Response to A Question for Christians
Jim Babka on Dec 23rd 2008
Preamble: In order to understand this post, it is helpful to first read Jason Kuznicki’s post, “A Question for Christians.” This is an attempt to answer the very legitimate questions of a friend. But the brew of sex and religion can scald if spilled. I’m scared to write this for fear I’ll be misunderstood. Therefore I want to make it clear that my comments are specific, not broad. If you hear something I didn’t write or intend, and it’s not connected to this immediate context, that’s your baggage. By the way, I refer to Jason by his first name in this post because I consider him a friend, and he is a colleague.
Response: First and foremost, I once again quote Donald Miller…
In a recent radio interview, I was asked by the host, who did not consider himself a Christian, to defend Christianity. I told him that I couldn’t do it, and moreover, that I didn’t want to defend the term. He asked me if I was a Christian, and I told him yes. “Then why don’t you want to defend Christianity?” he asked, confused. I told him I know longer knew what the term meant. Of the hundreds of thousands of people listening to his show that day, some of them had terrible experiences with Christianity; they may have been yelled at by a teacher in a Christian school, abused by a minister, or browbeaten by a Christian parent. To them, the term Christianity meant something that no Christian I know would defend. By fortifying the term, I am only making them more and more angry. I won’t do it.
Second, I think Jason’s understanding that homosexuality is Biblically proscribed is accurate.
But the hatred for the sinner that he notes is not a failure of God, but of some people who may choose to call themselves Christians. In the Biblical account, God loved sinners so much that he sent his son to die for them! It bothers me, deeply, that Jason, and others, have experienced such treatment, and I’m sorry.
The Christians to whom Jason referred are probably people who aren’t living up to their principles. The wrong behavior he described is called shunning. Per 1Corinthians 5:11–13 it is WRONG to shun those who are NOT former members of the faith family. Shunning is reserved for extreme cases of “falling away from the faith,” as a last resort tool to save and win back the wayward brother or sister.
Third, Jason’s comparison between the restrictions on eating blood and homosexuality doesn’t work on two very technical levels, which, taken together, answers his question about the “legal fitness” of Christians eating non-kosher meats.
1) Paul addressed the eating of meat sacrificed to idols in I Corinthians 8, and explained that the prohibition was one of example, not law. He provided exceptions to the rule, but said to never, under any circumstance, do it in front of a brother who is convicted that such is wrong, and would, using your behavior as an excuse, stumble in his own faith. Christians are supposed to be their brother’s keeper.
A modern application of this “brother’s keeper principle” is alcoholic beverages. Some come to Christian faith as part of their recovery from substance abuse. I happen to have a friend who is in this position, and he thinks drinking to be a sin. For him, it is a sin. As I wrote in a recent post, there is a difference between sin and evil — sin is that which prevents me from seeing God.** But I wouldn’t drink in front of him, ever. But James H. can have his steak.
2) The kosher dietary laws were an attempt to codify the Hebrew law for practice. Like all interpretative schemes, they are derivative and not inspired. They are highly legalistic, and they are “extra-Biblical.” Legalism was, as DAR pointed out in the comments, one of the targets of Jesus. He was a “lawbreaker” by Pharisaical standards.
But the drinking of blood prohibition probably has a lot more to do with worshiping pagan, polytheistic deities than it does with the thoroughness of how one cooks their steak (God’s not commanding you to order well-done!). One can see the connection with the blood consumption ban because it is mentioned in virtually the same breath as “eating meat sacrificed to idols.”
Also, commenter Mark Olson correctly observed that the passage Jason quotes from Acts had a great deal to do with avoiding, “friction between Jew and Gentile populations within the Church.” And he’s right that this problem no longer exists. But other variations of it do. Cultures change over time, and the old saw that begins, “When in Rome…” comes to mind. The principle still applies.
Fourth, overlooked in discussions like this is the possibility that God wasn’t a failure at all and the Bible really isn’t confused. The Bible, if it is a collection of the words of God’s prophets, is merely describing how we can bring, both to our individual lives and the lives of those around us, beauty and joy. God did give us a will, and as much as anyone complains about how the manufacturing process occurred, I know few complainers who would prefer to be dead, and none who want to surrender their personal sovereignty.
