What did logic ever do to Gene Robinson to make him abuse it so? Gene, if you'll recall, was the Episcopalians first openly gay bishop. We've mentioned his utter lack of coherent thought in prior posts like this one. From this article in CNS, it looks like he's still pushing the idea of "gay Christianity" (whatever that means). This time, he's talking about St. Paul's words in Romans:
Wherefore, God gave them up to the desires of their heart, unto uncleanness: to dishonour their own bodies among themselves. Who changed the truth of God into a lie and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen. For this cause, God delivered them up to shameful affections. For their women have changed the natural use into that use which is against nature. And, in like manner, the men also, leaving the natural use of the women, have burned in their lusts, one towards another: men with men, working that which is filthy and receiving in themselves the recompense which was due to their error. And as they liked not to have God in their knowledge, God delivered them up to a reprobate sense, to do those things which are not convenient.
Romans 1:24-28
According to Gene, everybody who has ever read this passage in the history of Christianity up until now has had it all wrong. Paul isn't condemning homosexuality except when it's practiced by heterosexuals.
“We have to understand that the notion of a homosexual sexual orientation is a notion that’s only about 125 years old," Bishop Robinson told CNSNews.com. "That is to say, St. Paul was talking about people that he understood to be heterosexual engaging in same-sex acts. It never occurred to anyone in ancient times that a certain minority of us would be born being affectionally oriented to people of the same sex.”
Where is that in the text? Nowhere, of course. Gene is relying on this idea of "orientation" to somehow make a whole new category of non-culpability for sin. It sounds a bit like a case of Immaculate Corruption. Does the same go for every other sin? After all, Paul himself sure seemed to struggle with some sinful orientations of some kind:
For I do not that good which I will: but the evil which I hate, that I do. If then I do that which I will not, I consent to the law, that it is good. Now then it is no more I that do it: but sin that dwells in me. For I know that there dwells not in me, that is to say, in my flesh, that which is good. For to will is present with me: but to accomplish that which is good, I find not. For the good which I will, I do not: but the evil which I will not, that I do.
Romans 7:15-19
Not to mention that Jews seem to have some concept of homosexuality in general:
You shall not lie with mankind as with womankind: because it is an abomination.
Leviticus 18:22
But maybe Gene addresses this later:
“The other thing about St. Paul,” Robinson said, “is that he was also speaking out against a practice known to him and both the Roman and the Greek world, and would have been known in the Palestinian culture there of an older man taking a younger boy under his wing, using him sexually, and so on. No one’s—that’s child abuse. No one is arguing for that today. We would all be against that. We would all agree with St. Paul on that.”
No, instead he's chosen to change the subject completely. First, Paul was talking about heterosexuals performing homosexual acts. Now, he's talking about child abuse. Which is it? Or perhaps the better question- Where the hell is Robinson getting this crap?
“So the real question when you look at scripture is, ‘What did it mean to the person who wrote it?’” said Bishop Robinson. “’What did it mean for the audience to whom it was written?’
I'm pretty sure it meant what Paul said it meant in the context of his being a Jew familiar with such condemnations and writing to an audience living in a culture with rampant homosexuality. Read up on Nero and Sporus if you doubt this.
And only then can we ask, ‘Is it eternally binding?’ And in this case, I would say, the things that St. Paul was against, I’m against, too.” Robinson added, “The question is, are there any answers there for what we’re asking today, which is the rightfulness of faithful, monogamous, lifelong-intentioned relationships between people of the same sex, and the Bible simply does not address that.”
Translation: "I'm Gene Robinson, and I'm gay. Since I can't possibly be wrong, there's no way what Paul said can pertain to me."
CNSNews.com asked the follow-up question, “So you would say then that St. Paul is incorrect in this passage?”
Bishop Robinson said, “No. I think St. Paul was absolutely correct in his own context given what he knew, and given the behavior which he was describing. The questions we’re asking today are about a completely different set of circumstances.”
More like in Gene's own context.
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