The
issue is Holy Unions, not marriage
The local Gannett paper was more succinct: "Gay Unions OK'd."
Yes, the Presbytery of Hudson River, 95 congregations in 8 counties to
the north and north-west of New York City, "affirmed the freedom of
Sessions to authorize their pastors to perform same-gender holy union
ceremonies, inside and outside their sanctuaries, understanding that
these do not constitute marriage ceremonies according to the Book of
Order." The vote, on January 30, 1999, at the White Plains
Presbyterian Church, was 105 to 35, with 2 abstentions in a secret
ballot. This position of the Presbytery was sustained by the Permanent
Judicial Commission of the Synod of the Northeast in a judicial case
this past Fall, since the Book of Order clearly allows for
ceremonies that celebrate significant life events of church members.
Most ministers cherish that freedom for creativity in worship, though
few actually perform same-sex union services.
This year's General Assembly will deal with several
overtures that would prohibit ministers from doing these blessings, and
would prohibit congregations from allowing them to occur in their
sanctuaries. Many will debate the issue on the basis of fear or
caricature, rather than prayerful effort at understanding. This article
gives some background to our Presbytery's action, and then looks at the
theological and pastoral concerns that lay behind the decision. In other
words, this is about the Christian and pastoral agenda, not the
homosexual rights agenda, important as that may be. And it will be my
argument that gay unions are not copy-marriages, but genuine and
appropriate rites for homosexually oriented people.
The
Background: A Commission of Inquiry
Two years ago, a front-page newspaper article
announced that one of the Presbytery's congregations was going to
celebrate the "wedding" of two gay men. The article was
quoting one of the men, but the ceremony was actually one the ministers
called "a holy union," not a marriage. Despite the beginning
of a dialogue process, one of the most conservative congregations in the
presbytery called for an investigation by the Presbytery and proposed
that the ministers be penalized, even suspended, for allowing the misuse
of the Presbytery's property.
The church whose ministers were threatened is one of
several "More Light" congregations in the Presbytery, stating
its welcome for gay and lesbian people publicly and indicating its
willingness to have homosexual people ordained as ministers and elders.
The church calling for an end to such blessings of homosexual
relationships was working with a lawyer long active in the
denomination's right wing, who added the novel element of
"fiduciary" mismanagement of sanctuary space to the usual
condemnation of gay unions as sinful and unbiblical. (That effort to
restrict any congregation's use of property continues in the current
overtures.) Not surprisingly, the congregation filing the complaint was
one which had withheld its per capita during the same period Amendment B
was being passed.
The Presbytery's General Council appointed a
Commission of 3 notoriously thoughtful moderates to listen to the
congregations involved and their pastors. The Commission's findings,
contained in 10 carefully written pages presented to the December 98
meeting of the Council, were that the More Light church was being
pastoral to its homosexually-oriented members and the conservative
church was sincere in its opposition to non-biblical sexual practices,
including the marriage of heterosexuals who were cohabiting to the
minister's knowledge. The investigative commission quoted extensively
from Shirley Guthrie's book on Christian doctrine, which invites people
to see doctrine in dialogue with scripture. They advocated further
dialogue between the two church-parties to the controversy and
recommended against inevitably drawn out legal battling.
This "keep talking" idea did not satisfy the
congregation that wants "holy unions" prohibited, and hence
dialogue would not protect the congregation and ministers under attack.
When it became clear that the anti-gay union church would pursue their
complaint in our church's courts, a "via media" became
impossible, and the motion affirming congregational freedom was passed.
That motion became a kind of concluding recommendation to the
investigative commission's report, circulated in advance of the
Presbytery meeting. Then the vote noted above.
The
Floor Debate in White Plains
The basic conservative effort was to table the motion,
either indefinitely or for various periods of time, to allow
congregations to study the issues more carefully. This article is part
of that study effort. But the motions were seen as disingenuous by the
moderates and progressives, who knew that the judicial complaint was
still alive and that voting patterns on the "gay issue" would
not change very much. It turned out that many on both sides were
surprised by the margin of victory for the motion, but few were
surprised when the lead conservative pastor announced that conscience
would lead his church to bring the complaint before the next highest
level in the church, the Synod. A prepared protest was signed by 14
members of the losing side, alleging an action against the constitution
(though one taken "decently and in order"). The debate
disclosed that the ceremonies in question do resemble marriage
ceremonies to varying degrees: the two men or women pledge faithfulness
to each other and the minister prays for their promise, though there is
no legal standing given to the "blessing." The question of
whether homosexual relations become less sinful if monogamous was not
addressed directly, but some were concerned that the distinctiveness of
Christian marriage was being eroded. Most felt that monogamy was
something to be encouraged among homosexual people and these ceremonies
were a way to that goal, analogous but not identical to marriage for
heterosexual people.
Theological
Considerations about Marriages and Holy Unions:
The basic Presbyterian understanding of marriage is
that it is an ordinance of God, a covenant deeply symbolic of God's
personal and public relationship with us, but not a sacrament carrying
God's grace as directly as do baptism and Communion. Marriage is a holy
estate blessed by God, between a man and a woman, to support and
structure their love for each other and to provide for their children.
