What do astrology, watching movies, charging interest, alcohol, gambling, dancing and divorce have in common?
All have been taboo at some point in Christianity-dominated societies of the past two millennia, but all are accommodated or even celebrated by American Christians today. And there is no philosophical or moral reason that gay marriage will not join their ranks within the next 20 years.
Culturally conservative American Christians are more freewheeling than they may seem to outsiders. Fareed Zakaria, in insightful commentaries in recent years on the rise of give-the-people-what-they want democracy, observed that Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson gained great fame not by demanding that Christians live their lives differently, but by sanctifying the lives they were already inclined to live.
Yet such leaders simultaneously cultivated a sense of cultural superiority within their all-too-comfortable flocks by finding other easy targets to censure, be they hippies or drug users or welfare mothers. Zakaria predicted that gays and Muslims would increasingly be the demons of the post-9/11 era among evangelicals, and damned if he wasn't right.
Yet culturally conservative proscriptions against homosexuality represent a weak, last attempt to pretend to stand for something, while standing for little in actual biblical terms.
I should concede that not all evangelical Christians are politically or culturally conservative. But you can be reasonably sure that when someone volunteers that he's a "Bible-believing Christian," he probably opposes gay marriage. Such a person may say that it's one thing for Christians to come to tolerate the sad reality of divorce (which was explicitly forbidden by Jesus), but it's another matter for them to have their arms twisted into affirming sex outside of a heterosexual marriage.
The difference between tolerating and affirming is semantics, of course. The key difference is that a culturally conservative Christian is likely a friend or relative of a divorced and remarried person. It's one of many signs I've seen, in observing Muslim and Christian societies, that culture drives religion far more than religion drives culture.
The conservative Christian senses the possibility of himself being divorced and remarried someday, and is easily able to reserve the right to such a role.
But there is a stinginess when it comes time for conservative Christians to decide whether or not to push for laws and amendments "protecting" marriage from gays. There is an element of bad faith in deciding that the lone, remaining area in which they will enforce the Bible is regarding a behavior that they conveniently had no intention of practicing.
This stinginess is especially troubling at a moment when gay issues have become the civil rights issues of our time. When the choice is whether to follow the biblical injunction to affirm the dignity of all human beings or to keep others from exercising their conscience, conservative Christians find it to be no contest.
Yet the door is open for conservative Christians to tolerate same-sex marriage in good conscience.
The distinguished New Testament scholar F. Dale Bruner made a salient observation in his influential commentary on the Gospel of Matthew. Bruner wrote that his theological mentor, Henrietta Mears of the famed Hollywood Presbyterian congregation, tended to avoid teaching from the three synoptic Gospels (which are attributed to Mark, Matthew and Luke) and instead chose to emphasize Paul's epistles.
Mears and many "dispensationalist" peers who dominate the evangelical landscape have typically argued that the many difficult commands of Jesus, which are crystalized in Matthew's Sermon on the Mount, are not commands for believers to obey now, but merely a description of the rules of the game after Christ's return.
That is a key reason why so many devout Christians, in the face of charges of hypocrisy, are able to tune out Christ's blessings of peacemakers. That is why many are able to rationalize ignoring his command to turn the other cheek and pray for enemies. That is why many can disregard his cautions about accumulating wealth while in fact sanctifying the status of wealthy "job creators."
In all these cases, educated believers will coolly insist that Christ's stringent commands are merely meant to remind us of our inability to follow those commands, which should then drive us to humility and to the recognition that we need divine grace and forgiveness.
Fair enough. But if such a formula allows a Christian society to eventually tolerate or rationalize away taboos ranging from usury to horoscope-checking, what keeps it from doing so in the case of gays who seek to make a public vow to work toward integrity and fidelity as they are best able to do?
Even if culturally conservative Christians cannot bring themselves to bless gay marriage, they could drop their opposition to imposing their political will on the larger secular republic. Given how inevitably they will be on the wrong side of history, it seems wise for them to cut their losses and drop their political posturing sooner rather than later, in order to move on to worthy issues where they're able to make a more positive impact.
It's been said that a fundamentalist of any religion tends to be driven by a certain nervousness about the body, which is why rules regarding sexuality are always enforced enthusiastically even when conservative Christians claim that they are not obligated to live up to Jesus' standards in this lifetime.
