual necessarily means asserting that they should spend their lives never knowing the loving intimacy with another that straight people enjoy and know to be the best and richest experience in life. Asking a homosexual to give up homosexual love isn't at all like asking him to give up booze, or greed, or any other such negative thing. It's asking him to give up love.
If I were gay and lived as most Christians would prescribe for me as ideal, I would live alone. I'd wake up every morning next to no one. I'd never hold hands with my special someone. I'd never kiss or be kissed by my special someone. I'd never cuddle up with someone who meant more to me than anyone else in the world. I would not know the profound pleasure of every day growing older with the only person in the world with whom I shared the deepest aspects of my life. For me, remaining as sinless as possible would mean never knowing love of the sort that all straight people, Christian or not, understand as pretty much the best thing life has to offer.
I hear a lot of Christians asserting that gays and lesbians should stop acting like gays and lesbians. But I never hear any of them saying the unavoidable follow-up to that -- saying what that actually means -- which is that gay and lesbian men and women should spend their lives never experiencing what people most commonly mean when they use the word "love."
When, all along, the Bible couldn't be more clear about love being the primary characteristic of God. (1 John 4:8: "Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love." 1 John 4:16: "God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.")
Something is seriously wrong somewhere in the mix between Christians and Christianity. (And it's spelled Paul -- whom I love, but about whom we really should be more clear. But that's for another post.)
I want to be the very best Christian I can. And that means being as scrupulously honest as I can. And on the topic of homosexuality, that means admitting that being gay is not like any other sin, and that the Christian proscription of homosexuality is nothing less than a call for anyone who is gay to live their entire life never experiencing the physical expressions of love that all of we straight people happily accept as one of the very best things about being alive. Those two things are true, no matter how many logic-challenged pastors daring to call themselves compassionate Bible lovers claim otherwise.
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What the Bible Says - And Doesn't Say - About Homosexuality
What's wrong with being gay? Homosexual behavior versus the Bible ...
Religious debates that effect the rights of American's are unfair, especially when one type of "sinner" is singled out to be ridiculed and place in the arena. All we are missing are some lions. I wanted to thank the author for trying. For all of you who do not agree with gay people, please know that your feeling are quite present in our society. In many parts of the country your views are winning. I know a person fired for being gay not in the 80's. I am talking about 2000's. He was a attorney, to boot. Plus, during the this current recession, all "the gays" that I went to architectural college with have all been fired or "laid off', you decide. That is 100%. What are the chances of that? So lets hear it for those "good ol' days" and those Godly ways. It seems to me that being Christian trumps being American or other American's rights. Just so some of you know not all of us have the same beliefs, but we all live in the same country.
5). The fact that I am attracted to multiple women does not mean that curtailing these desires is a denial of who I am. Nor does it mean that the fact that I am biologically predisposed to have multiple sex partners mean that it is not a sin to do so. The same can be true of two men or women who choose to live together in companionship. There are many ways of expressing and exploring companionship and we can leave that between a person and their community and God. We are dealing with a matter of trajectories here; as you say becoming the best "Christian" you can be.
Your belief that your thinking is more logical than others isn't quite right. The idea that the restrictions are culturally dependent and arbitrary is also not right. There are reasons for them. It may end up being the responsibility of the effected party alone to figure out what the reasons are and determine what they must do to be right in God's eyes.
1). The question as to whether homosexuality hurts no one is not settled. We can look at things like statistics and history to address this argument. You are wrong to make assumptions from your gut.
2). The rejection of homosexuality is not dependent on the Bible. There are plenty of non Christian and Jews that reject homosexuality.
3). The argument could be easily made that open marriages or polygamous marriages hurt no one, and yet the Bible most certainly points to a hierarchy of relationships.
also, the bible is full of polygynous marriages. whether or not there are other religions that categorize being gay as a sin is irrelevant as the author was speaking specifically about christianity. and you have yet to even acknowledge his contention (with which i agree) that telling a gay person to just not "act gay" means they spend their whole life never knowing romantic love and companionship. homosexuality doesn't hurt anyone, and you offered nothing to the contrary other than to say that the question isn't settled.
The anti-Christlike behavior of those who hurl invective and incite violence counters the very essence of the gospel: but so does cutting away the parts of Christian teaching that don't fit in with non- and anti-Christian notions of what constitutes God's love & the sexual behavior that is derived from it.
This selectivity, practiced by the regressive & progressive kind of evangelical, is the normal product of any faith which begins with the Bible rather than from the Church.
You seem quite logical, and make quite the cogent argument: homosexuality hurts no one and therefore shouldn't be a sin (despite what Paul may say).
