Rembert the Gutless

This guy seems desperate to frame this ordeal as a gay-issue, maybe so people won't focus on the fact that he stole $450,000 from his church. He's exploiting the current debates and controversies about homosexuality to hide his simple crime of theft. Regardless of how you want to interpret the Bible's stance on the whole homosexuality issue, "Thou shalt not steal" is pretty cut and dry.

also, Rod, "bloviating" is an awesome word. kudos.

Uh...he's quoting what he wrote in 2002 (maybe your browser messed up the format).

"intellectual touchstone" *snort* -- that's like calling Dan Brown a historian.

"We do not have the right to judge Scripture and Tradition; Scripture and Tradition judge us."

Oh, please. This is simply the "brain off, faith on" way of being a Christian. Where do you think we GOT Scripture and Tradition - from people.

To say we have no right to judge it is just mindless Christianity. We certainly have the right to judge both. If we didn't we'd still own slaves, women would be property as well and we'd be using leeches whenever we got sick.

We have a duty to continue to judge both Scripture and Tradition. If we cannot judge them and find new meaning in them in every age, then God is well and truly dead and has not one new thing to say.

God is still speaking. It's sad so many of God's followers refuse to keep listening.

What we may never know, though, is what role his fear of blackmail by his gay sex partners may have played in his decision to sacrifice the safety of Catholic children to keep up appearances.

I am tempted to use an expletive. The sex scandals that rock the Church were directed from ROME, with the complicity of the hierarchy at every level, in every country.

"What we may never know..." That's just slime, Rod, plain old slime.

It's pretty easy to reject any claim to innerancy as innerancy does not exist.

Ok, I had to say that. But the Affaire Weakland does seem to be hitting Milwaukee Catholics pretty hard. My wife left the Church long before we were married but she always liked him and is in something of a state of shock, which I have a bit of trouble understanding as she did choose a different path after all. But even my in-laws, who remain faithully trapped in the throws of Papist superstition... (CHUCK! BEHAVE!) Ok, I had to get another one in, are shaken by this.

To me, as an outsider, this more a cause for mirth than anything else. My reaction to my wife the other night was, "He's a Bishop! What else would you expect?"

And as far as I know, if the Vatican has chosen not to anathematize Rembert, then I'm unclear why you want to do so.

I'm a college professor in a major that attracts lots and lots of attractive young women, many of whom would likely consent to have sex with me. I find myself inclined to ask them to, because ever since I was twelve-years old I've known deep down that my sexual orientation is to want to sleep with lots and lots of women, especially blonde sorority girls with long legs and large breasts and blue eyes. Many of the women I teach are of that sort, they are above the age of consent, and I deem myself professional enough not to let the fact that I was sleeping with them interfere with my objectivity in assigning them grades on their academic work.

In addition, later on in life, I hope to do, at the least, one or the other of two things, and, if possible, both: get married and become a Catholic priest.

In addition to pursuing these two goals, I know that I can never be completely fulfilled unless I continue for as long as I can to have sex on a regular basis with twenty-year-old girls of the sort described above.

Father Weakland has given me hope that I need not feel ashamed of following my bliss, since that is what God put me here to do and since He loves me just the way I am.

CR,

The obvious difference being that (assuming you're single now) you're free to ask out one of those twenty year old girls, develop a relationship, and if things work out eventually get married and have children with her. Gay people are not, according to the current teaching of most churches. Some people, and some clergymen, think that difference is unfair, and not in accordance with their understanding of the nature of God.

You can't become a Catholic priest, but there are other churches that are open to married priests.

But the teaching of Scripture, and of the Catholic Church … is quite clear. It is the height of arrogance to presume that only we Americans, in the late 20th and early 21st century, have finally figured out what God must have meant about [insert issue du jour here].

Sigh. OK, here we go again……

Let’s charitably assume that the teaching of the Catholic Church is clear. But if there’s anything that is plainly true about Scripture, it’s that it’s not clear at all -- or that it’s clear only if by “clear” we mean something whose meaning never has been, and never can be, broadly agreed on. If Scripture were clear, there wouldn’t be all the many different strains and denominations of Christianity (or Judaism) with their many conflicting doctrines, not to mention more than 1,500 years of ceaseless argument about what Scripture means and requires of us. There wouldn’t have been a schism between the Eastern and Western churches, there wouldn’t have been a Reformation led by people who claimed that Scripture had been fundamentally distorted, there wouldn’t have been confident predictions that the world was going to end in AD 1000, 1260, 1844, etc., there wouldn’t have been numerous embarrassing climb-downs in which the churches eventually admitted that the scientific claims they had confidently based on Scripture were actually wrong, and so on.

You don’t even need to look any further than this blog, where commenters -- many of whom on both sides no doubt believe themselves to be Christians -- disagree fundamentally on just about every serious question raised. In fact, you don’t really need to look any further than Rod Dreher himself, who is obviously sincere in his Christian quest and yet, by his own admission, has changed his mind about which body of teachings it requires him to follow.

The Bible is a very complex book -- actually, a library of books -- that allows for many interpretations on virtually every point, from the fundamental nature of God to the correct way to order a society to the personal duties of the individual. On the point at issue, sexual ethics, even supposing that one consistent biblical rule could somehow be distilled, the fact that the Bible includes a number of antinomian statements (about being “freed from the law,” etc.) means that it’s always possible for an interpreter acting in good faith to question whether and how that rule was still binding. It is just empirically undeniable that we cannot come to agreement on how Scripture requires us to live. The real “height of arrogance” is to deny this and continue insisting that Scripture is “clear,” with the further implication -- so often invoked to unhappy effect -- that all the disagreements must therefore somehow be the work of Satan.

The Christian life means dying to self. That means dying to anything that keeps us from fulfilling God's will, and becoming like Christ.

See above. There is just no agreement on what “The Christian life means”; we have only interpretations and traditions, and we have to choose among them. Take the recent discussion on this blog about torture. Surely the Christian life means defending the innocent, right? But what does that mean, in practice? Does it mean taking any measures thought necessary to elicit information that might protect innocent Americans against attack? Or does it mean treating captured and (at that moment) defenseless “enemy combatants” with decency and humanity consistent with the Golden Rule? Which approach comes closer to “fulfilling God’s will” and “becoming like Christ”? I think I know, but so do people on this very blog who take exactly the opposite view.

One reason why homosexuality is breaking apart churches is not because of bigotry; it's because traditionalists rightly understand that if the churches yield doctrinal and Scriptural orthodoxy on this point, even out of a sense of compassion … then the churches have given away far, far more than they can afford to.

The churches have “given away” innumerable orthodoxies and yielded on innumerable doctrinal points throughout their history. Again, it would really help if Dreher knew some history on this. Faithful Christians of earlier eras were absolutely certain that the Bible instructed them that the sun circled the earth, that disease was God’s will (and therefore it was a sin to get vaccinated), that racial equality was anti-biblical and must be resisted, and on and on. The churches taught accordingly, insisted they couldn’t “afford” to yield, but then eventually yielded anyway. Whaddya know? They could afford it after all, and they’ll find out they can afford to yield on gay rights and equality as well. Then they’ll move on to defending some other orthodoxy that they’ll eventually yield on in turn. It’s an old, old pattern, and there’s every reason to think it’s still continuing today.

We do not have the right to judge Scripture and Tradition; Scripture and Tradition judge us. I understand, of course, that there are Christian traditions that take a different view.

These two sentences contradict each other. On Scripture, see above. On tradition: If there are “traditions [small t] that take a different view” -- thanks for noticing! -- then what does it mean to say that “Tradition [capital T] judge[s] us”? Which of those small-t traditions is “Tradition”? If it’s going to judge me, don’t I get to know that?

Hector
May 15, 2009 1:34 PM
And as far as I know, if the Vatican has chosen not to anathematize Rembert, then I'm unclear why you want to do so.

****

Hector, I know your question is really for Rod, but I had to pipe in.

Let me rephrase your statement and send it back to you: As far as I know, if the Vatican has chosen not to evolve the teaching on homosexuality, then I'm unclear why you want it to do so.

For one thing, Rod's not a Roman Catholic, so he doesn't really look to Rome in the way he once did.

Second, unless I'm mistaken and missed something, Rod simply asked why doesn't Weakland leave if he rejects so much of the Church teachings (cf. my previous post, this is really about much more than the teaching on homosexuality). Wondering why someone doesn't leave is a far cry from demanding they be thrown out.

As regards the Church's teaching on this having grounds to "evolve", sure it can evolve, but it can't change. That is, it can develop and grow, but it won't REVERSE itself and become something different.

If by evolve you mean like how wolves evloved into dogs, then that seems like a viable analogy.

But if by evolve you mean like how an fish became a man over millions of years, becoming a different type of thing altogether, then that analogy fails.

To borrow from what I wrote above, many (you?) reject that the Church's teachings on faith and morals are inerrant and eternal. Okay. But to reject that is to reject a cornerstone of the Roman Catholic faith. This Weakland has done. So apparently he's spent a lifetime buying into something he really doesn't buy into at all, and now he's publically trying to square the cirlce of his contradiction. Sad.

