"I believe homosexual acts between two individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts," Pace said in a wide-ranging discussion with Tribune editors and reporters in Chicago. "I do not believe the United States is well served by a policy that says it is OK to be immoral in any way.
"As an individual, I would not want [acceptance of gay behavior] to be our policy, just like I would not want it to be our policy that if we were to find out that so-and-so was sleeping with somebody else's wife, that we would just look the other way, which we do not. We prosecute that kind of immoral behavior," Pace said. [bold added for emphasis]
(Let it be noted the Tribune admits that the interview with the man who sits as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was "wide-ranging." That the Tribune chose to lead with a man's personal remarks about homosexuality in the military is curious. More later.)
But let us read how the essayist at the Huffington Post believes his like-minded peers should respond to all of this:
"I grow tired of my community trying to make organizations accept them, states, recognize them, governments respect them. We have power in numbers, and in our wallets, use it. If a state votes against same sex marriage or civil unions, move to a state that allows them. Reward the economies of fair states with your home purchases, car purchases, tax payments. Punish those that don't. Leave churches that don't accept you as a whole, real, non-broken person. Screw the Catholics and Evangelicals. Find a place where a real god, a god of love and acceptance is worshipped. Take your tithes, your physical presence, your donations elsewhere.
"It's time we stop begging everybody to accept us and just reward the people that do. And when those that don't feel that crush, lose that money, lose those bodies, lose the revenues, when the rolls dwindle or areas don't get rejuvenated and property values shoot up (every time gays take over an area, it shoots up†, ask South Beach in Miami, Hillcrest in San Diego, West Hollywood in California, Castro in San Francisco) when people start realizing that gays make this country work just like non-gays, and that without us some of the wheels just won't turn as well, then change will come."
How nice. A call to boycott, and a call to partitioning. Nay, it is a call to ghettoizing and to institutionalized hate. Mr. Bouley, after all, wants to oppress those who disagree with him. And he wants to isolate one group -- his "community" -- from anyone who does not think and act like him and his peers.
How very moral, and how convincing: Mr. Bouley's position is so easily defended he resorts to calls for balkanization and financial deprivation. Of course, I do not today see at any major conservative news or commentary outlet a single writer calling for us to ghettoize gays and lesbians; I hear no one calling for us to withdraw from Unitarian societies, Reformed synagogues, or to stop skiing in Vermont, shopping in Provincetown, drinking Tequila in Key West or gawking at the Wharf in San Francisco. But I do find a call from a gay advocate at the Huffington Post to do essentially that very thing.
One is tempted to urge Mr. Bouley to make good with his promises: Indeed, have everyone who is gay and like-minded move to Vermont, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and certain enclaves in California.
And, moreover, I would hope that if Mr. Bouley and his peers are not going to spend money on the homophobics around them, they will also not work for any homophobes who might own the company from which they draw paychecks or accept ANY MONEY FROM HOMOPHOBES FOR ANY REASON OR ON ANY CONDITION.
________
EDIT-ORS
Why would the Chicago Tribune choose to lead today's headlines with what a general in the US military said about homosexuality? Is it because the paper's editors' knew that there would be a tremendous wave of umbrage pouring over the country, and through the media and the Web? Did the Chicago Tribune see that it had a story that would dominate tonight's news cycle? Perhaps yes to both. But perhaps the Tribune also meant to do something else, namely, to bury something, to hide it, to drag a very piquant red herring in front of our noses. Though the paper said the reason Bill Clinton's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell"-policy question was asked had everything to do with curiosity about how the military is going to bolster sagging troop numbers, one wonders if there is something missing in that admission. What else did Gen. Pace say in his "wide-ranging" interview?
Hmm. He said this, for example:
"Addressing a range of other military topics, Pace said House Democrats' proposal to wind down the war could hamper President Bush's planned troop 'surge' in Iraq by creating gaps in troop levels."
Oops. Did General Pace say that the Democrats' proposal would adversely affect troop levels? Indeed, he did, if the Tribune is telling the truth. Of course, THAT sort of thing is not worth a headline at all. Instead, switch the problem: Troop levels are not in jeopardy because of Democratic action, but because of Gen. Pace's alleged homophobia.
(The whole Tribune story is worth reading. It is quite jumbled, bouncing back and forth on the gay/military issue. It does report that Pace is critical of Pakistan's recent political decisions that have hurt the overall war on terror. See copy of story here [you'll have to sign in, but it's easy and worth it].)
_________
DON'T ASK, DON'T TELL
Let us remember that it was Bill Clinton who elevated to the status of policy the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" numbness embraced by the military. Of course, it demands the question, If homosexuality is moral, why would anyone not be allowed to ask about it, and why would anyone not want to tell about it? In praxis, then, President Clinton's policy treated homosexuality as immoral, though not necessarily egregiously so. He at least suggested that speaking about it was wrong. Nevertheless, demanding silence about sexual orientation and behavior is utterly homophobic; to me, it is the only truly homophobic stance one can take: No one can utter a word about it. To state outright that homosexuality is wrong, immoral, unnatural, illogical or just plain unhealthy is hardly to state something homophobic, it is assert something as allegedly true. But to demand silence about it; to have a "Shhhhh!" policy in the military, is homophobia par excellence. Egads, most psychologists and even novelists know that any family's dysfunction is directly rooted in what that family CANNOT and MUST NOT talk about. Curiously, the only conclusion one can reach is that Bill Clinton institutionalized dysfunction in the military. General Pace, echoing the policy's intent, at least has the courage to state that he personally finds homosexuality immoral. Good for him.
But in the end, this is the sad moral of this tale of free speech's demise, and it is a lot like what I wrote about yesterday: the policy is really about General Pace's failing to heed his own services' policy: No one should've asked, and he should not have told -- because he is a bigot. And we must stop our ears at his harsh, cold words. Or so it goes.
