Same Sex Unions and Biblical Fidelity:
Discerning the Spirit in Text and Context

By Gary Hauch

© April 15, 2005

The will of God is not a system of rules established from the

outset. It is something new and different in each different situation

in life, and for this reason a person must forever reexamine what

the will of God may be. The will of God may lie deeply concealed

beneath a great number of possibilities.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Ethics, 1943-45

Do not answer fools according to their folly,

Or you will be a fool yourself.

Answer fools according to their folly,

Or they will be wise in their own eyes.

Proverbs 26:4-5

At its core, the debate in the church over same sex unions is about the will of God, about discerning it so that it can be followed and God be honoured. In this debate, as in others before and after it, careful attention to the Bible plays a central role because it is within its pages that we find God’s will most clearly expressed. But attention to Scripture, whether our theological convictions are conservative or liberal, or whether our exegetical practices are sophisticated or simple, is not in itself a guarantee that what we find in the Bible is indeed God’s will for us. Scripture has been used to underwrite our broken and sinful practices and world-views; it has also been used to transform them into something holy and life giving. Which texts and which traditions and trajectories within the biblical text do we draw upon for guidance in our present situation? The Proverbs passage cited above suggests that we need to read well not only the text, but also the context into which we speak lest we take the right action at the wrong time (or vice-a-versa) and find ourselves playing the fool in the name of wisdom. And the Bonhoeffer quote reminds us that God’s will may not always be what at first brush it appears to be, but may rather “lie deeply concealed beneath a great number of possibilities.” This paper is an attempt to look at what may lie beneath the surface, what guidance the Bible may offer when approached from the perspective of a slightly “less traveled road.” It is grounded in a high view of Scripture and its authority in the life of the church.

Introduction

Until fairly recently, the issue of holy same sex unions is something that has, by and large, not even been on the imaginative radar of the church’s ethical, pastoral, exegetical, or theological deliberations. If it surfaced at all, it did so as an oxymoron: same sex unions and holiness simply do not belong in the same semantic field. Now, however, the matter poses significant challenges to the church, because some have come to believe that the Holy Spirit is leading the church to do what it never imagined: to join the two semantic fields together by embracing committed adult same sex union as something sacred, and doing so on the basis of fidelity to Scripture.

And it is at this point that things begin to unravel. There are five texts in the Bible that explicitly speak to same-sex activity: Lev. 18:22; 22:13; Rom. 1:24-28; 1 Cor. 6:9; and 1 Tim. 1:10 (most scholars see Sodom and Gomorrah in Gen 19 as addressing different matters). What these five texts clearly seem to say is that same sex activity is unequivocally contrary to the will of God. And when we add to these texts the biblical traditions of marriage (all unions are heterosexual), creation (‘male and female he created them’), and blessing (‘be fruitful and multiply’), the evidence from Scripture seems to be overwhelmingly stacked against same sex activity, much less affirming the sanctity of same sex unions. But there is more to discerning God’s will in Scripture than looking at what it says directly about a given topic, although that is certainly very important. Attention needs to be paid not only to what the sacred traditions say, but also to how they are passed on to new generations, how within the Bible they are at times adapted to changing situations and contexts, and how at other times they are altered or replaced. It is only as we prayerfully consider all of the approaches to the biblical texts, both the roads less traveled and those that are well worn, and as we listen carefully to our changing contemporary context, among other things, that we are more likely to discern what the Spirit may be guiding us to do, and less likely to follow the echo of our own voice.

The question before us is, ‘Can one be faithful to Scripture, to the full canon of the Bible, and at the same time affirm the sanctity of same sex unions?’ According to some, the answer is clearly no. Others, I among them, disagree. We read the texts and traditions mentioned above differently and come up with different conclusions. It’s important to note that what a text says and what it means is not always the same thing. It’s also important to note that there is honest and rigorous debate about the meaning of the texts and traditions cited above among competent biblical scholars, theologians, and historians who take the authority of Scripture very seriously.

We’ll return to this debate later on, but for the moment let’s assume that what they say and what they mean are the same, that they do, in fact, proscribe same sex activity. Does this end the discussion? I believe not. In fact, were we to end it here, we might fail to listen to Scripture attentively enough and to take it as seriously as we should. We might fail to see how believing communities in both testaments sought to hand on the traditions they received in new and changing contexts, how they wrestled with situations in which what their sacred texts clearly taught seemed to be at odds with what they now sensed God’s Spirit to be doing in their midst. We may also, in the name of fidelity to particular ways of reading the Bible, fail to see what God might be doing in our own midst, and in the process end up resisting the One we seek to obey. Just because something was never allowed, or could never have been imagined, doesn’t mean that it can never be; God may choose, and at times has chosen, to colour outside the lines, to expand the boundaries of the possible, and to embrace those once explicitly excluded.

This paper will look at some of the instances in the Bible where received text and experienced reality seem to clash, where what God appeared to say in one context is at odds with what God seems to say in another. This is the “less traveled road” that this paper will explore. In the process, we will look at Jesus’ relationship to text and tradition, to his fidelity to the Torah and his openness to the new thing that God was doing even if it appeared to violate the Torah. But the main focus will be on how the early church learned to listen to what the Spirit was doing in regard to the Gentiles in Acts 10-15, even though it contradicted some of Israel’s most deeply held beliefs and texts. And as we do, we’ll look at the practices and dispositions that the early church employed as it listened to the Spirit and learned to re-read its sacred texts in new ways in order to see what we might learn for our present debate. We’ll then develop and apply some of these lessons by offering a re-reading of both the biblical texts and our present context. And as part of this re-reading, I will offer a brief account of how I came to change my own view on same sex unions. In two addenda, we’ll glance at what Jesus said to his disciples about the Spirit’s role of guiding them into yet undisclosed truth after he ascends, and at how Paul addressed the issue of mixed marriages in the early church. All of this is offered as an attempt to listen to what the Spirit may be saying to our church in both the biblical text and in our contemporary context.

Handing the Traditions On: Keeping the Story Alive in New and Changing Contexts

“In every case the storyteller is a wise man who has counsel for his readers… After all, counsel is less an answer to a question than a proposal concerning the continuation of the story which is just unfolding.”

Walter Benjamin, The Storyteller

The Bible is the story of God’s redemptive activity in human history. It begins with God creating a good world crowned with blessing and ends with a new creation that approximates the beginning. In between, it tells of human distortion and brokenness and the curse that sin unleashed. It also portrays instances of human faithfulness and courage. Above all, it speaks of God entering human history in Jesus to do what we couldn’t do, and to take upon himself the weight of our sin. In the midst of it all, it narrates God’s active love to bring about healing and restoration, a love that invites people to enter into an I-Thou covenant relationship with God and each other, to experience blessing and be a source of blessing to others. It invites us to participate with God in what Jewish tradition calls Tikkun ‘olam (mending the world).[1]

It’s a story whose overarching shape is that of narrative. And within that narrative, we encounter various laws, poetry, hymns of praise and lament, prayers and prophetic discourse, historical chronicle, love songs, wisdom sayings, genealogies, folklore and mythic tales, letters, and more. The purpose of all of this, the revelatory purpose, is to tell us who God is and to remind us who and whose we are. It is to give us advice and council on the journey so that we, its readers, may live as God’s faithful people. In this, the biblical narrators are like Benjamin’s storyteller: they offer us counsel, “a proposal concerning the continuation of the story which is just unfolding.”

So how do we keep the story going without distorting it? How do we pass on the biblical traditions faithfully? As we look at how this is done within the Bible, we’ll find that there is often a tension between the poles of continuity and change. We’ll also see there is often a creative and, at times, even a daring element involved in all of this.

Keeping the Story Going: The Witness of the Old Testament

Part 1:Traditions Passed On

Repetition plays an important role in the Old Testament, not only in the way it tells its story,[2] but also in the way it hands on its sacred traditions to new generations living in different contexts. Sometimes this entails a near verbatim repetition as we see, for example, in the mirroring that takes place between Ps 14 and Ps 53. At others, there is more substantive change that occurs as, for instance, when Yahweh’s self disclosure to Moses given in Ex 33: 19 is repeated (and used) differently in the different contexts found in Ex 34:6-7; Num 14:18; Neh 9:17; Ps. 86:15; 103:8; 145:8; Joel 2:13; Jonah 4:2 and Nahum 1:3. Even a foundational text like the Decalogue, first spoken in Exodus 20 at the beginning of Israel’s wandering in the wilderness, is changed when it is repeated in Deuteronomy 5 at the end of its sojourn there. In Exodus 20:9-11, the reason for keeping the Sabbath is traced back to creation; in Deuteronomy 5:12-15, it’s grounded in both creation and Israel’s oppression in Egypt. Likewise, the telling of Israel’s monarchial history differs in some substantive ways from the “Deuteronomist’s” (in this case, 1-2 Kings) version, and the “Chronicler’s” (1-2 Chronicles) version, although in the main, the stories they tell overlap. Scholars argue about the meaning of these changes, but for our purposes, it’s enough to note that different contexts often require creative changes in the re-telling in order that the tradition may be passed on faithfully. Sometimes the changes are minor, almost cosmetic; at other times, they’re more substantive. In either case, the point is that change is more often constitutive to the faithful handing on of tradition than not. There are numerous other examples of this creative retelling and reframing within both testaments, especially in the way the four Gospels each shaped the Jesus traditions they received.