That would explain the homophobia somewhat -- but again, the rising will to condone divorce means that this is a cultural issue more than a genuine theological issue, an issue that is subject to change as society changes.
Yet to maintain or restore the integrity of the evangelical American church, its culturally conservative leaders and adherents would seem to need to make a choice: all of Christ's severe commands apply today to everyone ... or to no one. History suggests they will ultimately choose the latter.
Follow Rob Asghar on Twitter: www.twitter.com/rasghar
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Sorry but that's a crock. Those "educated" believers are fooling themselves. Even outside a religious context, a command is meant to be obeyed otherwise it is not a command. That a person isn't always able to follow a command is where one learns humility. But not being always able to follow a command doesn't make the obligation to follow a command disappear.
http://video.google.com/videop...
I do not believe that his prophetic words, delivered before a video camera in the last year of his life, have been given enough exposure and comment. For that reason, I have included the above link for those among you who respect his teaching. When Lew Smedes uses the word heresy, evangelicals should at a minimum listen to what he has to say and think about how they are behaving.
baumgrenze
The scriptures represent God's character, and like the Constitution, their permanence is a great asset. Both Bible and Constitution serve as a plumb line against which the issues of the day are measured. There are times when the plumb has to be recalibrated, but one must take care not to casually change the definition of "up", lest what you construct collapse under its own weight.
The Bible counts homosexuality as ungodly in both old and new testaments—there is no religious cover offered to gay lifestyles within it's pages. It is therefore unreasonable to expect a church which bases it's positions on the Bible to change them.
The attitudes of devout Christians will always be shaped by scriptures—nominal Christians will always be shaped by culture. One will always get a divided response on most issues from the "Christian community."
Wisdom leads us to a "just inequality"—where people are equal before the law and as free to follow and reap the rewards/consequnces of their efforts. Equality before the law requires that we give gays a means to legally partner—personally I think we are at the point where government should consider all marriages "civil unions" and not distinguish beyond that. Religious and non-religious can marry according to their desires without having to involve the state to decide who has to recognize which marriage in which way.
Speaking for myself, it is unworkable to be the relationship police. Therefore, whatever two people wish to pretend is out of my control. But....
When they want the government to endorse their pretense, that's where I get involved. I have to, because they have in essence begged me to. They want government involvement, they got it. I am the government.
As Peter Green said, "Now, when I talked to God I knew he'd understand. He said, 'Stick by my side and I'll be your guiding hand. But don't ask me what I think of you; I might not give the answer that you want me to.'"
Similarly for alcohol. While many evangelicals may privately drink, this isn't something they would do at church activities.
etc.
But there are plenty of liberal evangelicals who tolerate gay marriage; but they aren't the ones that will allow one passage into Heaven. It’s still God's game world and universe; better clear it with Him first rather than listening to some liberal woman or man with a white collar around their necks.
You're 100% correct that religion has little to do with the way people treat GLBT people...it’s the people that do it. Paying taxes is not going to protect a GLBT person; people are still racist, sexist, cruel and mean. My feeling is that the best chance for a GLBT person to live in peace is to have faith in Jesus and realize that there are still parameters that people must live within. The world has always been tolerant of GLBT people but the world is not going to do a "180" and suddenly change religious beliefs and personal beliefs about GLBT people. The world is a cruel place and life isn't fair; paying taxes is just a reality that we all have to do. Paying doesn't allow anyone to make any demands for fairness; paying taxes doesn't give anyone any "rights”...it. just means that you've done your duty. The unfairness of life; it is what it is.
James 1: 12-15 (NKJV)
(12) Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him.
(13) Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone.
(14) But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed.
(15) Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.
I'm agnostic, and I don't care how many quotes you post. I don't have to follow your rules, and your rules shouldn't affect any law.
I don't care who anybody loves or marries, and neither should you.
We have separation of church and state in this country. If you don't agree with gay couples getting married, don't go to their weddings. But your religion and/or religious feelings should not mean I am subjected to second class citizenship.
p.s. I would take a closer look at the bible-judging, as you just did, is a big no no. Tsk tsk on the cherry picking.