I wish I had started this on Saturday, because I’m already losing some of the detail to the corners of my mind that memory has abandoned. Demands of a full Sunday and sick toddlers, though, trump blogging.

On Saturday, Heartland Presbytery met in a called meeting to consider proposed amendments to the shared polity that structures how we are church together, the Book of Order, as well as to ratify ecumenical agreements for our denomination. In the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the General Assembly receives recommendations for such amendments through an overture process, and if it deems the amendments commendable, they are sent to the Presbyteries for consideration. If a majority of the Presbyteries agree to the changes, they become part of the Book of Order.

Collectively, Heartland Presbytery voted on 10 amendments Saturday, and four ecumenical agreements (a collective agreement on the Sacrament of Baptism with the Roman Catholic Church, some shared ministry with the Episcopal Church, and full covenantal relationship with the Moravian Church and the Korean Presbyterian Church in America). A summary of our presbytery’s meeting was helpfully prepared by our stated clerk (pdf).

For the most part, there was little debate over most of the business before us. The ecumenical agreements were discussed with only one person rising to the floor–to mention that she was baptized in the Moravian church and was well pleased we were moving to recognize our common ministry. We had some discussion about the potential ramifications of two different amendments pertaining to Certified Christian Educators. A proposal to clarify Book of Discipline language so that accusers cannot veto Alternative Forms of Resolution was challenged, and there was some discussion about the suggestion to require a public profession of faith for new members in the context of worship. Generally, though, all of this was amicable, and as expected. (For Presbygeeks out there, at the end of the day, and not including the matter below, Heartland Presbytery voted to ratify all of the proposed amendments except 08A, 08F and 08I. You can see all the proposed amendments at the special page on the PCUSA website.)

The real debate, as expected perhaps, when we turned to the amendment that would modify that portion of the Book of Order that contains the so-called “fidelity and chasity” clause in G-6.0106b:

Those who are called to office in the church are to lead a life in obedience to Scripture and in conformity to the historic confessional standards of the church. Among these standards is the requirement to live either in fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman (W-4.9001), or chastity in singleness. Persons refusing to repent of any self-acknowledged practice which the confessions call sin shall not be ordained and/or installed as deacons, elders, or ministers of the Word and Sacrament.

The new language proposed by amendment 08-B would replace all of the above with the following:

Those who are called to ordained office in the church, by their assent to the constitutional questions for ordination and installation (W-4.4003), pledge themselves to live lives obedient to Jesus Christ the Head of the Church, striving to follow where he leads through the witness of the Scriptures, and to understand the Scriptures through the instruction of the Confessions. In so doing, they declare their fidelity to the standards of the Church. Each governing body charged with examination for ordination and/or installation (G-14.0240 and G-14.0450) establishes the candidate’s sincere efforts to adhere to these standards.”

Heartland voted to pass this change by a vote of 127-90, and if a majority of Presbyteries (87) vote likewise, it will become the new standard. I strongly favor this new language, for a number of reasons. Had I had the opportunity to speak in debate on the floor (I was in line, but the vote was brought before I could speak), here’s roughly what I would have said on the floor:

I want to share three of the reasons, among others, that I support this amendment. The first is theological. When I was a teenager, involved in youth ministry in my Presbytery and becoming familiar with how the church engages in all sorts of controversies, I could hear from every quarter “theology matters!” And it really, truly does. The current G-6.0106 advances bad theology, and particularly a theology that fails to articulate that our obedience is to Jesus Christ the Head of the Church. It is bad theology to pledge to live our lives in obedience to Scripture. We pledge ourselves to God, to Christ Jesus the living Word as testified to us through Holy Scripture. This amendment corrects that mistake, and in itself makes this section of our Constitution much stronger.

The second is personal. Two fellow friends of mine as a teenager, likewise engaged in youth ministry, had the same call to ministry I had. They had more gifts for it, and both are lesbian. One endured much pain and suffering and somehow, by the grace of God, is now a PCUSA minister, working for Presbyterian Welcome to advance the cause of inclusion in the church. The other, the sister of an esteemed, former minister member of this Presbytery, has abandoned the church and the faith that she sensed abandoned her. These capable, called women make me think of my own daughters, now two-and-a-half  years old. Should, as they grow older and find their faith nurtured in the church, they hear the call of God and the church to ordained leadership someday, and should God have made one or both of them a lesbian, I would find it unjust for there to be a formal bar for an ordanining body to consider their gifts for leadership. So I think of my more capable peers; I think of my daughters; I think of the sons and daughters of those in this sanctuary. This singling out of a single class of ostensible sins as a bar to ordained office makes little theological sense to those of us who claim the Protestant and Reformed mantle.