For Presbyterians, perhaps still mindful that all three of Calvin's
children died in infancy, the main purpose of marriage has been
companionship--as it was for Calvin. Even the Lutheran notion of
"orders of creation" can emphasize the procreative side of
marriage too much, bending a bit toward the Roman Catholic view, but
many contemporary Presbyterian (and other Protestant) weddings may err
the other way and say too little in favor of child-bearing and rearing.
Certainly we celebrate communion as a foretaste of the wedding feast of
the Lamb--and many of us still use the biblical imagery of the church as
the bride of Christ ("from heaven he came and sought her, to be his
holy bride..."), but we generally do not celebrate the Lord's
Supper during weddings. The core of marriage is companionship and the
fidelity that is to sustain it over time. It is a form of
communion, then, but it is not Communion.
By not considering marriage, and by implication, holy
unions, to be sacraments, they are put more with the theology of
creation ("a man shall leave his parents's house and
cleave...") than with redemption. If you allow that some gays, at
least, are "made that way," then they can be saved by God in
that condition and do not need to be healed out of it. The nature of the
"one flesh" that is created in a covenanted and blessed
homosexual relationship is of the same sort of mystery that marriage is:
it is a conscious solidarity and an unconscious unity, a psychic
imprinting if you will, between two Christian souls. And it is something
that Jesus and Paul did not have, in all likelihood, however much it may
be "a school of virtue," a "holy society," a
"covenant," a "commonwealth," or, perhaps now, a
"contract," as our Protestant traditions have said [see John
Witte, Jr.'s From Sacrament to Contract (1997), or James T.
Johnson's earlier, A Society Ordained by God (1970)].
How much alike are the basic affiliative desires of
love between hetero- and homosexual people? Here I take it that humans
of both orientations are created in God's image, even as "male and
female created he them." Paul Lehmann's distinction between
"foundational" and "limiting" notions of sexuality
in Genesis give integrity to this both/and view.(1)
Any position that allows avowedly gay and lesbian people membership in
the church must deal with their relationships: one might pun that
avowedly leads to avowingly gay couples. It is also the case that the
nature of the act of promising is the same, whatever one's sexual
orientation, so that on Kantian grounds there is an inner logic to
honoring the moral commitment of fidelity.
My own position is that we should bless homosexual
unions and seek to support them fully, while at the same time using
"marriage" for unions between men and women.
"Marriage," as an "evangelical" pastor of mine would
preach, is both the "wed" of love and parenting, and the
"lock" of being a bulwark against promiscuity and for
responsibilities to children and spouses. The protective side of
marriage is one of the reasons it involves a public ceremony with
religious and civil elements; the nature of the community created in a
"holy union" ceremony may be very much the same, but its
relations to the wider community may be different, for example in the
relative importance of friendships and extended families as well as
procreation. Thus I look to the gay and lesbian community to lead in
defining their unions theologically, but I am clear they belong in the
church. Unfortunately, to the conservative side, this view condones,
even celebrates, one of the sins that marriage is supposed to protect us
from.
Can
Marriage be a form of "healing" or "change ministry"
for homosexuals?
It may seem a reversal of the anti-gay union view to
insist that homosexuals try marriage, but some still believe this is
what should happen, if only as an antidote to sin. The issue of the
sinfulness of homosexual relations generally turns on whether the
orientation is changeable, or even heal-able. This remains a very
controversial area, because there clearly are people who do change
orientation--sometimes young men moving on to heterosexuality after
periods of gay life, or women at midlife who may find a female partner,
sometimes also with children. For most homosexual people, however, that
orientation is natural and apparently partly genetic for them. Certainly
it involves much pain, shame and higher than usual male and perhaps
female levels of suicide. It is this last consideration, in fact, that
makes denominations reluctant to endorse "change ministries"
for homosexuals, because some do commit suicide after desperate and
prayerful but unsuccessful efforts to re-direct their affectional
preferences, leaving their support groups and therapists liable for
malpractice. I do know of a couple of people who have found joyful
release from homosexual (bisexual?) tendencies in "ex-gay"
ministries, just as I have met "straight" men who chose
therapy to address the presumed impact of stereotypically overbearing
mothers and absent fathers. But given the general unchangeability of
sexual orientation, it seems unwise to instrumentalize marriage as a
kind of cure.
What
about the Cultural Consequences: Will there be a Domino Effect?
Behind references to the several anti-gay verses in
scripture is often a fear that Christian marriage and family are in
jeopardy. I share some of this fear about the jeopardy, but not the gay
role in it. Divorce, family dissolution by other means, high numbers of
children "born out of wedlock" living in poverty, the
degradation of entertainment, the decline in marriage and reproduction
rates, abortion and lack of sexual education: none of these are ideal,
though they are not necessarily sins. The increasing visibility of
homosexuality is added to this picture of disorder, either as a cause of
the changed relations between the sexes, or as a symptom. (Romans 1
would suggest it is an "unnatural" cause of disorder, but
still a symptom of idolatry.) I'm not sure that homosexuality is either
a cause or a symptom of anything other than greater personal freedom,
but I understand the impulse to "blame the gays" and their
unholy unions for further weakening marriage. It seems clearer to me,
however, that the church's endorsement of same-sex fidelity can only
help reinforce heterosexual marriages. It is the culture of narcissistic
self-fulfillment that inherently threatens fidelity and responsible
procreation, as well as all commitments to the common good. Denying an
Erasmus or a Joan of Arc a soulmate has probably never helped marriage
as an institution.
