No, but neither does it suggest the men of Sodom knew Lot's visitors were angels either.
Which wouldn't be relevant here. If I say, "A group of people in Sodom tried to gang rape angels" it doesn't matter that the people in Sodom didn't know they were angels.
The more reasonable explanation, given the SUM of God's Word, is that the men of Sodom saw them as men and wanted to have sex, relations with them.
The word you are looking for is rape. They wanted to rape them.
There is an intriguing, quite similar passage in Judges 19 that might shed some light on the culture of that era:
22 While they were celebrating, behold, the men of the city, certain worthless fellows, surrounded the house, pounding the door; and they spoke to the owner of the house, the old man, saying, “Bring out the man who came into your house that we may have relations with him.”
Good, you are already familiar with the passage. I want you to pay attention very closely to both where the stories are the same, and also where they are different.
Neither story is about the sexual orientation of the mob, both stories are about sexual violence being done to outsiders. In the first story, they refuse Lot's daughters; in the second story they refuse the old man's daughter, when the Levite's concubine is tossed out, they raped her to death.
They didn't care whether it was a man or a woman, they didn't care about that. They cared about hurting and violating someone, specifically an outsider, a stranger.
Moreover, I already quoted Paul in Romans 1 showing his, and by inspiration, God's attitude toward homosexuality - "men with men abandoning the 'natural function' of the woman..." This is also a perfectly reasonable indication of what "strange" means in this context - i.e. "unnatural." And because Paul was VERY CLEARLY talking about homosexuality, men with men, etc., it's a huge stretch to interpret that any other way.
You're right, St. Paul is talking about men having sex with men, and women having sex with women, in the context of pagan idolatry. Don't ignore everything else the Apostle is saying here, he's talking about pagan idolatry. Part of forfeiting the worship of the Creator God in favor of the worship of false gods, was that they gave themselves over to every lust of the flesh.
But why is Paul talking about this here? Why does the Apostle start talking about the Gospel, but then switch gears suddenly to the ways in which God's wrath has been revealed against all ungodliness?
For a few reasons, Paul wants to properly preach the Law and the universal condemnation of the Law against sinners, both Jew and Greek. Because the bitterness of the Law makes the Gospel all the more sweet. But to get to that sweetness of the Gospel he has to make some very important points. So one can follow along with what the Apostle is saying here, nodding along against just how profane those uncircumcised Greeks and Romans are; but take note what the Apostle does in the opening verse of chapter 2 of his epistle. He rightly points the hypocrisy of his readers in nodding along with him as he wags his finger against the perversions of the Gentiles. It is here that the Apostle begins laying down foundations of what he's doing, by leveling the playing field. That nobody, neither Jew nor Greek, is justified under the Law; but that instead "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God", that "all" means "Jew and Gentile"--so everyone, yes. Both Jew and Gentile, everybody, has sinned, and therefore stands condemned under the Law as a sinner; and for such reason no one can stand justified before God on the basis of the Law and the personal merits of the individual brought before God. It is, instead, solely by the grace of God, on Christ's account alone, through faith that the sinner is made righteous, rendered just, before God--by receiving a righteousness apart from the Law, a righteousness not of human merit, but of faith; that through faith Jesus Christ Himself has become our righteousness before God.
So when you quote Romans chapter 1 at me as though the point Paul is making is "eww, gay people", I simply want to tell you to keep reading what the Holy Apostle is writing here.
Because it is so, so much more than taking some quick shots at Greco-Roman Paganism.
-CryptoLutheran
