OK, now, just in case any n00bie lurker were to think that I'm defending homosexual vice, let me state right at the top that I detest and abhor homosexual vice. Likewise heterosexual vice, gluttony, sloth, gossip, and all the other vices, especially intellectual and spiritual pride. (My preaching is better than my practice, but just to get that on the record!)
So I shall assume the persona "Gayla X.Agete"
On Sodom and Gomorrah
LearsFool: They've got the chronology all mixed up. The destruction of the Sodomites was planned BEFORE they ever saw the angels, lusted after them, and tried to break in Lot's house to gang-rape-sodomize them. That story tells just how very wicked they were.
Gayla X.Agete Bu it doesn't say they engaged in loving, faithful, family-building, same-sex marriage. Therefore it is gang-rape-sodomy that is being condemned, not homosexuality per se."
"God made no distinction between them and us"
LearsFool: the "them and us" in this passage refers to Jews and Gentiles, not males and females or so-called gays and so-called straights.
Gayla X.Agete The division between Jews and Gentiles is just one part of the problem of human alienation. A fuller theological/moral context shows that God intends to break down all cultural/traditional/racial prejudices so that people of every race, tribe, color, physical condition --- blind, lame, lepers, male/female, gay/straight, slave /free -- are accepted in His Kingdom.
Marriage honorable for all, the marriage bed undefiled
LearsFool: What is marriage? Invented and defined by God as male and female (Matt. 19, I Cor. 6:16.) Plus, two men or two women cannot consummate a marriage. In the past, our laws provide for annulment if the marriage had not been or could not be consummated. And we all know what "consummated" means. A "marriage" between two people of the same sex cannot be consummated. They can never become "one flesh".
Gayla X.Agete: This comment about annulment is not in the Bible: it comes from a man-made legal code (“our laws”). It's human tradition. The Bible doesn’t say anything about annulment, infertility, or even impotence. It doesn’t even have the word “consummation” applied to sex. So please avoid these un-Biblical views.
The Old Testament view of marriage was only partial, because as the Bible says (Hebrews 7:18-19),"There is, on the one hand, the abrogation of an earlier commandment because it was weak and ineffectual (for the law made nothing perfect); there is, on the other hand, the introduction of a better hope, through which we approach God."
The law made nothing perfect. Hebrew law banned marriage by race and tribe (don't marry Canaanites, Moabites, etc.), was polygamous, especially on the part of its greatest patriarchs and kings, was not based on fidelity ("great" mean, ilike Abraham and David,could have sex even with slave girls -- fidelity, eh?), was not based on love (Deuteronomy 22:28–29 required a rapist to marry his victim).
The New Testament shows Jesus came to break down barriers between people, on the basis of love. Since Love is the supreme law --- "do unto others as you would want them to do unto you" --- gay people are freed to marry based on love: you wouldn't want any law to ban you marrying the person you loved, as long as that person is of age, single, and consenting. The New Law of Love is what we follow.
There is no longer... male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.
LearsFoolAre they seriously suggesting that we're all androgynous now?
Gayla X.Agete No,androgyny comes later, when in heaven, we will be "like angels," as Jesus said, and will be entirely free of gender restrictions. In heaven we aren't given in marriage in the same sense that the Old Law defines. But as for this life on earth, Gay Christians are saying sex and gender are now fluid categories, and not the central definition of a loving marriage relationship. The center of marriage is committed love, whatever the sex or gender.
Even Christ is portrayed, under "mysterium tremendum" image of Ephesians, as being "married" to the Church (Ephesians 5:32) All people of whatever sex are members of His Church, His bride. Yes, His bridal Church certainly contains men; so marriage in the Kingdom doesn't depend on gender.
"Husband" and "wife" in Ephesians therefore doesn't necessarily mean male and female; a married gay man can see his partner as his "wife" since this "great mystery" is dno longer constrained by the limitations of gender. In the Church he has a bridal relationship with Christ: same here with another man.
