Theology of Andrew: Homosexuality, the Shema, and the Anglican Communion

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Homosexuality, the Shema, and the Anglican Communion

I'm reading a book called "The Church in Transition: The Journey of Existing Churches into the Emerging Culture" by Tim Conder and it is really good. He brings up some great points about the captivity of the bible to systematic theology and other things.

However I've been thinking as I go on my perpetual journey for a denomination, what my views on Homosexuality are. I definately believe it is a sin and condemned in Romans, however I want to always remember that Christ is the center of everything. Colossians says he is 'the image of the invisible God'. So what does Jesus say when asked the Greatest Commandment? He replies that it is the Shema Yisrael, and says that it is to Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and that the second is like it to love your neighbor as yourself. And we all know in the story of the Good Samaritan which follows this shows that your neighbour is someone with a different religion (samaritan judaism and samaritan pentateuch) and someone who is unclean.

So we say as Christians two things. The Second greatest commandment is to love your neighbour. Then we have two other lesser commandments: 'judge not lest ye be judged' and the principle that practicing homosexuality behaviour is wrong.

So here's my question. Who has committed the greater sin? A Christian who hates and slanders homosexuals, or a homosexual who is practicing. In my opinion it is the Christian who hates and slanders homosexuals.

So while it is true that the Anglican Communion is splitting over whether or not to bless gay marriages (not even offer marriages, just blessings of them). It is strange how screwed up our priorities are. The conservatives reel on about the awfulness of homosexuals and how debased and sinful they are to the point that I would say it is hate and judgment to the point of sin.

Rob Whittaker - my hero - has written a genius paper on homosexuality and though he is against it, he writes in a very pastoral way that is amazing and very well done. He also taught me that heresy is not just lies, it can be either: 1) truth out of context, or 2) truth out of proportion. I feel like the over-zealous condemnation and rejection of homosexuals is guilty of the second definition of heresy.

So while I still believe that homosexual behaviour is wrong, I believe hatred for my neighbour is a greater sin.

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Quotes For Thought

"If baptism is the beginning of my life, and the day of regeneration is the first of days, it is obvious that the words spoken when I received the grace of adoption are more honorable than any spoken since....Through this confession I was made a child of God, I, who was His enemy for so long because of my sins. May I pass from this life to the Lord with this confession on my lips." - St. Basil the Great, On the Holy Spirit, par. 26.

"To know Jesus and Jesus crucified is the sum total of my philosophy." - St. Bernard of Clairvaux

"Oh the extraordinary goodness of God toward man? The just of the Old Testament thank God in the weariness of long years; but that which they obtained, by means of a long and heroic service pleasing to God, Jesus gives to you in the brief time span of an hour. Indeed, if you believe that Jesus Christ is the lord, and that God had raised him from the dead, you will be saved and you will be introduced into heaven by the same one who introduced the good thief." - St. Cyril of Jerusalem

"He made us to believe in Christ, who made for us a Christ on whom we believe. He makes in men the beginning and the completion of the faith in Jesus who made the man Jesus the beginner and finisher of faith" - St. Augustine

"Nor must we trust in holiness of origin, in forefathers, or in
the gifts of God which we enjoy. We must look to the Word alone and judge thereby. Those alone who truly embrace the Word will be as immovable forever as Mount Zion. They may be few in number and thoroughly despised by the world, as were Noah and his children. But God, through these few, preserved to man the truth of that promised mastery when he had not even room to set his foot upon the earth." - Bl. Martin Luther "Commentary on Genesis"