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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Evangelicals / Catholics Theological Method and Gender / Sexuality
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Edward Green
Review Editor
# 46
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Posted
I am fishing about here to see if some ideas I have been having make sense to anyone else.
I was wondering why in (Anglo but not exclusively) Catholic circles those who support the OOW also tend to be affirming on sexuality, whereas in Evangelical circles (Anglo but not exclusively) those who support the OOW tend not to be.
Holding my own theology up to the light I realised that my understanding of Women fully representing Christ as Priests is related to 'In Christ there is no Male nor Female'. That is Biological Sex / Gender is not essential to our ultimate nature and is passing away. This view also informs my understanding of sexuality, where the love between two people is more important than their Gender.
Many Evangelicals & Anglo Catholics now share a view that sex need not be so focussed on the possibility of biological procreation (and accept the use of most forms of contraception). Sex can be for fun (within the context of ... etc).
But again in my own theology this informs my understanding of same sex activity - because it leads me to see sex in a spiritually procreative sense. Or to be franker if straights are now allowed to have sex for fun why not now the non-straights?
In a sense I am saying if I wasn't affirming on sexuality I wouldn't be pro-OOW or pro-contraception.
I am not really looking for another debate on the horses, and I am aware that my theological method could be taken apart, but trying to understand the thought processes and models that are used by Christians of different theological backgrounds.
Has anyone else thought along these lines?
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Ricardus
Shipmate
# 8757
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Posted
Very interesting OP.
FWIW, I regularly receive from a woman priest and have rung a peal on church bells to celebrate a civil partnership.
However, I feel more confident arguing for the licitness of homosexual practice than for the ordination of women. That's because the morality (or otherwise) of homosexuality is supposed to be deducible from the natural moral law, using only reason and conscience, whereas priesthood is ordained by God, and so its nature is a matter of divine revelation.
I think it's easier to say "Your view of homosexuality is illogical", than "Your view of priesthood is not based on divine revelation, but mine is."
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Then the dog ran before, and coming as if he had brought the news, shewed his joy by his fawning and wagging his tail. -- Tobit 11:9 (Douai-Rheims)
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Lynn MagdalenCollege
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# 10651
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Posted
I think both involve divine revelation.
After all, God certainly was at odds with the world around the Hebrews when He gave Moses the Law that if there is a man who lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of them have committed a detestable act (Lev 20:13). I don't see any reason to be more comfortable with one than the other, although I've heard better arguments for the ordination of women, fwiw.
I fear in both cases we tend to fall into sentimentality: feelings, often expressed as "it's not fair..." when God is just and merciful. There's no 'fairness' in "Yet I have loved Jacob but I have hated Esau" or in Ishmael and Hagar being sent away because Isaac was the son of the promise - after all, it wasn't Ishmael's fault nor even Hagar's fault, though she shouldn't have preened over her fertility when Sarah was barren.
The Bible is full of this kind of "unfairness" and I think we get into trouble when we start trying to be "more fair" than God - although folks hardly ever call it that. ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
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Erin & Friend; Been there, done that; Ruth musical
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Barnabas62
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# 9110
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Posted
I'm puzzling over this issue this morning, following a somewhat frustrating conversation with folks I like very much. There seem to be roadblocks against discussing gay sexuality which go much deeper amongst evangelicals than discussing the role of women.
"Sitting under scripture" does not (pace Lynn) rule out looking deeply at issues of justice and fairness. I think for example there is a good deal of scriptural endorsement for this part of MLK's dream
"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."
Replacing "the colour of their skin" by "the nature of their sexuality" doesn't seem to me to be such a big step. IME homosexual orientation is not a matter of choice at all, so regarding it as a moral defect, a character flaw, is intrinsically unfair. Desmond Tutu has consistently drawn parallels between racism and homophobia and I think he is right. There is a fear of the different involved and it seems to get in the way of loving neighbours who are different.
But IME it is not that easy to get fellow evangelicals to discuss the issue in relationship to the justice themes of scripture. I'll be following this discussion with interest.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
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Chorister
Completely Frocked
# 473
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Posted
I've been puzzling over whether to be liberal means completely liberal in everything or whether there are limits - probably because my son is a lot more liberal than me.
Perhaps some of the answer can be found in the fact that within any church there is a spectrum of belief. So, for example, a church which describes itself as liberal catholic may have many people within it who still can't approve of gays, or women priests, or whatever is their particular bugbear. My church is supposed to be liberal catholic, but only recently one of the members complained to me that the new curate was divorced!
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Retired, sitting back and watching others for a change.
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seasick
...over the edge
# 48
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Posted
My thinking would go along very similar lines to that set out in the OP. If I were to be swayed in my views on the rightness of the ordination of women, it would be on grounds of the tradition of the church, but I would still struggle to find an (theological) anthropology that informs that. To me, in order to support it you need to have an anthropology that allows a very well-defined distinction between the genders and a reason by which one of those - both of which are in the image and likeness of God in terms of creation - is better placed, or even uniquely able, to focus and represent the priesthood of Christ. Our growing experience suggests that gender identity and sexuality is a much more complex phenomenon to describe simply in binary terms. I then end up back at St Cyprian with "Custom, though never so ancient, without truth, is but an old error."
In terms of sexuality, I would generally point out that St Paul holds up the single life as the ideal and sets marriage as a concession. If we hold up (heterosexual) marriage as the ideal then we have stepped quite a way away from St Paul already. I would still want to prize the single life - and greatly esteem monastics as a result - but it is not the life for everyone. St Paul could recognise that and I think we can too. We can probably also recognise that that holds across a broad of sexuality and gender identity.
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We believe there is, and always was, in every Christian Church, ... an outward priesthood, ordained by Jesus Christ, and an outward sacrifice offered therein. - John Wesley
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k-mann
Shipmate
# 8490
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Edward Green:
That is Biological Sex / Gender is not essential to our ultimate nature and is passing away.
Where do you get the notion that the sexes are passing away, or are to pass away?
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"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
— Paul Tillich
Katolikken
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Edward Green:
I was wondering why in (Anglo but not exclusively) Catholic circles those who support the OOW also tend to be affirming on sexuality, whereas in Evangelical circles (Anglo but not exclusively) those who support the OOW tend not to be.
Because for catholics, OOW is a doctrinally liberal policy because it goes against the main body of church tradition. But for evangelicals it is, or can be, a doctrinally conservative one, because they don't really worry so much about tradition and its pretty easy to find women ministering to churches in the New Testament.
But to evangelical traditionalists homosexuality (and all sex outside marriage) is a moral and ethical issue. Quite different. (And also quite different from the problems of sexism or racism - so that comparison seems meaningless to them, if not actually insulting.)
quote:
Originally posted by Edward Green:
... I realised that my understanding of Women fully representing Christ as Priests is related to 'In Christ there is no Male nor Female'. That is Biological Sex / Gender is not essential to our ultimate nature and is passing away...
Pretty irrelevant to many evangelical supporters of OOW. Most of them won't see ordained priests are representing Christ, or if they do its a minor part of their role.
For many of them the sacramental priesthood is Christs's alone and we all particpate in it in Christ. For most of them ordained ministers are presbyters and pastors, elders of the church, not sacrificing kohanim, and not representatives of Christ. (There are evangelical churches that don't allow women to preach but do have women presiding at Holy Communion - I think NFI are like that.)
