Stir Up! Stir Up! It's the SORs!

With the introduction of yet more bureaucratic red tape, or should that be pink tape, under the heading of the Sexual Orientation Regulations, the Government is bending itself into yet more unorthodox contortions in its attempt to do right by this country's minorities. Inevitably, orthodox, Catholic, traditionalist and almost all other Christians save the liberal and most of the Anglican establishment are once more on a crusade against what is perceived as yet another demon of secularisation. Anthony Browne has written a story in the paper and I've done a commentary to which a friend has emailed a response: "I read your analysis today with interest. I hardly think that getting BA to hold a review ( far less apologise, compensate or reinstate Eweida) and the Government backtracking on quotas on faith schools on actions that were pressing against natural justice is letting power go to people's heads.  The SORs are a monstrous infringement of conscience and religious freedom. Ann Widdecombe is right. On this occasion I can't agree with you."

  The danger the churches and other religious groups fear is that, once again, in its attempts to appease one particular lobby group, the Government will end by discriminating against another, the religious. Examples of what they fear is that Christian police officers might be forced to attend events such as gay pride. Wild and windy Irish priest Fr Leonard has posted his views on it, as have Oxford student housing guru Jock Coats and Catholic Ticker. Thanks to Christopher Lamb for this photo, see his comment below for its relevance to this post...

Leaders of some of Britain’s biggest black churches are just some of those threatening civil disobedience over the Government's plans to introduce the new gay rights. Black church leaders are accusing Tony Blair of casting black worshippers “back into slavery”.

The Roman Catholic Archbishop of Birmingham, Vincent Nichols, this week accused the Government of an “aggressive reshaping of our moral framework.” The Catholic Church is warning of a rebellion by schools, charities and adoption agencies, claiming the regulations will lead to an “inversion of family morality”. The Church of England’s Bishop of Rochester, Dr Michael Nazir-Ali, backed Archbishop Nichols. Interestingly, though, then Arcbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, will be staying out of this one, at least for the time being.

The Government has been charged with using Northern Ireland as a test bed after it forced through the controversial new rules banning all discrimination against homosexuals and transexuals ahead of the rest of the UK. Politicians and religious leaders from the province are outraged that the government used its direct rule powers to lay down the new legislation. The law - which would for example make it illegal for a Christian printer to refuse to print a leaflet promoting gay sex, or a religious bed and breakfast owner to refuse custom to a transexual couple - will come into force in the province on January 1st. Although no date has been set to implement the policy in the UK, next April is being talked about as a possibility.

The Lawyers' Christian Fellowship is leading the campaign against the regs. Black church leaders who had campaigned for the government to allow faith-based conscientious objections are so alarmed that out a whole page advert in The Times this week warning about the impact. Anglican Mainstream has reproduced the text of the ad. Under the umbrella of the Evangelical Alliance, a group of church leaders from across the ecclesiastical spectrum has met in London this week to prepare a strategy against the regulations. But they are hampered slightly in that no-one knows yet precisely what shape they will take as the detail has yet to be published.

What is known is that they will make it an offence to refuse to offer goods or services to someone because of their sexuality. The rules are being introduced under powers granted to the government by the Equality Act, passed by the Westminster parliament earlier this year.  The Northern Ireland office insists that the province is not being used as a guinea pig for controversial legislation, but that it held a different consultation process to the mainland. In England, there were 3000 responses to the consultation on the legislation, while in Northern Ireland there were just 373 responses. The government says that meant it could process the legislation in Northern Ireland quicker than in England.

Christian campaigners say the new regulations will force them to act against their conscience.
Bishop Alfred Williams, of Prophetic Voice Ministries, an influential grouping of black-led churches, said: “These regulations infringe the human right to expression of religious belief. In African culture, homosexuality is seen as debased. By our Christian values it is a sin. I am certain that black people will take to the streets over this. It will paralyse the economy. Black Muslims will protest also, it won’t just be Christians.” He condemned the Government for planning to introduce the regulations in the same year that it will commemorate the abolition of the slave trade. “My grandfather was a slave. These regulations are a new form of slavery. They will enslave our conscience.”

On his blog, Peter Ould writes: "The deeper problem with the act has been highlighted by the Lawyers’ Christian Fellowship who argue that since the law allows for prosecution if an individual felt that they had “been subjected to a ’humiliating or offensive environment’”, that means that if I stand up and give my testimony of healing from sexual brokeness or preach on the subject of homosexuality and somebody in the congregation who self-identifies as gay finds it offensive, I could be prosecuted. Or take it further (and I haven’t seen this argument anywhere else so I claim the rights!!!) - Could I be prosecuted for refusing to give Communion to somebody who I knew was willfully engaging in gay sex and not repenting? Would that mean that their dignity had been violated even though I was exercising traditional Christian (and Anglican) discipline?"

Meg Munn, Deputy Minister for Women and Equalities, wrote to The Times this week in response to the advertisement from the black church leaders. She said the regulations will provide "effective protection" from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in the provision of goods and services. "In developing the regulations the Government received a large number of responses and it is clear that there are deeply held views on all sides. We are seeking to strike a balance between protecting the rights of religious groups and preventing discrimination against lesbian, gay and bisexual people. In a diverse society, achieving a legal framework that balances fundamental rights is very complex. This is a Government, and country, which has a proud record of tackling discrimination wherever it exists. But it is also a country which has a proud record of respecting people from all faiths and none."

She continued: "There are a number of misconceptions about what these regulations will cover and what is being considered. For example, no-one is proposing that schools will have to promote homosexuality or that a priest will have to bless same sex couples. But at the same time, the vast majority of the British public would surely agree that is wrong for a gay teenager to be refused emergency accommodation after being thrown out of their family home on the grounds that they had chosen to tell their parents about their sexuality or for lesbian and bisexual people to be denied access to essential healthcare. It is right that there should be a public debate on these complex and difficult issues, but that debate should be conducted in a calm and measured way rather than through inaccurate and wild speculation."

Update: I understand that Ms Munn's office has been so besieged with protests over these regulations that she is asking anyone who is not calling her on a constituency matter to desist. I trust all readers of this blog will respect this minister's desire not to be troubled by the thousands who disagree with her. This link will take you to the numbers that you are requested not to call.

This is one that will run, and run, and run, and run..... as usual, lots of excellent links and comment on Thinking Anglicans.

Comments

[Frank Schnittger]

Alan - if you want and up to date view of where the CofI is on the issue of homosexuality in general, then the views of the recently elected successor to Archbishop Eames are probably relevant:

Speaking on BBC Radio Ulster in September 2003, Bishop Harper affirmed permanent homosexual relationships:"if a relationship between homosexual males is creative of love as well as being permanent and lifelong I don’t think that I am able to say that it is intrinsically disordered. What I am very much concerned about is the problem of promiscuity which is a totally different issue. I’m not entering now into the question of whether or not a homosexual lifestyle as we see it is intrinsically more promiscuous than what we call a straight lifestyle. But I am concerned about faithfulness."

This is similar to what he said to his diocesan synod in 2003 about cohabiting heterosexual couples: "That form of cohabitation in which couples commit themselves to each other in a loving, consenting, exclusive, permanent relationship is a form of commitment less complete than marriage, and therefore not the same as marriage, but is, nevertheless, a state of life which may be chosen in good conscience and is deserving of respect."

Of course the CofI is also very much in favour of Women priests, and is relatively "low church" compared to the the CofE. No political party in the Republic of Ireland supports discrimination against gays and the matter is not even a controversial issue at the present time.

[Kate]

Christopher: Indeed. But it has no logic. On one hand he is enrolling Robin Eames as a member of the anti-SORs brigade and on the other insulting the man as an idiot.

Is it possible that High Anglicans of the English variety might also be a tad racist/colonialist? No dogs, no Irish (even if they are C of I prods), no Blacks, NO GAYS of course. All rather inferior creatures y'know. Not tolerated by the God Alan and Jill KNOW so intimately. Seems High As will tolerate them blacks, paddies and poofters, if they keep to their appointed place - but only at a distance y'know!

PS. Too incensed earlier - forgot your comment on David Ervine two posts up. I knew him. He, like Robin Eames, earned deep affection. A good man of absolute integrity. His speech on SORs was poignant. David's grandson took his own life at the age of 14. Too many young men lost - to the bullet, to self-hatred, and to religiously inspired hatred. David was not of the camp that slices onions.

[Christopher]

Kate, you are right about patronising arrogance. I have challenged Alan more than once that if he has so little respect for the leadership of his own church and such respect for the Church of Rome shouldn't he make the switch? But Alan told me that the church of England is catholic enough for him - he can go on playing at being High Church, with incense, lace cottas, birettas - all the signs of true religion - while all the time still enjoying that anglican luxury of sniping at his hierarchy from the sidelines. He'd soon find that wasn't tolerated in the catholic church.

[Kate]

Alan: "If a woolly-minded archbishop at the head of a weak Anglican establishment can express such strong views .."

Is patronising arrogance the only weapon? From what perspective, what experience, what evidence, do you denigrate C of I as "a weak Anglican establishment"? Something to do with the ordination of women perhaps?

Lord Eames has proved himself a man of width and humanity who has led his people with loving compassion and integrity. He is respected and held in affection across all religious 'divides'. That is a major achievement. The same can scarcely be said of divided English Anglicans or the present ABC.

Far from "woolly minded", but an academic lawyer, Robin Eames found himself thrust into a cauldron of change and revolution, and the birth of a new Ireland. What he actually says here has to do with direct-rule processes.

"I found that it was my duty to join episcopal colleagues in drawing the attention ... to the tremendous concern that we as bishops felt about the manner in which the process of legislating in this place and in the other place for Northern Ireland was being followed.

What I am speaking of has nothing to with party politics or denominations.

... current procedures place some of us in an impossible situation, where we agree with large sections of legislation—where we agree with the spirit of it and recognise that it has to do with human dignity and equality—but cannot do otherwise than challenge other parts of it.

The main churches in Northern Ireland ... received the consultation documentation on 29 July and a response was demanded by 25 September. Noble Lords will recognise that this was a major holiday period, when anything akin to a full response was impossible. If the views of the main churches were of interest to the Government and were genuinely sought on such an important and sensitive issue as this, which has to do with dignity, equality and justice, how were we expected to respond with integrity? ......
......
Should it be the case ... that fast-tracking controversial legislation is simply a lever to force the restoration of devolved government for Northern Ireland, I would have very serious concerns."

The final paragraph is the most relevant.

[Alan Marsh]

I wonder if Frank has bothered to read Lord Eames' speech on the SORs in the House of Lords debate? Or the statement issued by the Bishops of the CofI?

If a woolly-minded archbishop at the head of a weak Anglican establishment can express such strong views, then perhaps even Frank can see that something might be a little wrong here? Unless of course Frank does not wish to know what they say but merely assumes that everyone agrees with him, unless they spell it out for him...

[Kate]

Christopher: Thank you for an ever humane and caring post. I am extremely proud of, and grateful for, all my children. I would, in normal circumstances, no more dream of referring to my gay son's orientation than I would his twin's straight, happily married condition.

However, some here would seek to perpetrate grievous harm. I have come out, not as a 'flag' of convenience, but in solidarity. I, as the mother of a gay man, have also been deeply wounded (and angered) by patronising quips about 'the closet' and 'backlash'; by unhealthy voyeurism and outrageous duplicity.

A very dear friend (SJ) of my youth, now dead and possibly the closest I have ever come to a real saint, spent his whole ministry in the closet. He left the Order on the arrival of the late John Paul (no friend of the Jesuits); 'came out', and enjoyed his remaining five years in a loving partnership. I will fight to my last breath and with all the knowledge and influence at my disposal, those who would impose such suffering on my son.

Jill: "snapping jaws" indeed. I am the PROUD mother of a gay man; he is not a flag of maternal martydom. Good to know I have impinged on your delicate sensibilities. May your God go with you, I am very glad he is not mine.

[Jill]

Oh, Christopher. I don’t know where to start with your post. You talk about pitiful, broken men and women, soaked in self-hate etc etc. But I KNOW, Christopher, that many SSA people do not need the input of anyone else to have that opinion of themselves. They know, NOT because we tell them so, that they are different. In the most gay-affirming societies that self-loathing is still there. We can tell them until we are blue in the face that they are fine as they are, but the self-loathing will still be there. It is NOT because of Christianity, or public disapproval, or anything like that – but because they KNOW that their desires are not for the purpose for which nature intended them. It is mean and unfair to blame other people.

Please don’t imply that I don’t understand. I do. My heart goes out to people who cannot change, and I know that this happens, but there are also some who can, and do, and live out full and happy lives.

Your comments about my comments about a gay backlash have been misrepresented (by you.) You have done this before. You have manipulated what I have said, and waved your own version of my words in front of Kate’s snapping jaws. I don’t hold this against you, though, Christopher. My comment ‘back into the closet with you’ was not a reflection of what I felt should happen, but what I felt would be the safest place for gay people in the event of an anti-gay backlash, and was actually repeating what one gay activist had actually said. I think your misrepresentation of that was slightly dishonest.

Added to this is the way that I talk, which is in a slightly flippant way, which – if you knew me – you could not possibly take offence at, but I acknowledge that it does not always come over that way on paper, without the eye contact and possible pinch on the cheek that would accompany it in head-to-head discourse. Nobody I know ever takes offence at what I say, because they know that I am not an offensive person.

Having said all that, I acknowledge that it DID hurt you, and I am truly sorry for that. Bear in mind, though, that you are not the only person who has been hurt on this blog – far worse things have been said about me than have been said about you!

Please do not talk about religiously inspired hatred. That is just your perception. Christianity is about love. It is how you interpret that love that is the point at issue.

[Christopher]

First and foremost, Kate, it is good to have you back and Many Happy Returns! I am delighted to use that Irish form of responding to your Happy New Year. When Frank used it I was puzzled because here in England we say that for birthdays - then at a drinks party in our street last weekend an Irish lady said it back to me when I greeted her. When we looked surprised she explained.

Now down to the nitty gritty. Congratulations Kate on having such a wonderful gay son. NO he is certainly not sexually broken. And Jill, nor am I. If anyone is sexually broken it is the poor people Johann Hari talked about that Jill wouldn't read first time round, so let's try again: "A few years ago, I met up with the British branch, and found pitiful, broken men and women soaked in self-hate, invariably "relapsing" into homosexuality and hating themselves even more."

These are the sexually broken people - poor misguided people who deliver themselves into the hands of the ex-gay ministries because they have learned to hate themselves - one of the baleful effects of institutionalised prejudice peddled by official christendom on the rest of society.

Robert Gagnon's mission at the Pittsburgh Theological seminary (please note this is not a normal Ivy League University but a theological college linked to the Presbyterian church) is to try to shore up the anti-gay readings in the Bible. In fact, he doesn't rest at the 6 or 7 or so texts that deal with same-sex relations (where, of course, the concept "homosexuality" is an anachronism) but to extend the "texts of terror" throughout the scriptures where none was thought to exist. He even seeks to reinstate the Sodom trope even after respected biblical scholars have said that they consider the point of the story is not about homosexuality but the evil treatment of guests. Walter Wink said that Gagnon delivered what the evangelicals required. Here it is again for Jill in case her adulation for her hero blinded her to any criticism from another christian scholar.

