Staycie’s Story: the Testimony of a Wheaton Alumni (pt. 4)
This leads me to the biggest heartache in this whole riga-marole. Somehow many Christians with diametrically opposed doctrines figure out how to say that if someone has embraced Jesus Christ as his or her Savior, then that person is in the universal body of Christ. And that means that we have much more in common than not. Yet, not when it comes to human sexuality. We have figured out how to live in harmony with disagreements over divorce, the end times, headship, female leadership (well kinda), gifts of the Holy Spirit, sanctification, and salvation. Why not sexuality!?
Okay, Okay, Okay,….Obviously this stirs a lot of emotion in me.
I won’t end without talking about the B-I-B-L-E (yes that’s the book for me). But I also won’t enter into a verse by verse discourse or hermeneutic pissing contest. The shortest way I know how to describe to you my biblical process about homosexuality is to say that it was the same process I went through when structuring my other theological beliefs.
I was 17 years old when I entered into ex-gay ministry. I was shown Bible passages and taught about the many psychological, spiritual, historical, and inconclusive biological evidences surrounding homosexuality. It made sense to me, I believed, and started walking it through. Then I went to Bible school and learned all about Biblical interpretation and translation. I learned that while the Scriptures are inerrant the people interpreting them probably are not. I realized very quickly that there were many opposing theologies amongst believers:
Non-cessationism and Cessationism
Calvinism and armeniaism,
Let the Women Preach and Let the Women Cover their Heads and be Silent
Sprinkle the Baby and Only Dunk Those of Consent
Celibacy and Marriage
Re-marriage and No-remarriage
…I think you get the idea. Time and again Christian believers have to choose between two “irrefutable” doctrinal truths, or somehow weigh and sort opposing and equally compelling arguments. We gather all the information we can, we consider the exegeses and hermeneutic, we sometimes weep, wait, argue, lament, and are hopefully changed for the better knowing why we believe what we believe. I came to my scriptural beliefs about sexuality the same way. I basically sat down within the framework of the Wesleyan Quadrilateral (if you don’t know what I am talking about ask Lyle Dorsett, he explains it very well) and started working my way through the various theological perspectives from Boswell, through Smedes, White, Dallas, Rosenau, Whiteheads, to Gagnon etc.. (While people do not always think of C.S. Lewis when cementing their theological beliefs around human sexuality I give his “the Weight of Glory” a big thumbs up!!!) I like to think that I didn’t approach the Scripture through my desires but rather approached the Scripture to find boundaries for my desires. In fact when it came down to the rubber hitting the road I needed to wrestle through my theology of marriage and whether or not it was even an option for me at all. I even think part of me was holding out for the single life so I didn’t have to figure out which gender to break celibacy with. Just as I struggled with various tenants of Armenianism and Calvinism and found myself agreeing with aspects of both I found myself developing a doctrine of Godly Human Sexuality that is strongly defined by my broader theology of Holiness and Sin. I hold points of agreement and disagreement with many theological thinkers on human sexuality. I really don’t fit into any prefabricated party line. For instance, (to many people’s surprise) my theology of human sexuality has plenty of room for “ex-gays”, or rather, people who no longer wish to embrace/experience any sort of same-sex erotic desire (and are well on their way to finding out that heterosexual desires can be just as confusing and daunting!). The bottom line is that when I survey, under the leadership of the Holy Spirit, the printed scriptures made alive in Christ, our Christian tradition, and my formative experiences and observations, I conclude that there is absolutely a place for homosexual marriage in the body of Christ and in the life of a disciple of Christ.
Amen sister!
Your story affirms the fact the there are gay people out there who actually take their faith seriously. It’s encouraging to read how much thought, prayer, struggle, and effort you’ve put in trying to understand your sexuality.
Comment by Suzanne R. — April 12, 2006 @ 9:23 pm
Thanks for your story Staycie. I really respect the amount of wrestling and thought you have put into this issue. It is encouraging to know that you have not taken this issue lightly or without much consideration. Though I disagree with your conclusions about the specific issue, I admire your courage.
May the Spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ guide us to ever increasing wisdom in this age, and correct whatever we get wrong in the age to come.
Comment by Chuck Liu — April 12, 2006 @ 10:59 pm
Chuck, I don’t think any of us who are Evangelical make the decision to embrace our sexuality without much consideration. It only comes through a lot of tears, anxiety, and prayers.
Not to target you specifically, but it really frustrates me, the idea that some (maybe not you in particular) people have of Christian gay people as simply “giving into to their sexual desires” because it’s “easier.” I don’t doubt that there are gay Christians who don’t want to be gay and end up having sex anyway and feeling guilty.. But for those of us who consider ourselves gay and Christian and feel at peace with that, you don’t get there without pain and struggle and the risk of support/respect/relationship from people you consider your family (and usually, your biological family). It is not easy, but very hard.
Also, it’s not about simply giving into desires, but about acknowledging how connected your desires are to your capacity to love and be a fuller human being because of how we are created. I do not see my sexual desires as dirty or as a source of temptation, but of part of what makes me human as God created me.
Thanks for posting! Kudos again for Staycie for her posts!
Comment by Anonymous current student — April 13, 2006 @ 10:05 am
Sorry, I meant risk the _loss_ of support/respect/relationship from people you consider as family, etc.