Its even just about logically possible to ordain women and have a headship doctrine. There are some that manage it, by having women as members of teams of pastors but always with a man at the head. (Which is why there are a few CofE charismatic/evangelicals who are OK with women priests but not women bishops) Or even by sayng that Jesus is the head of the Church and he's male, so women pastors are under his headship in their ministerial role, just as they are under the headship of their husbands in their role as wives, even if they are in fact the chief pastor of a congregation.
I know that seems like jumping through hoops to most of the catholic-minded here, but I promise you that a lot of catholic argumetns about authority seem just as convoluted, and far more obscure, to many evangelicals!
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
IME homosexual orientation is not a matter of choice at all, so regarding it as a moral defect, a character flaw, is intrinsically unfair.
Doesn't follow logically. Loads of people don't choose to do all sorts of things that other people think are character flaws, from gambling to violence to addiction to laziness.
And quite a lot of evangelicals are Calvinists anyway. Of course gays are born in sin! Just like the rest of us! So arguing that people can't choose who they are sexually attracted to doesn't help you with them. Hardline Calvinists will think the unregenerate incapable of free moral choice anyway. They can just say, "of course, we agree on that, it is not a free choice, neither is anythign else, so what?".
And even the more MOTR ones and traditionalist Arminians will think you can be born with a propensity to sin and the important thing is to choose not to act on it. Which might actually make them less well-disposed to gays than extreme Calvinists are, because they could see gays as people who have failed to exercise self-control. For them the difference between gay and straight is no more than different people being tempted to different sins. If I am not particularly interested in gambling, but I am prone to anger, I can't be praised for not gambling ecessively, because I am not tempted to that sin - but I can be criticised if I am violent - because I am tempted to that sin.
So you can't win...
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
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pjkirk
Shipmate
# 10997
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
I'm puzzling over this issue this morning, following a somewhat frustrating conversation with folks I like very much. There seem to be roadblocks against discussing gay sexuality which go much deeper amongst evangelicals than discussing the role of women.
"Sitting under scripture" does not (pace Lynn) rule out looking deeply at issues of justice and fairness. I think for example there is a good deal of scriptural endorsement for this part of MLK's dream
"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."
Replacing "the colour of their skin" by "the nature of their sexuality" doesn't seem to me to be such a big step. IME homosexual orientation is not a matter of choice at all, so regarding it as a moral defect, a character flaw, is intrinsically unfair.
And therein lies the gigantic chasm between you and those you are talking about. Their dedicated belief is that homosexuality is a choice, and speaks directly to the content of their character. Until you can break past the gay = disease which must be cured, not much is possible.
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Dear God, I would like to file a bug report -- Randall Munroe (http://xkcd.com/258/)
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Ricardus
Shipmate
# 8757
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lynn MagdalenCollege:
I think both involve divine revelation.
But in the case of morals, we have St Paul's assurance that the Gentiles have the law written on their hearts, even though they didn't receive the Torah. And Christianity tends to assume that God's commandments are not arbitrary and He doesn't just ban things because He can.
Which means that when we evaluate Christian morality, we have reason and conscience to guide us as well as the Bible. (And conservatives seem quite happy to reinterpret the Bible in the light of reason on moral issues such as levirate marriage, usury or even divorce.)
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Then the dog ran before, and coming as if he had brought the news, shewed his joy by his fawning and wagging his tail. -- Tobit 11:9 (Douai-Rheims)
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by pjkirk:
And therein lies the gigantic chasm between you and those you are talking about. Their dedicated belief is that homosexuality is a choice, and speaks directly to the content of their character. Until you can break past the gay = disease which must be cured, not much is possible.
I suppose that's my puzzle, pj. I cannot for the life of me see this "gigantic chasm". It really wasn't too hard for me to figure out that I didn't have any choice over my heterosexual orientation. I was born that way. What I did with that obviously did involve lots of choices, but that's a different matter. How much imagination is required to see the mirror image? Or, put even more simply, allow in fairness for the possibility that it might apply at least to some people?
My understanding was also helped by a number of very good discussions with work colleagues who were gay. You can't ring-fence assumptions of character defects; any such a priori assumptions are as likely to get in the way of fair work assessments as sexist or racist attitudes.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
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pjkirk
Shipmate
# 10997
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
How much imagination is required to see the mirror image?
A heck of a lot if you've allowed theology to override your senses and reason.
quote:
any such a priori assumptions are as likely to get in the way of fair work assessments as sexist or racist attitudes.
And it often does, resulting in many people taking stances like RadicalWhig's current thread in Hell.
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Dear God, I would like to file a bug report -- Randall Munroe (http://xkcd.com/258/)
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Knopwood
Shipmate
# 11596
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
And even the more MOTR ones and traditionalist Arminians will think you can be born with a propensity to sin and the important thing is to choose not to act on it. Which might actually make them less well-disposed to gays than extreme Calvinists are, because they could see gays as people who have failed to exercise self-control. For them the difference between gay and straight is no more than different people being tempted to different sins. If I am not particularly interested in gambling, but I am prone to anger, I can't be praised for not gambling ecessively, because I am not tempted to that sin - but I can be criticised if I am violent - because I am tempted to that sin.
Except that in this case, there aren't "different sins". There is only one set of behaviours (finding a partner, forming a household, cleaving to them as one flesh, and raising a family if applicable) which is defined as either sinful or natural and worthy (or at least capable) of blessing, depending on who is doing it (a man and woman or two of one or the other). So "conservatives" on the Issue in fact are criticizing others not for falling into a different temptation but for responding to the same near-universal human instinct that they themselves do with full moral sanction. And I think that's where many of us begin to raise our eyebrows. If it's simply a matter of not acting on it, then how come it only conveniently applies to parties other than the maker of the argument?
[ 21. January 2011, 17:24: Message edited by: LQ ]
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TubaMirum
Shipmate
# 8282
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
quote:
Originally posted by pjkirk:
And therein lies the gigantic chasm between you and those you are talking about. Their dedicated belief is that homosexuality is a choice, and speaks directly to the content of their character. Until you can break past the gay = disease which must be cured, not much is possible.
I suppose that's my puzzle, pj. I cannot for the life of me see this "gigantic chasm". It really wasn't too hard for me to figure out that I didn't have any choice over my heterosexual orientation. I was born that way. What I did with that obviously did involve lots of choices, but that's a different matter. How much imagination is required to see the mirror image? Or, put even more simply, allow in fairness for the possibility that it might apply at least to some people?
For the Church, gay folks are all defective heterosexuals - and I think both are working from some sort of understanding of "natural law," although this is only explicit on the Catholic side. (I'm not certain about this, but I think so.)
Catholics accept that we are defective heterosexuals - but also that the "inclination" can be "deep-seated" and not mutable. Also, celibacy is not a condition to be deplored, because of priestly (and monastic) celibacy.
Evangelicals believe we are defective, too - but think that with prayer and faith, we can change. That's why Evangelicals support(ed) "ex-gay" therapy, but (most) Catholics didn't or don't. Evangelicals think that celibacy is wrong - that was part of the Reformation, I believe, and also there's "be fruitful and multiply," after all - so they believe that God didn't intend for people to be gay. And, of course, there are the Biblical citations, which Catholics also cite but not so much.
Both are working from their usual positions, and have their own particular issues - and neither is able to see outside its system enough to make the simple conclusion you did. (The Catholic position rests very heavily on the birth control postition, BTW, too.)
[ 21. January 2011, 17:57: Message edited by: TubaMirum ]
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by pjkirk:
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
How much imagination is required to see the mirror image?
A heck of a lot if you've allowed theology to override your senses and reason.
