Straight Shooting

Why the Religious Right is wrong about gay rights.

by Nancy French

I'm a member of the "religious right." I grew up with cutouts of Ronald Reagan on my walls, attended daily chapel at my Christian college, and wept bitterly when Clinton was elected. You might even call me a "fundamentalist"—insult de rigueur—as I believe the Bible is true and try to live according to it. Every night, I pray, say the Apostles' Creed, and sing hymns to my children as they drift to sleep.

Not surprisingly, I believe homosexual sex is a sin but, that all people can be children of God by accepting Jesus as their savior. This means bank robbers, tax evaders, murderers, reality-TV contestants, desperate housewives, and even lawyers. The inclusive "good news" of Christianity is that anyone's heart and behavior can change if submitted to the will of our loving creator.

While most of us have sexual inclinations outside biblical standards, only a few of us resist those impulses in order to live a godly lifestyle. Living as a Christian is simply a choice most don't make.

The choice isn't an easy one because God expects holiness of all Christians—husbands shouldn't shag the secretary, wives shouldn't flirt with the electrician, unmarried Christians should wait until after the ceremony. Gay Christians have an even greater challenge because (unless there's an orientation-changing miracle) many of them are celibate for their entire lives—a small amount of time eternally speaking, but definitely a noble and challenging sacrifice for one's faith.

I believed the Church's anti-gay marriage stance—until I met a woman who respected her marriage vows as much as Kerry respected Bush's debating skills. She was a Christian who flirted with co-workers, stayed out all night and had sex with her husband on the rarest occasion. It was only a matter of months before she divorced him.

When I talked to a pastor about her subsequent remarriage, the pastor said something that startled me. "Do you expect her to live alone for the rest of her life?" Which sounded eerily like the question gay rights activists propose to the church: "Do you expect gays to simply live alone for the rest of their lives?"

And the whole debate narrowed to this: Christians are surprisingly lax when it comes to heterosexual sin yet horrified at homosexual sin, creating a double standard that is less pro-God than anti-gay.

If Christians really wanted the American legal structure to mirror God's law, we'd do away with divorce and make it illegal to remarry unless there was infidelity. Plus, we'd outlaw premarital sex and all extramarital affairs. If Christians were really all about "protecting marriage as a sacred institution," we would've picketed in the streets when the no-fault divorce laws were enacted. After all, casual divorce is epidemic compared to the number of gays who want to marry and is just as scripturally forbidden. The divorced heterosexual is the one to blame for making "traditional two-parent families" an anachronism.

It's also a question of the purpose of law itself. At base, we all want our personal moral choices to be acts of faith and will—not compelled by the state. It is not the law's place to make us moral, nor can it—we all drive 60 mph when the sign says 55. The law's limited scope is to protect us from injustice and harm. When Christians criticize the law for a lack of morality, it's like blaming a baked ham for not mowing the grass well enough.

Then there's the matter of misunderstanding Scripture. The Apostle Paul makes it clear that we aren't supposed to police non-Christians' sexual habits: "What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside."

Let the Church deal with its own sexual problems. Let it be a place that teaches of God's grace and forgiveness. Let it answer the question people struggling with sexuality ask—is Christ worth sexual restriction? And when some people invariably decide He's not, then let the church show kindness and love anyway. By supporting gay legal rights in spite of our beliefs against homosexual sex, we demonstrate the legal equivalent of the Golden Rule and can start bridging the divide between the polarized Americas.

Nancy French is a novelist from Center City. If you would like to respond to this Slant or submit your own (800 words), contact Duane Swierczynski, Editor in Chief, City Paper, 123 Chestnut Street, Third Floor, Phila., Pa., 19106 or e-mail Duane Swierczynski.