INCLUDE_DATA

Jan

23

Bethel Dialogue on Homosexuality

Filed Under Uncategorized 

The Alumni magazine of Bethel University, perhaps anticipating the coming of Soul Force this spring to their campus, had an edited summary of a faculty forum that was held last fall.

The forum participants were James Beilby, an associate professor of biblical and theological studies; Michael Holmes, my professor of biblical studies and early Christianity; James Koch, professor of psychology; Sherry Mortenson associate dean of campus ministries; Jenell Willams Paris, associate professor of anthropology, author/blogger and researcher in the field of sexuality.

The dialogue is not on th internet, but it shd be. It’s quite amazing how well informed it deals with the topic from different angles, while holding within the Bethel University covenant that they “believe that sexual intercourse and other forms of intensely interpersonal sexual activity are reserved for monogamous, heterosexual marriage.”

The article begins with an open ended question on their Christian perspectives on the popular issues of sexual identity and orientation.

Holmes:The Apostle Paul [in the NT] nowhere discusses homosexuality as an orientation. He discusses behaviors, and he never discusses them in isolation. When he talks about same-sex behavior it’s in the context of opposite-sex behavior as well. Paul has a category in which sx is rightfully exercised and enjoyed–in marriage between a man and a woman–and another category in which it’s not:for those outside such a marriage. His categories are not heterosexual and homosexual; they are married or unmarried. We impart so much of our culture into the way we read the Bible that it keeps us from hearing the text.

Paris:While same-sex behavior has long been recognized, “heterosexual” and “homosexual” as distinct human identities is a social construct that comes out of the 19th ctry, maybe a little earlier. Sexual identity is not a biblical concept, and I don’t think this concept is true to the way God made us. Not many cultures have said sexuality is so important that, beginning in childhood, you need to explore it and think about it, and you can’t be a healthy adult without expressing and knowing it. That, in my view, is a sign of a culture that has made an idol of sex.

The dialogue that then follows reflects some of the ambiguity in the language commonly used regarding homosexuality. For example, Koch the psychologist affirms the validity of the concept of sexual orientations but says that for some it is a predisposition from an early age, while for others it’s an evolving process. Beilby describes it as a complex mixture of potentially genetic factors, brain biochemistry, early experienes and responses to those.

By contrast, I think one can and shd separate our non-chosen biologically-based sexual orientations from our socially conditioned and personally chosen transgendered forms of sexual expression. I here base my terminology on the scientific work compiled by transgendered researcher Joan Roughgarden. I agree with Holmes that the Bible does not use the concept of sexual orientation. I think it also does not address directly with how we shd minister to people with homosexual orientations. Although, I agree it strongly rejects the many transgendered sexual acts accepted by metrosexual pagan societies. For, just because a distinction is not biblical, does not mean it’s not valid and helpful for informing Christian ministry. Although, I agree with Paris that we shd not give our sexual orientations prominence in our self identities.

Later in the article, they raise the question of whether Scripture, when properly read in our culture, would allow for committed gay relationships. There are three responses.

Holmes:When Paul deals with this issue, he begins not with the particular mores or ethics or psychology of his culture. Instead he establishes a theological foundation for his discussion of sexuality. And because his starting point is theological, it is therefore transcultural–it speaks to every culture, without being tied to any one culture. Scripture is the arbiter over all cultural perspectives: and the scriptural model is disciplined fidelity in heterosexual marriage for those who are married, and disciplined chastity for those who are not.

Beilby: For any of the eight passages in Scripture that prohibit homosexual activity, there are five or six possible counter-readings. But none of these are acceptable when you do careful exegesis. For example, Paul in a very explicit way takes two key words from a passage in Leviticus, pulls them forward into the NT, and validates the prohibition. In Romans 1 he adds a condemnation of lesbian behavior as well.

Paris: We need to take Scripture as a whole and ask, “What does it say about who we are as persons, who is God, and what is the world like that we live in?” Sexuality is a derivative question from those broader themes, and homosexuality is derivative of that. When we start backwards, it seems as if six verses are for gay people and about five verses are for women, for example, when in fact all of Scripture speaks to all of us.

I disagree with Holmes that theology is transcultural. True Christianity is transcultural, or it shd be. Christian theology on the other hand, as Alister McGrath in “The Genesis of Doctrine” argues, is dialogue among Christians on how we shd communicate the identity and significance of Jesus in our cultural situations. Now, as a Christian, I believe that “Biblical theology” must contain the transcultural Word of God, but I wouldn’t say that it answers definitively every ethical question we may pose to it, including how we shd minister to people with homosexual orientations. Beilby is right that Paul clearly signals that he holds to the Levitical law of the OT. The issue is then whether or not Levitical Law is open for us as Christians to make new exceptions based on our added experiences and our shared deliberations on Scripture and our experiences.

I don’t think the idea that Levitical law is open to the addition of additional exceptions based on extensive dialogue among Christians is that radical or liberal of a view, so long as the overarching goal of the dialogue and flexibility is not an excessive individualism but rather to show both love to our neighbor and the need for Christian discipline. I, myself, am glad I was able to learn from the experiences of these five other members of the Bethel Community with the magazine article. I hope it sparks additional dialogue among others in my community.

dlw

Comments

5 Responses to “

Bethel Dialogue on Homosexuality
”

  1. dlw on January 31st, 2006 6:03 pm

    I had som people at Jesus Politics respond to a comment I made that denied their naturalism.

