Jim Andris, Facebook

Religion and Homosexuality

[Ed. note: This is one of two manuscripts for the radio show GayTalk on KADI in 1979 that I kept in my records.]

This is Jim Andris for Gaytalk. Today I'd like to discuss a subject that is of utmost importance to the gay community: does the Bible condemn homosexuality or homosexual acts as a sin? Anyone who has spoken out for gay rights knows that this question is a matter of sincere concern for many gays and straights alike.

Let me start by relating a story that happened to me a couple of years back. I was going through the various buildings at SIUE, where I teach, and announcing that the day was National Gay Blue Jeans Day, the one day a year when gay people wear blue jeans as a sign of their pride and self-affirmation. Many fascinating things happened to me that day, but the following encounter was perhaps the most intriguing.

I had gone up to a trio of young men and said, "Have you made friends with a gay person today?" I encountered my first overt hostility. One of the men introduced himself as brother Joe. He was dark, thin, and tall with a mustache, and it was quickly apparent that he believed that he had the truth and that it was different from my truth.

"Brother are you saved?" he asked. "Yes, I am," I replied. "You can't be saved until you renounce your sinful ways." A second guy, Ed, chimed in, "Repent of your evil ways and be saved." "But I have repented of my sins." "Do you read the Bible?" "Sometimes." "It says in the Bible that homosexuality is wrong; it's wrong to be effeminate." I said, "I don't believe that's in the Bible about being effeminate."

They hunted through their Bibles. Joe extended his Bible forcibly under my nose with his finger pointing to Galatians. He read a long list of sins. "I still don't hear anything about being effeminate." He pointed forcibly to the word "unclean". "Homosexuality is unclean," he says. "Well, I don't accept that. They continued to repeat their charges. They asked me if I was born again. I put my hand lightly on Joe's shoulder and said, "My friend, Christ says,'Judge not, lest ye be judged.'" He drew away from me and said, "You're not my friend."

I told him that was his problem. and that I didn't think that Christ would say
all those things. He replied with, "Well, you better repent, mister, that's all
I can say." Joe sat down and began to read his Bible. The other two men had
already given up on me. As I part, I say, "And you, my friend, had better stop preaching hatred in the name of Jesus."

A couple of hours later, this trio burst into my office. Joe clutched his Bible in one hand, and a piece of paper with Bible verses quoted on it in the other. I looked at the sheet of paper. It said, in big print: (Romans 1: 27) MEN BURNED WITH LUST FOR ONE ANOTHERl SO GOD GAVE THEM OVER TO A REPROBATE MIND! (1st Cor. 6: 9-10) (EFFEMINATE), AND (ABUSERS OF THEMSELVES WITH MANKIND) Galations (5: 19-21) Works of the Flesh I.E., LASCIVIOUSNESS means filthy, WANTONNESS (Sexually loose) (ACTS 3: 19) Repent! AND BE CONVERTED (To Jesus) Acts 2: 38"

Now Joe began to harangue me again. He pointed to the First Corinthians passage and at the word 'effeminate." I took the Bible in my hands and read the passage aloud. "I guess the Bible does mention effeminate," I admit, realizing that it was bad strategy to question these bigots literal knowledge of the Bible. They continued to press their scriptures on me. Finally I said, "Ok you guys, now I've listened to you. Are you going to listen to me?" Joe reluctantly agrees to listen.

I told them that I was saved, that God had reached down a hand and held me, and that I have felt the peace that passeth understanding. "God loves me and I know it i my heart, I concluded. "There's a lot of people, brother," Joe countered, "that God loves, who aren't going to enter the kingdom of heaven. We got into discussing whether the Bible was the word of God. I kept telling them that they shouldn't judge, and that I would pray for God to release them from their bigotry. We parted without agreement or understanding.

But the question remains for millions of people: What about those passages in the Bible that Joe quoted to me? Don't they prove that being gay or worse,
acting out your gay impulses, is a sin, according to the bible?

Well, Troy Perry, founder of the Metropolitain Community Church found himself in a similar situation to the one I was in. He and a group of homosexuals were doing informational marching in the downtown LA area in 1969 before anyone had heard of gay rights. They were passing out pamphlets to bystanders. I'd like to read you his report of an encounter with a woman on that day. This passage is taken from Perry's book, The Lord Is My Shepherd and He Knows I'm Gay.

I quote Troy Perry: [Ed. note: I had the book with me that night of the broadcast, but do not have it now.]

I think that it's worth analyzing Troy's answer to this lady. His strategy was basically very simple. He pointed out to her that she was using the Bible selectively and overlooking a lot of things that are condemned or condoned in one part or another of the bible, things that she would never dream of trying to enforce, such as women not speaking or slavery.

As an educator, I can't help but note that there is something immoral about using the Bible, or for that matter, using any book in this way. I'm,talking about a cognitive process that infects too many people. The way it works is a person starts out with ideas about what is right or wrong, ideas picked up from parents, friends, and other fallible sources. Then, in order to prove these ideas are right, the person looks around through various sources until they find a sentence or two which seems to support their preconceived notions, and say "Aha, I knew it all along."

Educators are trying to substitute a process of critical thought for this prejudicial way of operating. An educated person will real a whole book and evaluate its contents intelligently, even the Bible. An educated person will start reading with the assumption that he or she does not have the whole truth, and might even discover that some of his or her beilefs are mistaken.

An educated person will try to see every book, even the Bible, in its
social and historical context. I remember a very good sermon I heard in Portland

--- unfortunately a page is missing here, but the Biblical stories of Ruth and Naomi and of David and Jonathan were being discussed ---

But, some will say, those were stories about people of the same sex who loved each other in a non-sexual way. They would say that it is not clear what the
Bible meant when it says that David "exceeded" when he embraced Jonathan. But
I say that the Bible says nothing about the personal sexual relations of any two people who love each other. On the one hand, the Bible condemns any form of sexual excess, on the other hand, the Bible holds up both same sex and opposite sex love up as an admirable thing. The conclusion I draw is tqat the private affairs of Christians should be of no concern to other Christians. What's your opinion? Let us know.