Fr. Philip Powell, OP has the same reaction that I did to the Newsweek story.
“The question I would love to ask the writer is: if your thesis is true, why in 5,000 years of Judeo-Christian religious history has there never been a single instance of a same-sex ‘marriage’ being celebrated as exemplary for Christians and Jews? You would think that if scripture is pressing the point that love and fidelity are more important that the sex of the couple, then one very powerful way of showing this would be to give us an example of a loving, faithful same-sex marriage. Yet, none exist. And we must be careful not to confuse same-sex friendships (Jonathan and David) with sexually active, religiously recognized, sacramental marriages celebrated in the Bible.”
He makes the point I was trying to make much better. While negative evidence doesn’t provide much of a proof, the total lack of reference to something that is suppose to be part of God’s will for human sexuality is rather odd. I guess in their view that God being the author of scripture needs an editor since he managed to leave out and positive reference to something normative.
Diogenes references another part of the article:
My friend the priest James Martin says his favorite Scripture relating to the question of homosexuality is Psalm 139, a song that praises the beauty and imperfection in all of us and that glorifies God’s knowledge of our most secret selves: “I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” And then he adds that in his heart he believes that if Jesus were alive today, he would reach out especially to the gays and lesbians among us, for “Jesus does not want people to be lonely and sad.” Let the priest’s prayer be our own.
And then replies:
“If Jesus were alive today …” The blunder invites the obvious response: Has Jesus died AGAIN? Why weren’t we told?
Miller does not put those words in quotation marks, and it’s a reasonable conjecture that they represent her own obtuseness rather than Fr. Martin’s. But there’s an important doctrinal point to be made. Jesus IS alive, and he speaks to us, today, through his Vicar, the successor of Peter. Such is the conviction of Catholics. And that Vicar has made it radiantly clear that sodomy is contrary to God’s will and that marriage is effected between, and only between, a man and a woman.
I would be interested to know if Fr. Martin feels that what was quoted is an accurate assessment of what he said. Diogenes makes some excellent points that Jesus is alive and acts through the Church. The Church is reaching out to those who suffer with same-sex attraction. Groups like Courage help those with same-sex attraction lead lives of holiness and to be chaste as we are all called to be chaste. But too many people equate reaching out with rubber-stamping approval of homosexual acts. Calling someone to repentance is a spiritual act of mercy and they do no favors by going along with the culture and denying that homosexual acts are sinful.
If someone actually did try to use Psalm 139 to relate to as a defense for homosexuality then if it proves anything it proves too much. You can just as well say those with a wandering eye and who commit lust in their hearts or even pursue their lusts are also wonderfully made. That all of us sinners are wonderfully made. We are truly “beautifully made” yet through the sin of Adam, sin came into the world. We all suffer with the concupiscence of the heart and can choose sin despite being made in the image and likeness of God. The Blessed Virgin Mary was Immaculately Conceived and as Fr. Pacwa jokingly points out “God doesn’t make that model anymore.”
18 comments
“…if your thesis is true, why in 5,000 years of Judeo-Christian religious history has there never been a single instance of a same-sex ‘marriage’ being celebrated as exemplary for Christians and Jews?”
It is true enough that there are no examples of gay marriage held up in the Bible. The question I have is what are we to make of the MANY examples of strong, committed, loving gay partnerships/unions/marriages (whatever you prefer to call them) that we have today? Are we simply to deny the authenticity of the experiences of such people?
While there were undoubtedly homosexually inclined people in the ancient world we must remember that sexuality is to a significant degree (not totally) socially constructed. How I conceive of and experience my relationships with others, both male and female, is in no small part influenced by the gender roles and notions of sexual identity with which I was socialized. It is extremely unlikely that there was anyone in the ancient world who would have conceived of themsleves in as “gay” or “lesbian” in quite the same way as we use the terms today. The concept of sexual orientation, that so many on both sides take for granted in these debates, is in fact quite recent in origin. So the fact that Jesus (or anyone else in the bible) didn’t speak of gay marriage doesn’t seem particularly significant to me. The question simply would not have arisen because it would have taken a significantly different set of cultural conditions for the question to hav even been conceivable.
Many people don’t know this, but the publication date of the story, December 6, is a holy day of sorts for journalists. It’s the Feast of the Inarticulate Deception.
What I find funny about all this ‘gay’ stuff are the people who make comments in one breath, “If Jesus were alive today . . .” For the above “if” statement is a theoretical one. A theoretical statement or question can only be asked if it is something that never happened, and therefore can be theorized about. For example “If Jesus lived today, how would he use the internet in his ministry?” Yet, comments such as, “If Jesus lived today and walked among us, he would embrace the gays and homosexuals of the world” seem to imply that homosexuality is something new to the world that was not in existence when Christ was walking the earth.