LearsFool: But all these distinctions still exist. Women and man ("Let the women keep silence in the churches" I Cor. 14:34) Slaves and masters ("Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling" Eph. 6:5) Races and cultures("And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks." Acts 18:4)
Gayla X.Agete But they shouldn't exist; they should fade away. Paul himself says they are all one in Christ, and shows the beginning of the end of all these barriers: his letter to Philemon saying a slave should be welcomed home not as a slave but as a brother; the enthusiastic in pouring of gentiles of every kind into the Church and all the barriers to Marriage Equality swept away; the prophetic stance that "God's Spirit will be poured out on all flesh, women and men prophesying, etc. Away with those who prohibit marriage between a man and the one he loves, or a woman and the one she loves.It may once have been against the law, but Paul says "Love" is th emore excellent way.
Romans 1:26-17 and Homosexuality
LearsFool: So because the path to this abomination is described, it's no longer an abomination? Is murder okay as long as I'm not sacrificing the victim to Molech?
Gayla X.Agete: Gay Christian married couples are neither practicing an abomination NOR sacrificing to Molech!
You're saying homosexuality per se is a "path" to the abomination of idolatry, but that's not so. What's abominable is idolatry itself, and the sins that were part and parcel of idolatry, such as pederasty, temple prostitution, and of course, as you mention, covetousness, maliciousness; envy, murder, strife, deceit, malignity; etc. - Rom. 1:29. But none of these things is gay marriage. If gay marriage does not involve pederasty or prostitution, or rape or promiscuity, or envy, murder, etc., then homosexuality per se is not what Paul was talking about.
Rape, promiscuity, prostitution, abuse of a minor, etc. can be in practice part of heterosexuality, too, and there can be heterosexual idolatry, but that doesn't make heterosexuality per se an abomination. It just means heterosexuality should be expressed in the right way: a commitment to love, in the shared covenant of marriage. The same is true for everybody, gay or straight. ("Marriage is honorable for all, and the marriage bed undefiled.")
LearsFool: Are these things sinful only for idol-worshippers?
Gayla X.AgeteOne could just as well say, "Are these things sinful only for homosexuals?" Of course not. These things (prostitution, sexual contact with a minor, promiscuity, etc.) are sinful for everyone. They are a product of lawless lust. But the solution to lawless lust is lawful marriage. St. Paul says "It is better to marry than to burn." So it is better for committed gay couples to get married than to engage in sinful behavior such as promiscuity and the other sins of non-married sex.
Besides, Paul says it is wrong to forbid people to marry. He says of certain erroneous teachers that "They forbid marriage and demand abstinence from foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth" (1 Timothy 4:3). These people by forbidding marriage to gay couples, are exposing them to the "burning" of lust. Mandatory celibacy is not taught anywhere in the Bible. Marriage as an honorable estate, and as a remedy for concupiscence, is.
Arsenokoitai and Malakoi
LearsFool: Arsenokoitai is a word coined by combining two words, yielding the new word "male-bedders". Malakoi means "soft" or "effeminate". The Bible writers often used euphemisms ("lie with", "know", "cover one's feet", etc.), just as we do ("sleep with", "powder one's nose").
Gayla X.Agete: That translation “male-bedders” doesn’t really define homosexuality -- to say that it does is a mere human interpretation. For one thing, a married straight woman is bedded with the man she wedded: that doesn’t make her an ”arsenokoitai”, precisely because she’s not just “bedding” a man, she’s married to him. It’s spousal love, not just male-beddery. So if a man marries the man he loves, that’s in principle the same: it spousal love, married love, not “arsenokoitai.” In fact, a life of promiscuous fornication, male-bedding, is just what Christian gays are trying to avoid: we say we should flee fornication, and get honorably married.
Many Goay Christians interpret "arsenokpitai" as bed-hopped of either sex, that is, promiscuous fornicators. A teaching agsinst "bed-hopping" is not against gay marriage. Onthe contrary, we should be against gays bed-hopping and in favor of gays settling down and getting married.
Even less are you using an accurate definition of "Malakoi." Strong's Greek Word study says malakoi means (a) soft, (b) of persons: soft, delicate, effeminate. Neither has any necessary connection with sexuality.
A word derived from "malakoi" (malakos) is used in the NT to describe fabrics (Jesus said, "Did you go out to the desert to see a man dressed in soft clothing?") But there are many heterosexual men who dress in soft lothing, and who ARE soft (in the sense of "not burly, muscular, rugged") and many homosexual men, on the other hand, who DO dress in rugged or stereotyupically masculine clothes and who ARE physically tough.