“But the Catholic Church does not extend this option (marriage) to homosexuals. They are forced into a life of continence, whether they are suited to it or not.”

Everyone is forced into the same life of continence. Even Wilt Chamberlain.

“it would appear that those homosexuals who cannot remain continent must therefore be damned not by their actions but by their very nature.
I submit that a God who created that particular situation is far more evil than a God who merely kills children with a hurricane.”

The homosexual is no different than the fornicating heterosexual. Each are damned by their actions (nature as you define it). By your standard, God is evil because gluttonous people crave food all the time, or liars lie.... Perhaps you’re right, maybe God is evil. But, it’s not because he made a special case of the homosexual.

I find the killing of children in a hurricane far, far more troubling than the plight of adults who must struggle with their passions.

"Vice is waste of life. Poverty, obedience, and celibacy are the canonical vices." --George Bernard Shaw

You know, I'm probably wading in where I shouldn't. But I'm getting a little tired of the "You heterosexuals can always marry. But we homosexuals can't, and thus are unfairly condemned by God to burn if we can't follow the rules of chastity."

It's pretty dismissive of the reality that lots and lots and lots of heterosexuals who want to marry, should marry, *need* to marry--don't, because the opportunity to do so never presents itself. Or don't until later in life, when concupiscence has already begun to quiet, or marry and then face the reality that a spouse isn't always "available" (what a reductive term, but I lack a better one in the context). Or marry, and then find themselves using Natural Family Planning for years, even a decade or more, because of an underlying health problem that makes pregnancy risky at best. Or marry, and are left widowed and alone sooner than they ever imagined, with no inclination or desire to marry again even if the opportunity did present itself. Or marry, and are abandoned by a spouse from a marriage that can't be annulled.

It's not the case that all heterosexuals get to have God-approved sex all the time, and only homosexuals do not. It is closer to reality to say that all homosexuals and many, many heterosexuals do not get to have God-approved sex, and only married faithful healthy heterosexuals below a certain age and in the absence of certain impediments do. The single young teen, the would-be-married 35-year-old single person, the widow or widower, the spouse of a person too ill or otherwise impeded from the marital embrace, the spouse of an elderly person who can no longer engage in this embrace, the spouse of a person who has divorced her and entered into an adulterous "marriage" leaving her with no options for companionship, and many, many other heterosexuals don't receive blanket permission to engage in sex--if they engage in sex with someone to whom they're not married they're as guilty of sin as any active homosexual, but if they are faithful to their condition of singleness or widowhood, or to the various states of marital continence I mention, they may be facing long or even permanent states of total avoidance of sex.

And just like active homosexuals, they sometimes fail or fall into sin. But they don't get to declare that this sin isn't a sin for them, that God understands, that being widowed or divorced or single past forty or whatever is just too hard, etc. It's still sin, and if they're Catholic they're called to repent, get to confession, return to the Eucharist and try really hard, with great sincerity, to avoid not only the sin but the situations that lead to it (e.g. singles' bars or porn or whatever).

Now, I think that Catholics, many of them, have set an abysmal example to our same-sex attracted brothers and sisters in two ways: one, by using artificial contraception and essentially demanding the pleasures of sex without any of its responsibilities, and living in a state of objectively grave sin for years at a time without ever removing themselves from the Eucharist as honesty and integrity demands they do; and two, by participating in the lie that homosexuals should get to engage in sexual activity without any moral culpability, that the Church is wrong and should change for them, and that they aren't really placing their souls in eternal peril for behaving in this way. We, collectively, owe our same-sex attracted brothers and sisters better than this, in both justice and charity.

Hector,

But what I really want to do, what it will really take for me to be happy as God intended me to be, is for me to be a married Catholic priest, and college professor, who has sex with twenty-year-old girls -- four or five of them at least each semester. Right now, the Catholic Church won't let me do that because its hierarchy is, at best, unenlightened and unprogressive, and, at worse, bigoted toward and oppressive of me and of others with my kind of sexuality. And I also think that many of the women my age whom I date and whom I look to as potential wives are similarly unenlightened and unprogressive or similarly bigoted toward and oppressive of me and of others with my kind of sexuality. There are millions and millions of men who, in order to be happy in the way that God intend us to be, need wives who are good housekeepers, good cooks, and good mothers to our children, and a steady string of blonde, blue-eyed, long-legged, big-breasted sorority girls to fulfill our sexual needs. Why should we not be happy, like everyone else? And why should we not be Catholic priests? Isn't it time that we let the Holy Spirit open our hearts to the new things that God has to teach? Isn't it time that we let go of the outworn dogmas of an outmoded past, time that we discovered our wings and learned to fly?

But, it’s not because he made a special case of the homosexual.

God didn't make a special case of the homosexual. The Church did. Leviticus is chock-full of prohibitions, virtually all ignored today (at least by Christians). MANY call for death. Even those are ignored.

How come? For all sorts of reasons, of course, but mostly because they appealed to a lot of people. If shrimp tasted bad to most people but provided a necessary nutrient to a small percentage of the population, we'd be arguing about the rights of crustacean-eaters.

We, collectively, owe our same-sex attracted brothers and sisters better than this, in both justice and charity.

What you owe us is an honest historical analysis of how we got to be the "intrinsically disordered" and "unnatural" ones.

Great post Erin.

-- What you owe us is an honest historical analysis of how we got to be the "intrinsically disordered" and "unnatural" ones. --

You're not the only unnatural ones. We're all born into sin and suffering. We all have disordered desires we have to discipline and when possible re-orient (I realize sexual re-orientation is rarely possible). You just suffer in this particularly grievous way.

Re: As the modern world tore down other major sins, like divorce or intermarriage, homosexuality retained its exceptional (and I mean that literally) quality.

Divorce is an interesting case. It would seem to me, that the Scriptural prohibitions against divorce- from the mouth of God incarnate, no less- are substantially less ambiguous than the Scriptural case against birth control, homosexuality, or premarital sex.

Erin, again, I see no warrant for prohibiting some forms of contraception (e.g. the Pill) in either scripture or natural law, and as for tradition, the tradition has evolved already, a lot. None of the early church fathers, as far as I know, approved of Natural Family Planning. Not Lactantius, not St. Augustine, not Clement, not St. John Chrysostom, not Tertullian, and not anyone else as far as I know. Your church has already conceded the legitimacy of trying to regulate family size, we are just arguing over the methods now. And I fail to see why adjusting your hormonal balance, through extended lactation, to suppress fertility is right, but doing so through taking pills is wrong. Let me know if you want to debate this more. As for whether all premarital sex is sinful, I think there's ground for debate about that as well, as there is over homosexuality. I think we would be better served to try to discern and follow the spirit and reason behind these prohibitions rather than apply them inflexibly and regardless of ths circumstances. As it is said, "The letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life."

Jefferson Smith, great post!

Max, I'm aware there's a Magisterium, and I'm also aware that it has changed its teaching numerous times over the ages. I'm also aware that innumerable Christians -- including Rod Dreher -- have rejected its teachings and its authority. Many of them have claimed to do this based on their own readings of Scripture.

So, we come back to the fact that "the teaching of Scripture" is "quite clear" (Dreher) only if by "quite clear" we mean "leading to all sorts of conflicting interpretations" and "allowing for many changes of doctrine as time goes on." I'm merely saying that that's a curious definition of clarity. As to the teaching of the Catholic Church being clear (as of now, until it changes again), I'm not a Catholic and so have no opinion on that. But even if we assume that it is, that doesn't resolve the ambiguity in Dreher's comments about "tradition/Tradition" or in any other way address the points I raised, which were not particular to the Rembert case.

"If we say our God is an all-loving god," he said, "how do you explain that at any given time probably 400 million living on the planet at one time would be gay? Are the religions of the world, as does Catholicism, saying to those hundreds of millions of people, you have to pass your whole life without any physical, genital expression of that love?"
Yes.
What part of yes don't you understand?

"Max, I'm aware there's a Magisterium, and I'm also aware that it has changed its teaching numerous times over the ages."

Please cite an example of a Magisterial teaching of faith and morals, given as an inerrant teaching that has changed, whether given ex cathedra or otherwise.

Max Schadenfreude,

The Catholic evaluation on whether it is ever legitimate to take interest, on whether natural family planning is licit, on whether the Jewish covenant is still valid, on whether it is legitimate for Christian agents of a Christian state to use lethal force against enemy soldiers and malefactors, and on 'extra ecclesiam nulla salus est' have all changed over time.

Not to mention, Rod Dreher himself disagrees with at least one teaching of the Magisterium, that the Pope is different in kind from the Eastern Patriarchs.

Jan Huss,

I'm high-church Anglican. But, you know, St. Thomas Aquinas talked extensively about 'primacy of conscience', and how even an erring conscience, even if it led one into conflict with the church, was binding on the will. St. Athanasius in his 'Quicumque vult' lays out quite nicely what 'The Catholic Faith' is, and I'm unaware that it mentions homosexuality at all.

