Is there such a thing as a Christian homosexual?

[Ruthiefan]

Im an out and proud Lesbian christian

It is my belife that God knew i was going to be Gay before i was born,so it is no suprise to him that i am.

 

[cabrown]

So, if you do a study absent the prejudice.......all of a sudden you realize that all the references are to rape, prostitution and promiscuity (or combinations thereof).

I have serious problems with your reading into those verses like that. I've read the context of those verses and there is nothing to refer them in that context. You're trying to fit the meaning to what you want. Now granted, there's nothing there that stops you from interpreting them that way. I do have a serious problem with Christian's who refuse to qualify their Bible interpretations, when clearly the interpretation is open to debate. I probably do it too: and that's a whole other issue.

A previous post said that no competent scientist would claim that homosexuals are free to choose. I disagree and agree with that statement. Clearly, none of us is truely "free" to choose without outside influence or pressure, in some sense, since all of us are conditioned in society to act one way or believe one way. But the very basis of scientific study requires us to believe the most probable solution until evidence suggest otherwise. Since there is no real evidence that homesexual tendenices are genetic or biological, the majority of scientists and social scientists assume these tendencies are a product of environment--and thus under are capacity to change. Which is where this whole issue stems from. :o

 

[cabrown]

Im an out and proud Lesbian christian

It is my belife that God knew i was going to be Gay before i was born,so it is no suprise to him that i am.

What is your opinion on this. If you were convinced that the Bible clearly forbid lesbianism, would you reject Christianity, reject those teachings specifically, or reject those teachings in our modern day.

I really do want to know: not being confrontational. Obviously you have a right to believe and act any way you want, and I love you as a sister in the Gospel. But if the situation were reversed in some way. How about this: I and my sister are love and develop a relationship. Can you accept my behavior as a fellow Christian , living in an incestual relationship. Forgive the analogy, I know it's not the same. But do you have a duty to stand up against practices you see as wrong, while still accepting me as a person? What do you think?

I loved Ruthie on the Real World too. That was the season they had that freak-o blond chic with all the esteem issues, wasn't it. What a headcase.

 

[Philo]

Man, this conversation has been entirely too civil.

Bravo.

<3,

Philalalalalalalalala

 

[mpshiel]

What is your opinion on this. If you were convinced that the Bible clearly forbid lesbianism, would you reject Christianity, reject those teachings specifically, or reject those teachings in our modern day.

I really do want to know: not being confrontational. Obviously you have a right to believe and act any way you want, and I love you as a sister in the Gospel. But if the situation were reversed in some way. How about this: I and my sister are love and develop a relationship. Can you accept my behavior as a fellow Christian , living in an incestual relationship. Forgive the analogy, I know it's not the same. But do you have a duty to stand up against practices you see as wrong, while still accepting me as a person? What do you think?

I think I'll answer this. While for YOU homosexuality may be a gigantic issue spiritually for me it is sort of like a friend I have who doesn't wear mixed cloth clothing. He believes it is a sin, he also believes that eating pork is a sin. If you pressed him and asked if he thought someone eating a ham sandwich was sinning, he would say yes. Now if you asked him if it were possible to eat ham and be a Christian as most Christians are "aware" of the scriptures regarding meat yet feel they don't really apply to them. He would say, yes; it is a personal issue. He doesn't eat ham because he believes it is a sin, another does eat ham because they think it isn't a sin. Both act out of their convictions and have convincing scriptures and arguements in both the NT and OT. But in the end, he doesn't need to denounce others, if God wants them to change, he will convict them as He did with him.

If I genuinely believed that having homosexual attraction was a sin - I would have to radically alter my view of God - sort of a cruel jester who makes people one way and then tells them it is a sin to be the way he created them. The same would go for a monogomous homosexual relationship. If I believed it was a sin, I suppose I would leave mine. But I happen to believe that God does not create two types of people - those who are allowed to experience the close bond between two people representing the love God has for us and those who are required to sit forever hating themselves. I also don't believe that God requires us to be abusers of others feelings, emotions, love and respect. Which is why "new" Christians are so annoying (hey I was one too) - back then I was so in love with the "truth" that I didn't care how many relatives, friends and associates I condesend, offend or never speak to again. Thankfully, I changed. It is also why I can't see God telling homosexual couples to split, leaving families devestated, children in limbo and two people who love each other living lives of misery....for the "truth."