Part 2: Traditions Passed Over

But can “the story be kept going” when received tradition and experienced reality seem to be at odds with each other? If a received text or biblical tradition commands one thing or prohibits another, does that end the matter?[3] Not really. For example, Deut 23:1-2 states that eunuchs cannot be admitted to the assembly of the Lord. No distinction is made between those who keep the Torah and those who don’t. Yet in Isa 56:3, eunuchs who keep the Sabbath are to be included. And in Acts 8, a eunuch is baptized and incorporated into the body of Christ. Clearly, a change has taken place; what was once explicitly prohibited is later explicitly permitted. Similarly, Deut 23:3 forbids Moabites from being admitted to the worshiping community “even to the tenth generation of their descendants” (cf. Num 25). Yet Ruth, a Moabite, becomes the grandmother of David who plays a central role in Israel’s worship, and the great grandmother of Solomon who builds and consecrates the centre of Israel’s worship (the temple)! And all of this takes place within less than the ten generations allowed by Deut 23. In this case, what was once explicitly forbidden, is later implicitly approved.

These and other instances of God saying one thing in one context and its apparent opposite in another do not so much render up an image of God as capricious or fickle. Rather, they subtly shift our attention from the commandments of God to the God who commands. After all, as Walter Brueggemann has shown, it is God who is the subject of the Old Testament, a God who is free and cannot be domesticated or fully known, and whose ways are not readily predictable.[4] But then, isn’t this what the book of Job is partly about? Neither Job, nor his orthodox friends, had a clue about the new thing that God was doing (in this case, the outworkings of the wager with Satan). But his friends not only didn’t get it, they unwittingly joined forces with Satan in adding to Job’s sufferings. And they did so by insisting on the rightness/orthodoxy of their views. And herein lies the poignancy of the book of Job, at least as it bears upon our contemporary debate about sexuality; their views were in keeping with the received orthodoxy and sacred traditions of the day. They read them well, but failed to read what was happening before their eyes. Their fidelity to their understanding of those traditions, of how God works and doesn’t work, kept them from seeing the meaning of the anguish of their friend. It’s not that they weren’t compassionate. They were. They wept and mourned and sat in silence with Job for seven days. It’s just that their defense of God and of the traditions they knew made them attack Job. From all that they knew, innocent people don’t suffer like this; Job must have done something wrong. But he didn’t. They couldn’t imagine that God could do something their traditions had no categories for, that God was free to colour outside the lines. In the end, it was they who had to ask for forgiveness and not Job. God does at times colour outside the lines and suspend or alter commands that were once firmly issued. In passing on the traditions, attention to the commands of God is placed at the service of attending to the God who commands. And this attending often results in rereading the commands once thought nonnegotiable in a new way.

Keeping the Story Going: The Witness of Jesus

Passing the biblical traditions on faithfully is central to Jesus’ mission. As the obedient Son, he has come to fulfill them. “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets,” he said, “I have come not to abolish, but to fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished.” Then he went on to add, “Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven” (Mt 5:17-19). Clearly, the story is important to Jesus; deviating from it carries significant consequences. But how does Jesus fulfill the story and pass it on? By being the type of which the law and the prophets is the antetype is one way. Another is by embodying the core intent of those traditions. In all things, it entails being responsively obedient to the Father’s will, discerning the Spirit in text and context and acting accordingly.

What is often disorienting as we read the story of Jesus’ responsive obedience, however, is how often that obedience draws him outside the lines of both convention and received sacred tradition. From the visit of the Magi[5] and the descent into Egypt at the beginning of his life, to the manner in which he died at the end,[6] the story of Jesus is filled with instances of sacred traditions being reframed and reinterpreted, clashed with and sometimes suspended. And in all of this, he was the Beloved Son with whom God was well pleased, and through whom God’s will was now being manifested (Mt 17:5). The first Eucharistic Prayer in the BAS captures this sentiment well:

“He healed the sick [often on the Sabbath, in violation to God’s commands] and ate with outcasts and sinners; he opened the eyes of the blind [again, often on the Sabbath]… In all things he fulfilled your will.”

In bending or breaking the law in order to obey the One who gave the law, Jesus is not being iconoclastic or idiosyncratic. He is doing what other faithful people have done before him: listening to what the Spirit is saying in both text and context, and then responding creatively and boldly.

So, when Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount that he has come to fulfill the law and the prophets (Mt. 5:17-20), and then a few verses later bends them in new directions (Mt 5:21-48, ‘you have heard it said… but I say unto you’), and a little later still, takes deliberate action that seems to contradict them (breaking Sabbath laws in Mt 12:1-14, and purity laws in Mt 15:1-20), he isn’t playing loose with language or text, but rather standing firmly within a core dynamic of Scripture itself. He upholds the biblical tradition, not by simply repeating past texts, but by reactualizing them in new contexts. At times, this involves radicalizing them, as when he prohibits divorce except for adultery (Mt. 5:31), or traces external acts like murder or adultery to the internal dispositions that lie behind those acts (Mt. 5:21-21; 27-30). At others, it entails setting text against text, as when he violates purity laws/conventions by his practice of table fellowship (Mt. 9:10-12), or allows his disciples to break the law by plucking grain on the Sabbath (Mt. 12:1-6) and then, in each case, invites his questioners to recall Hosea 6:6 and remember what it means that God desires “mercy, not sacrifice” (Mt. 9:13; 12:7). There is a dual attentiveness in Jesus’ life to the textual traditions, on the one hand, and the contemporary situation, on the other… an attentiveness, that is, that is guided by the Spirit and aimed at doing the will of God “on earth as it is in heaven” (Mt.6:10). And the substance of that will is clearly stated by Jesus in Matthew 22:37-40:

“’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets” (cf. Mt. 5:43-48, where the command to love embraces enemies as well as neighbours).

Jesus was obedient to the God who commands and faithful to the commands of God even as the latter were bent in directions that his predecessors couldn’t have imagined and, we might add, even when he clearly set some of those commands aside, as he did when he healed on the Sabbath, or challenged purity codes, or redefined table fellowship, or became a human sacrifice. In all of this, he read the Spirit well in both text and context.

Keeping the Story Going: The Witness of the Book of Acts (the Inclusion of the Gentiles in Acts 10-15)

Part 1: The Problem Stated

We turn now to look at the story of the inclusion of the Gentiles in Acts 10-15 to see how the early church wrestled with a situation analogous to the one we face today. That Gentiles were to be included was problematic enough,[7] just as the inclusion of homosexual Christians in the church is today.[8] What proved to be so explosive for the early church, however, was not that but how the Gentiles were to be included. Likewise, the issue in the debate over same sex unions today turns on the question of how gays and lesbians who respond to the Gospel are to be included in the church. The how for the early church turned principally on whether or not the Gentiles had to be circumcised.

The early church, after much debate and controversy over the matter, reached the conclusion that they didn’t. Here’s how the Jerusalem Council worded its decision, stated in a letter to be read to Gentile Christians:

“For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to impose on you no further burden than these essentials: that you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what has been strangled and from fornication. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell” (Acts 15:28-29).

The “burden” that the Council refused to impose on the Gentile Christians was circumcision and keeping the Law of Moses (15:1, 5). In other words, the Council said that the Gentile Christians were to be admitted as uncircumcised Gentiles, without any distinction being made between them and the Jewish Christians.

This is something that may not seem like such a big thing to most of us today; two thousand years of a predominantly Gentile church have greatly diminished the sense of scandal that confronted those early believers. But for the early church, it was a major issue! How can the story possibly be passed on without full compliance with the Law of Moses, and especially its command that all males be circumcised? Circumcision, after all, was the sign par excellence of the covenant! In Gen 17:9 –14 (cf. vss. 23-27), we read:

God said to Abraham, “As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations. This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. Throughout your generations every male among you shall be circumcised when he is eight days old, including the slave born in your house and the one bought with your money from any foreigner who is not of your offspring. Both the slave born in your house and the one bought with your money must be circumcised. So shall my covenant be in your flesh an everlasting covenant. Any uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant” (cf. Gen:21:3; Ex 4:25; Lev 12:3; Jos 5:2-9; Acts 7:8)

We get a sense of just how important this rite was when we look at the price that many were willing to pay to remain faithful to the covenant. During the period between the testaments, Antiochus Epiphanes attempted to Hellenize the Jews by forbidding them to observe the Torah and compelling them to participate in pagan festivals. Non-compliance was threatened with death. Possessing the Torah, observing purity laws, keeping the Sabbath, and practicing circumcision were particularly singled out because these were the most visible signs of Jewish identity. They were also some of their most deeply held practices. Here’s how the author of 1 Maccabees described it:

Anyone found possessing the book of the covenant, or anyone who adhered to the law, was condemned to death by decree of the king…. According to the decree, they put to death the women who had their children circumcised, and their families and those who circumcised them; and they hung the infants from their mothers’ necks. (1 Macc. 1:57-61)[9]

In the 2^nd century BCE book of Jubilees, we read that every male child that is not circumcised “belongs not to the children of the covenant which the Lord made with Abraham, but to the children of destruction; nor is there any sign on him that he is the Lord’s, but (is destined) to be destroyed and slain from the earth” (15:26).

