September 18th: "I'm Not So Sure About...Homosexuality and Gender"

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 First United Presbyterian Church

“I’m Not So Sure About…Homosexuality and Gender”

Rev. Amy Morgan

September 18, 2022

Romans 1:20-2:3

Ever since the creation of the world his eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things he has made. So they are without excuse; 21 for though they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their senseless minds were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools; 23 and they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling a mortal human being or birds or four-footed animals or reptiles. 24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the degrading of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

 26 For this reason God gave them up to degrading passions. Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, 27 and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error. 28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind and to things that should not be done. 29 They were filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness, they are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, rebellious toward parents, 31 foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32 They know God's decree, that those who practice such things deserve to die-- yet they not only do them but even applaud others who practice them. Therefore you have no excuse, whoever you are, when you judge others; for in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, are doing the very same things. 2 You say, "We know that God's judgment on those who do such things is in accordance with truth." 3 Do you imagine, whoever you are, that when you judge those who do such things and yet do them yourself, you will escape the judgment of God?

Today, it is not my goal to change anyone’s mind about homosexuality and gender. The attitudes you have about these things are your own. They have been developed out of your individual upbringing and experiences.

What I do hope to do today, and this is an ambitious task, is to deconstruct any illusions we may have that the Bible in any way, shape or form, supports the judgement and condemnation of people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, non-binary, asexual, or in any way variant from the heterosexual, cis-gendered population. I’m going to – very rapidly – walk us through each of the passages that have been used by Christians to normalize and even command such condemnation. Author and pastor Colby Martin calls these the “clobber passages” of the Bible because they have been used to abuse people in the LGBTQ community.  This is going to be a very quick, summary overview, so if you feel like you miss something, don’t quite get what I’m talking about, or want more detailed explanation, I encourage you to hang out down front after worship for some further conversation. 

So let’s start at the beginning. As in, “In the beginning.” One of the arguments made for the exclusion and judgement of LGBTQ persons in the church is that their relationships and very being are contrary to God’s sacred created order. God clearly created two distinct genders and decreed that they “be fruitful and multiply.” 

But let’s look a little closer. 

First, we tend to think this is a story about complementary relationship. The man and woman are different, with different gifts and needs and parts, and so they fit together to make a whole. If you take two things that are the same and try to put them together, that just doesn’t work right. If you take something that isn’t like other things, you can’t make it fit together right with anything. Complementary pieces are needed to keep the puzzle of God’s creation in good order. 

But we don’t need to read very deeply to figure out that this isn’t a story about complementary things at all. It is a story about connectedness, and even similarity. The man, Adam, is created from the earth, “Adamah” in Hebrew. He is connected to creation through his very substance, through his similarity with the creation. Next, a help mate is needed for the man. God creates all the animals and brings them to the man, but none of them are similar enough to the man to be an effective helpmate. He doesn’t need something different, he needs something similar. So God creates woman out of man’s flesh. They are again connected in their very substance, they are the same flesh. 

The divine ideal for creation we discover in Genesis 2 is not that God wants everyone to identify as either male or female and to be in heterosexual relationships. What we find is that God desires us to be connected to each other and to the creation, to appreciate the divinely inspired diversity of creation, and to recognize our deep and meaningful similarities with the creation and other humans. Sexual orientation and gender identity have nothing to do with it, and, by the way, those are two concepts that would have been completely foreign to the ancient Hebrews from whom we have inherited this story.

Now, when I read my 3^rd grad Bible cover-to-cover (yes, I’ve always been a Bible nerd), the book of Leviticus sealed the deal for me on homosexuality. There are two passages that mention male homosexual intercourse followed by the words, “God hates that.” Yes, this was the Good News Bible translation that contained that lovely phrase. I found it disturbing that God could hate, but I knew that meant I had to view homosexuality as the vilest of sins. This disturbed me, but what was a third-grader to do? The words could not have been clearer. 

This may have been one of the reasons I was so determined later in life to learn Greek and Hebrew so I could read the Bible in its original languages. But even if I had known that the Hebrew word translated as “God hates that” was toevah, I still wouldn’t have understood what it meant. Because scholars aren’t entirely sure what it means. It seems to connote some kind of transgression of boundaries, a boundary that separates God’s people from the people around them. Lots of things are toevah in the Torah, some of them clearly sinful, others morally ambiguous, and others entirely benign. One thing that should be noted is that the book of Leviticus contains prescriptions for the Levites, the priestly class of ancient Israel. So for starters, these passages are not meant to be applicable to the whole of society. They are things that are meant to set Israel, and especially its priests, apart from other people. There is also a lot of ambiguity in the language around what exactly is being described. It is not a given that homosexual behavior is even what these verses are describing. And if it is, it is only male homosexual behavior that is addressed. In ancient Israel, and many ancient cultures, there is also a deep concern for the male seed, as that was seen as the precious means of continuing one’s bloodline. A sexual relationship that did not involve the possibility of procreation would have been seen as a waste more than a sin. 

Now, on to Sodom and Gomorrah. We may be most familiar with this story because of what later became known as sodomy, a derogatory term used to describe homosexual acts. We know that Sodom was destroyed because of its utter wickedness, and that wickedness involved men wanting to have sex with men. But if we read the whole story, that is not what is happening at all. 

Some angels of the Lord visit Abraham’s nephew, Lot, and his family, in Sodom, to check out what is really going on there. One of the highest values in ancient near-eastern culture was hospitality. There were very clear expectations for how visitors should be treated, and it was a grave offense to neglect the duties of hospitality. Lot shows the visitors the proper hospitality, but all the men of Sodom do exactly the opposite. They come to Lot’s house, demanding to gang-rape the visitors. This story has nothing to do with sexual orientation, with committed, loving relationships between two people of the same sex. This is about gang-rape and inhospitable treatment of vulnerable people. If the church spent as much time condemning those who violate the vulnerable and reject those seeking hospitality and asylum as it has persecuting homosexuality, I wonder what good we might have accomplished for the reign of God. 

