Notes From Off Center - Latest Comments in Where is Christian Pragmatism?: A Curious Position on Homosexuality

Re: Where is Christian Pragmatism?: A Curious Position on Homosexuality

Drew Tatusko — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 19:55:18 -0000

It is your kind of perspective that motivates me to continue to post on the plight of the homosexual in the church. If there is a truly marginalized group in our culture right now, it is the homosexual. And the marginality is not an economic issue or a racial issue, but solely an ideological and value driven issue that is totally as arbitrary as assuming women are too emotional and black people are less human than whites. The bible was used in as assured and justified manner to marginalize both women and persons of color and we have yet to hear a coherent explanation how this kind of marginalization is different.

Further, the judgments rendered that welcome yet affirm also have another effect. If there is sufficient reason not to affirm, is it also true that a person who is a "practicing" homosexual (perish the concept since it is as redundant as saying "I am me") has therefore less capacity to unite with God through Christ? One would have to determine this in the affirmative for if union with Christ is not contingent upon one's behavior in this kind of situation, we have been spinning our wheels amidst useless jabber all along. Can the homosexual be completely reconciled to God as a homosexual (for an abstinent gay is still a gay and still enjoys the intimacy of the same gender but out of an act of will chooses not to fulfill that intimacy)? With the position of welcoming yet affirming we would have to say that no, it is not as high a probability or the capacity for the union is not as great as with the heterosexual. The scriptures are clear about what prevents that union from being as full as it could be, and a loving relationship with a person of the same gender is clearly not one of those stumbling blocks to the love of God.

Again, I would beseech those who disagree with this position to test it. If it is upheld then the homosexual must be delusional or have some other kind of mental issue that is the cause for their irrational desire. Then one has to argue why their position is more probable than that of the scientific community as it currently stands.

So again, the most rational position is either completely welcome and affirm, or not to welcome not to affirm. It is a simple equation of integrity that welcome and affirm does not observe and hence, it is fundamentally irrational. And anyone is free to disprove any of these propositions. I have only seen this attempted with uncritical appeals to authority, ad hominems, and other fallacies that simply support the argument in form if not even in content.

Re: Where is Christian Pragmatism?: A Curious Position on Homosexuality

Thu, 08 Nov 2007 18:41:28 -0000

Thank again, Drew, for your post. I cannot tell you how awesome it is (and soul-reviving) to hear this point of view from a straight person. It gives me so much hope for the future of Christianity (and not just the "fundamental evangelical church"...Christianity).

I have a major problem with "welcome but not affirming" stance. Being caught in the middle of this tension in a very real sense has made me clarify a lot of what I believe, and feel, about this issue. What I would say is this: welcoming isn't radical, and don't pretend it is. Jesus calls out the "lukewarm" believers so many times in his ministry. And I see this welcome-not-affirming stance entirely lukewarm.

As you point out (so coherently), there is this unanswered question left hanging in the air: what is one to do, then? It's like this, "Sure, be gay, but I don't approve. Christ's love is radical and we will let you "join in," but don't expect to be affirmed." What does that mean? And as a side note, this idea of "affirming" is ridiculous. No one needs the affirmation of a human body of believers. And I guarantee that if one congregation will be welcoming, but not affirming, there ARE other congregations that do both. And Christianity (or the nation, as James Dobson would have us believe) is still intact. Basically, it's extremely presumptuous for a group of believers to claim the right to discriminate who gets this "affirmation" and who doesn't. Sexual sin (real sin - not the wishy-washy idea of sin associated with homosexuality) is often overlooked, forgiven, and is not grounds for pseudo-excommunication.

I'm thankful soul-deep for the church I attend. They are fully WELCOMING and AFFIRMING. I don't have to pander to the general consensus that my sexual orientation is a cause for concern or internal battle. I'm gay, I'm Christian, God doesn't care. End of story.