The current Pope in his brilliant Regensburg Address of two years ago makes this point very clearly: God does not command things that are contrary to reason. That is the whole purpose behind the natural law reasoning tradition. Therefore, we need to try to understand the reasons why certain homosexual behaviours were condemned in Romans, Jude, First Corinthians, and in the wrtings of the church fathers and of Aquinas, and we need, in light of reason and the facts of biology as we now understand them, to try and decide whether such condemnations still apply to all homosexual acts, without exception.

Jefferson, I've been accused of many things here, but avoiding to engage in specifics of Catholic teachings is not one of them.

I do make a point to NOT argue with non-Catholics that they should do, or reject, something because the Church says so. That would be silly.

Hector,

I think your characterization of the following:

The Catholic evaluation on whether it is ever legitimate to take interest, on whether natural family planning is licit, on whether the Jewish covenant is still valid, on whether it is legitimate for Christian agents of a Christian state to use lethal force against enemy soldiers and malefactors, and on 'extra ecclesiam nulla salus est' have all changed over time.

greatly impacts whether or not a teaching has changed. Take interest for example. I believe a better description of the traditional teaching on usury is that one cannot require that another give back more than he borrowed. I'm not aware of the Church ever prohibited the regulation of births by periodic abstinance for serious reasons. And more recent teachings on the Jewish covenant and salvation outside the Church are more nuanced than you suggest.

"If the Archbishop's coming out adds to the conversation of respectable clericalism in the Church I think the Archbishop will have done a great service for the mind of the Church."

SNORT!!

Oh man! I just got soda on my shirt!

Geoff, my understanding of Catholic teaching is that the church isn't opposed to companionship and love between two men. It is opposed to sex between two men. I've heard priests (Fr. Benedict Groeshcel for one) say it is acceptable for same sex couples to live together and to support each other (even help each other die) but that they they should live together as brothers (or sisters). If you look into the Catholic organization called Courage you will see a very strong insistance on companionship and chaste mutually supportive relationships.

Rick

I've noticed that the real meaning of the statement

"the teaching of Scripture... [on such and such an issue] is quite clear"

often really means

"the teaching of Scripture... [on such and such an issue] is hotly debated and there are about 100 different opinions."

"We do not have the right to judge Scripture and Tradition; Scripture and Tradition judge us."

Talk about "bloviating." We not only have the right to judge Scripture and Tradition, we have the responsibility to do so, especially when it creates such soul-crushing damage that transcends generations. This damage goes far deeper than the loneliness of celibacy that you claim to understand. Weakland is absolutedly right to question and criticize tradition. (I see no questioning of Scripture in his words.)

We also have the right to interact and interpret Scripture and Tradition, as everyone in every generation has done. No one anywhere, no matter how much you'd like to think so, is a passive recipient of tradition and doesn't some how change it by receiving it. Not even you, no matter how "Orthodox" you claim to be.

Weakland has his flaws, but doesn't deserve your abuse, especially on such specious grounds.

Jefferson Smith wrote:
May 15, 2009 2:03 PM
“If Scripture were clear, there wouldn’t be all the many different strains and denominations of Christianity (or Judaism) with their many conflicting doctrines,...”

“...The churches have “given away” innumerable orthodoxies and yielded on innumerable doctrinal points throughout their history....

“..Which of those small-t traditions is “Tradition”?”

“Let’s charitably assume that the teaching of the Catholic Church is clear. But if there’s anything that is plainly true about Scripture, it’s that it’s not clear at all -- or that it’s clear only if by “clear” we mean something whose meaning never has been, and never can be, broadly agreed on. If Scripture were clear, there wouldn’t be all the many different strains and denominations of Christianity (or Judaism) with their many conflicting doctrines,...”

Sigh,

This is an effort worthy of Hitchens and Dawkins.

First you didn’t Rod correctly. So you set up a straw man from the beginning.

You continue to erect scarecrows by using words like orthodoxies and doctrine incorrectly.

You use a protestant hermenutic and separate Tradition from Scripture, which a Catholic would never do.

Then, your whole argument confuses all the myriad protestant denominations and their nearly infinite array conflicting beliefs with Catholicsm.

Interestingly, your whole complaint is a protestant one. And yes, this perspective does ultimately lead to the religious nihlism you suggest. That is perhaps why we now have Episcopalian priests who are also Wiccans, or simultaneously Muslim, or even Atheists.

It’s understandable for you to have these confusions, considering you’re premises.
.

But as I never tire of pointing out Weakley is a Catholic.

Re: By your standard, God is evil because gluttonous people crave food all the time, or liars lie....

But even gluttohns are not expexted to abstain from food until they starve, and liars are permitted to speak as long as they tell the truth. The issue here is why homosexuals are not ever permitted to love.

Re: Finally, Anglicanism is probably the most protestant of all protestant bodies on earth. Yes, even more than the Baptists.

This is absurd. The Anglicans have kept ecclesial and apostolic governance, sacramental grace, the Eucharist, and the vitality of Tradition (which does not mean they affirm every tradition Rome does any more than we Orthodox do). Show me a Baptist church that has any of these beliefs.

weakland paid the 450,000 back. So - telling what he believes to be the truth about his own experience makes him gutless? That he is th eonly bishop to agree to testify about the sex abuse scandal - makes him gutless too I guess? And we wonder why Pelosi isn't being honest.

Weakland violated his vows and was wrong to do so. Yes his theology is surely weak. BUt how come we are so hot on scripture when it comes to prohibiting gay sex and marriage but the scriptural prohibition that goes "judge not yet ye be judged" is forgotten?

Hector - agree that a re-examination is called for.

"how is it that a gay archbishop who by his own confession had multiple homosexual affairs, and in one of them paid his lover nearly half a million dollars -- money that he stole from the Church, mind you -- now suddenly becomes an authority on what Catholic teaching should be, or a moral authority on anything? Where is the integrity?"
-----

How is it that hundreds of bishops throughout the world who have protected sexual offenders, victimized children and their families, revictimized so many others, lied to their congregations and the public, and stolen church resources to pay off those who came forward are allowed to remain authorities on what Catholic teaching should be, or a moral authority on anything?

How come if you admit you're gay and criticize the Church's teaching on homosexuality, you're "blovating" and "gutless", but on the other hand, if you're a self-loathing closet case who probably has sex on the side while publicly condemning people like Weakland, you're still a good standing member of the Catholic hierarchy?

Homosexuals in our time, driven by the guilt inevitably associated with acting it out, twist, reinterpret, make gratuitous and totally unsupported falsehoods about Christian teaching on the subject. "First we choose our lifestyles, then our religion." That critique fits the above "Your name" nonsense.

As any honest person - someone for whom the first thing is to seek the truth and then to make our lifestyles conform to the truth (not the reverse)- cannot deny, the Catholic Church and all Protestant churches have traditionally, and going back to Christ and St. Paul, roundly condemn homosexual behavior as gravely immoral. Neither Socrates nor Aristotle approved of the Greek tendency to it - they conformed their views and lives to reason = truth.

Someone a slave to such vice has two choices just as the alcoholic, the gluttonous, the avaricious, the violent, etc do: 1.) Defend their
vice as somehow a virtue or at least not immoral and remain enslaved to it as the center of their lives, or; 2.) Make a sincere effort to overcome the vice, through prayer, avoiding the occasions of temptation (such as gay bars, gay movies, etc.) and gradually conquer it, as least the acting out of it. Like the alcoholic they may always have an inclination or attraction for it, but they do not have to give in to it. The choice is theirs. Many have overcome that vice, as is true of all vices. "Addiction" is merely the modern term for "vice" and all vice is sinful and so causes unhappiness. So we pity those trapped in any form of vice, and admire those who overcome it.

"Addiction" is merely the modern term for "vice" and all vice is sinful and so causes unhappiness.
---

I have been quite happily joined to my gay partner (and now my spouse) for the past 23 years, so your observation and your comparisons to "addiction" are innacurate at best, ignorant and hateful at worse.

Mark, who forced Weakland to take a vow of celibacy? And no one called him bloviating and gutless for criticizing the Church -- _obviously_, but rather for breaking his vow, then spending $450,000 of his flock's money to keep his failure a secret, and then presuming he has the standing to speak on a moral issue. Also, a self-loathing closet case who has sex on the side while publicly condemning people like Weakland can retain good standing in the Church if and only if he is just what Weakland was for all those years -- a phony who hides his sin.

None of this goes to the issue of homosexuality, just to your poor reasoning.

Sig,

Just get over yourself already.

"no one called him bloviating and gutless for criticizing the Church -- _obviously_, but rather for breaking his vow,"
---

(I disagree -- reading this column, I don't think that's obvious at all.)

"....a phony who hides his sin."
---

In my estimation, based on my experience in the seminary and in the pews, I would say that the Church is being largely led by such men, and has been for a very long time. All Weakland did was break the clergy code which demands "keep it quiet". I don't defend the man for the coverup, but he gets points for being honest.