Which leads to my third reason: I believe that God is working in our church and that, if we listen to the Holy Spirit, that now is the time for us to end this practice, and to consider that our Gay and Lesbian brothers and sisters might well be just the people God is calling to lead us and our congregations.

That would have been, more or less, what I would have said in my allotted two minutes. Nothing particularly novel or groundbreaking, and in some ways characteristic of much of what was said by proponents of the amendment. Many who lined up to speak did so by appealing to personal stories. The reason for this, I believe, is that it is the personal relationships that often cause those who strongly argue for the sinfulness of homosexuality and/or homosexual activity to rethink their position. And accordingly those who rise to debate for their two minutes often talk about their brother, or their cousin, or their friends, or their children. This is not to say that there aren’t solid theological, biblical, ecclesiastical, and missional reasons for holding a more inclusive view on this matter, but for many who are opposed, it is the fact that one’s loved ones are gay that gets them rethinking the whole “homosexuality is mainly a choice” meme.

But what struck me on Saturday, and what I wanted to blog about, was the tenor of the voices opposing the amendment. I’m not really interested in the one or two particularly vile remarks (such as the one painting Kansas City’s First Friday celebrations as a locus of homosexual debauchery), and concentrate on the rest, because I think these other remarks have more merit to them, and I empathize with all who are wrestling with this, even if we do not agree on these positions we passionately hold.

When these other voices spoke against the amendment, it seemed to me that they revealed more about what they thought we on the other side assumed about them. Their arguments often started with apology for their position. So, for instance, many started with a claim that their position was not about hating Gays and Lesbians, that they all felt that Gays and Lesbians were welcome in their churches, that this was about a higher standard for ordained officers.

Perhaps this was in reaction to the opposition’s first speaker, but this litany of apology struck me. I’ve never thought, for most who hold a view similar to those who resist broadening the rights of ordained office to GLBT folk, that hatred or flat denial of basic Christian love and charity for them was involved. Perhaps in some instances fear (or more to the point revulsion of the idea of the particular sexual acts involved). But not hatred. So, I wanted to just state that for the record. I know that many conservative Presbyterians are more motivated by their understanding of what they think Scripture lays out for human sexuality and church leadership (even though, after long study, much prayer, and I would argue an equal reverence for God, I come to a strongly different conclusion). I mourn that they don’t believe that we, on this side, think that they are motivated by the best impulses of Christian faith. I think they are; I just think they are wrong, and that their error has hurt scores of people in the process.

This goes both ways, of course: I also mourn that their side too often cannot call my view a biblical one, or a faithful one, or a Christian one, or somehow diminish the notion that I am coming to it with all the effort to listen to God’s desire for me, for the church, for the world that I can muster.

There were other highlights of the opposition arguments that I could highlight. For instance: the claim that a biblical sexual ethic brings one to wholeness of life in a way a secular sexual ethic cannot (which assumes, falsely, that those who support GLBT rights have loose sexual ethics simply because we think that GLBT’s are being ontologically discriminated against in many so called “biblical sexual ethics,” and also assumes, again falsely, that our sexual ethics are not biblically based). Or the argument that this is about breaking down all rules, all guidelines, and that the passage of this might as well mean no ethics at all (which is just hyperbolic on its face).

In general, I respected the debate and was proud of many of the participants, on both sides of the matter. I am glad that Heartland Presbytery voted for better theological standards and the removal of this barrier to Gays and Lesbians holding ordained office. May the rest of the Church continue to listen for the will of Christ as it deliberates..

The debate, I think, will be over whether sexual orientation is more like skin color or more like Parkinson’s disease. We are coming to understand more and more each year that sexual orientation–all of it, yours, mine, whether it be towards a member of the opposite or same sex–has some genetic foundation. The question then is what to do about it. For years, religious groups that argued against same sex practice said it was fundamentally a choice; now many of them are recognizing that in fact orientation (and the drives that stem from it) are more deeply rooted than that.