Moreover, in the arguments that people make about Jesus accepting homosexuals, they will gladly say in the next breath that homosexuality has been around for ages. In fact they might even say it is ancient. They will gladly point to the Romans and the Greeks and other cultures that practiced, to varying degrees, homosexual acts to make their case without ever realizing that Jesus also walked among the Romans and the Greeks and was familiar with not only Jewish culture but also Roman and Greek.
Apparently, the people who make the two above comments to prove a single conclusion fail to see the flaw in their own logic, which is understandable as sin does darken the intellect. One cannot at the same time be ancient and new in accordance to the natural order. Therefore it can only be stated that homosexuality is either new or it is ancient.
Though the argument from silence can be weak, it is still an argument as the only time Christ does speak about marriage he references the two parties who are married as being man and woman as it was from the beginning (Adam and Eve. Not Adam and Steve).
If Christ wanted to reach out to homosexuals, especially in the context of their sexuality and sexual preferences and in a way that is different to how he reached out to the sick and sinful, it would only make sense that he would have set that example before us then, when he walked among us.
Yet to argue that Christ could not have spoken out against such a way of life as it would have been too harsh for the ears of his people need only to read John chapter 6 for the answer, as if there was not a more difficult teaching for the Jewish mind to comprehend is how Christ was going to give his flesh in a way in which they must consume it.
Remember Christ came to heal us from our sin. He didn’t come to accept us in our sins and expect us not to change.
Dear Mr. Miller,
The Peace of Christ.
Yes, you were right to notice that that particular comment of mine was not in quotation marks. And yes, I do believe that Christ is alive. My point was that Jesus of Nazareth, in his earthly ministry in first-century Palestine, reached out to those on the margins of society (tax collectors, prostitutes, Roman centurions, the sick, the “unclean”) and so, analogously, if he were somehow walking the earth (in physical form that is, as an individual named Jesus) he would likewise reach out to the marginalized today, a group that would include gays and lesbians.
But yes, I do believe, as we say during the Liturgy of the Mass, “Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again.” As I believe in everything else that we profess in the Creed on Sundays. I would stake my life on it. Or give my life for it.
Peace,
James Martin, SJ
Dear Mr. Miller,
The Peace of Christ.
Yes, you were right to notice that that particular comment of mine was not in quotation marks. And yes, I do believe that Christ is alive. My point was that Jesus of Nazareth, in his earthly ministry in first-century Palestine, reached out to those on the margins of society (tax collectors, prostitutes, Roman centurions, the sick, the “unclean”) and so, analogously, if he were somehow walking the earth (in physical form that is as an individual) he would likewise reach out to the marginalized today, a group that would include gays and lesbians.
But yes, I do believe wholeheartedly, as we say during the Liturgy of the Mass, “Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again.” As I believe in everything else that we profess in the Creed on Sundays. I would stake my life on it. Or give my life for it.
Peace,
James Martin, SJ
Fr. Martin,
Christ did indeed reach out to the marginalized and the oppressed. He also reached out to sinners for their salvation.
I don’t think you mean to leave the impression that because Jesus reaches out to sinners, he reaches out to approve their sin. He reaches out specifically to bring sinners to conversion.
It is often the case that the “Jesus ate with sinners” line is used without its proper context to say, in essence, “See. This particular sin is OK b/c Jesus ate with sinners.”
There is absolutely no contradiction between the Church defending the basic human rights of those who struggle with same-sex attraction and witnessing to them that their same-sex sexual behavior is destructive to their holiness. This is not a sum-zero game of “take ’em as they are and leave them that way OR leave them as they are and let the Devil take ’em.”
Surely we can take them as they are AND show them the mercy that we ourselves have enjoyed as sinners!
God bless, Fr. Philip, OP
Fr Martin,
but of course Jesus is STILL reaching out to homosexuals through the Church. How else do you describe the continuous call to conversion and the invitations offered by the Church to these souls to come back home?
Reaching out is not the same as condoning! When my children do something wrong, I reach out to them and try to help them realize their wrong behaviour and change it. But if they refuse or expect me to accept their behaviour as right, then I have to refuse and maintain my ground.
I have homosexual colleagues whom I love (in the christian sense of the word) and support in their work and should they experience unjust discrimination. But they know that they will not hear support of their practice from me.
And if I, a sinful person, can do this, why shouldn’t the Church do it too?
