("I'll be in the gazebo, since you're already on the cross")
Athelwulf said:
Yet He did make them that way, so what do ya suppose that means? Hmm?!
I was thinking of posting this earlier, but did not because I came to it backwards, through the conservative responses.
So when God made homosexuals who fall deeply, achingly in love with each other, did he goof? ....
.... Over the last couple of months, I've been researching the question of how the Bible regards homosexuality. Social liberals tend to be uncomfortable with religious arguments, but that is the ground on which political battles are often decided in America - as when a Texas governor, Miriam "Ma" Ferguson, barred the teaching of foreign languages about 80 years ago, saying, "If English was good enough for Jesus Christ, it's good enough for us."
Kristof
That's from a pre-election (Oct. 23) column by Nicholas Kristof for the
New York Times.
In fact, Kristof covers a few other points common to the Sciforums discussion, as well:
• In fact, the most obvious lesson from Sodom is that when you're attacked by an angry mob, the holy thing to do is to offer up your virgin daughters.
• As for the New Testament, Jesus never said a word about gays, while he explicitly advised a wealthy man to give away all his assets and arguably warned against bank accounts ("do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth").
• The religious right cites one part of the New Testament that clearly does condemn male homosexuality - not in Jesus' words, but in Paul's. The right has a tougher time explaining why lesbians shouldn't marry because the Bible has no unequivocal condemnation of lesbian sex.
• In any case, do we really want to make Paul our lawgiver? Will we enforce Paul's instruction that women veil themselves and keep their hair long? (Note to President Bush: If you want to obey Paul, why don't you start by veiling Laura and keeping her hair long, and only then move on to barring gay marriages.)
Kristof
If you've clicked on the article, though, you may have noticed it's at a site for a guy named Robert Gagnon, PhD. I tend to think the PhD is important because Gagnon is a great example of a dysfunctional doctorate. In his
response to Krisof, Gagnon accuses:
As regards Kristof's complaint that "conservatives" "ignore [the Bible's/Jesus'] central message of love," it is hard to see how this is so unless one simply equates love with the desire for sexually intimate relationships.
Gagnon
That Gagnon's degree is in theology should not suggest anything about theologians in general; I know a theologian with a doctorate who has no such difficulties understanding simple concepts. I reiterate here what I wrote for another topic, largely because this is something I really do wonder why I have to explain to anybody:
But at the same time, you're arguing that someone should be denied equal protection of the law on the basis of their gender. To tack the word "crime" onto it is extraneous, but whether or not you believe you hate someone, you are indeed advocating a hateful outcome ....
.... You don't seem to think advocating arbitrary exclusion on the basis of gender is hateful, and I assert firmly that it is. The standard you advocate hurts people, and maybe you don't see that, but it looks hateful, sounds hateful, and smells hateful.
Tiassa
Somebody needs to tell me how rendering someone a second-class citizen on the basis of their gender is an act of love. I seriously don't see it. And if I have to explain that hateful acts are not loving acts, and thus Kristof refers not to mere sex, as Gagnon would have it, but rather to a love of one's fellow human being, it strikes me that they're missing the point.
At any rate, I found the Gagnon article through a blog called
TitusOneNine, which name refers to a Biblical passage about bishops; the name and address suggest strongly that the site originated in the fray over Bishop Gene Robinson.
Furthermore, Gagnon is a downright hypocrite:
Kristof begins by asking rhetorically: "So when God made homosexuals who fall deeply, achingly in love with each other, did he goof?" The question is not thought through, *
First, no scientific study has even come close to verifying that homosexuality is a condition determined directly and irrevocably at birth, For example, several of the least sample-biased identical twin studies indicate that seven-to-nine times out of ten, when one member of a identical twin pair self-identifies as non-heterosexual, the co-twin self-identifies as heterosexual—even though identical twins are genetic matches and share the same intrauterine hormonal environment, Kristof cannot even establish a model of congenital determinism for homosexuality, let alone one that correlates such determinism with a "God made homosexuals" claim.*
Gagnon
The point is so important to Gagnon that he pretends his God is severely limited, a charge most Christians would reject, for what happens in the Universe without God's say-so?
For Kristof's argument to work, he has to make the elementary mistake of assuming that all such traits are "made by God" and that to think otherwise is to assert that God "goofed."
Gagnon
Moving past that desperation and looking back to hypocrisy, Gagnon asserts,
What is unloving is to celebrate the developmental shortcomings in being erotically attracted to what already is or has as a sexual being: male for maleness, female for femaleness. An attempt at completing the sexual self through merger with a sexual same is a manifestation of sexual narcissism or sexual self-deception.
