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Dear David,

To be fair to Brian, he never said that gay sexuality was moral from the Christian point of view.

I've read over his posts more than once and I just can't find that.

What Brian is concerned about is social and political discrimination against homosexuals.

I think what has been said about Brian here is unfair and uncharitable in and of itself.

Alex

And, to keep a proper patristic perspective on the purpose of civil government and the licitness of legislating morality, I quote Chrysostom on Romans 13:

"So far is he [the ruler] from terrifying thee, he [Paul] says, that he even praises thee: so far from being a hindrance to thee, that he even works with thee. When then thou hast his praise and his succor, how is it that thou art not in subjection to him? For he maketh virtue easier for thee in other ways also, by chastising the wicked, by benefiting and honoring the good, and by working together with the will of God. Whence too he has even given him the name of 'Minister.'

"And consider: I give you counsel to be sober-minded, and he, by the laws, speaks the same language. I exhort you not to be rapacious and grasping. And he sits in judgment in such cases, and so is a worker together with us, and an assistant to us, and has been commissioned by God for this end. Hence there are both reasons for reverencing him, both because he was commissioned by God, and because it was for such an object."

Good government is government that works together with the will of God, defeating vice and promoting virtue.

In Christ,
Theophilos

Dear Theophilos,

I don't argue, but applaud, what you say.

The fight against sodomy et al. will not begin with politicians.

That fight has already been lost via the internet and the permissiveness that has already been allowed on it.

The real issue here is why even great corporations invest millions in the promotion of pornography of all kinds on the internet and no one says "boo" and least of all the Churches and Christians.

The investment in degrading pornography is actually what drives the internet industry, and it is present in a more subtle form in other media as well.

Alex

Brian,

Since Senator Santorum stated what can be considered to be a summary of the general Christian teaching on the issue (that it is not wrong to be homosexual but that it is wrong to engage in homosexual activity) then the logical extension of your remarks is that you consider the Catholic and Orthodox teaching on homosexuality to be equally harmful and insulting.

People who advocate the societal acceptance of consensual adult-child sexual activity also claim that it is extremely harmful and insulting to them when we condemn such behavior. If one applies your logic to this issue you must also support the removal of all societal prohibitions against adult-child sex and all other forms of deviant behavior.

As Christians we believe that homosexual sexual activity is harmful to society just as adultery and incest are harmful to society. They are each different but all are harmful and sinful. One cannot claim otherwise and pretend to be Christian.

As I have stated earlier, one cannot be Christian and approve of violence against homosexuals. This does not automatically mean that Christians must abandon unchanging teaching that homosexual sexual activity is sinful and must be just discriminated against by society. Brian, you seem to think that those of us who appeal to society to re-embrace Judeo-Christian morality are automatically endorsing violence. You are wrong.

I applaud Senator Santorum for his remarks. We need to work to elect more people like him.

Admin

Dear Alex,
When I am uncharitable I expect you to call me on it, either publicly or privately.

As for Brian, I do not think I was uncharitable to him. My post to him is correct, he has ignored direct questions to him. And his distortion boarders on lying when he states that the senator is equating being gay with incest when the fact is that the senator equated homosexual sex with incest. The latter is not, in anyway, social and/or political discrimination against homosexuals.


In Christ,
David

Alex:

Christ is Risen!

I agree that "what has been said about Brian here is unfair and uncharitable in and of itself."

Brian's point about discrimination against homosexuals emanating from anti-(homosexual) sodomy laws is an important one, and should enter into prudential considerations as to whether such laws make good public policy sense. There are, however, other points that must also be considered (e.g., effect on public morality).

In Christ,
Theophilos

Dear Theophilos,

If you maintain that good government is government based on the Gospel, where is that held in the governments of the West today?

Even Orthodox Saints, like St George Danilovsky, glorified in 2000 A.D., advised people to join the Red Army to fight the enemies of Russia.

We no longer live in a Christian society or empire, if we ever really did.

The most we can do is struggle for transformation of our society through activism and grass-roots outreach.

Alex

Alex,

You are quite correct. Those pushing for the societal acceptance of homosexual activity and to enact special protections for it have won the hearts of the media. I find it pretty sad that the senator is being attacked as a bigot for merely stating that he believes in Christian morality.

Admin

Dear Administrator,

There are some qualitative points in what you say that might be questioned.

You equate homosexuality with other forms of deviant behaviour - and as far as Christian ethics are concerned, you are correct.

Under the law, there is a qualitative distinction now made between homosexuality/homosexuals on the one hand, and deviant behaviour on the other.

Again, this goes back to the fact that the state no longer acknowledges Christian morality as being the same as "morality."

For one thing, juridical decisions often make mention of the view that "community moral standards" change over time. Christian morality does not.

Brian simply made the legally-defensible point that to decry homosexuality/homosexual acts is to fuel public discrimination against homosexuals.

That is certainly how the law today sees it whether we like it or not. (Although wasn't your earlier point based on whether the Senator even MADE that comment - I don't believe that he would have and that this was a ploy by his political enemies, putting words into his mouth).

To say that Brian therefore approves of homosexuality is simply making a stretch.

Again, while Christians see homosexuality as a form of deviant behaviour, the law protects homosexuals and that same behaviour. Under the law, homosexuality is NOT akin to incest etc.

Alex

"The Court has agreed to review this again in this present term"

Agreed, but it's always dangerous to read into the motivation as to why they granted certiorari on a particular case (and there may very well have been different motivations even among those who voted to grant cert). I sincerely doubt that there are five votes on this court in favor of creating a new constitutionally protected class based on sexual orientation.