You have a perfect right to believe as you do, and even to act on your beliefs in that you refuse to marry a same sex partner and your church refuses to confer the sacrament on same sex couples. That’s fine.
But where do you get the right to impose your beliefs on others whose very sincere beliefs are completely different from yours? Or where do you get the right to demand that the government impose your beliefs on others for you?
Mary-Lee, you wrote:
“But where do you get the right to impose your beliefs on others whose very sincere beliefs are completely different from yours? Or where do you get the right to demand that the government impose your beliefs on others for you?”
The framers of the US Constitution were by-and-large believing Christians, but the articulated the government’s role in protecting the individual rights they found in the natural law, not in the sincerity of people’s beliefs.
Surely you don’t mean to say that we ought to change the foundational laws on marriage and family due to the “very sincere beliefs” of people. What about people with “very sincere beliefs” about polygamy between consenting adults, or responsibly owning a machine gun for that matter?
I appreciate your recognizing the right of people to believe as they do about matrimony. I would ask you to further consider that the various state governments did not write laws defining matrimony, the laws merely recognized and codified in civil law the existing reality.
Can you see how the case now seems to be for the government to re-define marriage? It seems a case of the tail wagging the dog.
Mary-Lee:
First and foremost, there is nothing out of the same-sex marriage movement that makes me believe for one moment my right (and the right of my beloved Catholic Church) to worship freely will be respected. I need look no further than Canada and its Orwellian “Human Rights Commissions”, or MA and its treatment of Catholic Charities, or NJ and its treatment of a Methodist church, or NM and the treatment of a Christian photog, or to the Prop. 8 protests in California and the violence/threats/harrassment directed toward Christians and Mormons to see that *my* right to worship is extended only as far as I’m willing to tolerate, condone, and approve of homosexuality. When I don’t, the reaction is swift and merciless.
So the assertion that our First Amendment rights would in any way be respected is a non-starter with me. NOTHING has supported that claim in the past and I’ve no reason to support that claim in the future.
The “belief” that marriage is between a man and a woman has been the norm for millenia – and in cultures and societies wholly untouched by Christianity or the Bible. It is the most beneficial structure to support civilization, benefits husband and wife in a way same-sex marriage doesn’t, and is the best arrangement for begetting and raising children. Society has a vested interest in maintaining that institution.
If we are gonig to re-define marriage as between two consenting adults of either gender because anything less is “imposing” our beliefs on the sincerely held beliefs of others – where does it stop? No one can logically argue that it will suddenly *not* be discriminatory to limit the definition of marriage as being between two consenting adults. Such a definition clearly imposes morality on polygamists, those who prefer bestiality, and members of NAMBLA. In other words – it would never stop, and the foundation of civilization (the traditional, nuclear family) would be dealt a death blow. And shortly thereafter falls civilization.
You argue about not imposing beliefs on another forgetting that you can’t have “nothing” as a governing rule. Moral relativity ensures you get *anything* – usually much more displeasing than the “imposed” morality you so disliked.
Mary-Lee,
who is forcing what on whom? Which government or church is trying to force people to believe anything? If other people believe that same sex unions are OK (based on whatever criterion) and have the right to work towards legalizing that, we, believing the opposite (for whatever reason) have the right to work towards NOT legalizing it.
When you try to bully other people into not expressing their opinion or working towards what they think is right, then YOU are forcing your ideas on others. This false argument of yours has been around too much to still have any credibility
I’d also like to hear some thoughts on another set of questions that are sincere and not meant in any way to be rhetorical:
Why do opponents of gay marriage so frequently describe attempts to legally recognize gay marriage as a “threat” to traditional marriages or families? In what way is it a threat? Specifically, how would legally recognizing same sex couples as married do harm to current or future heterosexual marriages? Is the fear that children who grow up in a culture where gay marriage is common would be more likely to “choose” homosexual unions over heterosexual ones, resulting in fewer marriages and families?
Devon,
That’s a fair question. People here can answer better than I but I’ll take a stab.
We have had traditional structures in place in this country from the beginning, most good, some bad. I see that we are, for the most part, a cohesive country, and I’m reluctant to change the big tenants and see what we get. I do not think more children would choose to be gay.
As a for instance,
I do not object to civil unions for gays (I may be in a minority here) but the will of the people need to decide it. It cannot be forced on people and it only can be worked on through the legislative branch. The judicial branch does not make law, it interprets it. The people, with a two thirds majority, ultimately decide.
