An Open Letter from a Gay Christian:
I know Gay and Christian aren’t two monikers that usually go together. However, I assure you there are many of us that profess Christ as Savior and would still identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transsexual, pansexual or queer. There are many people of all denominations who strongly believe that people like me are bound for eternal damnation. I hope to convince them otherwise or at least put a shadow of doubt in their mind. Nonetheless, it is God alone who gets to decide about anyone in the end.
I live in a conservative Midwestern state. Being seminary educated, I believe that my theology is on solid rock. The treatment of non-heterosexual people in our country is an embarrassment. They are often treated like second class citizens being denied rights: marriage, jobs, and housing to name a few. People from the extremely conservative right have even made non-heterosexuals into deviant predators or perverts. Although, statistically most sexual predators are Caucasian, heterosexual, mid-thirties and male.
Many people who are against marriage equality quote Leviticus 20:13, “if a man lies with a man the way he lies with a woman, the punishment is to stone him.” I often wonder if people truly have read Leviticus because it has a lot more to say. We are not to eat pork (Lev. 11:7), no more bacon and eggs for everyone. Unfortunately, crab, shrimp, clams and oysters are out too (Lev. 11:12). Women who have just had a baby are not to be touched for sixty-six days (Lev. 12:1-5). If the same illness strikes your house twice, it shall be permanently unclean (Lev. 14:41-47); boy I hope my family doesn’t get the flu again! You can’t cut the hair on your temples (Lev. 19:27) and men are supposed to have beards. I hope you don’t have any tattoos because they are taboo, too (Lev. 19:28). The list could go on and on. It seems like we are picking and choosing which parts of scripture to follow.
There are of course New Testament arguments as well, so let’s look at them. First I would like to say that the word homosexual is not even found in scripture until the year 1946. Homosexual does not have a translation into Greek or Aramaic (the languages of the New Testament). The word that Paul uses in 1 Corinthians translates better as “those who abuse themselves.” In Romans 1 most people find their golden quiver against non-heterosexual lives. Paul was writing to the Romans and homosexual sex was a part of Pagan temple worship. It would seem unnatural for a Christian to worship in a Mosque or a Jewish person to pray in a cathedral. Paul would have thought any Pagan worship was unnatural for a people that had been converted to Christianity. There are less than ten verses that people can even use against homosexuality and nearly 600 uses of the word “love” in the Bible; perhaps Christians have lost the focus on what is actually important.
People who claim that homosexuality is unnatural have not seen the biological evidence that proves the contrary. Homosexuality can be found throughout the animal kingdom. How much more natural do you want. Anti-homosexual people have also claimed that we are not born this way. Well, I was indeed born this way. When someone asks me when I decided to be gay, I always ask, “When did you decide to be straight?” I tried for most of my life to be straight. I have dated the opposite sex, even had sex with the opposite sex. I have held to the cultural presupposition that gender is binary. Why would I intentionally choose a life that would make me a second class citizen? Why would give up the privileges I had as a “straight” person to live a harder life?
I hope this was thought provoking,
In the pew next to you
In the pew next to you
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