Homosexuality and the Clergy

A Presbyterian task force proposes a policy of toleration

Over 20 centuries, all branches of Christianity barred openly committed homosexuals from the clergy and from lay offices. Virtually all major U.S. churches still do. But the increasingly organized and vocal campaign by homosexuals to be treated just like everyone else poses particular problems for Christian churches. Their creed commands brotherhood and forgiveness, but it also obliges them to defend specific standards of conduct based on the Bible.

This week an official task force designated to study the problem is proposing that the 2.6 million-member United Presbyterian Church become the first denomination to adopt a policy of toleration. The gist of its findings: there is no reason in principle to deny ordination to a "self-affirming practicing homosexual Christian," even one who is "open to" or involved in "full companionship or partnership with a person of the same sex." The new proposal would make it possible for any local congregation to employ a homosexual if it wished. The church's various presbyteries (regional associations) must approve all clergy hiring, and would be free to accept homosexuals, or reject them, without any constraint from the national denomination.

The proposal is certain to produce a fire storm of argument among the not-so-United Presbyterians across the country. The final decision will rest with the church's annual General Assembly scheduled for May 16-24 in San Diego. What happens there is likely to influence the separate Southern Presbyterian church and the four U.S. Protestant churches (with 16 million members among them) that have also begun to address the question.

The task force was chaired by Rochester, N.Y., Laywoman Virginia Davidson, wife of a retired Kodak executive and mother of four. The members, selected to represent various views in the church, included an openly homosexual young alumnus of Yale Divinity School and Historical Theologian Richard Lovelace, an articulate conservative from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Massachusetts. With typical Presbyterian thoroughness, they prepared a 198-page report that examines psychological data, social currents and especially the 13 Bible passages that deal with homosexuality.

The task force reached an agreement that secular society should forbid job discrimination against homosexuals and repeal laws that regulate the private sexual behavior of consenting adults. It urges the church to work against "homophobia," the fear and loathing of homosexuals. But agreement only went so far. A conservative minority, consisting of Lovelace and two other theologians, an expert in ethics and a local pastor, filed a 19-page report. It urges the forthcoming General Assembly to interpret the church constitution as banning practicing homosexuals from the clergy and the lay offices of elder and deacon, though accepting homosexuals who remain celibate.

After considerable research, both sides concluded that most homosexuality is not the result of conscious choice and that it stems more from an unexplained complex of psychosocial forces than from heredity. The liberal side relied heavily on psychological theory, while conservatives pointed out that scientific findings are fluid and conflicting. Finally, however, both the majority and minority sides staked their case on the Bible. The two passages that drew most attention were the condemnation of homosexual relations in Leviticus 18:22 (repeated in 20:13) and St. Paul's teaching in Romans 1:18-32 that homosexual acts are sinful. Disagreement about how to interpret them was the logical outcome of two general views of the Scripture that exist in the theologically divided church.

Like many modern Bible scholars, the liberal majority decided that these verses merely express the opinions of the Jewish priestly writers and Paul, who were "conditioned by time and place." Consequently, their logic runs, such teachings are not direct revelation from God and modern Christians are free to change their views. If homosexuals evidence Christian virtues, "we are led to believe that God has chosen to redeem and sanctify these particular persons within the framework of their homosexual condition."

In a strong dissent, the minority report rejects the idea that "the Holy Spirit contradicts in our experience what He has clearly said in the whole fabric of Scripture." It considers the male-female distinction part of God's design to make human life coherent, concluding that homosexuals have a "distorted or insufficient belief in who they are." Even though all Christians sin in various ways, the minority felt that the church cannot afford to condone a practice that the Bible so clearly rejects: "Neither laypersons nor ministers are free to adopt a life-style of continuing, conscious, habitual and unrestricted sin in any area of their lives." Homosexual ordination, they agreed, would "set in motion both within the church and in society serious contradictions to the will of Christ."

No one knows which point of view will prevail among the 650 delegates who go to San Diego. Some conservatives are already talking about an emergency meeting this summer and the possibility of withholding money from the denomination or even of schism, if the liberal policy passes. Liberals believe the church can no longer ignore the fact of homosexuality and the anguish of those homosexuals who are Christian believers. For conservatives, including the growing Evangelical forces and many adherents of the waning neo-orthodox theology, the policy on homosexuality is crucial in ways that go far beyond the question of whether homosexuals are permitted to join the clergy. Since the Bible is so explicit, they wonder if the church will have any biblical basis for imposing any restrictions on human behavior if it votes moral acceptance of active homosexuality.

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