This is especially because when Christ boiled Christianity down it was represented by love (Toward God and Others - for who is my nieghbor, see the Good Samaritan - who did not give the man in the ditch a lecture on changing his behaviour out of his "love") and on how we enact Christianity in daily life: feeding those who are hungry, looking out for those who are vulnerable, etc.

I think you should always be searching yourself to see if you are allied with God, but not always searching your neighbor to see if they are allied with how you, AT THIS TIME, see God (for as we know, that always changes).

When I have friends who live lifestyles I think are harmful to them: if they want counsel and ask for it, I give it otherwise I pray for thier protection and try to be there so they know that no matter what else happens they have a friend who is there for them and can accept them, right now, where they are.

 

[Rocinante]

These are Cabrown's verses on Homosexuality. I will respond to each.


Gen. 19: 5 bring them out unto us, that we may know them. Refers to Rape.


Lev. 18: 22 (Lev. 20: 13) Thou shalt not lie with mankind . . . it is abomination. Refers to sex with male temple prostitutes.



Deut. 23: 17 there shall be no . . . sodomite of the sons of Israel. Male temple prostitutes.


Isa. 3: 9 (2 Ne. 13: 9) declare their sin as Sodom. Rape.


Rom. 1: 27 men . . . burned in their lust one toward another. Idolatry, male temple prostitutes and promiscuity.


1 Cor. 6: 9 nor abusers of themselves with mankind. Pederasty.


1 Tim. 1: 10 them that defile themselves with mankind. Pederasty.


Jude 1: 7 as Sodom and Gomorrha . . . going after strange flesh. Rape.


See also Gen. 13: 13; Oppression of the poor and rape.


Gen. 18: 20; Rape and oppression of the poor.


Isa. 3: 9; Oppression of the poor and rape.


Ezek. 16: 50; Again--oppression of the poor and rape.


2 Tim. 3: 3; No reference to homosexuality here.


2 Pet. 2: 10. No reference to homosexuality here.

........

Cabrown.......these are not "interpretations." My notes in red reflect exactly what the words are clearly saying, although you need a modern Bible translation or a trip to the lexicons in some cases to be clear on that.

But what I have noted here is laid out in a pretty straightforward way in the Bible.

It is glaringly apparent that the Bible does not condemn a monogamous and committed homosexual marriage relationship.

If you wish to discuss any of these, please let me know--I would like nothing better than to fully answer any questions you may have and put to rest the false impressions that prejudiced traditions have, unfortunately, left with you and many others.

 

[cabrown]

But in the end, he doesn't need to denounce others, if God wants them to change, he will convict them as He did with him.

I think you should always be searching yourself to see if you are allied with God, but not always searching your neighbor to see if they are allied with how you, AT THIS TIME, see God (for as we know, that always changes).

When I have friends who live lifestyles I think are harmful to them: if they want counsel and ask for it, I give it otherwise I pray for thier protection and try to be there so they know that no matter what else happens they have a friend who is there for them and can accept them, right now, where they are.

I think these are good points, and I agree that it's not my place to judge another person. If he wants to call himself a Christian, who the hell am I to tell him that he's not. I have no problem with that. But as Christians we are under an obligation to define and clarify the commandments--to outline the Way of the Gospel. And I don't think there's anything wrong with that in the slightest. Should we stop talking about lying or stealing because liars and thiefs are offended by our comments. If they want to lie and steal, it's up to them. But we need to establish clear guidelines for ourselves as to what is and isn't accepted by the Lord. I don't think that is intolerant, and I think most gay and lesbian Christians would agree with me in regards to other behavior topics. So please no more posts about "heal thyself, physician." You're preaching to the choir.

 

[cabrown]

 

[Rocinante]

Ok, I thought you honestly wanted some help to understand this issue.

Now I know better.

