Faggots, Bigots, and Heretics

I woke up this morning to a post on Facebook from my friend Matt, a staunch conservative.  I say "staunch conservative" because I'm pretty sure he would label himself as such; if I'm wrong, please correct me and I'll edit this.  Matt specifically tagged me, as he knows I am pretty much at the opposite end of the spectrum that he is, and I've had many Facebook "discussions" with him over the years, where it's been generally respectful despite our differences.  The post is below, with the other last names being omitted.

I've refrained until now about gay marriage. No longer.Gay marriage is a component of homosexuality. A component.The Bible says it is a sin in the old and new testament. Sin is sin. No one is greater than the other. "For we all sin and fall short of the glory of God." So to support gay marriage, again a component of homosexuality, is supporting sin. To support a pastor who will marry a same-sex marriage is also advocating for sin. To me, that means, you support most of the sins. Therefore making you an ineffective witness for Christ. ( Yes I have sinned. Yes I continue to do so. Unavoidable, I'm not Jesus Christ, or God, or the Holy Spirit. I am fallen. I am not the best witness either. I know that.)Love the person hate the sin. Absolutely. But Steven P N, Daniel Sutter, and Lacey C why do you support it?I agree we as humans can be forgiven, but to support a path of sin, really? Not to mention this is a blatant and strategic attack on Christianity and the first amendment. The law suits that are being up held against religious freedom. It's completely wrong and obvious.‪#‎onemanonewoman‬.

I used to engage in this type of online debate constantly, but over the past couple years, I've grown tired of it.  It can be emotionally and intellectually draining as well as extremely frustrating when someone can't understand your point of view, even though you spend an hour or more drafting your response.  Nobody will ever change their position based on these debates alone, and I consider it to generally be an exercise in futility.  I'm making an exception here, to give a genuine answer to what seems to be a genuine question.  I know I'm not going to change this friend's mind, but that's not my goal.  My goal is to help him understand why I think the way I do and also offer some guidance on ways we as Christians should act (or more importantly, not act) through these sweeping changes to our world regardless of where we land on the spectrum.

From here on out, I'm talking to and about Christians; everyone is welcome to read and chime in, but Matt's question is completely based around a Christian perspective (a perspective which I hold) and I want to speak to that. When talking about our stance on gay marriage, many people would have you believe that there are two stances to take; either you're for it or you're against it.  That's an oversimplification, and it prances around the underlying, until recently unspoken debate, which is "what do you think about homosexuality?"  And the follow-up to that, "how does what you think about homosexuality fit in with church orthodoxy?"

Regarding gay marriage, these are the points of view I have seen, and I have friends or acquaintances who hold to all of them.

Stance 1 - Homosexuality is a sin, and gay marriage should be illegal because of that.
Stance 2 - Homosexuality is a sin, but gay marriage should be legal because it's a civic institution, not religious.
Stance 3 - Homosexuality is not a sin, and gay marriage should be legal.
Stance 4 - I'm not sure if homosexuality is a sin; there seems to be some doubt among several Christians, but I'd rather be safe than sorry, so gay marriage should be illegal.
Stance 5 - I'm not sure if homosexuality is a sin; there seems to be some doubt among several Christians, and we've gotten things wrong before (i.e. slavery, flat-earth, misogyny) so I'd rather err on the side of grace; gay marriage should be legal.
Stance 6 - Don't know. Don't care.

I started off in Stance 6. I didn't know, and I didn't care.  Somehow, in my mind, I formed no opinion whatsoever.  I was involved in the musical theater, which has historically been an open and accepting place for LGBTQ folks, so I knew quite a few, but it never really came up to me.  It wasn't my issue.  My parents didn't teach me about it; I don't really remember my church talking about it.  I didn't even really think about it.  I was naive.

My naivete continued into college, where I started going to a youth group at a fairly conservative church.  Here I was introduced to the Bible as the authority.  What you need to know about anything, you can find it there.  The Bible says homosexuality is a sin, so it is, because the Bible is inerrant and authoritative, so we should hold to what it says.  As such, we should vote for the candidate who will fight against gay marriage, abortion, and...well, those are the only two that I remember; we talked about it during the height of an election year.  I believed it.  I knew that the people I was around were genuine, and they had good intentions.  So I took stance 1.  Homosexuality is a sin, and gay marriage should be illegal because of that.

