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The Vatican recently announced that it will inspect seminaries to make sure that they are taking steps to screen out homosexuals. They will be examining many other aspects of training for the priesthood, of course, but, inevitably, it is their inquiries about sex that have grabbed our attention. Other denominations are being torn apart by their own interminable debates over homosexuality. Jesus is not known to have ever said a word about homosexuality himself. The Bible does not even tell us anything at all about whether Jesus dated, had a girlfriend, or got married. At most, one can argue, "If he had a wife and children, I'm sure we would have heard about it," or "Everyone else in Galilee got engaged and married as a teenager; no other rabbi remained single." Arguments "from silence," however, are the weakest of all arguments. I like to think that he was about 6'5" and a wee bit Scottish, since I am both of these, and the Bible never says he wasn't, but any trust I might put in my projection would be unfounded. The experience of my own denomination, the United Methodist Church, hardly provides any definitive answers about how Christians should deal with homosexuality, but it should provide a host of caveats, including: I May Know It When I See It, But I Cannot Define It, "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Don't Work, Those Who Condemn Others Have Something To Hide, No One Knows What Goes on Behind Closed Doors, Almost Nobody Under 50 Cares Much About All This, Fighting Incessantly About Sex Alienates People, and, last but certainly not least, We Are Worrying About the Wrong People. The love life of our founder John Wesley was, to put it charitably, a train wreck. I know: the train had not been invented yet. But when the first locomotive derailed, the debris field looked a lot like his inappropriate relationship with a parishioner in Georgia, his faltering courtship of another woman, and his short-lived marriage. You'd think that we might have concluded that only asexual candidates should be ordained, but by some strange leap of logic we ended up preferring straight married guys instead. Wesley supported women as preachers 250 years ago, but only in my lifetime has our church ordained many women. As a straight married guy, I must warn you that we are the people your parents warned you about – or should have. We are the group that is most likely to: commit rape, murder, or assault (I know – we can never be certain about the seduce teenage girls, commit adultery that tears apart the congregation, become ensnarled in a bitter divorce or custody battle that scandalizes the community, give our partner a sexually transmitted disease, orientation of a felon, but that only proves No One Knows), molest young girls (although some therapists thinks pedophilia is its own sexual orientation, albeit a warped one, that is neither heterosexual nor homosexual), cause unintended pregnancies (okay, it takes two to tango or to do certain other things, but gays aren't responsible for any of these, except maybe the tango), or run off with the church organist or secretary – who is usually much harder to replace than the pastor. Straight women and gay men can also commit these offenses, of course, but let's be honest: we straight guys are the ones doing most of this sinning. I am not speaking personally here, but you get my point: if I had been judged on the basis of my gender and sexual identity, the church would have hosen someone else. Jesus cautioned that we should remove the timber from our own eyes before trying to pluck a splinter out of our neighbor. Perhaps someday the ecumenical movement will enable us to share across theological and denominational lines what we have learned in trying to deal with the passion and hypocrisy, joy and chaos that is human sexuality. Such ecumenical learning will require, as does our salvation, some recognition of our own shortcomings. As the Apostle Paul reminded the young church in Rome, "All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God." How lucky we are that God has not only justice and judgment for us but also mercy and grace. Shalom/Salaam/Shanti/Pax, |
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