Gagnon
For the benefit of those who can't figure out what the problem is, no scientific study has even come close to verifying that homosexuality is a developmental shortcoming. Furthermore, for Gagnon's argument to work, he has to make the elementary mistake of presuming that God runs a laissez-faire Universe, something that the Bible makes abundantly clear is not true. Furthermore, for Gagnon's argument to work, he must make the elementary mistake of presuming that God's will in our being
ends at conception. Additionally, biblical scholar Jack Blanco goes so far as to assert that God not only
knew the fall at Eden was coming, but that the disaster with the tree was part of God's Plan from the outset. (See
The Clear Word, Genesis 3)
That two people on opposite sides of an issue (e.g. Tiassa and Dr. Blanco) are willing to acknowledge the same point lends the point some certain credibility. God knows someone is going to be gay; to borrow from the abortion debate, God "blesses" their existence, anyway. And since the names are written or not in the Book of Life at the outset, one cannot assert that God is ignorant of what will come. That gays exist still falls within the range of God's Will. Additionally, since many feel the homosexual influence about them before they even know what sex is, one might be given to wonder why God would "test" somebody who is clearly, and by His Will, unprepared for the temptation.
Gagnon is not alone in any of this. A brief perusal of reader comments at TitusOneNine makes this clear:
• As usual Gagnon is right on target. Liberals wish to ignore the larger witness of Scripture and 6000 years of theology of marriage in order to make their points. But we conservatives cherry-pick.
Yawn. (MJD_NV)
• Gagnon is kind of an expert in the area of sexuality and the Scriptures ... Again, I think it is difficult to argue with Gagnon’s points, which ring clear and true. Of course this does not excuse us from loving people who identify themselves as homosexual, but polemic abuses of history and Scripture need to be confronted. (DJ)
• Dr. Gagnon does helpfully point out that “homosexual unions are structurally incapable of producing children from the union and therefore depend on rhetoric that ultimately decouples marriage from the raising of children.” (Mendimtari)
TitusOneNine
Briefly:
•
MJD_NV: This response suffers the same problem I noted above in which someone needs to explain to me how ostracism and oppression are loving. Until that explanation is part of the discussion, MJD_NV has no business commenting on the "larger witness of Scripture", since the larger witness of Scripture is too vast for such a narrow cause.
•
DJ: Okay, if it doesn't excuse you from loving the homosexual, what's with the hateful ostracism and oppression?
•
Mendimtari: The issue raised by this reader's comment looks back to heterosexuals, who more than gays have decoupled marriage from the raising of children. After all, Christians were alarmed a couple years ago when divorce numbers showed born-agains more likely do dissolve a marriage than atheists. The stats have evened out somewhat, but that's still a tall divorce rate. Additionally, author
Brian Elroy McKinley notes that Christian churches endorse sin in marrying divorced persons.
Now, let's pause for a moment to consider a simple question:
(1) Jesus said
nothing about gays.
(2) Jesus specifically stated that divorced persons should not marry another. (Luke 16.18)
(3) Jesus
also said:
Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you .... For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you salute only your brethren, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? You, therefore,must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
Matthew 5.44-ff
Thus the question arises:
Why do Christians arguing for traditional marriage defy Jesus Christ in order to show hatred and persecute others?
What is so important about shattering the notion of equal protection under the law that it should compel Christians to forego the instruction of their own Savior?
Whatsoever you do to the least of His brethren (Matthew 25.31-ff): How, on Judgment Day, will these alleged faithful explain to Jesus Christ that He does not deserve the simple respect reserved to every member of the society in which one lived? How do they welcome the stranger by pushing him away?
When it's time to take the trip home to God, I recommend packing some marshmallows, some hot dogs, and a sharp stick. Oh, wait ... that's right--as the bumper sticker says, "Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven".
If gays "should not continue living in sin", why should the Christian continue to live in sin?
This homophobia is starting to sound like a mental disorder: Christians hating and oppressing the least of His brethren in order to fulfill His Will?
One of our posters complained the other day that I wasn't concise enough, but how to be concise when the simplest of points requires much explaining? I mean, let's look at that phrase again:
Christians hating and oppressing the least of His brethren in order to fulfill His Will
Do I really need to explain what's problematic about that result?
I've asked before whether traditionalists truly find gay marriage a good enough reason to attack the Constitution, but we must also consider why homosexuality seems to be a strong enough reason to compel Christians to forfeit the salvation they believe in and work toward.
So help me out, please:
What's the problem here? Have the traditionalists lost their minds? Did they have their wits about them to start with?.
The sad thing is that I was researching something else when I came across the TitusOneNine site, which started this whole cascade. Sometimes it just falls into your lap, you know, and unless it bites while it's there, it might actually be a warm fuzzy.
Religiously-derived assertions of logic aren't necessarily
fun to attack, although I understand the pleasure derived from stomping on a poisonous bug that threatens you. However, such religious assertions as the traditionalists have lined up to sponsor their crusade against the core of American equality and freedom tend to be easy targets.
It's just a patience game. They'll cut their own wrists for this, and then pretend they're Jesus on the Cross.
____________________
Notes:
See Also -