If you have ever brought up the topic of homosexuality with a group of Christians, you might know the feeling that someone says, “The Bible says that homosexuality is a sin,” and then everybody nods and discussion ends. The lack of specificity in a label statement such as this belies a real lack of engagement with the issue of the acceptability of homosexuality among Christians. What does the Bible actually say about homosexuality? The answer to this question is important. In a prominent nationwide survey of un-churched young people, non-Christians (and nonpracticing Christians) associated Christian with anti-homosexual more than any other descriptive label. Ninety-one percent of them agreed with the statement “Christians are anti-homosexual.”
I understand that this is a politicized issue, and that this issue stirs up deep emotions. I am treading on contested ground by positing that homosexuality is not necessarily sinful, nor against God’s will. Most people think that orthodox Christians are unfailingly negative and militaristic toward homosexuality. However, most of the Christians that I know at Brown are not described by this statement. Many of us have gay friends. And, in fact, most of us do not condemn our friends’ sexuality to their faces. Is this a mere lack of courage, or is something else at work? How do we understand our commitment to them, and what does our Gospel have to say to them?
Scripture is not meant to speak to a vacuum, but rather to speak to our real-life experiences and desires. And when Scripture and life come together, we cannot help but that our experiences color, as well, our reading of the Bible. As hard as we try, a “pure” reading of the text is not possible. For instance, I once had an intense dream which forced me to consider the claims of Pentecostals with regards to the Bible for the first time. With this in mind, I acknowledge that my experiences of faithful, gay Christians have informed my viewpoint on homosexuality. I have known quite a few committed Christians who have come out as homosexuals, including some who live in committed, long-term relationships with their partners. Gary and Jim, who play organ and sing in my home church’s choir and who offered their house to my aunt for her wedding, have been together for thirty years. They were married last year in California, but Proposition 8 since annulled their wedding. Many of us have experiences of gay people here at Brown, as well, which may color our experiences in any number of ways. Few of us, however, know gay Christians, and our association with an entirely heterosexual church also informs our views of what a church should look like and how it should deal with gay people.
Our understanding of Scripture is informed by our experiences, and it should also be informed by the experiences of the author and the original audience of Biblical texts. We interpret Scripture in the light of the Gospel, in the light of the New Testament writers’ understandings of Jesus. Any Christian who has engaged in the reading of difficult passages of Scripture knows that sometimes this overarching idea – that God created a good world, that human beings have screwed it up, and that God sent Jesus into the world to reconcile Himself to us and to each other, to create a new heaven and new earth where all flourish and have intimate connection with God —needs to be applied to difficult passages of Scripture in order to make sense of them. Cultural context is also extremely important in understanding the true meaning of stories, letters and the Bible as a whole.
Scripture lacks a lot of statements about homosexuality. At most, eight passages deal with the topic (whereas 2,000 deal with poverty, for instance). Discussion centers, however, around three passages: the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, the law given in Leviticus, and Romans 1. Sodom and Gomorrah, describes two representatives of the Lord (who are implied to be very close to God himself) who meet Abraham and then travel to stay with Lot in Sodom. The men of the town demand that the men be brought out of Lot’s house so that they can rape them, and for that God destroys the town. The sins of Sodom and Gomorrah are inhospitality and attempting to rape an angel of God, not homosexuality.
Leviticus 20:13 says, “You shall not lie with man as with woman; it is an abomination.” This law must be interpreted in light of the purpose of the entire Jewish law, to distinguish the nation of Israel from other peoples. In fact, the word “abomination” implies not the same thing it does to us today, but rather something which makes the Israelites ritually unclean, such as violating kosher laws or having unwanted sexual discharges. Ritual purity was the way in which Jews were separated from other nations. Jesus’ fulfilling the law and universalizing the gospel makes these considerations obsolete for gentile Christians.
Romans 1 is the most difficult passage of the bunch. In it, Paul is making a polemic against idolatry in order
to emphasize the importance of the fact that Jesus’ salvation comes by faith, since no one has avoided idolatry and earned salvation for themselves. Writing from Corinth, the home of prostitutes, he denounces those idolaters he sees around him and says that because of their idolatry, “God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another.”! Anti-homosexuality scholars contend that this passage demonstrates the Biblical basis for a natural order of heterosexuality. People commonly express this by saying, “The parts don’t fit.” Paul does describe the idolaters’ acts as unnatural. However, he also uses “unnatural” (physis, physical nature, not ktisis, or created nature) to describe men with long hair, for instance. While this was unconventional, it was certainly not against nature, or genetics, for men to grow long hair. In fact, Paul’s reason for believing that their acts were unnatural may have been the lack of male gender dominance in their sexuality, not the fact that they were same-sex relations. While Peter converted individuals to Christianity, Paul worked within the existing societal structure of male-headed households to spread the gospel. While Paul in some ways was a radical feminist for his time, he also spoke in ways that resonated with the culture (“For the husband is the head of his wife as Christ is head of the church”). Households were generally converted according to the will of the father, as everything else done in society would have been done. Homosexuality, which does not make a picture of male authority, was in this way entirely unconventional and probably looked down upon by ancient Christians as a practice of social rejects and freaks. Thus Paul laments the unconventionality of these homosexual relations, the way in which it made them seem like sinners, rather than denouncing the act itself. If men and women are not the only physical partners for each other, anti-homosexuality scholars often contend that they are necessary metaphysical partners for each other, that they form the perfect team for life. However, this position is against Paul’s, who believes that men and women should be single if they are able to do so.
