Does Sex Mean Anything?

Does sex mean anything? That is does it have inherent meaning. Not meaning that we give it based on custom or superstition but meaning that is imbedded in the very nature of sex. Many people say No these days. There are people involved in the hook-up culture or whatever else that say they  engage in sex and it means nothing to them. Does that prove sex can be meaningless? Not really. You can have a Nazi declare the life of a Jew to be meaningless. He can kill many Jews and seem to have no ill effects. Does that prove he is right? That those loves and by extension all human lives are meaningless? No. You can say that the person in question is acting contrary to the nature of things. That people in the hook-up culture are living a lie when they engage in sex that way and Nazi's were living a lie when they treated Jews that way.

The next thing that people will ask is whether you can prove that people in the hook-up culture are suffering some ill effects from living sex lives contrary to what you say is the nature of sex. They want some irrefutable study that shows some measurable bad consequence of this. Of course that is a rats nest. All studies can be questioned. What qualifies as a "bad" consequence? When that can be shown then they can always claim the effects are not from the immoral acts themselves but the bad reaction of society to those acts. So you blame Christians for calling something immoral. That must be the real problem. It never ends.

But what about the Nazi example? Would you need to see a study of Nazi soldiers to know that the holocaust was wrong? Suppose they seemed to be otherwise upstanding citizens and claimed to sleep well at night? Would that make you think that maybe their actions were just fine? I hope not.

It really boils down to why can't we prove God exists scientifically. Moral truth has the same issues. We can come up with arguments that will work for those willing to be convinced. We can't typically come up with arguments that will convince everyone regardless. If that was the case we would no longer be talking about a moral issue. We fill our cars with gas so we won't get stranded on the road. That is not a moral issue because the bad consequence is clear.

They other reason we don't want to say that sex has meaning is that it is not nice. The people who claim sex has no meaning are going to say you are judging them. Besides, why does it really matter? I think the sexual acts I engage in or refuse to engage in have meaning. Isn't that enough? Not really. What we have done is taken something that is God's and made it something that is ours. When it is ours we can change it. When it is God's we must be changed by it. 

Dialogue with an LGBT ex-Catholic

Richard Evans responded to my post on gay marriage below. 

Is it not also circular reasoning to assume that the Roman version of Christianity is the only correct one as well? And even if she is, that all of society must follow it in the areas of sexuality, even if it differs from their personal morals and understandings of life?

It is not circular. You might say it is ad hoc if you were going to associate it with a logical fallacy. Of course, I would say there is good reason to believe that Christianity is the most correct sexual morality. The point is society has to do something. If I was the only Christian then your point would make some sense. But there is nothing Christian about letting society go in a wrong direction because a minority claim the right to take it there. If you really believe Christian sexual morality is true, and you should, then you should want society to be built on true principles.

Full disclosure I lived as a "same-sex attracted" Roman Catholic, nationally published and interviewed, for 7 years--until this summer when a well-known priest unfriended me and blocked me from FB for asking, in a polite manner, that we simply be careful in the way we approach others during the Chic-Fil-A controversy and protests.

Who cares what a well-known priest does? People treat each other badly over this issue a lot. I would say the pro-gay side has been much more mean-spirited and hateful but there have been incidents on both sides. It is sad. Still I don't understand changing your opinion of Jesus or His Church based on that. Jesus never promised us every Catholic would be nice.

While I did not leave the Church over this issue solely, it did influence me. When ecumenical Councils such as 4th Lateran can both begin to define Transubstantion (more fully developed at Trent) and then in the same documents define circumstances where land (which in those days usually meant a person's entire livelihood and even life at times) could be taken from "heretics," where this same Church can claim to have never, not once in 2000 years, erred in "faith and morals" but yet Popes have issued decrees, ones that any good Catholic at the time would have considered infallible, about not just if but how to proceed in burning infidels, meaning other Christians who did not agree with them,

First of all, the doctrine of infallibility was not defined until the 19th century. So the idea that any good catholic would find papal decrees infallible in the 13th century seems a bit anachronistic. Still heresy was taken seriously. The concern was more that it could lead to civil unrest and political instability. Doctrine does matter.

when this Church claims to believe in natural as well as Divine law and then uses that claim to stop people from simply living their lives such as LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) or others who are different in various manners, and onward to many other examples, then she is a Church drunk with power--and wears the blood of others on her vestments.