I'm a four legged stool person when it comes to theological understanding. Scripture, tradition, reason and experience. Reason is always in play. Does it always determine outcome? No, but in this case it does. Why? I have an inner conviction about the rightness of going against traditional understandings in favour of a justice argument. I've nailed my colours to this mast, as I did on the issue of the role of women over 30 years ago. I dissent from the traditional view, and the traditional evangelical view, as a matter of reason and conscience.
quote:
Originally posted by pjkirk:
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
any such a priori assumptions are as likely to get in the way of fair work assessments as sexist or racist attitudes.
And it often does, resulting in many people taking stances like RadicalWhig's current thread in Hell.
A priori assumptions are always dangerous. To avoid making any assumptions about RW's thread, I'll take a peek!
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
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pjkirk
Shipmate
# 10997
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by TubaMirum:
]For the Church, gay folks are all defective heterosexuals - and I think both are working from some sort of understanding of "natural law," although this is only explicit on the Catholic side. (I'm not certain about this, but I think so.)
My experience has been that once you leave the RCC and move into the evangelical realm it's more using whatever argument fits their presupposition that it is wrong.
I detest natural law, but at least it's an attempt at "doing it right."
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Dear God, I would like to file a bug report -- Randall Munroe (http://xkcd.com/258/)
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TubaMirum
Shipmate
# 8282
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Posted
(Actually, it's my thought that gay folks are a really good, challenging puzzle for both Catholics and Evangelicals.
We challenge some of the most basic doctrine and disciplines of both groups - all the doctrine around procreation on the one side and Scriptural literalism on the other - and we are unacceptable on that basis, because if we're accepted as we are it means having to seriously rethink certain dogmas that are pretty well set in stone. A big problem, IOW.
I think in the long run we'll be helping both sides out of two different kinds of jams they've gotten themselves into over time. Isn't that sweet of us? ![[Smile]](smile.gif) )
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
The sin issue is interesting once one sees some value in the mirror image argument. Exclusive lifelong faithfulness. Self-giving love. Commitment. Promise-keeping. "All that I am I give to you, all that I have I share with you". Leaving, cleaving, becoming. Mutual submission. None of these is in principle hetero-specific. High standards, yes, to argue as "best practice" for any committed relationship. [Some might argue "too high for most. All fall short".] But surely not double standards? LQ made a good point.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
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iGeek
Number of the Feast
# 777
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by TubaMirum:
I think in the long run we'll be helping both sides out of two different kinds of jams they've gotten themselves into over time. Isn't that sweet of us? )
Bleah. I didn't sign up for that. I just want to snuggle with my hubby, pay the bills and watch the grand-kids grow.
But an interesting observation, nevertheless. Hadn't heard it put quite that way before.
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TubaMirum
Shipmate
# 8282
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by iGeek:
quote:
Originally posted by TubaMirum:
I think in the long run we'll be helping both sides out of two different kinds of jams they've gotten themselves into over time. Isn't that sweet of us? )
Bleah. I didn't sign up for that. I just want to snuggle with my hubby, pay the bills and watch the grand-kids grow.
But an interesting observation, nevertheless. Hadn't heard it put quite that way before.
At least you have a hubby who's accepting of you being in the church - or even of your faith in God. I've had women freak out on me when I've talked about it - or else just slowly back away. Believe me, I didn't sign up for any of this either.
Oh, well. Vanity, vanity - all is vanity and a chasing after wind....
[ 22. January 2011, 00:46: Message edited by: TubaMirum ]
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by TubaMirum:
(Actually, it's my thought that gay folks are a really good, challenging puzzle for both Catholics and Evangelicals.
We challenge some of the most basic doctrine and disciplines of both groups - all the doctrine around procreation on the one side and Scriptural literalism on the other - and we are unacceptable on that basis, because if we're accepted as we are it means having to seriously rethink certain dogmas that are pretty well set in stone. A big problem, IOW.
I think in the long run we'll be helping both sides out of two different kinds of jams they've gotten themselves into over time. Isn't that sweet of us? )
Some fairly basic assumptions in this post are not universally true.
I suspect there are many Catholics who are a lot more nuanced on the link between sexual expression and procreation - but it's better if a Catholic speaks to that one.
What I do know for a fact is that not all evangelicals are either scriptural literalists or inerrantists. A high view of scripture does not preclude critical scholarship on issues of faith, morals, creation, truth-as-meaning etc.
It's pretty important to avoid stereotyping. In so far as any Christian stereotype others (folks from elsewhere in the Christian spectrum, or different colour, or religion, or gender, or sexual orientation) they seem to me to be acting against some pretty fundamental tenets of our faith. Such behaviour doesn't seem to be on all fours with acting justly, practising loving kindness, walking humbly.
Having written that, of course I realise it is a kind of generalisation! It's a finger I always point at me first. Offered "on an open hand".
Where I do agree with you is that homosexual orientation and practice represents a challenge to traditional ways of thinking about human sexuality. That challenge has not just impacted on members of faith communities. I used to have an early 1960's set of Encyclopedia Britannica, within which the entry on homosexuality described it as a form of pathology; a distortion of normal sexuality. One of the examples discussed was a Freudian view that same-sex attraction were a normal part of sexual development for lots of people, but some folks got "stuck there". "Cure" was thought to be possible but problematic. The entry contained some summary of religious and cultural attitudes. It was presented as a secular view. I guess it was compiled and edited in the late 1950's. From memory, I don't think it made any reference to the Kinsey reports.
My gut feel is that the impacts of the Civil Rights movement and the Feminist movement have brought about some fundamental cultural rethinking, certainly in what we describe as the Western world, about what is fair in the treatment of folks perceived as different simply because of their nature. I'm not saying that understanding did not exist before, rather that those movements focussed attention. Within that kind of paradigm shift, all of the -isms have come under a closer ethical scrutiny. One can see the effects in political correctness discussions.
When I came into Christianity (I was about 30 when that happened) these cultural effects were already at work in my mind and experience. I've spent my life since within a nonconformist evangelical setting, so the rubbing edges for me have been both personal and worked out within that faith community. That outworking hasn't felt at all like some kind of "fashionable adjustment"; rather it has been a case of testing my pre-existing beliefs and attitudes against some fundamental and biblical Christian values; acting justly, practising loving kindness, walking humbly, seeking to avoid judgmentalism, live peaceably with others insofar as it depends on me.
So, yes, I've been challenged. My personal response is settled now; the outworking of that within the faith community to which I belong is ongoing. That's a big challenge as well.
Edward Green, I'm also hoping this kind of response is getting to the heart of your desire to explore theological differences.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Lynn MagdalenCollege
Shipmate
# 10651
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by seasick:
Our growing experience suggests that gender identity and sexuality is a much more complex phenomenon to describe simply in binary terms. I then end up back at St Cyprian with "Custom, though never so ancient, without truth, is but an old error."
In terms of sexuality, I would generally point out that St Paul holds up the single life as the ideal and sets marriage as a concession. If we hold up (heterosexual) marriage as the ideal then we have stepped quite a way away from St Paul already. I would still want to prize the single life - and greatly esteem monastics as a result - but it is not the life for everyone. St Paul could recognise that and I think we can too. We can probably also recognise that that holds across a broad of sexuality and gender identity.
There are two different elements here I'd like to respond to: first, our growing experience may suggest that gender identity and sexuality are more complex than thought (in the relatively recent past; I suspect ancient Greece had a rather more complex view of it than your average western european of the last 200 years) but whyever would our greater knowledge have any bearing on God's knowledge? He created us, He designed us, He knows how we're broken and fallen and entropy (the law of sin and death) is at work in us all.