_________
BOULEY IS A WHOLE PERSON
If there is one thing that sets Christianity apart from the populist faiths currently en vogue, it is that Christianity has not once said that any person, except Christ, is whole; or as Mr. Bouley puts it, "non-broken." In fact it is the one thing that may very well prove Christianity is undeniably true. I have never met a whole person, nor do I know anyone else who has been so lucky; every person I've met has needed to be saved from some demon, sorrow, malaise or besetting sin. Mr. Bouley may indeed set himself above the common herd of humanity, touting himself as fully integrated. But the rest of us honest souls can't help but admit that he strikes us as remarkably disintegrated, a broken man in a great deal of denial. I am sure he can find -- in California no less -- a church and a god that will love him for his apparent integrity and wholeness, but I believe his call for such a deity can only yield but one foolish youth -- Narcissus.
_________
†GAY PROSPERITY
†This idea is rooted -- in part, I believe -- in the work of Richard Florida, whose book, The Rise of the Creative Class argues that in communities where there is a high-level of social tolerance, economies thrive. That Mr. Bouley believes this, is clearly evident; though his sentence makes one think that wherever gays increase in numbers, communities turn to injecting themselves with hard drugs:
"…every time gays take over an area, it shoots up, ask South Beach in Miami, Hillcrest in San Diego, West Hollywood in California, Castro in San Francisco."
That phrase -- "take over an area" -- is unintentionally chilling, for certain. But the effect of Mr. Bouley's "policy" is intentionally chilling: he wants to take over.
I wonder what Mr. Bouley would have to say to this observation about San Francisco, made by a fellow Californian from that beloved city and gay haven (quoted from the Salt Lake Tribune):
"San Francisco is one of the 'least family-friendly cities in the U.S.,' says Maurice Healy, longtime editor of Catholic San Francisco, the diocesan paper. 'Only about 14 percent of families have children under 18. There is an increasing gap between rich and poor. The lack of affordable housing is a crisis.' "
Oh, forget it. I know what Bouley would say, since Healy is a Catholic: "Screw the Catholics."
But what Healy says is really quite true. Have you ever looked at property in, for example, Provincetown, Massachusetts? It is surely NOT a place for the poor OR real economic diversity. But the overlooked fact in all of this is really rather plain: wherever the rich gather in great knots of prosperity, the first thing to go (often) is morality. Why? Because the rich can afford to be indulgent; the rich can afford to be immoral. Therefore, prosperity alone is feckless in helping us determine the health or wholeness of a group, a movement, a community.
Peace.
©Bill Gnade/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.
PS. Lest anyone be confused, let me at this moment announce that no where here, or anywhere else, am I calling for the ghettoizing of gays and lesbians, or for the balkanization of American culture. Any idea of such forced segregation is reprehensible to me.
19 comments:
As you point out, the debate has ceased to be one of tolerance. It has now become one about whether certain thoughts or opinions are appropriate. It matters not that I tolerate behavior. Nay, I must approve of it; sanction it; celebrate it or I have committed "thought crime."
Cheers.
--Hi Bill--
This is the first I've heard of either Pace or Bouley, but I did look up both of the articles you've quoted here.
You left out something rather interesting: Pace made his statements in the context of DEFENDING Clinton's cowardly and despicable "don't ask don't tell" policy (and I agree with you that it is a policy that institutionalizes disfunction, though the military is a totalitarian organization & hardly a kind "family", to begin with; in fact, the military itself is already institutionalized disfunction at its most horrible extreme: a family that imprisons & executes its children for disobedience). Here's the quote:
"Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Monday that he supports the Pentagon's "don't ask, don't tell" ban on gays serving in the military because homosexual acts "are immoral," akin to a member of the armed forces conducting an adulterous affair with the spouse of another service member."
And here's another interesting tidbit that you didn't bring up for scrutiny (I'm not rebuking you for not bringing it up, by the way, but it is intriguing):
"(Pace) said his views were based on his personal "upbringing," in which he was taught that certain types of conduct are immoral."
In other words, Pace has not provided us with any rational, thoughtful reasons for his convictions (unless the Tribune carefully omitted it). He has simply informed us, rather pompously, what Mummy & Daddah taught him. Therefore, there's no sensible intellectual reason for us to respect his convictions, no matter how firm they may be. Now Defense Secretary Robert Gates has rebuked Pace, but Gates will not tell us WHY Pace's remarks are inappropriate. This is all about PR, as you know--it is not about examining a real issue. Thus, irrationality goes to war with irrationality. It's all very entertaining, in a sick way.
Now for my thoughts on Bouley:
First off, Bouley's recommendations remind me very much of some statements made by the "evangelical" christians whom I grew up with. Like them, he has strong convictions, and like them, he urges people who share his convictions to use their financial power to express & empower those convictins. His remedy might be foolhardy (at the very least, it is certainly imperfect), but it is as American as apple pie, and hardly unique to his "community". Observe that he only denounces groups that have consistently denounced his entire romantic/sexual life. What exactly is wrong with his rebuke of Catholics and evangelicals? Is it wrong because it's politically incorrect? Because it's blunt & honest? He has not called for their convictions to be outlawed. He has simply called for an unarmed, economic revolt, and no offense, but I think your reaction to him is rather melodramatic. His revolt is deeply "conservative" in a sense: rather than demand action from the feds, he urges buying power; he urges use of the free market as a bargaining weapon, rather than immediate legislative action.
But let's really get into this issue: let's talk about sex. And let's talk about what Christianity really says about the perfectability of the individual. Let's talk about brokenness, and wholeness. I'll be back in a moment, to continue those conversations.
Luke
"Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect."
--Matthew 5:48
"I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.”
--John 14:12
"No one, after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God."
