What Should Faithful
Lutherans in the ELCA Do?
by
Robert A. J. Gagnon, Ph.D.
Pittsburgh Theological Seminary;
gagnon@pts.edu
Sept.
30, 2009
For printing use the pdf version
here
I
give my permission for this article to be circulated widely in print,
email, and on the web.—RG
With a process that gives new meaning to the expression “stacked deck,”
the ELCA Churchwide Assembly in August 2009 voted to allow for the
blessing of homosexual unions and the rostering of pastors in homosexual
relationships. I salute the efforts of the renewal group Lutheran CORE,
which courageously fought against the homosexualist agenda at the assembly
(I had the great privilege of addressing them). Just this past weekend
they had a meeting attended by 1200 persons that began the process of
defining a new vision and structure for those who recognize the ELCA’s
hard-left departure from normative Christian faith and practice.
How
should faithful Lutherans—that is, Lutherans who affirm the male-female
requirement for sexual unions so important to Jesus and the scriptural
witness to him—deal with these new heretical and immoral actions? In
particular, do the recent actions of the Churchwide Assembly justify
beginning a trajectory that will lead eventually to disaffiliation with
the denominational structure known as the Evangelical Lutheran Church of
America? Let me suggest a syllogism that goes something like this:
A MAJOR PREMISE
A denomination renders itself illegitimate
when, through enactment, it willfully ordains persons actively involved in
adultery, incest, polyamory, or like acts, and blesses sexual unions
constituted by such behavior.
B MINOR PREMISE
Adult-committed homosexual practice is,
according to Scripture, at least as bad as—and probably worse
than—adult-consensual adultery and adult-committed incest and polyamory.
C CONCLUSION
A denomination renders itself illegitimate
when, through enactment, it willfully ordains homosexually active persons
and blesses homosexual unions.
Simply put, would you stay in perpetuity in a denomination that officially
sanctioned adult-consensual incest, adultery, and polyamory (i.e.
concurrent multiple-partner unions) and even set up as leaders of the
church persons who engaged unrepentantly in such immorality? If the answer
is “no,” consider this: Scripture treats homosexual practice of any sort
as at least as bad as, and probably worse than, these offenses. And the
ELCA hierarchy has now endorsed adult-committed homosexual practice.
Few
will contest the major premise (A) that a denomination ceases to be a
faithful representation of the body of Christ to the world once it
endorses adultery or consensual, adult-committed incest or polyamory.
Perhaps a few would argue for the continuing legitimacy of a church
that both blessed such unions and rostered leaders unrepentantly involved
in such unions. Yet such advocates would be a tiny minority that could be
identified and isolated as extremists.
The
main point of contention will be over the minor premise (B); namely, over
whether adult-committed homosexual practice is at least as bad as (and
probably worse than) consensual adultery and adult-committed incest or
polyamory. Yet the point can be easily demonstrated by three
considerations. As I note in an online piece entitled “How Bad Is
Homosexual Practice according to Scripture and Does Scripture’s Indictment
Apply to Committed Homosexual Unions?” (http://www.robgagnon.net/articles/HomosexHowBadIsIt.pdf):
-
Homosexual practice, committed or otherwise, is
the violation that most clearly and radically offends against God’s
intentional creation of humans as “male and female” (Gen 1:27) and
definition of marriage as a union between a man and a woman (Gen 2:24).
According to the story in Genesis 2, the differentiation into
man and woman is the sole differentiation produced by the removal of a
“rib” or (in my view a better rendering) “side” from the originally
undifferentiated human. It is precisely because out of one flesh came
two sexes (a story line that makes a transcendent point about the
exclusivity of male-female complementarity) that the two sexes, and only
the two sexes, can (re-)unite into one flesh (2:24). Since Jesus gave
priority to these two texts from the creation stories in Genesis when he
defined normative and prescriptive sexual ethics for his disciples, they
have to be given special attention by us. Paul also clearly has the
creation texts in the background of his indictments of homosexual
practice in Rom 1:24-27 and 1 Cor 6:9.
-
Every text that treats the issue of homosexual
practice in Scripture treats it as a high offense abhorrent to God.