This simple fact, of course, must impact biblical interpretation, and should in theory change the way we argue over the matter. (I’ll point you, once again, to Kim Frabricius’ exposition entitled Twelve Propositions on Same-Sex Relationships and the Church)

But for those of us who argue for more inclusive positions for our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters, we can’t assume that because we had that matter right we’ll win the day. Some are going to argue that we ought to use various therapies to remove homosexuality from the human condition. In fact, some are even beginning to make that argument today. Here is Roman Catholic priest Rev. Joseph Fessio, editor of Ignatius Press, Pope Benedict XVI’s U.S. publisher:

“Same-sex activity is considered disordered,” Fessio said. “If there are ways of detecting diseases or disorders of children in the womb, and a way of treating them that respected the dignity of the child and mother, it would be a wonderful advancement of science.” (from an AP Article linked at chicagotribune.com, free registration required)

Fessio is commenting on a recent article by Dr. Albert Mohler, the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, who raised these sorts of questions on his blog (entitled Is Your Baby Gay? What If You Could Know? What If You Could Do Something About It?).

Mohler is clear that he himself is dead set against abortion or gene therapy to reverse orientation (of course, he thinks liberals wouldn’t be so against it), but would consider perinatal hormone treatment if it would do the trick. Here are his ten points to end his essay:

Christians who are committed to think in genuinely Christian terms should think carefully about these points:

1. There is, as of now, no incontrovertible or widely accepted proof that any biological basis for sexual orientation exists.

2. Nevertheless, the direction of the research points in this direction. Research into the sexual orientation of sheep and other animals, as well as human studies, points to some level of biological causation for sexual orientation in at least some individuals.

3. Given the consequences of the Fall and the effects of human sin, we should not be surprised that such a causation or link is found. After all, the human genetic structure, along with every other aspect of creation, shows the pernicious effects of the Fall and of God’s judgment.

4. The biblical condemnation of all homosexual behaviors would not be compromised or mitigated in the least by such a discovery. The discovery of a biological factor would not change the Bible’s moral verdict on homosexual behavior.

5. The discovery of a biological basis for homosexuality would be of great pastoral significance, allowing for a greater understanding of why certain persons struggle with these particular sexual temptations.

6. The biblical basis for establishing the dignity of all persons — the fact that all humans are made in God’s image — reminds us that this means all persons, including those who may be marked by a predisposition toward homosexuality. For the sake of clarity, we must insist at all times that all persons — whether identified as heterosexual, homosexual, lesbian, transsexual, transgendered, bisexual, or whatever — are equally made in the image of God.

7. Thus, we will gladly contend for the right to life of all persons, born and unborn, whatever their sexual orientation. We must fight against the idea of aborting fetuses or human embryos identified as homosexual in orientation.

8. If a biological basis is found, and if a prenatal test is then developed, and if a successful treatment to reverse the sexual orientation to heterosexual is ever developed, we would support its use as we should unapologetically support the use of any appropriate means to avoid sexual temptation and the inevitable effects of sin.

9. We must stop confusing the issues of moral responsibility and moral choice. We are all responsible for our sexual orientation, but that does not mean that we freely and consciously choose that orientation. We sin against homosexuals by insisting that sexual temptation and attraction are predominately chosen. We do not always (or even generally) choose our temptations. Nevertheless, we are absolutely responsible for what we do with sinful temptations, whatever our so-called sexual orientation.

10. Christians must be very careful not to claim that science can never prove a biological basis for sexual orientation. We can and must insist that no scientific finding can change the basic sinfulness of all homosexual behavior. The general trend of the research points to at least some biological factors behind sexual attraction, gender identity, and sexual orientation. This does not alter God’s moral verdict on homosexual sin (or heterosexual sin, for that matter), but it does hold some promise that a deeper knowledge of homosexuality and its cause will allow for more effective ministries to those who struggle with this particular pattern of temptation. If such knowledge should ever be discovered, we should embrace it and use it for the greater good of humanity and for the greater glory of God.

One fundamental appreciation and two fundamental objections. He’s right about remarking that all human beings are made in the imago dei and must be treated as such. That’s helpful. And he’s right that our ethical landscape is about to be challenged with the new gene detection and treatment options on the horizon. We need more work done in this area.