So exactly how does the church stop LGBT people from living their lives? It simply teaches that certain sexual acts are gravely immoral. That list includes acts commonly committed by heterosexuals as well as some more common with homosexuals. People are free to ignore what the church says.

It is quite a claim to say something is immoral. You need to be right about it. Jesus gave us one institution that could get questions of faith and morals right. That is my faith. I pray it is yours as well.

I am no longer Roman Catholic--and no longer defining myself as "same-sex attracted." I am humbly but gladly LGBT and still a "catholic Christian" within Anglican/Episcopal circles.

The question is whether you were following God or following your own desires.  How do you know? You have tried to get rid of a church drunk with power. You have ended up with all that power yourself. Can you do better at discerning God's will than the successor of Peter and the successors of the apostles? I can't. My sin is too great and I end up arriving at all sorts of false doctrines.

And if you and I or some of those who have blogs in your roll had lived 500 years ago, you likely would have torched me by now and felt justified. Thank God for secular law which stopped them from such horrendous practices post-Reformation on both sides. There is a reason for separation of Church and state. And yes it is a delicate balance for either.

The same-sex marriage issue is not about separation of church and state. It is only to the extent that people don't understand what separation of church and state means. People feel some sort of obligation to not oppose same-sex marriage if their opposition is rooted in their faith. They should not feel that way. That is a twisted notion of the non-establishment clause. No church body is trying to control the government. We have individuals exercising their democratic rights to fight for a government that reflects their values. Chris Kluwe calls that "unamerican." He could not be more wrong. 

Though it may seem it from this comment, I do not hate Rome--far from it. But Rome does not authentically accept me, except in the far back row of the Cathedrals and some parishes.

The Roman Catholic church accepts everyone. What they don't accept is serious sins. If people are in a state of mortal sin then their communion with the church is going to be limited by that. The hope is those obstacles are eventually removed and communion can be restored. That can only happen when we repent and allow God to change us. God is not going to start accepting sin. We have to start accepting holiness.

Jesus does not want you to define yourself as same-sex attracted or LGBT. He wants you to define yourself as a child of God. Everything else about you needs to be seen in the light of that central truth.

That is what is at issue here. Not some secret "gay agenda," and I do not deny that some activists go too far, I have been one and done that at times, nor some conspiracy against the Church and all she stands for. Live and let live is at issue here. And that is something Rome at times seems to forget how to do. 

I don't think there is some secret agenda. I do think that evil grows. When people start attacking the church and calling her evil for teaching what she has always taught that tends to get more intense over time.  Nobody plans that. It just happens. In the Chic-Fil-A controversy we have government openly stating that they will try and destroy a business because of their religion. If you would have told me five years ago that big city mayors would publicly call for the state to discriminate based on religion I would have said we are decades away from that. Now we have seen it. Where does it go next? Anti-Christian bigotry and hatred will get worse.

Complacency

It seems we always want to make a deal with God. Give Him this much and that should be fine. This is especially true when we do things right that most people don't do. I know as a teen and even as a young adult I was there. I was going to church. I was not having sex. I was staying away from excessive drinking and drugs. I knew most guys my age were not doing those things. So a certain pride develops. Looking back on it that had me in a spiritual rut for a long time. Just assuming God should be satisfied because I do those few things right.

When you get into married life the list changes a bit. You avoid contraception. You tithe. You teach the faith to your children. Pretty good. But that is just the basics. Luke 17:7-10 says:

Suppose one of you had a servant plowing or looking after the sheep. Would he say to the servant when he comes in from the field, ‘Come along now and sit down to eat’? Would he not rather say, ‘Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink’? Would he thank the servant because he did what he was told to do? So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.’

What is Jesus getting at here?  Obedience is not something we should see as a big deal. Disobedience is an insult to God. It is like punching God in the nose. If you avoid punching your friend in the nose you don't expect him to be overwhelmed with gratitude. It is expected. Our obedience of God is like that. It is expected. It is the starting point of a relationship. It isn't the goal. Jesus is pointing out that God remains our master. We should still be more concerned about God's business than about ours.

That is the nature of God. He is always going to want more. He is looking to take us all the way up. That is the goal. For us to be holy enough to enter into the life of the trinity. We get a few feet up that mountain and we want to celebrate. There is a lot of hard work ahead.