"It was inevitable that the antihomosexual lobby would develop something equivalent to a neutron bomb designed to wipe out the homosexual lobby without (it is hoped) altogether destroying the church. I refer to a tendentious study by Robert A. J. Gagnon of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. In an exhaustively argued work of over 500 pages he has tracked down most of the views put forward by homosexuals and targeted them for annihilation. Gagnon makes no secret of his convictions. From the first page he displays his loathing for homosexual behavior"

Jill: "And tut tut, Christopher, you mustn’t give other individuals’ personal comments here; I have been severely chastised for doing that." Well after that in your next post to JPearce what is this - an extensive quotation from Theodore Dalrymple? A little more practising what you preach, if you please!

OK, I know you don't like Johann Hari, but what about Mary Kenny whose conservative opinions should chime in with your own? No comment about her statement on the extraordinary success of civil partnerships, Jill, or would it choke you to get out the words "I was wrong"?

Finally, Jill asked a serious question about whether I felt dehumanised by her when JPearce accused Robert Gagnon of marginalising and dehumanising gay people. He simply said to her "Take note". Jill took it that he was accusing her when I read it that he was simply trying to bring to her attention that one of the more disreputable ways the debate is framed is to condemn by a false association. Jill answered: "J Pearce, I object strongly to your insinuation that I dehumanise anybody. I do NOT. What I, and some others, try to do is address the issue objectively without bringing personalities into it. Christopher, as a gay man, do you feel you have been dehumanised by me? If you do, I am very sorry; it was quite unintentional."

Well, Jill I will tell you that I have felt dehumanised, not so much by that which is the fundamentalists' stock in trade that no decent person any longer takes any notice of, but on a couple of occasions when you predicted a supposed backlash against gay people "Then it'll be back into the closet with you!" On another occasion you have said the closet is the safest place for gay people. I was surprised that you could not begin to have the faintest idea of what it is like to live in the closet. I tried to tell you the horrible experience with my father. I lived in terror of being found out for my guilty secret of just being who I was - not doing anything, mark you, but just knowing I was different. More gay people suffered this back then and I never want young people to feel as guilt-ridden and self-hating as I did in those days. Your words came like a fist in my face. I couldn't believe how anyone who purports to love gay people could think that it was fine to wish them back into that state. I have come out of the closet now but it took me many years - I still have to think about it sometimes. If I went to hotel and was turned away I'd be mortified - the scars of self-inflicted homophobia run deep. Modern young people don't take so long to come out because bigotry itself is now on the retreat and increasingly seen as abnormal - but it is still unforgivable. I do not forgive Robert Gagnon whose works seem entirely malevolent because they are about upholding an ideological position rather than about impartial scholarship, and are reckless about how they cruelly damage individuals in the process. Gay people are not broken, they are not perverted, it is religiously inspired hatred that is perverted. It upsets me thinking about the unacceptably high number of young people wanting to end their lives because some idiot preacherman thinks it his duty to make them loathe themselves or is too stupid to see the effect of his words on young minds. Wishing the closet for them is the best way to make them loathe themselves - take it from one who knows. Talking about gay people as "sinners" may be some people's idea of their religious freedom but they don't know who is in their audience to hear their words and words heard in childhood stay with you for ever. But, Jill, if it's any consolation, I don't think you did mean it maliciously.

I am glad the Lords had the sense to dismiss Morrow's attempt to nullify the SORs last night. Here is a good account of why we need them from the TUC:
http://www.tuc.org.uk/equality/tuc-12827-f0.cfm

During the debate Lord Tebbit conceded that "'black' is about being. Sexual orientation is also about being. We would not wish to discriminate against people for being black or on grounds of their sexual orientation. The concerns being expressed this evening are primarily about sodomy rather than about sexual orientation—that is, doing not being."

Apart from admitting that there is such a thing as sexual orientation and that it ought not to be discriminated against - a position we have heard from many of the opponents of the SORs - the point Tebbit makes is that they still ought to be allowed to discriminate "because they do not want to facilitate sodomy in their own homes". So if they are not discriminating against the same-sex couple but just the act of sodomy, how do they know that is going to happen under their roof? Isn't this just a case of prejudging people as sinners before anything has happened? If they have no objection to gay people per se is it any business of theirs what people do in private? Why don't they leave it to god to judge?

But even in the strongholds of the DUP the late David Ervine spoke out in favour of the SORs saying "Equality is equality is equality".

http://craig-cpnlsn.blogspot.com/

[J Pearce]

Can I add as a postscript, when I refer to "Christians", I use it as a generic term and for brevity.

I, of course, realise that there are many Christians who read and contribute to this blog who do not share the opinions which I frequently rail against.

I apologise to those people who feel I might be tarring all with the same brush unfairly. Just thought I better make that clear.

Now, where was I...? Ah yes, i was being told by Jill that "you youngsters don't know nowt about 'owt..."

[Kate]

Earlier on this thread, Jill requested (I think Frank) that he 'put up or shut up' in relation to her questionable allegations. I am about to 'put up'. More steam-rolling I fear JP! However, before I do so, I'm forced to 'come out'.

Some 25 years ago, I moved from philosophy and literature to psychology. I work as a teacher and a therapist. At an early stage, and with several gay friends, I found myself 'drawn' into work on (for brevity) 'gay' psychology.

It was a Divine intervention or perhaps merely maternal intuition. When my polymath son IN WHOM I AM WELL PLEASED and (with cause) inordinately PROUD came out at the age of 20, I was not reduced to "weeping" or covert antagonism. My son is young, healthy, successful, well-informed; a professional man in a stable relationship.

False witness is cunning, baffling and powerful. I have no fear of the Gagons and Smiths (USA). They are representatives of a society engaged in a moral civil war which, as JP has ably illustrated, bears no relation to contemporary European thinking.

However, the rabble-rousing endemic in Jill's supercilious 'scolding' is another matter. It is a warning of incipient Christian fascism in the UK. Nazi interpretation of ancient Aryan texts led to the claim that Jews were an alien presence in Aryan societies. Semitic people were targeted as the cause of destruction of social order and values. Goebbels portrayed the Jews as leading to civilization's downfall; as Jill portrays gays.

His speciality was repetition; repetition of lies, patriotic angst and incitement to hatred.

Jill: "Homosexual practice has been shown to curtail people’s lives by up to 20 years." FACT: HIV Aids has been shown to curtail people's lives by up to 20 years. Fact: the majority of UK homosexuals are not HIV positive.

Jill: "I am talking about levels of promiscuity simply not understood by heterosexuals."

FACT: She is referring to Randy Shilts (USA) circa 1980s not UK 2007. Gaetan Dugas, "Patient Zero" presented by Shilts, was accepted as fact; it raised a storm of homophobia on top of that which already existed. Neither Shilts nor his publisher corrected or repudiated his portrait, either for its epidemiological inaccuracy nor the fact that he made up the conversations.

FACT: I have worked with heterosexual women who were "not sure how many people" one needed to sleep with in order to be promiscuous! My best recollection (1995) is the woman who had achieved a grand total of 37. Jill's views on heterosexual behaviours need revision.

Jill: "The figures I posted earlier from the World Health Organisation on the alarming rise in the UK of HIV cases among men who have sex with men must surely be an indicator that this is so."

FACT: I am on the WHO mailing list. I can find no evidence of a breakdown in HIV figures which highlights "men who have sex with men" in the UK. As I have already posted, increase in HIV in the UK is centred on the number of African immigrants, hetero and homosexual, who are presenting as HIV positive.

Perhaps I have missed something. A link would help.

Jill to David Smith: "I have been insulted in every possible way, and expect to be again. It is hurtful, especially as it’s not something I would do myself ..."

FACT: Routine insult of intellectual ability, life and/or professional experience, of other posters is Jill's modus operandi. She presents as omnipotent; presumes to pontificate on EVERYTHING and everybody, including age, life experience and the faith position of other contributors.

Jill: "Tolerance of religious belief appears to fall into a different category to ‘tolerance’ of sexual brokenness."

What insolence. Do you feel you are 'sexually broken' Christopher? My son is certainly NOT. It is not a description consistent with the demeanour of any gay man I know. See under 'omnipotence'.

Jill: "I also think that one of the unfortunate repercussions will be an anti-gay backlash." FACT: The mix of fact, fiction, personal opinion and rabble-rousing which permeate Jill's posts conspire to incite 'backlash'.

Jill: "Over 40,000 faithful Episcopalians left the Episcopal Church last year." Indeed they have. They have done so to ally themselves with the abominable Nigerian Akinola. The man who would hang or imprison all homosexuals. The man who refuses to recognise the HIV heterosexual epidemic in Nigeria.

Jill: "How will some of you SOR supporters react to receiving blood donated by practising homosexuals, bearing in mind that refusal would be discriminatory and homophobic?"

WOW. Translation: All gay men are diseased. Not just HIV positive gay men but ALL practising homosexuals. Joseph Goebbels "If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it."

Jill: "You only have to read this blog to see the extent of the vitriol from secularists, atheists and homosexualists to anyone who raises even the mildest protest against homosexual practice."

There you go Frank, forget reasoned debate and good manners; membership of C of I doesn't count - we are "homosexualists". Jill has judged - we are definitely on the road to Hell.

Jill: "It is interesting that you, and others, keep repeating phrases such as ‘marginalising’ gay people. Why do you do this? Many of us have told you that Christians do not ‘marginalise’ people, they merely (try to) abide by scripture which proscribes sexual activity outside of marriage. By the same token (horrible phrase but I can’t think of another more suitable one) you could say that we ‘marginalise’ paedophiles and rapists."

Perhaps the closed mind is the most dangerous. Jill's posts, which reiterate 'difference' in its most extreme forms, dehumanise and marginalise homosexuals. In real terms, she displays only contempt for anyone not of her own particular perversion of Christian teaching. She treads a very dangerous and offensive line in following Gagnon and Smith on this one i.e. the paedophile canard.

It is not persecution of Christians to insist they refrain from generalised abuse and false witness against others. It is not persecution to apply the law of the land to all who seek to defame and ostracise decent law-abiding citizens.
It IS persecution for any group or individual to demand all others succumb to their own bigoted, divisive and inhumane ideolody.

[J Pearce]

"If you support the SORS legislation in the form that it presently takes, it is hard to escape the conclusion that you are more than happy to see trampled down the civil and legal rights of those who think that homosex is wrong to even say so."

Better re-read the thread again, David. I support the SOR's in principle but I acquiesed to some of the points Alan M. made..oooh..aeons ago, whereby some of the more obvious inequalities could do with being re-visited.

The commentators on this thread who purport to oppose the SOR's continually wish to shift the terms of the debate - from re-storing parity in legal and civil rights for a paticular minority group (gays) in regards to purchasing goods and paying for publicly available services -to, instead, a focus on the as yet unproven "derogation" of their religious conscience, in being forced to aquiesce in actively enabling acts of homosexuality. This continual re-focussing of the agenda masks a core issue - that Christians wish to retain the right to actively discriminate against homosexuals, in the public arena, as is currently allowed for in law.

I am more than happy to admit that I am getting frustrated by the continued attempts by Christians to maintain this charade about "religious conscience" and ignore the core issues. If anyone is guilty of "eyes tight-shut", its certain commentators on this blog who peddle misinformation, anecdote and highly subjective opinion, but who choose to blatantly ignore the injustice that the SOR's are designed to remedy. Instead, the only justifications I read are variations on "because the Bible says so". I'm sorry, but I utterly reject the Bible as any source of moral authority whatsoever. Its just another book - one which is riven with contradictions and impossibilities, I should add. I have no more "faith" in the authority or validity of the Bible to provide a moral touchstone than I do in a Jilly Cooper novel.

Christians are not being "forced" by the "thought police" to think corrupting thoughts, as some more hysterical contributors have posited. Christians will retain the right to their particular prejudices in the private sphere, without fear of reprisal . However, Christians are being forced, in the public domain, to treat all members of society as equal - in the eyes of our secular, democratically approved laws. These laws - and those of a similar ilk, such as the regulations against discrimination on religious grounds (which I am absolutely certain you approve of David, right?) - are designed to provide equality of treatment to all members of society, when they engage in paying for goods or a service in the public sphere.

As for Christian "conscience" - given Christianity's dubious history when it comes to enacting prejudice against various minority groups through the ages (as Frank has already pointed out), I do not believe that Christians have the moral right to assert the rights of their "conscience" over the rights of all law abiding citizens in this country to be able to buy goods and pay for services, as they see fit, without fear of refusal based on religious prejudice, when those goods and services are offered for public purchase.

"How too, I wonder, do you in your own eyes, maintain any credibility as a champion of ‘rational’, open-minded debate when your own position ultimately boils down, as you say yourself, to 'that's me ranted out' ...."

Its called a wearied attempt at self-deprecation. Which was recognised as such. By one person, at least.

As for your "slippery slope" arguments - this is exactly the kind of baseless, ill-informed paranoia that seems to inform the arguments of Jill and Mr. Gagnon. What they are peddling (and you appear to be buying into) is unadulterated fear, as if the Dark Ages never happened. It’s the bogeyman, come to doom us all - but this time, he's not French, or Jewish, or Black, or a woman - he's gay. History shows us David, that this kind of societal anxiety is inculcated by those elites who perceive a threat to the dominance of their hegemony. Christians are frightened, because the exitence of homosexuality challenges the orthodoxy of religious teaching. By accepting gays, we reject certain tenets of Christian teaching, This in turn, disempowers the religion and consequently, its hierarchy.

This has now become as much about the Church fighting to retain its waning power, as it is about secular legal issues versus moral conscience.

[Jill]

J Pearce, my children have all flown the nest now, but I look back with some nostalgia on the many years I had of them and their teenage friends lolling all over my house, playing dreadful music, eating everything in the fridge and putting the world to rights until the small hours. I never knew who I was going to find sleeping on the floor of my living room when I got up in the mornings. I used to listen to them talking, and sometimes smiled to myself, because that is just how I was once, young and full of idealism, when everything had a simple solution if only the older generation could see it. I felt inordinately proud of them, and the care they had for their environment and the planet, and for the welfare of others.

I agree with David that you are an intelligent and articulate young man of great compassion (even if a little arrogant), which I applaud, but please, do us the courtesy of understanding that some of us have actually been where you are at now, and, through subsequent experience, found that things are not always as simple and straightforward as they seem, and that the ‘obvious’ solutions threw up problems that we simply didn’t envisage.

I also agree that there is a possibility of David’s prognosis becoming fact, although my money would be on polygamy first, and as we cannot see into the future it is just as possible that things will go completely the opposite way. Just fast forward thirty years or so, and consider the possibility that you could be in a position of fighting against your grandchildren’s school stocking books with titles like ‘Uncle Fred loves Little Johnny’. You could well be posting your alarms on blogs just like this one, and there will be people calling you paedophobe and bigot, and insulting your intelligence. You may laugh at this, but believe me, there are big rumblings in that quarter already. If nothing else, this may help you to understand my position, because thirty years ago if anybody had told me that there would be homosexual marriages and homosexuals would be able to adopt children, I would have laughed at them.