I’m a libertarian, so I believe that if it doesn’t “pick my pocket, or break my leg,” then what you do with your life and property is not really my business. But that doesn’t mean a person is made happy, or makes others that they care about happy, by their actions. If I was invited to counsel a person who is struggling with some guilt or relational difficulty, I would counsel that they should choose what makes them and those they care about happy, as much as such a thing were possible. Maybe that’s what love is. The summation of the law, given by Jesus, seems relevant here. He said simply, “Love.” 1) Love God. 2) Love your neighbor as yourself.
Now, in the example of my friend the alcoholic, I can tell you that even his friends occasionally find him intolerant and overbearing. He’s on a crusade. No one should drink adult beverages, ever. But his life was truly a mess before, and like many with religious conversion experiences, he has a tendency to overcompensate. Hopefully, he grows out of it and arrives at balance. Returning to I Corinthians 8 Paul describes this overcompensating stage as “weakness.” But his weakness may indeed be so profound that my consumption of an alcoholic beverage could be harmful to him. Yes, that is “weak” indeed, and bully for you if you don’t have his issue. But because I care about his happiness, which he and I both suppose is attainable only through sobriety, I won’t simply say, “It’s my life, my body, I can do what I want to. Watch me drink this, friend.”
Which brings me to my fifth and final point, and it has to do with guilt. The Biblical position is that all of us have issues of some sort or another — we’re all sinners. That means if Jason is coming face to face with sanctimonious Christians, they are definitionally hypocrites who need a remedial course, from Jesus, about the dangers of judging. Fortunately, such a course is available in Matthew 7.
But continuing our example, research seems to indicate that alcoholics have predispositions to their condition — genetic (nature) AND atmospheric (nurture).
Thus, however our condition is derived, be it nature or nurture, we seem to have an almost “built-in” understanding of what is evil, what is ugly, what is unhealthy, what is good, what is still better, and what is best. Reaching up this ladder isn’t easy. But we seem compelled to try and climb it. The problem is that failure, particularly in the face of addiction, leads to guilt.
It is a logical error to suggest that anything that might be natural is necessarily beneficial, or even acceptable. And from a religious perspective, this failure-induced guilt begins a descent that is disconcerting.
Guilt leads to doubt. Doubt progresses to moral drift (deeper engagement in what ails us). Moral drift imposes even greater guilt, and that greater guilt leads to the frustration of apathy (what’s the point?). Apathy leads to idolatry — the new god to replace the old one. And that god just might be the very addiction we were fleeing.
Perhaps at this point we just simply blame God the Creator for the terrible mess we find ourselves in. He must be a “deadbeat dad” who left us in this slop.
Religious thought has much to do with guilt. It is popular these days to quip that religion imposes guilt, and that is almost certainly true. Yet guilt, which is part of the nervous system of our conscience, isn’t always a bad thing. Religious thought, for many, is the path to relief from the pain of guilt. And that makes sense because guilt oppresses a person in more ways than the narrow religious question we’ve just covered here.
In other words, I tend to suppose Biblical prohibitions make sense not as a way to kill our fun or confuse us. That’s why it’s called “the gospel.” The Good News is that it’s not some cosmic joke and God is sitting by laughing at our expense. And not following Biblical advice doesn’t make you a bad (in the moral sense) person. But we are finite beings who learn by limited experience. Being human is hard. Maybe the dead have something to tell us. Maybe the Biblical writers are pointing us to a seemingly counterintuitive satisfaction, joy, and beauty — the kind we can’t obtain by pursuing things by our own, necessarily limited, understanding.
End Note** - Regarding Sin vs. Evil . . .
Today’s church-going folks still don’t understand the difference between evil and sin, because they don’t understand the one-to-one connection between power-seeking and evil. This failure leads to many errors.
Evil is harm to your fellow man — a failure to follow the second Great Commandment to, “love your neighbor as you love yourself.” Coercion is necessarily a practice that violates this rule. Government power, used to make the culture more moral, is simply brow-beating backed by force — beyond the scope of what a government should be doing.
Sin is anything that blinds you to God. The Bible [as I understand it] is quite concerned with this matter of sin, and presents spiritual renewal by way of a relationship with the risen Jesus. That is the “Good News.”