Jesus says a very interesting thing at the end of His upsetting teaching on marriage (no easy divorce, as Moses' allowed) in response to His disciples' saying, "If the relationship of the man with his wife is like this, it is better not to marry." "Not all men can accept this statement, but only those to whom it has been given. For there are eunuchs who were born that way from their mother's womb; and there are eunuchs who were made eunuchs by men; and there are also eunuchs who made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. He who is able to accept this, let him accept it." In the last few years I've begun to wonder if part of what He's referencing may be what many have come to view as innate same-sex attraction.
As He so often does, Jesus holds up the standard of perfection ("be ye perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect") but simultaneously recognizes not everyone will achieve it or even attempt to embrace it. I think there may be an element of that here: those who have ears to hear this teaching should try and walk it out and we shouldn't be too quick to jump on the folks who stand on the other side of the issue; ultimately it is Christ who separates the sheep from the goats and I'm sure it grieves Him to see the sheep calling each other goats.
As for Paul's statement about marriage and about his preference that everyone might be as he was (now unmarried & content to be so), I think it is important --as with all teaching-- to consider the context. The nascent church was looking for the imminent return of Jesus (remember how he had to institute the "if you don't work, you don't eat," rule because so many people had simply taken to fellowshipping and keeping an eye heavenward as they passively waited for the coming of the Lord) and Paul clearly felt a huge call to preach to everyone, everywhere, get the word out, and save all that are willing to be saved. With that in mind, his preference for unmarried ministers of the gospel makes sense: freedom to travel, no need to please or consult a wife, unencumbered by familial demands. In a way it's like hanging out and watching the heavens, looking for Jesus - if all Christians had refrained from marriage there would be no children raised in the faith and all new believers would be converts. But Paul doesn't call everyone to a single life of celibacy; he recognizes it as a peculiar gift (1 Cor 7:7 but the whole chapter is insightful).
I also wonder if there's a small element of exasperation in all this: trying to bring people out of pagan lifestyles which included temple prostitution and into one that emulated highly restrictive Jewish sexual laws-- yikes, the mind reels. Remember when he makes the remark about wishing the guys pushing the whole of the Jewish law on new Christians, including adult circumcision, would just go ahead and 'cut the whole thing off'?!
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Barnabas62 said:
IME homosexual orientation is not a matter of choice at all, so regarding it as a moral defect, a character flaw, is intrinsically unfair.
FWIW, I actually know several people who did, in fact, choose their sexual orientation (they are quite in the minority, at least so far as conscious choice goes). But the question in my mind is whether you believe that expecting all humans, gay or straight, to remain celibate outside of (heterosexual) marriage requires seeing same-sex attraction as a 'moral defect' or a 'character flaw.' I don't. I don't even see acting on the impulse to have sex outside of marriage as a moral defect or character flaw for people who don't practice Judaism or Christianity. I think it's an issue for Christians but, as with everything, it's ultimately between the person and Christ.
I do think it's problematic, however, if we think a person ought to be able to act on their sexual impulses just because they believe they were born with those impulses. I assure you, there are men attracted to children who have never felt attracted to a grown man or woman; I don't see the basis on which one defends erasing the Mosaic Law for homosexuals but not for pedophiles. Obviously consent is an issue but most pedophiles aren't violent rapists but rather seducers; they think they have consent and they think the child is sufficiently mature to consent, whatever we may think.
From the same standpoint, I don't get to go pick up men in bars (or churches, for that matter) and take them home for the night - I've come to recognize that the God who created me actually has something to say about the right use of my sexuality. Even when I don't like what He has to say and the ways in which He restricts its use. I don't see this as a 'fairness' issue or a 'justice' issue. You can argue it as a 'mercy' issue but I think it's very slippery slope.
ken: "So you can't win..." ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
quote:
Originally posted by Ricardus:
But in the case of morals, we have St Paul's assurance that the Gentiles have the law written on their hearts, even though they didn't receive the Torah. And Christianity tends to assume that God's commandments are not arbitrary and He doesn't just ban things because He can.
Which means that when we evaluate Christian morality, we have reason and conscience to guide us as well as the Bible. (And conservatives seem quite happy to reinterpret the Bible in the light of reason on moral issues such as levirate marriage, usury or even divorce.)
This doesn't exactly follow... For when Gentiles who do not have the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having the Law, are a law to themselves, in that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them, on the day when, according to my gospel, God will judge the secrets of men through Christ Jesus. Of course any time one wades into Romans, the waters get deep--! But Paul isn't talking about Gentiles keeping kosher (the details of the Torah) so much as the core of the Torah: love your neighbor as yourself: don't steal, don't gossip; don't lie; don't commit adultery. I've never heard it argued that the Gentiles were keeping the fullness of the Mosaic law.
The problem correlating it with Christians going outside the Law is two-fold: one, it's going outside the Law and two, on what basis do we call it 'reason and conscience' when, for 2,000 years, we've not done it? So we know the standards to which God called the Jews and we know that the Gentile believers were called to avoid consuming blood, avoid food sacrificed to idols (although Paul has interesting things to say about that one later), and to abstain from sexual sin. What is sexual sin? The Law instructs us. So on what basis do Christians, who have the Law available to us (so we cannot claim ignorance), put aside that small portion of the Law that we were asked to keep? You say "by reason and conscience" - really? If it's by reason that we put aside the sexual restrictions, on what basis do we keep any of them? When I was a child, 'everyone' knew it wasn't right to act on homosexual impulses, just as we knew it wasn't right to act on ANY sexual impulses outside marriage - so in what way was Christian reason and conscience defective in the first 70 years of the 20th century but it is now cured? Isn't it more likely that we've all softened from soaking in the last 40 years of concerted effort to change the cultural bias? And, once the cultural bias changes from loosely following Biblical teaching, how quickly one must start attacking those 'dinosaurs' who cling to their Bibles and 'the old way' of thinking.
As for conservatives reinterpreting the Bible in regard to usury, levirate marriage, and divorce, I don't think that's a reinterpretation of scripture but rather a moral failing to apply the scripture. I don't know anyone who says it's okay to charge 20% interest on a loan (well, the Mafia...) but credit card companies do it. If a Christian & Jewish movement rose up to attempt changing the lending laws to line up with Mosaic law, the ACLU would scream about the separation of church and state. So part of what we have now is the fact that God gave the Mosaic Law to the Jewish people to make them a people and it did. Even with the diaspora, the Jews remain the Jews; extraordinary! Yet even today in Israel, Mosaic law is not the law of the land. I have no reason to believe that God gave the law to Moses in order to impose it upon all humans, everywhere (although I expect we will live under the Torah during the millennial kingdom). I think it's an effective window into God's heart and a challenge to ask, "why? why no mixing of linen and cotton?" and "why can't I eat bats?" and "wny isn't it okay for me to have sex with whoever or whatever I want to have sex with?"
I agree, the number of 'Bible-believing' Christians who divorce and remarry is appalling - but humans are self-serving, every single one of us. With integrity we at least become aware of it and embarrassed and possibly change.
I cannot read the rest of the thread tonight and it's unlikely tomorrow (I've got a memorial service and family in town from across the country) and the thread's moving pretty quick - please don't be offended; I'm not purposely ignoring your or your brilliance! ![[Help]](graemlins/help.gif)
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Barnabas62
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lynn MagdalenCollege:
ken: "So you can't win..."