By the time the New Testament opens, circumcision and Jewish identity were inseparable: to be a faithful male member of the covenant people meant bearing the physical sign of the covenant – circumcision.

But there is more. Gentiles were regarded not only as ethnically different, but primarily as sinners. They were the Other, the zenos, who has no part of the covenant. What Paul writes in Rom 1:18-32 is an apt description of how 1^st century Jews would have seen Gentiles; they were idolaters, who “were filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness…God haters, insolent” and more. For Gentiles to be admitted to the covenant, they had to convert to Judaism, and that meant keeping the covenant, and submitting to the sign of the covenant - circumcision. Admitting Gentiles as Gentiles, that is, without requiring them to be circumcised, was profoundly difficult for many early Christians to conceive.

I can imagine an early Jewish Christian standing up in the Jerusalem Council and proclaiming, “If we don’t require circumcision of the Gentile converts, I won’t have a Gospel to preach! We’re already being persecuted for speaking about Jesus. Imagine what will happen if they hear we’re doing away with circumcision! Our grandparents paid with their lives to be faithful, and their circumcised infants were killed. How dare we compromise on this!” Or another exclaiming, “If we give in on this essential issue, where will it stop? What else are we going to be asked to accommodate to as we reach out to the Gentiles? Remember, Jesus was circumcised, and so were all of his disciples. I’m afraid that this is just the thin edge of the wedge.”

So difficult was this issue, that even after the Jerusalem Council had reached its decision, after they had come to one mind on the matter, it continued to provoke deep seated controversy in the early church for years to come. Admitting the Gentiles as Gentiles was a shift of seismic proportions in how the traditions were perceived and handed on. Yet it was precisely this shift that the Holy Spirit guided the early church to make in order for it to embody and hand the story on faithfully.

Part 2: The Story Told

The story begins in Acts 10 with a late afternoon vision in Caesarea one day by a God-fearing Gentile named Cornelius and moves to a vision that the apostle Peter had on a tanner’s roof in Joppa the next day. In the former, Cornelius was instructed to send for Peter and told where to find him. In the latter, Peter saw a sheet come down from heaven containing “all kinds of four-footed creatures and reptiles and birds of the air”, and heard a voice commanding him to “Get up, kill and eat.” He refused. Peter, a faithful Jew, had never eaten anything unclean or profane, and the lowered sheet contained both. But the voice continued, “What God has made clean, you must not call profane.” This, the text tells us, happened three times. While Peter ponders this, the men whom Cornelius had sent the day before arrive at Peter’s door and ask for him. As they do, and while Peter is still contemplating the vision, the Spirit tells Peter to go downstairs and to go with the men “for I have sent them.” After a brief conversation, Peter invites them to spend the night and then set off for Caesarea the next morning, accompanied by six Jewish believers. When they arrive at Cornelius’ home, Peter relates, in abbreviated form, the vision he had in Joppa, and Cornelius tells Peter the vision he had instructing him to send for Peter. Cornelius then invites Peter to tell him and those he had assembled “what the Lord has commanded you to say.” Peter begins to tell them about Jesus, but before he finishes, while he’s still speaking, the Spirit falls on all who heard the word and they begin to speak in tongues. This amazed everyone, especially the circumcised believers who had accompanied Peter. “Then Peter said, ‘Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing these people who have just received the Holy Spirit as we have?’ So he ordered them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they invited them to stay for several days” (10:46-47).

But word of this began to spread to Judea. And when Peter went to Jerusalem, ‘the circumcised believers criticized him, saying, “Why did you go to uncircumcised men and eat with them?” Peter then bore detailed witness to what happened on the roof in Joppa and in the home of Cornelius in Caesarea. As he was relating how the Spirit fell on the Gentiles, Peter recalled two things that are noteworthy. First, he told his critics that he “remembered the word of the Lord, how he said, ‘John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’ And second, he told them what conclusion he drew from all of this: “If then God gave them the same gift that he gave us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could hinder God?” The result of Peter’s testimony, memory and conclusion is a changed perception on the part of his critics. “When they heard this, they were silenced. And they praised God, saying, “Then God has given even to the Gentiles the repentance that leads to life” (11:1-18).

The story in Acts then goes on to narrate the calling of Barnabas and Paul (11:19 ff), the further persecution of the believers (12:1-19), the mission to the Hellenistic Jews and Gentile converts to Judaism (12: 24- 13:43), and the turning to the Gentiles (13:46 ff). Then, in chapter 14, we read of Paul’s and Barnabas’ ministry in the region of Iconium and their eventual return to Antioch where they call the church together to recount “what God had done with them, and how he had opened the door of faith for the Gentiles” (14:27).

News about this opening reopens the same controversy that Peter had with some circumcised believers earlier. Some believers from Judea came to Antioch and said, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved” (15:1). This prompted “no small dissension and debate” between them and Paul and Barnabas. So Paul and Barnabas, along with others, were appointed by the church in Antioch “to go up to Jerusalem to discuss this question with the apostles and the elders.” This is how Luke describes what happened next. As they traveled to Jerusalem,

they reported the conversion of the Gentiles, and brought great joy to all the believers. When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and the elders, and they reported all that God had done with them. But some believers who belonged to the sect of the Pharisees stood up and said, “It is necessary for them to be circumcised and ordered to keep the law of Moses.” (15:3-5)

The apostles and elders met to consider the matter. And “after much debate,” Peter addressed the council, and reminded them that God had called him to open the door to the Gentiles, and that God had given them the Holy Spirit. He then went on to say, that God,

“in cleansing their hearts by faith… has made no distinction between them and us. Now therefore why are you putting God to the test by placing on the neck of the disciples a yoke that neither our ancestors nor we have been able to bear? On the contrary, we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will” (15:9-11).

Barnabas and Paul then recounted to the assembly “all the signs and wonders that God had done through them among the Gentiles” (15:13). After this, James, who is presiding at the council, speaks. He recalls what Simon (Peter) related about God reaching out to the Gentiles, and then cites Am 9:11-12(cf. Jer 12:15; Isa 45:21), stating that what Peter related accords with the prophets (15:13-18). He then renders his decision (which is subsequently seen as the decision of the council) that Gentile Christians do not need to be circumcised, but should, nevertheless, “abstain from things polluted by idols, fornication, anything strangled, and blood” (15:19-20).

It’s important to remember that the issue that prompted the debate concerned under what conditions and to what extent the Gentiles were to be included. Similarly in today’s debate on same sex unions, the issue isn’t whether gays and lesbians are to be included in the church (that has already been largely, but not comfortably, settled). What is at stake is under what conditions and to what extent are they to be included. The early church came to see that the Gentiles were to be included as Gentiles, with their foreskins intact; circumcision was not to be required. Table fellowship was to be extended fully to them, and no distinction was to be made between Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians. The ethical demands placed on Gentiles were to be no different, no more restricting, than those expected of Jewish Christians. To do otherwise was considered tantamount to getting in God’s way and contravening God’s will. Yet it is precisely because the early church followed the promptings of the Spirit in these matters that it was able, again under the promptings of the Spirit, to see that salvation comes through grace, not law, and that the old categories that separate people no longer apply in Christ. Or, as Paul put it, “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus” (Gal 3:28).

Keeping the Story Going: Today’s Context

Might the Spirit be prompting the church to embrace gays and lesbians today as the Spirit prompted the early church to embrace Gentiles? Might the Spirit be leading us to fully accept them as gays and lesbians, to make no distinction between them and those who are straight, to extend to them the same ministry opportunities, same pastoral care, and same access to all of the sacraments as are available to straight Christians, and finally, to place no additional requirements on them that are not placed on straight Christians, like mandatory life long celibacy? A growing number of Christians, I among them, believe that this is precisely what the Spirit is doing.

In a number of respects, the story of the full inclusion of the Gentiles in Acts 10-15 provides us with a fairly close biblical analogue to the issue confronting us about the full inclusion of gays and lesbians in the church today.[10]

• First, the emotional intensity of the debate and the potential for ecclesial division are similar.
• Second, the magnitude of the theological shift required in both cases is similar.
• And third, the issue faced by both is the same: reading the Spirit in text and context when the latter seems to contradict the former.