Filed in The Belfry
Well, call me honored to have my thoughts used in a link here.
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First, my argument was not that that which is natural is necessarily good, just that it is natural; as in homosexuality is not something concocted by the hedonistic or sinful mind of man. And I realize you address that with the comparison to the alcoholic, but I also think that comparison confuses the extremism of one condition with the healthy practice of another. Any homosexual or heterosexual who went around humping anything that moved and actually had a disorder that made it nearly an addiction would certainly run the risk, if not guarantee themselves some unkind consequences. That’s the nature of nearly any addiction.
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To me, the big disconnect or dissonance comes in whenever we try to mix the idea of what it means to be free and what that means in the context of being religious and following the rules and regulations of the road. It strikes me that too often you get people who see freedom only in the context of their religious prohibitions. I’m much more inclined to see it in the way that J.S. Mill would have which is — that which causes no harm, regardless of its offensiveness, should be allowed.
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And finally, because I’ve written this post over the course of two hours, I’ve lost my train of thought, I’d ask the question: Is it still sin if the person has no religious belief?
just that it is natural; as in homosexuality is not something concocted by the hedonistic or sinful mind of man. And I realize you address that with the comparison to the alcoholic, but I also think that comparison confuses the extremism of one condition with the healthy practice of another. Any homosexual or heterosexual who went around humping anything that moved and actually had a disorder that made it nearly an addiction would certainly run the risk, if not guarantee themselves some unkind consequences. That’s the nature of nearly any addiction.
I think there are a lot of jokes that could be made here; but I’ll try to be serious. I’m pretty skeptical about the notion of a “sex addiction” or that a desire to “go round humping anything that moved” actually constitutes a disorder. This isn’t something I can say I’ve personally experienced. But it seems that a lot of younger men, probably those with the highest levels of testosterone, have the desire to spread their seed as wide and far as possible, if you understand what I mean. For heterosexual men, their desires are tempered in large part because of the consenting and more monogamous nature of women. But for that small % of men who by virtue of their “luck” manage to find themselves with opportunities to have as much sex with as many women, for instance athletes, rock stars, movie stars and whatnot, it’s an entirely “natural and normal” response to want to sow his seed as far and wide as possible with hundreds if not thousands of partners.
Now, it’s not physically healthy to do this. And it’s not emotionally healthy for women to be used in such a fashion. (Women by their nature tend NOT be be satisfied by promiscuous sex outside of relationships.) Being a realistic I see NO evidence of emotional harm whatsoever to the man in living a rock star life banging hundreds if not thousands of women. But I understand why a religious conservative would think this corrupts one’s soul.
Mr. Boggs wrote, “Is it still sin if the person has no religious belief?”
From my perspective the answer is no. That’s a symptom or consequence of sin. But please be clear by what I mean: Sin, once again, is not doing unethical or violent things. One can be moral and nice, but we’re all sinners — me included. And sin blinds us to God’s desire for relationship with us.
Yes, Jonathan, and that was my only point about the ill-effects of voluminous sex with everyone and anyone was the possible health issues that arise. I have no problem, other than maybe some jealousy, with the man who has the opportunity to have sex all the time and with some of the most attractive women. I guess I was trying to further rebut the argument about “just because it is natural doesn’t make it healthy” argument that I think gets used to defend the opposition or disapproval of homosexuality.
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As an aside, Jonathan, I was hunting for the Alexander Solzenhitsyn quote used in the article I asked you to read yeaserday and I came across a comment thread at the Gateway Pundit where you were taking on some Christian Nationist. You were only operating under the screen name “Jonathan” but as soon as I read your first comment I suspected it was you and when I clicked the hyperlink on your name, it took me to your blogger page.
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You are everywhere all the time. But you still lack omnipotence…2 out of 3 ain’t bad.
Jim, or Mr. Babka, (is there a reason everyone keeps referring to me as Mr.? ‘Cause I’m not entitled)
I’ve got to admit that most of you guys are so much better versed in most of the stuff you’re talking about that I’m never sure I truly understand what you’re all talking about. I just stand at the kitchen door and hope I recognize some of the food being cooked by the smell.
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I’m going to attempt to ask a question as though I understand what you’re saying. You believe that not having religious belief is a consequence of sin? Or you believe that your perspective (that it isn’t a sin if I have no religious belief) is a consequence of sin? Did that make sense?