"One reason why homosexuality is breaking apart churches is not because of bigotry; it's because traditionalists rightly understand that if the churches yield doctrinal and Scriptural orthodoxy on this point, even out of a sense of compassion (and truly, anyone who doesn't feel compassion for a gay or lesbian Christian facing a lifetime of chastity hasn't thought seriously enough about the Cross these brothers and sisters in Christ are asked to carry), then the churches have given away far, far more than they can afford to."

Quite true Rod. Quite true. Once people begin to question some parts of the Bible (or for that matter, any religious text) they may very well begin to question the authority of the rest.

"We do not have the right to judge Scripture and Tradition; Scripture and Tradition judge us. I understand, of course, that there are Christian traditions that take a different view. The Roman Catholic tradition is not one of them. To justify his own sins, the ex-archbishop wishes to change 20 centuries of authoritative Catholic teaching about sexuality and anthropology. Why not just become an Episcopalian, and leave the people who believe that the Catholic Church is what she claims to be -- the authoritative teacher of the faith handed down to the Apostles -- alone to work out their salvation in obedience to Catholic truth?"

Actually, the Catholic Church already ceded that argument once it decided that the Bible was not the literal Word of God - that, in fact, some biblical positions are open to interpretation. The slippery slope was started by those who chose they could not take the Bible's passages literally. Bishop Weakland, unfortunately for him, merely applied the argument to people in his situation at a time when the Catholic Church is not ready to apply its, ahem, reasoning to people who are gay. And no, natural law is not an excuse for defending traditionalism, for if natural law means grounding oneself in that found in nature then the gay livelihood is the acceptable exception since it occurs naturally, nothing more and nothing less. The Catholic Church is of course free to oppose the sexual expression between two gay people but calling it natural law is itself a misnomer when in reality it is selectively applying natural law philosophy to conform with its own biblical precepts.

Hence, why I am no longer a Catholic. Hence why I am not a Christian and hence why I am an agnostic. In its quest to remain scientifically relevant it had (rightly) distanced itself from the claims that the earth was created in seven days and that evolution could not have been the means by which we were created. But the fault lies not with those of us who question its beliefs but rather with those, like you, who fear that the line of questioning which we are both referring to inevitably leads to religion's demise. You dread it. I welcome it.

"Newsflash gays aren't a race."

Breaking news update: The bigoted arguments used against them are almost word-for-word identical to the arguments once used to enforce racial bigotry. Learn some history.

-- "All Weakland did was break the clergy code which demands "keep it quiet". I don't defend the man for the coverup, but he gets points for being honest." --

No, what Weakland did was break his vows, and then make his flock literally pay for that. What honesty? He didn't come out, his old lover had already outed him.

what Weakland did was break his vows, and then make his flock literally pay for that. What honesty? He didn't come out, his old lover had already outed him.
---

His lover outed him, and he subsequently admitted to being gay, so he's at least two steps ahead of his ex-colleagues.

Your Name and Jon,

I say that Anglicanism is far and away the most protestant body on earth because it has carried out the protestant ideal more fully than any other (unless you count the Unitarians). Despite the beautiful churches, the robes, the incense, claims of apostolic lineage, etc. and references to tradition, scripture, and reason, Anglicans' ultimate authority is individual private judgement. And in Anglicanism, private judgement is accepted and encouraged more readily than in any other protestant group. That is why in Anglicanism one can find such things as atheistic bishops, priests who deny the resurrection, priests who belive they can simultaneously be Muslim or Wiccan, and most radically- churches that practice communion with non-believers. Perhaps, I should modify this by saying this is true in United States, Canada, and the UK. Probably not in Africa. But, there is nothing in principal to prevent it from occurring there.

As an additional point, you each demonstrate what I am referring to in this discussion. You both reference the Apostles, the Church Fathers, Tradition and the Scriptures, but you each sit in judgement upon them. Your ultimate authority is your own pesonal reading of them. Your own interpretation is what counts. This is the essense of protestantism.

Re: As an additional point, you each demonstrate what I am referring to in this discussion. You both reference the Apostles, the Church Fathers, Tradition and the Scriptures, but you each sit in judgement upon them.

And when the Third Council of Constantinople said this, "And with these we define that there shall be expelled from the holy Church of God and anathematized Honorius who was some time Pope of Old Rome, because of what we found written by him to [Patriarch] Sergius, that in all respects he followed his view and confirmed his impious doctrines," were they being Protestants as well?

“And when the Third Council of Constantinople said this, "And with these we define that there shall be expelled from the holy Church of God and anathematized Honorius who was some time Pope of Old Rome, because of what we found written by him to [Patriarch] Sergius, that in all respects he followed his view and confirmed his impious doctrines," were they being Protestants as well?”

Err...I am not sure where to begin with this. You’re example has absolutely nothing to do with the point you’re tryng to make.

The judgement of an Ecumenical Council are the complete opposite of the INDIVIDUAL private opinions of an individual protestant. An Ecumenical council is the word of the entire Church.

Jan Huss,

My point is that the notion of strict infallibility needs to be qualified and attentuated. Catholic teaching holds that infallibility lies both with individual popes, and with ecumenical coucils. So what happens when an ecumenical council anathematizes a Pope, as happened with Honorius? Either Honorius was not infallible when he pronounced that Jesus had one will, or the Council was not infallible when they anathematized him.

On balance, what JonF said. The Anglican communion as a whole has not fallen into apostasy, even if individual Episcopal parishes and clergy have. God would have saved Sodom for five righteous men, and He will protect the Anglican communion as long as it has five righteous bishops.

-- "Regarding virtue, I'm ascribing nothing of the sort to Weakland -- or to his former colleagues. As for the Church's position, it speaks for itself." --

So the honesty you attributed to him isn't a virtue?

I don't know how a position could speak for itself until the thinking and the motives behind it are understood. Ah, but why bother to try, right? Just write it off as hateful.

You know, I'm more on your side than not, politically and theologically. I just more people on both sides would grant each other the benefit of the doubt.

Mark, you don't seem to have considered whether or not Wheatland believed at the time that homosexuality was sin, and thus believed that he himself had sinned.

And how is the Church's teaching based on lies rather than merely on what you believe is incorrect? Are you saying that even the Biblical writers didn't believe what they wrote? Are you saying no one could in good conscience believe that the Bible is the word of God and it should be taken at face value on homosexuality?

It looks to me as if in your anger your judgments are both uncharitable and none too logical (one-size-fits-all).

Hector wrote:
May 17, 2009 9:01 AM

“My point is that the notion of strict infallibility needs to be qualified and attentuated.”

Yes, I understand. But, again, it is your point. The case of Honorius has been decided already for a Catholic. You want to weaken or alter the Tradition according to your opinions. This is very Protestant.

“God would have saved Sodom for five righteous men, and He will protect the Anglican communion as long as it has five righteous bishops.”

The Anglican Communion has been a beautiful expression of God’s love for mankind. I am sorry that some elements in it have marred that image. It’s tragic.

Hector wrote:
May 17, 2009 9:05 AM
“And by the way, "Protestant" in the commonly used sense connotes the denial of transubstantiation, sainthood, apostolic succession, sacramental grace, tradition (in its entirety, not just in terms of qualification and interpretation), and the reverence due to the Mother of God. At least do us the favor of calling us "the Anglican heresy" or something. Low church Baptists we are not. “

I apologize if I insulted you. You are correct in citing the elements of tradition that Anglicanism has kept. And I didn’t mean to suggest that Anglicanism was low church (though it allows for similar expressions). I was focusing upon the protestant premises which lie beneath the communions’ method of understanding doctrine, Tradition, etc. and the degree to which those premises have been carried out.

In any case, I wish you well.

Mark, first of all, I've read entire books by Christians for and against on the question of homosexuality. The notion that opposition to it is fundamentalist just won't wash. In fact, if one salient characteristic of fundamentamentalism is ignorance, it's fundamentalist.

Secondly, the Bible doesn't demonize everyone, it calls us all sinners. All of us.

Finally, your claim that Christian opposition ot homosexuality contributes to all that stuff needs to be unpacked and defended. As a blanket statement, it's a joke.

Mark, first of all, the church has always preached against violence. It is no more responsible for people who commit violence against gays, sometimes in its name, than rank and file 1960's anti-war protestors are responsible for the Weather Underground violence.

As for prejudice and discrimination, those are loaded terms. If you refuse to grant that good, intelligent, well-meaning people can disagree on homosexuality, then you're going to see all opposition to it as prejudice. I just don't think that opinion stands scrutiny. Likewise, to discriminate means first of all to draw distinctions. The real question is whether or not the distinction is drawn wisely and correctly. And again, I think good people can and do disagree.