This view was not something I came to on my own; I just believed what I was told.  Now, to clarify, I'm not bashing this group or what they believe; the onus was on me and my ignorance.  Overall this group was great for me and formed a solid foundation for understanding God and who he is, most importantly the concepts of Grace and Faith.

During the first year or two out of college, I started to think a bit differently.  This came about through a shifting of how I understood the Bible.  As I read and studied it, parts of it seemed to contrast with things I believed, contrast with itself, and contrast with how I understood Jesus.  For example, the Genesis story.  I still believed that God created the world, but I did not believe he did that in a literal seven days some 4,000 years ago.  I could not reconcile the genocidal God of the Old Testament with Jesus.  And I wasn't sure I believed that homosexuality was a sin.  (So I transitioned to stance 4 and then 5).

This led to a huge crisis for me, because so much of what I believed about God was based around what I believed about the Bible.  I wasn't confident enough at the time to claim I didn't believe these things.  As I talked about them, I considered them doubts I was struggling with, but in retrospect, they weren't doubts; they were beliefs.  And I was too afraid that I would be ostracized from the rest of the church if I believed that way.  How can I believe in Jesus, but not believe everything the Bible says?  Am I really a Christian?  This was a dark time for me.

I can't speak toward others who hold to an authoritative interpretation of the Bible, but for me, what I was doing was equating the Bible with God.  I was idolizing it.  But the Bible is not God, it's the word of God; Jesus is God...and the Word of God (and with God).  At that same time, I started reading books by several authors (the ones that impacted me most were Shane Claiborne, N.T. Wright, Rob Bell, and Tony Campolo) who didn't necessarily believe everything the Bible says is literal.  This began to give me some comfort. These people are following Jesus, but don't believe homosexuality is a sin (Campolo) and don't necessarily believe in hell as eternal conscious torment (Bell) or that Jesus came not for us to go to Heaven when we die, but to start his Kingdom here and now (Wright, Claiborne).  These people articulated so well what I was thinking and believing (especially Claiborne and Wright) that I was comforted to know that there were other followers of Christ who thought the way I did.

A few more years went by, life happened, my family moved around a lot, and we were looking for a new church after a move.  What we found has been life-changing.  We go to a church where I have learned that I am not alone.  Other people believe the same things I do about God and have the same questions about the Bible.  And not only that, but people who do not believe the same things I do still recognize that I'm a follower of Jesus, and we commune, worship, serve, and follow Jesus together, knowing that we disagree about a lot, but we agree about the most important thing.

Now, I am comfortable claiming that I land on stance 3.  I do not believe that homosexuality is a sin (and gay marriage should be legal.)  Knowing Jesus, having gay friends, and learning about the original language and context of the Bible has reinforced this.  I believe God would bless a committed monogamous marriage between two people regardless of what sex organs they have.

So, that's my journey. I've been at all but one of those stances.  I get it.  I know why you think the way you do.  So what are we to do?  Specifically those who believe homosexuality is a sin and those who believe it is not a sin.

I've seen three words used to debate for and against homosexuality, and they are NEVER helpful.  In addition to using these three words, we should avoid alluding to them.  They cause nothing but hurt, anger, and bitterness.

Faggot, Bigot, and Heretic.  

We obviously know "faggot" is an insult, a slur that should never be used; especially as the church.  People who agree with me, we should not call others "bigots" as most people who hold the opposing view are not. They are genuine in their understanding, and they didn't choose their stance, they learned it.  They just believe that way; maybe they will change some day as some of us did, maybe not.  People on the far right, don't call those of us who do not believe homosexuality is a sin "heretics".  We are still trying to follow Jesus as best as we know how, and this should be what unites us, not our differences.

The Sunday after the Supreme Court decision came down, we began at my church by singing together and then communing together.  Prior to taking communion, we recite the Apostle's Creed.  Despite our differences of opinion on homosexuality, the death penalty, war, method of baptism, we come together, worship together, and serve together, and that should be the response of the church.