Free For All - The Free Liberal Blog: Should the Church Perform Gay Marriages?

July 2009

Sun

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

Fri

Sat

Michael Binder writes, “Acceptance of gays will only come when the Church doors are opened to them for marriage.” Perhaps, but should the Church open its doors to gay marriage. How about these similar ideas:

“Acceptance of sluts will only come when the Church sanctifies one night stands.”
“Acceptance of crack dealers will only come when the Church doors are opened for crack parties.”
“Acceptance of polygamy will only come when the Church doors are opened to them for marriage.”

What is different about these statements? Answer: the Biblical case is stronger for them than for gay marriage!

The Bible has plenty of bad things to say about sleeping around. If a married woman slept around, it was a death penalty offense. The same held for a teenage girl still living with her parents, or the daughter of a priest at any time. But outside these cases, harlotry was legal, though certainly not celebrated. Solomon, as a demonstration of his wisdom, adjudicated a dispute between two harlots. He did not have them arrested.

As for crack, there is no mandate for a drug war in the Bible. The Bible does condemn drunkenness (and gluttony), but it also celebrates alcoholic beverages: vineyards and wine are a recurring theme in the Bible. Other mind-altering drugs get little to no mention, so crack might be permissible by default. (But not if it causes one to fall into sin!)

Polygamy was legal under Biblical Law. It comes up frequently. Jesus did deprecate the practice as suboptimal, but he also deprecated getting rich, collecting debts, and punishing criminals.

I am not suggesting that the Church sanctify one night stands, host crack parties, or reinstitute polygamy. I am simply saying that doing these things is arguably less bad than hosting gay marriages. Homosexuality was a death penalty offense [Leviticus 20:13]. Politically incorrect but true. The language was unambiguous, and it was not about pederasty or rape. Both participants were to be killed upon discovery. For the Church to sanctify such relationships is to either call the Bible a set of fairy tales or claim the Church knows better than God.

One can make a Biblical case for repealing sodomy laws and even for state sanctioned gay marriage. Enforcement of the ban on homosexuality was limited to the Holy Land. The Israelites never received a mandate for worldwide jihad to enforce The Law on the rest of the world. The Holy Land was to be an example for the world.

Likewise Christians are tasked to be a holy people, to be examples for the societies in which they live. The Bible provides no mandate for Christians to force everyone to live up to Christian standards. The Bible says repeatedly that Christianity is not for everyone! Follow the link for relevant scriptures. Unfortunately, Christians have often overlooked these passages, and tried to ram Christianity down the throats of those not Called, resulting in witch burnings, inquisitions, blue laws and drug wars. Conversely, when in a position of weakness the Christians have dumbed down the meaning of “Christian” in order to get those not Called into the church doors. This is why we have a plethora of saint’s days that are actually papered-over pagan holidays.

According to Paul, the correct response by Christians for homosexuality – at least for those who have joined the Church and then gone back to homosexuality – is shunning. In 1 Corinthians 5, Paul condemns that church for retaining a member who is sleeping with his father’s wife – a sin listed in Leviticus 20:11, two verses away from the verse on homosexuality. Paul tells the Corinthians to expel the sinner and to never associate with him, to shun. Paul mentions no resort to violence or law enforcement even though this too was a death penalty offense.

The state represents everyone. It has no business shunning unless someone has committed an offense against another member of society. The Church does not represent everyone; it represents Christians only. It should be allowed to set its standards for membership, even if those standards are politically incorrect.

The First Amendment calls for separation of Church and State, not Church and Religion.

Comments

Carl,

The Churches created the Bible, so no, I have no problem at all with the Church responding to what we now know about the nature of homosexuality (that it is natural for gays) and celebrating gay marriages.

Marriage is good for gays. Crack is not good for addicts, neither is promiscuity good for sluts or polygamy good for women (group marriage may or may not be if the sides are balanced, however it would likely be too complicated to work.).

I am not calling for telling the Church to celebate gay marriages. I am calling for the church to do it so that it can legitimately include in the body of the faithful those who God created to be gay. (As Paul himself would do had he known more about homosexuality's origins, when he said to the Jews I was a Jew, to the Greeks a Greek, to the slaves a slave, etc.).

Posted by: Xianleftist_Michael | August 24, 2008 08:57 PM