Mark, I used to be a Christian conservative, and so I took the Christian conservative line on homosexuality. But I wasn't a Christian because of what the Bible says about homsexuality. My Christian belief came first, and because I believed that the Bible is God's word, and that we're all sinners, and that, because they made snese to me, all sorts of other things the Bible teaches are true, I also believed what the Bible says about homosexuality. I believed the big stuff so I felt I had to believe the small stuff too. Why my views on homosexuality have changed is of no concern here; I'm trying to illustrate why a well-meaning person can believe that gays should hoe a hard road. (And being single and chaste is just as tough for the many heteros who have little hope of marriage, or who feel called to the Catholic priesthood).

The conservative Christian teaching on homosexuality is that gays have, through no fault of their own (please reread that last phrase), disordered desires. In other words, they have a handicap. We don't blame the lame person for how he walks. We don't blame gays for their sexuality. We don't demonize either one, and Christians that do are using the Bible as an excuse for their own prejudice, not following Christ in that respect, not being Christian. Granted, without the Church's teaching they wouldn't have that crutch. But again, the peaceful protestors aren't to blame for the violent ones. The Weather Underground's actions did not invalidate the cause for which the others marched.

I know many, many Christians who believe homosexuality is wrong, who oppose gay marriage. But what is it gays wisely say to straights, "we're your neighbor, your colleague, your doctor, etc."? The people I know are all around you too. You just don't know it, because they demonize you. They don't look down on you one little bit.

BobN, you're right, I don't know what it is to be grow up gay and to gradually realize that most of the people I know, the people I instinctively love and look up to, think what I experience as my deepest desire is wrong, is yucky, is unnatural.

But I do know what it's like to grow up feeling unloved and unloveable, and thus doomed not to find fulfillment, for other reasons.

So what I'm trying to say is that I can imagine your pain and, in my imagining, share it with you. I just don't think -- and you probably agree with me here -- that that truth is to be found in feelings alone.

I do know what it's like to grow up feeling unloved and unloveable, and thus doomed not to find fulfillment, for other reasons.

I don't know what it is you are talking about, but gay people are not doomed in finding fulfillment. In fact, we do find fulfillment, and that is in spite of the negative messages we are constantly fed.

Hello Jefferson Smith,

Faithful Christians of earlier eras were absolutely certain that the Bible instructed them that the sun circled the earth, that disease was God’s will (and therefore it was a sin to get vaccinated), that racial equality was anti-biblical and must be resisted, and on and on. The churches taught accordingly, insisted they couldn’t “afford” to yield, but then eventually yielded anyway.

The church never had any doctrinal teaching on these subjects as such.

the Bible teaches that there is something deeply and fundamentally wrong with each of us

The Bible also teaches that it is an abomination to consume shellfish. However, if what you say is true, the part of me that is deeply and fundamentally wrong does not include my capacity to love. To frame that dimension of my being as "sin" is deeply and fundamentally wrong.

It is amazing that many in our society feel the need to broadcast there story for our “Oprahfied” or Springer world. His motive don’t really seem to be to improve the how to handle situations like abusive priests or the mishandling of diocesan funds, but rather to justify himself and rationalize why it is ok for people, in this case, priests to engage in homosexual behavior. By paying the man who demanded the $450,000, he and those in the diocese who knew about the transaction, seem to have participated in accepting a bribe. Those who did this participated in a felony.

The physical acts he engaged in with various people were nothing more than using others for his own gratification. As far as I know, this alone is a sin outside of the homosexual acts, you think someone like that would be able to recognize that. So even if the homosexuality is deemed ok by God, as he tries to rationalize by his estimation of the gay population, is using people ok too?

I find it interesting that the former Archbishop blames everyone else, like the Vatican and psychologist, for not removing priests who had a history of abuse and not placing any blame on himself. He also fails to recognize that he abused people as well. Even if they are willing participates in the physical acts, as an Archbishop he abused people on various levels. He abused people by using them for his physical gratification and he abused them by not living up the example he is supposed to as an Archbishop. The latter impacts the faith of the faithful and fuels the cynics and the atheists rather than drawing people closer to Christ. This is Common sense tells me that at the very least an abusive priest could be placed in an assignment that insulated him from contact with potential victims until a verdict had been rendered by the Vatican. Further, how soon did the Archbishop notify the Vatican about these priests?

It just irritates me that a person who was a leader in our Church would behave in such a way and then write a book suggesting he is some great pioneer out to improve the Body of Christ. I guess he is just a victim of the oppressive hierarchical Church and we really just need to pray to the great god, happy, so we can be free to do whatever we want.

The church never had any doctrinal teaching on these subjects as such.

Athelstane, I said "the churches," not the church. And those two words "as such" certainly cover a lot, don't they?

OK, maybe you'll like this phrasing better: Various church bodies and many prominent Christians, including leaders of the Catholic and other churches, actively promoted and sought to enforce views that virtually everyone today, Christian or otherwise, has abandoned as clearly wrong. They did this on the basis of what they sincerely thought were correct readings of Scripture, as well as on their understanding of God's will as revealed in nature, history and tradition. Which is what raises my original question: How, then, could any of these sources, including the Bible, been "quite clear," as Rod Dreher and other conservatives Christians claim?

On this very thread, there's been disagreement about (for instance) whether the Scriptural condemnations of homosexuality were aimed at what we understand by that term or at specific ancient practices that aren't at issue today. There has been disagreement even about what's authoritative in Catholic doctrine, let alone in Christian teachings more generally.

Religion, in short, can provide many things, but it's just empirically undeniable that it has not provided "clear" guidance for social policy in any meaningful sense of clarity. Insisting that it does settles nothing but is just a formula for further conflict.

And even as I'm writing my last comment, Kelidei posts:

"Finally--One does not even need scripture to know the truth about human sexuality. It is written into our physical design. ....Psychology is NOT immutable truth--- theories come and go--- OTOH, our physical design is--- the continuation of the species RELIES on heterosexuals not homosexuals. This does not change, it IS an immutable truth. It is not a reality that changes with society or time."

Yes, and it is written on the very bodies of blacks and whites that they are physically, immutably different, that God had different intentions for them, that blacks are descendents of Ham, that people of different races mustn't intermarry, that thousands of years of life in "the jungle" has unfitted blacks as a race for high civilization, and blah blah blah blah blah. It's all been said before by way of explaining why slavery was justified, why segregation was essential, why the law must not treat the races as equal, why the hierarchies and prejudices of an earlier era were never going to change, why it would destroy civilization and/or religion if they ever did, and why enforcing those hierarchies was an act not of rank injustice but of compassion, recognition of reality, humility and dutifulness to God's great design, etc. etc.

Now we see that this was all just error and bigotry when applied to blacks (and women, although there's still some rearguard action on that front). Yet the exact same arguments are simply transferred whole to the fight against equality for gays.

The people who make such claims lost the arguments over race and gender. That apparently wasn't enough for them, so now they want to lose the same arguments again over sexual orientation. Well, congratulations to them, because they're getting their wish.

The ritual laws are no longer binding, not after Christ. Moral laws reflect reality, and so they're eternal.

Nonsense! You're just rationalizing your cafeteria-style biblical interpretation to support your antigay bias. Where is the distinction drawn in those passages between "ritual" acts and "moral" ones?

I don't think you'll find any Christians who say your capacity to like and admire and take care of someone is wrong.

"like"? "admire"? "take care of"? Nice way to patronize and purposefully minimize the meaning of our relationships so that you don't have to feel uncomfortable or confused about it.

Mark, you are far too angry to be able to reason. Ritual laws reminded Israel of its covenant relationship with God. The prohibition against shellfish obviously had no moral component to it. On the other hand, morality and sexuality are clearly intertwined.

As for my supposed anti-gay bias, I'm all in favor of civil unions, and I think there are strong arguments for gay marriage, although I don't support it right now. What a nasty guy I am, don't you think?

And I wasn't patronizing anyone or minimizing anything, just pointing out how lazy and rhetorically convenient your definition of "love" is. Of course in your anger you presume that opponents of homosexuality don't feel your pain. And it sounds more and more like that's just what you want to believe.

Mark, I don't in the least doubt that you love your partner, and I never suggested otherwise. My point is that love doesn't have to include sex. Not every desire has to be acted upon.

There are some nasty folks out there who condemn homosexuality as just lust. But I think that among opponents of homosexuality they're a pretty small minority.

Mark, take a tip from Obama. It's possible to respect someone's views without agreeing with them. I hope you some day learn how that's done.

It's possible to respect someone's views without agreeing with them.

It's possible, though you haven't written anything respectable yet. You've contradicted yourself several times, so it's difficult to fathom just what your views are.

Adam wrote:
When did everyone stop considering homosexual activity to be depraved behavior that puts you on a road to Hell?
---

When they left their churches and realized that their pastor, doctor, teacher, counselor, brother, sister, son, daughter, friend, relative or parent was homosexual.

You're not tying to fathom my views. You're trying to keep me, and everyone else who doesn't see homosexuality as completely natural and good in every way, in a box labeled "Bigots," so you can claim the moral superiority you think we claim to have over you. Perhaps you should ask yourself what you really gain vs. what you might lose that way.