Many Gay Christians interpret "Malakoi" to mean "a man who dresses in fine clothes," that is, a fashion-obsessed man. This is a teaching against male fashion, vanity, and especially luxury --- not against gay marriage.
So this has nothing to do with sexuality. To say that homosexual men are soft in this sense--- sissies or pansier--- is another human stereotype, one of the "traditions of men." To apply it to sexuality is just to perpetuate a false and defamatory stereotype. Those gay professional athletes are not soft and effeminite. The rapists of Sodom were certainly not malakoi! And as for whethether they are "arsenokoitai"? Well, it doesn't say the men of Sodom wanted to bed men. It says they wanted to rape angels. And angels, as we know, have no gender.
And would it have been better if the men of Sodom had wanted to rape Lot's daughters?? Really??
LearsFool: You don't have to know many same-sex couples to observe the natural male-female relationship in its perverted state: One plays the male part, and the other plays the female part. (Pardon my bluntness, but if they both played the same part, they'd never get anywhere.) And the role-playing goes beyond their sexual acts.
Gayla X.Agete: That’s more of that “human custom” or “traditions of men” again. It is unfortunate that this is heternormative, binary-based homosexual behavior still lingers--- but it's because when gays haven’t been free to really develop a fully-expressive gay culture, they too often find themselves imitating heterosexual behavior, and even the worst of heterosexual behavior: male/female role playing, one active, the other passive; one the gal, the other the guy, one dominating the other, etc. Now that gays are more free to explore the whole spectrum of sexuality, this binary stuff is disappearing. There’s infinite variety in the ways of sexual intimacy that doesn’t mimic heteronormativity. The gender binary is out the window.
LearsFool: They know this. They deny it, because it's a constant reminder of God's design of male and female which they fight against.
Gayla X.Agete: Read agains what I said about the rejection of the gender binary. We are rejecting these limitations, which are really the “traditions of men.” In fact, even Christian heterosexuals are rejecting these artificial rules.
LearsFool: (What exactly is "the natural use of the woman" in Rom. 1? What does it mean for something to be "against nature"?)
Gayla X.Agete: Exactly. Most straight couples have decoupled sex from fertility: they use contraceptives within marriage, they get vasectomies and they have their tubes tied, all with the acceptance of their various churches. Evangelical women actually top all other religious categories in their use of the most effective forms of birth control : surveys show 74% of married Evangelical women (LINK)have voluntarily sterilized themselves: they use either (permanent, surgical) sterilization or (temporary, hormonal) sterilization, e.g. oral, transdermal, injected or implanted hormones. Like the Pill. Hormonal alteration of one's sexuality.
Clearly, the vast majority of married Evangelicals -- as well as other Christian denominations, including married Catholics --- have in practice rejected “the natural use of the woman” and are habitually having sex “against nature.”
And there’s practically nobody in the Christian world who is consistently against this love-and-relationship-centered view of sex, and thus marriage is more “about love” than “about rigid gender roles chained to procreation.”
Any view of sex that makes a mandatory connection to procreation is a “tradition of man,” and not really Biblical, since most extended and detailed text about sxual love in Scripture is the Song of Solomon, and it's all about inerpersonal longing, and the experience and fulfillment of desire. It doesn’t allude to having babies --- not even remotely, not even once. Therefore it has no necessary connection with male and female. That is necessary for fertility, but it is not necessary for love and marriage.
Thus ends, for now, the dialogue between LearsFool and Gayla X. Agete.
I just want to repeat again that I am neither Gay nor pro-Gay (nor, pro-Gayla.) I’m playing back the arguments that have been made to me in other forums and in actual conversations with people who term themselves "Gay" "Christians."
Your turn…
:o)
God bless you.
Maybe I am wrong, but the “Christian: pro-sodomy point of view seems to be of recent origin. Doesn’t necessarily mean it’s wrong. Just curious that until our culture/society has turned its back on the Bible and Christianity, Christians did not even entertain such notions. Now that the Church is influenced, if not dragged around, by modern culture, this is an issue.