But the rest of the argument isn’t consistent with that. Are we going to treat all of our orientation more like skin color or like a disease? Is our sexuality deeply something about who we are? The problem with this argument is that it isn’t consistent: if orientation has biological roots, the moral options for appropriate exercise of practices related to that orientation must be fairly offered. You can’t say that there is a morally appropriate route for fulfilling your God-given sexuality if you are straight, but not if you aren’t. The moral rules must apply equally; the must be able to be universalized. But Mohler falls into the argument that we mustn’t do that. And he does so because he falls back on an assumption of biblical condemnation of homosexual practice that is actually debatable. (Again, see above Kim Fabricius). Far better would be an extension of the biblical sexual mores towards homosexual partners, blessing unions and promoting monogamy among faithful couples and their growth into productive, mutually caring families. This would be to universalize the biblical teaching on human sexuality in a way that recognizes that the biblical authors didn’t write about same-sex relationships as we know them, but condemn what we all (should) condemn: gang-rape, pederasty, etc…

Second, this idea of treating away an innate human condition like sexuality is repulsive. This was experimented with in human history before with disastrous effects. I recognize that Mohler is against gene therapy and abortion for this matter, but how long until the next guy pushes this line further toward the abyss?

For what its worth, if I have a gay or lesbian child, I’m going to love him or her and encourage him or her to have a full, meaningful, grace-filled life, including one hopes a lifetime of happiness with a loving partner.

Much to my dismay, my reservoir of blog posts-to-read has overflowed. To be honest, I have a pile in my office of really good posts-to-read from before the turning of the new year. I’m not sure I’ll get to them; they may be either pitched or filed away. We’ll see.

But today I read a very good entry I wanted to commend and pass along: this truly wonderful exposition by Kim Frabricius entitled Twelve Propositions on Same-Sex Relationships and the Church from back in January. Here are her first three propositions:

1. Let it be said at once that the question of same-sex relationships and the church is a question of truth before it is a question of morality or discipline. Is the church’s interpretation of scripture true? Is the church’s traditional teaching true? If they are not, then they have to go, otherwise the faith of the church becomes bad faith. As Milton said, “Custom without truth is but agedness of error.” One other thing in anticipation: Jesus said that the truth will make us free (John 8:32); Flannery O’Connor added that “the truth will make you odd.” But before we say anything more, we must know what we are saying it about. In most discussions on the issue of human sexuality we talk at each rather than with each other; in fact, we talk past each other.

2. I take it that homosexuality – and certainly the homosexuality I am talking about – is a given, not a chosen (a “life-style choice”); a disposition recognised, not adopted; a condition as “normal” as left-handedness – or heterosexuality (whether by nature or nurture is a moot but morally irrelevant point). I also assume an understanding of human sexuality that is not over-genitalised, where friendship, intimacy, and joy are as important as libido, and where sexual acts themselves are symbolic as well as somatic. Needless to say, the “Yuk” factor deployed in some polemics has no place in rational discussion, while the language of “disease” and “cure” is ignorant and repugnant. Fundamentally, homosexuality is about who you are, not what you do, let alone what you get up to in bed. This is a descriptive point. There is also a normative point: I am talking about relationships that are responsible, loving, and faithful, not promiscuous, exploitative, or episodic.

3. What about the Bible? This is the Protestant question. “The Bible says,” however, is a hopelessly inadequate and irresponsible answer. Nevertheless, we must certainly examine specific texts – and then (I submit) accept that they are universally condemnatory of homosexual practice. Arguments from silence – “Look at the relationship between David and Jonathan,” or, “Observe that Jesus did not condemn the centurion’s relationship with his servant” – are a sign of exegetical desperation. No, the Bible’s blanket Nein must simply be acknowledged. But Nein to what? For here is a fundamental hermeneutical axiom: “If Biblical texts on any social or moral topic are to be understood as God’s word for us today, two conditions at least must be satisfied. There must be a resemblance between the ancient and modern social situation or institution or practice or attitude sufficient for us to be able to say
that in some sense the text is talking about the same thing that we recognise today. And we must be able to demonstrate an underlying principle at work in the text which is consonant with biblical faith taken as a whole, and not contradicted by any subsequent experience or understanding” (Walter Houston).

I’d demur a bit about this last point, because the next several go on to show how, for most of the scant references cited, the Biblical material isn’t in fact saying a Nein to “homosexual practice” for various reasons. Kim’s point is that there are Neins being said, but to different things, really.

Nevertheless, this is a great read. Check it out. [...Ed Note: If you've got time, check out the comments too...]