Comment by Anonymous current student — April 13, 2006 @ 10:12 am
Hi Anonymous,
I’m learning a lot through this whole process, and I thank those like yourself who are sharing. I can see why an assumption like that would frustrate you. I can only speak for myself, but from my own life and studying psych, I know how intimately our desires are connected with how we evaluate things. True objectivity is rare, if not impossible. The reality is that many people make decisions on any number of things and *then* find the support to back it up, not vice versa. Christian or not, that is often the case. Whether it be on homosexuality, doctrines, eschatology, war, whatever, it’s extremely difficult (in my experience) to wrestle with the issues as opposed to simply accepting spoon fed answers that go either way. I admire anyone who does their best to evaluate things to the best of their ability, not just in homosexual issues, but all of life. I’m as guilty of generalizing as anyone else, but I would think that there are people who just go with the flow on any number of things. I myself am guilty and the Lord is gracious in showing me my own blindness and hypocrisy.
Blessings,
Chuck
Comment by Chuck Liu — April 13, 2006 @ 10:54 am
Suzanne and I are having a discussion similiar to Chuck’s and Current Student’s under part one of “my story”.
Comment by staycie — April 13, 2006 @ 6:40 pm
Responding to Chuck…
I don’t know that true objectivity, defined for me as seeing things through God’s eyes, can be reached by any one of us. For myself, I try to be faithful to where God leads me: through prayer, through scripture, through the words of others, and yes, even through experience and desire. I do not believe that I can separate out the influence of each of those things through introspection to get, e.g. in this case, the rational truth separated from my desires.. But I trust in a God who knows me and who will speak to me as a whole person, embodied, emotional, rational, etc. I also trust in a God who will speak to me in a voice I can hear when I am going the wrong way, as He certainly has before in my life. At this time, I do not believe that choosing to be romantically involved with people of the same sex is against God’s will. If I am wrong, I trust that it will be made known to me.
I guess another piece I bring to this puzzle is that for many years,I saw my sexual desire for members the same sex as something alien from me, as a foreign component of myself that I wished to sever off much like an infected leg. Now, I experience same-sex attraction as intimately connected with the deep desire I have to be in a close,life-long, God-given monogamous relationship. Of course, as with straight people, I can be tempted to be unfaithful, to lust, etc. But I do not believe same-sex attraction is inherently lustful, any more than heterosexual attraction.
Thanks for the dialogue! Peace to you!
Comment by Anonymous current student — April 13, 2006 @ 6:57 pm
Thanks for your moving personal story, Staycie.
One thought in response: you write that “We have figured out how to live in harmony with disagreements over divorce, the end times, headship, female leadership (well kinda), gifts of the Holy Spirit, sanctification, and salvation. Why not sexuality!?” But of course the purpose of any institution’s “statement of faith” or “community covenant” is to indicate critical areas of difference in precisely these areas, and others. Denominations, churches and other Christian institutions are famously bad at living in harmony over just such points, which (whether or not you and I woulld concur) seem to the institutions as important theological points worth disagreeing over. Nowadays such differing groups mainly leave each other alone rather than engaging in direct conflict as in Reformation-era, war-torn Europe, and this is, I think, a good thing–let’s hear it for the First Amendment.
Wheaton College has staked out a position on the expression of human sexuality that is not secret, that is very widely accepted by Christians historically, and that is eminently defensible based on at least one interpretation of scripture, even if you and I agree that more than one interpretation might be possible. (The fact that some Christians would say that multiple interpretations of scripture are NOT possible is the source of great grief on many, many issues.) I imagine the College would mainly like to be left alone to believe and hold this position without uninvited guests trying to force a change in the belief statement.
It is interesting to note the deep emotions triggered by this particular area of theological disagreement. To date I doubt that Wheaton College has been picketed by those advocating baptism by immersion only, or had civil disobedience expressed by those promoting the expression of a different end-times theology in chapel (”For Christ and His Kingdom,” the school motto, has changed its eschatological meaning quite a bit since the days of Jonathan Blanchard), or been informed by any other group, a la SoulForce, that they were coming to “visit” whether the College liked it or not to protest, for instance, the College’s position (or lack thereof) on the Holy Spirit…
Does the College and the church have much to apologize for in the history of GLBT relations? Certainly. Has Wheaton College apologized and asked forgiveness for its part in rejection and hate? Yes, although perhaps not sufficiently (what would be sufficient?). Is Wheaton College entitled to hold its doctrinal position? Yes, and feels duty-bound to do so. Is SoulForce entitled to hold its dissimilar doctrinal position? Yes, although Wheaton College disagrees that it represents a proper understanding of scripture and the intent of God for humans.
Must Wheaton College agree with SoulForce’s perspective, and/or accept those who hold it as fellow believers? Ah, now there is the interesting question. Clearly SoulForce thinks so, and sends a busload of people to engage the College in dialog to this end. But surely you and I would agree there are theological positions a person could hold that would indeed put them outside the pale of acceptable Christian doctrine–multiple gods, perhaps, or that Christ’s death meant nothing, or that Christ calls us all to be mass murderers or cannibals (and I do not mean by these extreme examples to associate such behavior with a GLBT perspective). But once we can agree that a person COULD hold a theological position that forfeits his or her right to be called a fellow disciple, the remaining dialog becomes about what such a position might be. Surely it is not that “anything goes”–there must be some boundaries and definition to what constitutes “Christian” doctrine. (Otherwise the Baha’i approach that all faiths and beliefs are equal seems reasonable.)
Wheaton College seems to hold that a person actively desiring to express a GLBT lifestyle (whatever that might be) cannot be serious about their commitment to Christian discipleship–the two are incompatible. This is what makes your story so moving. How can Wheaton College demonstrate love to you without agreeing that your perspective is correct, when it is in opposition to the College’s own position?
Comment by Diogenes redux — April 21, 2006 @ 12:24 pm