Christianity, Certainty, and Change

If there is anything that I've encountered in my wanderings among the interwebs, it's that those who oppose transsexualism (and obviously, likewise homosexuality) from the argument that it is forbidden in Christian Scriptures by God himself are absolutely, unshakably, non-negotiably convinced that they cannot possibly be wrong on the matter.

Phrases like "it is very clear" or "it is indisputable" fall easily from their fingertips onto their keyboard as they presume to end debate by stating the facts that seem so obvious to them. It is apparent to me that such people have overlooked some very basic realities which would argue against such hubris. But as is often the case with ideologies that are held because one has been taught to believe them, rather than arrived at by one's own reasoning, these realities have not only not been considered, but the adamant one dares not consider them because of the risky implications. It is a very valid rule for living that what one believes is worthless unless one knows why they believe it. "Because my pastor said so" is not a sufficient answer. Another good principle is that the un-examined opinion isn't worth holding. That is, if you are not willing to submit your views to close examination and entertain the real possibility that it might be in whole or in part incorrect, then it has no value. you have not learned, you have been indoctrinated.

I submit that there are two major arguments against the claim of certitude before one ever actually opens the Bible and studies the relevant Scriptures. Either of these alone is sufficient to give the intellectually honest reader pause, both together in my opinion should be impossible to ignore for a person who authentically wishes to seek God's actual will and not just stand on tradition for tradition's sake.

Let me pause here for this caveat: I know that I have readers who do not believe the Bible reflects god's will in any material sense, even those who believe there is no God at all. While my views are not completely orthodox on these points, my opinions are sympathetic to the Christian opinion on them. Nevertheless, even if I did not believe it - I am addressing people who do, and I will show the respect of addressing the subject within the context of what they believe. In my opinion, a condescending "you believe e in a fairy tale God from a book of myths" attitude is not an approach that's going to give you the opportunity to reason with any believer. If you wish to read the following as within a "for the sake of argument" discussion, feel free to do so.

To begin, let us restate the claim. The proposition is that God's word makes it unmistakably clear that homosexuality (and by extrapolation transsexuality) is forbidden, sinful, and an abomination before God of which one must completely repent. Further that it is not possible for one who accepts the authority of Scripture to hold any other view and to do so is twisting the Bible or ignoring it altogether.

The first counterargument against that claim is the record of church history. Space forbids me to fully detail the evidence on this point, but let us sample the record beginning with the most recent examples and working backwards. Some of these were near universally agreed upon by the church, others were examples of a wildly held view that was, however, not universal in the church (and by "church" I mean the whole of Christianity, not the Catholic Church). what they have in common, however, is that a significant number of Christians would have argued that their position was completely Biblical and to dispute it was to "twist the Word" and evidence of being out of step with God's will.

• In 1967 the Supreme Court in Loving v. Virginia struck down laws which banned interracial marriage as unconstitutional.  Until this ruling was announced (and frankly, for some years afterwards) it was the consensus opinion of the church, particularly in America, that such relationships were unbiblical. It would have been unthinkable in the vast majority of churches to preform such a ceremony.
• Through the 1960's, divorce laws were widely restructured to expand the ability to dissolve an unworkable marriage. Before that time, a woman (or man for that matter) might have been forced under the law to remain with an abusive spouse, or continue in various other untenable relationships. The church in those days (and many still) were adamantly opposed to this and most are still uncomfortable with it despite recognizing the necessity of the reform.
• Throughout the civil rights era a great many churches, particularly in the south but also in major cities, were outspoken in their opposition to desegregation. This was preached from the pulpit as a Godly point of view and even those who were not certain of that almost always rooted themselves firmly on the sidelines while black ministers and churches took to the streets to lead the fight for equality.
• One hundred years earlier, the largest protestant denomination in the United States split in two (as did several other less prominent ones) over a dispute concerning slavery. Hundreds of churches of various denominations took their stand on the proposition that slavery was not only acceptable but possibly even favored in the eyes of God. That largest of denominations took almost a century and a half to formally declare they had actually been mistaken.
• In the period of our history which preceded those days, the law viewed women as, essentially, property of their spouses or their father. For most of that time they could not own property except under special circumstances, they could not vote or hold office, there were even laws which specified to the husband to what degree he might beat her and be within the law.
• Go back another century or so and you will find supposed witches being put to death, and while you might find that an isolated example, the reality was that banishment, violent punishment or even death was standard operating procedure for heretical views. Read about how the Puritans, themselves refugees from an oppressive state church, dealt with Ann Hutchinson. Before our Constitution was ratified (and in some cases even after) laws established what was the acceptable faith and what would result in official sanction.
• Speaking of the state church, when the first colonists arrived in North America, Europe was completely filled with official state churches and bloodshed was routine between these churches and those who would oppose their rule. People literally killed each other over disputes in theology (and if you look around, there are places this still happens). Of course, as often as not it was political power which was the real source of their passion, but they claimed it was for God.
• Not so very long before that, John Calvin, the founder of the Calvinist thought that informed most of our Founding Fathers said this of a man who was eventually burned at the stake for heresy: "for if he came, as far as my authority goes, I would not let him leave alive." While it is not true that Calvin himself ordered the man's death, he surely consented to it.