That this is so is evident from (a) the triad of stories about
extreme depravity, Ham, Sodom, and Gibeah (which incidentally are no
more limited in their implications to coercive acts of same-sex acts
than is an indicting story about coercive sex with one’s parent limited
in its implications only to coercive acts of adult incest), to (b) the
Deuteronomic and Deuteronomistic legal and narrative materials that rail
against the homoerotic associations of the qedeshim as an
“abomination” or “abhorrent practice” (men who in a cultic context
served as the passive receptive sexual partners for other men), to (c)
the Levitical prohibitions (where the term “abomination” or “abhorrent
practice” is specifically attached to man-male intercourse), to (d)
texts in Ezekiel that refer to man-male intercourse by the metonym
“abomination” or “abhorrent act,” to (e) Paul’s singling out of
homosexual practice in Romans 1:24-27 (compare 1 Cor 6:9) as a specially
reprehensible instance, along with idolatry, of humans suppressing the
truth accessible in the material creation set in motion by the Creator,
labeling it sexual “uncleanness,” “dishonorable” or “degrading,”
“contrary to nature,” and an “indecent” or “shameful” act. These views
are also amply confirmed in texts from both early Judaism and early
Christianity after the New Testament period, where only bestiality
appears to rank as a greater sexual offense, at least among “consensual”
acts. There is, to be sure, some disagreement in early Judaism over
whether sex with one’s parent is worse, comparable, or less severe,
though most texts suggest a slightly lesser degree of severity. Yet
while Scripture makes some exceptions, particularly in ancient Israel,
for some forms of incest (though never for man-mother, man-child,
man-sibling) and for sexual unions involving more than two partners
(though a monogamy standard was always imposed on women), it makes
absolutely no exceptions for same-sex intercourse. Indeed, every single
text in Scripture that discusses sex, whether narrative, law, proverb,
poetry, moral exhortation, or metaphor, presupposes a male-female
prerequisite. There are no exceptions anywhere in Scripture.
-
The male-female prerequisite is the foundation or
prior analogue for defining other critical sexual norms. Jesus
himself clearly predicated his view of marital monogamy and
indissolubility on the foundation of Gen 1:27 and 2:24, texts that have
only one thing in common: the fact that an acceptable sexual bond before
God entails as its first prerequisite (after the assumption of an
intra-human bond) a man and a woman (Mark 10:6-9; Matt 19:4-6). Jesus
argued that the “twoness” of the sexes ordained by God at creation was
the foundation for limiting the number of persons in a sexual bond to
two, whether concurrently (as in polygamy) or serially (as in repetitive
divorce and remarriage). The foundation can hardly be less significant
than the regulation predicated on it; indeed, it must be the reverse.
Moreover, the dissolution of an otherwise natural union is not more
severe than the active entrance into an inherently unnatural union
(active entrance into an incestuous bond would be a parallel case in
point). The principle by which same-sex intercourse is rejected is also
the principle by which incest, even of an adult and consensual sort, is
rejected. Incest is wrong because, as Lev 18:6 states, it involves
sexual intercourse with “the flesh of one’s own flesh.” In other words,
it involves the attempted merger with someone who is already too much of
a formal or structural same on a familial level. The degree of formal or
structural sameness is felt even more keenly in the case of homosexual
practice, only now on the level of sex or gender, because sex or gender
is a more integral component of sexual relations, and more
foundationally defines it, than is and does the degree of blood
relatedness. So the prohibition of incest can be, and probably was,
analogically derived from the more foundational prohibition of same-sex
intercourse. Certainly, as noted above, there was more accommodation to
some forms of incest in the Old Testament than ever there was to
homosexual practice. Adultery becomes an applicable offense only when
the sexual bond that the offender is cheating on is a valid sexual bond.
It would be absurd to charge a man in an incestuous union or in a
pedophilic union with adultery for having sexual relations with a person
outside that pair-bond. One can’t cheat against a union that was immoral
from the beginning.
The Exploitation-Promiscuity and Orientation Arguments
Claims have been made by ELCA “homosexualists” that Scripture’s indictment
of homosexual practice is an indictment only of promiscuous or
exploitative forms of homosexual practice and not an absolute indictment
of homosexual practice per se. This argument is akin to asserting that
Scripture’s indictment of incest or the New Testament’s implicit
indictment of polygamy extends only to promiscuous or exploitative forms
of these relationships and not to adult-committed forms. The
exploitation-promiscuity claim shows ignorance of the historical record.
