After posting twice recently about the nature of ‘facts’ and ethical argument (see #1 and #2) and in particular about the difficulty in moving from ‘is’ to ‘ought’, I noticed an article in Friday’s paper that underlines the importance of these issues again. ‘Straight and narrow’ by Katrina Fox is about an openly and proudly gay woman attending a Christian conference on dealing with sexual sin. In particular, she talks about a workshop she attended on dealing with homosexuality.
While, at one level, it was an article about her personal experience in attending the conference, the point of the article is quite clear: Fox wants us to know that people are born gay, and that this is a good thing. Homosexuality just is. She makes her point in a number of ways. Firstly, she raises the issue by talking about her experience in the workshop on homosexuality: (Ian Lind is the name of the man running the workshop.)
The workshop has drawn around 20 people. One couple is concerned about their son who came out as gay a year ago. “It’s there in your upbringing,” Lind asserts.
“If our mothers nurtured us and our fathers spent time with us, we wouldn’t have those issues.” Discussion ensues about whether a person is “born gay”.
While Lind is adamant this is not the case—despite various research studies identifying biological factors such as prenatal hormones and brain structure that may be related to sexual orientation—others in the room argue it doesn’t matter if people are born gay. “As Christians we shouldn’t be worried about this,” says one participant. “You can still be redeemed and choose to live a pure life.”
The big question is “Is someone ‘born gay’?” As the article goes on, Fox makes her case that people are born gay by pointing out that the two main speakers she heard—Ron Brookman and Ian Lind—both still struggle at times with same-sex attraction in spite of being happily married. Her point is then emphasised by talking about the experience of Anthony Venn-Brown:
But for those who leave ex-gay programs, unsuccessful in their quest to become straight, depression and suicide are common, according to Anthony Venn-Brown, a former Assemblies of God preacher, author of A Life of Unlearning and leader of the Freedom 2 B[e] organisation that offers support to gay and lesbian Christians. Venn-Brown went through several ex-gay programs before embracing his homosexuality and is adamant such programs don’t work. “You can’t recover from your sexual orientation,” he says.
In other words, the men who claim to have dealt with their homosexual orientation are still, in effect, gay, and the man who has embraced his orientation is the one who has grasped reality. Fox’s point at the end of the article? “I’m still gay”—by which she means that it’s an essential part of who she is, and the Christian desire to say that she’s ‘sinful’ or ‘broken’ is just plain ridiculous (although the point is made very cleverly by illustration, rather than by assertion).
How should we respond? Well, the first thing to notice is that the basic argument—that she ‘is’ gay and so should be free to act as a gay person—is not an argument I think she would make in other circumstances. What do I mean? Well, the thing that seems so obvious here—that ‘is’ should lead to ‘ought’—is not, in fact, obvious at all. For example, there is a lot of scientific evidence that biology plays a part in things like personality disorders (e.g. borderline personality), and we also know that there are many diseases which are genetic (e.g. muscular dystrophy). In both cases, if we followed the basic line of her argument, then we would argue that the the person with borderline personality just is, so they should be free to be as manipulative and as antisocial as they like. Or we would argue that the person with muscular dystrophy just is, so stop trying to cure the disease. I am not saying that homosexuality is exactly like either of these other things, but I am pointing out that Fox’s basic argument about her gayness is not an argument that she would accept in other circumstances.
So why does the ‘givenness’ of her gay identity hold such power in argument? Well, it’s because of a whole lot of other assumptions—like the assumption held by many in our society that what is natural (by which I mean occurring in nature) must be good (although the personality disorder argument shows that we don’t really believe this), and the assumption that the expression of sexuality is a fundamental human freedom that shouldn’t be denied. We could go on, but this will do for the moment. The point is that the ethical response to the data is not particularly determined by the data, but by the framework surrounding the data. 300 years ago, there wasn’t even a category called borderline personality disorder (but people certainly had it). Nor did we know that it could be at least partly (if not wholly) influenced by hereditary issues. But we thought what people did as a result of it was wrong. 300 years later, we are in possession of all of these facts, and we still think that the people who act antisocially because of their disorder are wrong. 300 years ago, we were aware of homosexuality, but not of the fact that it is influenced, to some extent, by hereditary characteristics, and we thought it was wrong. Today, we know that there is some hereditary influence, but how we think about it as a society has changed completely. It is now a perfectly normal and acceptable lifestyle. Our ethical understanding hasn’t changed because we know more ‘facts’, but because a range of very complex social circumstances (from the increased availability of pornography to the advertising value of sexuality; from multiculturalism to the idea that there is no morality) have lead certain parts of our world to make different decisions from the ones they used to make.
So why do people keep making the argument about what is? It’s because it works. In the face of the “it’s just what I am” argument, if Christians say that they think homosexual sexual practice is wrong, then they are denying the scientific data and calling into question another person’s right to be. And so Christians are easily ridiculed and sidelined. Secondly, because most people don’t think very hard ethically, the argument appears to work. If you and I share an ethical framework, we can move from ‘what is’ to what ‘ought to be’ without talking about all the shared assumptions and without even realizing that they are present. Thirdly, because the world keeps telling us that our ‘faith’ is a private reality, we are forced to keep arguing onto the ‘rational, scientific’ playing field. But the ‘rational, scientific’ playing field is largely biased against God because it believes that we can always understand the world without any reference to the God who created it. The result is that Christians are constantly encouraged to feel that they are denying science and personal freedom when they suggest that homosexual sexual practice is wrong. (Not to mention that rationalism is not as objective as it keeps pretending to be; because rational argument is so affected by presuppositions, it is, in fact, an almost infinitely flexible playing field while pretending to be hard and objective.)