I realize, however, that it’s one thing to claim that the Holy Spirit guided the early church to do what it couldn’t imagine, and quite another to suggest that the Spirit is guiding the church today to embrace gays and lesbians and to consecrate their unions. It’s one thing to argue that God at times colours outside the lines and suspends or alters previously issued commands, and quite another to propose that this is what is happening with same sex unions today. So how do we seek the mind of God in this? How do we discern if this is part of the “more” (Jn 16:12-13) that Jesus, through the Spirit, is saying to the church today? Attention to how the early church discerned the mind of the Spirit in regard to the matter of the Gentiles might give us guidance for addressing this question.[11]

As we look to Acts 10-15 for guidance, it’s important to recall that the early church had “signs and wonders” at its disposal that we, to date, do not have, at least not to the same extent and clarity. Peter and Cornelius had visions and heard the Spirit, or an angel, address them directly, which opened them to receive something new. And Gentile believers spoke in tongues just like the Jewish believers did as a confirmation that the inclusion of the former was the will of the Spirit. Would that we had such clarity and confirmation today! But then, the mere existence of the miraculous is no guarantee that we’d get things right. Witness the misreadings present in the Corinthian church where signs and wonders abounded! And a close reading of Acts 10-15 reveals that there could have been numerous points at which the miraculous signs could have been misinterpreted. That the conflict of how the Gentiles were to be included continued long after the unanimous Council decision is evidence that even with signs and wonders, some got it wrong. What helped Peter, Paul, Barnabas and the Jerusalem Council get it right was a cluster of dispositions and practices that are also available to us as we seek to read the Spirit correctly in text and context. Stephen Fowl puts it this way: “There are several very practical social structures, practices, and habits at work which enable the characters to recognize, interpret, and enact the work of the Spirit. My suggestion is that in the absence of these elements, no number of miracles will be able to account for the transformation in peoples' views which are related in these chapters.”[12]

I’d like to highlight some of those elements found in Acts 10-15 and then apply them to the debate on same sex unions. The elements in the story in Acts include:

• An open mind – which entails a willingness to conceive the inconceivable, to entertain the possibility that God may be doing something new. This isn’t easy; the vision of the animals being lowered in a sheet and the command not to regard as unclean what God has called clean had to be played out three times for Peter.
• An open home – which engages in the practice of hospitality. Both Peter and Cornelius practiced hospitality and table fellowship. For Peter, this meant eating with Gentiles contrary to holy conventions. Later in chapter 15, the Jerusalem church and the Antioch delegation practiced table fellowship even amidst strong disagreements. In this, they followed the example of Jesus in the Gospels who expanded the boundaries of who was welcome at table, and included those formerly excluded.
• A listening ear – which makes room for what the other says in the imagination and heart of the hearer, and opens the hearer to the possibility of change. Both Peter and Cornelius listen to each other, and the church in both Antioch and Jerusalem listen to the testimonies of the conversion of the Gentiles.
• An attentive eye – which observes what it sees and allows that to alter what it preconceived. Peter and the six circumcised Christians with him take careful note of the Spirit falling on Cornelius and his house, and allow what they see to change what they formerly believed. Attentive sight may lead to redemptive insight.
• A creative memory – which recalls the appropriate sacred traditions from the perspective of the present experience. Peter and James “remember” the texts in light of what they see and hear in the present, and interpret those events in light of those texts. Here we see the Spirit doing what Jesus said would happen in Jn 14:26: “The Holy Spirit… will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you.” And this memory permits change. Peter extends what Jesus said would happen to the Jewish disciples in Jerusalem, and boldly reapplies it to Gentiles in Caesarea.
• An engaged imagination – which is willing to connect the dots in new ways and see new pictures emerge. Peter surmised that what he saw was the work of the Spirit. He then discerned from that that God no longer made a distinction between Jews and Gentiles. And based on both of these insights, he concluded that Cornelius and his house should be baptized. When Peter later spoke to the Jerusalem Council, he continued to boldly connect the dots by asserting that salvation comes not from observing the Torah, but through grace, and that God no longer makes distinctions between Jews and Gentiles, i.e., that grace is extended equally to both (15:10-11). It is important to note that these insights emerge out of a controversy that threatened to tear the early church apart. Conceiving the inconceivable gave birth to an insight that was to play a crucial role in how the story was to be passed on.
• A faithful tongue – which bears truthful witness to what the listening ear hears and the attentive eye sees. Peter, Paul and Barnabas all told the story of what they saw God doing among the Gentiles. This is testimony based on experience.
• A willing heart – which requires the courage and will to follow the promptings of the Spirit, even when they fly in the face of sacred tradition. Cornelius obeyed the angel and Peter heeded the Spirit. And when Peter sensed that God was opening the door to the Gentiles, he took daring, obedient action by baptizing Cornelius and his house. In addition, when the early church discerned that Gentiles were to be embraced as Gentiles, they obeyed what they discerned even in the face of internal controversy and a potential split.

Applying the Lessons Learned from the Early Church to Our Context

We turn now to explore how some of these elements may help us to discern the Spirit regarding same sex unions.

· An Open Mind: Discernment’s First Step

It is clear from Scripture that God at times does colour outside the lines and suspends or alters commands that were previously issued. I believe that this is where we need to begin in our attempt to discern the Spirit today: we need to entertain the possibility that God might be doing something new in our midst. Without entertaining this as a real possibility, our minds will be made up before we get out of the gate. It will be all the more difficult to interpret what we see or hear as not confirming our prejudices, and all the more difficult to form redemptive friendships with those who differ from us. In the debate facing us today, what this means is entertaining the possibility that God may be calling the church to embrace gays and lesbians as the early church embraced Gentiles. Doing this isn’t easy, because it runs counter to what the dominant Christian imagination has construed as real (and as imaginable) for nearly two millennia. It takes imaginative boldness, not only to conceive the unimaginable (holy same sex unions), but especially to entertain the possibility that the unimaginable, in this case, is God’s will.

In addition to entertaining the possibility that God may be doing something new before our eyes, each side in the debate needs to entertain the possibility that it might be wrong. Neither side has access to the full picture. As Paul reminds us, “now we see in a mirror, dimly… Now I know only in part” (1 Cor 13:12). This is really a call for interpretative humility (we might be wrong) and imaginative boldness (God could be doing what we couldn’t conceive). Without these dispositions, our practices of hospitality, listening, seeing and bearing witness take on a parodic edge. Without imaginative boldness and interpretive humility, dialogue is in danger of becoming diatribe.

· An Open Home: The Practice of Hospitality

Hospitality and table fellowship played a central role in the early church, not only in discerning the mind of Christ, as in Acts 10-15, but also in carrying out the church’s mission and witness.[13] It is in each other’s presence and at table that we break bread and “discern the body of Christ”, learn to listen to and see each other differently, welcome the Other, the zenos, and, perchance, find in that Other the face of Christ. Stephen Fowl speaks to the importance of hospitality and table fellowship in the debate over the issue of same sex love when he writes, “To even be in a position to debate… Christians will need to begin by opening themselves to the sorts of friendships with homosexuals that would enable them to testify about the work of the Spirit in the lives of their friends. Without this step, Christians will neither be able to read the Spirit nor read with the Spirit.”[14] He goes on to caution us about the friendships we form:

The point of such friendships is not simply to be able to make inquiries and judgments about the sexual practices of another person. Friendships are not to be a form of field work from which one can then make judgments about others. That is, like all friendships between Christians, these friendships are to be marked by the habits, practices, and dispositions that enable friends to deepen their communion with each other and with God. Through prayer, conversation, argument, tears, and laughter, these friendships are to be part of the transformations that God seeks to work in both friends' lives, conforming them ever more nearly into the image of Christ. Christian friends both assist in each others' struggles to live faithfully before God and exemplify for each other the shape of faithful living in particular contexts.[15]

I believe that it was Karl Jaspers who once said that abstraction is the root of all violence. It is when we lose sight of each other’s face, each other’s humanity, each other’s sufferings and longings, each other’s brokenness and vulnerability, and each other’s holiness, that we are prone to give in to abstraction. Our neighbour’s face then gets transformed into an issue to be addressed, or a cause to be defended. And in the process, we end up doing violence to each other and to God (cf. Mt 25:45). We need to open our hearts and homes to each other, and to form the kinds of friendships that enable us to see each other’s face and attend to each other’s stories. The practice of hospitality and table fellowship creates the context in which we can listen and see attentively.

But for the practice of hospitality and table fellowship to work well, we need to be good hosts and guests. This means, in part, that we need to have charitable dispositions towards each other.[16] In the case of the dialogue on same sex unions, it means not assuming that traditionalists are homophobic, or lack compassion, or are unsophisticated readers of texts, or are wed to the past. Likewise, it means not assuming that revisionists don’t take the Bible seriously, or view its authority lightly, or are heretics in sheep’s clothing, or deluded readers. It’s important to note at this point that neither side of the debate on same sex unions has a corner on Spirit directed readings. Both sides, I believe, are earnest in their attempts to listen to the Spirit in both text and context. Both sides desire to be faithful disciples of Jesus. And both sides are passionate about keeping the story going. We need to listen to and observe each other charitably and with humility, and to be attentive to the history of exclusion, fear, and pain that informs the words we speak and hear.

· An Attentive Eye: Giving Credence to Experience

In the book of Acts, being attentive to experience plays a major role in recognizing the Spirit’s activity in the lives of Gentile converts. It is important to note that the testimony of Peter, Paul, and Barnabas, based on what they witnessed God doing among the Gentiles, is given pride of place over textual tradition in discerning the mind of God. It is the narratives of the experience of the Spirit falling on Gentile converts that leads to a reinterpretation of Scripture, rather than the other way around. Commenting on the way James introduced his citation of Amos 9, Luke Timothy Johnson writes, ‘He says that “the prophets agree with this” rather than that “this agrees with the prophets” (15:15). In other words, it is the experience of God revealed through narrative [i.e., testimony of what they saw] which is given priority in this hermeneutical process: the text of Scripture does not dictate how God should act. Rather, God’s action dictates how we should understand the text of Scripture.’[17] We’ll return to this below when we discuss the use and interpretation of Scripture more directly.