Maybe. Like on the role of women, however, I've decided to stay inside the evangelical tent pissing out, rather than go outside the tent and piss in.
quote:
Originally posted by Lynn MagdalenCollege:
I don't see the basis on which one defends erasing the Mosaic Law for homosexuals but not for pedophiles
Harm of children? Millstones around neck? Jesus was pretty specific about that. The gospel is pretty solidly anti-exploitation of the vulnerable. It doesn't allow much room for indifference either.
Anyway, what is the basis for setting aside the death punishments in the same Mosaic law? The picking and choosing has been ongoing. The Levitical laws are archaic - we tease out continuing relevance and continuing applicablity to standards of justice in accordance with wider principles. That's all I'm trying to do. It's not a novelty to do that kind of thing.
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angelicum
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62
I suppose that's my puzzle, pj. I cannot for the life of me see this "gigantic chasm". It really wasn't too hard for me to figure out that I didn't have any choice over my heterosexual orientation. I was born that way. What I did with that obviously did involve lots of choices, but that's a different matter. How much imagination is required to see the mirror image? Or, put even more simply, allow in fairness for the possibility that it might apply at least to some people?
I'm a Catholic and a chaste homosexual. I know my homosexuality is not a choice. But choosing to act on those inclinations IS a choice.
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Originally posted by LQ
Except that in this case, there aren't "different sins". There is only one set of behaviours (finding a partner, forming a household, cleaving to them as one flesh, and raising a family if applicable) which is defined as either sinful or natural and worthy (or at least capable) of blessing, depending on who is doing it (a man and woman or two of one or the other).
But that happens all the time. Sin is never just about the action or the outcome of that action but intention and attitude as well.
And even with intention, the Catholic understanding isn't that temptations necessarily have to be bad-intentioned or produce evil for it to be considered a temptation. We can sin even if our motives are perfectly good - like wanting to raise a family. For example, when Christ was tempted in the desert, on the face of it, his temptations were for things any reasonable person could want. Christ was tempted to make bread, he was tempted to perform a miracle so that more people would follow him, etc. Those don't look like very bad things, but in his context, he would be disobedient to God's plan and that is the sin. So from the Catholic understanding, sin is about rejection of the will of God, not about doing 'bad things' per se.
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TubaMirum
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
quote:
Originally posted by TubaMirum:
(Actually, it's my thought that gay folks are a really good, challenging puzzle for both Catholics and Evangelicals.
We challenge some of the most basic doctrine and disciplines of both groups - all the doctrine around procreation on the one side and Scriptural literalism on the other - and we are unacceptable on that basis, because if we're accepted as we are it means having to seriously rethink certain dogmas that are pretty well set in stone. A big problem, IOW.
I think in the long run we'll be helping both sides out of two different kinds of jams they've gotten themselves into over time. Isn't that sweet of us? )
Some fairly basic assumptions in this post are not universally true.
I suspect there are many Catholics who are a lot more nuanced on the link between sexual expression and procreation - but it's better if a Catholic speaks to that one.
What I do know for a fact is that not all evangelicals are either scriptural literalists or inerrantists. A high view of scripture does not preclude critical scholarship on issues of faith, morals, creation, truth-as-meaning etc.
It's pretty important to avoid stereotyping. In so far as any Christian stereotype others (folks from elsewhere in the Christian spectrum, or different colour, or religion, or gender, or sexual orientation) they seem to me to be acting against some pretty fundamental tenets of our faith. Such behaviour doesn't seem to be on all fours with acting justly, practising loving kindness, walking humbly.
Having written that, of course I realise it is a kind of generalisation! It's a finger I always point at me first. Offered "on an open hand".
Where I do agree with you is that homosexual orientation and practice represents a challenge to traditional ways of thinking about human sexuality. That challenge has not just impacted on members of faith communities. I used to have an early 1960's set of Encyclopedia Britannica, within which the entry on homosexuality described it as a form of pathology; a distortion of normal sexuality. One of the examples discussed was a Freudian view that same-sex attraction were a normal part of sexual development for lots of people, but some folks got "stuck there". "Cure" was thought to be possible but problematic. The entry contained some summary of religious and cultural attitudes. It was presented as a secular view. I guess it was compiled and edited in the late 1950's. From memory, I don't think it made any reference to the Kinsey reports.
My gut feel is that the impacts of the Civil Rights movement and the Feminist movement have brought about some fundamental cultural rethinking, certainly in what we describe as the Western world, about what is fair in the treatment of folks perceived as different simply because of their nature. I'm not saying that understanding did not exist before, rather that those movements focussed attention. Within that kind of paradigm shift, all of the -isms have come under a closer ethical scrutiny. One can see the effects in political correctness discussions.
When I came into Christianity (I was about 30 when that happened) these cultural effects were already at work in my mind and experience. I've spent my life since within a nonconformist evangelical setting, so the rubbing edges for me have been both personal and worked out within that faith community. That outworking hasn't felt at all like some kind of "fashionable adjustment"; rather it has been a case of testing my pre-existing beliefs and attitudes against some fundamental and biblical Christian values; acting justly, practising loving kindness, walking humbly, seeking to avoid judgmentalism, live peaceably with others insofar as it depends on me.
So, yes, I've been challenged. My personal response is settled now; the outworking of that within the faith community to which I belong is ongoing. That's a big challenge as well.
Edward Green, I'm also hoping this kind of response is getting to the heart of your desire to explore theological differences.
Barnabbas, if it helps, please go ahead and consider me a non-Christian from this point onward. I'm on my way out of the church; I'm fed up with it. (This way, I get to continue to stereotype people. Yay.)
Anyway, I've been fighting with these people for 40 years; I really do know something about the issue. It's ruled my life, for most of my life; friends have committed suicide and drunk themselves to death over it. I'm glad you belong to some (tiny, believe me) Evangelical sect that doesn't act the way others do, I really am. But you're the one who asked this question to begin with, calling on people to generalize in the first place!
That's why these threads are so annoying sometimes; people (some right on this thread) get to come here and blather on for a few minutes, pronouncing judgment on others they can't even bother to think about as human beings - and then go away and don't think another minute about it until they come back to blather on again in another 3-1/2 months for another 15 minutes. All the while never asking, but pontificating.
Meanwhile, we are living with their "issues" every minute of every day. Thank God it's gotten better - but that's only because we've worked hard to make it that way.
I will say that your sect wasn't supportive of us 40 years ago, though. I can say this for sure because NOBODY was supportive of us 40 years ago; we were utterly alone. (That goes for all the "enlightened atheists" too, BTW, who are now so quick to bully "religionists" over the issue. Don't think it's not obvious that we're being used as debating points in your little anti-religion war.)
So, I'm sorry if you were offended. But I'm not a Christian anymore, so please find another way to scold me, if you would.
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TubaMirum
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Posted
(Sorry, I can see now that it wasn't Barnabbas who started the thread, but Edward Green. Apologies on that score.
Barnabbas, to be honest, I don't think the post you quoted contains any stereotyping anyway. I was speaking in about particular errors (as I see them, of course) made on the both Catholic and Evangelical sides. I had no intention of saying that every Catholic and Evangelical made those errors; on the contrary, in fact. I'm well aware that many Catholics don't make the error; I'm well aware of the fact that most Catholics use birth control, for example. It's also true that many Catholics (not many Evangelicals, BTW) do not hold with the very confused Church teachings about homosexuality.
And I've met some evangelicals who've been very fair and open-minded; not many, but a few. One in particular had a great influence on my view of Evangelicalism as a whole.
My point was precisely to show that there are, in my view, errors in the thinking of the two points of view. But ordinary Catholics haven't had much to do with the working-out of the Church's theology, so I certainly don't hold them responsible for the errors. Likewise for Evangelicals.