Never forget the Law of Unintended Consequences. CPs and SORs are a massive departure from the norm, and now that the norm is no longer the norm, the future has become very unpredictable and, in my view, very unsafe.

Frank – not a valid argument. Being a woman is not a behaviour. If you are talking about women’s ordination, that is not valid either as the priesthood has nothing to do with women’s ‘rights’. You are scraping the barrel a bit. (Don’t take the trouble to play the race card, either!)

[Jill]

This is a brief summary of how this thread, after 400+ posts, has gone so far, between the two ‘sides’.

Christians believe that sex outside of marriage is wrong. This is not following blindly some abstract dictum. It has withstood the test of two millennia and the scrupulous exegesis of some of the world’s greatest thinkers. It has also been borne out by the experience of countless generations to be the best way of ensuring the health and well-being of the world’s people.

‘This means you are homophobic.’

No, we simply believe that sex outside of marriage is wrong.

‘You wouldn’t say this if it were about heterosexuals.’

Yes, we would, as we believe that all sex outside of marriage is wrong.

‘You are opposed to new regulations designed to end discrimination against gays.’

We do not discriminate against gays, we simply do not wish to be forced to condone what we believe to be wrong, i.e. sex outside of marriage.

‘Jesus never said anything about homosexuality.’

He endorsed the Old Testament teaching on sexual behaviour, which says that all sex outside of marriage is wrong.

‘You would not refuse to let your church hall to heterosexual groups.’

We would if they were promoting sexual activity outside of marriage, as we believe that ......

‘You are bigots and homophobes’

No, we are not, we simply believe that ......

‘You are old and dribbling’ (subtext: your opinion is worthless)

Not quite, but we still believe that ......

‘You are psychotic’.

No, we are not, we simply believe that ......

‘You are morons and half-wits’

We have studied these matters carefully and can find no evidence to contradict our belief that ......

‘YOU ARE OBSESSED WITH SEX!’

Sigh!

[Frank Schnittger]

"Er, Frank – which opposition parties would you be talking about? We don’t actually have any at present in the UK, at least none with any teeth." - Jill

This is not the place to start debating comparative political systems Jill, even if it is a subject dear to my heart. However the following political parties are all represented either in Westminster, in the European Parliament, or in the Scottish, Welsh and N. Ireland Assemblies.

Labour
Conservatives
Lib Dems
Scottish Nationalists
Democratic Unionist Party
Sinn Fein,
Plaid Cymru - Party of Wales
Social Democratic and Labour Party
Ulster Unionist Party
Respect Coalition
Independent Kidderminster Hospital and Health Concern
Scottish Green Party
Scottish Socialist Party
Solidarity
Scottish Senior Citizens Unity Party
Forward Wales
Alliance Party of Northern Ireland
Progressive Unionist Party
UK Unionist Party
UK Independence Party
Green Party of England and Wales

You will note that this is an awful lot more choice and representation than is available in most democracies in the world.

You will also note that these parties represent about 99% of the vote in most elections, and that explicitly religious parties, whether Christian or Moslem, have not currently won a single seat in any of the Parliaments or Assemblies.

Your and Alan’s claims to represent the 72% of Britons who self identify as Christians is clearly daft. 1% might be a more accurate estimate if actual votes cast are to be the measure of real support in a democracy.

Alan whinges about a lack of consultation. However all the parties above are ahead of you in the queue as they have actually sought and received some measure of endorsement by the electorate for their policies and views.

What you are effectively looking for is to bypass the democratic process entirely and receive privileged treatments for your views – as is still the case, to some extent, in the House of Lords.

Alan even threatens a civil disobedience campaign. If Christians are further marginalised (that word again!) as a result of their campaign against the SORs, they will only have themselves to blame.

[Frank Schnittger]

Those who argue that the acceptance of gays puts society on the slippery slope to the acceptance of Paedophilia probably had similar concerns about the granting equality to women in society - another cause being fought to the last by religious conservatives.

Many Christians argued that it was “against their Christian Conscience” to grant equality for women, as Jesus hadn’t appointed any as disciples, as St. Paul had roundly condemned them to second class citizenship, and as the Jewish culture of biblical times granted them no such equality. In fact most of the religious arguments used here against homosexuality have been recycled from the arguments against women’s equality.

The reverse argument now would be that failure to grant gays the same legal rights as others would lead to the slippery slope of reversing equal rights for women. Indeed, equality for women has exposed them to the stresses of following a career as well as of making a home. Some of the health arguments so dear to Jill’s heart could also be deployed against the women’s liberation movement – on the grounds that it is “unnatural” for women to behave more like men.

The wilder excesses of the women's lib movement have of course now also been rejected, as may also happen with the more extreme forms of gay activism. But few would argue that women should once again be placed in a subservient role in society. Or would you, Jill, David?

And just because there is plenty of legislation on the statute books outlawing discrimination against women doesn’t make old fashioned male chauvinism a criminal offence. In fact it shows no signs of dying out. So much for the hysterical claims that the SOR’s will result in a new range of thought crimes that will criminalise Christians for “following their Conscience.”

That is the oldest justification for ignorance and prejudice known to man. It is an adult form of the childish “I don’t care about others, I just want to be let to do things my way” whilst all the while preaching that you are only discriminating against others “for their own good” and “out of Love and Concern”.

Gays are by definition marginalised in society because they will never make up more than a very small percentage of the population. Granting them the same legal rights as others changes very little in Society as a whole, and takes nothing away from the heterosexual majority who already enjoy those rights.

[J Pearce]

Jill,

It is not political correctness, to allow a group in society who are currently disenfranchised in certain legal respects, to achieve parity of legal status with the wider majority, in regards to access to goods and services.

You would choose to deny a particular group in society the same legal and civil privileges that you currently enjoy. What would you call this? I call it intolerance, bordering on persecution. To deny a group in society the same basic civil and legal rights as the majority is to essentially label them as pariahs, as "not equal" to the rest. This is the beginnings of the process known as de-humanisation. You are as guilty of it as R. Gagnon, albeit in a more euphemistic manner ("disadvantaged" is the phrase you used).

I note today that the Board Of Deputies have given a cautious welcome to the proposed regulations. Nice to see the eldest Abrahamic religion displaying a wisdom lost on its younger siblings.

[David Smith]

J Pierce:
'I refuse to allow the civil and legal rights of individuals to be trampled by a bunch of religious dogmatists.'

J Pierce:
'I know I'm right.'

If you support the SORS legislation in the form that it presently takes, it is hard to escape the conclusion that you are more than happy to see trampled down the civil and legal rights of those who think that homosex is wrong to even say so. I wonder again, where is the consistency or ‘internal logic’ in that position for one who sees himself as being a champion of tolerance? Can we now perhaps be excused for beginning to see you rather as a champion, in your own way, of the very same kind of one-sidedness, closed-mindedness, and personal prejudice that you increasingly lay at the door of those who disagree with your point of view?

How too, I wonder, do you in your own eyes, maintain any credibility as a champion of ‘rational’, open-minded debate when your own position ultimately boils down, as you say yourself, to 'that's me ranted out' and ‘I may not win a prize for debating, but I know I'm right’, and when even those on this thread who are 'on your side' now congratulate you specifically on your 'ranting'.

You have shown yourself to be a highly intelligent and humane person, so I think it doubly sad to see you closing your eyes tight-shut to the real effect and precedent-setting of this legislation (instating the unhindered imposition of homosex on society and the stiffling of any opposition to this, and of free speech with it) and at the same time increasing the percentage of personal animosity in your posts. I think Jill is right. When arguments full-square on an issue in question are not being won, bare, unfounded, personal attack often takes over.

Can we try to take this discussion back to the true ‘rational debate’ that you are so fervent in demanding from others, whilst increasingly abandoning it yourself?

A major concern of mine here is what is next on the global agenda of those who want to consign the true Christian values that have served this country and many parts of the civilized world so well for so long (including that of tolerance for ALL shades of opinion, and not just those we happen to agree with) to the dustbin of history.

Once homosex is culturally accepted, I believe that the next bastion in God’s order to be attacked and to have its overthrow enshrined and rendered legally sacrosanct and irreversible by law will be our children’s innocence and their right to be nurtured and to develope as God intended.

European Union Law, which inevitably becomes our law, either through written statute or via the European Court's decisions, now has this blanket item all drafted and waiting to be put on its statute book, and probably, like these SORs, then simply imposed on us in Britain by regulation: 'It is illegal to discriminate against a person on the grounds of their beliefs... or sexual orientation.'

I trust that neither you nor any others on this site think that we should actively assist grown men to have sex with little girls, and do absolutely nothing to protect the very young. But when the first paedophile comes before a court, as he inevitably will, arguing, as a member of a minority group, that he has been discriminated against because he has been refused a job, or not welcomed at a hotel, or other measures have been taken to keep him from accessing children for sex (I trust, too, that we would all still call this 'protecting’ the children); and when he argues that he has 'always' liked children this way ... ever since he can remember... and anyway HE believes that it's OK... in fact he believes God made him that way; and wins his case, and is put back amongst vulnerable children, and even paid a little something for hurt feelings and loss of earnings or career prospects... what will you argue?

Actually there will be no effective arguments left – neither for you, J Pierce, nor for me – if the case against accepting homosex as a norm has gone the way you are presently so determined that it should.

All the same arguments as are being put forward for making homosex culturally acceptable will be put forward for making the long-term sexual use and abuse of children similarly acceptable.

As well as putting forward the above arguments, what most of us now call sexual abusers (though already labels that paint such people as uniquely well-disposed and empathetic towards children are beginning to enter the arena), and their misguided supporters, will argue is that they actually love children, and are on their side. It will be said, for example, that they actually provide them with that most important and valuable part of love: touch; or that it's never too young to begin get them in touch with their sexuality. It will be said that such relationships are OK so long as they are long-term and ‘committed’. It will be said of the abusers that ‘their dignity is violated’ or that they have been subjected to a ‘humiliating or offensive environment’ (to use the terminology and device of the present SORs) when attempts are made to keep them away from jobs and situations involving contact with children, or when they are present in public fora where their ‘orientation’ is actually being called wrong. What then, I wonder, do you think will be left by way of argument to prevent, step by inexorable step, the abusers' rights not to be discriminated against becoming our legally-cemented inability to raise a finger to protect children?

You have argued on this thread that ‘an incestuous sexual relationship is abnormal on the basis that (a) there is strong biological evidence to show that incestuous unions produce inferior or potentially flawed offspring, and (b) it is emotionally damaging for the participants.’ Do you think for one moment that arguments like this will then save the day for the world’s children? Not at all. Just as it does now concerning so-called homosexual ‘genes’, an irresolvable and inevitably inconclusive medical and scientific debate on the ‘biological’ undesirability or otherwise of incest will drag interminably on. Supporters of our being allowed to have sex with our own children will be as furiously upset at the suggestion that this has been responsible for any mental or physical defects that they manifest as many of those who practise homosex have been to date at the suggestion that aids has been the result of this. Likewise, the argument that incest is wrong because it is emotionally damaging to the participants, will be of no avail. You will have no more success proving (let alone carrying the day with) this argument in the context of child sexual abuse than those of us who argue the same about relationships involving homosex, as I do, have had with those who are determined to carry these on and their supporters.

I’m sorry my friend, but rather than a world whose basic ground rules stand only on what I see as the tissue-thin foundation of the reasoning processes of men like you, I prefer one whose basic ground rules stand on the instructions of its Maker, who is right not just because of Who He is, but because His way has also stood the test of time.

[Kate]

Well! Happy New Year to all. I'm just back.

J Pearse: I hope you've done your lines and flagellated yourself thoroughly. What impertinence to disagree with a (Jill-authorised) self-promoting, academically unreliable, bigot!

A wonderful "rant" JP, with which I am, of course, in full agreement. I too will fight Jill/Gagon/Smith ideology to my last breath. I am not of the gentlemanly mode but recommend those on the thread who have countered, irrational bigotry with such patience. I have had much cause for thought.

Reading Gagon, Smith and Jill (again), I feel only unutterable weariness; the thread has run its course.
Viva la Quinte Brigada! Well fought my friends.

Even the olives were bleeding
As the battle for Madrid it thundered on
Truth and love against the force of evil
Brotherhood against the Fascist clan.

[Jill]

I have read much of Robert Gagnon’s work in the past, J Pearce; in fact I think I have probably recommended some of it on this blog.

I disagree that I or any of the other Christian posters here have merely fallen back on the scriptural argument. You say ‘this does not constitute rational debate’. So what do you think DOES constitute rational debate? Calling people names? I would say that THAT is failing to look beyond the confines of your self-imposed, utterly inflexible moral parameters. I don’t believe you have taken on board a single thing that any of us has said to you. Do you think that no Christian challenges scripture? I suspect we all have, at some time or other, especially when it prohibits something we particularly like. It is only on further examination and – dare I say it – with the experience that comes with age that one comes to understand WHY Christian teaching is right.

You are young, you have a young family. I am surrounded with your generation, and know how arrogant you can be, in the nicest possible way, and which for the young is only right – I too thought I knew everything when I was your age. (Good God, I know that sounds patronising, but bear with me!!) I now realise that I was wrong about many things. You will, too. There is nothing new about sexual misbehaviour; it’s as old as the hills. All civilised societies, though, have had to contain behaviour through a legal and moral system. CPs and SORs fly in the face of all that has gone before; many of the things which have made us a tolerant and liberal (in the old sense of the word) nation. I believe this tolerance will be lost once the SORs kick in, and politically correct ‘enforcement’ starts taking place. The thought police are already in place, we have seen several examples already of heavy-handed action against perceived slights. I read in the papers recently that the police are keeping a register of anyone who has been suspected of making homophobic or racist remarks.

This little piece came my way recently. Dr Theodore Dalrymple, in an interview, was asked: You make the shrewd observation of how political correctness engenders evil because of “the violence that it does to people’s souls by forcing them to say or imply what they do not believe, but must not question.” Can you talk about this a bit?

Dalrymple: Political correctness is communist propaganda writ small. In my study of communist societies, I came to the conclusion that the purpose of communist propaganda was not to persuade or convince, nor to inform, but to humiliate; and therefore, the less it corresponded to reality the better. When people are forced to remain silent when they are being told the most obvious lies, or even worse when they are forced to repeat the lies themselves, they lose once and for all their sense of probity. To assent to obvious lies is to co-operate with evil, and in some small way to become evil oneself. One's standing to resist anything is thus eroded, and even destroyed. A society of emasculated liars is easy to control. I think if you examine political correctness, it has the same effect and is intended to.

The URL for the interview is: http://www.frontpagemag.com/articles/Printable.asp?ID=19293

(As an aside, a little further down in the interview was the following:)

You note that Alfred Kinsey had pierced his own foreskin and had put metal wires up his urethra. I had heard echoes of this throughout my life but didn’t investigate it – as the very idea of this reality terrifies me. But now I can’t help from asking: why did he do this? Who in their right mind would do this? What was the objective?