St Teresa of Avila has this as her first of seven levels in her interior castle. Not just the decision to take the spiritual life seriously but the ability to stop congratulating yourself for doing that. She lived with nuns. Many thought they were spiritual superstars because they answered the call the religious life. But we need to get to a point where that is unremarkable. God calls. We obey. That is what Christians do. It is not heroic virtue. That comes at the higher levels.

Depressing Surveys With Silver Linings

There is yet another study showing the increase of secularism. The headline is that for the first time less than 50% of Americans self-identify as protestant. That is just a milestone more than anything else. The trend has been downward for some time. But I was interested in a point Jeffrey Wiess made:

Because drilling down, it looks like more of the remaining Americans who say they are religious are very religious. While the folks who were nominally attached to some particular church have decided to give that up.

He associates that with politics. I don't know if I agree with that. But the notion of the disappearing middle ground between secularism and Christianity is something that has been expected. People are less and less able to keep one foot in both camps. Part of it is that secularism keeps moving. Gay marriage is the latest non-negotiable doctrine of secularism. The demonizing of dissenters is much more intense as well. It is quite scary. So people have to choose. Churches have to choose. Either cave into the culture or accept being radically counter-cultural.

This is actually a great time for The New Evangelization. That is for the church to actively re-propose the Catholic faith to those who are just going through the motions. That is what Vatican II was all about. To have the laity catch the faith. Letting them become full-fledged members of the People of God, not just hanging onto the church but actually becoming one with the church and therefore with Christ.

For many years people just declared themselves to be one with the church and thought they had the spirit of Vatican II. That is not it. Unity with Jesus and with each other requires us to change. Jesus does not become like us. We become like Him.

But you can't do that in an atmosphere of dissent. Right after Vatican II we had Humanae Vitae. The most openly dissented form papal teaching in the history of the church. It really has taken this long to get to a point where most bishops and priests are willing to defend it.

So we are at an interesting time. The church is finally willing and able to engage in evangelizing secularized Catholics. At the same time those Catholics are really starting to feel that position becoming untenable. 1 Kings 18:21 comes to mind:

 Elijah went before the people and said, “How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him.”

That is the idea of a choice. If you think money, power and sex are really the most important things then go serve them. Give your life to those things. But if you really believe that Catholicism is the truth and Jesus is God then give your life to that. Don't waver between the two.

So we will have more Nones but we will also have more nuns and more priests and more great Catholic families.

Chris Kluwe and Matt Birk

Matt Birk is an NFL football player for the Baltimore Ravens. He came out against same-sex marriage. I think the issue is being voted on in Maryland. Chris Kluwe is an NFL punter. He has a reputation for speaking up a lot more than punters normally do. Here he responds to Birk's position.:

Full disclosure: I know Matt Birk, having played with him for multiple years in the NFL. I think he’s a smart, funny person who has done both good things in the community here in Minnesota as well as with the concussion issue facing disabled players. I respect Matt, and I respect his right to his own views and ideas. However, in this instance, Matt I think you’re wrong. This is not an attack on you as a person or your beliefs, but the argument you presented in the Star Tribune simply does not stand up to logical inspection.

It is good that he is trying to be charitable but he is actually arguing  against Birk's beliefs.

Problem the first – Your argument lacks facts, sources, or statistics. You can’t just say “Same -sex marriage is bad for kids because I think it’s bad for kids, and I think it’s bad for kids because it’s bad for kids”. That’s called circular reasoning and it’s a logical fallacy. If you want us to understand why same-sex marriage is bad for kids, you need to provide some sort of substantial evidence. Tell us that children from same-sex couples are more likely to grow up broke and miserable and alone and will end their days starving in a gutter. Just don’t use a study like this one, which displays clear source and confirmation bias (as outlined neatly in this article from Slate). Use something like this

This is funny. Use studies. They contradict each other so use the ones I like. Why? Because they say I am right. So who is engaged in circular logic?

He makes another assumption. That we need studies. That we can't figure out what is good for kids any other way. Before we had the internet and could trade links to studies we don't understand we had to make decisions about children. Guess what? We have an intuition about what is a good situation for children and what is not. Should we ignore that? Gay marriage is trendy. Do we want to bet a child's future on something just because it is fashionable? It shows a lack of seriousness about the business of raising children. They are political props that we use when we can make them help us and ignore when they don't.