Also, tangentially, I just worked through the Strategy Report adopted by the New Wineskins Association of Churches. I’ve got some comments that I might put into an upcoming post. I am trying to distance myself from the initial reaction to having my position repeatedly called unfaithful to the bible and then reading the authors of the report decry the arrogance of their interlocutors.  How does one react to that? How does one attempt to maintain a charitable and grace-offering relationship with fellow clergy and elders who willingly distort the theological convictions and views of others? Anyway, I’d encourage everyone to read that strategy report, remembering that it is also a rhetorical document.

I have a place in my heart for pastors and churches who are torn by their conscience to remain in our connectional body. There is likely a way to process their schism as faithfully as possible on both sides. (And yes, it is a schism). My greatest concern is with pastoral pensions and medical care…

On the other hand, I’m deeply wounded and ashamed by the tact many of them are taking in their argumentation; they ought be more honest with the true differences on both sides and what that means for the church. And I think that the language used here is simply inaccurate:

• such as with the case of the word ‘coersion’ that comes up with regard to our property trust clause in our Consitution which both defines our connectional system (we’re not congregationalist, nor truly hierarchical) and which defies the history of churches that voluntarily assented to the current constitution and its trust clause when we merged as a denomination in 1983;
• so too the purported arguments about the PUP as “changing” what is in fact a reaffirmation of historical Presbyterian practice (local examination with higher-governing oversight, acknowledging that the scruple issue muddies the waters);
• so too the language that the Trinity Report is “unscriptural” when it is in fact rooted in biblical hermeneutics and full of biblical citation, an exercise (not universally successful) of lifting up the biblical resources for thinking about the trinity while upholding the classical trinitarian formula “Father, Son and Holy Spirit.”

And there are others; those are just the ones heavy on my mind.

Why mention all this here? Well, this group, among others, argues that there is “clear teaching of scripture” on the homosexuality issue, among other things. This has been the recent trope, since most of them adopt Robert Gagnon‘s argument that this is in fact clear cut. But Fabricus is more on point.

That’s enough for the day. May all who read this have a grace-filled Lenten season…

An addendum to the last post: that reference, and many more helpful pieces on the subject of Same-Sex marriage, are included in what I think is one of the best readers on the issue: Andrew Sullivan’s Same-Sex Marriage: Pro & Con. Its a helpful collection of some of the strongest arguments on the subject, and a helpful resource.

I’d commend it, particularly given the fact that it marshals strong arguments on both sides, the author admits his own bias and position, and it is fairly balanced. You might get something out of it…

The question came up over in the comments at Mark Smith’s blog post on this subject about whether people are arguing that rearing children is the ONLY reason for marriage. Here is one argument that, in fact, argues that position. Maggie Gallager wrote this article “What Marriage is For” for the Weekly Standard (August 4-11, 2003). An excerpt:

Again, what is marriage for? Marriage is a virtually universal human institution….Not all of these marriage systems look like our own, which is rooted in a fusion of Greek, Roman, Jewish and Christian Culture. Yet everywhere, in isolated mountain valleys, parched deserts, jungle thickets, and broad plains, people have come up with some version of this thing called marriage. Why?

Because sex between men and women makes babies, thats why…

The problem with endorsing gay marriage is not that it would allow a handful of people to choose alternative family forms, but that it would require society at large to gut marriage of its central presumptions about family in order to accommodate a few adults’ desires.

The debate over same-sex marriage, then, is not some sideline discussion. It is the marriage debate. Either we win–or we lose the central meaning of marriage. The great threat unisex marriage poses to marriage as a social institution is not some distant or nearby slippery slope, it is an abyss at our feet. If we cannot explain why unisex marriage is, in itself, a disaster, we have already lost the marriage ideal.

Same-sex marriage would enshrine in law a public judgment that the desire of adults for families of choice outweighs the need of children for mothers and fathers. It would give sanction and approval to the creation of motherless or fatherless family as a deliberately chosen “good.” It would mean the law was neutral as to whether children had mothers and fathers. Motherless and fatherless families would be deemed just fine.