According to the biblical witness, attention to experience matters. It is often through the experience of God acting in history that the people of God, aided by the Spirit, discern the will of God. Healings, conversations, encounters, manna in the wilderness and water from a rock, tumbled walls and routed foes all become grist for revelation.

But so does experience on a more mundane, less miraculous, level. This is most evident in the wisdom traditions best represented in the Bible by the books of Proverbs, Job, and Ecclesiastes, but also present in a number of Psalms and prophetic writings. Wisdom, according to Gerhard von Rad, is “a practical knowledge of the laws of life and of the world, based on experience…”[18] This practical knowledge comes from careful observation of life and nature, and then from that observation, it offers advice and makes ethical judgments. Commenting on the role that experience plays in the wisdom traditions, Choon-Leong Seow writes, ‘Here in the wisdom traditions of the Bible is scriptural authority for human beings to make ethical decisions by paying attention to science and human experiences. We must not say, as we hear in the debate about homosexuality, that "experience has nothing to do with it" or that "only scripture matters." It is scriptural to take human observations and experiences seriously.’[19] To discern what the Spirit is doing, if we are to be serious about the Bible’s teachings on wisdom, means that attention needs to be given to what the sciences and social sciences have to say about homosexuality, as well as to the lived experiences of gays and lesbians.

· A Listening Ear: The Requirements of Hearing Well

Being attentive to the world around us, and to the experience of others requires us to observe and listen well. And for us to do that means that we need to make space within our imaginations and hearts for each other, and for what lies before us. It also means being willing to be changed. This isn’t to say that we need to agree with everything we hear. On the contrary, if that were to happen, there’d be no true dialogue or meaningful conversation. And the gifts we have to offer each other in our differences and disagreements would disappear. We need the clash of differing perspectives and opinions to keep ourselves from being self-deluded and to remain honest. As Elizabeth Gaskell writes to a friend, “I suppose we all do strengthen each other by clashing together, and earnestly talking our own thoughts and ideas. The very disturbance we thus are to each other rouses us up, and makes us more healthy.”[20] The point is that unless we’re open to admitting the other into our imagination, and open to the possibility of being changed, our listening and seeing will be partial at best, if not disingenuous.

Listening to each other also means being attentive to each other’s fears and hopes, intentions and longings. Heterosexual singles, while called to practice ‘celibacy’, or abstinence while single, can nevertheless dream of sharing their life in intimacy (sexual and otherwise) with another person. As they come to sexual awareness in adolescence, they can dream of dating and see their desires as something good and worthy of celebration. And when they attend weddings, they can dream about their own wedding one day. All of this, however, is forbidden to gays and lesbians; their desire is seen as unholy, their dreams as something to be repressed. It is important for straight Christians to try to imagine on an affective level what it might be like not only to have their love and potential marriage denied, but to have their deepest dreams and desires judged unholy and unclean. The playing field in the debate is not even.

Careful listening also involves an awareness of the wider context in which the listening and seeing take place. In the debate at hand, gays and lesbians do not come to the discussion on equal footing with straight Christians. Like the Gentiles, who were seen by the early Jewish Christians as sinners and idolaters, unclean and dangerous, so homosexuals have been seen by the church as perverts and deviants, idolaters and sinners. Their love has been called an abomination, and their orientation an affective disorder. When charitable, they have been called sick, and their condition likened to alcoholism. Throughout history, they have been mocked, beaten and killed. When the Nazi death camps were discovered, those wearing a pink triangle were left in the camps for weeks after everyone else was liberated, and then they were not set free or taken to hospital, but transferred to another prison. This history of exclusion is important to acknowledge, because, on the one hand, it informs the animus that some feel against homosexuals (it is part of the cultural given many inherit), and on the other, it shapes the deep feelings of hurt, self hate and sense of exclusion that many gays and lesbians feel (also part of the inherited cultural given). It is a history that freights the conversation with emotional intensity and vulnerability. The requirements of compassion and love demand that we take this emotional vulnerability seriously, and the demands of truthfulness require us to acknowledge the inherited animus.

· A Faithful Tongue: Testifying to the Spirit

Stephen Fowl notes the important role that testimony played in how the early church discerned the will of the Spirit, and suggests ‘that any analogous application of Acts 10-15 to issues of homosexual inclusion will need to be grounded in testimonies of "homosexual holiness."’[21] He goes on to add an important qualifier as to whom the burden of testimony chiefly belongs. “It is crucial that Peter, Paul, and Barnabas were all circumcised Jews testifying about the work of the Spirit in the lives of uncircumcised Gentile believers. It is not the responsibility of the Gentiles to provide testimony to their own reception of the Spirit. It should not, then, be the responsibility of homosexual Christians to provide - "narratives of homosexual holiness." Instead, the onus is on other Christians who may enter (or have already entered) into friendships with homosexual Christians out of which they might offer testimony of their friends' holiness.”[22]

Since bearing witness played an important role in how the early church discerned the mind of Christ, I’d like to offer my own testimony about what I have seen and heard, and about how I have come to change my mind on the matter at hand. In so doing, I add my voice to others who have come to the same or similar conclusion, and together with them, offer what we have discerned to the wider church in its quest to read what the Spirit is doing in our midst today.

When I began ordained ministry, I believed that divorce and remarriage, the ordination of women, and same sex love were all contrary to the will of God because that’s what the Bible clearly taught. I could cite chapter and verse to support each position then, and can still do so now. What led me to reconsider my views in each case was two-fold. First, I became aware of a growing sense that an injustice was being propagated, and second, I got to know people personally in each of these categories.

In the case of divorce and remarriage, I came to learn of the tremendous suffering that people endure when trapped in bad marriages. I met women who were beaten by their husbands, men and women who were psychologically abused by their spouses, children who were sexually violated by their fathers, and on rare occasions, by their mothers, and families mired in depression and broken patterns of behaviour. I saw how lasting the effects of bad marriages can be in the lives of those involved, especially children. Maintaining the covenant bond of marriage “until death do us part” regardless of cost or context, I came to see, was in fact contrary to the will of God, chapter and verse not withstanding. It was contrary to the demands of justice and love. It was also contrary to those demands to insist that people who suffered through broken marriages and ended them, had to remain single for the rest of their lives. I also met people who were divorced and some who were remarried, and came to see in their lives clear evidence of God’s approval and blessing. Moreover, I witnessed not only God’s blessing on them, but also through them. All of this led me to return to the Bible, to re-read its texts and story, and to see that what I initially believed was wrong. This return to the Bible, however, was not a private affair; it took place in the context of communal dialogue and debate.

In the case of the ordination of women, it was my experience of the Spirit in the ministry of a particular priest that began my journey of rediscovery. My family and I met Sarah shortly after I began graduate studies at a time when our children were in the midst of a series of medical crises. I had also recently become a postulant, and she was appointed to be my supervisor. As I got to know her, I couldn’t deny the fact that God had called her and anointed her to be a priest. My family and I experienced God’s grace and presence through Sarah at a time when we were particularly vulnerable and in need. Through her pastoral care, friendship, sermons, liturgical celebrations, and presence, we found ourselves being sustained, challenged, nurtured, and transformed. Around this time I also met other women who were either already ordained or studying for the ordination. Some were my teachers, others were my students, and still others were colleagues and friends. What I saw in their lives confirmed what I had come to see in Sarah’s: that God was indeed calling women to the ordained ministry, again chapter and verse not withstanding. This, together with a growing awareness of the unjust ways that women were still viewed and treated by the church, led me to reexamine the Bible with fresh eyes and new questions. What I discovered was that what I once believed to be true about the ordination of women was wrong. Reading the Spirit in context led to (re)reading the Spirit in text. I’m glad that the church followed the Spirit and opened the door of ordained ministry to women. Not only have I and others been immeasurably enriched by their ministry, but had that door not been opened, I’m not sure I could have imagined what for me, on the basis of chapter and verse, was unimaginable. It took seeing a woman priest for me to imagine women priests.

What prompted me to rethink what I believed about gays and lesbians at a deeper level than I had previously done was a Bible study on the Gospel of Luke. We were talking about how lepers were viewed and treated by Jesus’ contemporaries and how his approach to them differed radically, when someone asked, “Who might the lepers be in our world?” (This was around the time that AIDS was becoming an epidemic in North America and, in some circles, was referred to as the ‘gay plague.’ Homosexuals were becoming the explicit target of vicious discrimination, ridicule and fear). When one person in the study offered, “Gays are today’s lepers,” the penny dropped for me.[23] I began to see what was there all the time, but had not been noticed or appreciated before: just how terribly and unjustly homosexuals have been, and still are being, viewed and treated. And as I did, I came to realize that things have to change. This maltreatment and censorious gaze have to end, especially by and in the church. It was a matter of justice and compassion.