    They wrote, “I don’t agree with that at all, dlw. Blindness, deafness, cancer and other abnormalities like that were not caused by the fall of man. All cannot be perfect in a perfect world. There needs to be a balance between good and bad, sickness and health. What kind of world would it be if we were all always healthy and physically perfect in every way? Most would jump and say the world would be so much better. I say we’d be way worse off. We’d take more things for granted, our behavior would be worse, and there would be far less appreciation for God and His / Her creations. It is all part of God’s plan, but in no way does it make God evil. ”

    So God planning for us to suffer so much doesn’t make God evil? Why, because it is all part of God’s plan? She has a plan and so we’re s’posed to just deal with stuff.

    Never mind the global burden of birth defects, so many of which could be prevented and are caused by the ways we treat our environment and ourselves. “We didn’t cause it. Adam and Eve didn’t happen the way the bible says it did. It is not a literal story. It is a respresentation of the separation of God from Man, and nothing more than a mythological story to explain why there is sin in the world. Man fell from God the second our souls became separate from Him. We lost our God-like perfection at that very moment. Not because of anything we did, but because that is how God wanted us to experience this life.”I don’t know what recent source you get your cosmology from, but in the hebraic biblical account, going back quite a ways, the fall is clearly shown as a disruption of the covenantal relationship between the Lord God and Humanity that also harmed the relationships among humanity. This is not something that God foreordained. The blaming of guilt is not passed along from the serpent, a created “wild” animal who is outside of the garden/covenant with the Lord God, to the Lord God.

    “Homosexuality is not a result of Man’s fall from God. If that is the case, it would not be so in other forms of nature. Animals surely cannot commit sin, yet they behave in the same manner. It is nature. It is God’s creation. It is perfect the way it is. I imagine there will be a long line of Christians at the gates of heaven refusing to go in when they realize how many gay people were let in too. ”

    I doubt that they’ll care that much. One simply cannot exonerate the forces of Nature. In the biblical account, the rebellion of Satan led to her dominion over the world. The creation of humankind and their stewardship over the Garden was s’posed to be part of a process of redemption in which we are given a role.

    “In Exodus 4:11, God says that he causes the deaf, mute and blind to be exactly the way they are. It is not from the curse. It is not creation gone awry.”

    dlw:Try reading the cotext of the passage. This presumes from the principle of continuity that the correct interpretation of a passage is based on its surrounding passages. We see then that this verse is part of God’s dialogue with Moses, where God is telling Moses that he is s’posed to be his voice for the Hebrew slaves. Moses excuses himself by saying that he don’t talk so good and God promises that God would lteach him and give him the words to say. There is absolutely nothing in the text that suggest it concerns how that whatever stuff we are naturally born with is from God.

    dlw

     

  2. Chris Capoccia on January 31st, 2006 8:19 pm

    DLW: did you even read the verse? mute is only one of the defects God mentions. what do deaf and blind have to do with your supposed context?

    Moses said to the LORD, “O Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.”
    The LORD said to him, “Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the LORD? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.”
    But Moses said, “O Lord, please send someone else to do it.”

    If God is just responding to Moses reluctance to speak, why does God mention that He makes the blind?

    I think Paul says it best in Romans 9:
    But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’ “Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?

  3. dlw on January 31st, 2006 11:40 pm

    There’s no mention that they are birth defects. The context is that all of our gifsts ultimately come from God and so Moses is not to worry about his speech disorder, God will speak through him.

    Romans 9 is dealing with the question of why so many Jews were rejecting Christianity, while Gentiles were embracing it. It has a lot to do with the issue of what is meant by the elect or God’s predestination. This is a very controversial subjects and, as such, so is the insinuation that God predestines some to have homosexual orientations or birth defects as part of God’s overarching plan for existence.

    My basic point is that, just as I do not believe predestination implies that the future is exhasutively and definitely foreknown by God, I do not believe that all that happens naturally is from God, either. I would say the verses you mentioned do not imply what you are making them out to imply.

    dlw

  4. JoeG on February 4th, 2006 2:16 am

    Hey dlw -
    My first posting at your site - how exciting! :)
    Anyway, just to respond to the above, and I do
    appreciate your responding to mine and Chris’ comments over at
    JP.
    “I don’t know what recent source you get your cosmology from, but in the hebraic biblical account, going back quite a ways, the fall is clearly shown as a disruption of the covenantal relationship between the Lord God and Humanity that also harmed the relationships among humanity.”

    Please keep in mind, dlw, I am not a Christian and never claimed
    to get my cosmology from any bible-related source. It is my belief,
    as a pagan practitioner, that we were all once part of the Godhead.
    At some point in time, God/Goddess decided to separate our souls from
    him / her so that we can experience life and all that comes with it,
    including pain and suffering. The point our souls became separated is
    what I would consider the “fall of man”. This is difficult for me to
    comprehensively express in words, and is probably not coming across here
    as I would like it to.
    May I instead recommend a book called “Between Death and Life” by
    Dolores Cannon. I believe somewhere in that book there is a better
    explanation of what I am trying to get across. I have to find the book
    myself (renovating the office!), if it is not in there I will find
    what book it actually is, but I’m 95% sure that’s the one.
    Wish I could post a bit more, but it is just after midnight and the old
    eyes are starting to droop. I swear at 33 I’m already starting to act
    like an old man! :) I’ll keep checking back on this thread and hope we
    can continue this discussion…when I’m more awake!
    JoeG

  5. dlw on February 4th, 2006 3:11 pm

    JoeG,
    keep in mind that claims of continuity with past pagan practice by recent pagans have not been corroborated and pagans vary quite a bit among themselves, reflecting their religious background.

    That is why I responded to your arguments like I would to another Christian, inasmuch as I don’t think they’re really anything new under the sun.

    thanks for commenting!
    dlw

Leave a Reply