--Luke 9:62
I could go on quoting, but I think the message is clear already: Christianity proposes a standard of total perfection (which will come with supernatural gifts, too!), and claims that it is entirely possible to achieve this standard. This side of Christianity is not often emphasized on Contratimes. Why not? The focus here seems to be on the church as a place for the wounded; but wholeness is offered, nay, demanded, consistently throughout the New Testament and elsewhere in Christian theology.
Furthermore, the idea that Christianity's concept of the brokenness of human beings might "prove" anything at all about the truth of Christianity's many dogmas is intellectually indefensible. Buddhism recognized the same thing, earlier, but that doesn't prove that Buddhism is "true" in all cases, does it? Both systems come with a lot of other baggage.
Luke
I hope you will find this provocative & engaging. Here goes:
1) Sex is good for more than breeding. It is also a way for adults to express affection towards one another. Sigmund Freud (hardly the libertine he's often made out to be!) thought that for a couple to continue having sex after their child-bearing capabilities had ended was perverse; a vice. Mr. Sherman & Mr. Gnade are both with me & against Dr. Freud in this matter, correct?
Is a marriage that fails to produce children inferior to one that does?
2) Eugene Robinson, the first "gay" bishop ordained by the Episcopal church, is a logical product of Christianity. In the New Testament, Christ states the following:
"Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled." --Matthew 5:17-18
And throughout the New Testament, Christ shatters much of the "Law" that he's ostensibly referring to: he replaces "tooth for tooth" with "turn the other cheek" (except when it comes to the money-changers in the temple); he breaks the rules of the Sabbath by feeding his disciples on that day, and he intervenes in the stoning of a prostitue; a stoning that was in full accordance with the Old Testament law that he claims to be upholding.
Eugene Robinson insists that he is following the best, most true vein of Christianity; he and many of his supporters even suggest that he is following the direction of the holy spirit, in going against the "law"; that he is continuing the work of Christ. Since, as I have just demonstrated, Christianity has been self-contradictory from the beginning, he is, in a sense, fulfilling the most true spirit of the faith, is he not? Like Christ, he claims that he is upholding a history that he is really intent of tearing down; like Christ, he contradicts himself repeatedly.
(In an act of stunning benevolence, I'm posting this in small chunks to save readers from the dizziness that I often experience when reading a long thread on a computer screen).
Of course, Eugene Robinson is not really "gay" at all. He made love to a woman for many years, and fathered two daughters. I don't doubt that he's more attracted to men than to women, but he is obviously bisexual; how else would he have been able to become aroused enough to have sex with his wife?
Speaking of sex, we all know that the vast majority of copulations do not result in conception. The window in which humans have the capability to reproduce is quite small, when compared with the average lifespan. Even the most reproductive couples have more non-reproductive sex than any other kind. Most sex is not about procreation.
Once again, I think Dr. Gnade & Dr. Sherman agree with me on these points. You can see where this is leading, though: why are you guys opposed to sam-sex attraction, and to the expression of that attraction?
Actually...ARE either of you even opposed to it? Or just opposed to its being accepted, and allowed marriage privileges, in so-called polite society?
I don't know. But I have some ideas about the opposition to homosexuality in general. For one thing, it makes sense for many people to be disgusted by homosexuality: if you are attracted to women, it makes sense that you might be disgusted by the thought of men touching one another in a sexual manner. But to elevate this very natural predisposition to the level of a moral complaint is solipsistic. I believe that MOST, if not all, of the opposition to same-sex attraction is not "homophobia" (which, before it was expanded to include everyone on earth who is not thrilled by queers, only referred to those who loathe homosexuality because they are gay) but merely self-absorption.
For that matter, it makes perfect sense that some people who appear to feel attracted only to their own gender would express disgust for apparently heterosexual people, by calling them "breeders". They are expressing revulsion for opposite-sex love that they really feel.
Now: are there moral arguments against same-sex attraction & sex that are NOT rooted in this purely physical disgust, and are they legitimate?
In trying to locate a rational argument against same-sex attraction, I feel compelled to further explore more plausible reasons for resistance to it.
It has been said many times that "when a man has hungry mouths to feed, he'll do what he's told". There is truth in this: if I decide to quit my job due to degrading behavior on the part of my boss, I don't have to think about the effect this action will have on my children, because I don't have any. In other words, my lack of a family to support makes me more likely to rebel against authority. And someone whose sexual atractions are focused primarily on their own sex is less likely to reproduce, and much less likely to raise children (though this may be changing). They can fulfill their physical desires with less risk of tying themselves more tightly to the society in which they live. You can see why many authoritarians would be horrified by this.
I can think of no sexual activity that is exclusive to same-sex relations. Obviously, this is not all about the bedroom.
So, what is this about? Is the love two persons of the same sex feel for one another real love? Is it inferior to opposite-sex love? Can either Dr. Gnade or Dr. Sherman point us to their PRIMARY objection to same-sex attraction & expression, and can either of them justify that objection, using logic? I am really curious.
Part of the problem is that we live in a society strewn with red tape & regulations. Our current legal situation prohibits many long-time companions, romantic & otherwise, from visiting one another in the hospital, taking care of each other's bills and/or children after death...you know the story. Some people are trying to modify these laws right now in my own state. But what about marriage? If the state were to condone same-sex marriages, what would prevent couples who view such alliances as an abomination from continuing to practice their own marriage vows as they see fit? It seems to me that many people on both sides of this debate are asking for an awful lot of assistance from the government; many on both sides are asking for the government's blessings. Dr. Bouley at least urges a more independent course.
In response to Mr. Sherman's complaint:
"It matters not that I tolerate behavior. Nay, I must approve of it; sanction it; celebrate it or I have committed "thought crime."