But in any case, I'm fed up with the whole thing, and am leaving the church, so consider what I have to say from that point of view from now on.)
[ 22. January 2011, 13:29: Message edited by: TubaMirum ]
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TubaMirum
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Posted
(Sorry for the rant. I get mad sometimes. Carry on.)
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Barnabas62
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Posted
That's fine, Tubamirum. [I'd just been looking at RadicalWhig's Hell thread before I read your posts].
One of the good things about this cyberplace is the space it provides for sounding off. I'm sorry you've had such experiences.
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TubaMirum
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
That's fine, Tubamirum. [I'd just been looking at RadicalWhig's Hell thread before I read your posts].
One of the good things about this cyberplace is the space it provides for sounding off. I'm sorry you've had such experiences.
Yes, and I really didn't mean to address my particular frustration at you, of course. And actually re-reading it, I think I've been mistaken about the posts on this thread; I saw certain "key words and phrases" and made certain assumptions that I think were unfounded and that I shouldn't have taken in the way I did.
So, really: do carry on and ignore this little outburst. It comes from past experience, mostly, and does not reflect upon you all but upon me. I didn't mean to put the damper on the discussion; you are right to be talking about it and I made a mistake. Sorry.
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Edward Green
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Posted
Just to let people know I am reading and reflecting and will be replying when I get the chance.
There have been some very interesting reflections on theological method but also on pastoral practice - another difference between Evangelicals and Catholics.
The Catholic tradition also has always had options without suspicion for those not called to marriage, and religious ways of life that enable people to form companionships. I cannot easily think of the equivalent within Reformed thought.
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Ricardus
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lynn MagdalenCollege:
You say "by reason and conscience" - really? If it's by reason that we put aside the sexual restrictions, on what basis do we keep any of them?
"Reason" = by evaluating whether a system of ethics is internally coherent.
"Conscience" = by evaluating whether it matches up to our experience.
The Church Fathers' view of sexuality seems to me internally coherent. Sex is for procreation. Any other use of sex is wrong. Sex is a dodgy appetite anyway because it causes us to act in irrational ways.
Homosexual acts are by definition wrong but so are a lot of heterosexual ones. The idea of "homosexual identity" would be foreign to the Fathers - but so would heterosexual identity, because you shouldn't be identifying yourself by your sexuality at all.
Does the Fathers' sexual ethic correspond to our experience? Certainly it seems very odd to suggest that sex can never just be an expression of love. But it's possible that our attitudes are distorted, and if someone genuinely followed the ethics of the Fathers, I would have a certain sympathy.
By contrast the contemporary "conservative" view is just incoherent for the reasons LQ says. If sex can be an expression of love, and love is a good thing, then on what grounds can homosexual sex be wrong?
And how can "Because the Bible says so" be a sufficient reason in this case when conservatives are perfectly willing to reinterpret the Bible in other cases?
quote:
As for conservatives reinterpreting the Bible in regard to usury, levirate marriage, and divorce, I don't think that's a reinterpretation of scripture but rather a moral failing to apply the scripture. I don't know anyone who says it's okay to charge 20% interest on a loan (well, the Mafia...) but credit card companies do it.
But the Biblical usury laws aren't just against excessive rates of interest, they're against any interest at all.
I don't know about America, but in Britain it'd be perfectly possible for a Biblical conservative to keep the usury laws, by taking out an Islamic bank account. But none of them do.
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Then the dog ran before, and coming as if he had brought the news, shewed his joy by his fawning and wagging his tail. -- Tobit 11:9 (Douai-Rheims)
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TubaMirum
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Posted
C.S. Lewis makes this very point about interest, very vehemently, in "Mere Christianity."
quote:
Now another point. There is one bit of advice given to us by the ancient heathen Greeks, and by the Jews in the Old Testament, and by the great Christian teachers of the Middle Ages, which the modern economic system has completely disobeyed. All these people told us not to lend money at interest: and lending money at interest-what we call investment-is the basis of our whole system. Now it may not absolutely follow that we are wrong. Some people say that when Moses and Aristotle and the Christians agreed in forbidding interest (or "usury" as they called it), they could not foresee the joint stock company, and were only dunking of the private moneylender, and that, therefore, we need not bother about what they said. That is a question I cannot decide on. I am not an economist and I simply do not know whether the investment system is responsible for the state we are in or not This is where we want the Christian economist But I should not have been honest if I had not told you that three great civilisations had agreed (or so it seems at first sight) in condemning the very thing on which we have based our whole life.
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angelicum
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Posted
quote:
If sex can be an expression of love, and love is a good thing, then on what grounds can homosexual sex be wrong?
Surely its possible? When Christ was tempted it wasn't that he was tempted by things which were in themselves intrinsically evil. Bread, miracles, etc. are not in themselves evil, in fact they are good things. But just like Christ performing a miracle outside the will of the Father would have been sinful, so to for us. Sex is not a bad thing, and as you say it can be an expression of love. But sex as Catholics understand it - in its proper form i.e. in a couple united in the sacrament of holy matrimony is a proper expression of love, whilst sex outside of marriage would be, like the temptations of Christ in the desert.
In any case, as a Catholic homosexual, my take on it is fairly simple I guess. A few people are called to the priesthood. Some to the religious life. Some people (few people actually - certainly not the very many people that society expects) are called to the vocation of married life. All are called to the vocation of chastity. So I don't have the vocation to the married life (because I believe that we discern our vocation, not by an "individual experience" or a subjective perception of need but in the community which we call the Church). I don't have the vocation to be a monk, or a social worker, or a nurse, either. That doesn't preclude me from living out my vocation to chastity - and what the Church teaches is what makes it (for me) even more beautiful - that the sacrifices and trials that I (and other people with homosexual inclinations) undergo in the pursuit of the virtue of chastity is united to that of the sacrifice of Christ on the cross (CCC2538). That is, but one, of the many consolations which the Church gives her children. So far from condemnation of my state, or damnation into hell, it is with the Church, and through the Church that I live out my vocation as a Christian called to "put on Christ. " And when I fail - as I sometimes do - I always have the sacraments to revive and console me, particularly the sacrament of confession, and I can be assured of the forgiveness and mercy of God. I guess my point is, people are free to disagree with this teaching, but to view the Catholic Church as some cruel institution for those with homosexual inclinations to be a part of is wrong. There's a maternal side to the Church (our mother, the Church) that many people on the outside don't see.
[ 22. January 2011, 23:21: Message edited by: angelicum ]
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Bullfrog.
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Posted
That sex can be an expression of love doesn't mean it necessarily is an expression of love (in gay or straight relationships.)
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Some say that man is the root of all evil
Others say God's a drunkard for pain
Me, I believe that the Garden of Eden
Was burned to make way for a train. --Josh Ritter, Harrisburg
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Barnabas62
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Posted
Edward
My gut feel is that both Catholic and Reform traditions are somewhat mixed up about human sexuality. Both grasp completely the pervasive and destructive effects of human selfishness, but for both the way that selfishness is allied to sexual behaviour seems be skewed somewhat. I'm giving that some more thought - because the skewdness I perceive probably has a mixture of same and different roots in both traditions.
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Lynn MagdalenCollege
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Anyway, what is the basis for setting aside the death punishments in the same Mosaic law? The picking and choosing has been ongoing. The Levitical laws are archaic - we tease out continuing relevance and continuing applicablity to standards of justice in accordance with wider principles. That's all I'm trying to do. It's not a novelty to do that kind of thing.