Both the conception and reality of adult-committed homosexual
relationships existed in the ancient world. Moreover, we have texts where
Greco-Roman moralists and Church Fathers acknowledge the presence of love
and commitment in homosexual unions and yet still reject the unions as
unnatural and immoral. Finally, Paul gives numerous indications that his
indictment of homosexual practice is absolute, including his echoing of
creation texts, his nature argument, his indictment of lesbianism, his
stress on the mutuality of affections, his derivation of the term
“men-lying-with-males” (arsenokoitai) from the absolute
prohibitions in Leviticus, and the historical context of early Judaism’s
absolute opposition.
As
even Louis Crompton, a homosexual historian and author of a massive and
influential historical-cultural study of homosexuality, has written:
According to [one] interpretation, Paul’s words were not directed at “bona
fide” homosexuals in committed relationships. But such a reading, however
well-intentioned, seems strained and unhistorical. Nowhere does Paul or
any other Jewish writer of this period imply the least acceptance of
same-sex relations under any circumstance. The idea that homosexuals might
be redeemed by mutual devotion would have been wholly foreign to Paul or
any other Jew or early Christian. (Homosexuality
and Civilization [Harvard University Press, 2003], p. 114)
Note the similar comments by the lesbian New Testament scholar Bernadette
Brooten, who has written the most important book on lesbianism in
antiquity and its relation to Rom 1:26, who criticized both John Boswell
and Robin Scroggs for their use of an exploitation argument:
Boswell . . . argued that . . . “The early Christian church does not
appear to have opposed homosexual behavior per se.” The sources on female
homoeroticism that I present in this book run absolutely counter to [this
conclusion]…. The ancient sources, which rarely speak of sexual relations
between women and girls, undermine Robin Scroggs’s theory that Paul
opposed homosexuality as pederasty. (Love
between Women: Early Christian Responses to Female Homoeroticism
[Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996], 11, 361)
In
addition, the claim that the ancients knew nothing akin to our concept of
homosexual “orientation” and had no conception of congenital influences on
homosexual development is also false. Such theories did exist in the
Greco-Roman world. Some are close to modern theories, others more distant,
but all presuppose the critical point that at least some homosexual
behavior is traceable to influences beyond a person’s control. Also
erroneous is the claim that knowledge of homosexual orientation would have
made a significant difference to Paul’s indictment of homosexual practice.
Let’s remember that Paul defined sin in Romans 7 as an innate impulse
passed on by an ancestor, running through the members of the human body,
and never entirely within human control.
As
classicist Thomas K. Hubbard notes in his magisterial sourcebook of texts
relating to homosexuality in the Greco-Roman world:
Homosexuality in this era [viz., of the early imperial age of Rome] may
have ceased to be merely another practice of personal pleasure and began
to be viewed as an essential and central category of personal identity,
exclusive of and antithetical to heterosexual orientation. (Homosexuality
in Greece and Rome: A Sourcebook, 386)
Classicist and church historian William Schoedel in a significant article
on “Same-Sex Eros: Paul and the Greco-Roman Tradition” (an article that,
incidentally, favors ecclesiastical acceptance of homosexual unions)
states that “some support” exists in Philo for thinking that Paul might be
speaking in Rom 1:26-27 “only of same-sex acts performed by those who are
by nature heterosexual.” But he then dismisses the suggestion:
Schoedel
also acknowledges that a “conception of a psychological disorder socially
engendered or reinforced and genetically transmitted may be presupposed”
for Philo (p. 56).
Similarly, Martti Nissinen, who has written the best book on the Bible and
homosexuality from a homosexualist perspective and whose work I heavily
critique in The Bible and Homosexual Practice, acknowledges in one
of his more candid moments:
Paul does not mention tribades or kinaidoi, that is, female
and male persons who were habitually involved in homoerotic relationships,
but if he knew about them (and there is every reason to believe that he
did), it is difficult to think that, because of their apparent
‘orientation,’ he would not have included them in Romans 1:24-27. .