Dalrymple: Alfred Kinsey was a very strange man. He was repressed sexually until quite a late age, and then expressed his sexuality in more and more bizarre forms as he grew older. His was a classic case of the appetite increasing with the feeding. Once you are on the treadmill of exploring sensation as the key to contentment, you have to experience more and more extreme things. I think this explains the logic of artistic production and how 'transgressive' becomes a term of praise.

I thought his answer was very interesting, and bears out a lot of the things I have said.

[J Pearce]

Jill,

I have found on this blog that when I challenge most Christians to justify their positions using logical arguments, they fall back on the same old argument, which is usually a variation on the theme:

"I'm right because Jesus says so/the Bible says so/I have faith".

This does not constitute rational debate. Therefore, why bother engaging in such debate with people who are incapable of looking beyond the confines of their self-imposed, utterly inflexible moral parameters?

By the way, I suggest you ought to read Mr. Gagnon's work a little more closely, before criticising me. Also, please remember that you approach it with a view to justifying your own opinions - you've already agreed with his conclusions, before you've even read them.

[Jill]

J Pearce, I object strongly to your insinuation that I dehumanise anybody. I do NOT. What I, and some others, try to do is address the issue objectively without bringing personalities into it. Christopher, as a gay man, do you feel you have been dehumanised by me? If you do, I am very sorry; it was quite unintentional. I would never make personal insinuations or remarks about you, or any other person, in an insulting way, and hope I have not done so. But to avoid the topic of homosexual practice altogether for fear of causing offence would render this discussion worthless.

As a Christian I believe every human life is a gift from God. In my simple way I hold the belief that when a person is disadvantaged in one way, they are given special gifts in another. A small child might be extra-sensitive and intelligent, and perhaps considered a bit weedy by his peers, but is especially gifted in, say, drawing or music. This child may well grow up with same-sex attractions if his upbringing and peer pressure are conducive (I use that word advisedly). This is the ‘nurture’ argument for SSA, and is one which I believe to be quite common in reality.

I do challenge the concept of ‘orientation’, though, on which rests the whole of the gay agenda. No scientist, even the most determined, has managed to find any evidence of a gay gene; the best they have come up with is a hormonal imbalance. Hormonal imbalances are responsible for a lot of things. However, I know from personal experience, and from listening to people like Christopher, that there are some who know they will never be anything other than SSA, but this is by no means true in every single case, as anyone involved in ex-gay ministries will tell you.

It is only in this generation, though, that SEX has become such an overriding requirement. Everybody must be free to have sex; it is a national obsession. This has never been the case until recently; obviously the Pill had a lot to do with it. The truth is that we can live perfectly full lives without sex; countless millions have done so in the past and still do, and would find it highly offensive to be told that they should be having sex. The Christian ideal is that it should be contained within marriage, that’s all.

J Pearce, I also object to the way you treated Professor Gagnon. His field of expertise is the Bible, and his painstaking examination of homosexuality and the Bible is second to none. He is probably (though I may of course be wrong) not accustomed to dealing with secularists when discussing such matters. I think your behaviour was boorish and offensive. You say ‘he dresses prejudiced, opinionated drivel up as pseudo-academic, respectable research. He makes bigotry sound acceptable… (He) equates homosexuals with paedophiles and homosexual relationships with incestuous relationships.’ Now, apart from the fact that I don’t think that’s what he did at all, this is not what I call debate. If you disagree, you could simply say ‘I disagree’ and set out your reasons why. You have not actually engaged at all with what he said, you have merely called him names. This brings to mind something Margaret Thatcher once said - ‘I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack one personally, it means they have not a single political argument left.’

[Jill]

Er, Frank – which opposition parties would you be talking about? We don’t actually have any at present in the UK, at least none with any teeth. I know things are different in NI but Ian Paisley doesn’t actually cut much mustard here.

I quite like the shift of your arguments (your shifting paradigms again, Frank? You want to get them seen to, you know!). It is true that Muslims and Jews have now joined Christians to oppose the SORs, and now the government is going to have to decide who it wants to appease most – militant Muslims or gay lobby groups. Christians don’t count for tuppence in their eyes. There was an article by Janet Daley in the Telegraph three years ago on this very issue, and much of what she said has already come to pass:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2003/11/05/do0502.xml

Liberalism is in danger of disappearing up its own backside, or as Janet Daley puts it rather more politely, ‘Liberalism has pushed its dogma to a kind of logical conclusion. What it has done by abandoning the tactful fudge in favour of aggressive enforcement of its own code is to expose itself to just the kind of rigorous examination that it cannot afford. By insisting on its gay bishop, by demanding not just tolerance but moral equivalence, it does not just risk a backlash. It threatens to destabilise the ethical edifice on which our imperfect, but reasonably benign, social settlement rests.’

It is already well known that all the major religions are opposed to unfettered sexual activity, but there has already been an anti-Christian backlash from our secular society. You only have to read this blog to see the extent of the vitriol from secularists, atheists and homosexualists to anyone who raises even the mildest protest against homosexual practice. (I except Christopher from this; he at least has always behaved like a gentleman. Well, nearly always.)

If you read the comments I have made to Christopher about the Randy Shilts book, you will see that exactly the same things were happening in San Francisco in the 1980s when the gay lobby was very powerful and politicians lived in fear of them, giving rise to the AIDS pandemic. HIV is on the rise again here, but no politician is going to face up to this threat. Why? The same fear, fear of being howled down by bullies and activists, and we have all seen how those tactics work.

It is interesting that you, and others, keep repeating phrases such as ‘marginalising’ gay people. Why do you do this? Many of us have told you that Christians do not ‘marginalise’ people, they merely (try to) abide by scripture which proscribes sexual activity outside of marriage. By the same token (horrible phrase but I can’t think of another more suitable one) you could say that we ‘marginalise’ paedophiles and rapists. I think the hate card has been played rather too often.

[Jill]

Why, Christopher, thank you, and yes, we had a lovely Christmas, with a houseful, but Randy was nowhere in sight. Just as well, because his name would have provoked much mirth and merriment from my family, I’m afraid. Well, we are English. And what a naughty boy you were to torment your father like that. Sadly I’ve outgrown my teen years. And who is this Pat Robertson you and others keep banging on about? Not somebody who crosses my path, I’m afraid. And ‘Calm down, dear’ – oh, don’t tell me you are a Michael Winner clone – I couldn’t bear it!

As for ever-emptying churches – I know I keep saying it, but you keep ignoring it, so I will say it again – the churches that are emptying are the liberal-led churches. People are not buying what the Anglican Church is selling. Over 40,000 faithful Episcopalians left the Episcopal Church last year. That is around 110 a day. December 2006 saw the greatest single exodus of Episcopalians in the 300-year history of the Diocese of Virginia. Many have left their properties, which they themselves built and paid for but which technically belong to the diocese, and shaken the dust from their feet. More than 20% of the funding and 25% of its members have either left or will leave that diocese this year. Obviously now that the new Presiding Bishop(ess) has nailed her colours to the mast, people have found it’s ‘make your mind up’ time and can no longer play at sitting on the fence.

Whether this will translate itself in the Church of England remains to be seen as we are a less moral, or a less religious, nation, but it is a fact that the liberal churches have passed their sell-by date and are dying whilst the ones that are growing are evangelical and Pentecostal churches. Liberal ‘Christianity’ is a non-sequitur – it’s a question of obedience. Obedience to self-will rather than to the Will of God makes one a Humanist, as far as I can see, and any gathering in a church under that banner would be just a social club.

Far from getting a lopsided view from Randy Shilts, himself a gay man I’m told, his book factually charts stage by stage the progress of the AIDS epidemic in the San Francisco gay community, and is completely non-judgmental. It uncovers the self-deceit and denial of the gay community and the spinelessness of the politicians, both sides allowing people to die in their thousands rather than try to put a rub in the way of the greedy money-grubbing gay bathhouses which fostered the promiscuous gay culture.

It was very telling that even the blood transfusion services lived in fear of gay activists, who strongly objected to any restriction of blood donations from the gay community on the grounds that it was ‘homophobic’. It will be interesting to see the outcome if the current ban in the UK on blood donations from men who have ever had sex with men is challenged under the SORs. I somehow think that a victory on this issue will not go down too well with the general public. How will some of you SOR supporters react to receiving blood donated by practising homosexuals, bearing in mind that refusal would be discriminatory and homophobic?

I don’t feel inspired to read the book you recommended to me, Christopher, if the timesonline article is anything to go by, because I started to read it twice and gave up. Especially talking about the book being ‘staid’ and ‘dry’.

And tut tut, Christopher, you mustn’t give other individuals’ personal comments here; I have been severely chastised for doing that. Mr Hari must be discounted, I’m afraid. Anyone who starts off with ‘The homophobes …’ gets discounted by me anyway. His is only an opinion, and I will have to counter it by quoting individuals again, like lesbian author and activist Camille Paglia, for instance, who says "Homosexuality is not 'normal.' On the contrary it is a challenge to the norm … Nature exists whether academics like it or not. And in nature, procreation is the single relentless rule. That is the norm. Our sexual bodies were designed for reproduction … No one is born gay. The idea is ridiculous … homosexuality is an adaptation, not an inborn trait." (Her words, not mine. Perhaps she is homophobic.)

[Christopher]

Hi JPearce!

I agree with you about the incoherence of Andrea Minchiello Williams's performance on the H&E show. In fact I almost felt SORRY for her and was embarrassed to see someone who was a barrister make such a mutt of herself. I can't believe she did her professional career much good, either. Who'd want to employ her after that? But all said and done, it is her case that is flawed, built as you say on " the unfettered bigotry and naked self-interest that has come to the surface" rather than the principles of equality and justice.

And JPearce, only groupies like Jill and Alan would think Gagnon did anything for his credibility as an impartial academic researcher by his splenetic postings here. The man has succeeding in revealing himself in his true colours to a wider audience, that's all, and he didn't need much help from us to do it.

Frank's wise remark should be heeded before it is too late, but I fear now that Andrea's cohorts will be seen tomorrow evening making common cause with radical muslim muftis outside the House of Lords normal decent people will soon begin to ask themselves, if muslims now, then why not the BNP next time?

[Frank Schnittger]

You guys have the advantage on me - I don't get British TV channels - but I am puzzled why the BBC focused on Guest Houses when they are specifically excluded from the scope of the SORs. The DUP guy was perfectly entitled to exclude the Lesbian couple, even after the introduction of the SORs.

I see Robert and Alan have vanished from this debate. Perhaps they are girding their loins for the protest outside the House of Lords tomorrow. Perhaps they have conceded the argument?

Anyway I am beginning to feel like I am preaching to the already converted. So unless someone here comes up with a radical new angle I think I shall give it, and Ruth, a rest!

[J Pearce]

I watched a fascinating program today. The "Heaven and Earth Show" on BBC1. Part of the program focussed on precisely the issues that have been discussed in this thread (in fact, it appears that some of the contributors were quoting verbatim the arguments played out on these very pages, although I am too humble to take credit for that...).

The bottom line is this - representing the Christian viewpoint, they had a barrister - yes, read that, a BARRISTER - to argue the religious case against the SOR's. Now - you would imagine that a barrister would
be able to argue a cogent, rational and comprehensively logical case for the religious argument against the SOR's. If you thought that, you would be utterly and completely wrong.

When faced with the crux question about this issue (and I quote almost verbatim):

"So, what you are essentially arguing for is that religious groups should be allowed
to perpetuate discrimination against groups which they object to"

the barrister in question was completely and utterly unable to provide any direct answer whatsoever. She failed miserably to provide any sort of cogent, rational argument to support her viewpoint, beyond the tired and failed rant about "freedom of conscience".

THIS is the essence of the argument. It is about whether Christians should be allowed to discriminate against gays in a secular society, in the public arena.

The simple question is this - in the public arena (ie commercial transactions, health services etc), what right do
Christians have to refuse a service to members of minority group? The simple answer is - NONE. Christians ASSUME the right to discriminate based on their religious beliefs (one of a set of competing beliefs, I should point out). I hate to make this so blunt, but this perspective is no different to Fascist Germany at the height of its persecution of the Jews. An attitude that can be summed up thus:

"We object to them because they are different. We believe they are wrong. Therefore we will stop them.".

David Smith - yes, I am angry at Robert Gagnon. I am angry, because he dresses prejudiced, opinionated drivel up as psuedo-academic, respectable research. He makes bigotry sound acceptable. This is no different to what white south Afrikaans did or what any other totalitarian regime has attempted to do.

Gagnon equates homosexuals with paedophiles and homosexual relationships with incestuous relationships. This is a profoundly de-humanising way of framing the debate (although it appears to be one Christians appear most comfortable using, Jill take note). How you or any other alleged "Christians" who contribute to this blog can feel comfortable with that quasi-fascist approach is beyond me. It makes a mockery of your religious beliefs. As for Gagnon...the man is a joke. And a bad one at that.

I would love to see some kind of equitable balance played out in the SOR's, where each competing interest group can find some settlement which suits their own needs. But you can't please all of the people all of the time and in this particular case, the unfettered bigotry and naked self-interest that has come to the surface as a result of these proposed laws - from the religious community - makes it clear exactly where the problem lies.

Its about time you religious recidivists got in the real world. The repudiation of religious beliefs - which allow the practice of real and direct discrimination against a group of law abiding citizens - easily outweighs the "freedom of religious conscience" argument. If the religious groups in our society were to hold sway over law-making, then we can look forward to a future where all women are forced to wear veils, adulterers are stoned to death and condoms are outlawed. That is not a society I wish to partake in and I will fight tooth and nail to prevent it happening, whether it be against Muslim, Christian or Scientologist.

I refuse to allow the civil and legal rights of individuals be trampled by a bunch of religious dogmatists. As far as I am concerned, over this particular issue, those Christians who oppose equal legal rights for gays are no different from radical Islamists.

And thats me ranted out. I may not win a prize for debating, but I know I'm right.

[Christopher]

Ruth predicted that the SOR thread would run and run and golly was she right! There was a very good presentation of the issue by Gloria Hunniford on BBC 1's Heaven and Earth Show this morning. The studio discussion ably chaired by Gloria was between Andrea Minchiello Williams of the Fellowship of Christian Lawyers, Ben Summerskill of Stonewall and a Northern Irish Radio presenter whose name escapes me. The programme arranged for a young lesbians couple to visit Antrim and try their luck at booking a double room into a number of guesthouses. It was gratifying that they didn't encounter one guesthouse, not one, where they were refused a room or made to feel uncomfortable. To their credit the people of Antrim, the "Bible Belt" of Northern Ireland were warm, humane, hospitable and non-judgmental. There was only one guesthouse - and the producers seem to have had to hunt for that - where the owner (a council member for the DUP and mayor of the city) said he would not allow a same-sex couple to book a room. The women in their turn said they would not want to stay anywhere where their presence made people feel uncomfortable. And isn't that the truth of it, despite all the hysteria drummed up by Andrea Minchiello's outfit? Andrea tried to argue that there was only a very small area where there were difficulties with the principle of equality that the SORs seek to establish and it only concerned what guesthouse owners could do in their own homes. Why then, one wonders, all the hysteria and fuss being drummed up by her organisation if it is such a minute adjustment? Ben Summerskill showed that this was not true - gay people have been refused treatment by homophobic doctors, lesbians have even been refused smear tests; these are among the cases of discrimination logged by Stonewall. Against the charge that these regulations are not needed Ben showed that there is every need for them. What people do in their own churches is up to them but its entirely unacceptable that people should be humiliated publicly by a refusal to provide goods and services that would be supplied to everyone else without question. Against the point that guesthouse owners might also discriminate against adulterers and other "sinners" Ben said they had surveyed this and there is no evidence that anyone is ever turned away from guesthouses on those grounds, proving that the aims of the Fellowship of Christian Lawyers are clearly to discriminate selectively against one small section of people.