 

[transientlife]

But there's one final point that absolutely needs to be made here. We are not called to go out and condemn sinners, but to show them Christ's love and lead them to Him, to have them enter into repentance and newness of life in Him. Jesus's commands are quite clear and explicit on this. There are any number of people who understand this to involve "speaking the truth in love" -- and if that is truly their intent, I agree with them -- in a way that points out the sins of a brother or sister, in overt love of them, to assist them in repenting of their sins. I see singularly little of this attitude expressed in the homosexual debates that plague this board. I don't care whether or not you agree with my church that homosexual sex within a gay marriage is excluded from the condemnation in scripture of gay sex for gratification of lust, or hold that gay sex and the lust for it are sinful in all times and places: what you are called to do is to love everyone, old or young, black or white, gay or straight, Christian, pagan, or atheist, penitent or stiff-necked, as your neighbor, as your brother or sister, for the salvation of whom Jesus Christ gave up His life, and received it back from God in order that they and we might have new life in Him.
And we're told that he will count what we do towards others as done toward Him, and that we will be judged by the measure with which we judge. As I hope for mercy, compassion, love, and forgiveness, so must I extend them to all.

Wonderful! I absolutely wholeheartedly agree!

 

[PastorFreud]

I don't know what studies you have been reading regarding homosexuality and its causes. It is true that we don't have a clear cut causal relationship, but the correlation of homosexuality is high among identical twins who share the same genetic make up, lower but still high for fraternal twins who share the same prenatal environment, drops drastically for two children in the same the family born at separate times, and drops again for two randomly chosen people from different families. This suggests a biological influence that is strong.

Regarding environment, poor studies were done in the 60s that seemed to show a correlation between homosexuality and absent fathers, etc. The problem was that the population used for these studies were people in therapy. When the studies were done on the general population, the correlations disappeared.

By manipulating the prenatal environment, we can make gay fruit flies and bisexual mice. That doesn't prove much, I will grant that. But then we can't exactly do an ethical experiment using humans for this.

Regarding scripture, what do you do with clear cut passages condemning pork and wearing polyester? What do you do with passages supporting slavery? What about women being silent in church? Practically every Christian I know uses a method of interpreting these texts that takes into account the language of the oldest copies, the culture of the audience and authors as known from the text and outside sources, awareness of historical and social events from the time, and an understanding the type of literature represented by the text as compared to other religious and secular texts of the time period, and comparing the text to other texts in the canon of Scripture. No one calls this picking and choosing what you will believe. No one calls this twisting scripture to mean what you want it to mean. But when this approach is applied to the small number of verses relating to homosexuality, hermeneutics gets a bad rap. It's considered "justifying" what you want to believe, blah, blah, blah.

I think it is clear from the text that women are property, slavery is a birthright for Hebrews, marriage has more to do with power and politics than love, women are to be subordinate to men, children are the property of the man of the house to do with as he will, etc. etc. We don't move these passages into modern times and apply them at face value. Why shouldn't we understand sexuality in context as well?

 

[PastorFreud]

I have serious problems with your reading into those verses like that. I've read the context of those verses and there is nothing to refer them in that context. You're trying to fit the meaning to what you want. Now granted, there's nothing there that stops you from interpreting them that way. I do have a serious problem with Christian's who refuse to qualify their Bible interpretations, when clearly the interpretation is open to debate. I probably do it too: and that's a whole other issue.

I think it is the SAME issue. We must be consistent in how we read the text, otherwise we really are picking and choosing. It makes trouble to do it this way. You cannot support the tithe, for example, as a current law that must be followed. And I really wish we could seeing as how I am a part time pastor and all. It would make it easier to get donations. But it wouldn't be right to examine Corinthians in its historical context and show that women being silent in church isn't what we think it means, while preaching tithing as a commandment. Actually, there is good manuscript evidence to suggest copyist tinkering with that whole "women must be silent" thing.

 

[cabrown]

I don't know what studies you have been reading regarding homosexuality and its causes. It is true that we don't have a clear cut causal relationship, but the correlation of homosexuality is high among identical twins who share the same genetic make up, lower but still high for fraternal twins who share the same prenatal environment, drops drastically for two children in the same the family born at separate times, and drops again for two randomly chosen people from different families. This suggests a biological influence that is strong.

