I have read many stories over the past few weeks of people reaching out to people, particularly amid the rubble that is now Haiti, and I applaud every effort, even the one mentioned in Wendi C. Thomas' column "Center Has Soft Spot for Kids in Hard Times," in the Memphis Commercial Appeal, which championed a safe place for young people dealing with same gender attraction. However, I must respond to the underlying "born-that-way" implication that someone dealing with same-gender attraction has only one recourse, which is to submit and embrace homosexuality.
We seem to be living in the grim fairy tale world in which the emperor is parading around naked, yet we all feel compelled to exclaim over his dazzling new clothes. In this world, to hint that homosexuality is not a sentence but a challenge, is to be denounced a heretic. One who so proclaims is forthwith accused of "gay bashing" and is relegated to the lowest possible rung of societal opinion.
Notwithstanding, I feel compelled to say unequivocally: there is a way out of homosexuality, just as there is a way out of alcoholism, or of sexual addiction of any kind, or of any addiction, whether genetically imposed or environmentally disposed or consciously chosen. There is always a way out; I have seen it happen. One must ask: Did Christ come for nothing?!
Had we not embraced such a casual attitude toward right and wrong that families began to fall apart, that marriage became optional and "shacking up" preferable, that sexual relations among teenagers became normal and expected, then we would not have arrived at the place where we find ourselves today, where homosexuality too has become normal and natural, and where further moral erosion threatens the innocent in ways we dare not (as yet) imagine.
We have, as Isaiah describes it, "turned things upside down" (Isaiah 29:16), as societies before us have done; and, while we fiddle our own tune, like Nero, modern Rome - I mean our Western world - burns. For while the emperor was "born that way", his nakedness exposes him to dire repercussions, unless he finds a way to be clothed.
I say this, not because I hate, but because I care.
The loss of Hope is such a cunning, insidious strategy of the adversary during this time in the world.
ReplyDeleteIn an age of amazing technological and medical breakthroughs, we so easily succumb to the message that X, Y, and/or Z cannot be changed about ourselves, when that change could be the most life-altering advance of our lives, if we let Christ make it.
Oh the joy of being compared to an alocholic, gotta love it.
ReplyDeleteThanks for this Linda. You are right, of course. Homosexuality is a paraphilia, and most people know that in their hearts, I think, but are afraid to say it out loud, for fear of being called hatefilled. And the idea that we are "born that way" on the one hand absolves us of responsibility and on the other robs us of hope. The truth being that we were all born, if not "that way" then "some way" which is the whole reason the Atonement was necessary in the first place. I can not imagine the challenge of being same-sex attracted, but I do know the Atonement covers every challenge in this life.
ReplyDeleteIs that all you have to say, El Genio?
ReplyDeleteYes, I compare one addictive or compulsive behavior with another. I've compared myself to an alcoholic sometimes, when considering behaviors over which I have no control. It seems odd to me that you would find offense in it; is an alcoholic not worthy of sympathy/empathy, any more than the rest of us?