Clearly Andrea and her outfit are breaking their own 9th commandment if they claim otherwise. When Andrea denied this was their aim Ben pointed out that Earl Ferrers in the Lords, one of their chief supporters in favour giving christians the right to discriminate against gay people, said that christian hospitals might very well want to turn away gay people and charities might very well want to refuse to help gay clients, giving the lie to what she said. The radio guy said that a very few people in Northern Ireland are as bigoted as the DUP. Because the DUP leaders are very noisy in their alarmist claims we assume they speak for everyone in the province when in fact they only represent a small but vociferous bigoted minority.

[Frank Schnittger]

Jill - despites Alan's claims that the Government has been acting entirely undemocratically on the SORs, the fact remains that they were passed by the House of Commons by a margin of 299 to 13.

No major political party has yet voiced its opposition despite the fact that opposition parties are normally the first to spot a weakness in the Governments position and to exploit any lack of popular support for a particular measure.

How can a 1% lobby like the Gay lobby so overwhelm the 72% who self identify as Christians unless the vast majority of those Christians too, are convinced of the justice of the SORs or are at least are not as concerned as you, Robert, David and Alan appear to be? Perhaps Tuesday’s rally will be the start of a fightback, but you have an awful lot of ground to make up.

All of this could change of course, if, as you fear, a number of test cases brought under the regulations do turn out to demonstrate that the regulations are as oppressive as its opponents here confidently predict.

But you are going to have to do better that recruit Ian Paisley’s DUP to your cause if you want to have real influence on Government policy. My concern is that this issue could so marginalise Christianity in public political discourse in the U.K. that people will start to think that you have to be some kind of Paisleyite or BNP supporter if you want to join a Church or publicly self-identify as a Christian..

Remember also that there is another subtext to the political agenda here: The increasingly strident demands from Islamic groups for the application of Sharia law and for Civil legislation to take account of Islamic sensitivities. Such demands will be resisted by all who value our political freedoms.

However you can’t logically oppose Islamic attempts to (say) to marginalise gay people without opposing attempts by Christian groups to do the same. Any “religious” exemptions you achieve – will also become available to Moslem Groups.

If there is a backlash, therefore, it could just as easily be against Christianity for appearing to make common cause with fundamentalist Islam in the name of Religion. Nothing would promote the further secularisation of society more rapidly than if an association between evangelical Christianity and Radical Islam became embedded in the public mind.

[Christopher]

A story to warm the cockles of your heart - unless you are Jill or Alan who disapprove of civil partnerships. The staunch catholic commentator Mary Kenny has actually come out in this newspaper and revealed a Damascus-road conversion or perhaps just a dose of common sense realism when she says:

"The extraordinary success, this year, of gay civil unions — more than 15,000 homosexual couples undertook a civil partnership — is in a paradoxical way a tribute to the enduring element of family structures. Gay people not only wish to affirm their rights to a family life, but also, in some cases, to children, either by adoption or by assisted conception: the aspiration represents a remarkable triumph for “family values”. It is quite the opposite to Cyril Connolly’s thesis, as outlined in his Enemies of Promise, that the main advantage of being a homosexual was that you were free from tiresome and bourgeois institutions such as marriage, and emphatically, from the tyranny of “the pram in the hall”. Now we hear a positive clamour for the pram in the hall. This is not quite a matter of having seen it all before, but a surprising way in which circumstances change but human desires remain familiar and consistent."

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,173-2520604,00.html

Doubly daft then, except for the usual suspects who will no doubt see it as a heroic act of christian witness, is the petty island-mentality (and probably ultra vires) ruling that the island council of Orkney will not allow one of their registrars to officiate at Sir Peter Maxwell Davis, Master of the Queen's Music's civil union on the remote island of Sanday. Lots of famous people were due to be there and the profile of the islands would have been raised, helping the tourist industry, but no, it looks as if the fundamentalist PC island council computer says "no". Striking another blow in the name of christian heroism, is the island council seeking "martyrdom" (i.e. slap on the wrist) to the cheers of sundry homophobes?

"Accusing the council of 'downright discrimination', [Sir Peter] said: 'Everybody can get married where they live except me, it seems. Ever since the law on civil partnerships was brought in, we thought that finally there was an opportunity to get married and to have a little celebration. There are all sorts of people we were wanting to invite from the music world and it would have needed a lot of telephone calls. Well, if we can’t have it here in the place we live then we don’t want to do it at all in Orkney; we’ll probably go to London'.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2533465.html

Sure sign the SORs are needed more than ever.

[Christopher]

It seems the Norwegian exhibition of gay animals isn't the only story that Focus on the Family and co find threatening to their blinkered and blinkering view that homosexuality is ONLY a human "lifestyle choice".

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,7-2527347.html

Now it seems the University of Oregon, recognising that gay rams cost the industry a lot of money are searching for a hormonal "cure", inadvertently telling the world that gay sexuality is a natural occurrence right across the animal kingdom. By the third trimester it seems the die is already cast so if you can extrapolate to humans it is already too late for those ex-gays who want to convert (should that be revert?) to full heterosexual functionality. But worse news for Focus on the Family, it seems to prove what the vast majority of gay people have known all along, that they are born that way.

Johann Hari of the Independent reports:

"The homophobes know that when people realise this, homophobia becomes unsellable. The latest US poll found that 79 per cent of people who think human beings are born gay support full gay equality, while only 22 percent who believe homosexuality is a choice agree. The Family Research Council, an evangelical lobby group in the US, are in a panic. In their latest publication, they warn that discovering people are born gay 'would advance the idea that disapproval of homosexuality should be as socially stigmatised as racism'. Uh-huh. So they spend hundreds of pages trying to debunk the new evidence."

All this throws doubt on the efforts of the so-called ex-gay ministries that David Smith seems to believe in:

"Today, there are Christian ministries across the world who claim they can "cure" gay people through prayer. A few years ago, I met up with the British branch, and found pitiful, broken men and women soaked in self-hate, invariably "relapsing" into homosexuality and hating themselves even more."

http://comment.independent.co.uk/columnists_a_l/johann_hari/article2124227.ece

[Christopher]

Hello Jill

Nice to see you back. I hope you had a nice Christmas but from your pent-up frustration I imagine it was a pretty tight-lipped affair with the H word not being mentioned for the sake of family peace. Still, I am sure you left the Rany Shilts book out on a convenient coffee table so the gay family member was sure to see you were boning up on all the evils of HIV/AIDS. (Reminds me of myself as a rebellious teen-ager leaving out a copy of Rev Walton Hannah's anti-masonic Darkness Visible to peeve my father in his year as Worshipful Master of the lodge.)

You play the martyred (christian) mother part to perfection but somehow I doubt you or David Smith will find yourselves in clink, or that suddenly gay people will become the new Gauleiters of society after the passage of the SORs. I know you will find it disappointing that your Dante-esque horror-fiction scenario won't come about, - just more vociferous demands for special rights for religion alongside ever-emptying churches and more crazy after-the-event predictions from Pat Robertson. So calm down, dear!

Anyway, to redress the balance from the lopsided view you are getting from Shilts I suggest you ask the family to get you Robert Aldrich's magisterial Gay Life and Culture. Here is a review in this newspaper to tempt you http://tls.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,25549-2529473.html

And Jill, Robert Gagnon has got your vote - somehow we guessed that - so you can get up off your knees. JPearce was right, not wrong. It is you who have got it wrong.

Happy New Year! (No fear of offending anyone in saying that, I hope.)

[David Smith]

J Pearce – thank you! To the casual onlooker to this thread – if such a person exists - your two posts following my last have actually made the main point of that post every bit as cogently as I could myself.

When it comes to supporting homosex, you purport to be a champion of tolerance. So can I suggest that, instead of giving us, as you did in particular in the one to Robert Gagnon, all a box-seat view of your own angry, insulting, and actually bullying intolerance towards people who, with no personal animosity towards you or towards any individual homosex advocate or practitioner, but who simply disagree with your point of view, you yourself try to put a little more energy and objectivity into the genuine ‘study and argument’ side of this discussion.

You tell me: ‘what you are advocating is a reduction of basic legal rights to a subset of society’ (namely advocates of homosex). Actually, if you read my post again, you will see that I was not. What I was advocating (at the same time as advocating non-discrimination against people of a homosexual orientation) was my own right not to be legally FORCED by others intolerant of my point of view to assist in the spread of a practise that I profoundly disagree with.

If you read the SORS legislation right through, you will see that, as it is worded, it gives any individual or group that wants to practise itself or lead and encourage others, in every walk of life, into practising homosex the right to FORCE me (as a Christian and with the view that I hold) to help them. If, having read it right through you cannot spot this in the wording, as have the Christian Lawyers and many others, let me know and I will spell it out for you word by word.

Once you have grasped this fact about this ‘imposed legislation’ or ‘regulation’, would you then kindly like to tell us where, to use your own phrase is the ‘internal logic’ (or even a sense of basic fairness) in saying that you support legislation that allows a particular group to FORCE me to actively support an activity of theirs that is against my conscience, whilst at the same time insisting that at all costs I must allow (and actively help) members of that group to freely think and do just as they please?

[Jill]

J Pearce, you accuse Professor Gagnon of reactionary propaganda towards a harmless sector of society, and you talk about religious repression. You are quite wrong, it was once a relatively harmless sector of society, but once the SORs become law it will become extremely harmful, not just to Christians but to all of us, severely curtailing our freedom of speech. (And, J Pearce, you have badly misrepresented some of the things Prof. Gagnon has said, but I shall keep out of this one.)

Homosexual practice has been shown to curtail people’s lives by up to 20 years. Do you not care about this? The best way to ensure maximum danger is to be tolerant and permissive. I know I have harped on about the book ‘And the Band Played On’ about the beginnings of the epidemic of AIDS in San Francisco, but it is such an eye-opener. The most shocking thing, in my view, was not the reluctance of the government to come to the assistance of the gay community, as it was fearful of being branded homophobic (aren’t we all?) by drawing attention to the fact that this new disease affected mainly homosexual men, but the attitude of the gay community itself. The book is written in diary form, and is not a work of fiction, although many individual cases are talked about. The permissiveness shown to the gay community increased the levels of promiscuity many-fold, which is what happens when laws allow more tolerance. But in spite of many efforts, and the knowledge that their fellows were dying in their thousands through an illness not yet understood but known to be caused predominantly by sexual activity, they would not give up their sexual promiscuity, or even curtail it to any degree, such was their addiction to sex. I am talking about levels of promiscuity simply not understood by heterosexuals.

The point I am trying to make here is that the more ‘permission’ through CPs and SORs and the like that we give as a nation to same-sex attracted people, the more promiscuity we are going to get. It always happens – relax licensing laws and you get more drunks, not less; relax birth control and you get more STIs and unwanted pregnancies, not less; relax divorce laws and you get more divorces, not less. Relax attitudes to sex outside of marriage and – well, we all know what happens. There is no reason to think the SORs will be any different. The figures I posted earlier from the World Health Organisation on the alarming rise in the UK of HIV cases among men who have sex with men must surely be an indicator that this is so.

Should the government encourage smokers to shorten their lives (though not by as much as 20 years) by forcing others to allow smokers to smoke in their guest houses, or to criminalise anyone who objects to them smoking?

David, do not be too disheartened by the response to your post. Any soul-baring here is regarded as a sign of weakness, I think, and you can expect to be torn to ribbons. I have been insulted in every possible way, and expect to be again. It is hurtful, especially as it’s not something I would do myself, but I don’t care any more. If people choose not to believe me when I say these things are not because I don’t care about gay people but because I DO, well, I can’t help that. I won’t be gagged. Tolerance of religious belief appears to fall into a different category to ‘tolerance’ of sexual brokenness.

Frank, if you seriously think that the SORs are going to turn people away from Christianity (if I have understood you right) you are surely mistaken. I think the opposite will happen, and there will be a religious revival. This may not happen immediately, of course, but I am certain that it will. God is bigger than you, Frank, or any of us, and the Christian faith is always revitalised by a few martyrs. Read about some of them, Frank. Countless Christians have died horrible deaths rather than renounce their beliefs. We are not required to die horribly in this country, but it may be that some of us will go to prison; well, so be it. There will be no shortage of people willing to do this. I also think that one of the unfortunate repercussions will be an anti-gay backlash.

The SORs are simply a charter for malicious lawsuits, and you can be sure we will see plenty of them. Well, bring them on! OR – they could simply scrap them, saving a lot of Christians from prison sentences and a lot of gay people from the anti-gay backlash!

[J Pearce]

"(Incidentally, you begin your attack by quoting from my recent posting to Christopher, then introducing a quote from my online "Secular Case" article with a contrasting "Yet," as if there is any contradiction between the two quotes. There isn’t.)"

I never posited there was a contradiction. I was merely trying to elucidate the framework of the argument you are trying to present. According to your own words Mr Gagnon, "same-sex intercourse was indeed generally regarded as a more serious offense in ancient Israel, early Judaism, and early Christianity than even incest." The framework I mention appears to be, according to your arguments, that you propose that homosexual unions are indeed more morally repugnant than incest.

Please read again your own words:
"There are good grounds for arguing that homoerotic unions are worse for society than polygamy and adult consensual incest."

If this is the kind of moral relativism which passes for Christian teaching in America, I'm appalled (but, actually, not surprised).

"Second, and more importantly, you say nothing at all about adult consensual incestuous unions where the couple (1) uses contraceptives to prevent childbirth or (2) is infertile by nature or surgery. In other words, you would be for an incestuous union where children were unlikely to result from sexual intercourse?"

What the hell kind of argument is this? I've heard of straw man, but this is a veritable field of hay! You ask me to justify something I never commented on in the first place, then attack me for it! For the record, I am against incest, full stop.You seem to want to peddle disinformation about the qualitative difference between incestuous relationships and homosexual relationships. The differences are quite clear, if you have any understanding of homosexual relationships at all (and you clearly do not, Mr. Gagnon). Without wishing to sound trite, an incestuous sexual relationship is abnormal on the basis that (a) there is strong biological evidence to show that incestuous unions produce inferior or potentially flawed offspring, and (b) it is emotionally damaging for the participants. It is quite clear why incestuous relationships are discouraged in mature societies, although that is not to say that they do not occur.