Same-sex marriage advocates are startlingly clear on this point. Marriage law, they repeatedly claim, has nothing to do with babies or procreation or getting mothers and fathers for children. In forcing the state legislature to create civil unions for gay couples, the high court of Vermont explicitly ruled that marriage in the state of Vermont has nothing to do with procreation. Evan Wolfson made the same point in Marriage and Same Sex Unions: “[I]sn’t having the law pretend there is only one family model that works (let alone exists) a lie?” He goes on to say that in law, “marriage is not just about procreation–indeed it is not necessarily about procreation at all.”

Wolfson is right that in the course of the sexual revolution the Supreme Court struck down many legal features designed to reinforce the connection of marriage to babies. The animus of elites (including legal elites) against the marriage idea is not brand new. It stretches back at least thirty years. That is part of the problem we face, part of the reason 40 percent of our children are growing up without their fathers.

It is also true, as gay-marriage advocates note, that we impose no fertility tests for marriage: Infertile and older couples marry, and not every fertile couple chooses procreation. But every marriage between a man and a woman is capable of giving any child they create or adopt a mother and a father. Every marriage between a man and a woman discourages either from creating fatherless children outside the marriage vow. In this sense, neither older married couples nor childless husbands and wives publicly challenge or dilute the core meaning of marriage. Even when a man marries an older woman and they do not adopt, his marriage helps protect children. How? His marriage means, if he keeps his vows, that he will not produce out-of-wedlock children.

Does marriage discriminate against gays and Lesbians? Formally speaking, no. There is no sexual-orientation tests for marriage; many gays and lesbians do choose to marry members of the opposite sex, and some of these unions succeed. Our laws do not require a person to marry the individual to whom he or she is erotically attracted, so long as he or she is willing to promise sexual fidelity, mutual caretaking, and shared parenting of any children of their marriage.

But marriage is unsuited to the wants and desires of many gays and lesbians, precisely because it is designed to bridge the male-female divide and sustain the idea that children need mothers and fathers. To make a marriage, what you need is a husband and a wife. Redefining marriage so that it suits gays and lesbians would require fundamentally changing our legal, public, and social conception of what marriage is in ways that threaten its core public purposes. …

She really doesn’t explain how expanding marriage to gays and lesbians so threatens her understanding of “its core public purposes,” but here Gallagher argues that the reason we have marriage is parenting. The threat, it seems, is to either argue for some other singular purpose for marriage or to argue for multiple purposes of marriage. The concerns she raises above do the former, arguing that marriage is really about something else. And she argues that, when you do that, you say implicitly that raising kids can happen anywhere.

She really doesn’t take up the position that Marriage is, both historically and theoretically conceived, on the one hand, and in practice today, on the other, a more complex institution than merely one for procreation marriage. She’d get closer if she modified this statement in way that doesn’t define it with the genders involved:

“Marriage is our attempt to reconcile and harmonize the erotic, social, and financial needs of [an individual] with the needs of their partner and their children.…”

As I’ve posted elsewhere, Augustine included the rearing of children as a good of marriage, along side the reigning in of sexual passions and the flourishing of the deepest of intimate friendship. I’d argue two things: people get married to have help in raising children, if they intend to have children. But also, people get married to fulfill their deepest desires for communion with another, and to experience the fullness of life that dedicating oneself to a single other offers. That transcends gender. That is why people get married, and the state has an interest in supporting that too. (In other words, the data supports not only that children do better in stable families, a bit better in traditional nuclear families but pretty good in other stable, committed family structures as well, and at the same time the data shows marriage has tangible benefits for the married individuals themselves while it also supports that marriage is better for the individuals that are married to each other; and the state has an interest in supporting both).

Gallagher argues that we allow men and women who can’t or won’t have children to marry because, well, if they *do* have children they’ll care for them in the social institution suited for it, and it discourages them from having children outside of that social institution. In some sense, any male-female marriage supports the idea of marriage as the place to rear children, even if the particular case doesn’t apply. Her concern is “motherless” and “fatherless” children. Missing is an argument about how unisex (her term) marriages-that-don’t-have-children negatively impact that problem. How does the fact that Fred and John are married and don’t plan to raise children impact, theoretically or practically, regardless of your feeling about it, the argument that children should be raised in so-called “nuclear” families? It really doesn’t. And I’m sorry, but her arguments for why the current status quo isn’t discriminatory don’t wash with me: they continue a trope that orientation is chosen and that denying your sexual orientation is necessary for both societal and individual well being. That doesn’t work. Just look at Ted Haggard as an example (the bogus fact that he was declared “completely heterosexual” recently aside).