Unconventional sexuality is both a punishment for and a result of idolatry in this passage. He describes this group of sexual deviants as “full of every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; …they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy”. 9 Does this description accurately describe our gay friends today? What about the gay people that we know who are not idolaters of this type? Today’s cultural landscape of some level of tolerance for homosexuals means that more “normal” people feel safe in coming out. Paul may not be speaking about the same people that we are speaking about. In another way, however, Paul is speaking to everyone. He uses this passage to tell everyone, including the Christian congregation, that they are sinners as well and need to be reminded of his main point – that Jesus saves all by faith, not by our own perfection. Thus, this passage either does not describe today’s homosexuals, or it describes them only to the extent to which it describes everyone.
Multiple readings of this passage are possible, but the one that makes the most sense with my experiences, with Paul’s point in the passage and the overall salvific message of the Bible, and in the context of the first century, is the one that does not condemn homosexuality outright. The prudent course is to drop our opposition to it. Attempts at curing homosexuality, such as ex-gay treatments, are rarely successful at preventing gay behavior, and never successful at stopping gay attraction. Also, I know that when I tell people that I support gay marriage, they are more willing to dialogue with me about the crux of Christianity as well. But this is not only the practical path, but the right one. God has created us and our sexuality good, and this statement applies to gay people as well as straight ones. Coming out as a gay person is an incredibly challenging process of discovering and asserting one’s identity; it is hard enough without Christians denouncing them. Wouldn’t it be better if, instead, during this process of self-discovery gay people knew that God loved them, created them to be who they know themselves to be, and were offered God’s healing grace just the way that straight people are?
Hey, it would be great if this article could be linked to the main page. Let’s get the discussion going.
Scripture condemns homosexuality as it condemns all other sin. It’s amusing how you glaze over passages that blatantly state this. 1 Timothy 1:10 lists homosexuals along with murders,
1 Cor. 6 says “Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. ” this is followed by “And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.”
Christians can struggle with homosexuality, but they cannot embrace it. If they embrace their sin, they are not embracing Christ. Christ calls us to die to self, and to live for him – not for our own sinful desires. As this passage shows, when the Holy Spirit opens our eyes we begin a continual process of letting go of what we _were_, we do not embrace _our identity_, but find our identity _in Christ_.
We are called to love those who are homosexuals, but in no way are we to nod in approval of their life style.
What you say of Romans 1 is off. Because of their idolatry, God gives them over to their sin. It is NOT addressing these sins as idolatry, but again, states that they are committing them because God himself “gave them up” – He pushed them away from himself. If we switch this verse around, and men were to worship God as they should worship Him – then God wouldn’t be giving them up to these sins. That is, Iff we are worshipping God as we should (If we are saved by Christ’s blood and living _through_ Him), Then we will not embrace homosexuality.
Romans 1 is very clear about homosexuality – i fail to see how you pass it up without hitting a brick wall.
I have many friends who say they have been saved from homosexuality once they gave their lives over to Jesus. They say it did not happen all at once but slowly as they beagan to go into their relationship with God deeper. They are all doing very well, one of them has a wife with his first child on the way. I know that homosexuality is a sin, but we are all sinners and we are all guilty of one sin or another. To cast out one group of people completely is actually turning them away from God. Unfortunately some people are born gay, because we are all birthed into sin. I feel really bad for them because it is going to be hard struggle but if they call on Jesus I know he will hear them and guide them through.
I read this article a few days ago and never intended to comment, but something in 2 Timothy that I read today brought me back.
Here is the verse: “For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.” (4:3)
I think the time has come. It is easy to follow the trends of this world, especially in a time when being a Christian is increasingly unpopular, but it is perhaps less easy to resist the temptation to twist scripture to suit what the world and even one’s own self wants to hear.