Comparing this to homosexual relationships, it is obvious that in a male-male relationship, there would never be any offspring. Therefore, it is not biologically damaging to the perpetuation of the species (and as homosexuality is confined to a minority of the population, this behaviour does not threaten the survival of the species). Some might even argue that homosexual behaviour is natures way of regulating population control, a manifestation of self-regulation within the biosphere which we inhabit. Certainly, unfettered breeding in a population without control leads to imbalance within a system and eventual collapse. We are threatened with this problem as the global population continues to expand. Therefore, it is not unreasonable to posit that the incidence of homosexual behaviour in the population may increase as a result. This could be interpreted as a natural response to over-population.

But this kind of out-of-the-box thinking appears to be beyond most Christians, who appear to more concerned with visiting their petty prejudices on any passing minority group. As Frank pointed out, it used to be blacks. Before that, it was Jews. Now its gays.Your religion has a bit of history in regards to persecution, doesn't it Mr. Gagnon?

"You then conveniently ignored the array of risk factors for ancillary harm associated with homosexual activity…"

Oh deary, deary me. Not this hoary old canard again?! There are risks associated with all forms of sexual behaviour! I am happy to concede that if a couple were to live in a monogamous relationship for their entire life, then their chances of contracting STD's would be slim to none. But not all people are predisposed to live chaste or monogamous lives (and life would be pretty boring if we were). We are sexual creatures and the bottom line is that sex is enjoyable. And that goes for homosexuals as much as anyone else.

But as a Christian, Mr. Gagnon, you would assume the moral right to refuse people the choice as to how to live their sexual lives, yes? Or more likely, you would vilify and ostracise those who choose not to follow your Christian dictums on how to live their relationships. Except for those who hold positions of power in your Church, of course, who appear to be exempt from the moral strictures you apply to the masses.

"Nothing that militant Islam is capable of doing will ever threaten the civil liberties of Christian children in these areas."

You are joking, right? You've not heard of 9/11? 7/7? The Madrid bombings? What planet are you on, man? Granted, the chances of a terrorist or rogue state strike against the US is physically not as likely as it is against the UK or European mainland (and aren't you lucky, Mr. Gagnon, that while you can sit safe at home vilifying the odd minority group that happens to pass by, we have to suffer the aftermath of the Christian-neocon inspired disaster known as American policy in the middle east), that still doesn't mean that it can't or won't happen. And what will that mean what? Death and destruction on an industrial scale. Yet according to you, a bunch of "faggots" with attitude are a greater threat.

I'd laugh if I thought you were joking! What exactly do they put in your water supplies?

[Christopher]

Robert

You are at cross purposes here if you think a blog is the same thing as an academic debate or even a peer-review of a person's work. Also I think you are being a tad thin-skinned if you mind your published work being referred to in the cut and thrust of a blog discussion about a matter on which it only has relevance because it has been mentioned by one or two of the parties as presenting THE open-and-shut-case-last-word on the whole issue of homosexuality (when obviously not even you would be so bold as to claim that, I imagine?).

You must surely be the first to admit that there are others who do not agree with you since you publish or give links to a great deal of material on your website which contests your views or publishes views on homosexuality that you wish to contest. Some of them are convincing, but even you dismiss people on an ad hominem basis, such as Countryman's review of your book "because he is gay". How about dismissing you because you are have evangelical agenda and have 'difficulties' over homosexuality? (After all, it certainly looks like it when you praise Rabbi Jacob Milgrom's three-part commentary on Leviticus as "perhaps finest commentary on Leviticus ever written"....oh,....except for his interpretation of two verses 18:22 and 20:13 which you say "is not up to the standard that he achieves elsewhere". Now I wonder why that should be? Nothing to do with the fact that if Rabbi Milgrom is right it fatally holes the christian case against all same-sex relations below the water-line, surely? But then I have said on this blog before that those scriptures belong to the Jews. Surely their ablest scholars can be relied on to know what they mean. I would trust Jews on their scriptures before I would trust vatican experts or evangelicals who want to kick into touch their dis-ease with anything homoerotic.

You also publish a large number of responses to responses. I have, in fact read your responses to the two Lutheran doctors whose work I suggested it might benefit Alan Marsh to read. Let him read your responses too. The fact that he didn't appear to be interested in reading any of it makes me wonder if he had read your original book - is it just on his bookshelf?

I also read your answer to Walter Wink's less than enthusiastic review of your book "To Hell with Gays?". One thing that comes over is how personally you take any criticisms - the Lutheran doctors are "nasty" in the way they respond, Walter Wink, who says "It was inevitable that the antihomosexual lobby would develop something equivalent to a neutron bomb designed to wipe out the homosexual lobby without (it is hoped) altogether destroying the church. I refer to a tendentious study by Robert A. J. Gagnon of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. In an exhaustively argued work of over 500 pages he has tracked down most of the views put forward by homosexuals and targeted them for annihilation. Gagnon makes no secret of his convictions. From the first page he displays his loathing for homosexual behavior" you say "is a disheartening reminder of how mean-spirited the debate about homosexual behavior can get". (Nothing about YOUR mean spiritedness, please note!)

Among evangelicals the name Gagnon has become a by-word for their anti-homosexual stance - "don't bother to read the book, it's very detailed - just know he's our man on homosexuality and no one can gainsay him" is all most of them want to know. The fact is, Robert, they are not interested in the truth of the arguments or the real-life situation of millions of homosexuals so much as winning a cultural war.

Then in an exchange with an email correspondent who called you an "anigay [sic] bible bigot" you say something which is a sinister reminder of the way down the centuries the christian church has adjusted language to wash its hands of the disgraceful and cruel treatment it meted out to heretics, witches and homosexuals, when the Inquisition "relaxed" them to the secular state for burning after they had been tortured to the Question. Hence you say in your answer to Bob Schwartz of Chicago: "I do not support any hateful actions toward homosexual persons--including the endorsement of homosexual practice, which in the end turns out to be hate for those beset by homoerotic desires. 
I do not hate you. I really want the best for you. But it is futile to engage in discussion with you when you have not done the necessary homework to reason intelligently and lovingly on this important matter. Please do not contact me again until you can cease to be abusive and demonstrate that you have read widely." So "endorsement of hateful actions towards homosexual persons" includes in your view "endorsement of homosexual practice". This semantic shift is seen in the way you fundamentalists dispense "love" when you want to beat children with rods. Such a semantic shift took place in German where the word "gift", which retains its original meaning in English now means "poison" in Modern German. Whatever it means when used by you "lovingly" does not have the same denotation for the rest of us who are not deluded into thinking that ancient texts incorporating a bronze-age "ethic" are the highest moral standard that humans can aspire to.

In your next posting you say "the greater danger to Western society is now.... the intimidation of persons who regard homosexual practice as immoral".

So you think it is immoral to stop people persecuting others in the name of religious fictions? Prejudice is justified as long as it masquerades itself as 'morality'? By the same token you must then agree that it is immoral for the Indian government to forbid sati (the immolation of a wife on her husband's funeral pyre) interfering with an essential religious practice that believers say will be her salvation and turn her into a goddess - sati - for them.

You say you know of no cases in the US where gay people have been denied lodgings. Good. That says something about the decency of ordinary Americans, though we are not talking about the US for once but about a real case in Scotland. The guesthouse owner only came out of the woodwork as a christian when he thought it would give him a greater claim to be acting in conscience and not from bigotry, but he didn't advertise his guesthouse as a christian institution at the outset.

Your next comment about "an aggressive homosexual lobby that persecutes those who oppose homosexual behavior" is duplicitous rubbish. The homosexual 'lobby' and 'agenda' is the invention of American far-right fundamentalism - led by people like Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, pro-Family groups like Focus on the Family and Concerned Women of America. JPearce is right about you, you do "peddle baseless, reactionary propoganda".

Of course, we would expect you, an evangelical to promote homosexuality as a greater sin than polygamy since so many of your co-religionists in Africa are polygamist. something we never hear archbishop Akinola condemn. Nor do we hear you condemn divorce because that is the besetting sin among American and British christians. How many evangelicals do you know who have not managed to stick with one spouse till death do them part?

Despite your laboured arguments from Mustanski and Bailey the rest of the post is at best a straw man and at worst a rant since the morality of homosexuality is not the issue here since HM government is not concerned with the private morality of consenting religionists but giving equal and fair treatment to ALL citizens of the UK, irrespective of belief, race, ethnicity or sexuality - against, in many people's view, the immorality of discriminating against people on the grounds that you disapprove of their sexual orientation and practice.

In your next post you move the ground of your argument back to a couple of biblical texts. Evangelicals like to think the account of the Genesis myth with the interpretation of complementarity of sexes is the new silver bullet. But the catholic church has in the past always preferred Paul's plea for celibacy for christians and marriage only as a safety net for those who couldn't manage it. The Jews have a lot more commentary on the meanings and interpretations of the myths that figure in Genesis and perhaps christian commentators should be more careful about ascribing a single authorial intention.

At this point may I mention a fascinating book in this connection I have been reading over Christmas, It is Rabbi Steven Greenberg's Wrestling with God and Men: Homosexuality in the Jewish Tradition. Rabbi Greenberg is an Orthodox Rabbi who happens to be gay. People who think the only interpretation of the Hebrew scriptures is the one we get from christian scholars had better think again and have a look at what will be a revelation. For example, in the midrash on Genesis the rabbis give an entirely different interpretation. The original adama meant earthling, a hermaphrodite being ("male and female he created them" is said to refer to the adama). Adam and Eve came later, only after the divine operation splitting the one into two). The story of the rib is really the division of the one into two not the removal of a rub. For an account of all this and its sources see Rabbi Steven Greenberg - it is too long to include here. Finally, if marriage is so important why didn't Jesus marry, why didn't Paul?

".....Just as incest involves an attempted sexual merger between two persons who on a familial level are too much alike, so too homosexual practice involves an attempted merger of persons who on a sexual level are too much alike....."

You are entering the realm of mythical idealisation beyond the biological confurations of the sexes. JPearce has already answered you on why incest is harmful. You may state that you have proved homosexuality as more morally objectionable, even leaving aside your own religious prejudices, but you are very far from having proved anything of the sort. Assertion is not an argument. At least you only convince the Alans, Jills and Akinolas of this world, who believe for whatever psychological neediness on their part, in the biblical myth as literally true.

The post where you give a list of requirements is a litany of Aunt Sallys. The SORs will not be forcing the Rev Ian Paisley to get himself into drag to attend "coming out parties" or the Belfast Gay Pride. He is free to go as one of the ugly sisters (hardly Prince Charming) or to stay away. The litany is typical of what we have come to expect from the politics of our own gutter press without any help from you.

By now the SORs have become law in Northern Ireland. We have to wait until April for the rest of the UK to catch up. If this thread is now petering out into a promotion of the views of Robert Gagnon I am not interested in giving further publicity to your doubtlessly lucrative book sales.

As we are in the New Year 2007, let's begin it as we end, with a blessing, "lovingly" bestowed, that you may get to receive a gay child into your close family circle who will teach you what unconditional love really means.

[Christopher]

David
I've just seen that for JPearce your fine words butter no parsnips, and I would add that what looks like a concession - "Every person who committedly practices and/or preaches homosex is still a unique and special and wonderful creature" - is a new tack perhaps, but we can still see you above the undergrowth when you say: "And I would appeal to the real altruism and sense of responsibility to wider society that I know exists in many such people, and ask them to look out beyond their own personal perceived interests and needs, and way of trying to meet these" is the plea of Reynard to Chanticleer. How can I believe you when the god you fundamentalists worship is such a moral imbecile?

So we see the stink being stirred up over the SORs by so-called christians who are threatening to pour onto the streets in torchlit demos outside Parliament next Tuesday and who are harrassing the queen with a petition to ask her to intercede with Tony Blair to when the lawyers who lead them know as a constitutional monarch she cannot interfere. (Indeed fundamentalist christians tried the same tack in Canada when they tried to get the queen to prevent the governor general from giving the Royal Assent to the bill allowing same-sex marriage - a pointless and invidious rabble-rousing - all in the name of being persecuted for their christianity! These are people who enjoy protection against unfair discrimination wanting to deny those protections to others. George Broadhead secretary of the Gay and Lesbian Humanist Association (GALHA) has said about it: "These evangelical groups are becoming hysterical and desperate as they pile on the pressure to destroy the new Sexual Orientation Regulations." George Broadhead added: "The religious lobby is now resorting to the use of dishonest and misleading tactics to try to panic politicians into scrapping the Regulations. Following their full-page advertisement in The Times - which made claims about the effects of the SORs that were simply a pack of lies (and this has been confirmed by recent Parliamentary questions tabled by humanist Peer Lord Lester of Herne Hill."
 
Mr Broadhead said that Government must stand firm against this onslaught of dishonesty. "These regulations have already been seriously compromised by the granting of extensive religious exemptions. "The religious groups will not be satisfied until they have destroyed them altogether. The gay community really must get its act together or these important new measures will be steamrollered by religious bigotry."

[Christopher]

David
I might also say "every person who committedly practices and/or preaches christian delusion is still a unique and special and wonderful creature."

What are you appealing to gay people to do? Most would think it's your view of society, based as it is on some interpretations of pre-scientific texts, that needs correcting.

I am aware of Robert Gagnon's website. He runs a one-man industry dedicated to discrediting homosexuality and challenging every challenge to his views. All this makes evangelicals feel a lot better about the way they justify discrimination against people on grounds of their sexuality.

And what 'loving god' are you talking about, may I ask, the one who tortures little children to death with cancer?

".... the normalization of homosex is a linchpin towards the normalization of adults being allowed to have sex with children."

That old slur? What about the normalisation of child brides for heterosexual men until an age of consent was fixed in the 19th century? Don't tell gay people about under-age abuse.

"Even now, just by holding the view that I do and writing like this, I run the risk of being verbally and physically assaulted, and of being fined or imprisoned."

If it is hate speech you may deserve it. Too many lives have been put at risk by people using the cloak of religion to preach hatred. Remember David, we have already read the hateful things you have said about catholics on this blog.

"I believe that homosex, in thought and practice, is wrong because it goes against the fundamental way we are designed as human beings and cannot (just as many heterosexual unions cannot and do not) actually fulfil us in the way that a right heterosexual relationship can."

That's your opinion. It means there's no hope for anyone who does not fit into the 'married + 2.4 children' paradigm...but Paul and Jesus are your hostages to fortune, not to mention all those celibates who gave up everything to follow Christ.

"Far from assisting in its perpetuation, I want to oppose its spread."

Please! How do you think it is spread? By shaking someone's hand? Apparently Akinola seems to hold this superstition http://www.andromeda.rutgers.edu/~lcrew/natter/msg00056.html It seems if it is on the increase it may just be that more people are acknowledging it and being true to themselves - or nature may be using it to combat an overcrowded planet - so it's back to the drawing board for you.