In short, Gallagher also is arguing for an ideal of marriage that permits exceptions. That’s fine, but the other exceptions we’re talking about don’t diminish that ideal. The problem is with straight folk and their families: blessing gay folk’s unions won’t weaken straight folk, and in fact might strengthen the institution of marriage.

As for unisex couples that do want children and plan to raise them, I’m not so sure that that’s a bad thing for the children or the family. Either any children they also create would so be supported within their marriage vow, or they wouldn’t have children. Its functionally equivalent to her argument. We are saying “marriage is the best place to raise children” straight or gay. Often, its far better than the foster system. Lots of data available out there, and that’s perhaps a subject for another day’s post.

Toby, the Classical Presbyterian, points his readers to this interesting piece of news coming out of Washington State:

OLYMPIA, Wash. – An initiative filed by proponents of same-sex marriage would require heterosexual couples to have kids within three years or else have their marriage annulled.

Initiative 957 was filed by the Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance. That group was formed last summer after the state Supreme Court upheld Washington’s ban on same-sex marriage.

Under the initiative, marriage would be limited to men and women who are able to have children. Couples would be required to prove they can have children in order to get a marriage license, and if they did not have children within three years, their marriage would be subject to annulment.

All other marriages would be defined as “unrecognized” and people in those marriages would be ineligible to receive any marriage benefits.

“For many years, social conservatives have claimed that marriage exists solely for the purpose of procreation … The time has come for these conservatives to be dosed with their own medicine,” said WA-DOMA organizer Gregory Gadowin a printed statement. “If same-sex couples should be barred from marriage because they can not have children together, it follows that all couples who cannot or will not have children together should equally be barred from marriage.”

Supporters must gather more than 224,000 valid signatures by July 6 to put the initiative on the November ballot.

Opponents say the measure is another attack on traditional marriage, but supporters say the move is needed to have a discussion on the high court ruling. (emphasis added)

Toby calls this an “adventure in missing the point” but it seems to me that there is a very good point here (even if this is both a fruitless and misguided application of that point): if the argument is that marriage is reserved for heterosexual couples per se because marriage itself is for the raising of children, and if you hold to the logic of that point, you’d restrict marriage to those who are or in fact do bear and raise children. It’d be a requirement. You’d not allow sterile people to get married, or anyone who wasn’t planning on it. This is just being consistent with their argument.

Or, speaking just to this narrow issue, you speak of this requirement as an ideal, and then you open other people to the institution: the sterile, those not planning to have children, and perhaps even (gasp) gays and lesbians.

Those who are “defenders of traditional marriage” like to use this argument for why marriage is a heterosexual institution but don’t follow their logic all the way through. This proposed legislation makes them do that…

…Mark Smith, someone who advances a position as a supporter of gay rights, is really concerned with this legislation. His take here…

I’ve been busy with life: family mainly. For instance, this post has been interrupted no fewer than five times (diapers, dropped pacifiers, etc). But fear not. I’m planning a return to blogdom in the near future, likely next week.

In the meantime, I note with approbation that the Very Left Reverend has been reading the Gruntled Center‘s reflections on what Presbyterians should say about Homosexuals, marriage and same-sex unions, and VLR has been less than impressed. Go find out why. (More here and here) (Ed Note: VLR is no longer blogging at these links…)

VLR is concerned with a functional definition of family. I appreciate that tact, but even so, I find Gruntled’s arguments on their own weak. Particularly his latest effort to defend his statement that “Marriage is the complementary union of a man and a woman to make and raise children.” I’ve posted a bit on this “good” of marriage, and wonder why Beau isolates this “good” above the others in his “social ideal”. There doesn’t seem to be a good reason to do so, and his attempts to rationalize why we still let people who have no chance of having children marry anyway shows that this so called ideal is selectively applied. One could just as easily allow gays and lesbians to marry, like we might allow a sterile couple to marry, and still argue in some sense the positive social role of marriage for bearing and raising children. And in particular, I think this is both hyperbolic and wrong as a justification of keeping “marriage” for heterosexuals:

However, if all children were produced without marriage, society would disintegrate. And if no marriages produced children, society would end.

Please. Allowing gays and lesbians into the “social ideal” of marriage in itself does nothing to bring this apocalypse upon us…

Okay, back to my babies. More soon…

Via Andrew Sullivan, who links to a New Zealand paper:

The Conservative Jewish movement, the faith’s American-based middle ground between liberalism and orthodoxy, is nearing a leadership decision that seems likely to permit openly gay rabbis and same-sex unions.