Another thing (promise, last point): Jesus, in his ministry, talks and preaches about money more than the kingdom of heaven on earth or heaven. Behind money is widows and orphans. Let's forget about worrying who our neighbor chooses to be a in a relationship with and focus on these REAL issues that Jesus seems much more concerned about. /end rant

Re: Where is Christian Pragmatism?: A Curious Position on Homosexuality

Drew Tatusko — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 16:13:25 -0000

I liberated your post from spam! Glad I found it there as well. Quite insightful. I do think that the probable outcome is not just that it results in a system of purity as you mention, but that it rather explicitly enforces a system that has been culturally legislated and normed. My problem with the "welcome but not affirm" position is that is sounds like full inclusion, but it is in fact clearly not. The problem is that when your intent and actions do not match, it simply lacks integrity. That loss of integrity in relation to the homosexual is what this position sets up and thus creates a serious moral problem.

I also think that we do the texts a bit of injustice when we infer a moral absolute that is directly applicable to our current situation. This is where I part ways with evangelicals with my hermeneutic of scripture. I think so much of it enforces an ethic bound to its sitz in leben that we ought not simply apply those same cultural norms and ethical systems - especially of purity - to our own situation. It think the way we interpret must be in conversation with our experience in an explicit manner and that our ideas about the text need quite a bit of flexibility. So sue me, I have a rather low biblicism in order to maintain my high regard for a God that is not fully known in the text itself. This is where the Cross is directive of these issues since it does reveal a love that people find absurd - otherwise Jesus would have not been crucified and we would not still crucify him today with what we say and do.

Does this mean cherry pick the text so it suits our needs? No. It means to get at the kernel of the message itself and not to focus on so many tangential issues that are clearly ambiguous as to make the kernel pointless to our praxis of Christian life.

The text in Romans is about distinct boundaries between those in the community of faith and those outside of that community. Those outside lust after each other, those inside ought not behave as such. Did Paul probably not even consider the validity of a loving homosexual relationship? Perhaps he did not and we will never know, but that is clearly not what he sets up in this crucial distinction here as he does with the Corinthians and with the Colossians especially. But to infer that this is what these injunctions also refer to is making an arbitrary judgment outside of the evidence presented in the rhetorical style of the text.

My position is love our homosexual brothers and sisters fully, talk about sex openly and honestly with one another, speak to the sins of envy, pride, gluttony, lust, etc. in that context and love one another demanding of one another the love the Christ showed his church. That is what we have been baptized into, and it is high time we started living in accord with the inclusion our baptism gives us by God's grace alone.

Re: Where is Christian Pragmatism?: A Curious Position on Homosexuality

Stephen (aka Q) — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 12:04:04 -0000

Hi, Drew, you popped in and left a comment on my other blog (Outside the Box).

I think homosexuality elicits a strong emotional reaction from many Christians because it retains an association with defilement. All sins are bad, but homosexuality seems especially bad because it is a defiling sin (as I've expressed the point here). That's our emotional response — but it's not objectively so.

Jews have worked out several degrees of defilement. "Cleanliness was understood [by the rabbis] to be closely connected with Levitical purity; of this there were several degrees, there being sections in the community which observed its rules more strictly and extensively than did others." (Jewish Encyclopedia) I forget the exact language, but a person who keeps purity to the third level would be contaminated by contact with an ordinary Jew; and a person who keeps purity to the second level would be contaminated by contact with a person of 3rd-level purity, etc. You always have to be mindful of everyone else's degree of purity.

I mention it because I think that's the logic of Scot's position: it would result in degrees of purity in the Church.

I don't think defilement per se has any place in Christianity. I think Jesus' practice of inclusiveness specifically set concerns about purity aside:

"There is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him, but the things that come out of a person are what defile him" (Mark 7:15). The things that "come out of" a person — out of his or her heart — includes sexual immorality, but also theft, murder, coveting, deceit, slander, pride — these things "defile".