I sympathize, believe me. I have experienced this same stifling influence at the hands of all sorts of people with all sorts of different ideologies. Rest assured, I am not accusing anyone of thought crimes. But I would like some explanations.
luke
Luke,
#1. I may be melodramatic, but I don't think so. Mr. Bouley's essay is a hate screed; that is precisely what is wrong with it. If hate is bad, then it is always bad.
If a Catholic essayist at Opinion Journal had written such a thing, we would be hearing a great cry right now from gay advocacy groups. In fact, I believe the Catholic essayist would have apologetically resigned by this morning.
Yes, of course, perhaps it is a conservative response; but because it is a call to hate, to disenfranchise, to stigmatize, to ostracize and shun and ban and marginalize, it is repulsive. It is a call to increase poverty among the homophobic; it is unarguably a call to balkanize. That you discount this and I don't is perhaps due to my being spleen.
As for evangelicals that you grew up with calling for similar things, I am sure you have anecdotal evidence; but I do not have any evidence whatsoever, even though I, too, have evangelical roots. I cannot recall anyone speaking in church or even on the street with ss much vitriol as Mr. Bouley speaks here.
#2. I am not really interested in returning to a discussion on original sin, Luke, and you are approaching it here. We have gone down this road before, at least in part.
What I have consistently said is that Christianity -- and I agree with this -- holds to a very simple and observable truth: we are all broken. Mr. Bouley flatly contradicts this tenet of the Faith.
Your quotes merely affirm my argument: calls to perfection imply that we are broken. Nothing in Scripture implies anything other than human brokenness, lost wholeness, and divine wholism. The Catholic Church has a doctrine of the deification of the saints; while some Protestants hold to the perfectibility of the saints. But both are gifts of God, and both presume human dis-integration.
So, you are arguing something irrelevant to this discussion. I DO believe in obedience, self-discipline, and the pursuit of holiness. I do not believe that anyone BEGINS as a whole person, as does Mr. Bouley. He believes that he is already integrated, and that there is a God out there who affirms that integrity. But to suggest that I am somehow truncating the full teachings of the Church here is absurd.
Besides, you assume too much about this site. I am not here as apologist for the Faith, nor am I here as pedagogue to the faithless. I am merely here, arguing, challenging, denying, observing, laughing, and, at times, crying. Are you suggesting that I should be griping that Christianity expects perfection? Luke, I expect perfection. And if Christianity did not hold such a demanding and perhaps unreachable standard, I'd want nothing to do with it.
Lastly, I was not discussing ancient faiths, like Buddhism. I was talking about populist faiths that are "en vogue"; most of these are hybrids that always end up in some form of self-idolatry and elevation. Of course Buddhism believes in a form of alienation. I do not deny that. But the Americans that I refer to who are so enamored of pop faiths are not REAL Buddhists, even if they describe themselves as such. Or so I believe.
#3, 4, 5. I will not address your questions here. I have answered such questions elsewhere.
That would be Vicki Gene Robinson, the gay bishop. I am sure it is arguable that he is a bi-sexual, but I am certain he is permitted to define himself.
Peace.
Gnade
Bill--
I doubt either of us thinks hate is always wrong. I KNOW I don't. Hate is often the only proper response. Apathy disgusts me more than hate does.
Catholicism expresses contempt for same-sex attraction & expression: it is utterly condemnative of Mr. Bouley's lifestyle & of his desires. If its denunciation is couched in a different sort of language than that of Mr. Bouley, so what? It is still hatred. I know nothing of Bouley, but I am cheered by his bluntness and honesty, and I think his denunciation of Catholicism and evangelicalism is utterly fair. I prefer his irreverent bluntness to the kind of airy hatred that floats like a polluted vapor from so many pulpits in our land. Neither of these faiths holds a rational, reasonable view of human sexuality. I am glad that you & I disagree about this; perhaps I should even be glad that neither of us will budge an inch.
Of course Robinson can define himself however he likes; and if his definition seems to me to be lacking, I am free to attempt to puncture it, no?
I don't believe you will ever answer my questions to my satisfaction, but of course, that's not your job. You believe Christianity is the best thing ever to enter the universe (don't you?)--and I think it breeds stupidity and totalitarianism, by its very nature; I believe these qualities are in evidence even in the works of one of my current favorite authors, Thomas Merton.
In spite of all this, we enjoy each other's company--sometimes. That is truly interesting. We have the luxury of not having to kill each other in a fight over the future of civilization--yet. How long do you think this will last?
Luke
Dear Luke,
When I wrote the following,
I may be melodramatic, but I don't think so. Mr. Bouley's essay is a hate screed; that is precisely what is wrong with it. If hate is bad, then it is always bad.
did you think I meant that I believe hate is bad? I meant no such thing. It is Mr. Bouley who believes that the ONLY thing that stands in the way of his freedom and bliss is hate. He does not believe that morality, or truth, or God or science or reason or logic or anything can stand up to his truth that homosexuality is lovely: Only hate disagrees with him.
And he hates this, of course. Without responding with anything reasoned, he delights us with a diatribe, one that is blistering with hate. He despises homophobes; they are a curse to the land, and should be shunned. Catholics and evangelicals are sub-human.
Again, at least to me the hypocrisy is blatant and sad. And since Mr. Bouley offers nothing reasoned or truthful or evidentiary or logical or even calm, it would be easy to conclude that the only thing that stands in the way of Catholics' and evangelicals' bliss is Mr. Bouley's type of hate.
You believe Christianity breeds stupidity and totalitarianism; I believe otherwise. I believe stupidity breeds stupidity; I believe self-deception is perhaps the most pervasive of psychological maladies. At least my philosophy explains this: humans are fallen gods and goddesses. But Mr. Bouley's philosophy cannot explain how it is that he is whole and others are not; nor can you explain how it is that you are exempt from the stupidity within which I am bred. How are you so privileged? Or do you think me an exception to the rule; does my lack of stupidity (assuming you admit that I am neither stupid nor totalitarian) prove that I am not a real Christian?