Regarding environment, poor studies were done in the 60s that seemed to show a correlation between homosexuality and absent fathers, etc. The problem was that the population used for these studies were people in therapy. When the studies were done on the general population, the correlations disappeared.

By manipulating the prenatal environment, we can make gay fruit flies and bisexual mice. That doesn't prove much, I will grant that. But then we can't exactly do an ethical experiment using humans for this.

I don't want to turn this discussion into a tedious study exchange, but the most recent review article of the studies done on homosexual origin and development (Mustanski et al. A critical review of recent biological research on human sexual orientation. [Review] Annual Review of Sex Research. 13:89-140, 2002.) agrees that there is no clear evidence in either direction that homosexuality is genetic. Some of the researchers find evidence that genes influence sexual orientation, but because no molecular connections have been shown, this is just as possible to be environmental effects. The one thing that has been consistently shown is that having older brothers increase the odds of homosexuality in men, which points strongly toward environmental effects also. And in the twin studies that you cited, the fact that siblings vs. fraternal twins have different rates of homosexuality suggests an environmental connection, not a genetic. If it was genetic, fraternal twins and siblings would have similar rates. Using twins in this kind of study is problematic in many regards: unless they are seperated there is no way to evaluate genetic vs. environment against each other. Anyway, sorry to bore.

One last point, the studies on animals you mention are almost interely irrelevent, since the procedure in effect masculinates females and feminizes males. And we already know that naturally males are attracted to females, and vice versa. There was an interesting study done on sheep doing the same thing last year. Interesting, but not very useful.

OK, I'm quitting. By the way, thanks for your response. Oh, one other thing about the scriptures: clearly many of the laws of Moses in the OT were done away with at the coming of Christ, and it's fair to say that OT references maybe don't apply in the new gospel. But many of the references are from the NT, which we accept fully. So there is something wrong with saying we don't live some laws while we live others. We live a very specific part of the Bible in our lives, not just some random smattering of them, and I think homosexuality is still an active no-no, while the other laws you mentioned are no longer active.

Okay, honestly, done.

 

[mpshiel]

For the first time in my life, I am personally aquainted with a number of openly gay and lesbian individuals, many of which are religious. I find almost all of them as sincere and heartfelt in their spiritual zeal as any other Christian, but it seems to me the Bible is explicity clear that homosexuality in any form is a sin. Can christianity embrace and accept gays and lesbians? I am not sure what my opinion is myself?

I am glad we were able to help clarify that for you in such a very short period of time.

 

[Rocinante]

I am glad we were able to help clarify that for you in such a very short period of time.

Roz sez:

Yeah! It's amazing!

We must be geniuses or something.

 

[cabrown]

or something.

 

[PastorFreud]

I wrote a long response and got kicked off. Got the error screen when I hit "post."

Sometimes this forum drives me nuts.

 

[PastorFreud]

Okay, second time. Not as thorough.

I don't want to turn this discussion into a tedious study exchange, but the most recent review article of the studies done on homosexual origin and development (Mustanski et al. A critical review of recent biological research on human sexual orientation. [Review] Annual Review of Sex Research. 13:89-140, 2002.) agrees that there is no clear evidence in either direction that homosexuality is genetic. Some of the researchers find evidence that genes influence sexual orientation, but because no molecular connections have been shown, this is just as possible to be environmental effects. The one thing that has been consistently shown is that having older brothers increase the odds of homosexuality in men, which points strongly toward environmental effects also. And in the twin studies that you cited, the fact that siblings vs. fraternal twins have different rates of homosexuality suggests an environmental connection, not a genetic. If it was genetic, fraternal twins and siblings would have similar rates. Using twins in this kind of study is problematic in many regards: unless they are seperated there is no way to evaluate genetic vs. environment against each other. Anyway, sorry to bore.

I'm not sure what studies you have seen. I agree that we don't know the mechanisms involved, but that doesn't mean we can't see that something is at work. We don't understand how most medicines really work, but we know that they do and have a list of side effects.

