Because I have sympathy for those who have been wounded by others’ insensitive and harsh treatment, sometimes in the name of Christ, the last thing that I wish to do is to add to their pain. At the same time, my primary vocation is as a Bible scholar, and I need to explain the text faithfully. Despite the pressing character of the debates in the church, I have long delayed this post because of my inadequacy to articulate sufficiently the balance between what I believe the text says and the needed pastoral sensitivity to apply it.

Framing the discussion charitably

Our politically partisan public culture lends itself to polarized expressions, playing to each side’s respective constituencies. Everyone is warned of the slippery slope consequences of the other side’s triumph on any elements of the debate. Although some of these consequences are plausible concerns, civil discourse invites us to do less name-calling and more dialogue. Discussion of homosexual behavior and faith today is so polarized that venturing into the issue at all frequently gets one pigeonholed as belonging to one extreme or the other—or, if one doesn’t buy into the polarization, pigeonholed as on the wrong side by both poles. Only because the issue is such a burning one in the church does it seem necessary to insert one’s neck into the guillotine of public debate.

Because I am familiar with only how these issues have been tied together in Western culture, I beg my many international readers’ indulgence for this one post as I try to address this issue with a largely Western Christian audience in mind. Because my public role is as a Bible scholar, my paramount professional concern is to avoid distorting the meaning of the biblical text. At the same time, as a pastor-teacher, I want to be sensitive to those wounded by those who have abused the text. That requires more delicate expression than may be possible in a blog post that will be read in different ways by different readers (even despite this particular post’s inordinate length). Thus I must beg the indulgence of my Western readers also.

Framing the discussion critically

Unfortunately, most Western Christians fail to distinguish various discrete questions—exegetical, pastoral, social, and so forth. Christians hopefully start by listening to Scripture. One question, then, is what biblical passages say about homosexual practice. Even when that question is resolved, however, another question is, based on wider biblical principles, how we should apply that information—in church practice, in pastoral ministry, and in how we treat our neighbors. The legal and political questions are yet another issue distinct from these.

Some voices, however, blend all these questions together as if holding one view on Scripture resolves all the other questions. To take the most extreme example I know of: when one country suggested the death penalty for particular homosexual offenses, critics were quick to blame the belief of many Christians that homosexual behavior is wrong, even though the vast majority of those who hold this belief opposed that policy. For another very extreme example: almost all Christians, however they read Paul, condemn the infamous and hateful cult known as Westboro Baptist Church, whose well-known, theologically perverted views I will not honor by repeating here. As another example of mixing categories, one who believes that the Bible condemns homosexual intercourse need not for that reason conclude that it should be illegal (since most do not, for example, insist on legal prohibitions for unmarried heterosexual intercourse or for gossip). Likewise, one who believes that the LGBT community has been mistreated by many churches need not for that reason assume that Paul did not in fact condemn homosexual practice, unless exegesis supports that conclusion.

There are multiple, distinct issues, and it is important to critically distinguish them. Tragically, the real human beings for whom these are personal issues often are forgotten in the political crossfire. I want to explore some of these questions briefly, in what I hope can be my only foray into the subject (thus the unusual length of this post).

What does the Bible say?

First, what do biblical passages say? For those who, by Christian conviction, stand under the authority of Scripture, this question is vitally important. Because I believe that the biblical passages about homosexual behavior are fairly clear (while conceding that not everyone agrees), my focus in this post is more on pastoral application. Nevertheless, I start by noting that, for the clearest passages, especially Romans 1, I believe that the majority exegetical position is strongest. A variety of interpretations exist, many advanced by very capable scholars, but most exegetes, whether they agree personally with Paul or not, still regard Romans 1 as disagreeing with homosexual practice. (By “majority exegetical position,” I refer to academic, exegetical commentators, not to the separate question of featured voices in popular media, although they too have a right to their say.)

I would be happy to be persuaded otherwise, but so far it continues to appear to me that this is where the exegesis strongly points. Paul’s argument from “nature” makes sense in light of both some Stoic and many Jewish arguments against homosexual activity based on nature, by which they meant not genetics but primarily anatomical design. Ancient Greek homosexual relations were often, but not exclusively, pederastic, but Paul speaks more generally and includes lesbian relations. (Adolescents were considered adults; many relations began just before puberty, but others continued into adolescence and some involved adults. Among Romans, the issue was less of age than of status and position.)

For better or for worse, this is also what nearly all exegetes concluded until recent decades when different interests came to the fore. My own discussion appears in my Romans commentary (and a briefer summary of ancient background in the background commentary), so I will not elaborate on the exegesis here. The debate will continue, but engaging it is not the purpose of this post. For the sake of staying on task here I will address primarily those who share my understanding that the passage disapproves of homosexual intercourse. My point in this post is less to argue about the meaning of this passage than to challenge the lumping together of separate questions.

Regarding the exegesis, I would simply note two points that too often go unmentioned: passages specifically addressing homosexual practice (as opposed to sexual sins in general) constitute less than one-tenth of one percent of Scripture. In thirty years of public preaching, I have only once had occasion to specifically address Romans 1:26-27 from the pulpit, and that was to help set up for the senior pastor’s sermon on a different part of Romans 1. I was not avoiding the subject per se; it is just that the other 99.9 percent was keeping me busy almost 99.9 percent of the time. (The issue was not a divisive one in our church.) Because public debate has raised the visibility of some issues, they consume a greater proportion of our exegetical attention than their representation in Scripture by itself might warrant. (Admittedly, proportions in Scripture should not necessarily limit the proportions of our preaching; for example, I have never yet had occasion to preach from Leviticus.)

My second point here is the more important. The strongest New Testament passage to challenge homosexual activity (Rom 1:26-27) is a set-up. Paul first condemns what his fellow ancient Jewish people regarded as stereotypical Gentile sins—idolatry and homosexual intercourse (Rom 1:19-27). After his Christian audience (1:7) is presumably applauding his condemnation of these activities, however, Paul turns to a wider list of vices, including greed (certainly a widespread value in U.S. culture), envy, gossip, slander, disobedience to parents, and so forth. All these sins, Paul concludes, merit death (1:28-32). Perhaps I am the only Christian who has done so, but I confess that I have committed some of these other vices myself. (I cannot, then, cast the first stone.) If we shout against homosexual practice yet tolerate or even celebrate materialism or gossip in our churches or in our lives, we miss Paul’s point.

As many people note, we are even more inconsistent if we denounce homosexual sin while ignoring heterosexual sin—which is probably included in 1:24. It’s easier to rail against other people’s temptations than to address our own. When some Christians overgeneralize as if everyone who is gay or lesbian is hostile to religious freedom, or use the most militantly anti-Christian elements of the gay community to depict everyone who is gay or lesbian, might that not even count as slander?

Part II addresses pastoral practice, church and society, and loving one’s neighbor