. . For him, there is no individual inversion or inclination that would
make this conduct less culpable. . . . Presumably nothing would have made
Paul approve homoerotic behavior. (Homoeroticism in the Biblical World
[Fortress, 1998], 109-12)
The ecclesiast who claims that the authors of Scripture would not have
opposed a committed homosexual union entered into by homosexually-oriented
persons simply doesn’t know the historical evidence well; or, if knowing
it, has deliberately sought to hide the historical evidence to others in
the church. Our so-called “new knowledge” about homosexuality is not so
new after all.
For further study: For a brief presentation of evidence against
the use of exploitation and orientation arguments see again my “What
the Evidence Really Says,” especially “3. Rom 1:24-27 and the
Erroneous ‘Exploitation Argument’” on pp. 3-4; my “How
Bad Is Homosexual Practice according to Scripture and Does Scripture’s
Indictment Apply to Committed Homosexual Unions?,” especially pp. 6-8; and
my “Why
the Disagreement over the Biblical Witness on Homosexual Practice?,”
especially pp. 62-83. For a look at the Greco-Roman evidence for committed
homosexual relationships and the conception thereof see my
“A Book Not to Be Embraced: A Critical Review
Essay on Stacy Johnson’s A Time to Embrace” [Part 1: the Scottish
Journal of Theology article] (Mar. 2008; 16 pgs.; online:
http://robgagnon.net/articles/homosexStacyJohnsonSJT2.pdf),
especially pp. 5-8; and for a more detailed look at orientation theory in
antiquity see my article “Does the Bible Regard Same-Sex Intercourse as
Intrinsically Sinful?” in Christian Sexuality: Normative and Pastoral
Principles (ed. R. E. Saltzman; Minneapolis: Kirk House, 2003),
106-55, especially pp. 141-46.
Since it is the case that Scripture treats homosexual practice per
se as at least as bad as, and probably worse than, adult-committed
forms of incest and polyamory and adult-consensual forms of adultery, the
ELCA Churchwide Assembly by its recent decisions has forced the faithful,
against their will, to give sober and painful reconsideration of long-term
affiliation with the ELCA.
Scripture does not offer any refuge for those who claim that their “bound
conscience” requires them to support committed homosexual unions. The
argument about unity in Rom 14:1-15:13 applies only to what the Stoics
called adiaphora, matters of indifference such as diet and
calendar, not matters of significance involving sexual immorality
(contrast Paul’s remarks in 13:12-14; 6:19-22 with 1:24; 8:12-14;
11:21-22; 1 Cor 6:9-20; 2 Cor 12:21; Gal 5:19-21; 1 Thess 4:2-8; Eph
4:17-19; 5:3-6; 1 Tim 1:9-11). When Paul encountered some at Corinth who
prided themselves in their ability to “tolerate” a case of
adult-consensual incest (1 Cor 5), he didn’t say, “respect the bound
consciences” of those who think adult-consensual incest is acceptable. He
didn’t put church unity over church purity; rather he defined church unity
christologically rather than sociologically. Unity around immorality wasn’t
worth a warm bucket of spit. Only the unity centered around the will of
Christ is worth anything. So Paul insisted “in the name of the Lord Jesus”
that they put the offender outside the community for the sake of the
offender (who needed a wake-up call lest he be excluded from God’s
kingdom), for the sake of the church (lest members get the mistaken notion
that sexually impure behavior does not incur God’s judgment), and for the
sake of God (who redeemed the community with the precious blood of the
Jesus, the new Passover lamb, and who can still “take us out”).
The
ELCA has gone beyond the Corinthian community. It has allowed for sexual
immorality that Paul (and Jesus) would have regarded as even more extreme
than the specific case of incest at Corinth. Furthermore, it has not only
tolerated such immorality but also allowed for its blessing and the
rostering as active leaders of the church the very persons engaging
in the immorality. Moreover, unlike Corinth, this outcome is not just a
recent development but part of an orchestrated effort for promoting
homosexual behavior over the past decade. The faithful in the ELCA have
been more than patient.
At
some point—perhaps not immediately but surely down the line—those who
remain in the ELCA run the risk of becoming enabling accomplices to a
regime that has betrayed the illustrious heritage of the Lutheran
communion, to say nothing of the worldwide church, Scripture, and the
Lordship of Jesus Christ. No doubt there is pain ahead, but also the joy
that comes from dying to self and living for God. May God grant them
wisdom and courage in their future decisions, which only they can make.