In the name of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, I ask that he guide my and your hearts in peace and fellowship to better understand His word. Amen.
Brothers and Sisters in Christ, this is a subject that has given me much unease. Knowing you to be knowledgeable in God's Word, I earnestly ask for your help in understanding. I put this here because I desire a close reading of the Bible to answer this question.
I will lay out my problem directly- I am an Episcopalian who in reading his bible has found that homosexuality might not be sinful in itself. I am trying to figure this out, so I'll lay out the train of thought that led me to this conclusion, and I'll ask you to discuss this with me on the basis of reading the scripture. I'll lay out scriptural bases for condemnation, and why I'm not sure that they're sufficent.
First, many people quote the old testament sources that claim homosexuality to be an abomination. I won't go into detail here because this is the weakest argument. Shellfish are also abomination, but Paul teaches that through Christ we are not accountable to this particular area because it is cultural in nature and Christ's covenant is spiritual. Thus 'I am convinced no food is bad' etc.
Second we several references (Timothy, Corinthians comes to mind) in passing to homosexuality in a list of sins. These certainly establish that Paul is condemning something, but does not describe in any fashion what that thing is. I am wary of accepting homosexuality as practiced in Paul's time as spiritually equivalent to modern homosexuality. I'll talk about this more below.
The longest explanation of Homosexuality is in Romans. I'll place the text here for convienence (chapter 1)
22Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
23And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.
24Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:
25Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
26For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:
27And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.
I see two things here. First, Paul is talking about the practices of the native Romans. When he talks about being given over to vile affectations, he's talking about orgies with lots of wine and promiscuous sex. Second, he clearly talks about a change in desires brought about by worshiping wisdom and worldliness.
First, orgies are not the practice of the homosexuality I confront today. As an example from my personal life, I have a friend who began to use drugs and drink to great excess often. The more he did this, he would find himself having sex with men while intoxicated and high. He would not have any desire to do this while sober, and described it to me as being more that sexual gratification was all that mattered when he was like that- that desires beyond basic gratification wasn't even possible when he was that drunk. This is what I hear Paul talking about. I also have a friend who is homosexual and has been living in a monogamous and committed relationship with the same man for 20 years. He tells me he has never felt attraction to women and has always and under every circumstance been attracted to men. To him, then, it is difficult for me to see how pride and materialism has anything to do with it. Furthermore, Paul's entire thrust in Romans 1 (not limited to homosexuality) is how worshiping the material world and not god perverts the soul. Since my second friend has always had these urges, they can't be the perversion talked about since perversion requires something pure being changed into something impure and nothing has ever changed for him. If I am right about this, then it seems that the passing mentions of homosexuality is talking about what Paul identifies in Romans.
I appreciate your help. All references are KJV.
Brothers and Sisters in Christ, this is a subject that has given me much unease. Knowing you to be knowledgeable in God's Word, I earnestly ask for your help in understanding. I put this here because I desire a close reading of the Bible to answer this question.
I will lay out my problem directly- I am an Episcopalian who in reading his bible has found that homosexuality might not be sinful in itself. I am trying to figure this out, so I'll lay out the train of thought that led me to this conclusion, and I'll ask you to discuss this with me on the basis of reading the scripture. I'll lay out scriptural bases for condemnation, and why I'm not sure that they're sufficent.
First, many people quote the old testament sources that claim homosexuality to be an abomination. I won't go into detail here because this is the weakest argument. Shellfish are also abomination, but Paul teaches that through Christ we are not accountable to this particular area because it is cultural in nature and Christ's covenant is spiritual. Thus 'I am convinced no food is bad' etc.
Second we several references (Timothy, Corinthians comes to mind) in passing to homosexuality in a list of sins. These certainly establish that Paul is condemning something, but does not describe in any fashion what that thing is. I am wary of accepting homosexuality as practiced in Paul's time as spiritually equivalent to modern homosexuality. I'll talk about this more below.
The longest explanation of Homosexuality is in Romans. I'll place the text here for convienence (chapter 1)
22Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
23And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.
24Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:
25Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
26For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:
27And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.
I see two things here. First, Paul is talking about the practices of the native Romans. When he talks about being given over to vile affectations, he's talking about orgies with lots of wine and promiscuous sex. Second, he clearly talks about a change in desires brought about by worshiping wisdom and worldliness.
First, orgies are not the practice of the homosexuality I confront today. As an example from my personal life, I have a friend who began to use drugs and drink to great excess often. The more he did this, he would find himself having sex with men while intoxicated and high. He would not have any desire to do this while sober, and described it to me as being more that sexual gratification was all that mattered when he was like that- that desires beyond basic gratification wasn't even possible when he was that drunk. This is what I hear Paul talking about. I also have a friend who is homosexual and has been living in a monogamous and committed relationship with the same man for 20 years. He tells me he has never felt attraction to women and has always and under every circumstance been attracted to men. To him, then, it is difficult for me to see how pride and materialism has anything to do with it. Furthermore, Paul's entire thrust in Romans 1 (not limited to homosexuality) is how worshiping the material world and not god perverts the soul. Since my second friend has always had these urges, they can't be the perversion talked about since perversion requires something pure being changed into something impure and nothing has ever changed for him. If I am right about this, then it seems that the passing mentions of homosexuality is talking about what Paul identifies in Romans.
I appreciate your help. All references are KJV.