Here Jesus is using "defile" to refer to ethical stains, rather than the ceremonial stains that arise from eating with unwashed hands, or physical contact with a menstruating woman, or any of the other things that so preoccupy the rabbis. As I said above, defilement per se didn't figure in Jesus' system of morality. All sins "defile" in the figurative sense (moral impurity); no sin defiles in the literal sense (ceremonial impurity).

What I'm saying is that the emotion surrounding this issue is out of place. Homosexuality is a sin, according to a couple of biblical texts. But it isn't worse than, say, greediness — see 1Co. 6:9-10. Somehow we manage to be inclusive of greedy people in our churches.

The fact is that we're all sinners; no one has the moral high ground when we meet around the Lord's table, which I think is the point you're making in your post.

I think we should let gays and lesbians make their own moral choices before God, and accept them in the Church without establishing degrees of purity. Given the scientific evidence that you allude to, and Jesus' example of radical inclusiveness, it's time for the Church to focus its attention on something else.

Re: Where is Christian Pragmatism?: A Curious Position on Homosexuality

Drew Tatusko — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 10:31:11 -0000

Markeesha,

Thanks for responding. As I indicated to Scot, my issue is of clarity of language when we engage others relationally with the Gospel. If there are conditions to that relationship, then we need to be clear and honest about them and then be willing to engage a dialogue about them. I think Scot has engaged the dialogue which is a very good place for all of us to be.

But the position begs homosexuals to cry out: Lord I believe, help my unbelief, and it is unfair to set up the structure where that tension simply exists without any clarity or resolution on the other side.

Re: Where is Christian Pragmatism?: A Curious Position on Homosexuality

Drew Tatusko — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 10:26:36 -0000

Scot,

Thanks for reading. I am glad that you engaged my thoughts and indeed you did generate conversation! Please also excuse the strong language. As with most blogging environments my initial posts are generally not intended to frame debate rules and I would usually not use language of that candor in a formal debate setting. However, I do tend to prefer stronger language that is clear rather than more toned down language that can often obscure things.

To your question on Paul, to say that he does not have a very resonant and clear theology of the Law as it relates to the Cross seems quite clear in his discussion of it in Romans especially in chapters 3 and 5. But perhaps you can elaborate on your contention here. To also say that the relationship between Law and the Cross (namely the central revelation of God's grace to which Paul clearly holds the law realtive)is not formulated in a theology that Paul is putting forward seems to be more of an issue of semantics than of substance. It is not a "systematic" or "dogmatic" theology, but it is a theology nonetheless.

My problem with the language of "welcoming but not affirming" is that is does not seem to have much merit since it makes a firm distinction between the person and the specific sinful behavior. Hence, it is not the desire that is so much a problem (or perhaps it is in this view, but I am assuming here that it is not), but the acting upon that desire or, the specific behavior that is the problem. While we can work this out logically, and I think you have done so as well as could be asked, I do not think this position holds much merit when one tries to live it. This is what sounds like double-speak. I will accept you, but clearly I cannot *really* accept your behavior or probability of behavior does not meet specific conditions.

Perhaps this position would equate homosexual behavior with drug addiction or other behaviors that are clearly denigrating to the human person, but I would venture a guess that you would not make such an equation - all the better for it. Or does homosexuality inherently catalyze or promote the "cracked Eikon" that is human being? This seems to be a rather arbitrary judgment in what are clearly a limited and somewhat ambiguous set of texts that deal specifically or, I think, rather tangentially to the issue of homosexual behavior as it would exist between two loving persons who uphold each other and quite regularly can enhance the relationship the partner has with God.

The problem is that this position misses the relationship between sexuality and identity and just does not become very tenable when we practice it with actual homosexuals who we are not then expecting to be "reformed" as someone like Colson or Exodus would have it. IT does not ask homosexuals to respond in any way except to live under the umbrella that their identities are not affirmed. This is not very welcoming at all by hypocritical. Please test this hypothesis with the homosexual community to see if it is somehow misguided.