Brendan

Dear All,

I promised myself that I wouldn't post on this topic again, but the issues are really important, so here goes....

It seem to me that Alex's point is well taken.

The Church has spoken about the moral status of homosexual acts. That is fact. For us that issue is settled.

The question, it seems to me, is whether or not the state should decide what is moral and what is not. It certainly can decide that something is legal or illegal. The problems seem to arise when when it decides that someithing is illegal because it is immoral.

Let me cite an example. If I am not mistaken, for many years, marriage between black Americans and white Americans was illegal in many states. If I remember correctly, there were churches which taught that it was immoral and that it was unnatural. There still are groups that teach this to this day, the white supremicists and some churches, for example.

We understand today that marriage between blacks and whites is clearly neither unnatural nor immoral. Because it was thought to be so, it was made illegal and caused grave harm to many for many years. It took struggle to change the law. Ultimately, in my lifetime, the courts declared such laws unconstitutional because of discrimination on the basis of race.

Appeals to what is natural and moral should be considered when debating whether or not to make things legal or illegal. I think, however, that Dr. John is on to something when he points out that harm or lack of harm to others than those in the activity should also be a consideration before making something law. A major factor must be evidence that a specific thing, in itself, brings harm to civil society or the individuals who are members of it.

I agree with Theophilius when he posted this:

"For example, the issue of homosexuality: Is it immoral behavior? Yes. How do we know and – this is key since we live in a multicultural, multireligious society – can we justify our conception of its immorality to others. This means that appeals to Leviticus or Romans are not sufficient. One can appeal to revelation (see the civil rights struggle, the debate over slavery), but ultimately we need to make our case in an idiom that non-Christians can understand. We thus fall back on the natural law, and attempt to make our case through appeals rooted in reason and experience."

I wonder how Christians in European countries or we in our countries will view legislation of morality if and when the majority voting in those countries are followers of Islam? I suspect that those Christians will protest imposition of shira as the law of the land. I think that they will find the practice of taxing infidels for the privilege of practicing faiths other than Islam unfair and discriminatory. Our brothers and sisters in parts of Nigeria are battling the imposition of Shira today.

I think that we should be cautious when we deal with our homosexual and lesbian brothers and sisters and anyone else about what they do in the bedroom because of religious belief or because we see what they do as unnatural. It seems that that could come back to bite us later.

Thanks for hearing me out!

Steve

Dear Administrator,

You should have gone into politics yourself!

Yes, there are those who promote societal acceptance of homosexuality et al.

And I'm sure they are among the good Senator's enemies.

And there are homosexuals who are themselves against special protections for them under the law.

But the law, in and of itself, is a different animal from Christianity, and has a different purpose in a society where there are many religions and also many with no religion.

But this would never be such an issue of polarisation in Canada.

The posts on this subject here indicate more about American politics than anything else - how utterly fascinating!

And thank you for not saying that I have been remiss in terms of my Christian morality in this respect - I really don't want to go to Confession again before Pascha!

Alex

Alex --

Legally in the USA it's really a question as to (1) whether the law discriminates on its face (or in its effect) between classes of persons and (2) if so, whether that discrimination is permissible under the equal protection clause of the US Constitution.

As to the first question, this is a law that does not discriminate on its face. That is, it applies on its face equally to all people. It could be argued that it discriminates in its effect as homosexual persons who are sexually active are more likely, perhaps, than are heterosexual sexually active persons to engage in acts describable as "sodomy". So, if we assume that one can argue colorably that this law discrinminates in its effect (and there certainly is at least some countergarument to that), then the question becomes whether that discrimination is constitutional.

The court has, in the past, applied different constitutional tests depending on whether the class of persons classified under the law in question is a protected class or not. Race is the most highly protected class, and statutes that discriminate on the basis of race are basically unconstitutional (technically subject to "strict scrutiny", which in effect means that they almost always fail constitutionally). Gender is sort of in a middle category -- some statutes that discrinminate on the basis of gender, if reasonably tailored to an important state interest, are constitutional -- otherwise they may not be. Other categories of persons are not considered protected classes, and laws that apply to certain categories of persons and not others (whether on their face or in their effect), unless the class is a "protected class", are generally constitutional if they are rationally related to a legitimate state interest. In effect, this test allows almost any law (under an equal protection analysis) provided that it is not irrational.

The real legal issue here is whether sexual orientation should be a protected class -- akin to race -- or, perhaps a quasi-protected class of a lower order such as gender. That's where an equal protection claim is won or lost, really. And I, for one, can't see five votes on this court for the proposition that sexual orientation is a protected class from an equal protection perspective. It's hard to predict, but it would be very strange for thos court to be able to produce five votes in favor of that.

So it really is not abouyt the distinction between private and public morality. In the US, its an issue as to what degree the constitution protects sexual orientation -- is it akin to race, gender, or what. That's really the core of the debate, legally.

Brendan

Again, was it Senator Santorum who inserted the term "gay" in 'consensual sex?' Mr. Administrator notes how it was an AP reporter who included that word. Hmmmmmmmm.

It must be campaign season again.

Joe

Dear David,

O.K., but I don't see how saying that what someone said borders on "lying" is charitable!

Perhaps I'm missing something here? Is it because I'm Canadian and less strident about things?

Was it Brian's intention to say what you accuse him of saying?

And I just made the uncharitable comment in general, without pointing a finger at you - because that would be, well, uncharitable

(It really looks like a lot of you Americans, Catholic or Orthodox, are real Southern Bible-thumpers!)

Not that there's anything wrong with that . . .

Alex