That's why you find my views confusing. You keep conveniently forgetting what I tell you of them, such as the fact that they have changed over the years but that my views -- and by extension the views of many people who still oppose legitimizing homosexuality period, full stop -- were rooted in an all-encompassing religious view, not in personal feelings about gays. Bigots will always be attracted to the Church's teachings on homosexuality, just as libertines will always be attracted to critiques of it. But would it be fair to say that most gays who reject the Church are libertines? Neither is it fair to say that most Christians who reject homosexuality are bigots.

Once you allow the idea that your opponents might just be decent people with your best in mind, you can begin to try to understand their views, and perhaps even to change them. That's the best way, and maybe the only way, to gain their respect for your 23-year long relationship.

And I wasn't patronizing anyone.....

Well, Ken, yes you were, if you're the same Ken who wrote this yesterday:

"The conservative Christian teaching on homosexuality is that gays have, through no fault of their own (please reread that last phrase), disordered desires. In other words, they have a handicap. We don't blame the lame person for how he walks. We don't blame gays for their sexuality. We don't demonize either one.....

This is EXACTLY the same patronizing line that racists used to take: "It's not their FAULT that they were born black, and therefore with 'disordered desires,' it's more like a handicap." It's still bigotry and it's still odious.

Which leads to my response both to you and to Kelidei. Because overt racism has largely been defeated, we have forgotten what it used to look like. It did not (mostly) consist of people sitting around saying "I hate blacks" but giving no reasons. No, it included all kinds of expressions of alleged sympathy for blacks (and Jews, Asians, etc.), but set alongside an insistence that it was just written in Scripture, or nature, or reality, or the whole history of human societies, that they were born / destined / intended by God to occupy a certain "place," and that it was merely rational, or prudent, or obedient to the Bible to recognize this and maintain the needed legal restrictions, because otherwise we'd be acting "unnaturally" and dishonoring God, and therefore society and/or religion would collapse. I mean, really, the exact same arguments.

So now we hear that raising this is a "red herring" because, of course, actually the REAL physical attribute that God and history and nature recognize, and that should determine how we arrange things legally and socially, is not skin color, which is "just" one of the "variations found in the species" (Kelidei), but rather the ability to reproduce. THAT'S real; the rest is just an illusion that, for some reason, centuries of Christian and other teachings mistakenly held to be extremely important. Those people in the past -- including the churches -- were apparently just dumb or unserious; but WE, today, somehow have it right, finally -- WE in our wisdom can see that skin color is not defining of people, but the ability to procreate is. WE, unlike our racist forebears, can see that "nature" is consistent with equality for the races, but also that it somehow abhors being gay (or, allows it but in a way that commands our sympathy, because it's like a "handicap").

See, racism was not just a feeling of disliking blacks, Jews or Asians. It was a highly elaborated system, with all kinds of Scriptural proofs behind it, all kinds of arguments about what was "natural," as well as a superficially plausible-looking appeal to the lessons of history, which after all seemed to show that the "white" races had "achieved" more than the others and had come to dominate the world, and that therefore this must somehow be right and/or what God intended. There was a whole, elaborate explanation for this that held race to be much more than merely skin color -- it was the inherited burden of thousands of years of different cultural development, and it necessarily meant, therefore, a predisposition to certain kinds of behavior (although it was also held that a few heroic blacks could resist and rise above these predispositions, much as the bigots of today claim that gays are called to resist and rise above the urge to have gay sex). Oh, and also, blacks weren't different just in skin color, but also in the shapes of their heads and teeth and lips and in all kinds of other ways -- and these were (supposedly) NOT meaningless differences like eye color, they were biblical: the "mark of Cain," the curse of Ham, the sign of being of that human branch that had not inherited the God's blessing, etc.

The fact is, some people want to have sex with others of the same gender. This is apparently inborn, i.e. genetically part of their nature. Like skin color or head shape, it is just a variation within the species, and therefore it's no more reasonable to stigmatize people for it -- or to patronize them over it and suggest that it's some kind of handicap -- than it is to stigmatize differently colored skin.

And really, how arrogant do you have to be say otherwise? When it came to race, people claimed FOR CENTURIES that they knew what was natural / unnatural, essential versus merely superficial, against Scripture and so forth, yet now we see they were consistently wrong. But here you are, today, equally certain you really do know what is natural / unnatural, essential versus merely superficial, against Scripture, etc., and that in making your extremely similar-sounding claims you are not repeating exactly the same mistake. How arrogant is that?

My point here has just been that the racists ultimately lost, and you're going to lose too. In the future your arguments will either be forgotten (if you're lucky), or will be looked back on with the same revulsion that the racist arguments are viewed with today.

And I wasn't patronizing anyone

Well, Ken, yes you were, if you're the same Ken who wrote this yesterday:

"The conservative Christian teaching on homosexuality is that gays have, through no fault of their own (please reread that last phrase), disordered desires. In other words, they have a handicap. We don't blame the lame person for how he walks. We don't blame gays for their sexuality. We don't demonize either one.....

This is EXACTLY the same patronizing line that racial bigots used to take: "It's not their FAULT that they were born black, and therefore with 'disordered desires,' it's more like a handicap." It's still bigotry and it's still odious.

Which leads to my response both to you and to Kelidei. Because overt racism has largely been defeated, we have forgotten what it used to look like. It did not (mostly) consist of people sitting around saying "I hate blacks" but giving no reasons. No, it included all kinds of expressions of alleged sympathy for blacks (and Jews, Asians, etc.), but set alongside an insistence that it was just written in Scripture, or nature, or reality, or the whole history of human societies, that they were born / destined / intended by God to occupy a certain "place," and that it was merely rational, or prudent, or obedient to the Bible to recognize this and maintain the needed legal restrictions, because otherwise we'd be acting "unnaturally" and dishonoring God, and therefore society and/or religion would collapse. I mean, really, the exact same arguments.

So now we hear that raising this is a "red herring" because, of course, actually the REAL physical attribute that God and history and nature recognize, and that should determine how we arrange things legally and socially, is not skin color, which is "just" one of the "variations found in the species" (Kelidei), but rather the ability to reproduce. THAT'S real; the rest is just an illusion that, for some reason, centuries of Christian and other teachings mistakenly held to be extremely important. Those people in the past -- including the churches -- were apparently just dumb or unserious; but WE, today, somehow have it right, finally -- WE in our wisdom can see that skin color is not defining of people, but the ability to procreate is. WE, unlike our racist forebears, can see that "nature" is consistent with equality for the races, but also that it somehow abhors being gay (or, allows it but in a way that commands our sympathy, because it's like a "handicap").

See, racism was not just a feeling of disliking blacks, Jews or Asians. It was a highly elaborated system, with all kinds of Scriptural proofs behind it, all kinds of arguments about what was "natural," as well as a superficially plausible-looking appeal to the lessons of history, which after all seemed to show that the "white" races had "achieved" more than the others and had come to dominate the world, and that therefore this must somehow be right and/or what God intended. There was a whole, elaborate explanation for this that held race to be much more than merely skin color -- it was the inherited burden of thousands of years of different cultural development, and it necessarily meant, therefore, a predisposition to certain kinds of behavior (although it was also held that a few heroic blacks could resist and rise above these predispositions, much as the bigots of today claim that gays are called to resist and rise above the urge to have gay sex). Oh, and also, blacks weren't different just in skin color, but also in the shapes of their heads and teeth and lips and in all kinds of other ways -- and these were (supposedly) NOT meaningless differences like eye color, they were biblical: the "mark of Cain," the curse of Ham, the sign of being of that human branch that had not inherited the God's blessing, etc.

The fact is, some people want to have sex with others of the same gender. This is apparently inborn, i.e. genetically part of their nature. Like skin color or head shape, it is just a variation within the species, and therefore it's no more reasonable to stigmatize people for it -- or to patronize them over it and suggest that it's some kind of handicap -- than it is to stigmatize differently colored skin.

And really, how arrogant do you have to be say otherwise? When it came to race, people claimed FOR CENTURIES that they knew what was natural / unnatural, essential versus merely superficial, against Scripture and so forth, yet now we see they were consistently wrong. But here you are, today, equally certain you really do know what is natural / unnatural, essential versus merely superficial, against Scripture, etc., and that in making your extremely similar-sounding claims you are not repeating exactly the same mistake. How arrogant is that?

My point here has just been that the racists ultimately lost, and you're going to lose too. In the future your arguments will either be forgotten (if you're lucky), or looked back on with the same revulsion that the racist arguments are viewed with today.

"does not mean that somehow heterosexuality will become extinct and the species wiill die out. That's what you're arguing, and frankly, that's ridiculous.'

Really? That may be what you want to think I am arguing--- makes it easier to dismiss it--- but it is not at all what I have been discussing. My point is not based on a "fear" of anything--- least of all the "extinction" of heterosexuality. comments here implied that the Church should change it's teaching with regard to homosexual marriage and acts--- I laid out the foundation for the Church's stance based upon natural law, human biology and physiology--- which are facts, truths of the nature of human beings they are unchangeable. The moral teaching of the Church is not in conflict with natural law--- natural law is a proof of God's intentions for human sexual activity homosexual acts (as well as some heterosexual acts) are disordered to the foundational reality of human sexual relations.