So perhaps a question will clarify it then. I am not a big fan of this is what ought to be the case, but then answering the question of how one lives in that world with ambiguity or a murky pragmatics. I think it is our Christian responsibility to be clear with our flock and not ambiguous with how we understand our relationship to God and that of others. It is our duty to foster reconciliation as you very clearly espouse and we could not agree more.

But what does this kind of reconciliation truly look like when in our invitation of sinners to the table, we are secretly not affirming their identities when we break bread? It is this kind of murky hypocrisy that has been the source of the alienation and denigration of more homosexual brothers and sisters that I can enumerate.

Therefore, the issue is either we welcome unconditionally, or we welcome conditionally. It is only with the greatest integrity that we can hold to either position clearly for the Christian community. The question is what reconciliation looks like within the bounds of that fundamental disagreement. Welcoming but not affirming is simply not going to fly based on the issues I have articulated above among others that I have not.

But I think Gene Robinson has the answer. He says that as Christians we have one responsibility to the world and that is to answer the questions: How were you saved? and then What did you do about it? This is the heart of witness and the common link that holds the Christian family together. Not affirming sets limits on the salvation narratives of our homosexual brothers and sisters. Here again, I would urge you to challenge and test this hypothesis as well.

Again, thanks for the dialogue and I do hope that we can continue. I also hope that my language is not too strong. I do not mean it to be offensive, I am just rather direct more often than not.

Re: Where is Christian Pragmatism?: A Curious Position on Homosexuality

Makeesha — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 16:54:42 -0000

I agree Drew. This is the problem I have with so many like McKnight (who I deeply respect by the way) regarding this issue - they say we need to love homosexuals and not exclude them but then say that their attraction is not God's order BUT THEN don't provide any sort of guidance for what homosexuals are supposed to do. Just as you said Bob - it leaves those with same sex attraction in a sort of spiritual and relational limbo - and that's not even addressing the issue of what those who are already in committed same sex relationships are supposed to do - split up and become celibate?

There really only seems to be one conclusion for Scot and others to come to but they don't seem to want to spell it out.

Re: Where is Christian Pragmatism?: A Curious Position on Homosexuality

Scot McKnight — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 11:06:00 -0000

Drew,

Thanks for this direct, if a little strong in language ("double-speak" is no kind accusation in my book), engagement with my many posts on homosexuality and the church, which are after all posts and not official publications and which were written to generate conversation instead of simply attempts to articulate my own viewpoint.

My view is easy to articulate: it is classically called "welcoming but not affirming." I think this is the pragmatics of Jesus as well (on anyone he thought was living contrary to God's will).

I've read your post now five times, and there are some things you say that I have no clue for understanding. I give one: are you suggesting with your corpus of Paul's theology to the gentiles that, say, Romans is for Gentiles but not Jews? (Is there a "corpus" -- body -- of Paul's "theology" -- do you mean letters since we have no other "theology" by Paul?)

It is, I would argue, easier to have a pragmatics of radical inclusiveness on this issue or one of radical exclusiveness on this issue, than a pragmatics of welcoming but not affirming. The murkiness of the pragmatics stems from the ambiguity, so I would argue, of pastoral ministry to cracked Eikons. My experiences shows that pastoral life dwells often in murky pragmatics.

Well, thanks for your engagement.

Re: Where is Christian Pragmatism?: A Curious Position on Homosexuality

Bob Cornwall — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 19:01:22 -0000

Drew,

Thanks for the post. I too found Scot's post ultimately unhelpful. Essentially he leaves gays in the closet. Choose celibacy or (what's the other option?). We who are straight can find intimacy, but if you're gay, no way. So instead of providing opportunities for long term monogamous loving relationships, we leave them the choice of nothing or clandestine relationships.

Reconciliation makes us new persons, but it doesn't change our essence -- as I understand Paul.