Before that the record gets too ugly to even detail. Inquisitions, Crusades, Holy Wars, indulgences - the list goes on and on. The one thing they all have in common is that all or most of the contemporary church would have defended them as obviously biblical actions, and all or most of the modern church would shudder to even admit that Christians had ever behaved thus.

I do not submit this list as a condemnation of Christianity, but as confirmation that the church is filled with flawed and failing human beings who very often get it wrong. The reality of God and reliability of his word are not proven or dis-proven by the fact that human beings, particularly in groups, manage to screw up anything they touch.  The bottom line for the current discussion is this: the church has a solid track record of being firmly convinced they knew the biblically expressed will of God and ended up, in retrospect, hopelessly mistaken.

The second major counterargument is this: The current state of the church universal. Think about it: does the church, across denominations, have a unanimous opinion on the following subjects - ANY of them:

The nature of God?
The nature of Christ?
The manner of Atonement?
The process of Sanctification?
The practice of the sacraments?
The method of Baptism?
The security of the believer?
The nature of Prayer?
The proper mode of Worship?

All these things are the fundamental essential core of Christianity. Yet if you ask a Baptist, a Catholic, a Presbyterian, and a Pentecostal to explain these concepts, you will get often wildly different answers despite all of them professing to literally and faithfully interpret the same book (yes, the Catholic Bible is somewhat different but that only further reinforces my point).   It gets worse if you go beyond these to the less fundamental theologies - some can't even agree on what the rules are for how one is to dress. but let's lay the minor stuff aside.

There are literally hundreds of variations of interpretations on the most basic core doctrines which provide the foundation for the Christian religion. All drawn from the same Bible, All believed fervently by faithful people of respectable scholarship. The unmistakable implication is that it is legitimately possible for flawed human beings to misunderstand what the Bible says on any point. After all, two (or more) conflicting theologies cannot both be right. So at least one, and possibly all our understandings of that given point are flawed. simple common sense demands it. Only incredible hubris and arrogance (something that Christians, sadly, do not lack for)  would provoke one to say that they are absolutely certain they have the right interpretation and all others are wrong. The most that can be said is "I believe and am convinced that I understand it properly, with all due respect to a differing view." Still even when one is convinced they have the right view, you cannot in good faith deny that it's possible for sincere scholars to reach a different view. You can't seriously condemn every differing view as the result of dishonorable motives or poor scholarship.

Now, in light of this reality - are we to believe that while it is possible for imperfect humans to have differing views of the most fundamental and crucial doctrines in the Bible, we can nevertheless be absolutely certain beyond all doubt that our understanding that homosexuality is forbidden cannot possibly be in error? that the ONE thing in all the Bible that God was SO passionate about that he left NO room for misunderstanding...was the matter of how to have sex? REALLY?

How could that possibly begin to make even a little sense? And then you view that in the context of the church's track record for imposing personal bias onto Scripture in order to arrive at a false teaching and you still deny the remote possibility that the doctrine that homosexuality is sin cannot possibly under any circumstances be a false teaching? To me you have to have turned your brain completely off and let the battery die in order to be that obstinate.

The obvious conclusion, then, before one even considers a study or the relevant passages, is that it is foolhardy to suppose that the traditional teaching - the one your pastor and Sunday school teacher and that guy on the radio taught you - cannot possibly be incorrect. If that's what you believe, then don't even bother to open the book and read it because your masters will tell you what they want you to know. But for the rest, it's time to learn for yourself and not just accept what's been spoon fed to you. You may still reach the same conclusion, but at least one hopes you'll have learned the value of recognizing that others can and do disagree.

And if, then there is a finite possibility - just a possibility - that you are wrong and God does not, in fact, condemn your homosexual brother, do you really want to risk taking a hostile stand against that which God may not have condemned after all? Will you risk judging where he has not?