But what really prompted me to see things differently, what led me to believe that gays and lesbians not only have a place in the church, but to also imagine that their love could be holy, was getting to know them personally, and observing God’s Spirit in their lives as gays and lesbians. What I find striking is that for all of the violence and discrimination that homosexuals have experienced from the church, they still want to be fully included in its life and believe that they have something redemptive to offer and receive. Might not this in itself be a sign that God is calling them to such an inclusion? And might not their desire to enter into lasting covenant relationships in which they may not only know sexual fulfillment in the context of holy love, but also help each other grow in holiness, be evidence that the Spirit is prompting this desire? I know people who have come to know Jesus in a living way through the ministry of homosexual Christians, some of them ordained. I have been personally graced, blessed, and called to more faithful discipleship through the friendship and ministry of gays and lesbians I know. I have seen clear evidence of holiness and Christian virtue in their lives. Closer to home, I have come to experience the Spirit’s presence in my gay son in ways that have deeply transformed and enriched me as a Christian. He is, in many ways, a sacrament of grace, not only to me, but to others who know him as well. These are but some of the signs of the Spirit’s presence in the lives of gay and lesbian Christians that I have come to witness. What I have come to experience of the Spirit in their lives has led me to read the Bible differently. This re-reading of the text, together with the narratives of homosexual holiness that I have encountered, has led me to believe that the Spirit is now inviting the church to open its doors to gays and lesbians and to welcome them to participate fully in its life without distinction or added burden.

· A Creative Memory: (Re)reading the Text with the Spirit

When trying to account for the experience of the rushing wind and the gift of tongues on the day of Pentecost, Peter said, “this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: ‘In the last days…’” (Acts 2:16ff). And when James ruled at the Jerusalem Council that the Gentiles were to be fully included in the early church, he backed that ruling by saying, “This agrees with the words of the prophets, as it is written, ‘After this I will return…’” (Acts 15:15-18). Both Peter and James believed that the experiences they referred to were the work of the Spirit, and believing this, they turned to the sacred text for confirmation. However, in connecting the experience with the texts, they (re)read them with an interpretative freedom and boldness that goes beyond the “plain sense” of those texts. Spirit initiated experience, in other words, reinterprets sacred text. Stating, or arguing (as Paul does in the letter to the Galatians) that a new experience is in accord with Scripture was a central feature in the early church’s attempt to read the Spirit in text and context. It may be of interest to note that in the debate over whether or not to circumcise Gentile converts, those who argued that they shouldn’t be circumcised didn’t focus on pivotal texts like Genesis 17:9-27, or any of the numerous other biblical texts that mandated circumcision or described its practice. While those who argued for circumcision assumed their existence and weight (and may have cited them in the debate, but Luke doesn’t mention this in the book of Acts), those who argued against it turned elsewhere in the biblical traditions. James invoked Amos 9:9-12, and Peter recalled the words of Jesus in Acts 1:5. In both cases, attention was shifted from the act of circumcision to God’s evangelical mission to the whole world – Jews and Gentiles.

In what follows, I offer some biblical texts, traditions and trajectories that I believe are in accord with the experience of the Spirit in the lives of gays and lesbians, and with their conviction, based on that experience, that the Spirit is challenging the church to no longer discriminate between them and straight believers. What this end of discrimination means is that homosexual believers are to be afforded the same ministry opportunities, same pastoral care, same discipline, same access to all of the sacraments (including marriage), and same call to holiness and mission as are afforded to straight Christians. Some of the reasons for ending the discrimination are listed below.

• It is in keeping with the scope of the evangelical thrust of Jesus’ ministry: all people are invited to taste God’s redeeming and transforming love. “God so loved the world… (Jn 3:16); “Go… and make disciples of all nations (Mt 28:19). Note the concentric widening of mission in Acts 1:8: Jerusalem, all Judea and Samaria, the ends of the earth.

• It is in keeping with Jesus’ practice of table fellowship and ministry of compassion. He eats with tax collectors and sinners (eg., Lk 15; Mt 9:10-13), and widens the boundaries of who are to be included at table. In Jesus’ ministry, he enters into dialogue with a Samaritan woman and offers her living water even though it was against convention (Jn 4), heals a Gentile woman’s daughter even though he was called to work with Jews and not Gentiles (Mt 15:21-28; Mk 7:24-30), heals through touch a hemorrhaging woman even though that touch would render him ritually impure (Mt 9:19-22; Mk 5:25-43; cf. Lev 15:25-30), and heals a blind man on the Sabbath even though that violates Torah (Jn 9). These are all instances of compassion (cf. Mt 9:13; 12:7) and care of those who suffer. They are also an invitation to those who have been excluded to sit at the table as welcome guests. In this, he invites people who have come to see themselves as unclean or sinners through the eyes and practices of those around them to now see themselves through God’s eyes as beloved. And in doing so, he also invites others to see these people as beloved. This may also be what lies behind Jesus’ pronouncement in the Beatitudes of blessing on the poor, the hungry, the grieving: an invitation to see themselves not as cursed, but beloved.

Raymond Carver’s poem, Late Fragment, gives voice to a longing and experience that Jesus’ ministry of inclusion and compassion addresses. Near the end of his life, as he lay dying, he wrote:

And did you get what

you wanted from this live even so?

I did.

And what did you want?

To call myself beloved, to feel myself

beloved on the earth.

I believe that it’s God’s desire for us all to feel ourselves to be beloved on the earth… even so. Unfortunately, this is not what homosexuals have generally known. Through the eyes of society and church, they have been seen as unclean, an abomination, sick, sinners, and under curse and judgment. They have been excluded, persecuted, diminished, and shamed. Many have internalized this gaze and have seen themselves as anything but God’s beloved; some have even taken their lives, as a result. Welcoming gays and lesbians to the table, not as second class citizens, but as full members of God’s people on equal footing with straight believers will help to transform the internalized gaze of censure into one of belovedness, and begin the healing process so many long for.

• It is in keeping with the insight discerned by the Jerusalem Council that no distinction is to be made on the basis of race/ethnicity: Gentile and Jew were to be treated alike. This insight was soon extended in the early church to include the categories of gender and class. “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus” (Gal 3:28; cf. Col. 3:11: “there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all!”). God is seen removing the accidents of nature and history that keep people apart and unequal – accidents into which people are born that define their identity and place in society. The church has developed this insight through time and expanded it. It came to see slavery as evil (something not seen in the Bible), and extended full participation to women and people with disabilities (neither of whom, according to the biblical witness, could be ordained). Dismantling the wall that separates homosexuals from heterosexuals is but an extension of what the Spirit guided the early church to do in dismantling the wall between Jews and Gentiles. In speaking about the latter, Paul writes:

“But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us. He has abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace, and might reconcile both groups to God in one body through the cross, thus putting to death that hostility through it. So he came and proclaimed peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near; for through him both of us have access in one Spirit to the Father” (Eph 2: 13-18).

Might not the blood of Christ be effective in bringing homosexuals near as well? Might not they also be part of the new humanity that Jesus created in his flesh on the cross? In other words, might we not borrow James’ words and say that the full inclusion of homosexuals “agrees with the words of the apostles, as it is written,” and then quote this text from Ephesians?

• It is in keeping with the changing understandings of marriage within both the Bible and beyond it. In the Bible we encounter monogamy (Adam & Eve, Isaac & Rebekah), polygamy ( Solomon and his many wives…), concubinage (cf. Jud 19:: where the Levite’s concubine is calles his wife), monogamy with concubinage (Abraham & Sarah & Hagar & others, cf. Gen 25:6), polygamy with concubinage (Jacob & Leah & Rachel & Bilhah & Zilpah. Cf. Gen 30), and levirate marriage (Deut 25:5-10; see the story about Tamar and Onan and Judah in Gen 38). In addition to these different understandings of marriage, there are differing views on whether divorce and remarriage are permitted, and whether mixed marriages can be holy or not (see Addendum 2 below). True, the common element to all of these is that they are between one male and one or more females; that is, between people of the opposite sex. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that it must always be so.

While it is true that the Bible nowhere imagines non-hierarchal unions between committed, mutually consenting adult same sex partners, it is equally true that it doesn’t imagine such unions between partners of the opposite sex. Women were regarded as inferior to men. They were generally seen as the property of men; unmarried women belonged to their fathers and married women belonged to their husbands. This inequality between the sexes is imbedded in Israel’s cultic, legal and economic laws, as well as in the design of the temple (the court of Israel is separated from the court of women by a wall). Males were able to divorce females, not the other way around, and males were permitted to have multiple partners of the opposite sex, while females were limited to one (not counting prostitution). All in all, greater honour is given to sons than to daughters, to men than to women. This all reflects a world constructed and governed by the ideology of patriarchy.[24] And it is this world which begins to be challenged to the core by Jesus’ attention to women, the evangelical ministry of women in the early church (eg., Acts 18; Rom 16), and by the confession that “there is no longer male or female, for all are one in Christ Jesus” (Gal 3:28).

This challenge has eventually helped to reshape the contemporary church’s understanding of marriage from a union of unequals to one of equals. Marriage is no longer seen, in part, as a transfer of property (“who gives this woman…”). Nor does the wife unilaterally promise to obey her husband any more; what each partner says to the other, in the BAS marriage ceremony, is the same. Understandings and practices of marriage change. If the church has to date been guided by the Spirit to no longer discriminate on the basis of gender, race/ethnicity, or class, might the Spirit not also add the category of orientation to the list? Just because it hasn’t been done doesn’t mean that it can’t, or shouldn’t, be done.