Thanks Mark.
I definitely spend more time on the Internet than I should (I should spend more time working out, playing the guitar and doing other stuff); but I realize that going onto these discussion threads does make somewhat of a difference.
Even if folks disagree with me it helps to make them aware of what the arguments are.
Blogging non-anonymous, while at the same time being concerned about my public reputation also helps. I make sure I document my arguments carefully and I remain civil.
Mark, I started using Mr. (where I know it’s appropriate) because that’s the old convention, and one day, our resident oldster, Mr. Ridgely, reminded us that some people are still bothered by too much formality on the part of this younger generation ;-) But I’ll call you Mark, or whatever you prefer.
I don’t understand your second question, but the answer to your first question is Yes. Sin is that which blinds me to God, or makes me suspicious and distrusting of him.
The chief sin is idolatry, which is the worship of other gods. Other gods come in many shapes or sizes, and worship of them is not necessarily obvious.
For example, I hear that a Wall Street investor jumped out of a 21st story window a couple of weeks ago. I don’t know him, but the report I heard is that he said in his suicide note that part of the reason he jumped was the decline in the market. If that was true, and I’m suspicious that it is, then I would say that guy was serving the wrong god.
If we permit our sin to keep us from God because we’re suspicious we can’t live without it, then we have made a choice to worship another god as well. In part, that’s what I was getting at with addiction, but it goes for other things that might not necessarily be clinically-defined addictions either. Anyway, that choice would also be a sin.
Mr. Babka,
Does that mean that you would consider the practice of homosexuality to be worshipping a different God than the proper one?
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And I guess you’ll pardon me if I seem irreverent in asking this: A person can be in all ways a very humble, moral, altruistic person and if they happen to be a homosexual it means hellfire for eternity?
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And finally, since you have stated you’re a religious person (I think), why do you think other religious people who are so concerned about keeping gays from marrying because they don’t want the state condoning their behavior, are not all up in arms about the state issuing business licenses to businesses who will operate on the Sabbath? Isn’t keeping it holy one of the Big Ten? Or am I just being a nitpicker on that one?
You’re not an adult? Because if you are, you’re entitled to be referred to as such, especially by total strangers who should not presume to know you well enough to be on a first name basis with you. You may not agree with this principle now, but I assure you that when you’re old enough for the Senior PGA tour and 18 year old receptionists are being condescendingly ‘friendly’ to you as they say “The doctor will be with you in a few minutes, Mark,” you’ll understand my point.
Dear Mr. Ridgely,
As far as being an adult, you’d have to ask my wife, she thinks I’m just the oldest kid in the house. Call me new fashioned. Considering I’ve worked at private golf clubs for 19 years and have pretty much always referred to people by Mr. and Mrs. even when I couldn’t stand them and they did little to deserve respect, I guess I see the titles as window dressing rather than the glass that is the substance. But, since I am in Rome, I shall do as the romans do and I apologize if I have been too colloquial with other commenters or blog managers, I mean no disrespect.
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As far as what 18 year old receptionists do to me…as long as they wink so I know I still got it. Unless I’m at a urologists for prostrate issues or at a doctor for my ED treatment, then I suppose the cat’s out of the bag, huh?
Considering I’ve worked at private golf clubs for 19 years and have pretty much always referred to people by Mr. and Mrs. even when I couldn’t stand them and they did little to deserve respect, I guess I see the titles as window dressing rather than the glass that is the substance.
On a side note I love Caddyshack and bet you’ve seen plenty of “Judge Smailses” in your day.
Don’t worry, Mr. Boggs. I’m the only curmudgeon on this blog with that attitude. And trust me, unless you’re swimming in wealth, lead singer for a major rock band or staring in a new Hollywood blockbuster, that 18 year old will have decided you no longer have it (if you ever did) long before you start getting AARP membership offers.
As far as what 18 year old receptionists do to me…as long as they wink so I know I still got it.