"I do not want to try to force any homosexually oriented person to stop thinking and doing privately and genuinely consensually what I think is wrong, nor do I want to see them hated or pilloried for so doing. Many of those who practice homosex are simply trying to find the elements of true love. I don’t believe that they will by this route."

I assume you don't know what it is like to be homosexual, so you can only guess. I have on this blog already suggested to Jill and Alan that they can have all the sympathy in the world but if they have no empathy they will never understand. Their meddling, then, is just that, like David Blunkett trying to give colour-co-ordination advice to an interior decorator. Sorry if this sounds rude but you don't have a clue. Leave your god out of it - YOU may be terrified of him but some of us do not believe in bogey men.

"But I myself know that I am very imperfect and do many things which others think are wrong, and constantly need the forgiveness and unconditional acceptance of others. I want to persuade homosexuals by argument that what they are doing is wrong, and then, if they want this, to help them to become free of this orientation. As it is proposed, the law will force me to do the opposite, and to actively facilitate homosex. It will thus brutally and forcefully discriminate against me. In technical legal terms, this will be ‘on the grounds of my belief’."

I am soooo sorry for you that the law will not force you to do anything except to stop discriminating in the delivery of goods and services! All the rest is hysterical overreaction, misinformation and hype drummed up by people with an anti-gay agenda.

"If that happens, will those advocates of homosex, whose battle cry is ‘Freedom of thought and practice’ and ‘No discrimination’, stand up and fight for me?"

To do what? Help you carry on your oppression? If you have unhealthy fantasies you should be free to keep them to yourself or within the bounds of your church but when you want to pollute public space the rest of us also have the right not to be molested by you.

"I believe that those who find themselves involved in relationships involving homosex have been badly let down. They have been let down by those who misunderstand, hate, and persecute them in general."

Again, you may think that, I know different, and I am old enough to have experienced the change in this throughout Europe.

"But worst of all, I believe they have been let down by a ‘church’ that has told them that what they are doing is terribly wrong.....This has been the way of the false institutional churches that have given so many millions a false idea of what God is all about and can really do."

I think it is cruel to let you carry on believing in your oppressive fantasies that has a god sending people down to hell because they are on the wrong side, catholics, when you think they should be protestants, or for catholics the other way about. Just listen to yourself.

"In the course of my 3 decades now of involvement in a Christian healing ministry, I have not seen one person who really wanted to return to a heterosexual orientation from a homosexual orientation, and has been given the right information and help, fail to do so."

I've read a great deal about this, probably as much as you, so you will not be surprised that the evidence is that while a very few may change (perhaps because they were bisexual or not even gay in the first place) for the vast majority fully functioning heterosexuality is not possible. It is a cruel deceit to lead them on in the way NARTH and other ex-gay movements do. I recommend a documentary on this subject: Under One Nation which tracks the careers of the leadership of Exodus International.

"In my experience, homosexual orientation is never ‘genetically immutable’, but always the product of a person’s reaction to an imperfect spiritual and emotional environment in their formative years, sometimes going back as far as the womb. Making certain choices, and welcoming and allowing God’s power to work can always change it."

That may be. Scientists are still out on the subject but in the meantime I would trust a gay man's account of how he experiences his sexuality than what the faux doctors of reparative therapy have to say about it. If they are heterosexual they should ask themselves one question: When did they CHOOSE to be straight? And if they are ex-gay: Have they REALLY lost all same sex attraction so that they never have a a gay thought in their heads again?

"I know how challenging and even hurtful it will be to some to hear these kinds of statement, and I do not underestimate the enormity of the life-changes that some would face if they even begun to contemplate taking such steps towards change..."

You have no idea. I think Jesus said it better "Father forgive them for they know not what they do"

David, if you are heterosexual I have not much patience with your prescriptive vision on how others whose life experience is so utterly different from yours that you could not possibly understand it while you hold such rigid views; if on the other hand you are homosexual you need to heal yourself of your own internalised homophobia and begin owning your sexuality as god-given (since you persist in believing in that entity). But you would be happier, in my opinion, if you disabused yourself and came out.

[J Pearce]

"...inasmuch as a prohibition of more than two partners in a sexual bond is logically and naturally predicated on the 'twoness' or duality of the sexes..."

This assertion is opposable on the grounds of observable evidence in nature.

1. There have been numerous societies which have practiced polyamory, to no detrimental effect. The fact is that many of these societies were forcibly converted to a (for them) unnatural Christian model of familial structure, which often resulted in much societal distress.

The fact is, Christianity has been responsible for much pain and detrimental societal upheaval where it has been forced onto an indeginous population, which did not practice it. Thats what I call unnatural.

2. Homosexual behaviour (or an analog of it) has been observed in many species other than man. If it were so "ungodly", it would not occur at all.

3. Homosexual behaviour predates Christianity. It is a part of the "human condition". No amount of religious repression is going to remove it from society.

The argument that homosexuality is akin to incest is disingenuous as it conveniently ignores the yawning qualitative gulf between the two. I have found that it is very convenient for Christians to equate homosexuality with incest and child sexual abuse, most likely on the simple basis of "tarring with the same stick".

It is morally abhorrent that you, Mr. Gagnon, should attempt to draw such parallels. By using such sweeping, prejudicial analogies, you effectively condemn an entirely innocent section of society to pariah status. This is persecution by any other name. As a Christian (what are you people supposed to be famous for? loving? caring? Please remind me), you should be disgusted with yourself.

[Frank Schnittger]

Robert Gagnon – You may have missed large tracts of the earlier parts of this thread where Alan and Jill argued at length for the right of Christians to refuse hospitality to persons they identified as being gay. Indeed, that was the issue which generated the most heat on this thread until I pointed out that the SORs explicitly excluded the provision of Guest House accommodation from their scope. It is still legal, therefore, to discriminate against gays in the provision of such accommodation.

I appreciate that your views are probably pretty mainstream in evangelical America, but you may perhaps not be aware how little they resonate with European political culture generally. The right not to be discriminated against on the basis of your sexual orientation, whether homo or heterosexual has long been accepted here and few want to reopen that particular Pandora’s box.

In Europe only neo fascist and openly sectarian parties like Northern Ireland’s DUP support such discrimination, and given their lamentable record of persecution directed at Jews and other racial/religious minorities few in mainstream society really wants to go there again.

Europe is also, of course, secularising fast, and I can think of no better way of accelerating that process still further than by linking Christianity with opposition to legislation aimed at outlawing discrimination against gays. Christians will become totally marginalised in all political discourse if this is seen to be their dominant concern. Some, of course, will welcome this, feeling the more elite and “elect” the more isolated their societal position becomes.

I am only slightly surprised that given the U.S.’s past record of racial discrimination, that many Americans are now enthusiastically embracing another form of discrimination. There appears to be a great inherent need to feel superior to somebody else.

All of which is not to say you are not perfectly entitled top argue your case that Christianity and opposition to homosexuality are inextricably linked. I doubt you will find many here even willing to engage with you on that basis. Most would find that argument reason enough to ditch Christianity!

I am, personally, very sad that such a great tradition might become so marginalised and debased, but see it as an increasingly inevitable outcome if the American evangelical influence within what remains of European institutional Christianity becomes more pronounced.

For me the wish to discriminate against others on whatever basis is so far removed from the essence of Christianity, it is not even worthy of debate. Hence I have limited my comments here to the politics of the argument. You remind me of the theologians who endorsed Apartheid as God’s plan for black people. They, too, had their favourite biblical quotes.

If your theology is incapable of differentiating between such diverse phenomena as polygamy, paedophilia, incest and homosexuality, it is not worthy of serious consideration. Your attempts at pop-science not even a basis for debate.

But it is your politics which are the most objectionable, seeking, as they appear to do, to entrench in civil law the right to practice discrimination against gays on religious grounds. Moslems seek exactly the same thing with the application of Sharia law and the duty to dhimmitise infidels.

It is the ultimate irony that Western societies, in seeking to protect their civil liberties (which were originally largely of Christian inspiration), are forced to legislate against both Christian and Moslem attempts to persecute others in the name of their Religion.

[Robert Gagnon]

Dear J. Pierce,

One final thing. You attempt to ridicule my assertion that "homosexual activism represents the greatest threat to civil and religious liberties for our children" by pointing to militant Islam as a far greater threat. Obviously you didn't understand my point, which was restricted to Christians who are citizens of the United States, Canada, and Europe (in other areas homosexual activism is virtually nonexistent and therefore irrelevant for the purposes of my observation). Nothing that militant Islam is capable of doing will ever threaten the civil liberties of Christian children in these areas. But for expressing Christian views on homosexual practice Christians can risk all sorts of things from state declarations of their views as the equivalent of virulent racism, to attenuation of educational opportunities, to threats on employment and career advancement, to stiff fines, loss of property, and (some day) incarceration. There is nothing else that I believe as a Christian that puts me so at risk of collision with the state. That is what I was asserting, which you misunderstood and/or misrepresented.

Robert Gagnon

[Robert Gagnon]

Dear J. Pearce,

Save your bile. It apparently clouds your judgment. There is a lot of heat in your response but precious little light. I will deal below with what little attempt you make to offer anything like a rational argument for your position.

Don’t feign such shock over the comparison with adult, consensual incest. Same-sex intercourse was indeed generally regarded as a more serious offense in ancient Israel, early Judaism, and early Christianity than even incest. It was viewed as a greater, more foundational violation of God-ordained, body-embedded structures in the human creation. For this point see my lengthy footnote 17 (online) in my notes to my published material in Homosexuality and the Bible: Two Views (Fortress Press, 2003), at http://www.robgagnon.net/2VOnlineNotes.htm. (Incidentally, you begin your attack by quoting from my recent posting to Christopher, then introducing a quote from my online "Secular Case" article with a contrasting "Yet," as if there is any contradiction between the two quotes. There isn’t.)

You argue that the analogy with incest is a bad one because "weight of biological evidence available…proves 'consensual incest' to result in genetic abnormalties [sic] which perpetuate themselves through generations." I have two problems here. First, life-threatening or even serious abnormalities do not occur in anything like all the offspring of all incestuous bonds, and certainly not for occasional single-generation bonds. Moreover, there are many non-incestuous unions where one or both of the parents has a high risk for passing on a significant congenital defect to offspring and yet we don't prohibit such unions out of hand with absolute civil penalties. So why the absolute prohibition on incest of an adult, consensual sort if all one has to go on is the kind of argument that you raise here?

Second, and more importantly, you say nothing at all about adult consensual incestuous unions where the couple (1) uses contraceptives to prevent childbirth or (2) is infertile by nature or surgery. In other words, you would be for an incestuous union where children were unlikely to result from sexual intercourse? You appear to have a skewed understanding of what is fundamentally wrong with incest. See my postings above on this question. Tell me, tell us all, what is wrong about a man having sexual intercourse with his consenting mother or consenting sister or consenting adult daughter when offspring are unlikely to arise? Anything? Then explain to me and to us all why there is no similarity between this wrong aspect of incest and a root feature of homosexual unions.

What you pointed to in the case of incest was an instance of one particular risk factor of ancillary harm for incestuous unions. You then conveniently ignored the array of risk factors for ancillary harm associated with homosexual activity that I cite at http://www.robgagnon.net/SecularCase.htm. This article lists the problems and provides links for the documentation of assertions (which, incidentally, I just updated for your benefit). To see the documentation you have to check the links. Have you done this?

You claim to have now "sampled my work" adequately to draw your conclusions. But it is clear that you neither read for comprehension the 1-page discussion that you looked at nor examined any of the links where the documentation is provided.

[Robert Gagnon]

If, then, homosexual practice is morally objectionable on the same grounds that society finds polyamorous and incestuous behavior objectionable, the following follows as case examples:

(1) No church or religious organization should be compelled by law to offer its facilities for, much less provide its own blessing to, the sanctioning of bonds that perpetuate homosexual activity, any more than it should be compelled to lend its support for polyamorous or incestuous unions.

(2) No adoption or foster agency, whether religious or not, should be compelled to place children with homosexual couples, any more than it should be compelled to place children in families consisting of 3 or more sexual partners or sexual partners who are close blood relations.

(3) No owner of a print shop should be compelled to print materials promoting homosexual practice, at least not unless the owner could be compelled to promote sexually immoral behavior of all sorts, or immoral behavior of any sort, like racism.

(4) No schools, whether parochial or public (I guess you use the word ‘state’), should be required to promote the acceptability of homosexual unions to school children, including the stocking of books like "Heather has two mommys," accommodation to "gay clubs," and classroom instruction that equates "gay rights" with the struggle of persons of African descent for racial equality. Certainly no parents should have their children held captive to such forced indoctrination in public (= state) schools.

(5) No person should be made to feel that his or her job is at risk for failing to participate in or support "coming out" celebrations or "gay pride" observances in the workplace, for failing to give preferential treatment to "gay" applicants for a job position, or for expressing his or her personal disapproval of homosexual behavior (whether in the workplace or out) when others in the workplace are expressing their intolerance of persons who do not approve of homosexual unions (so long as this expression of disapproval does not explicitly commend violence). Nor should any company be in any way penalized for failing to support homosexual unions, including providing benefits for the homosexual partners of employees.

(6) No person should be made to fear prosecution by the state, whether through fines or through incarceration, for publicly expressing opposition to homosexual practice (again so long as this expression of opposition does not explicitly commend violence).

In all cases a distinction must be made in law between "orientation" and behavior.

I cite these as examples because SOR-like laws in various parts of the Western world have already been employed to violate human rights in all these areas. Even if the SOR-like law does not directly address these matters the principle of establishing homosexual orientation, interpreted to include homosexual behavior, as a protected civil rights category invariably leads to other laws that further infringe the civil liberties of those who cannot be complicitous in the condoning of homosexual practice.

[Robert Gagnon]

If one is opposed to providing societal supports for adult, consensual polyamorous behavior then one should be opposed to supports for homosexual behavior, inasmuch as a prohibition of more than two partners in a sexual bond is logically and naturally predicated on the 'twoness' or duality of the sexes, male and female. Jesus himself made this connection (according to Mark 10) when he predicated his view of marital monogamy and indissolubility on the fact that God made us "male and female" (Genesis 1:27). Insofar as the union of a male and female bring together the only two sexes that exist (contrary to the alleged existence of a "third" sex), a third party is neither needed nor desirable. Surely the principle of only two persons in a sexual bond is not more important than the principle of the duality of sexual complementarity on which it is based.

If one is opposed to providing societal supports for adult, consensual incestuous behavior then one should be opposed to supports for homosexual behavior, inasmuch as the reason why society is opposed to adult, consensual incest is even more keenly felt in the case of homosexual practice. Just as incest involves an attempted sexual merger between two persons who on a familial level are too much alike, so too homosexual practice involves an attempted merger of persons who on a sexual level are too much alike. Sex (gender) is, after all, a more basic and fundamental component of human sexuality than the degree of blood relatedness.