· It is in keeping with Paul’s advice to the Corinthians on sexual fidelity at a time when sexual immorality was rife. Husbands and wives should not only be faithful to each other, i.e., not cheat, but should also not withhold “conjugal rights” from each other. The reason for this is so “that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control” (1 Cor 7:5). Sexual fulfillment within marriage is seen as a deterrent to sexual immorality, i.e., sexual fulfillment outside marriage. He then goes on to tell the Corinthians that he wished that they could be celibate as he is (the reason for this is given later in vss 32-35: it allows for a greater devotion to the mission of the Lord.). But he is clear that not everyone is called to celibacy; it is a gift given to some and not to others (v 7). He then repeats his desire that those who are unmarried, remain so, but quickly adds, “if they are not practicing self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to be aflame with passion” (v 9). Sexual holiness is important to Paul; it is part of the church’s evangelical witness to a world mired in broken sexual relations. He advises those who are single to stay that way unless they burn with passion. It is better for them to marry and find sexual fulfillment within the bond of covenant love than to satisfy their needs outside it. Marriage is therefore seen as a key deterrent to mirroring the broken sexuality of the world.

Gay and lesbian Christians, like straight Christians, are called to embody sexual holiness in their relations with each other. Some are called to celibacy; most are not. To those who are not, the bond of covenant love, of marriage, is the appropriate context within which to find sexual fulfillment and live in sexual fidelity. The question now arises, why should straight Christians be offered a means for enacting holiness in their bodies and relations that homosexual Christians are denied? Why is the former offered a means for withstanding the temptations to sexual immorality that the latter is not? In addressing the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15:10, Peter said, “Now therefore why are you putting God to the test by placing on the neck of the disciples a yoke that neither our ancestors nor we have been able to bear?” Might not those words apply here as well? Opening the door of marriage to gay and lesbian Christians is in keeping with Paul’s council on sexual holiness, and with Peter’s claim that God makes “no distinction between them and us” (Acts 15:9).

This is only some of the biblical evidence that can be adduced to interpret and frame the claim that the Spirit is prompting the church to open its doors wide to gay and lesbian believers, and to incorporate them fully and without distinction into its life.

Concluding Comments

In her novel, The Secret Life of Bees, set in South Carolina in 1964, Sue Monk Kidd lets us in on a conversation between Zachary Taylor, a good student and athlete about to be a junior at the African American high school, and Lily Owen, a white “orphan,” about what the future might hold and the part that imagination plays in opening hitherto closed doors. Zachery comments,

“I don’t know if I’ll have much of a future either.”

“Why not? You’re not an orphan.”

“No,” he said, “I’m a Negro.”

I felt embarrassed. “Well, you could play football for a college team and then be a professional player.”

“Why is it sports is the only thing white people can see us being successful at? I don’t want to play football,” he said. “I wanna to be a lawyer.”

“That’s’ fine with me,” I said, a little annoyed. “I’ve just never heard of a Negro lawyer, that’s all. You’ve got to hear of those things before you can imagine them.”

“Bull…. You gotta imagine what’s never been.”

Both Zachery and Lily are right. Zachery is right in that we need people to imagine the unimagined in order for the unimagined to become a reality in history. This is where it must begin. And Lily is right in that we need the unimagined to become real so that those who need to see or hear it can begin to imagine it. Without either, nothing changes. This paper is an invitation for the church to “imagine what’s never been”: the full inclusion of homosexual Christians in its life and ministry. But it is more than that. It is also an invitation to take bold action so that what was unimagined can become real in order to help those who need to see or hear be able to imagine what they couldn’t conceive before. Had the church not taken action to ordain women to the priesthood, I never would have met the priest who helped me imagine what I couldn’t before. I am deeply grateful that the church took that action; had it not, I and countless others would have been deprived of the profound blessings we’ve received through the ministry of our ordained sisters. What blessings from its gay and lesbian members will the church forgo in the future should its imagination fail and its courage falter?

Postscript

This paper has argued that the full inclusion of homosexual Christians in the life of the church is in keeping with the biblical witness even if the five texts that explicitly proscribe same sex love do mean what they appear to say. But what if they don’t? What if the context now has changed so much from the context then that what the biblical authors addressed no longer applies? Or, to put it differently, what if what the biblical authors had in mind bears no substantive relationship to what gay and lesbian Christians have in mind when they ask the church to bless their unions? Earlier I mentioned that there is honest and rigorous debate among biblical scholars about the meaning of these texts and the traditions that implicitly seem to support them.[25] The debate is real, and the jury is still out. If the meaning and applicability of the texts and traditions banning same sex love are far from being settled, then why grant them determinative status in discerning the mind of Christ in the matter of same sex unions? Moreover, might we not be more biblical if we were to follow the example of Acts 10-15 and argue our case from texts and traditions other than just the pivotal ones that either prescribe or proscribe an issue at hand? In the book of Acts, this shift from the germane texts enabled the early church to broaden its purview and frame the issue with greater theological insight than it would have had it remained focused on the issue of circumcision. The priority of faith and grace over “works” in salvation, and the divine abolition of the walls of race/ethnicity, gender and class were some of the fruits of this shift. Might our debate over same sex unions yield similar insights today if we were to shift our attention from the five key texts and their supporting traditions (the meaning of which remains unsettled) and look at the Bible from a broader perspective?

Addendum 1: Excursus on Jesus and the Spirit

In Jn 14-17, we have one of the most extensive accounts of the role of the Spirit in the New Testament, especially as to how it relates to the church’s memory of Jesus, and how it hands that on to future generations. Speaking to his disciples, Jesus tells them that after he ascends back to the Father, the Father will send them the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, who “will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you” (14:26). A little later, he informs them that he has more to say to them, which at this time they’re unable to bear. He then goes on to say,

“When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine. For this reason I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you” (16:12-15).

Commenting on these texts, Stephen Fowl writes, ‘Reminding and speaking of what is “more” are activities of the Spirit that enable the followers of Jesus to continue the mission Jesus started and which they are to continue. The Spirit will guide and direct the followers of Jesus into the future, while at the same time, enabling them to “abide in the true vine” (15:1-11).’[26] He then goes on to show what this “remembering” entails in John’s Gospel.

In John 2:13-25, Jesus “cleansed” the temple. When asked by what authority he did this, he replied, “Destroy the temple and within three days I will raise it up” (2:19). In what follows, it appears that his disciples didn’t understand what he meant at the time. But the text goes on to say, “After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken” (2:22). Then in chapter 12, Jesus enters Jerusalem riding on a donkey. In verse 16 we’re told, “His disciples did not understand these things at first; but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written of him and had been done to him.” In each of these cases, the disciples “memory” is engaged from the perspective of Jesus’ resurrection. And in each case, they understand from that perspective what they couldn’t grasp before. Moreover, their “memory” enables them to reread past texts and connect them to contemporary events in ways they couldn’t have anticipated. This is all part of the “more” concerning the Spirit’s role that Jesus referred to earlier. And there is more. The disciples are called to “abide in the vine”, to remain faithful to the “memory” of Jesus. And it is the role of the Spirit to direct Jesus disciples, past, present, and future, in such ways that they may “abide in the vine” faithfully in the various and changing contexts in which they find themselves. But to do that is not always easy or safe. As Nicholas Lash reminds us, “Fidelity to tradition, in action and speech, is a risky business because it entails active engagement in the process of continual change.”[27]

And if we consider what Jesus said about the Spirit earlier in the Gospel, being directed by the Spirit may also be unpredictable. In his dialogue with Nicodemus in chapter 3, Jesus likened the work of the Spirit to the rush of the wind which “blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes” (Jn 3:8). And a little later in chapter 7, he described the Spirit in terms of “rivers of living water” (vs 38) that gush from deep within believers’ hearts. What both of these images of the Spirit have in common, the rush of the wind and the gushing rivers, is that they lie outside of our predictability and control. This is reinforced by the combined image of wind and fire at Pentecost in Acts 2. To step into the wind, hermeneutically speaking, and to be borne on the rivers that gush from within, requires us to relinquish control of our conditioned understandings and habituated ways of seeing. This is not to suggest that we abandon all traditions and understandings – just, perhaps, our certainty of them. After all, we still need to pass the story on. To do so requires us to have a story to pass on.

Addendum 2: Beyond Specific Revelation – Attending to the Spirit When No Signs or Oracles are Present

It’s one thing for God to alter what God has commanded, but is there any precedent in Scripture for humans changing God’s expressed will without recourse to specific revelation (as a word from the Lord) or compelling divine signs (like the manifestation of glossalia among believing Gentiles in the book of Acts)? There is. The Old Testament, for instance, is clear about God’s proscriptions against Israelite males marrying foreign females (Deut 7:3-4; Josh 23:11-13; cf. 1 Kg 11:1-8). The reason given is that it “would turn your children away from following me, to serve other gods. Then the anger of Yahweh would be kindled against you, and he would destroy you quickly” (Deut 7:4). When judgment finally came and Israel went into exile, it was so devastating (see the book of Lamentations) that it threatened Israel’s faith to the core. When it was over and a remnant had returned to the land, Ezra commanded all Israelite males who had taken foreign wives while in Babylon to send them away, together with their children lest Yahweh’s wrath be kindled again! (Ezra 9:14; 10:11-44). A new beginning in the land requires strict holiness and adherence to the Torah. Yet Paul, in a different context, goes against this in both letter and spirit. In 1 Cor 7:12-16, he commands the believing spouse not to leave his or her unbelieving (read ‘foreign’) partner because, in Paul’s view and against the Old Testament witness, the believer renders the unbeliever holy. And this command, Paul is at pains to tell us, is his own and not the Lord’s; that is, he is speaking from his own apostolic authority and not from direct revelation.

