Today I posted something about a famous homosexual man on my personal Facebook page:
“Jim Nabors died yesterday. Yes, it pains me that he was homosexual, but he was an iconic, funny, talented homosexual.”
Almost immediately, a friend commented:
“How does him being a homosexual pain you? It had nothing to do with you personally so it shouldn’t have pained you one iota.”
Below is my reply to her and to anyone else whose mind went where hers did.
My Reply
I knew someone would ask. Thank you for opening the dialog.
Let’s start with the pain I feel that a woman I don’t know is in the hospital right now in another state. She is the mother of a friend of a friend, and she will probably die of ALS in the next few days. Her life and impending death have nothing to do with me, yet her affliction causes me terrible sadness, and no one would ask me what right I have to feel that way.
But death is recognized as our universal enemy, so perhaps something less common to all would be a better example to explore.
I do not like houses painted green, and it would bother me to live in a green house. But no one would question my right to feel this way even if they disagreed or if they LOVED green on dwellings more than any other color.
Why Do You Care?
Why then should it matter to anyone whether or not I am pained by something? If Jim Nabor’s homosexuality does not affect me, and I should therefore not be pained by it, why should my feeling about it, which does not affect anyone else, trouble someone who isn’t affected by my emotion? And if my opinion isn’t troubling, why would someone bother to comment on it?
The answer to my question is that it matters to some people what I think because they are opposed to my position against homosexuality. They are opposed because they do not regard homosexuality as a sin (although scripture could not be more definitive about it.) It’s a clash of ideologies, in which case I could have just posted “I don’t like what you think,” and you could respond, “I don’t like what you think either,” and we could love each other despite our differences. Unfortunately, while among friends like you and me, we can come to that conclusion, on a societal scale, we are losing that ability, and we are tending to demonize those of other ideological bents.
Why I Care
The answer to your question, contrary to modern thought, has nothing to do with a phobia or hatred or any of the other rhetoric that gets bandied about so freely this past decade.
According to my religious belief, which is dictated by holy scripture, homosexuality is a sin, and as such, it pains me because all sin, one’s own especially, must be painful to those who love Christ.
I do not hate Jim Nabors any more than I hate myself. In fact, I admire him considerably. He was funny, and he had a beautiful baritone voice that pleases me.
If not hatred, what causes my pain and drives my desire to express my distress at his homosexuality?
Sin and Law
Christian orthodoxy holds that humanity’s fallen nature is the cause of all evil that befalls man, including the tumor in my wife’s head and the drowning of my son. I cannot be grieved by my sorrows nor find closure for those griefs unless I am disturbed by the reason for those catastrophes, i.e., man’s fall and original sin. It is in this sinful nature of man that my hatred lies.
Naturally, my own sins cause me the most pain, but that does not preclude a disdain for ALL immorality, be it sin in general or others’ sin as individuals.
As a libertarian, I believe that by civil law, Jim Nabors should have been free to practice homosexuality just as he should be free to paint his house green, no matter how I feel about it. But likewise, I should be free to be bothered by his decisions for any reason, or for no reason at all.
Theologically, the issue can’t be so liberal, I’m afraid. God is not only free, as we should be, but supremely righteous, as we cannot be. Yet He calls us to be good and then helps us to become so.
The Current Trend
In our current culture, homosexuality is one of a handful of sins that the world does not merely wink at (like adultery, lying, divorce, particular types of theft, etc.,) but one that many honor openly. Worse yet, we are close to sanctioning those who refuse to glorify it, as Canada has done with their so-called hate speech laws. In Canada, they have outlawed merely believing something and speaking freely about that belief. In CHURCHES it is no longer legal to say, “the Bible calls homosexuality a sin, and we stand against it as a congregation.”
Starting in the “Summer of ’69,” we began to celebrate free love and open, wild fornication, but we never came close to persecuting those who stood against it for their religious beliefs.
Notice that I do not espouse the notion that we should disallow Jim’s homosexuality legally, nor that we should persecute him for his beliefs, but the opposing side DOES want to both make my belief illegal and abuse me for it in the meantime. I want all to be free to do or say what they wish. Jim’s free to do whatever it is that he does with his buddy. I’m free to proclaim how sinful it is. Bob’s free to think I do it out of a personal hatred for people or because I’m afraid I might be gay or whatever. Sally’s free to call Bob a lunatic. But no one is free to shut down thought or feelings or speech.
Response from Fellow Christians
Furthermore, there are well-meaning but biblically ignorant Christians who honestly believe the world’s throw-it-in-our-faces retort, “judge not lest ye be judged.” Not only do they misquote Matthew 7:1, but they don’t bother to read as far as verse 5, which very plainly tells us to cast the mote out of our brother’s eye, or in other words, to judge him. They also don’t know about the half score other references that instruct Christians to judge the world righteously. Can you imagine people who believe that God would have us not judge sin? It’s hard, but they’re out there and in droves.
Many Christians feel caught because they love their homosexual children, cousins, etc. I have homosexual family members, too, and I love them. I’m not “unaccepting” of them; I just do not approve of their sin, or more importantly, of their choice not to turn away from it. No one would say, “Cousin Billy likes to play golf with cat heads, and even though I prefer golf balls, I don’t want to be unaccepting of Billy’s ways.”
I also have unmarried kin who live in another state who are welcomed to stay in my home overnight, but not in the same room, even though they live together and have for years. If it insults them, that’s just tough. I cannot raise my children to avoid sin and then condone it from others under my own roof. So it’s not a matter of rejecting the person, but their refusal to do what is righteous.
There are those who refute my stance on sin based on my status as a sinner. Such a refutation is a type of ad hominem fallacy called poisoning the well: Claiming that my point is false because I too am a sinner. As if a spade can’t call a spade a spade.
I know there is sin I have not turned from because it has not come to my attention, or that I try to turn from though I fail time and again, but there is none that can be demonstrated scripturally for which I make an excuse and ignore God’s word to commit.
There are those who say “I was born this way” etc., but I maintain that I, too, was born this way: With a predisposition to steal and to be haughty. I don’t have to fight theft: It’s a simple sin to avoid. I decide whether to act prideful much more quickly than I decide, for example, to steal a Lamborghini, so I sin in this manner far more easily. The temptation isn’t the sin, we know, because Jesus was tempted in all the ways we can be, yet He did not sin. I hate my sin, and I don’t excuse it. That’s the difference between my sin and open, unashamed, justified homosexuality.
Our Sin DOES Affect Others
So, you see, Jim Nabors’ homosexuality DOES affect me personally, but the acceptance of that sin, or of any sin, and the willingness of people to call others out for NOT accepting it, has a much more severe effect on me, and on all of us. The widespread acceptance of sin is injurious to our whole culture.
Much more importantly, though, if sin is abhorrent to God (and scripture makes this abundantly clear,) then the universal acceptance of sin is worse. How much more of an insult to God is it to sanction those who do not wish to condone sin? We face not only the destruction of our freedoms in the name of freedom (ironically) but the very wrath of God. Again. For the same sin. Because we never learn.