The Rabbinical Assembly Committee on Jewish Law and Standards which last tackled the issue in 1992 meets in New York next week, its 25 members reviewing an issue that has already rent many Christian churches and simmers across Judaism.

“The way it looks, it will be decided on a more liberal understanding of the law,” Rabbi Irwin Kula, president of the National Jewish Centre for Learning and Leadership, told Reuters. “It would be a very big, big surprise if that’s not the case.”
…
A gay pride rally in Jerusalem this month met with stormy protests and finally unfolded in a small stadium under heavy security. But Israel’s highest court also has ruled that homosexuals who marry abroad may be registered as married in the country.

There are perhaps 6 million Jews in the United States, only about a third of them affiliated with a congregation. Of those who do attend synagogue 38 per cent are Reform, 33 per cent Conservative and 22 per cent Orthodox, according to one survey.

Rabbi Kula, author of Yearnings: Embracing the Sacred Messiness of Life, said the move toward liberalisation among Conservatives “is not something that came down from the top. It came from Jews in the pews … Jews who had homosexual children and wanted them to be rabbis.”

Rabbi Gerald Zelizer of Neve Shalom, a Conservative congregation in Metuchen, New Jersey, a former president of the Rabbinical Assembly who is a contributing columnist for USA Today, said in an essay in that newspaper this year that he backed the 1992 position but now had a different view.

“Conservative Judaism has always taught that we must upgrade our biblical understanding with new scientific knowledge. Contrary to the biblical assumption that gayness is a sinful choice, our best knowledge today indicates that it is as determined and irrevocable as blue or brown eyes …” he wrote.

Hermeneutics in action. I, for one, am glad to see this move. I’m looking forward to my PC(USA) getting it, someday, when we realize that, yes, God creates you with a sexual orientation (yes, sometimes on a sliding scale), and that God creates most of us to live out the fullness of our life in intimate relationship with another (though some of us, regardless of orientation, have no such desire and live celibate lives). When we as a church come to see that, then this matter about ordination will be simple. Then we can see how blessing same-sex couples to lasting, intimate, reciprocal relationships can be important, a responsibility, and a gift for the couple, for the culture, for the church. And how realizing this will not decimate our view of either God or the bible, any more than our rejection of slavery or the full inclusion of women in all teaching ministries of Christ’s church did. And how these, in fact, led to fruitful reappraisal and renewed appreciation for scripture, not less. So much so that almost all Presbyterians (of the PCUSA variety) now read the bible with new eyes and reject readings that support slavery or subjection of women. I’m still waiting on those PCA folk, but I’m not holding my breath…

While this move was prompted by “Jews in the Pews,” we too have our voices from the pews. Some people in the our pews object to this (see the comments, for instance, to the this comment in this thread over at the Classical Presbyterian‘s Blog):

I’ll speak bluntly. I am a person in the pew. I do not want to be affiliated with a denomination that ordains practicing gays. I do not want my children being taught that two men or two women living together in a “marital” relationship is not only o.k. but blessed. I don’t want to support church leaders who want to “re-imagine” God or spend their time thinking up new names for the Trinity. I don’t want to go to a women’s bible study on the book of Genesis and find out that it is about “voices that have been muted, if not outright silenced” (from the PCUSA website).

But this isn’t a universal, or even a majority view. (Not addressing either the reaction to the “re-imagining” conference, or this reader’s rejection of the denomination’s theological reflection on the full biblical revelation of the nature of the one triune God, or the rest) I think progressives are way out ahead on the issue of sexual orientation and the church, and the PCUSA moderates, like the Conservative Jews in this piece, realize that we’re talking about their children, their nieces and nephews, their brothers and sisters, and they don’t want them excluded from the fullness of life that God intends for them, nor from the fullness of service that God might be calling them toward in the Church.

And my prayer is that, three generations or so from now, most of my conservative brothers and sisters in the PCUSA (those who haven’t already gotten this) will see this like they now see women leadership. I think that will happen, and, frankly, I think that’s what they think will happen too, and it scares the crap out of them.

Our church is more Christlike because we’ve moved past abolition and women’s ordination, and we’ll be more Christlike when we achieve this one too. My two cents.