How would you respond if you were asked what God’s plan is for Gay people?
That’s the question I’ve been musing on over the last couple of weeks based on current events.
In some ways it is a strange, leading question. I don’t really even know God’s plan for my own life.
Some of my thoughts thus far are as follows:
* I believe in a loving Creator that loves all people equally and without limit.
* I believe the science that says that our sexual preferences are largely genetic. I.e. not a simple choice. So if God knits us together in our Mother’s womb, then he chose our sexual preferences.
* I believe that the primary command that Jesus left with us is to love God and to love our neighbour.
* I don’t believe that being gay is any impediment to following this command.
* In some of his writings [1], in amongst verses fraught with pitfalls in this discussion, Paul seems to suggest that abstaining from sexual relationships gives you more time/focus on God and his work, but if you can’t handle that, then you should marry to avoid burning with passion. He seems to see marriage as a last resort for those who haven’t the will to fully focus their lives on God. But it’s ok, he tells us – if you’re passions are too strong and you decide to marry, you aren’t sinning…
* Based on this, it seems to me that if you are gay, and have sexual desires, the best plan, to be able to focus on God’s work, is to be married (or at least to seek a long-term monogamous relationship with another believer if you are excluded from being allowed to marry.)
* The bible has been used to justify slavery.
* The bible has been used to justify the oppression of women.
* The bible has been used to justify persecution of homosexuals.
* The bible has been used to justify wars, genocide and racism.
* Christianity and the central message of Jesus, that all people are created equal and loved equally by God, was core to those seeking abolition of the slave trade, the civil rights movement, women’s suffrage, and other work around the world to lift people out of poverty and oppression. We are called to be people characterised by our care of others. I would much rather be part of this list than the previous one.
* By generally being silent on this issue, am I complicit in the prevalent views within the church? How do things continue to move forwards? What is my responsibility in this?
“In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” Martin Luther King, Jr.
[1] 1 Corinthians Chapter 7.