I'm not posing here merely a "slippery slope" argument, although society should be concerned about a slippery slope as well. I'm arguing that if one finds polyamory and incest even of an adult, consensual, and committed sort to be morally objectionable, then one should find homosexual practice even of an adult, consensual, and committed kind to be morally objectionable. Since these arguments are not predicated on a particular, sectarian religious view but rather on general moral grounds, their application in civil society should not be restricted to the religious sector.

[Robert Gagnon]

Christopher,

I forgot to respond to your last comment; namely, "Does your Theology on Homosexuality mandate Christians to discriminate against persons they consider might be homosexual in the provision of goods and services - e.g. a hotel room?"

Let's be honest about the fact that the greater danger to Western society is now not the persecution of persons actively engaged in homosexual practice but rather the intimidation of persons who regard homosexual practice as immoral. I don't know of any recent cases in the United States where persons who identify themselves as "gay" or lesbian are denied hotel rooms. None. I do know of many instances where the state has attenuated the civil liberties of those who lovingly disapprove of homosexual behavior.

The real issue is that establishment of legislation like SORs results in an aggressive homosexual lobby that persecutes those who oppose homosexual behavior and invariably creates civil endorsement of homosexual practice.

One of the big errors in this discussion has been the assumption that homosexuality is akin to ethnicity and gender. It is not. Quite simply, ethnicity and gender are (1) 100% heritable; (2) absolutely immutable; (3) primarily non-behavioral; and (4) inherently benign. Homosexual "orientation," like many impulses, especially sexual impulses, is (1) not 100% heritable; (2) not absolutely impervious to outside influences; (3) primarily behavioral; and (4) thus not necessarily benign.

To argue that homosexual practice is entitled to civil protection on the sheer basis that homosexuality is a deeply ingrained condition is like arguing that consensual and "committed" polysexual practice (having sex with multiple persons concurrently) and, worse, pedosexual practice (pedophilia) are entitled to civil protection because polysexuality and pedosexuality are deeply ingrained conditions for many.

As even two strong proponents of homosexual unions in the psychological/psychiatric community, probably non-Christian, have acknowledged, "all behavioral differences will on some level be attributable to differences in brain structure or process. Thus, no clear conclusions about the morality of a behavior can be made from the mere fact of biological causation, because all behavior is biologically caused" (Brian Mustanski and J. Michael Bailey, "Sexual and Relationship Therapy 18:4 [2003]).

In other words, the morality of a given behavior has absolutely nothing to do with the presence (or absence) of biological causation factors. Nothing. Even Mustanski and Bailey, who incidentally have collectively done as much research into the study of congenital causation factors for homosexual development as any in the world, admit that basing one's moral case on "the origins of sexual orientation is focusing on the wrong issue."

[Frank Schnittger]

Alan, I last met Dr. Eames shortly before Christmas on one of his last engagements before retiring at the end of 2006. I did not have the opportunity of a private discussion, and anyway, I somehow doubt that the SORs were the most important priority on his mind at that time. In any case he did not address the issue of SORs in his address to the School.

It seems, from your last post, that at least the cabinet is engaging in some kind of debate on the SOR's - which is more than can be said for David Cameron and the Conservatives. Normally it is the role of Opposition to force such debates on the Government on the day in Parliament. Presumably the Tories don't see any votes in it for them, or at least it doesn't project the sort of image they want to project.

If you can’t get either the Government or the main opposition parties to support you on this, and can rely on only the support of the DUP in Northern Ireland, then I suggest that your prospects for success are not great. In a democracy it is votes and seats in Parliament that count. Any marginal special interest group can shout about lack of consultation or seek to bypass the will of parliament. In fact that is probably what Jill and others accuse the Gay lobby of doing.

Bottom line, they have managed to secure the support of Government and at least the acquiescence of opposition parties who would normally be the first to exploit any weakness or lack of popular support for a particular measure. Given that Gays represent, at best, a very small percentage of society, you have to marvel at their political achievement.

How is it that you cannot mobilise the 70% of Britons who self identify as Christians in support of your position? If Robert Gagnon is to believed, they are not entitled to express a view in favour of “the Gay Agenda” without reading and critically debunking all of his scholarly work first (writing on Amazon or a blog like this apparently does nor qualify).

Perhaps the Holy Spirit has moved them in another direction. Perhaps it is just laziness. Perhaps they have been manipulated by a corrupt political culture. Take your pick. But you will have to do better than enlist the DUP in your support if you want to succeed in the political marketplace.

[J Pearce]

Mr Gagnon says on this thread:

"At Corinth, some of the apostle Paul's early converts believed, for one reason or another, that a case of adult incest should be tolerated in their midst. So what? They were wrong."

Yet in his "How to make a valid secular case against cultural endorsement of homosexual behaviour" piece (http://www.robgagnon.net/SecularCase.htm), Mr Gagnon makes the following statement:

"There are good grounds for arguing that homoerotic unions are worse for society than polygamy and adult consensual incest."

So, I think we can reasonably deduce from these opinions that on Mr. Gagnon's list of "offences against religion", homosexuality is worse than incest.

Interesting opinion. Has Mr. Gagnon not made himself aware of the weight of biological evidence available that proves "consensual incest" to result in genetic abnormalties which perpetuate themselves through generations? Or does Mr. Gagnon believe that children who suffer inherited genetic abnormalities as a result of incest are more tolerable in his Christian world, than a pair of law abiding adults who do no harm to others and are, by definition, not going to produce any offspring themselves?

I also wonder, what else in Mr. Gagnons world is more tolerable than homosexuality? Given the following quote:

"Homosexual activism represents the greatest threat to civil and religious liberties for our children."

It seems quite obvious that in Mr. Gagnons opinion, the threat to Christian civil and religious liberties offered by, say, Militant Islam (a nuclear armed Iran, perhaps; or maybe an Al-Quaeda terrorist strike) - is far outweighed by a small section of society, who's greatest weapon appears to be their ability to make a cutting remark.

Until I read your piece, Mr.Gagnon, I was under the impression you were supposed to be a well-educated, widely read individual who put forward a set of robust, academically sound arguments in favour of Christian teaching on homosexuality. Having sampled your work, I now realise it to be a scattershot, completely unacademic (albeit literate) rant against homosexuals, based on little more than personal opinion, anecdote and a propensity to blindly follow the dictums of a belief system which itself has no internal logic and is riven with contradictions, outright falsehoods and prehistoric dogmatism.

Do you not think, Mr. Gagnon, that being allowed to peddle baseless, reactionary propoganda against a harmless section of society under the thin veneer of psuedo-academic respectability is not a little irresponsible? And that perhaps, you should be re-aligning your Christian concerns to address the real threats to society, instead of indulging your petty, barely-disguised intolerances?

[J Pearce]

"If that happens, will those advocates of homosex, whose battle cry is ‘Freedom of thought and practice’ and ‘No discrimination’, stand up and fight for me?"

No. Because what you are advocating is a reduction of basic legal rights to a subset of society - based on religious belief, not democratic accountability (which is the basis of our current functioning society).

On the basis you advocate David, if I were to say all Jews should be denied legal rights in the same way homosexuals currently are, because my (for example) islamic belief system advocates that, whats the difference between you and me?

If God (the alleged real one, not G, Brown) would like to kindly turn up at No. 10 this new year and make it obvious he exists - and that he personally endorses the Christian religion over ALL the myriad other ones currently available - then I might have time for some of your arguments.

Until then, I think not.

[Robert Gagnon]

Christopher,

In answer to your comment about why I should post here, Ruth said I should post my comment above on this discussion since the other ones were now dead. So I have complied.

You said that you were "merely making the point" in referring negatively to my work that I "do not necessarily represent the views of all christians on homosexuality, and cited the two good Doctors as examples of Christians who differed." But that was not all that you were doing. You were dismissing my work (citing, of all things, two incompetent Amazon.com comments) without having read it and then accusing Alan of being "too fragile" to read opposing views when you are apparently too afraid of reading my opposing views firsthand before you criticize them.

When you add "please don't feel insulted if I haven't read your every word or feel the need to engage in an exhaustive critique of your work," I must ask what precisely you have read. So far as I can tell, you have read nothing firsthand, let alone anything close to "every word."

You tell us that there are Christians that have opposing views to my own on the issue of homosexual practice. This is not news to anyone. Of course there are professed Christians who argue in favor of homosexual practice. But why stint yourself on this one issue? Christian history is riddled with instances of professed Christians adopting various views on theological and ethical matters. At Corinth, some of the apostle Paul's early converts believed, for one reason or another, that a case of adult incest should be tolerated in their midst. So what? They were wrong.

The observation that some Christians believe that homosexual practice can be harmonized with the teachings of Jesus and/or of Scripture generally is vacuous. The issue is whether the case made is a credible one in light of criticisms.

With all due respect, you would have more credibility in your arguments on what Scripture allows and doesn't allow as regards homosexual practice, or what alleged "new knowledge" we have or don't have on homosexuality relative to the ancient world, if you actually interacted with the scholarly critiques of attempts to read Jesus and/or Scripture as not opposed to homosexual unions.

[Frank Schnittger]

David, it's good to hear from a Christian who is concerned not to condemn but to work with and help those gays who "who really wanted to return to a heterosexual orientation from a homosexual orientation".

But let us deal with the problem of those who don't, can't, or won't for whatever reason. Are they to be treated as some kind of second class citizen, whatever your moral feelings might be about them?

I think we are in danger of confusing morality and legality. A choice can only be moral or immoral if it is freely made. Decisions made in compliance of the law can be incidentally either moral or immoral, but the point is that they have been enforced by the law under threat of sanction, and in that sense are essentially amoral.

You cannot, by law, force people to be either Christian, heterosexual, homosexual or whatever. These are moral choices people have to make for themselves. We can argue about how free these choices really are for most people, given the amount of social conditioning we are all subjected to from earliest childhood on, but the point about being a mature adult and citizen in a free and democratic country is that we ultimately have to take responsibility for these choices ourselves - however much we may be influenced by or want to rebel against our conditioning or the " imperfect spiritual and emotional environment in their formative years"

In the past, in our societies, this conditioning has been almost all one way – favouring Christianity over other religions and favouring heterosexuality over homosexuality. The fact that these choices have been for most people also the right choices – in a moral sense – is neither here nor there. Merely becoming the product of your conditioning is an amoral process. It only becomes moral when you consciously choose them as the right choice for you.

This is not a choice we can make for others, however much we might want to, and however much we might believe it to be the right choice for them as well. This is a choice they have to make for themselves.

We may disapprove of the choices some people make from our moral perspective – and retain the right to express that view – but that does not give us the right to make their choices illegal, or seek to discriminate against those who make those choices.

The question of whether certain choices or lifestyles should be illegal is an entirely separate matter, and made by us as citizens within a democratic society. We may, for instance, decide to make paedophilia illegal for both moral and practical political and child protection reasons.

But simply because you disapprove of homosexuality morally doesn’t give you the right to make it illegal (or to confer second class citizenship status on those who practice it). You would have to make that case on practical political grounds, and it is that case which Christianity has lost since homosexuality was decriminalised.

I have to laugh when I hear Christians complaining about Gay rights groups propagating a homosexual culture and the danger this poses for Christians,heterosexuals, families and children – given the amount of prejudice and conditioning which has far more often been directed against gays. I well remember experiencing the fear that I suspect most adolescent boys feel at some stage “that I might be like one of them”. Think of the shame, stigma, hostility and perhaps even violence that you would have to endure!

If Gay Rights groups can succeed in reducing the hostility and stigma that gays have often experienced, I am all for it. But the notion that it is only such conditioning and control by fear that prevents most people from practicing gay sex is truly nonsensical.

Most of us are heterosexual because we are heterosexual and not because we need society to condition us to be so. It is far more likely, and historically far more prevalent, for homosexuals to be conditioned by fear, violence, or extreme “educational” measures to behave heterosexually than the other way around.

Giving a small percentage of the population the right to deviate from accepted norms is no more a threat to the vast majority and their norms of sexual orientation than allowing a few atheists to live in a Christian society. In fact it is a Christian duty to treat others, who are different, as we would they would treat us.

The law may change in order to strengthen the rights of gays to assert their “differentness”, should they choose to do so. That no more impacts on Christian teaching, nor the right of the vast majority to behave in a Christian or heterosexual way than allowing some members of racial minorities to live in our midst as equal citizens.

In fact the choice of Christianity and/or heterosexuality is only moral if we have the right and the opportunity to do otherwise. Otherwise it is simply cowardly compliance with the law or the dominant norms of our society.

Our freedom, as Christians, heterosexuals, or whatever, is dependent on allowing ourselves and others to make different moral choices. By all means proselytise for what you believe is true all you want – even if you have to deal with a few stupid Coppers or Council officials on the way – ref. Alan’s post.

Those are the sort of problems that racial, religious, or sexual minorities almost take for granted, because they have to deal with ignorance and prejudice all the time. It may be a new experience for mainstream straight Christians – still quite wrong of course – but perhaps also salutary and educational if it teaches them the sort of thing others have always had to put up with.

But the bottom line is that choices are only moral if they are free. If you teach Christian morality, you also have to guard and fight for the right of others to make choices that are different from ours. That is why legislations aimed at protected others from discrimination or persecution also protects our right to be moral and free.

[Alan Marsh]

Frank, I am opposed to the SORs in all sections of the UK, of which NI remains a part, and the CofI remains part of the Anglican Communion, of which I am also a member. Its leaders are (sometimes painfully) reticent, and for them to use language such as that quoted above - We wish to protest this frankly oppressive behaviour on the part of government - ought to indicate that the government and Peter Hain have far exceeded themselves with this particular project.

The NI situation can be read in at least two ways: an attempt to push the warring parties back into the Assembly - or a swift coup to get the regulations on the statute book before Ian Paisley becomes the leader of a functioning Assembly. Either way Labour will not suffer electorally because it does not permit the election of Labour MPs from NI.

Parish halls and even guest houses are a relatively trivial issue both in NI and in Scotland, and England & Wales, although they will produce test cases sooner rather than later.

The key issues here are education - and the whole constitutional principle of imposing this kind of legislation, and in such a covert manner.

The government has been questioned about its intentions in schools and has declined to deny that the SORs will indeed, either directly or indirectly (through use of the device of "harassment") be used to impose a gay sex curriculum in both state and church schools. Perhaps, as you are a fellow governor with Dr Eames, you could tell us what his views are on such a prospect?

Thanks to the usual ineptitude of the Cabinet, the SORs intended for the rest of the UK are still being fought over between ministers, and there is no voice being heard from the Opposition to indicate What Cameron Would Do. So there is indeed more time for public debate here, but there is a certain difference between that and proper consultation, and the production of legislation which is appropriate. (Hint: consultation does not mean simply writing to lots of people and then ignoring their responses).

It seems to me that David Smith, in the above post, has correctly diagnosed the government's wider agenda here, to "normalise" that which is not normal or natural, let alone godly, and the education system will be the means by which it intends to achieve its aims.

Do you support this? Does Dr Eames? I think we should be told, and you seem to be the one best placed to find out.

BTW I have already indicated what kind of amendments I wish to see to the SORs, in NI and elsewhere: amendments which protect Christian life and witness along the same lines as the exemptions already included in the employment regulations.