-- But here you are, today, equally certain you really do know what is natural / unnatural, essential versus merely superficial, against Scripture, etc., and that in making your extremely similar-sounding claims you are not repeating exactly the same mistake. How arrogant is that? --

If certainty is arrogance, you sound pretty arrogant. The similar-sounding line won't wash. Some things really are unnatural, that's why we have the word, and human anatomy provides some pretty clear cues to what's natural for humans. It doesn't secrete KY Jelly, for one thing, and it doesn't allow gays to do what straights can do, to consumate their love for each other by reproducing themselves.

Now I don't jump from that to the conclusion that sexual relations between committed partners is wrong, or is anything less than beautiful in God's eyes. But you guys have a huge handicap here, which just might (or might not) say something about your sexuality, and instead of acknowledging the handicap and then arguing from there, you whine that you're being patronized. It's not like you don't have a larger case, but you sound pretty silly here.

Jefferson, my apologies for presuming you were something you're not. But I'm not sure by what logic a mistake in judgment ("homosexuality is wrong" when in fact it's not, or "the Bible says homosexuality is wrong and I believe it about other things including things I'd rather not believe so I have to believe it about homosexuality too" when in fact the Bible is wrong) is patronizing. And there's an important difference between empathy and pity.

Again, by your logic, nothing is unnatural. Make an argument, not just a claim. And nothing here is simply obvious to me, though as I said, anatomy offers some pretty big clues. I acknowledge that there are arguments to be made against mine, although you haven't made them. No, you'd rather not be looked on as a bigot. Far more fun to call other people bigots. You guys always do miss the irony.

By the way, Ken, I've taken positions here not just in support of gay rights, but against racism, sexism, and antsemitism. Do you assume that I must therefore be a black Jewish lesbian? Because if that's the case, I must need a new mirror. :-)

OK, Ken, seriously: If you suggested to a black person that he was "handicapped" by not being born white, but that you had "empathy" for him because this was "no fault of his own," the kindest thing we could call that remark would be patronizing. Yet you think it's fine -- indeed, you probably think it's praiseworthy -- to speak exactly the same way to gays.

The difference, you think, is that gayness "really is" unnatural. You ask for my argument to the contrary. OK: At least three percent of the population, probably more, is gay, i.e. has an inborn desire for sex with members of the same rather than the opposite gender. What percent of the population has the talent to learn to play concert violin like Jascha Haifetz? Way less than three percent, I'm betting; more like .0003 percent. And yet it would just be meaningless to call that talent "unnatural." It's clearly one of characteristics a human being might have, and there is zero reason to stigmatize someone for it.

Likewise, being gay is clearly one of the characteristics a human being might have. We don't know enough yet about human evolution to know why that is, but, if anything, it seems to be far more widely distributed than great musical talent or any of a thousand other traits that we find here and there. So it's just meaningless to speak of it as "unnatural," especially if by that you mean to justify calling it a "handicap" or basing some kind of discrimination on it. To say it's unnatural even though it plainly occurs in nature is just to redefine "unnatural" to mean "things I wish didn't occur in nature, even though they do."

Arguments from nature, then, get you nowhere, and if you want to discriminate you need some other argument. That, of course, is when the Christian conservatives reach for the Bible, which they've conveniently reinterpreted as not requiring racial discrimination, as they once insisted it did, but which they're still absolutely sure can only be read as stigmatizing gays. And so the game continues, until eventually the current bigotry is also abandoned and then we're told that, gosh, nature and the Bible "really" mean something else, and that's what we'll then hear defended in the teeth of all the evidence. It doesn't take a "moral visionary" to see that this is how it's going to play out, because we've been down this road many times before.

it doesn't allow gays to do what straights can do, to consumate their love for each other by reproducing themselves.

Kindly stop the narcissistic bloviating. Even slugs can breed. You're arguing what is regarded as a"biologism": biology-as-ideology. It's intellectually dishonest to claim that the sole purpose of sexuality between married adults is producing children. What to do with all the heterosexually married couples who biologically cannot conceive or who are unwilling to conceive? Does their love remain unconsummated?

Exactly, Mark -- Kelidei and others are reductionists who want us to think that human sexuality must be understood only and entirely in terms of reproduction. This is a version of the "genetic fallacy," the notion that something must be defined by how it originated. No doubt, sexual desire evolved as an instrument of reproduction, but like most other aspects of human ability it developed way beyond that narrow purpose. Our high intelligence and our various other hormonal urges presumably evolved in the context of hunting gazelles on the African savannah, but does that mean that's all we can or should do with them? Clearly they also give us many other capacities, some of which are common and some quite rare. Jasha Haifetz's brain and hormones gave him the talent and desire to play world-class concert violin, an activity our distant ancestors couldn't possibly have used in nature (they didn't even have violins). It's just a gratuitous gift, whether from evolution or from God or both, and it can be used to create something beautiful -- as sex can, too, for the people involved, gay or otherwise.

So, should we tell Jasha Haifetz that the rarity and gratuitousness of his urge to play violin mean they're "unnatural" and therefore shouldn't be acted upon, and that if he can't use his violin in some narrowly functionalist way -- say, for hunting gazelles -- then he shouldn't use it at all? That would obviously make no sense. Yet that's essentially the same logic that people like Kelidei try to use against gays.

OK, Guy, so in that analogy to the Church and homosexuality, which is the drinking and which is the driving?

If I'm missing the point, I assure you it's not "deliberate." I just have no idea what you're talking about. Are you saying that homosexuality, while completely fine in itself, leads to abuse of minors if it's allowed into the priesthood? Because if that's your point, it is NOT the argument (certainly not the only one) that others here have been making, and that I've been replying to.

Mark, you set up another straw man to argue with. I didn't say that the only purpose of sex was reproduction, but the fact is that the majority of people want children and want them with the one they love, and no gay person can ever do this; they can't fulfil this powerful and basic and beautiful drive.

Straights who want kids and can't have them are handicapped. (Remember that word?) Would anyone really argue otherwise? Do they? Then why are gays different?

So you didn't say the only purpose of sex was procreation, but you did say that childless heterosexual couples are "handicapped". Yet even more contradictions? Does that include those who *purposefully* avoid having children? Or would they be mere "sinners" shacking up in an unconsummated relationship? Ken, no offense, but... -- I am not talking down to you, of course, I'm only advocating for your best interests -- you're an idiot.

And for the record, I have no desire to have children. For you, it sounds like a big narcissistic ego trip.

Ken remininsced:
Try being the recipient of anal sex naturally, without a lubricant, and tell me how natural it feels.

Well, tell us Ken. How does it feel?

Yes, Mark, there are lots of couples who don't want kids, and if they want them but can't have them, they can adopt. Now tell me that that option -- except when it's taken out of love for orphaned children -- as beautiful as it is, is still not second best. Tell me that couples who want to conceive together but can't don't shed tears. And tell me that the way conception symbolizes the unity of two people is just window dressing, of no ontological as well as psychological import.

Mark, you're changing the subject to political ramifications. And on this political issue, I mostly agree with you. I'd like to see more studies, and longer term studies, of children with same-sex parents before I support gay marriage, but even if kids don't do as well as they do with straights, as common sense and some studies suggest, there is the fact that any two loving parents are better than no parents, and are, I presume -- but I don't want to decide on presumption -- probably better on average than only one loving parent.

But what do you mean by "important"? Look, call me all the names you like, but I'm not interested in bashing gays. I don't think that way. I don't feel that way. If anything, my heart goes out to gays because of all they've suffered (and yes, suffered often at Christian hands). I just see homosexuality as a less desirable condition than heterosexuality, which leads me to see it as a result of the primordial "fall" described in Genesis, which leads me to look very carefully at what the Bible says about it, which leads me to conclude that God blesses and is pleased by loving same-sex commitments, but also leads me to understand why some smart and loving people think otherwise.

-- There are a million things that we do as human beings that we can’t do “naturally” or without “lubrication” of some kind. --

But for straights, intercourse isn't one of them.

-- We can’t . . . --

See above. You're comparing apples to oranges.

-- you seem to think that in noting that I’m not gay, yet support gay rights as a matter principle, I’m claiming to do something brave. --

You made a pont of saying you've taken positions against racism, sexism, and anti-semitism, as if doing so was brave in this day and age. But perhaps you just wanted to set up your joke.

I'm not interested in bashing gays ... I just see homosexuality as ... a result of the primordial "fall" described in Genesis

This isn't "smart and loving"; it's insulting, contradictory and confused. Why not just say you're confused and that you have mixed feelings?

But for straights, intercourse isn't one of them. ….See above. You're comparing apples to oranges.

