Tolerance can't trump theology

Professor Richard Nunan is right that at times Christians have been intolerant of people with homophile sexual desires for reasons other than specifically Christian ones. But his association of changing views of homosexuality with changing views of slavery and women betrays a lack of biblical understanding.

Views of women and slavery have changed in part because people rediscovered the true meaning of Scripture that layers of culture and tradition had obscured.

Paul's great statement that "in Christ there is neither male nor female, slave nor free" (Gal. 3:28) shows how far in advance of its culture the Bible really was. But his argument that because revisionist scholars have a variety of interpretations about the biblical passages about homosexuality the church should stop calling it "sinful" fails to recognize that these agenda-driven scholars have not gained universal acceptance of their views.

These "revisionist" scholars, are just that -- eager to bend Scripture to say something it doesn't say. Which of them, for example, has been willing to engage Dr. Robert Gagnon's landmark volume "The Bible and Homosexual Practice"?

Their widespread silence in dealing with his comprehensive analysis of what the Bible actually says on this subject is deafening. (See www.robgagnon.net)

Furthermore, Prof. Nunan fails to distinguish between "sexual orientation" and sexual practice. Do we not make such a distinction in dealing with an orientation towards gambling, alcoholism, anger, overeating, or lying? Even though we recognize the cultural, and even perhaps inherited, factors that may influence these tendencies, is it intolerant to call the activities that flow from them sinful? On his reasoning, because of some people's orientation we should stop calling fornication, pedophilia, incest, and polygamy wrong.

I would also question Prof. Nunan's assumption that those with homophile tendencies desire "long-term monogamous" relationships. While some do, the number of sexual partners in the homosexual community exponentially exceeds that among heterosexuals.

Andrew Sullivan is doubtless right when he writes in The New Republic, "There is something baleful about the attempt to educate homosexuals and lesbians into an uncritical acceptance of a stifling model of heterosexual normality."

Then finally, Prof. Nunan makes the uncritical assumption that to identify certain behavior as "sinful" is to demean a person's character.

Quite the opposite. It is to affirm the value of the person. It is precisely because God "loves the sinner" that God "hates the sin." Sin destroys. That's why we need redemption. It is because of the Bible's high view of our humanity that it takes a dim view of those actions that mar the imagio dei within us all.

Tolerance is good as a pastoral impetus. But it is not a particularly useful as a theological foundation. The church should help people with same-sex attraction find hope and, when possible, healing. But it should also continue to identify as sinful those actions that rob us of our full humanity.

PETER C. MOORE

Associate for Discipleship

St. Michael's Church

Meeting Street

Charleston