The Gay Debate: The Bible and Homosexuality

[steve7150]

As for male homosex, in this case the text can quite reasonably be construed in different ways; so here we have a debatable shade that has already been painted on the canvas. One may assert that it is "green"; another may insist that it is "blue"; either may be charged with "painting" if they wash over the ambiguity in the original.
kaufmannphillips






I think we disagree on most points including this and we are both starting to repeat ourselves so thanks for the dialogue and your viewpoint.

[Homer]

This has been an interesting discussion. It seems to me the advocates for the homosexual cause use arguments that defy common sense. I think Paul summed it up pretty well:

Romans 1:26-27
New King James Version (NKJV)

26. For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. 27. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.

Anyone with a bit of common sense can see that the human anatomy was designed to function in a certain way. That the parts can be used in other ways does not make it the norm. All the talk about what animals do is irrelevant. One of the most disgusting things I have ever seen was to find a mother cat eating her kittens - alive! But this repulsive behavior is not all that unusual. And the mother cat's physiology accomodates the aberrant behavior, with even less problems than can occur in homosexual activity. So much for the bonobo argument.

I do not present this argument as an direct analogy, but only to prove a point about the relavance of behavior that occurs in nature and is physiologically possible. The intent and motivations of homosexuals is certainly different than that of the mother cat. However neither is normal.

All the foldoral about gay rights, etc. for the past many years boils down to one thing: a quest for approval of their behavior.

[kaufmannphillips]

Homer wrote:
It seems to me the advocates for the homosexual cause use arguments that defy common sense.

Over and over in human history, things that used to defy common sense, eventually become common sense. And what of it? "Common sense," past or present, is not always infallible.

Didn't Christianity fly in the face of "common sense" for many in the first century (cf. I Corinthians 1:23)? And in many cultures and subcultures today, doesn't it still?

Homer wrote:
I think Paul summed it up pretty well:

Romans 1:26-27
New King James Version (NKJV)

26. For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. 27. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.

When does Paul make a parallel appeal from "nature"?

I Corinthians 11:14 (NKJV) "Does not even nature itself teach you that if a man has long hair, it is a dishonor to him?"

The appeals are quite similar to one another, using the same Greek diction: phusis "nature"; atimia "vile"/"dishonor."

And yet, many devoted Christians in present-day America will not scruple against men wearing long hair. (Paul might give Steve Gregg's recent 'do a caustic review!)

If present-day Christians are not compelled by Paul's appeal to "nature" to keep their hair short, should they invoke Paul's appeal to "nature" against homosexuality, and consider that compelling?

Homer wrote:
Anyone with a bit of common sense can see that the human anatomy was designed to function in a certain way. That the parts can be used in other ways does not make it the norm.

"Normality" is no more infallible a guide than "common sense." When it comes to human behaviors and sensibilities, statistical majorities vary from place to place and from era to era.

These days, it seems that "parts" are being used in so many ways by heterosexual couples that an appeal to "normal" use of "parts" won't cut the ice that it once did.

As for argument from design - people generally are using their "parts" in ways that yield some sort of physiological and/or psychological results. And such results generally depend upon the human schematic. So *boom* one runs smack into a highly versatile argument from design: "I'm designed to experience x when my partner does y, so this is natural/functional/etc."

Homer wrote:
All the talk about what animals do is irrelevant. One of the most disgusting things I have ever seen was to find a mother cat eating her kittens - alive! But this repulsive behavior is not all that unusual. And the mother cat's physiology accomodates the aberrant behavior, with even less problems than can occur in homosexual activity. So much for the bonobo argument.

Other organisms have behaviors that might be relevant or might be irrelevant. Some people are inclined to take animal behaviors into consideration, and if they do so, they should include bonobos as part of their sample. And for what it's worth, bonobos are more similar to humans than felines are.

Homer wrote:
All the foldoral about gay rights, etc. for the past many years boils down to one thing: a quest for approval of their behavior.

There is more to it than that. When a person is not allowed to be in a hospital room with their life-partner of twenty years because they're not legally "family," there is something more than approval at stake. One does not have to approve of two individuals' sexual relationship to respect the fact that they care about each other.

[BrotherAlan]

Dear kaufmannphillips,

In response to my previous post (a few weeks back), you wrote:

The error here, of course, is that you have focused your attention upon only part of the apparatus which is involved in human sexual activity. Human sexual construction cannot be reduced to the functionality of gametes and pelvic organs….

The question at hand is, “What is the primary end of sexual activity.” Now, what is the defining characteristic of this kind of activity (as opposed to other kinds of activity)? Sexual activity involves, of course, the transmission (and corresponding) reception of gametes*. All the other changes in the body (including changes in the brain), all of which affect the mind, have, as their end, this transmission/reception of these gametes. Therefore, since this, and nothing else, is the defining characteristic of sexual activity (i.e., this is the specific trait of sexual activity which makes it different than all other human activity), we must look at the purpose (and functionality!) of the sperm and ovum in order to understand what is the primary purpose of sexual activity. And, when we look at this, it is obvious that the primary end of sexual activity is procreation, for the end of a gamete is, clearly, to be united with a gamete of the opposite sex so as to generate offspring (and, for this reason, any deliberate, human sexual activity which is not intrinsically oriented to the generation of human offspring—whether that activity be homosexual activity……or, for that matter, masturbation or sexual activity which employs contraception—is contrary to the natural, primary purpose of human sexual activity….and, therefore, is, objectively speaking, morally wrong). Now, the failure to see that we must focus on the functionality of these parts of the human body in order to know what is the primary end of sexual activity is a great mistake, and will lead to many false conclusions on this important matter of the nature and purpose of human sexuality (and human sexual activity).

In Christ, the Savior,
BrotherAlan

* = We can, of course, speak of other activities, such as certain kinds of kissing, as also being “sexual activity”; but, we only speak this way if such activities are of such a nature that, if they were carried through to their natural completion, they would lead to the transmission/reception of gametes, and so even these sorts of activities have a natural orientation to sexual activity which is carried through to its completion, i.e., to the transmission/reception of gametes. My primary concern in this post is “sexual activity”, in its fullest sense (i.e., sexual activity which is carried through to its natural completion).