I’m kind of at that transitional phase in my life at 35. I certainly don’t look as good as I did when I was in my early to mid 20s and had most of my hair. But, I shave my head and keep myself in shape. I might sometimes find it believable. But all of this blogging and not being careful enough about what I eat has led to a bit of of a spare tire, which is actually good in a sense. I don’t need students trying to hook up with their professors; there’s trouble down that road. Plus my partner doesn’t mind my less than perfect appearance as I age, it makes there less reason for him to be jealous. He purposefully feeds me fatty foods.
That’s not my call. As a certain presidential candidate said, “That’s above my pay grade.” But I did write, “I think Jason’s understanding that homosexuality is Biblically proscribed is accurate.”
You assume too much. I didn’t write anything about hellfire, especially for eternity. I also have, three times now, explained that being a sinner (a category to which I belong), does not mean someone doesn’t have the tendency to be humble, moral, or altruistic (if you think altruism is a good thing, or even possible).
I am a born again Christian. I’m also a libertarian. Please see the quote by Donald Miller in my post as my answer to this question.
My best recipe for becoming unsightly was to quit smoking before my first child was born six years ago. Seventy pounds later and even I have a little trouble being intimate with me. Fortunately nothing I can’t get a handle on.
Mr. Babka,
OK. And the only reason I asked if homosexuality was worshipping a different God was because you said it is anything that blinds you from God and that the chief sin is idolatry and then gave the anecdote of the Wall Street guy, which I assumed you would basically say anyhting other than God that was the focal point of one’s life or thought conflicted with the total devotion or worship to God.
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But you don’t tell me what you think happens to sinners who continue to knowingly sin all the way up until they die. The reason I ask is because it seems to me there ought to be different levels of sinners. White lie sinners, coveting adulterous neighbor sinners, and serial killer sinners–each with its appropriate level of punishment. Or is all sin equal regardless of severity or frequency? And I don’t ask this to be glib, just curious.
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How the hell do all you guys know each other and how did you end up gathering here? You seem to be a somewhat eclectic bunch.
Mr. Babka,
Wasn’t Mr. Kuznicki’s point that consigning someone to Hell is directly ‘hating the sinner’? Here’s the quote:
The sinner is hated too; he is excluded from the church, and from the Kingdom, and from communion with God. In brief, the sinner goes to Hell. If that’s not hate, nothing is. Yet such is Christianity as I cannot help but see it.
Why does the alternative to God’s way need to be eternal torment?
Mr. Huisman, My thoughts aren’t yet fully-formed enough to comment adequately. But there appear to be at least three assumptions in Jason’s statement, Mark’s question, and your question, that I don’t necessarily believe are Biblical.
First, God sends anyone to hell.
Second, that Hell is a place of literal fire and extreme, perpetual torture.
Third, that failing to believe in some propositional statements is how you end up there.
I don’t believe that these assumptions are the best reading of scripture, nor the best way to understand a God who loves humanity so much that he sends his son to us. I think the good news it that death has been defeated, and I believe that “every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess, that Jesus is Lord.” Clearly, that hasn’t happened yet.
There’s probably a fourth assumption built into each of your statements or questions as well, that (if hell is a conscious place) that hell is eternal. It’s possible that the “unsaved” might merely be, as many atheists suspect, simply dead. Or, it’s possible that there is, as Founder Benjamin Rush believed, a point at which everyone confesses Jesus as Lord — the evidence and beauty of the position becomes clear to the unpersuaded with additional evidence presented after death. But of this last proposition that hell is eternal, I’m as certain as one can be about such things, that this is not the position of the Biblical writers. The word eternal in conjunction with hell has nearly vanished as succeeding translations of the Bible have been published — and with good reason. Aeons means ages. Aeons and Aeons means for ages and ages — a long time. But it doesn’t mean perpetual or eternal. Different verbiage was available to the New Testament writers if that was what they intended to say.
And I think there might even be Christians in Hell — Hell, Michigan, that is.
But seriously, while I’m certain that what I’ve written here begs questions, this will be my final comment in this thread on the matter of hell. My post was about apparent Christian inconsistency in application of the moral law or the Biblical commands, and why, in the here and now, the writers of the Bible may have given the directions they gave.
[...] Waiting is ideal, but what the less religious states in the Gallup list grasp is that, “perfect is the enemy of good enough.” Condoms are better than several other alternatives. Sex before marriage is not “evil” (I’m referencing a blog post from December, in particular see the “End Note”). [...]