The studies I have seen point to some kind of effect in the prenatal environment and hormone exposure. The bro. phenomenon is related. Fraternal twins share the same prenatal environment, whereas siblings do not. But as women have subsequent pregnancies, there is more testosterone in the prenatal environment at certain times. This is suggesting a biological basis (still technically called environment) for the development of sexual orientation.

Now you could pressure your child and manipulate it so that it turned out gay, but it is more likely the child would have a gender identity disorder. If there is an environmental factor that causes homosexuality, we don't have a clue what it is. Faulty research in the 60s suggested absent fathers, etc. But that research was done on volunteers who already presented to therapy for some reason. When the research was generalized to the gen. pop, these "factors" disappeared. In fact, going back and looking at the straight men in therapy, it became clear that the list of factors such as absent fathers was more likely a factor for a need for therapy more than anything.

One last point, the studies on animals you mention are almost interely irrelevent, since the procedure in effect masculinates females and feminizes males. And we already know that naturally males are attracted to females, and vice versa. There was an interesting study done on sheep doing the same thing last year. Interesting, but not very useful.

Again, I don't know what studies you are referencing. In the ones I mentioned, hormones were added to the prenatal environment at certain periods and it produced homosexual behavior in fruit flies and bisexual behavior in mice (or it might have been rats, can't remember.)

There is also some data on the hearing systems of lesbian women. They have brains structures more like those of straight men than straight women. Gay men have spatial recognition structures more like those of females than that of straight men. And there is something to do with fingerprints that I read, but didn't quite understand. This is all pointing to biological factors, but the results are not clear.

Now just because something is biological doesn't mean it is necessarily good. Dyslexia has biological causes, but we consider this a tragedy. It does help us understand that homosexuality is NOT a choice.

OK, I'm quitting. By the way, thanks for your response. Oh, one other thing about the scriptures: clearly many of the laws of Moses in the OT were done away with at the coming of Christ, and it's fair to say that OT references maybe don't apply in the new gospel. But many of the references are from the NT, which we accept fully. So there is something wrong with saying we don't live some laws while we live others. We live a very specific part of the Bible in our lives, not just some random smattering of them, and I think homosexuality is still an active no-no, while the other laws you mentioned are no longer active.

Okay, honestly, done.

The way you have decided that homosexuality is wrong, while rejecting other prohibitions less than 10 verses away seems like random selection to me. You may have some reasons for your selections, but I don't think they hold water.

I reject ALL Mosaic law. All of it. I accept the law of Christ. The tests for what is right and what is wrong are based on loving God with heart, soul, mind, and strength, and loving neighbor as self. Now your example of incest does not meet the law of love. My ham sandwich does. Wearing polyester does not violate the law of love. Wearing a suit that you know was manufactured in a sweat shop would. If one of Moses laws fits in the paradigm that Christ gave us, I keep it. If not, I throw it out. Homosexuals living in committed relationships does not harm anyone. Homosexual rape does. Heterosexual rape does. Beastiality forces oneself upon an animal that cannot give consent.

We might have a few areas where we would have to lay a case in order to apply the law of love, but these are typically areas the Mosaic law doesn't address anyway. For example, decisions about cloning aren't covered in Leviticus. Applying Jesus' rule to cloning will require some definitions be agreed upon, but we will come closer to an ethical choice than we could using Moses.

 

[EltronRangamma]

Beastiality forces oneself upon an animal that cannot give consent.

I have an issue with this because people would generally see this as -- and I would agree -- an immoral act. Alotta people, however, give sketchy reasoning for this. If you think about it, when you go to a kennel and adopt an animal, you are doing so without the animal's consent.

 

[transientlife]

I see your point, Eltron, but when you adopt an animal from a shelter, you are giving them (or SUPPOSED TO BE) a loving home and a second chance at life. I don't see any cruelty behind that. Besides, most time people won't adopt an animal if they (the adopter and the adoptee) don't get along. Animals may not be able to give verbal consent to adoption, but I would think a wagging tail and a positive response would be consent enough.