On a related topic, I think, in general, a discussion of sexuality too early in school is bad; I’m for covering it the way it was covered in my 7th and 10th grade health courses in school. Give the mechanics, leave the sermonizing to others. Those classes didn’t pitch heterosexual marriage; they taught the basic biology of our bodies. Too often people want to do true social engineering in our schools, to the point where non-academic stuff outweighs the academics, and our kids are suffering because of it.
To your question, I don’t think more than ten percent of the population is gay or is going to be gay, and I think it bothers the 90% who have to make the changes in structures they have always considered sacred and have acted, in a Petri dish way, as the backbone of the country.
On property rights, executor, health care proxy type stuff, I think a person should be able to appoint anyone they wish. But I think the people have a right to decide what they want about marriage. Or, we can continue to let the states decide. Or, a Constitutional amendment can be put forward.
Just because the most innocent victims may not get a mention otherwise, let me ask, “What about the children?” Of the handful of professed homosexuals I know (and love) one is the child of parents who revealed their desires to live a gay lifestyle when he was a teenager–they subsequently divorced. He is now involved in same-sex relationships and is depressed to find that most gay “partners” in his experience are not interested in committed relationships, but in exploitation. That’s not what he was taught to believe and even if he were taught differently, he suffers from not having the male role model he feels he should have had.
The other is a child whose father has a male love interest and who advocates for gay “rights” to the point of getting angry over his young son’s resistance to the idea of gay relationships. What will happen if gay “marriage” is sanctioned? No doubt, this child will have to be counseled for his “homophobia”–the adults who followed their desires will not be held responsible for their selfishness.
Divorce hurts children, who have a need for a mother and a father. Marriage needs to be built up, not destroyed further by promoting adult desires that fail to take into account the needs of children. Because homosexual “marriage” is irrational, unnatural, and immoral, the children who are abandoned cannot even be given a reasonable explanation for their suffering.
Devon,
your questions are based on a common, but huge misinterpretation of the issues. Nobody objects to the fact that two people of the same sex share their life because they find some affinity that leads them to want such sharing. The objection is to consider the fulfillment of their inordinate sexual desires as acceptable and, worse still, to want to enshrine such behaviour into the definition of marriage.
If there were a female coworker with whom I found spiritual, psychological and cultural affinity, I would do nothing wrong to share part of my days and my experiences with her, but I cannot move that to a marriage, because I am already married. (different reason, same conclusion). It would definitely not be prudent for me to push the boundaries too far, lest I go into bad territory, but by itself my “love” could be expressed in human terms, just not sexual.
Same for people with same sex attraction. They can share their life experiences, but it is not right to give license to their sexual desire or to call it a marriage. It isn’t, no matter what you call it.
Bruce, there are many people whose faith tradition tells them that homosexual marriages are fine and dandy. They “sincerely believe” what their own faith teaches them. That’s what I’m trying to say.
I understand Catholic teaching, but I wonder if Catholics understand the teachings of other religions or the challenges presented by the U.S. Constitution. The belief that homosexual marriages, or homosexuality itself, are sinful is a belief that the Catholic church holds, but not one that all churches share. These same beliefs are contrary to our Constitution.
The state needs to affirm the right of homosexuals to marry because the right to marry is a civil right. It cannot say that homosexuals must marry… it can and must say only that they can marry if they wish because it’s their right to claim. To do otherwise is to discriminate against homosexual couples… just as, many years ago, society discriminated against mixed race couples marrying.
Joann, you personally know only a handful of professed homosexuals, and of those you cite two examples of a couple having some problem raising their children.
I don’t quite follow who you’re talking about in your first example, but in your second I’d say that it’s probably not smart for the father to get angry about anything his son has to say. The better way would be to be patient until his son is mature enough to understand that discrimination against anyone, including people who are homosexual, is wrong and needs to be fought against with every bit of energy he possesses.
Research shows that the children of homosexual couples fare as well or better than their peers who are children of traditional marriages. That research was conducted on a whole lot more than two children! Your sample is too small to mean anything other than as a specific piece of anecdotal evidence.
Joann, you personally know only a handful of professed homosexuals, and of those you cite two examples of a couple having some problem raising their children.
I don’t quite follow who you’re talking about in your first example, but in your second I’d say that it’s probably not smart for the father to get angry about anything his son has to say. The better way would be to be patient until his son is mature enough to understand that discrimination against anyone, including people who are homosexual, is wrong and needs to be fought against with every bit of energy he possesses.
Research shows that the children of homosexual couples fare as well or better than their peers who are children of traditional marriages. That research was conducted on a whole lot more than two children! Your sample is too small to mean anything other than as a specific piece of anecdotal evidence.