I view the power of life and death as inherently to do with "the state" - so whether I believe in the death penalty for bestiality or not, I don't have the right to impose it (or carry it out, yikes!). So I don't see the relevance of your question - the basis on which death penalty laws have been set aside isn't religious, it's secular. I think referenced earlier, the Mosaic Law was given to one people group, for them to live by, and God hasn't asked any other nation or people to live by those laws (not to my knowledge, anyway; there have been groups which have attempted to live by Mosaic Law but I don't know any successes; shoot, ancient Israel wasn't even successful). The first church council, which address Mosaic Law in relation to the church, didn't believe the Holy Spirit was directing them to lay the yoke of Mosaic Law upon the church - so why is it an issue that the church doesn't embrace it all now? What the council in Jerusalem concluded is very concise and precise: "For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these essentials: that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication; if you keep yourselves free from such things, you will do well. Farewell." (Acts 15:28-29). That's the charge to the church, not the whole of the Levitical law. So yes, I find it curious that so much of the modern church has decided that fornication isn't such a bad thing, really, and you can't expect people to overcome their nature.
quote:
Harm of children? Millstones around neck? Jesus was pretty specific about that. The gospel is pretty solidly anti-exploitation of the vulnerable. It doesn't allow much room for indifference either.
But 38 years after the Roe v. Wade decision, we routinely slaughter children and, when you consider fetal stem cell research, "exploit the vulnerable" - and many of the people who support both those positions are Christians. And most pedophiles are convinced they're not hurting the child; they love the child. Please don't misunderstand me, I'm entirely against it and I see a big difference between consenting adults doing *whatever* and the power dynamic between a manipulative adult and a child - I'm just aware that the "it's not fair" argument for homosexuality can be applied to pedophilia, too. ![[Frown]](frown.gif)
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Edward Green
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# 46
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Posted
There is a lot to respond to and engage with here. I want avoid the usual arguments if possible and focus on theological method.
Ken is right to affirm the different relationship with tradition. In the search for authentic Christianity I would turn to the Apostolic Father's rather than the Alpha Course.
Although I am having a tease, Evangelicals do have a Tradition which is expressed in the pages of Christian Magazines and in the words of popular speakers past and present. That Tradition is not absolute, the Evangelicalism of today is different to the Evangelicalism of 100 years ago. Evangelicalism does have within its Wesleyan stream a tradition of Women in ministry, and the Puritans argued for the joy and exuberance of marital sex.
If I turn to the Father's however I find very little that speaks of sexual pleasure or the female presbyterate.
Pauline thought does not seem overly pro marriage, or procreation. To defend sex as mutual pleasure one must turn to the Song of Solomon, which plenty of commentators suggest describes a progression of pre-marital and marital intimacy and mutual pleasure.
It may be 10 years of NFI, but despite having preached the Roger and Faith Forster line on the New Testament texts the complementarian exegesis of Paul's teaching still seems more consistent. Indeed I find it more compelling than the constant mythologising and demythologising that surrounds the sexuality texts.
With my Evangelical head on I still feel you need Galatians 5:28 and Matthew 22:30 as trump cards that point towards a future goal that Paul was (and the Church since has been) unable to achieve.
And it is not hard to find conservatives who believe the use of these texts in regards to women in the presbyterate leads to raising questions about sexuality. They make the links too. Example
So in a sense perhaps it is only the 'liberal' Evangelicals (in terms of female presbyters) who don't make the link.
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TubaMirum
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# 8282
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lynn MagdalenCollege:
"For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these essentials: that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication; if you keep yourselves free from such things, you will do well. Farewell." (Acts 15:28-29). That's the charge to the church, not the whole of the Levitical law. So yes, I find it curious that so much of the modern church has decided that fornication isn't such a bad thing, really, and you can't expect people to overcome their nature.
Because "fornication" is understood as "illicit sex" - and it's become obvious that it doesn't apply to gay married couples any more than it applies to straight married ones. I would think that's fairly obvious.
quote:
Originally posted by Lynn MagdalenCollege:
But 38 years after the Roe v. Wade decision, we routinely slaughter children and, when you consider fetal stem cell research, "exploit the vulnerable" - and many of the people who support both those positions are Christians. And most pedophiles are convinced they're not hurting the child; they love the child. Please don't misunderstand me, I'm entirely against it and I see a big difference between consenting adults doing *whatever* and the power dynamic between a manipulative adult and a child - I'm just aware that the "it's not fair" argument for homosexuality can be applied to pedophilia, too.
But everybody agrees that pedophiles are hurting children. You know, since children are, by the definition of the act itself, being exploited and hurt. So who the hell cares what pedophiles think?
Nobody, of course - oh, except when pedophiles are being quoted to use as an argument against homosexuality. Then, it apparently matters a great deal what their opinions are....
Posts: 4719 | From: Right Coast USA | Registered: Aug 2004
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angelicum
Shipmate
# 13515
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by TubaMirum:
But everybody agrees that pedophiles are hurting children. You know, since children are, by the definition of the act itself, being exploited and hurt. So who the hell cares what pedophiles think?
Nobody, of course - oh, except when pedophiles are being quoted to use as an argument against homosexuality. Then, it apparently matters a great deal what their opinions are....
Except of course, its not only paedophilia which is sinful, but any sex outside the marital state (though there are of course degrees of sin).
And before the argument about fairness between homosexuals and heterosexuals come up about who can and cannot marry - not all heterosexuals are called to the married vocation. In fact, judging by the great numbers of failed marriages, my suspicion is that many are not called to marriage. In this respect, perhaps the Church is failing those who have heterosexual inclinations in their discernment as to whether they are called to married life or not.
[ 23. January 2011, 14:44: Message edited by: angelicum ]
Posts: 364 | From: Full in the panting heart | Registered: Mar 2008
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TubaMirum
Shipmate
# 8282
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by angelicum:
quote:
Originally posted by TubaMirum:
But everybody agrees that pedophiles are hurting children. You know, since children are, by the definition of the act itself, being exploited and hurt. So who the hell cares what pedophiles think?
Nobody, of course - oh, except when pedophiles are being quoted to use as an argument against homosexuality. Then, it apparently matters a great deal what their opinions are....
Except of course, its not only paedophilia which is sinful, but any sex outside the marital state (though there are of course degrees of sin).
Again - for the hundred-thousandth time - we're discussing pedophilia on a thread ostensibly dedicated to homosexuality and women's ordination. To me, this fact in itself says something pretty important about the anti-gay argument, and about its origins in religion.
For me, the very last reason on earth to oppose pedophilia is because it's "sex outside of marriage." It wouldn't even occur to me to use this as a defense in any discussion. And of course it has nothing to do with the anti-gay argument, either; why has it come up yet again?
quote:
Originally posted by angelicum:
And before the argument about fairness between homosexuals and heterosexuals come up about who can and cannot marry - not all heterosexuals are called to the married vocation. In fact, judging by the great numbers of failed marriages, my suspicion is that many are not called to marriage. In this respect, perhaps the Church is failing those who have heterosexual inclinations in their discernment as to whether they are called to married life or not.
So you've said you believe. However, since around 90-95% of people (in the U.S. at least) get married eventually, you'll have a bit of a hard time selling that argument anywhere, I'd say.
Another, simpler idea might be do more to help people keep their marriages together....