The
Both/And model: Conscious marriage and same-sex unions
Modern Christian marriage is, in fact, a victim of its
own success in modeling equality and freedom (with great good impact
around the world) and in raising expectations of intimacy that fewer and
fewer couples (and incomes) can sustain. It is also the case that by
opening up the rich inner life of each partner through psychology and
counseling, the role of the unconscious must increasingly be taken into
account by pastoral theology (see particularly the works of Ann Belford
Ulanov in this regard). A key understanding in this whole development is
that every human has inner 'masculine' and 'feminine' qualities, in
varying proportions over time. This suggests that the theology for
same-sex "holy unions" not assume the same intra-psychic and
"archetypal" dynamics as marriage. Mine is thus a
non-literalist position influenced by that mystical son of the Reformed
Church, Carl Jung.
Because I think the masculine and the feminine are
God-given qualities, experienced in both men and women but inherently
different, I regard marriage as inherently a union of different things,
even of opposites. Following the work of Robert (not Thomas) Moore, a
theologian and Jungian analyst at Chicago Theological Seminary, the
issue is more complicated than simply "Mars and Venus," and
these two polarities themselves can begin to approach each other at
midlife. At the same time, homosexual unions and their dynamics may have
much to teach us "straights" about complementarity beyond
stereotypes and stereotyped roles, but that is a bigger topic than can
be addressed here. The bottom line is that if homosexuality is a genuine
orientation, then it needs its own relationships to be respected, such
as through "holy unions" or whatever they may be called. This
is an argument for diversity, not separatism.
The argument against this position is that separate is
never equal, so that by restricting gays and lesbians to "holy
unions" we are depriving their relationships of marriage status and
worth. I am open to learn more on this, but justice and equality do not
necessarily mean the same category in this case. The practical fact that
homosexuals have been bearing and rearing children throughout history
argues for their rights, and secular society is granting same sex
partners spousal privileges at an increasing rate.
The strongest historical argument for same sex union
ceremonies is John Boswell's Same Sex Unions in Pre-Modern Europe
(1994), which contains Greek manuscript translations of
"brother-making" ceremonies between men in the early and high
middle ages, which it does not call marriages. These ceremonies have
been disputed as to what family or relationship was to follow, since
property and progeny are not mentioned, but the liturgies celebrate
friendship, mutual protection, faith and love, and invoke disciples like
Bartholomew and Philip and the martyrs Serge and Bacchus as partners in
the Spirit.(2)
Pastoral
Considerations
When I preached the day after the Presbytery, my
non-lectionary texts were a pairing of the cleansing of the Temple by
Jesus with the cleansing of the priests by categories of exclusion in
Leviticus 21. Thus I made reference to the Leviticus 18:22 prohibition
against homosexuality in the context of the Leviticus 21, and in
contrast to the great valuation of love over purity by Jesus. In driving
out the money-changers, Jesus is focusing on what the true function of
the Temple is: "a house of prayer for all peoples." The issue
there I adapted to the question of whether a sanctuary could be used for
praying for peoples of all orientations. The phrase, "holy
union," is different in connotation from the concept of the holy or
sacred in the holiness codes, but holy retains the idea of some thing or
relationship being "set aside" for divine purpose. Whether or
not my sermon was a tour de force or simply a tour, only one of the 90
or so present told me he disagreed, and to his credit he acknowledged
his own lack of perfection as a divorced and remarried person.
Self-fulfillment is a widely accepted ideal in my
suburban congregation, so to deepen faith and faithful marriages means
being more truthful than the advertising: there is emptiness and
loneliness, anxiety and addiction, abuse and anger, even in marriage and
family. Jesus Christ gives us power to face the cross in all its forms.
God has created us for communion, and Christ gives us a model for
fidelity and integrity, hope and maturity. Whatever disagreements we may
have, I warned specifically against contempt for those who are
different, as we clearly see in the scape-goating of homosexual people
in our larger church family system: they are the identified patients,
but the whole family suffers from denial.
We all struggle to find what sacrifices we are called
to make in order to serve the greater joy of God's love. We prayed for
those whose path is immeasurably harder than ours, on this matter and
many others. And we pray for those who still believe that Christianity
can be a matter of coercion, exclusion and heresy trials.
1. Lehmann is quoted by Patrick Miller in the
Princeton Seminary faculty symposium, Homosexuality and Christian
Community (1996), ed. by Choon-Leong Seow, pp. 57-58.
2. For a hardball attack and
defense of Boswell's work, see the exchange between Brent Shaw and Ralph
Hexter in The New Republic, July 18 & 25, and October 3,
1994 issues.