How should we respond? Well firstly, Christians need to remember that in God’s created world, God has the right to tell us what right and wrong are. Morality isn’t a matter of pure rational speculation; it is a matter of revelation. Secondly, we need to understand that the world’s morality isn’t a matter of pure, rational speculation either. Many of the common arguments are deceptive. Thirdly, we need to remember that God’s revealed truth is not for our ill, but for our good. The God who sent his Son to die for us doesn’t ask us to obey him because he is a great killjoy, but because he loves us. And remember that God loves and enjoys what is good. He created sex. So don’t let people make you feel backward or nasty for trusting his revealed standard of morality. Trust in the goodness of God’s revelation. Fourthly, we need to acknowledge that there may be some biological component to some people’s struggle with homosexual sexual feelings (just like there may be a biological/hormonal component to someone’s anger problem). This means that in this particular area of godly living, some may have an ongoing struggle with temptation that may never leave them in this lifetime. We mustn’t make people feel like a failure because they struggle. But here is the point to hold our nerve: in our world in the absence of God, the avoidance of pain is basically the only ethical rational. Therefore, to say you need to persevere in something difficult is seen as being immoral. If we say that God has a certain standard of right and wrong, we will be attacked and God will be attacked as being immoral. But rather than giving in and accepting the world’s standard, we must encourage each other to be obedient in spite of our struggles, because that is where true joy and righteousness is found.
One post is obviously insufficient to examine all the issues, and I’m sure that you can think of other things that need to be said and explored on this issue. So please contribute.
Paul
this reminds me of an article reprinted in the Briefing over a decade ago – something along the lines of “I am a Christian – and I like taking other people’s things”.
Following the “is” to “ought” logic I wonder how long before, say, a convicted rapist or pedophile would use the “but this is my orientation” as justification for their actions.
Following on from Hamish,
This “logic” already is seeping into thinking in other areas.
First thing that came to my mind was the increasingly popular TV Show Dexter. Have never watched it (out of principle) – the premise is that a person with sociopathic tendencies can be tolerated/supported/defended/etc because the ends justifies the means.
Which is weird (on so many levels!) when you consider how socially unacceptable or rather how trendy and popular obescity is! “But I’m born this way” doesn’t hold water when airlines charge for an extra seat or the medical association demonstrates extreme prejudice by putting adverts on TV all the time telling us that being fat is evil. (well at least that is message being conveyed).
Overeating yourself to death is greedy, selfish, prideful and sin. So is overspending so is homosexuality! Why stop at verse 9 of 1 Corinthians 6 when verse 10 has so many more (common) birth defects
“nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God”
I know it over simplifies things, but I think the danger in confronting or dealing with this is to focus on the symptoms of sin without addressing the root cause?
Don’t get me wrong – it needs to be engaged – but not at expense of over emphasis or at the expense of excusing other forms of unrighteousness.
Hi Hamish and Albert,
Thanks heaps for your comments. Albert, I agree with you completely. My intent wasn’t to focus on homosexuality, it was more that this example arrived providentially so to speak. That is, I had posted twice on the subject of is-ought in the last week or so and then just came across the article on Friday which was a ‘real-world’ example of exactly the problem I was talking about. But it could have been anything.
In fact, I originally tried to write this post about two articles. This one about homosexuality and then Paul Sheehan’s review of Bettina Arndt’s new book called The Sex Diaries (http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/winning-war-with-bedroom-battles-20090301-8lh1.html?page=2). Unfortunately it became impossible in a reasonable space to deal with both. But here is an excerpt from Sheehan’s article:
The point is that here again it is the vagaries of what is that drives the ethical decision making. You should have some ethical ideas but as soon as they become too difficult, then abandon them for something else. Hidden in the argument is the idea that a high libido inherently deserves to be expressed and should not be repressed (the is and the ought again).
The problem is of course that this worldly way of thinking about what is right is so ubiquitous that it easily infects the thinking of many Christians. So thanks for the many other examples.
Grimmo
The interesting thing is that when I went through university and studied genetics, the head of the school at the time was not a Christian and yet he stated that the evidence for the ‘gay gene’ was very flimsy at best and he stated that a more rigourous study which was later done overturned the initial conclusions (I must confess I haven’t looked at the data myself and so am trusting the faithfulness of this non-Christian genetics lecturer)
The reaosn the subsequent study was not paraded across the front pages of newspapers was because it didn’t fit into the ‘world view’ that the pro-gay lobby wanted to put forward. An interetsing case of selection bias.
However I’m surprised that people put so much weight upon the genetic influence of ‘being gay’ because the flipside is that if you DON’T have the gene/chemical imbalance and identify yourself as ‘gay’ then you are living a lie. Are these people lying to themselves? Should they be allowed to identify themselves as ‘gay’? It seems to me there’s a lot of people trying to use data for their own agendas when it suits them.
Just to clarify, I do not want to trivialise the struggles that many people may face in homosexual temptations; my point is that the pro-gay lobby use data very selectively and we need to be careful when engaging with arguements.
I saw Arndt interviewed, and she seemed to deny what Sheehan says she says in his article. Which is to say, she was adamant that she was not advocating an affair, and that the overwhelming majority of people were against affairs as well.
James,
I think the point here is that while it may (or may not) be right to oppose “gay gene” idea in the name of good science, it’s completely missing the point to focus on it in any sort of Christian argument. The deeper problem isn’t data selection, but the assumptions used to interpret it.