Problem the second – Your argument that “government recognizes marriages and gives them certain legal benefits so they can provide a stable, nurturing environment for the next generation of citizens: our kids” is flawed on two counts. The first flaw is one of simple mathematics – if “marriage” is so necessary to the proper raising of children, why are we not passing an amendment to outlaw divorce? 

Very confusing.  Does he think Birk is in favor of divorce? I would be shocked if he is. Same-sex marriage is the issue on the ballot. So why bring up divorce? It is a bad idea too. Because we have already done terrible things to marriage we should continue? Is that the argument?

The second flaw is that you’re actually arguing in favor of same-sex marriage. If children having a stable home is the main crux of your concern, then denying gay couples the benefits of 1100 federal laws can only harm the children they will raise. Not allowing those children the same health benefits, family care benefits, survivor benefits; that can only be a detriment to the upbringing and care of a child, correct? Or do you propose that same-sex couples should be unfit for adoption, should be unfit to raise children?

I would suspect Birk is against same-sex adoption too. Again, not the issue on the ballot. The 1100 federal laws are a red herring. Including gay couples in those benefits might make sense. So change the laws that make sense to change. Don't just charge into 1100 unexamined law changes because it was politically correct.

Problem the third – You’re conflating “‘if it feels good, go ahead and do it’” with couples that want the stability and benefits of marriage and just so happen to be gay. There’s plenty more heterosexual couples that marry because “it feels good, go ahead and do it” with no intention of ever having children than there are same-sex couples (again, simple mathematics). Should we deny marriage to anyone who doesn’t plan to have kids? What about the infertile couples? The old people? You yourself say “Marriage is in trouble right now — admittedly, for many reasons that have little to do with same-sex unions.” So why the discrimination? Why should we be passing a constitutional amendment denying legal rights to American citizens who pay taxes and serve in our armed forces? If “marriage” is so important, why aren’t we going after all those “many other reasons” first?

Again, bringing up another issue that is not on the ballot. We need to fix every problem in the world before we can answer the same-sex marriage question. Until then the default answer is Yes for some strange reason. Marriage can be about procreation even if not all marriages produce children. The essence of man and woman is such that they can produce children. It is enough that a couple have those essences even if they don't reflect them well enough to be fertile. It does not make those essences unimportant.

Problem the fourth – Marriage has already been redefined multiple times over the years. Marriage used to be one man and multiple women. Marriage used to be a way to exchange property between two families. Marriage used to be between brother and sister to keep the royal bloodline pure. Marriage used to be between children. Marriage used to be only for people that were the same skin color. Marriage used to be a lot of things, many of them oppressive towards women and minorities.

Most of this is just false. Polygamy was accepted once but a marriage was between one man and one woman. The man would just have multiple marriages. Similarly the other things don't effect the definition of marriage. It was just an instance of marriage that we would not longer find acceptable.

I think I’d rather marriage be between two people that love each other and are committed to each other no matter what combination of fleshy bits are hanging off their bodies; not a reality TV show.

Is this about what we would rather have marriage be? Does that not assume a lot? That marriage is up for definition based on our preferences? Nothing other than human opinion need be considered.

Then there is his caricature of gender. Does he really believe that the essence of man and the essence of woman begins and ends with anatomy? I doubt it. It is more a willful ignorance.

Problem the fifth – You’re trying to raise a religious argument in a secular matter. The First Amendment isn’t just about the freedom FOR religion, it’s also about the freedom FROM religion. The word “marriage” appears in thousands of legal documents and laws in this nation, and to attempt to narrowly define it through a religious application means you’re trying to assert a religious viewpoint on those who may not necessarily hold the same views. Our founding fathers knew quite clearly the dangers that state sponsored religious persecution could inflict (they lived through it!), and the First Amendment is worded in favor of state neutrality for a reason. I will support your right to worship at whatever altar you choose, but I will not support you trying to force it on someone else, or to deny someone else legal benefits due to religious reasoning.

More nonsense. Religion cannot be imposed on a minority by the government. But that does not mean government policy cannot be informed by ideas that flow from religion. If those ideas have the support of the majority then they can be implemented. Even the constitution itself uses religious logic. All men are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights ...

Problem the last – The only impact same-sex marriage will have on your children is if one of them turns out to be gay and cannot get married. What will you do (and I ask this honestly) if one or more of your kids ends up being gay? Will you love them any less? What will your actions speak to them, 15 years from now, when they ask you why they can’t enjoy the same relationship that you and your wife have now?

