Jesus, Marriage, and Homosexuality

Jesus, Marriage, and Homosexuality | Leroy Huizenga | CWR

The early Christians, following the lead of Jesus, doubled down on traditional Jewish sexual morality.

In the wake of the Supreme Court’s decisions striking down the substance of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and California’s Proposition 8, Jesus’ opinion—or lack thereof—on homosexuality has received renewed attention. In a crass fundraising email running the risk of violating the Second Commandment, Mike Huckabee wrote, “My immediate thoughts on the SCOTUS ruling that determined that same sex marriage is okay: ‘Jesus wept,’” while social media ran rampant with memes of Catholic comedian Stephen Colbert’s words from a show in early May 2012: “And I right now would like to read to you what the Jesus said about homosexuality. I’d like to, except he never said anything about it.”

Colbert’s claim is common, and it’s effective because it’s true: Jesus did not directly address the matter. But it does not follow that Jesus’ words and example have no relevance for marriage, sex, and family, nor that modern Christians should approve of gay marriage. A few observations:

First, Jesus was a Jew who inherited Jewish Scripture and tradition. Jesus did not drop out of the sky to bring a brand new set of moral teachings de novo. If he did, perhaps his apparent lack of attention to sex and sexuality would be striking. But the Jesus of the Gospels—especially Matthew, the First Gospel in so many significant ways—is a conservative Jew, as was in all likelihood the so-called historical Jesus behind the Gospels. And whether we're talking about the historical Jesus or the Jesus of the Gospels, Jesus stands well within the breadth of Jewish tradition. Thus, it's not true that things Jesus doesn't spend an inordinate amount of time on or doesn't mention are unimportant. Rather, we should assume that those things in Jewish tradition which Jesus doesn't overturn or reinterpret are assumed. Sure, Jesus doesn't outright forbid homosexual practices in the Gospels. But he doesn't have to, because Jesus' Judaism did.

Assuming that religion is a matter of prohibitions, in debates over sexuality people often assume that Jesus came simply to forbid certain behaviors, and if he didn't forbid something, it's therefore licit. The principle would be "Scripture permits anything not expressly forbidden." But why assume that hermeneutical posture?

Continue reading on the CWR site.

Comments

[Eric]

One thing I will say for the Catholic Church as opposed to Protestant fundamentalist denominations is that Catholics know that having a same sex attraction is either learned very early or is innate. Catholics will at least not lead gays to believe they can be changed. But what they say is this is your cross to bear, you are a victim soul. Priests, brothers, and sisters may take vows of celibacy/chastity; gay people do not. I don't believe God wants gay people to live single, celibate lives because they are attracted to the same sex. Just hold on you have only 80 years of suffering to do and then God might reward you just doesn't cut it. Being gay is a gift-- and its up to the gay person to live out that gift-- hopefully with another person of the same sex.

[MyKCMom]

I disagree. Homosexuality was not uncommon when Jesus walked the earth. Considering, He knew he was addressing this in Matthew 19: 4-6 "

He said in reply, “Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female’ and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must separate.”

Then consider He was called Rabi, and He "studied the scriptures." Of course that is kind of silly to say since Jesus is the Word made flesh (Genesis John 1: 1-5, John 1:14), but in that light consider Matthew 5: 17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill." He knew what He was saying.

So we know what God says, and I believe Jesus was clear, and then there is the Holy Spirit. In 1 Corinthians chapter 6, Paul's writings are clear. If we believe the New Testament was inspired by the Holy Spirit, then clearly God (the Trinity) said it, and God said it more than once.

What scares me most, is not that Jesus didn't spend all of His time talking about it, but that He didn't... I say that considering, John 3:17-21, which says(among other things) Jesus did not come to condemn, we condemn ourselves. We need to pray for the deliverance of homosexuals and we need to pray for the children they raise, that they may come to see His truth, which sets people free (John 8:32), and that reminds me of the reading today, Gal 5:1, 13-18

[Joe]

"Being gay is a gift."

Or a disorder.

Which is clear to anyone observing the biological purpose and function of genitals.

People insist Christians try to bend reality to their theology, when the entire gay argument is based on bending psychological desires to a secular ideology.

[Deacon Harold]

Homosexuality is not a gift:

http://deaconharold.wordpress.com/2013/02/04/the-truth-in-love/

[The Rev. Steven P. Tibbetts, STS]

"Colbert’s claim is common, and it’s effective because it’s true: Jesus did not directly address the matter."

Except that it is not quite true. What is true is that Jesus does not directly address homosexuality in the Gospels. The Gospels, of course, note that they do not include everything that he taught and did, but included enough of what he taught and did so that we might believe.

One year as the lectionary was running through the Epistle to the Hebrews, I was struck by the writer quoting the Lord Christ, but the actual quote was from the Old Testament, not anywhere in the New Testament. And drawing on that while remembering that Jesus is the Word of God, the eternal Logos, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, I realized that Jesus speaks throughout the Holy Scriptures, and that his words are not only those that some publishers print in red ink in the Red Letter Editions of the Bible.

Colbert and others are much too quick to dismiss what we do find about homosexuality in the Old and New Testaments as "not what Jesus said." And frankly, I think that fits better with the rest of your argument.