Embraced by God...

Romans 1:26-27: What big errs you have!

The debate: Does this text give us the origins of homosexuality? Has God abandoned queers and left them to a "debased mind?"

¹⁸For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of those who by their wickedness suppress the truth. ¹⁹For what can be known about God is plain to them, because....²⁰Ever since the creation of the world his eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things he has made. So they are without excuse; ²¹for though they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him....²³and they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling a mortal human being or birds or four-footed animals or reptiles.

²⁴Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the degrading of their bodies among themselves, ²⁵because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

²⁸And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind and to things that should not be done. ²⁹They were filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness, they are gossips, ³⁰slanderers, God-haters, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, rebellious toward parents, ³¹foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. ³²They know God’s decree, that those who practice such things deserve to die--yet they not only do them but even applaud others who practice them. (NRSV)

Deep thoughts: Paul’s theology is a hotly debated topic among scholars, for there is no consensus as to whether he should be characterized as a liberal, moderate or conservative. In Paul we meet a man of complex arguments, flawed theological speculations and more than a few shocking theological sound bites. From there we each try to understand Paul, the very human theologian, as best we can. Personally, I see Paul as a transitional figure—a theological genius to be sure but flawed, too (see side-bar: Paul’s tragic flaw). The reason Paul seems to be everyone’s theologian is that he was purposefully trying to "...become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some" (1 Corinthians 9:22b, NIV). As a transitional figure, Paul was a bridge to the future, not the future himself. Paul had too many theological flaws to be the future, but he can point us in its general direction.

In Romans, the key principle and pointer to the future was Paul’s insistence that we are put right with God—made Righteous—not through grandiose moral accomplishments but by faith. Paul, ever the complex theologian, put it this way: "Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand" (Romans 5:1-2a, NIV). This may sound complicated but it’s not—honest.

As stated, we become righteous by faith, not works. Faith involves a person somehow saying "YES!" to God’s active and saving presence in their life—it’s a relationship that blossoms from yes to yes, for the righteous live by faith (1:17). Works—trying to earn merit with God—fails, for nobody will get right with God by obeying the Law (3:20). Now righteousness isn’t connected to the Law (3:21), with the result that there is no fundamental difference between Jews and Gentiles, "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Jesus Christ" (3:22b-24, NIV).

As for our behavior, Paul says, "Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship....Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in brotherly love" (12:1, 9-10a, NIV). The lesson here and elsewhere in Paul’s theology is that even though good works will flow from our "YES!", they can never substitute for it, for God’s ultimate concern is to mold our souls, not to teach us "stupid human tricks" (cf., Ephesians 2:8-10).

The difficulty in understanding Romans 1:26-27 is that it’s just a small section of Paul’s bridge to the future, so our task is to see the whole bridge and beyond—to see his future that we are even now creating. On the one river bank is the Law, on the other, Christ is the end of the Law (Romans 10:4), and the bridge is the gospel of liberation. Paul wanted everyone to accept this gospel—the good news that one gets right with God by faith, not works—and the preaching of this gospel became his mission in life (Romans 1:14-16). The first eleven chapters in the book of Romans are Paul’s major presentation on this teaching.

The two verses we are specifically examining (1:26-27), are part of a large subsection in Paul’s argument that’s contained in chapters one through three. Paul’s theme in these three chapters is the universal need for God’s plan of salvation. Paul’s point is purposefully built on overstatements and it goes like this:

In the defense of queers, Romans 1:26-27 has been dealt with in a number of ways. First, scholars will point out that the context is that of a discussion of idolatry. From there some scholars argue that what is being condemned is limited to the idolatrous sexual acts that occurred within the religious rituals of fertility cults which were commonplace in the Greco-Roman world. Others go back to the argument that Paul was merely condemning some types of pederasty.

Also, it is often noted that Paul and the other New Testament writers’ viewpoints on sexual morality were derived without any consideration of sexual orientation, for this is a relatively recent advancement in our understanding of human sexuality. Thus, it can be demonstrated that despite Paul’s brilliance, he was largely speaking from an inaccurate data base, so regardless of what his words on the topic of homosexuality actually meant to his readers, they carry little weight for Christians today. Another approach is to argue that what this passage is condemning is all non-procreative sex—both as a leftover concern of tribal society as mentioned in our Leviticus discussion and as a reflection of Paul’s tragic flaw. Maybe I’m wrong, but in a world of six billion people the old tribal concern that everyone procreate little warriors isn’t terribly compelling. Finally, a number of scholars have questioned whether the vague Greek words in verse twenty-six actually refer to lesbianism or just heterosexual kink—it’s a grammatical toss up.

Frankly, I couldn’t care less which of all the above options are correct, because what I do know is the only valid interpretive options are those which align themselves with Paul’s major points in Romans and elsewhere about faith—and on that point I’ve already won. And I’ve won because there aren’t two sets of rules—one for queers and another for heterosexuals. If queers aren’t saved by faith, then nobody is saved by faith and we’re all still under the Law and haven’t a chance of being righteous, for no one will be declared righteous by obeying the Law (3:20). Everything in Paul’s theology has always been about coming under the righteousness of Jesus, not our own.

If queers must earn their way to heaven by first denouncing themselves as GLBT persons, then there would be a higher standard for queers than simply putting their faith in Jesus. And if this is so, then these additional steps can only mean that queers must do something extra in order to make up for something that was lacking in what Christ did for us on the cross. We know "doing something extra" doesn’t match up with conservative theology, but we’re asked to believe such nonsense out of a hatred of ourselves as queers.

The unbiblical fact of the matter is that our attackers would like us to believe that somehow the saving work of Christ on the cross is only sufficient for other people, not us. Against all this, we know we are of God, for "The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children" (8:16, NIV). So let us each walk with the Spirit, allowing others and ourselves the freedom to follow the light that we’ve been given. We can trust God to love each of us to "himself," for that’s God’s job.

Finally, Paul slams the point home, saying: "What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us?....Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies....For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (8:31-39, NIV).

Bottom line: After all is said and done, Romans 1:26-27 is just a theological sound bite needing a context. In the context of Romans, this sound bite is held in check by Paul’s teachings about the gospel, grace and faith. Regardless of whether Paul the flawed theologian understood the pro-queer implications of his major theological teachings doesn’t ultimately matter. What does matter is that from his many spiritual insights and our own the Church today is continually becoming more inclusive of all persons. From Paul we’ve learned the stunning truth that the Creator of the universe is also the lover of our souls. Whether queer or straight, our part is to say "YES!" And whether queer or straight, "...each of us will give an account of himself to God. Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another....As one who is in the Lord Jesus, I am fully convinced that nothing is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for him it is unclean....[because] everything that does not come from faith is sin" (Romans 14:12-23, NIV).