Now, let’s turn from the Old Testament to what Jesus and the gospels have to say about homosexuality and gender. This part of the sermon is very short because Jesus says nothing at all, not a single word, on these topics. I would note, however, that as far as we can glean from the canonical gospels, Jesus was a-sexual an a-romantic. He also crossed gender boundaries in welcoming female disciples and in his interactions with women throughout his ministry. He did not fulfill many of the cultural expectations for his gender, and his ministry is filled with examples of overturning numerous cultural norms. 

There are two passages in the New Testament epistles that contain lists of those who offend God – murderers, thieves, drunkards, and others. These lists also contain words that have been translated in a variety of ways – sexually immoral people, perverts, and homosexuals. But there many reasons why the word homosexual is not an appropriate translation. 

First of all, the concept of homosexuality did not exist in the first century. There was no cultural understanding of a person who could be sexually attracted principally to someone of the same sex. That is not to say that no one in that culture had same-sex relations. The pagan cults practiced sexual rituals that involved a variety of sexual relationships, and Greek men of status would take younger boys under their patronage in relationships that were sometimes sexual. But this was not seen as an orientation. In fact, these relationships and sex acts were condemned by Jews and Christians alike, not because of the same-sex nature of the relationships but because of the exploitative nature of the relationships. These sexual relationships were not covenantal, and they were abusive. These are relationships that we would condemn today, whether the participants were homosexual or heterosexual. 

I want to emphasize that one of the best arguments for why none of the “clobber passages” in the Bible are condemnations of homosexuality is that the concept literally did not yet exist. The word “homosexual” did not enter the English lexicon until about 150 years ago, and the understanding of human sexuality as a spectrum of orientation rather than a psychological disorder developed within the last few decades. The concepts of gender dysphoria and identity are even more recent developments in psychological study. But just because these concepts may be relatively new, it does not make them wrong. And it does not mean we should cling to cultural norms and worldviews from over two thousands years ago instead. 

It is clear from the gospels that in the first century, epilepsy was attributed to demon possession. Throughout the intervening centuries, epileptics were seen as cursed, criminals, or insane. With the development of the field of neurology and improved understandings of this condition, we would not now relate epilepsy to demon possession or, in fact, pronounce any kind of moral judgment on this condition. So then, why would try to maintain a first-century understanding of same-sex relationships and concepts of gender identity?

Finally, we turn to the passage from Romans we read today. I saved this one for last because, for many Christians, they are willing to overlook all the rest, but this one, for some reason, is their sticking point. 

The first thing we need to know about this passage is that it is a judgement on the Christian community, not on homosexuality. If we look at the context around this passage, Paul is using a rhetorical device to set up his audience. He’s basically saying, “Aren’t those people so terrible? Look at all the terrible things they’re doing? Aren’t they just the worst? Oh wait, you know what’s worse than those people? You people who are judging them.” It’s a judgment on how judgmental the Roman Christians have become. 

But if we take seriously for a minute the judgments he’s putting in the mouths of his audience, we find that, again, what they are condemning is not remotely related to homosexuality as we would define it today. These acts are things that were considered culturally dishonorable or without value in the first century. These acts are public and abusive acts that we would consider indecent today, whether heterosexuals or homosexuals were involved in them. And these acts are not procreative, something that most of us today would not consider a condemnable offense against God. But in the first century, when child mortality was high and the need for healthy, adult progeny was desperate, procreation would have been a primary concern.  

 

I have not gone into nearly enough detail here, I imagine, to satisfy every question or qualm, but again, if you want to join me in conversation after worship, we can dig deeper into the assertions I’ve made about these passages in the Bible. Again, as an individual, as a product of the society we live in, you are free to feel whatever you feel about homosexuality and gender. But I do not believe that Christians may use our scriptures to condemn people who identify as LGBTQ. This is not a conclusion I have reached because I’m compassionate, or liberal, because people I love identify as LGBTQ, or because I want to be loving and welcoming to everyone. This is a conclusion based on lots and lots of study of scripture, and it’s something I’m very clear about. 

At a minimum, the “clobber passages” of the Bible contain a lot of ambiguity as to their meaning and application for today. Perhaps not so much in their very unfortunate English translations, but certainly in their original languages and contexts. 

But there are some things that scripture is not at all ambiguous about. Showing hospitality to the stranger. Caring for the vulnerable and outcast. God is love and desires all to be saved. Each human is made in God’s image. Creation and humanity are connected, similar, and diverse. Judgment belongs to God alone. All human relationships are subject to brokenness and sin, but Christ’s grace and forgiveness are freely given to us all. 

Each person has the freedom to believe and say what they like in this nation, and that is a freedom for which I am profoundly grateful. We have the right to religious freedom, for which I am also profoundly grateful. These are essential human rights. 

But the Christian faith, the Christian scriptures, do not condemn people who are LGBTQ. In fact, those scriptures condemn those who would judge others. So the denial of rights and freedoms to those who identify as LGBTQ is not a matter of religious freedom for Christians. Because it is not what our religion, our sacred texts, teach. I understand why there is confusion on this point, given the way these texts have been translated and mis-interpreted. But we must, friends, correct this grave error. For the preservation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. For the love of our LGBTQ neighbors. And for the salvation of our own spirits. 

To God be all glory, forever and ever. Amen.