Might there be other sins in the Bible that in reality hurt no one? Pre-marital sex (ie fornication) in the bible is considered sinful by many Christians. Granted Corinthians was written by Paul, someone you seem not to respect as much as the rest of the New Testament and would be very interested in knowing why.
However, it seems odd that one that calls himself a Christian picks and chooses what to believe from the Holy Book that forms the basis for his beliefs. After all, without the Bible, how could you know what to believe in? The revelation of Christ comes from the Bible alone. Wouldn't logic say that if a book has incorrect information, maybe its farcical? It just seems like you're so logical about comparing homsexuality to sin, but become so illogical once you start to pick and choose what to believe from the Bible.
Many conservative religious folks would answer your logic saying, "it doesn't matter what you think hurts people. If God says something is bad, that's what matters."
Religion isn't logical. A revealed religion like Christianity is based on writings. If you don't like what they say, why follow them? Why disobey God, in other words?
Homosexual intercourse in the ancient world was quite different in the ancient world than it is today. Today, we divide ourselves into separate camps, gay on one side, straight on the other. But in the ancient world, it was not uncommon at times for men to engage in both types of sex. (Some women did as well, but women had much less freedom to do anything back then.) And these sexual outlets were not even viewed the same.
As such, couldn't many biblical prohibitions against homosexual sex be prohibitions against adultery and prostitution?
In addition, Sodom and Gomorrah were written as inhospitable places where the people were selfish and cruel to foreigners. Hospitality to travelers and strangers was a BIG deal in ancient society. (Tales tell of Zeus and Hermes traveling in disguise among mortals to test their hospitality and rewarding those who were kind to them.) And nothing is less hospitable than wanting to rape the foreigners, as is told in Genesis.
I'm a Christian and I tend to hold with the idea that same sex relationships can be as sinful as heterosexual relationships. I also think they can be as spiritual and loving as heterosexual relationships. The things that can make any relationship sinful or not have nothing to do with the genders of the people involved, but rather how they treat one another. Are sexual acts an expression of love? Or some perverted social status symbol? Do the people involve at least treat each other with respect and care? These are among the factors that should guide whether or not any sexual act or sexual relationship is perceived as sinful.
Homosexuality in itself is not a sin. Same sex relationships that are an expression of love between two people are, as you pointed out, expressing that divine characteristic, which we Christians believe is intimately associated with God; if not the essence of God himself. It is most certainly not a sin.
It makes me so sad to see Christians, who use their faith as a justification for their homophobia, because we should be doing just the opposite. I mean love, people outcast from most of the rest of society? Come on guys! This is our territory!
Once upon a time the Bible had been used to justify slavery. All the patriarchs had slaves. Leviticus even has rules for how to treat your slaves, but Quakers and Evangelical groups understood that slavery is inherently against common Christian principals. Christian groups were involved in the civl rights movement led by Reverend King. There were Christians on both sides of theses movements, of course. There are Christian groups that embrace same sex love in the same way they do heterosexual love, but they are too few and too silent in comparison. On the whole we Christians are either on the wrong side or notably and shamefully silent, when it comes to welcoming same sex couples into our communities.
Does the biblical mention of slavery have a theological point or is it simply a means of condoning slavery? In the narrative the Jews were to treat slaves with empathy because the Jews once were slaves, right (do unto others as they would treat you)?
Paul mentions homosexuality as a means of discussing the Christian need to be more responsible not less. It mentions homosexuality as a sin to suggest the Christian sins are much greater (pride, gossiping, greed etc); not less. Paul then goes on to mention the ideal. It is not monogamous relationships at all. It is in fact celibacy. He recommends celibacy not to avoid women but rather so that the early church could focus exclusively on spreading the good news. Paul rightly knew that it was unfair to demand commitment unto death (martyrdom) while trying to establish and maintain a family! Paul actually mentions slavery in a similar way. To suggest the writings of Paul support mistreatment of homosexuals or condone slavery is completely bogus. The same is true of the Hebrew Bible.
Among Christians, erotic expression of love has never been without specific limitations and circumscriptions.
Now can we please take note that the ancient Jews were a small tribal group in a land that was both geographically and politically hostile. Safety in NUMBERS, folks. Of course the ancient Jews would want every man to marry and breed. (The Bible also forbids "onanism", i.e. masturbation.) So homosexuality would not fulfill this societal population need.
On a planet with almost 7 billion and counting, I think even Yahweh would agree that we have more than adequately fulfilled the "be fruitful and multiply" thing.
I appreciate your refreshing view.