Chapter 6 Is Christianity basically anti-Gay? Given its behavior and our needs for self-defense, is it anti-Gay? Updated.
Chapter 6 Is Christianity basically anti-Gay? Given its behavior and our needs for self-defense, is it anti-Gay? Updated.
Theological quagmires aren't our concern, defense of the Gay community is.
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Chapter 6 Is Christianity basically anti-Gay?
Christianity is sex negative.
[1] It is anti-sex and only tolerates it to perpetuate humanity. It strictly regulates sex as if it was dangerous. Lust is a sin. It is hard to see how an anti-sex religion would not see homosexuality in a negative light given that it has no utility for reproduction.
[2] The mother of Jesus is almost always called the Virgin Mary. The Christian religion finds it impossible to have Jesus be the result of sexual activity and male orgasm.
[3] Jesus doesn’t have a sex life. Though in many religions, the founder doesn’t either. Neither does the Father or the Holy Ghost.
[4] There aren’t any stories in the Bible of angels having sex either.
In regards to homosexuality, both the Old Testament and New Testament calls out for the death of those who engaged in homosexual sex.
Christians partition the Bible when it suits their purpose. So, they decide to be able to eat shrimp because it is forbidden only in the Old Testament. However, homosexuality is condemned in the New Testament Gospels also with the penalty of death.
So, Christians who want to accept Gays do a further partition it down to what Jesus said.
This is not without precedent. Both the New and Old Testament is solidly pro-slavery, and Jesus uses slavery to explain his religion, but since Jesus didn’t make some specifically, legal statement supporting slavery, Christians now days don’t claim that their religion endorses slavery. This is a theological view that didn’t arise until very recently in history. It is now simply unacceptable for a religion to support slavery and so Christians have acquired a new theology.
Theology is infinitely elastic and accommodating to social change and human wants and desires.
The Sons of Confederate Veterans desires to have a Biblical defense of slavery to defend the Confederacy.
No theological question or disagreement is ever entirely resolved in Christianity even when entire groups have been burned alive in an attempt to do so. Theology isn’t mathematics.
The Christians may assemble a series of statements and assert that the statements constitute a proof, but usually other Christians will have assembled other statements purposed being a proof contrary to the other proof.
Since there isn’t an overwhelming social opinion regarding accepting homosexuality like there is against slavery, homophobic Christianity is dominant globally.
Even if by some unforeseen reason homophobia became as unacceptable as slavery globally, the situation would not be assured. Theological opinions aren’t stable and will vary with circumstances. With all the vicious homophobic statements in the Bible, it certainly would require societal pressures to keep Christianity from reverting to its historical homophobic self.
What needs to be looked at is how Christianity performs, how it behaves, what is its historical record in the varying situations that in which Christianity has existed, in time, geography, and different societies.
If homophobic Christianity was the exception, then it might be that it doesn’t have an inherent homophobic character. However, nearly always, globally, historically, except in recent times and then only with a small fraction of Christians in liberal democracies, Christianity has been viciously homophobic. The very word “faggot” comes from the practice of burning homosexuals alive.
Acceptance of homosexuality by some Christians is largely just tolerance to resolve any conflict between their identities as being a Christian and a nice person. It is similar to the societal pressures which forced Christianity to not be pro-slavery.
Even then, Evangelicals adopt a formula of, “love the sinner, hate the sin,” which shows how ineffectual and limited this identity resolution can be to restrain Christian homophobia.
There can be other evasive rationalizations. Recently a church has moved into Dallas County which calls for the government to execute Gays. A local Christian wrote a letter to the editor published in the local major daily that god was in charge of judging and punishment and homosexuals and not the government, avoiding the question whether homosexuality was a sin or whether it was something God would punish.
Though many were quick to say not all Christians are homophobic, we didn’t see any contingents from churches at the protests of this church.
Functionally Christianity globally is nearly always homophobic with only a small fraction of Christians being tolerant and an even smaller fraction which are actually supportive.
The fraction that is tolerant or supportive is contingent on social pressures in favor of Gays. There is always a possibility of reversion into the overwhelmingly predominant homophobic Christianity.
There is no absolute answer whether Christianity is anti-Gay or not given the elasticity of theology and its essentially non-rationalistic nature. Nothing is to be gained by getting into this theological quagmire.
The question needs to be asked in relation to the security of Gays now and in the future. In developing plans to stop the current attacks of homophobic Christianity and prevent them in the future what should our assessment of Christianity be?
Christianity is homophobic. It has been a deadly danger to Gays, it is a deadly danger to Gays and shows every indication of being an ongoing opponent to Gays.
As for those few Christians globally, who aren’t homophobic and aren’t just tolerant, we aren’t required to support their theological position if it limits or undermines our ability to defend the Gay community. They have not considered that if a religion is homophobic, maybe it is invalid. Their agenda is perhaps holding on to Christianity to avoid considering other religious possibilities. They have merely adopted a formula to meet their own emotional needs. They have made the decision that Christianity is valid despite its clear and vicious history and current predominant homophobic behavior. We have to defend the Gay community without being restrained by what they have decided or distracted by theological questions.
Our defense needs to be based on the assessment that Christianity is inherently homophobic as it has been historically and is overwhelmingly globally.
Link to Chapter 7 will go here when it is written.