I take particular issue with your treatment of Leviticus Chapter 20. There is a list of sins, and some are punishable by death and some are not. Among those punishable by the death are the following: sacrificing a child to Molech, a false god (20:1), cursing one’s parents (20:9), adultery (20:10), sleeping with one’s own father’s wife (20:11), sleeping with one’s daughter-in-law (20:12), a man sleeping with a man (20:13), marrying both a woman and her daughter (20:14), bestiality (20:15-16) and a man or woman who is a medium or a spiritist (20:27).
I am not at all implying that these laws or punishments should be in place. But I think that the fact that these sins are listed together, all with capital punishment, makes the wrongness of the acts apparent. Are there any other sins listed in Leviticus 20, which are punishable by death, which are not still immoral? Adultery was wrong in the time of Moses and it is wrong today. Can not the same be said for homosexual acts?
To relate to your article, was violating kosher laws or having an unwanted sexual discharge also punishable by death in the time of Moses? (actual question, I did not search Leviticus)
Finally, you say “God has created us and our sexuality good, and this statement applies to gay people as well as straight ones.” It is my view that when God created Adam and Eve, both they and their sexuality were good. But throughout the course of human history, human sexuality has frequently led to immorality, and straight people today have issues with everything from promiscuity to pornography. It seems that keeping our sexuality “good” is a constant struggle. I have trouble buying your final point that if someone is born with a certain desire, it is ok, because God made them that way. People are born sinful, and it is by the grace of God that they are saved, not by waiting for Christians to approve of their sin.
Me thinks that you self-righteous dudes should check out a book titled Dirt Sex and Greed by William Countryman who is a committed Anglican who REALLY did his homework.
That is he did a thorough study of the “Old” Testament, and the various cultural contexts in which the now archaic “purity” laws came into being.
This essay was written as a positive response to that book, and as a necessary antidote to self-righteous dudes like you.
http://www.dabase.org/freersex.htm
Plus a related essay (and book) on emotional-sexual Understanding.
http://www.dabase.org/2armP1.htm#ch1
I was once a gay and now that I have come to the knowledge that being a gay won’t please God and the punishment of sin is death and being a gay is living in a sinful nature I repent and draw near to the Lord Jesus Christ, receive Him as my own Lord and Savior and I experienced an unbelievable experience that I become transformed and renewed individual loved by God. I will say that the Lord loves gay people or any homosexual individual that’s why He want them to come to the knowledge of Him and be BORN Again means to be transformed renewed and saved by the loving grace of God. Being born again is an individual who turn away from sin and draw near to God. I believe that no gay people can say to himself or stand and declare that he doesn’t have any desire to have relation or sex with same sex which a very sinful desire that the Lord hates. The Lord died on the cross to redeemed us from sin and I believed if a gay person really want to accept the Lord as his own Lord and Savior he will turn away from sin and confess it to God and God is faithful to forgive his sin and CLEANSE him from all iniquities. 1 John 1:9. I believe that those who truly accept the Lord will turn away from sin. I am now a renewed man of God I have a wife and a boy child. I received the forgiveness of God and now living a happy life.
I’m not self-righteous, I am redeemed. And the things I am redeemed from leave me in no position to throw any stones at anyone. Ok? So with that out of the way, let me say that it is not a “special” connection between two people of the same sex that God disapproves of. Look at Ruth and Naomi, no two closer women have ever lived, I think. BUT God burned Sodom to the ground for a reason, and He doesn’t make a secret of how He feels about same sex SEXUAL relationships. We can like it or not, but it’s crystal clear in scripture. So to feel the propensity to love the same sex is one thing … but to act on the lust of that propensity is another altogether, and the Bible clearly calls it a sin. And to continue in that sin without regard for how simple it is for God to change us into anything He chooses, is a lack of faith. To be reBORN and made NEW is exactly that. And where sinful earth has allowed the propensity for this sin to FEEL natural to some, God is quite capable of changing that … just like any other thing He changes in a person when He makes them NEW. It’s a matter of sacrifice and a willing surrender to turn away from something we know is wrong no matter how difficult it is for our flesh and trust Him to MAKE that change in us and for us. For you, maybe it’s homosexuality, for me maybe it’s a desire for drugs or money, or promiscuity, or whatever … but God is BIGGER than any and all of it, and surrender means SURRENDER, trust means TRUST, and NEW MEANS NEW. (by the same token, I suspect abomination means ABOMINATION.)Just my thoughts.
I think that the misunderstanding between successive responders to this article is based wholly upon a difference in their approaches to reading Scripture. One tends to evaluate culture entirely through the lens of Scripture, and the other tends to evaluate Scripture through the lens of culture. Unless this fundamental difference in perspective is acknowledged by both parties, they will never reach a mutual understanding.
I urge readers of all shades of opinion to remember the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi: “Grant that I may not so much seek…to be understood, as to understand…It is in pardoning that we are pardoned.”