I find the Church's teaching on sexuality thoroughly rational, sound, realistic, consistent and true. There is nothing perverse therein; nor is there anything unusual. Perhaps those who despise limits on their loins will find Christian teachings on sexuality immoral and debased, but that is a bit like observing that those who lie find truth inconvenient and annoying.
As you know, recent studies show that the virus that often leads to cervical cancer for women is directly linked to promiscuity. God forbid the Church should be right about sexual cleanliness; thank God he has sent science to our anti-viral rescue. Sad, however, that the media do not tell us the whole part of the story: they just tell us that sexually active women have the virus. They just don't want us to realize how they got it.
My wife, no prude, recently read the powerful book, Unprotected, and believes it to be must reading for all young men and women. The book is written by a UCLA psychiatrist whose work is entirely focused on young women and the brutal medical and psychological realities connected to premarital sex. The author believes that there is an undeniable conspiracy of silence, even denial, about the horrors that our women (and it is usually women) endure in the wake of the great liberation from the Church's "repressive" sexual guidelines.
Lastly, the Catholic Church does indeed express contempt for Mr. Bouley's lifestyle, but it does so out of love, not hate. He himself is not forsaken by the Church, until he wants to be forsaken. But there is no doubt he wants to forsake Catholics. Of course, the Catholic Church has given myriad reasons why homosexuality is immoral and deviant; and yet the pro-homosexual crowd HAS NOT PROVEN its case that the Catholic Church is wrong. The Catholic Church has responded to even the most sophisticated pro-gay arguments; and yet the pro-gay lobby, as exemplified in Mr. Bouley's essay, has not responded in kind. That is why it is the pro-gay lobby that has chosen ostracism, politicization, character assassination and yes, hatemongering, to make headway for its cause. It is not the Church who calls for ostracism or extortion. Suzanne Pharr, gay activist and lesbian, told readers in her book, Homophobia: A Weapon of Sexism (a book I read), that gay proponents should not allow themselves to be engaged in debate with their opponents. Rather they are to constantly point out their opponents' homophobia. That's it! Just label, label, label. There is no debate. There is only name-calling. And it is precisely this kind of thing that the Catholic Church has never done: the Church has a comprehensive defense of marriage, and it promotes it without calling for banishment, boycott or ghetto.
Peace.
Gnade
I don't know anything about Suzanne Pharr, but I also don't know a single intelligent person who argues as she (according to you) does. There is no shortage for stupid arguments in this world; there is no shortage of stupid arguments in support of worthwhile things. And the closer you stick to the mainstream, the more of them you'll find.
Part of the problem here is that you are approaching me, in your argument, as if I were sticking up for the entire "pro-gay movement"; I think you are even approaching me as if I were also arguing for rampant promiscuity, but that's probably not your intention.
You have said that "the Church's" teachings on marriage are rational. I assume you're talking about the Catholic church. Do you believe that ALL of the Catholic church's teachings on sex are rational? Do you think that the Catholic church's recent history is evidence of a RATIONAL sexual morality?
Yes, the more people one has sex with, the more likely one is to contract certain diseases. Fortunately, the one you just mentioned now has a wonderfully effective vaccine, which will save & enrich millions of lives.
If all sexually transmitted diseases were cured tomorrow, I think religion would be terribly weakened. Were that to happen, I think that an honest, intelligent sexual morality would be easier for more people to arrive at. I suspect most Christians, Muslims and others who hold to a strict sexual ethic are aware of this; and aware that their ethic would not be the one chosen.
You and I agree that sexuality is precious, and that it is mercilessly cheapened and degraded by our society. I just have a few less rules about it.
"the Catholic Church does indeed express contempt for Mr. Bouley's lifestyle, but it does so out of love, not hate."
How do you know? The Church is not a human being. It is not even a lucid, unified entity, though it tricks some people into thinking that it is. You are talking as if this vast and often chaotic organization were a single person who you've known intimately for many years. That is strange, and it makes me a bit dizzy.
There is more, much more, to be said here, so I'll try to return soon. I hope I'm not boring you.
Luke
Dear Luke,
How are things?
OK. This is what you wrote last week:
"Catholicism expresses contempt for same-sex attraction & expression: it is utterly condemnative of Mr. Bouley's lifestyle & of his desires. If its denunciation is couched in a different sort of language than that of Mr. Bouley, so what? It is still hatred. I know nothing of Bouley, but I am cheered by his bluntness and honesty, and I think his denunciation of Catholicism and evangelicalism is utterly fair. I prefer his irreverent bluntness to the kind of airy hatred that floats like a polluted vapor from so many pulpits in our land. Neither of these faiths holds a rational, reasonable view of human sexuality."
And today you wrote the following, which begins with a quote of mine:
"…'the Catholic Church does indeed express contempt for Mr. Bouley's lifestyle, but it does so out of love, not hate.'
"How do you know? The Church is not a human being. It is not even a lucid, unified entity, though it tricks some people into thinking that it is. You are talking as if this vast and often chaotic organization were a single person who you've known intimately for many years. That is strange, and it makes me a bit dizzy."
I can see why you are dizzy. I am dizzy too.
The Catholic Church has literally tens of thousands of pages of material written about sexuality, homosexuality, marriage and related issues. Of the many pages I've read, I have not found them to be dripping with hate, nor do they appear to be born of the sort of hate you initially suggested. Hence, I stand by what I said, irrespective of your odd suggestion that I am anthropomophizing. But let me just urge you to be consistent: if it is wrong, in your opinion, of me to speak of the Church monolithically, then surely it is wrong of you to do the same thing. I find that only one of us has made sweeping generalizations about the Catholic Church. I am just conceited enough to aver that I am not the one generalizing.