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LutheranChik
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# 9826
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Posted
A drive-by observation from me (I really don't want to get embroiled in another one of these discussions): The argument that involuntary celibacy by virtue of one's adherence to church's teaching is somehow more spiritually noble than a mutually loving/respectful/kenotic committed same-sex relationship is an idea I find offensive, hurtful and insulting...and emotionally/spiritually unhealthy. To me that's like engaging in a self-amputation and then offering up one's suffering and difficulties to Jesus.
Happily, that's not an expectation I have to deal with in my own life in my church or, increasingly, in my denomination. One of the tipping points in the Lutheran conversation about same-sex relationships is the number of committed relationships that embody everything that Christians have claimed is important in our relationships: fidelity; mutual love and care; living the love of Christ into the lives of our partners; being priests to one another. How can you call these good things bad? "Teh Bibel sez" is becoming an increasingly weak argument as the lives of gay and lesbian couples become more open.
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Simul iustus et peccator
http://www.lutheranchiklworddiary.blogspot.com
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Barnabas62
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# 9110
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Posted
Its Gal 3:28, leo. Just a typo.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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angelicum
Shipmate
# 13515
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by TubaMirum:
For me, the very last reason on earth to oppose pedophilia is because it's "sex outside of marriage." It wouldn't even occur to me to use this as a defense in any discussion. And of course it has nothing to do with the anti-gay argument, either; why has it come up yet again?[QB]
That sex outside of marriage is considered sinful is quite alot to do with why the Church believes homosexual acts can be sinful.
quote:
Originally posted by TubaMirium: [QB]So you've said you believe. However, since around 90-95% of people (in the U.S. at least) get married eventually, you'll have a bit of a hard time selling that argument anywhere, I'd say.
Another, simpler idea might be do more to help people keep their marriages together....
It's not simply my belief. It's the belief of the Church - that all are called to chastity, that some are called to marriage (and some to priesthood, etc.)
Both helping people discern whether or not they have a vocation to marriage AND helping them keep their marriages together is important.
One of the tipping points in the Lutheran conversation about same-sex relationships is the number of committed relationships that embody everything that Christians have claimed is important in our relationships: fidelity; mutual love and care; living the love of Christ into the lives of our partners; being priests to one another. How can you call these good things bad?
There are many polygamous relationships that are like that can be seen in those terms as well. And yet, the vast majority of Christians believe that polygamy is sinful.
As for your question about how 'good things' can be sinful, as I have pointed out at least twice on this thread, Christ was not tempted by obviously evil things, but rather he was tempted by making bread, etc. His third temptation is particularly relevant - the Fathers believe that Christ was tempted by influence, by the ability to influence others and to go after as many followers as possible (the devil took him to a high mountain and showed him the entire world). And it all sounds so good and holy. What could be better after all then for Jesus to be THE influence? And yet, the Gospels make it very clear, this was a temptation, and to succumb to that temptation would be akin to worshipping Satan. So this is how seemingly 'good things' can be sinful - if those things are not a part of God's plan.
quote:
Originally posted by LutheranChik: Teh Bibel sez" is becoming an increasingly weak argument as the lives of gay and lesbian couples become more open.
Many on this thread, have suggested that because there are things in the Bible that Christians no longer obey, e.g. usury, therefore the admonishment against homosexual acts can too fall under that bracket. But of course, the Bible is only one part of the deposit of faith, which we call Sacred Tradition (capital T). It is not the sole totality of the deposit of faith.
The Church, both those living here and now in 2011, and also those who have died in Christ, even 2000 years ago, is the authentic interpreter of the Bible. It is not for me, as an individual, or as part of a group, to decide which parts of the Bible are relevant today, and which are products of their time. Rather it is the Church - militant, triumphant, and suffering - who guides our understanding. So, in the Catholic understanding, the admonishment against homosexual acts by St Paul forms one part of our understanding of human sexuality. The teachings of the Fathers and the continuing witness of the Church also forms a part of it.
To try an characterise Catholic teaching on human sexuality by the phrase 'the Bible says' is a gross oversimplification.
[ 23. January 2011, 16:37: Message edited by: angelicum ]
Posts: 364 | From: Full in the panting heart | Registered: Mar 2008
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Edward Green:
The Catholic tradition also has always had options without suspicion for those not called to marriage, and religious ways of life that enable people to form companionships. I cannot easily think of the equivalent within Reformed thought.
Missionaries ![[Biased]](wink.gif) They are our saints and monks and nuns and heroes of the faith.
That's semi-serious. More obviously, there has alway s been a place for single women. Especially older ones.
But single men over the age of about thirty are, if not the object of suspicion, considered obvious losers and abject social failures and not at all people you would want to associate with. But that is true of British society as a whole of course, not just Christians - and its one reason Roman Catholicism is in some ways still not fully accepted as British.
Outside the churches that's still true, but the working definition of "not single" no longer requires legal marriage. Inside the churches we don't have that option.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Barnabas62
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# 9110
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Posted
angelicum
I don't think LutheranChik was addressing your arguments. There are others involved in this conversation.
One could replace "Teh bibel sez" with "Teh Holey Tradition sez" and the net effect would, however, be the same. You are appealing to a different authority, of course, but the real issue LutheranChik raised is the ongoing credibility of that authority in conversation with folks who are in life-long, committed, same-sex relationships which mirror the best understandings of faithfulness within Christian heterosexual marriage.
I honour and respect your decisions to adopt a chaste life style in obedience to Catholic teaching. And I understand where you stand on the alternatives - and why. In all conscience, I am not persuaded that your response is the only moral one available to Christians.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Knopwood
Shipmate
# 11596
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by angelicum:
It's not simply my belief. It's the belief of the Church - that all are called to chastity, that some are called to marriage (and some to priesthood, etc.)
...and that marriage is jerry-rigged so as to inevitably frustrate a certain proportion of vocatons thereto. Do you see the problem? You can hold that sexual activity is okay only within the context of marriage OR you can define marriage in such a way as to exclude some existing marriages, but you can't eat your cake and have it too, because the others are not going anywhere. The fact that the Church says so doesn't make it any more tenable or enforceable a position.
[ 23. January 2011, 21:28: Message edited by: LQ ]
Posts: 6806 | From: Tio'tia:ke | Registered: Jun 2006
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Incipit
Shipmate
# 10554
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Posted
Tuba Mirum
What you said resonates very much with me. I have also left the church because of the cruelty of the views of most versions of Christianity towards homosexuality. The secular world seems much more 'Christian'. And the hypocrisy of the church in knowingly relying on employing thousands of gay clergy, many in lifelong relationships, while officially denigrating their sexuality, makes the situation stink even more.
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LutheranChik
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# 9826
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Posted
There's also, I think, an underlying sex-negativity implicit in much of traditional Christian sexual discussion anyway -- the idea that celibacy is an ideal state; that marriage -- while being "esteemed" in word -- is actually treated as a reluctant concession to second-string Christians who can't control their sexual impulses...God's rather yucky plan for continuation of the species. If that's an institutional attitude toward heterosexual married sex, no wonder anything that doesn't fit that model is viewed as being especially vile.
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Simul iustus et peccator
http://www.lutheranchiklworddiary.blogspot.com
Posts: 6462 | From: rural Michigan, USA | Registered: Jul 2005
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Bullfrog.
Prophetic Amphibian
# 11014
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Posted
quote:
Originally Posted by angelicum:
There are many polygamous relationships that are like that can be seen in those terms as well.
Are you speaking from experience here?
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Some say that man is the root of all evil
Others say God's a drunkard for pain
Me, I believe that the Garden of Eden
Was burned to make way for a train. --Josh Ritter, Harrisburg
Posts: 7522 | From: Chicago | Registered: Feb 2006
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