In what Paul says in 1 Cor 7:12-16, he not only clashes with Old Testament teaching about intermarriage, but also with Jesus’ teaching on divorce. According to Mark 10:2-9, Jesus forbids divorce for any reason, thereby rolling back the concession that Moses had made earlier (although in Mt 5:31-32; 19:1-12, Jesus seems to allow it for sexual misconduct). When speaking to believers Paul seems to agree with Jesus (1 Cor 7:1-11). But when he speaks to believers who are married to unbelievers, and does so in his own name, he provides what Brian Blount calls an ‘escape clause’ that permits divorce for reasons other than infidelity (7:15). The reason for Paul’s ‘escape clause’ is that his context was different from that of Jesus. Jesus was speaking to Jews who were married to Jews (non-mixed marriages) while Paul was speaking to Christians who were married to pagans (mixed marriages). The problem that Paul was concerned with was something that didn’t present itself in Jesus’ ministry, viz., that a pagan partner might disapprove of the conversion of the Christian partner, and prompt the latter to compromise their new found faith, or worse, to return to paganism. In this, Paul’s concern was in keeping with Ezra’s fear mentioned earlier about the harmful effect that non-believing spouses may have on their believing partners. Paul’s change to Jesus’ ethical teaching on divorce, while departing from the letter of what Jesus said in one context, was, however, in keeping with Jesus’ call to fidelity to the kingdom of God (Mt 6:33). Blount puts it this way, “Paul believed that it was more important that a Christian remain a Christian than return to paganism to appease a disgruntled partner.”[28] He then concludes his discussion of Paul’s reframing of the Jesus tradition on divorce by offering the following suggestion to the church as it wrestles with the issue of homosexuality: “as the Spirit guided Paul to understand the Jesus tradition in this manner,” he writes, “so, too, the Spirit can guide the Christian community today.”[29]

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[1] Sylvia Keesmaat, drawing on Tom Wright, describes this story as an unfinished drama in six acts. Act 1, she suggests, focuses on the creation of a good world crowned with blessing. Act 2 tells of its distortion by human sin. Act 3 narrates the calling of Israel to be a blessing. Act 4 recounts the ministry of Jesus life, death and resurrection. And Act 6 is about Jesus’ return and the final consummation. However, Act 5 which deals with the church, departs from the biblical narrative in that it begins in the Bible with the early church, but then moves beyond the Bible through church history up to the present time and beyond. We live near the end of Act 5, with Acts 1-4 and the first part of Act 5 behind us and confident of the outcome of Act 6 yet to come. Sylvia C. Keesmaat, “Welcoming the Gentiles: A Biblical Model for Dicision Making.” In Living Together in the Church Including Our Differences, ed. By Greig Dunn and Chris Ambridge: Toronto: Anglican Book Centre, 2004. p. 31. For a slightly different presentation of the biblical story, see Bernard Anderson, The Unfolding Drama of the Bible, 1971.

[2] See, for example, the numerous books and articles on literary approaches to the Bible (references available upon request).

[3] The passage cited from Proverbs at the beginning of this paper is an example where context determines when a command is to be kept and when it’s not; there are times when it’s appropriate to answer fools according to their folly, and others when it’s not. This reminds us of the importance of reading contexts well; if we don’t, we might apply the right text to the wrong context. This is certainly germane to the debate on same sex unions

[4] See Walter Brueggemann, Theology of the Old Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1997).

[5] Magi were astrologers or wizards whom the Israelites were forbidden to consult (Lev 19:31; 20:6). In the inter-testamental literature, Balaam was seen both as an arch enemy of the Israelites, but also as a magus.

[6] Deut 21:23 states that anyone who is left on a tree is accursed. That Jesus , the King and Messiah , the Blessed One, died as one who was cursed, posed a significant challenge to the early church, and from that challenge came one of its deepest insights stated in 2 Cor 5:21: “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

[7] Luke had already given a heads up that their inclusion was to happen. The genealogy of Jesus is traced back to Gentiles (Lk 3:34-38), and Simeon prophesied that Jesus would be “a light for revelation to the Gentiles” (Lk 2:32; cf. Acts 13:47). In addition, John the Baptist proclaimed that “all flesh shall see the salvation of the Lord” (Lk 3:6; cf. Isa 40:3-5; 2:3-4). And Jesus’ public ministry was framed with references to the inclusion of the Gentiles: In Lk 4, Jesus outraged the people in the Synagogue when he focused on God’s care of Gentiles, and before he ascended, he commissioned his disciples to proclaim repentance and the forgiveness of sins to all nations (Lk 24:44-47; cf. Acts 1:8). Yet this didn’t keep the issue from looming large in the book of Acts and in the letter to the Galatians.

[8] Homosexuals have been called objectively disordered and intrinsically evil by the Vatican and other Christian bodies and individuals. The Vatican even stated that they are part of an 'ideology of evil'. Homosexuals (whether celibate or not) are still forbidden to teach children in some Christian communities.

[9] Similar tales are told in 2 Maccabees:

At the suggestion of the people of Ptolemais a decree was issued to the neighboring Greek cities that they should adopt the same policy toward the Jews and make them partake of the sacrifices, and should kill those who did not choose to change over to Greek customs. One could see, therefore, the misery that had come upon them. For example, two women were brought in for having circumcised their children. They publicly paraded them around the city, with their babies hanging at their breasts, and then hurled them down headlong from the wall. Others who had assembled in the caves nearby, in order to observe the seventh day secretly, were betrayed to Philip and were all burned together, because their piety kept them from defending themselves, in view of their regard for that most holy day. (2 Macc. 6: 8-11; Cf. 4 Macc. 4:24-26).

[10] The first person I read who suggested that Acts 10-15 is an appropriate analogue to the issue of homosexuality confronting the church today was Jeff Siker in his article, “Homosexual Christians, the Bible, and Gentile Inclusion: Confessions of a Repenting Heterosexist.” In Homosexuality in the Church: Both Sides of the Debate (Louisville: Wistminster John Knox Press), pp. 178-194. Stephen Fowl refined Siker’s argument and expanded it by drawing attention to not only how the early church came to its decision on the inclusion of the Gentiles, but also on what dispositions, practices and habits they employed that enabled them to read the Spirit in text and context. See Engaging Scripture: A Model for Theological Interpretation (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1998), pp. 97-127. Sylvia Keesmaat (“Welcoming the Gentiles…”) also draws in Acts 10-15 to discuss the inclusion of homosexual Christians in the church.

[11] Stephen Fowl addresses this well in his detailed study of Acts 10-15 in his book, Engaging Scripture (pp.101-127).

[12] Ibid, p. 105.

[13] See John Koening, New Testament Hospitality: Partnership with Strangers as Promise and Mission (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985).

[14] Fowl, pp. 98-99. I added the italics in the quote to stress the importance of the point he makes. Later on, he writes, “Christians have no reason to think they understand how the Holy Spirit weighs in on the issue of homosexuality until they welcome homosexuals into their homes and sit down to eat with them.” (p. 122).

[15] Fowl, pp. 121-122.

[16] On charitable readers, see Fowl, pp. 86-96.

[17] Luke Timothy Johnson, The Acts of the Apostles (Collegeville, Minnesota: Liturgical Press, 1992), p. 271.

[18] Gerhard Von Rad, Old Testamnt Theology, Vol I (New York: Harper & Row, 1962), p. 418.

[19] Choon-Leon Seow, “A Heterosexual Perspective”, in Homosexuality and Christian Community, ed. By Choon-Loen Seow (Louisville:Westminster John Knox Press, 1996), p. 22.

[20] Cited by Linda Hauch in her PhD dissertation on Elizabeth Gaskell.

[21] Ibid p. 121.

[22] Ibid.

[23] I am not suggesting that homosexuality is a disease like leprosy. The point of the comparison is the exclusionary maltreatment by the religious community and society at large of lepers in the first century and homosexuals today.

[24] A good deal of the animus against homosexuality, especially male homosexuality, is rooted in the world constructed by patriarchy. In a world in which being male is intrinsically better than and superior to being female, it was a shame for a male to be cast in the role of a female (passive partner).

[25] See the paper that Ray Fletcher presented to the Diocesan Committee on Dialogue on Same Sex Unions, and especially the bibliography he includes.

[26] Ibid, p. 99.

[27] Cited in Fowl, p. 101.

[28] Brian Blount, “Reading and Understanding the New Testament on Homosexuality” in Homosexuality and Christian community, pp. 31-32.

[29] Ibid. p. 32.