You ask whether I believe that the Catholic Church's recent "history", i.e., the sex scandal among priests, is at all rational. Of course, I do believe that the Church's sexual doctrines are rational; but I never said a thing about how the Church behaves in relation to its own teachings. Inconsistency of behavior says nothing about moral codes; to argue that it does is a bit like saying that the speeding motorist proves the irrationality of speeding law. But even if the speeding motorist is the very legislator who set his town's speed limit, his speeding may in fact PROVE the reasonableness of the very law he drafted.
And, before you think I have stepped into a trap, I will add that merely because parts of the Catholic Church DO speak hatefully and viciously against homosexuality, it does not follow that the authoritative position taken by the Church regarding the proper use of the body was not drafted in love.
I am surprised that you find such solace in modern science. Of course, before long there will be new viruses associated with sexual promiscuity: science will not keep pace with them at all. But even if it does, even if all adverse effects of sexual promiscuity were destroyed, one harmful effect will not be destroyed, and that effect is the only one that will keep religion thriving (and has helped it to this day): the utter emptiness of the human soul, and the utter emptiness of the sex act. Let the world screw its brains out without compunction or fear of disease; but the silent and quiet desperation, the spiritual alienation, the great "Is this it?" questions of the human heart, will not ever be cured except by increased callousness -- the deadness of denial -- or conversion. Women will begin to respond first to the great deadness; men will begin to wonder what the hell is going on. What will follow, in part, will be a collective and irrepressible longing for meaning and purpose; for the union of soul with body, spirit with biology, transcendence with immanence.
Religion is still in its juvenescence; it is the world that is slipping into senility: it is in love with the banality of pleasure adorned as promise. These are tired and ancient idols the world pursues, shriveled and cracked idols, injected with botox and smeared with lipstick and rouge.
BG
Dear Bill--
"if it is wrong, in your opinion, of me to speak of the Church monolithically, then surely it is wrong of you to do the same thing."
You're right, of course, and I knew that you'd hammer me for that. I deserve it! But surely you grant that our monolithicalities (is that even a word? I hope not!) differ drastically in tone and substance.
On the utter emptiness of the sex act in and of itself, and the ridiculous importance often assigned to sex appeal in our society, I agree with you--and, interestingly enough, I feel that my awareness of the void you speak of is a part of the nucleus around which my different opinion has formed.
Yet, I don't find the church, or any church, to be youthful at all. I don't feel the need to join or support any dogmatic institution as a defense against the soul-crushing vapidity of our society. I see every church that I've explored, no matter how ancient, as PART of the soul-crushing vapidity of that society. I admit I have been tempted, in the past...but I could never fit, and now I don't even want to. I find every institution on this earth positively sickening, when I try to contemplate joining it.
You see homosexuality as a discord, a great brokenness. I do not see it quite that way, but for a moment, I will grant your view of it for the sake of an interesting argument. I find this conception of the 'proper use of the body' actually tyrannical.
We all, I suspect, have a puritan somewhere in us, and I am far from being an exception. But I have learned that, in my early zeal to purify, I was a madman.
And I've learned to love the brokennesses of my friends, within reasonable limits, partly because there seems, very often, to be nothing to replace them with. I am no longer bothered when people smoke, drink too much, or jog too much (ruining their knees). I find that these eccentricities are part of a person's charm; I know that if one were to strip away these things, something worse would likely replace them. Of course, there are actions that I find horrifying, so horrifying that they distance me from people; I find obsessive promiscuity, or the use of cocaine, frightening (but I also find it frightening when people play video games all day), and I don't tend to spend time with anyone who engages in these pursuits.
But I am thinking of people I love, and how their weaknesses, if they are weaknesses, are a part of their preciousness, a preciousness that is necessary to their life, to their happiness and to their creativity. Just try to imagine, for a moment: how on earth would WH Auden's life been better, and more worthwhile, if he had been heterosexual? Just try to imagine him without it. Isn't it perhaps likely that homosexuality was so much a part of him that to tear it out would also mean to tear out much of his tenderness, his genius, with it?
Should Christopher Hitchens stop drinking whiskey? Would he still be as thrilling, as interesting, as funny and wonderfully infuriating, without it? Should he also be cured of his atheism? You see, this idea of the perfectable human being makes me sick; I think we should strive for greatness in all things, but I find that, within reason, a certain discord is good, and beautiful, and productive. I don't care for this "whole person" crap any more than you do. But Auden, and Hitchens, and my friends, are close enough to whole, for me.
Perhaps this is how I should view your religion: as a weakness that I can see as part of your beauty. But that sounds condescending. Of course, you are free to say something like that to me: we are amazingly, wonderfully free to infuriate each other.
And it would definitely be condescending, and abominable, to praise and encourage a really terrible behavior in a friend; that's not love. I just think that the "vices" I've just named (remember, I'm granting certain things just for the sake of argument) aren't necessarily bad things. They may be a discord that makes the melody clearer, when taken with it.
You may think that my argument is overly sentimental; I think it's a bit deeper than that, so I hope that you don't over-simplify it.
Just a moment ago I was writing to a friend, and I said the following. I don't want to distract from our debate, but it might amuse you:
"Am I wasting my time, trapped in an endless debate with a sophisticated madman? Am I neglecting stores of ammo that I could be using? I seem to lose all objectivity when debating with Bill, at times; perhaps I care too much about him, and desire to crack open his head and eat his brain. Perhaps I want to make him more like myself: the ultimate abomination in human interaction, bar none."
Perhaps I am the madman, and not sophisticated at all. But I don't think this discussion is a waste of time; we are nerds, and this is part of what we do best. Hurl away! I will swing back as heartily as I can.
peace, or something better,
Luke
"I do believe that the Church's sexual doctrines are rational; but I never said a thing about how the Church behaves in relation to its own teachings. Inconsistency of behavior says nothing about moral codes; to argue that it does is a bit like saying that the speeding motorist proves the irrationality of speeding law."