Ken, I guess that’s true, as long as we let you define what are apples and what are oranges. My point is that your definitions, which you claim are “natural,” are just arbitrary and are chosen to serve your political or social agenda. Most of what human beings do both is and isn’t “natural,” so we can always arbitrarily choose either definition. The fact that I’m typing this message right now is both utterly natural (I’m using the brain, language capacity and fingers I was born with) and highly unnatural (my human ancestors of 10,000 years ago could never have imagined it, I had to learn additional skills like writing that someone had to invent, and I’m relying on the assistance of all kinds of larger systems that human beings developed collectively over many centuries –- using, however, their brains, hands and other natural endowments in turn).

To me, gay sex is like solving chess problems or interior decorating or piloting a plane: something I don’t personally want to do, and that nobody can do without all the “lubricating” our civilization has made possible, but that some people find pleasurable and fulfilling, part of their exercise of their full humanness. Debating whether any of those activities is natural or unnatural is just a game of semantics (they’re all both, as I’ve noted), and while maybe that’s the particular activity that gives you pleasure, it has no apparent purpose other than to stigmatize others and restrict their freedom. And someone who insists on doing that does not have empathy for the people he’s stigmatizing, however he flatters himself into thinking he does.

(OK, hoping this doesn't double-post again.......)

(.....and, no such luck. I'll tell you one thing that ISN'T natural, but is plainly the devil's work, is this "captcha" system here.)

Jefferson, you write that my definition of what's natural is arbitrary and chosen to serve my political or social agenda. I have a simple question for you: how could you know that? You've heard of Occam's Razor? The simplest explanation for why Christians don't see homosexuality as natural is that the Bible says it isn't, and the Church has always taught that it isn't. And spare me that superfical stuff about Leviticus also says . . ., as if no theologically conservative Christians have studied that book and their distinctions between ritual and moral law aren't at least reasonable, plausible. You've taken positions on racism, sexism, anti-semitism -- what do these prejudices all have in common? False and uncharitable stereotypes. "Blacks are lazy, women are dumb, Jews are greedy, . . . " Which of the following phrases belongs in the list? "Gays have an affliction they're not responsible for"? Or, "Conservative Christians are intellectually dishonest"?

Maybe you should take a position against your own thinking.

To go back to what's natural, our bodies are made for heterosexual, not homosexual intercourse, and our hearts are inclined to reproduce with the ones we love, but homosexuality can't help us there. I'm not saying this is incontrovertible evidence for my claim, but to dismiss it with some metaphor about technology allowing us to engage in other pleasurable activities is to wander off into the ether. No one has an innate drive to type.

And looking at the question of what's natural or not goes right to the heart of the debate about homosexuality. Obviously.

-- someone who insists on doing that does not have empathy for the people he’s stigmatizing, however he flatters himself into thinking he does.

Stigmatizing? I don't think homosexuality is anything to be ashamed of, and I never have.

-- I may be a "sinner" -- but it's not because I am gay. --

You're either a very careless reader or else you need a straw man to knock down because just can't bear to argue with what I've actually written. Once again: I agree. Like I said, disagreement isn't always criticism. I don't criticize you for being gay.

Your homosexuality is natural to you? In the same way that infertility is natural to the woman who comes of age infertile.

"without being critical, condescending or patronizing," . . . let's see. What would critical of homosexuality be besides criticism of gays for being gay? What did I just tell you above?

Condescension and patronization are attitudes, not views. Have you never disagreed with someone without looking down on them?

"Kelidei, if the Church had not updated its positions in the past, it would long since have gone out of business. The only thing that stops it from being rendered irrelevant is that it keeps abandoning older views as they become discredited."

Hi! I missed your post yesterday---sorry ;) The Church has changed certain teachings--- The most widely known is the whole Galileo thing. The Church had to alter its thinking on that because natural law --- the actual physical reality--- did not support the previous belief. God and science cannot be in conflict. Since God is the creator of all things His revealed truth is never in disharmony with natural law--- but rather it is our understanding of it that is wrong.

Scripture is completely silent on the physics of the universe and while physics is fascinating and not to mention essential to our existence it has no meaningful impact on how we humans conduct ourselves and our societies--- it is morally neutral. The Church is not and has never claimed to be infallible in everything--- just faith and morals--- this is the charism given to Peter when Christ told him that He was giving him the keys of the kingdom and "what ever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven and what ever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."

Certain teachings can never change and if someone says they have you can be sure it is a deception. The Church teaches that ALL HUMAN life is sacred. If tomorrow the pope came out and said "Sorry--- cows, pigeons, earthworms and dandelions are equal to human beings. Natural law and scripture do not support that teaching no matter what environmental scientists say.

This is the same with regard to human sexuality. As I said in my previous posts--- there is a physical reality--- that underlies the teaching in scripture. No matter how deeply I may feel about earthworms and their importance it is immoral for me to put their well being before that of a human being. The same is true with the use and abuse of human sexuality. In either case ignoring the physical realities--- the revealed truths--- has a moral impact on how people and society function. There is no truth to the statement that "what goes on between two people behind closed doors is no one else's business"... STD's, abortion (if the 50 million aborted the past 35 years had been born, and had children--- whom would be in the workforce would our tax and social security/medicare system be substantially plumper?)unwed mothers (largest group living under the poverty level in this country), divorce---- all result from personal choices made behind closed doors between two consenting people. It is pure idiocy to think that acceptance of homosexual acts is any less frought with problems than the the disordered acts of heterosexuals. I am a retired public health nurse--- I worked for years in the homosexual community in Chicago. I have seen the physical and psychological consequences--- and as we venture into the brave new world of in vitro, surrogate gay/lesbian families we can only guess what those consequences will be a few generations down the road. We know the consequences on children of missing/uninvolved parents and no matter how you try to sweeten it up children conceived under these false pretenses fall into that group. A second mom cannot replace a dad and a second dad cannot replace a mom--- no matter how much they may love the child it still leaves a gaping hole in the child's world.It is sad when these things happen by chance--- what the consequences will be for them and the rest of society as we purposely create these losses for children--- who knows--- once out it is impossible to stuff the genie back in the bottle--- that I do know.

Your homosexuality is natural to you? In the same way that infertility is natural to the woman who comes of age infertile.

You're classifying homosexual people as being handicapped/less-than/incomplete. That is a damned insult. Either you get that or you don't. Obviously, you don't.

Scripture is completely silent on the physics of the universe.....

Kelidei, that's the modern understanding that the churches eventually adopted, after they'd been proven wrong repeatedly and had lost a bunch of arguments eerily similar to the ones we're having now. For most of Christian history, the most faithful and influential interpreters of Scripture were convinced that it had a great deal to say about the physics of the universe. St. Augustine, to take just one of hundreds of examples, thought it was ridiculous to suppose that there could be people living in the Southern Hemisphere, because various Scriptural passages clearly ruled that out. (Oops.)

Eventually, the same kind of reinterpretation that you're now unconsciously invoking will occur with respect to sexuality -- in fact it's already begun -- and then all this talk about how the Bible condemns gay sex or gay lifestyles will be forgotten. Someone just like you, 50 years from now, will be insisting that Scripture is "completely silent" about gay sexuality. If the unfortunate passages are pointed out to them, they'll say, well, those obviously are just ancient metaphors, or they have to be read in the context of other passages that render them non-binding on us today, etc. It's a process we've seen many, many times before, with respect to physics, biology, and many other subjects (slavery and racial hierarchy, for instance), and it's always played out the same way.

Meanwhile, gays will have won the full legal and social inclusion that they are very rapidly winning now. You and Ken and other like-minded folks can sit around talking to each other about how "unnatural" it all is, and can express varying degrees of contempt and/or patronizing sympathy for those benighted souls, but meanwhile they will go about living their lives, and there won't be anything you can do about it.

-- http://conservativesarealwayswrong.googlepages.com/home --

Alweays, eh? You should have posted this first so I knew what kind of mind I was dealing with. ;-)

I'm a Democrat, by the way.

You should have posted this first.....

I did, at least once in the discussion above. And hey, the Democratic Party is a big tent! (While the Republican Party is, increasingly, more like a pup tent.) :-)

Sorry, can't resist one more of my favorite examples:

“It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, ...who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them like a tent to dwell in” (Isaiah 40:22) .....“Stretching out heaven like a tent curtain.” (Ps 104: 2)

So, right, the Bible is "completely silent" on the physics of the universe -- except for passages like these, which clearly describe the sky as a kind of curtain or tent stretched over the earth.

No fair, you say, those are the work of ancient writers who didn't know what we know today. They're just metaphors. They're not attempts to do physics.

Right! But that was not understood for many hundreds of years, and it was believed and widely taught that this WAS God's revelation of the physical structure of the universe. Only later, when it became too embarrassing to keep thinking this, did Christians suddenly discover that these were just poetic metaphors.

As I say, it's a pattern we've seen innumerable times over the centuries, affecting not just physics but alleged biblical claims about society and morality as well. As sure as the sun rises in the dome of the firmament, we will see it again with regard to homosexuality.

Rod,

I assume you will follow up with an expose on the problem of homosexuality in the Orthodox clergy. By now you know it is a problem. You could start with Mt. Athos. I am sure you don't want to just focus on your former Church.