On God, Jesus and gay marriage:

Most of the opposition to the extension of the basic civil right to marry to all people comes from so-called Christians. I hate to rain on the religious right’s parade, but their stance in these matters isn’t remotely Christian. Not in my interpretation-- and I’m a Christian too.

God made everything. God doesn’t make mistakes so he must have made the boundless diversity of living things on purpose-- including gay people.

So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. God blessed them… (Genesis 1:27 -28) God saw everything he had made and indeed it was very good.” (Genesis 1: 31)

Though the Bible doesn’t state specifically that God gave people free will, it is widely accepted that he did since Adam and Eve were able to disregard God’s warning about the fruit of the tree of knowledge. There are many credible and persuasive arguments against sexuality being a choice, but even if you believe it is, choice seems to be something God granted humans.

Who are we to judge another human?

The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery; and making her stand before all of them, they said to [Jesus] “Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” They said this to test him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” And once again he bent down and wrote on the ground. When they heard it, they went away one by one, beginning with the elders; and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus straightened up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, sir.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.” (John 8:3 - 11)

If it is the case that gay people are doing something against God’s law, which-- as we have seen-- is not for us to judge, intolerance and punishment through legal limits to their rights are not a Christian response.

Let us therefore no longer pass judgment on one another, but resolve instead never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of another. (Romans 14:10)

Would anyone who is not gay, but who is black or who lives with a disability or whatever other difference, want others in society to make laws that treat him or her differently?

In everything, do to others as you would have them do unto you. (Matthew 7:12)

What about laws that limit the rights of rich people? In a passage that is apparently subject to the selective amnesia of televangelists, George Bush and others, Jesus says to a man who tells him he has followed all the commandments, “You lack one thing; go and sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” (Mark 10:21) “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” (Mark 10:25)

Christianity was, of course, named for Jesus Christ. I understand that many people who are very excited about their faith wear t-shirts these days that read WWJD?—what would Jesus do? So, what did Jesus do when faced with people who weren’t perfect? Jesus kneeled down and washed sinners’ feet. He cared for lepers no one else would touch. He gave people like the adulterous woman another chance and a choice. No matter how imperfect he believed others to be, he gave them the benefit of the doubt. He didn’t just tolerate them, he didn’t just accept them, he loved them.

Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery; You shall not murder; You shall not steal; You shall not covet”; and any other commandment, are summed up in this word, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law. (Romans 13.8 -10)

Should we grant all people in our society the same rights under the law? WWJD?

It is unlikely that the Bible is the unmodified word of God. It was written over centuries by many different authors in 4 different languages. The parts of the Bible as we know it were chosen and “stabilized” in a process of canonization that took place over the course of more than 6 centuries in various cultures and denominations across the world. (Until they were stabilized, the content was “flexible” or changing.) There is no original manuscript. Among the surviving ancient documents there are differences ranging from probable “typos” to substantive differences which change the meaning of passages. Scholars have to make decisions about what was meant by the original authors. And then there is the translation from ancient Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek and Latin. Words and expressions don’t always translate directly from language to language (hence the expression “lost in translation”). Our understanding of how meanings have changed over time is still developing—therefore every new translation attributes new meanings. There is almost certainly cultural, worldly influence lent by the individuals who put the word on paper, or rewrote or printed it, or included or excluded it from the canon, or translated it. How else can God’s supposed endorsement of slavery be explained? That is only one example of many Biblical ideas we find difficult to reconcile with even a conservative interpretation of our current values. (Essay “The Canons of the Bible”, The New Oxford Annotated Bible, NRSV, 2001, page 453)

We can’t know exactly what was meant by the authors of the Bible as we know it never mind what was meant by God himself. I think we can understand the spirit of the book (and therefore the Word), however. The Bible is allegory and parable, meant to teach us broad brush lessons. Is The Boy Who Cried Wolf applicable only to sheep herders? We are looking for the moral of the story, not the details. (What is it they say about the details?) To me the spirit of Jesus’ story is beyond laws or rules or exhortations to sin no more. It’s in the way he treated the sinners. And be assured, we are all sinners. Jesus, Prince of Heaven and Earth, got down on his knees and washed their feet.

Maybe gay people are sinners (why should they be different from anyone else?). That is for God to decide. If we are really Christian, here on Earth, we should do as Jesus did and taught: judge not, treat others as you expect to be treated, love your neighbor as yourself.


Source: The New Oxford Annotated Bible, New Revised Standard Version, 2001

On civil unions for everyone:

In Turkey, in many ways a more truly secular society than the U.S., marriage is a civil ceremony for everyone. The legal ceremony-- which is very brief and to the point, consists of: the couple stating their intention to be joined legally; the entering of the event into the record books of the municipality with the signatures of the couple, the official and 2 witnesses; and, occasionally, a short speech on the importance of marriage—is carried out by a government official usually at a party that resembles an American wedding reception. Those who wish to have an Imam (or minister or priest) sanction the marriage, seek one out separately. For some people the official ceremony is the “real” wedding and for others the religious one is most important-- that’s up to the couple and their families. The state sidesteps the issue, as it should, by not allowing religious leaders to be vested with powers of the state. Or, more accurately, it preempts it. In a truly secular society, this never becomes an issue in the first place.

That we have such trouble in the U.S. with the separation of church and state is largely an accident of history. Clearly our founders meant us to have a secular state. Because it was born of a more religious state, colonized by Christians, organized in its early days around churches, and made strong through public education that was-- for much of its history-- religious, the U.S. has out of habit, and sometimes political will, taken on certain characteristics of a religious state (In God we trust).

It is not, I would argue, an accident of history that we have a pluralistic society. It is, instead, the nature of America to welcome citizens of all kinds. The assertion of our Declaration of Independence that all (men) are created equal permeates our national self-image. Before there was even a democracy here, pilgrims came seeking freedom. “Give me your tired, your poor, yearning to breathe free,” the statue of liberty beckons. Our Constitution’s dictate of separation of church and state implies that we are open to being a home to people of all faiths.

Our citizens subscribe to many different religions or to no religion at all. They have many different styles of life and, under our Constitution, they are free to choose what they do privately. Even if you don’t believe this is a secular democracy by doctrine, certainly it is one de facto by virtue of our diverse population.

Now some citizens want to ammend our secular Constitution to deny others the right to marry based on religious ideas that aren't common to all. If we want to keep our democracy from flying apart, we need to affirm that it is a secular one. We should take a lesson from Turkey. We should make church and state truly separate by making civil union and religious marriage separate.