See, I just CAN'T agree with this. To me, it's like a communist denying that the abject misery of the Soviet Union had anything to do with the philosophy of communism. I believe that part of the reason so many Catholic priests (the ones who haven't been hidden and/or protected by the church!) have been involved in these sex scandals is because their sexual morality was irrational to begin with. They associated abstaining from perfectly fine natural urges with holiness, with fulfilling their duties. Don't you see how this over-emphasis on sex, this view of sex as something monumental and utterly overpowering, to be avoided at all costs, might have heated their perversions, may in fact have attracted sexually tormented people who were bound to do something stupid with their instincts sooner or later?
I don't have a problem with not having sex. It's fine. It's a great way to concentrate your energies on something else, that you feel is important enough to make the sacrifice for. But I still see these religious doctrines concerning sex as obsessive and neurotic in nature; just as neurotic as promiscuity.
The brilliant Simon Weil asked, in her LETTER TO A PRIEST, why chastity, and specifically virginity, was so emphatically and repeatedly associated with holiness. She never got an answer. I doubt I'll get one either, but I like the question.
Luke
Dear Luke,
I could never find you infuriating.
OK. Since you have posited some things here merely for the sake of argument, things stipulated, allow me to do the same.
Perhaps I do, indeed, find some things irrational about the sexual moral teachings of the Church. Celibacy does indeed strike me as wildly irrational, even reckless and almost anarchistic: its seems a wild rebellion against obvious, glorious and even simple pleasure. Celibacy - all sexual abstinence - seems a bit like refusing to breathe because God - apparently - does not breath, and then concluding that the glories of suffocation is akin to holiness. I have written before about this conflation of sexual purity with spiritual purity; I can accept that the spiritually pure might have pure sexual relations, but I cannot accept that the acme of spiritual purity is to have no sexual relations at all. For the life of me I do not know what is gained by asserting that Mary's post-partum virginity somehow affirms her holiness: there is nothing at all unholy about sex. Ever.
OK. Now how far will you permit me to speculate wildly? How far can I go to try to make sense of all of this? What are you willing to concede to me while I run about this life looking for one truth to devour?
Here goes:
First, I am quite comfortable with the teachings of the Catholic Church re: how a man and woman are to enjoy conjugal love. The context of Holy Matrimony is glorious to me; and I can hear the joy in all my married (and parenting) friends -- many of whom had sexual relations with others before marriage -- as they proclaim that the best sex they ever had, bar none, was when they were willingly and thrillingly TRYING TO HAVE CHILDREN. In every case this has been the case with my peers, and the reasons are many: the sex was without any hint of guilt, anxiety, fear, shame, worry, concern; it was not for one second touched by doubt or weirdness or second-guessing. So my experience confirms perhaps everything I've ever learned from the Church: sex is best left for marriage in the freedom of pro-creation.
But what of the apparent irrationality of priestly celibacy? How does that fit?
Well, as you know, the Catholic Church affirms seven sacraments, with one of the seven being confession. One essential part of confession is absolute confidentiality; the Church has worked out exhaustive rules wherein there is barely an exception to privacy (if there are any at all). With that said, it is imperative that the priest hearing confession is capable of assuring his charge that such a confession is sacredly kept in secret; that is, perhaps, even forgotten.
The practice (it is not a dogma) of priestly celibacy is rooted here: confession is protected by celibate priests who otherwise, if married, may be disposed to share professional secrets with their wives. As many married men know, it is hard not to divulge secrets, even those heard in therapy sessions, closed court, or the doctor's office. There is, in the confessional, a tacit admission that nothing will disturb the privacy of the confessional. The priest is not really supposed to even anonymously share the secret; whereas the therapist could always share that he or she had a drunk in the couch that morning; the therapist can tell a tale without naming names. The priest is not even supposed to go that far, for the sin/secret is supposed to have been forgotten.
But there is more to it than that: the idea is that in pastoral counseling any person seeking priestly care is encountering an asexual being: one that is not looking to seduce or be seduced. This is theoretical, of course; but the Church has defended its practice of priestly celibacy to remove the possibility that the very male priest ministering to the very female woman is in no ways trying to seduce that woman: seduction is utterly out of the equation. Hence, women can trust their priests, and so too the men who are married to these women.
(I will not enter here into the debate about female priests.)
OK. That's part of the argument, and I now see that priestly celibacy -- when explained in such terms as seduction and confession -- makes theoretical and practical sense: it seems utterly rational.
But the Church has always said that priestly vows are a vocation, a calling, and a divine gift, even a divine grace. Perhaps (and I share this for pure argument without committing to it in any way), perhaps those who believe they are born homosexual -- have ALWAYS felt gay, different, whatever -- actually have been given the charism which suits them for service in Holy Orders. Perhaps it is the crazy anti-Catholic world in which we live that has actually displaced people endowed by God to be priests; perhaps homosexuality is actually an abuse of a divine gift, a calling to men to serve as priests - safe priests. Perhaps gay men are not so much attracted to other men as they really are just NOT attracted to women; without the framework of the Church, perhaps these folks are unable to be what they are meant to be.
And perhaps those folks -- drawn toward the Church in order to meet the low quotas of priests we have seen for decades -- who come into the Church and act as pedophiles or homosexuals, are not men who have the gift at all: They are there for the wrong reasons entirely. They are not given a gift; they are hoping for one, perhaps to conceal or remedy some sort of derangement. They have tried to subsume their sexual instincts under the cloak of Catholic vows but, in so doing, have actually corrupted their sexuality in the process.
That the Church cannot judge the integrity of anyone's alleged call to serve is a given: the Church can ask and screen, but it cannot really determine whether a man's vocation is real separate from the man's declaration that it is. But we do know that there is a tremendous shortage of priests; and we do know that gay men are leaving the Church in droves or are refusing to even understand its very teachings.
