United Methodists and homosexuality: Spraying scriptural verses around proves nothing
A recent writer to the Montgomery Advertiser announced that “the Bible trumps anything in The Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church (aspects of which are under debate) …. While same-sex unions and ordination of gay clergy are not addressed directly in the Bible, the Bible does define marriage as only between one man and one woman.”
He then cites four slightly relevant scriptural references, but not their words, for the proposition, all of which verses are based on the first one, declaring Adam and Eve to be the first married couple. Never mind that the Bible also declares them to be the only man and woman on Earth, thereby eliminating all other choices.
If the Bible does so define marriage, how are we to understand the practice of multiple marriages (bigamy, today) and divorces permitted in the Old Testament?
The writer then announces that the Bible proscribes extramarital sex to be “immoral and sinful, including homosexual practice.” Adultery is not on the agenda for discussion in the UMC and is mentioned by him seemingly only for rhetorical purposes, for the writer has his sights set on homosexuality. For that proposition, he cites six more scriptural references, again without quoting the verses, half of which beg the question. They are the familiar, cherry-picked, ambiguous verses supposedly condemning homosexuality, but few readers seem to notice the reference is always to male homosexuality. And it all begins with one of the 613 Jewish laws in the Old Testament.
Leviticus 18:22 states: “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination,” for which sin, we are told two chapters later that the men involved are to be killed by fire, the usually forgotten part of that old proscription. For some 2,000 years thereafter, those words have encouraged and given cover to homophobes to attack gay and lesbian persons throughout the world. The church has followed suit and so have local, state, and national governments, following in its wake, until just recently. Governments in the West have slowly changed; Protestant churches are changing even more slowly.
Thus goes the public debate and the debate in the UMC on the subject of the role of homosexuals in the church. Despite this, it is possible to have a candid conversation on what was once called “the crime against nature,” even in the United Methodist Church, the latest of the mainstream Protestant denominations in which the matter has broken out.
Methodists, United Methodists since 1968, unlike the referenced writer above, do not have to choose between the Bible and the UMC Book of Discipline; the latter is based on the Bible, in particular the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth and may be found at www.cokesbury.com/book-of-discipline-book-of-resolutions-free-versions. As such, the Discipline is a 900-plus-page compilation of church policies, principles, and procedures, developed since the time of Anglican pastor John Wesley some 250 years ago. Its quadrennial publication provides the single source of statements constituting what it means to be a Methodist today and so is a handy reference point when issues are at stake and need debating. Over the history of Methodism, which is longer than that of the United States, such previous topics of debate have included the morality of slavery, the relevance of race as a dividing principle, the propriety of divorce, the role of women in the church, and more. Throughout, the arc of evolving, Bible-based principles has bent toward inclusion, as the Rev. Dr. Sam Parke puts it in a recent essay. Today, the issue underlying most of the present controversy is: To what extent should homosexuals enjoy full participation in the life of the UMC?
This is not a new or novel question to Methodists. The Discipline has long proclaimed that homosexuals are created in the image of God, just as the rest of us are, and as children of God are welcomed into our congregations and are not be mistreated or made the subject of hate and/or violence in any way. It is stated this way: “We affirm that all persons are individuals of sacred worth, created in the image of God. *** “[A]ll persons [are] … equally valuable in the sight of God. We therefore work toward societies in which each person’s value is recognized, maintained, and strengthened. *** We deplore acts of hate or violence against groups or persons based on race, color, national origin, ethnicity, age, gender, disability, status, economic condition, sexual orientation, gender identity, or religious affiliation” (pp. 113, 119, and 226 of the 2016 printed version).
However, the Discipline also states: “The practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching (despite the fact that Jesus never addressed himself to the matter). Therefore, self-avowed practicing homosexuals are not to be certified as candidates, ordained as ministers, or appointed to serve in the United Methodist Church” (p. 226). A self-avowed practicing homosexual is a person who openly acknowledges being a practicing homosexual to designated church officials. That strikes me as the UMC version of “don’t ask, don’t tell.”
It will be noted that the Book of Discipline is inconsistent in its treatment of homosexuals. (It also fails to cite Scriptural support for its present wording.) In its humane insistence that they are children of God and are of sacred worth, it fails to treat them as such. On the one hand, it affirms that homosexuals are created in the image of God and are to be treated as such, while, on the other hand, it denies them full participation in the life of the church, even if God calls one of them into the ministry, including the right to be married and the right of clergy to marry them. That’s how we used to treat other excluded groups. Who is to minister to a local UMC congregation of mostly homosexuals?
Despite even more verses that seemed to support slavery, the Methodist Church eventually found the way to condemn it, just as it overcame many fewer verses that seemed to deny full participation to persons of color, immigrants, the poor, and others. The UMC reached those conclusions not by denying what scripture says, but by interpreting it in ways consistent with modern scholarship and cultural trends, rejecting literalistic and dogmatic ways of reading ancient texts which are, at the very least, often ambiguous and mired in cultural practices and understandings that are no longer considered binding upon modern peoples. After all, God did not write or dictate the canonical books of the Old and New Testaments of the Protestant Christian Bible. He inspired mortal men to write as they did, but we do not have a single original text of what any of them wrote. We only have copies of copies of copies in Aramaic, Greek, Hebrew, and Latin, which have been translated into English — 17th century English in the case of the still popular King James Version. Since we cannot agree on the “original meaning” of the U.S. Constitution, the original text of which, less than three centuries old, we do have, why should we be surprised by disagreements over the meanings and implications of the languages of the Bible, translations of which in English now run into the hundreds?
That is why Methodists follow the wise counsel of Wesley who “believed that the living core of Christian faith was revealed in scripture, illuminated by tradition, vivified in personal experience, and confirmed by reason” (pp. 82-88), what we call the Wesley Quadrilateral, which informs our study of the meaning of Christianity.
In regard to the latter, “It is therefore expected of all who continue [in the faith] … that they should continue to evidence their desire of salvation, First: By doing no harm …. *** Secondly: By doing good …. *** Thirdly: By attending upon all the ordinances of God …” (pp. 78-80).
Can the contemporary UMC avoid doing harm with its present schizophrenic policy which gives cover to homophobes, in and out of the church, who attack homosexuals, verbally and physically? Can it do good with the policy? Indeed, can it fulfill the love commandments of Jesus by misusing isolated verses of scripture to continue to discriminate against the five percent of our population (about 18 million people!) who are not in the heterosexual mainstream of America?
They didn’t choose that status. God did. Anyone who has a problem with those children of his has a problem with God, not with them, or with those of us who think 2,000 years of rank, violence-generating prejudice is more than enough.
Dr. Jim Vickrey is a retired professor emeritus and lawyer, who came of age in Montgomery at Capitol Heights UMC, which split in the ‘60s over race, and who taught an adult Sunday School class at Frazer Memorial UMC, which recently joined the Free Methodist Church.
This article originally appeared on Montgomery Advertiser: UMC and homosexuality: Spraying scriptural verses proves nothing
