(The Nationalist, 05 March 2007)
A recent survey of homosexual men in Northern Ireland in the 16-25 year age category showed that the level of attempted suicide among them was five times that of their heterosexual counterparts. That suggests a high level of anxiety and stress among them.
Consider some of the possibilities open to homosexual persons. I can think of five:
Firstly, they can enter into serial casual relationships. That leads to hurt, anger, jealousy, and, along with high risk of sexually-transmitted infections, to suicide or murder in extreme cases. It separates physical intimacy from the personal, psychological, or emotional intimacy without which it is meaningless.
A second option is to say, ‘Forget about being homosexual. Don’t even think about it. Live a normal life. Marriage and children will straighten you out.’ I believe that is likely to lead to injustice to the other partner, and to troubled relationships in the family. Good human relationships can never be based on denial. This option is a denial.
A third approach is to say, ‘In itself, there is nothing morally wrong with having a homosexual orientation. But that does not mean you may express it in genital sexual activity. That would be seriously sinful. Your homosexual orientation means you are called by God to life-long celibacy.’ That sounds like saying, ‘It’s alright to be a bird as long as you don’t fly’, or, ‘For you, salvation will be found in suppressing your nature’. Yet no number of “shoulds” makes an is, and theologians say that grace builds on nature. Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, has said that, if it could be shown that homosexuality is a condition natural to some people, then the church would have to look again at its attitude towards it.
A fourth option is for a couple to live together privately in a union, or partnership. This would be like a heterosexual couple living together in a common law marriage. It might sound like an ideal ‘free’ arrangement, whereby either partner may walk away any time they wish. But it lacks commitment or a sense of belonging. The statistical record of breakdown in common law partnerships is substantially higher than in marriages.
A fifth option is for a homosexual couple to enter into a recognized partnership, like marriage. This is qualitatively different from merely living together. When a couple formally and publicly, in the presence of witnesses, declare their love for each other, and their intention to live in mutual fidelity until death, that is something deeper, more committed and, likely, more long-lasting than merely living together.
Which option to follow? We should avoid making the best the enemy of the good, and consider that an all-or-nothing attitude more often leads to nothing than to all. But if you do what is right by the person, then, by God, you won’t go far wrong.
I could summarize the attitude towards sex that was inculcated in me and, I think, my generation also, when I was going up as, ‘The less you have to do with sex, the better, and ideally – as in celibacy – nothing at all’. It was very much a list of prohibitions which took the joy out of sex. Did it ever occur to us that Jesus was truly a man, and therefore sexual? Why does it seem outrageous to some to mention sexuality in Jesus?
A Jewish acquaintance of mine, after reading the gospels, said he could tell Jesus was Jewish, just from his sense of humour; yet Jews sometimes say that Christians have turned Jesus into a Gentile. Have we neutered him out of fear of the sexual? Have we made him sexless, like a statue? About homosexuality Jesus said nothing.
The dividing line between people on the issue of homosexuality is not between liberals and conservatives as between those who have and those who haven’t a homosexual in their family.