Bishop Gene Robinson and Bishop Martyn Minns are being sidelined for the upcoming Lambeth gathering of the world-wide Anglican Fellowship. These two bishops have become the flashpoints for two sides of a Culture War going on inside the Episcopal Church. Bishop Robinson is the first openly gay ordained bishop and Bishop Minns leads a series of conservative Episcopal congregations around the country who have broken away in large part in reaction to Bishop Robinson.
I pray for our brothers and sisters in the Anglican Fellowship. Their fight is one going on inside the Presbyterian Church as well. And like the Episcopalian Church, it is damaging and dividing us. A number of our churches have withdrawn to join the Evangelican Presbyterian Church.
Makes me wonder how we fight a Culture War and stay faithful to our Christian beliefs. Makes me wonder how two groups of Christians with polarized beliefs can function in the same denomination. Makes me wonder how the mainline will thrive if this is where we get stuck.
It is not an issue of the authority of Scripture. Some people want to make it that, but I don’t buy it. It only becomes an issue when the authority of Scripture is rejected to make the point of homosexuality and sin. But once the authority of Scripture is rejected, a fundamental presupposition of conversing as Christians is rejected and, for me, the conversation goes outside the sacred realm and into the secular.
And that is okay, but not here.
For me, the issue is the interpretation of Scripture. Are the famous (or infamous) verses in the Torah and in Romans speaking about homosexual activities in themselves as sinful or are they speaking of homosexual activities when used as religious rituals as sinful? Or are they condemning both? Or do certain passages address sexuality and certain passages address religious ritual?
The tough part of resolving this issue is that the interpretation of Scripture rests on settling a cultural/scientific question. Is homosexuality innate or is it chosen? Can it be both, chosen by some, innate in others? Are there people who are truly not sure? How does a discussion of transgender enter in?
The reason these two questions are connected for me concerns the question of innate behavior. If homosexuality is innate, it is created by God. If it is innate, how can we interpret Scripture to condemn what God has created?
If homosexuality is chosen, Adam and Eve is the biblical example of marriage, an heterosexual monogamous relationship. If homosexuality is innate, Adam and Eve is the biblical example of marriage, an exclusive monogamous relationship.
Some of my friends get upset with me when I say that this issue follows the pattern of interpreting the Scripture about slavery, about the ordination of women, about civil rights. In each generation, those issues generated their own anger. We fought a civil war over slavery. The Presbyterian Church split over the issue. We are apparently splitting again.
What do I think? I think there are no easy answers. I think this issue strikes to the heart and soul of many devout Christians on both sides. I also think that the flames of the debate have been fanned by the devil to suck away the church’s life blood from the real matters of gospel proclamation and world redemption.
I also think mercy is the order of the day. I know devout Christians who are gay. I don’t think they chose. Given the discrimination that goes on in this country about gender issues, I cannot imagine why they would want to choose. I would rather risk being wrong for the sake of the gospel going to include more.
I am also ordained in a church where the polity takes the opposite view. I know full well that putting this opinion up on my blog could catch me hell (literally) with my congregants and with my denomination. I smack of personal hypocrisy, saying one thing while working in a church that teaches something else.
But theologically, this is a minor issue. I don’t think salvation rests on it, one way or the other. There are any number of sins that could be listed which don’t grab the spot light like this one does which are as or more damaging to our Christian natures. I think this is a cultural issue first and foremost that has been taken up in the church and, as I said before, sucks energy away from what is really important.
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