OK. Now I know I've gone way off course; I know I've said more than I should. I am not really advocating anything here; I am merely amusing myself, perhaps, as I try to figure out all that the Church teaches regarding sexuality. But the main reason I have gone this far afield is to make one simple point: celibacy is not necessarily a bad or irrational thing. Only those who look at it superficially (and I include myself here) might be quick to dismiss it as gobbledy-gook.
Now, I must return to something I said earlier, and that is that sex is never unholy. I do believe that to be a profound truism; but I do not mean that ALL sex is always holy. What I mean is that sex properly understood, and properly practiced, is never unholy; and that any other type of use of the body is not really sex at all. It is, in short, an abuse of the sacred and, since real sex is sacred, any desecration of the sex act is not really sex. It is like saying that swallowing is only pure if one actually swallows: choking is not swallowing, nor is receiving nourishment through an IV. Swallowing is swallowing.
Now, you characterized something I said above inaccurately, I think. You responded to my statement
"I do believe that the Church's sexual doctrines are rational; but I never said a thing about how the Church behaves in relation to its own teachings. Inconsistency of behavior says nothing about moral codes; to argue that it does is a bit like saying that the speeding motorist proves the irrationality of speeding law"
with this, and I quote:
"See, I just CAN'T agree with this. To me, it's like a communist denying that the abject misery of the Soviet Union had anything to do with the philosophy of communism."
It is not really like this at all. You have switched terms here, I believe: I am not talking about the abject failure of the Catholic Church. I'm talking about the theoria of the Catholic Church, not the praxis of it. I am suggesting that we all fall short of any sort of theoria we posit: our praxis always falls short irrespective of how devoted we are to the theoria or even how close to perfect the theoria my be. You have assumed that the Catholic Church is a disaster, like the Soviet Union. I make no such comparison. My speeding analogy perfectly illustrates my point: discounting a theory because no one practices it well is silly. But your counter that a fallen Soviet Union could still be defended on theoretical terms falls short: that it collapsed PROVES that the theory was faulty. But the Catholic Church has not collapsed. It remains viable, vibrant, strong and real. People still travel through it, like the speed zone. But no one is speeding through the Soviet Union.
Peace.
BG
Bill--
No one is speeding through the Soviet Union, but the idea that socialist and communist dogma has been defeated for all time (not your idea, perhaps, but one that seems to be popular), is simply untrue. These ideologies are still running rampant all over the world, albeit sometimes in different forms, and often going under different names. And many people who espouse forms of these doctrines have failed to truly grasp WHY the Soviet Union was a failure, and why it HAD to be a failure. I think we agree on this, to a point.
"they proclaim that the best sex they ever had, bar none, was when they were willingly and thrillingly TRYING TO HAVE CHILDREN. In every case this has been the case with my peers, and the reasons are many: the sex was without any hint of guilt, anxiety, fear, shame, worry, concern; it was not for one second touched by doubt or weirdness or second-guessing."
I don't doubt that this is the case--for your friends. I've heard very different things from very different people. We attract very different sorts of people, I imagine, which must be kept in mind whenever we deliver what you correctly term
"anecdotal evidence". For example, you have said that your "leftist friends" tend to be rude more often than your "conservative friends". But, of course, your "conservative friends" are more likely to be at ease among you, since they are closer to your wavelength. We must keep in mind that we ourselves have a great deal to do with how others appear to us! I have watched previously friendly people turn on me abruptly when I began to grow away from their fondly-held ideals. How people appear to you depends very often on who you are. I am trying to keep this in mind more often.
And, of course, it's difficult for me to imagine a sex life more explosively wonderful than my own has often been, but I won't bore you with the details. I have gay friends who claim (playfully) that I can't even imagine their highest blisses, but it's pretty tough to compare. If others are ascending to greater heights than I, bravo.
"celibacy is not necessarily a bad or irrational thing."
As you can see from previous comments, I agree. My argument is not with celibacy per se. And I fully understand the rational reasons behind the church's policy of celibacy for priests. As an only child, with a taste for solitude, contemplation and detachment, priests and monks are not foreign creatures to me; I even have a certain instinctive affection for them. I think, with admiration and love, of Trappists brewing beer and chopping wood all day, barely indulging in speech, and eating in silence, carefully chewing each bite and meditating on it. But there is a flipside to all this: when one has never made love to another person, one cannot help but misunderstand much of what is crucial in the lives of others; one is missing out on what is, for many, an absolutely earth-shattering experience, and this might make it hard to minister intelligently. It's a very interesting dilemma. I believe that Thomas Merton's brilliance in dealing with the world, when he's at his best, has a little bit to do with the fact that sex was not foreign to him (though I get the impression his experience was far from ideal).
"(I will not enter here into the debate about female priests.)"
Hmmm. I wish you had! Man, do I wish you had! That's a truly interesting subject.
"Now how far will you permit me to speculate wildly?"
You wildest speculations are your best! I disagree (I think) with much of what you've posited here, and yet my disagreement seems moot, because I enjoyed reading your musings so much.
"How far can I go to try to make sense of all of this?"
Please, go further!
"What are you willing to concede to me while I run about this life looking for one truth to devour?"
I don't think you need me to concede very much, or visa-versa; at times we seem to be about to hang-glide around each other most interestingly precisely when we are not conceding anything.
But speaking of speculating wildly:
"Of course, before long there will be new viruses associated with sexual promiscuity: science will not keep pace with them at all."
There may come a day when this is no longer true. It may seem inconceivable now, but I want people to be able to dream of conquering disease through science.
But I suspect that no matter what diseases, of lack thereof, we're faced with, very few people will ever REALLY make love, just as very few people will ever write a profound, articulate letter to a friend. The heights are reserved for the climbers, and the climbers are few.
Luke
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