This is also silly. Morals always get hard when people we love break them. If your child commits adultery does that mean adultery is OK? It is just an attempt to appeal to sentiment. I can feel sentimental about the guy who just robbed a bank. He might have a very sad story to tell. But we can't make our law about bank robbery based on that story.

Reasoning About Reason

Reading some stuff on rationality. It strikes me at how complicated this process of reasoning is. There is endless analysis about how you should reason to avoid error. You can see why. We have a lot of smart people committed to reason yet they have huge disagreements. Somehow people are not reasoning quite right. At least the people who disagree with me are not reasoning right! Seriously, we have faith in pure logic. We tend to think we can engage in pure logic when we want to. Put all the bias and presuppositions aside and look at things in the cold light of pure reason. The truth is we can't. I am reminded of this quote from Merton which I have discussed before:

I think that if there is one truth that people need to learn, in the world, especially today, it is this: that the intellect is only theoretically independent of desire and appetite in ordinary, actual practice. It is constantly being blinded and perverted by the ends and aims of passion, and the evidence it presents to us with such a show of impartiality and objectivity is fraught with interest and propaganda. We have become marvelous at self-delusion; all the more so, because we have gone to such trouble to convince ourselves of our own absolute infallibility.  The desires of the flesh–and by that I mean not only sinful desires, but even the ordinary, normal appetites for comfort and ease and human respect, are fruitful sources of every kind of error and misjudgement, and because we have these yearnings in us, our intellects (which, if they operated all alone in a vacuum, would indeed, register with pure impartiality what they saw) present to us everything distorted and accommodated to the norms of our desire.

If we get our minds around what Merton is saying here it will rock our world. We can't trust our own thinking. We need our reason to be checked against something. Pure science gives us that. Ideas are tested by experiments. Even conclusions we are very certain of need to be discarded if they don't fit the data. We need that. Before we developed the scientific method the knowledge of the natural world grew very slowly. Reason alone just takes too many wrong turns.

When we get away from pure science into social science, morality, philosophy or even theology then our reasoning gets progressively less testable. The experiments are not precise and we get into endless discussions about methodology. As we get further and further into the realm of human choices and what they mean we lose the science. We are back down to pure reason and we don't do well. We still have great confidence in our logic. We are just wrong a lot.

Some say that it is only a matter of time before science becomes able to test our reason in all areas. That will only be true if humans are not actually capable of making choices. If every human thought and every human decision can be predicted 100% by analyzing the physical inputs then science at least has a chance of analyzing it all. But what if that is not true? What if people really do make free choices? That is a human person is more than their body chemistry, their brain processes, the sum of their inputs? What if we are not at the mercy of the physical world but actually have some power to act on it?

Then science would have a barrier. It would not just be a barrier of complexity but a more principled barrier. That human behavior simply could not be fully described by science because humans make real choices. They are capable of doing good and capable of doing evil. Then science will never be able to describe your marriage like it can describe photosynthesis.

In approaching this question logically we are firmly in one of those areas that Merton says is "fraught with interest and propaganda." Where our reason tends to be distorted. What is up for debate is the very essence of who we are. How can we not be biased? Biases can run both ways.

Merton found an answer in Jesus Christ and in the Catholic church. That is why he became a monk. Not to stop reasoning but to have something to check his reason against. More than that, he wanted to control those appetites that infected his reason. Through a sacramental, prayerful, and holy life he could keep the "desires of the flesh" under control and be truly rational.

What Is Evangelicalism?

There were a couple of stories that talked about evangelicalism and exactly where are it's boundaries. There was Dan Haseltine from Jars of Clay talking about his new record being outside of the comfort zone of most evangelicals. That can be good or bad. Spiritual growth comes through getting uncomfortable. Then again heresy can happen that way too. Which is it? Depends who you ask. The trouble is that evangelicalism is defined by comfort to a large degree. How else can it be defined? There is no one organization that defines it. There is no one leader or set of leaders that have the final say. In fact, one of the defining properties of evangelicalism is their discomfort with the very idea of any definitive religious authority.

The other story involves Brian McLaren. He has gone outside of the evangelical comfort zone a few times. The latest episode involved the same-sex "commitment ceremony with traditional Christian elements."

Timothy Dalrymple does a good job of analyzing the issues with defining who is and is not evangelical. Still he avoids the obvious question, how could it work?

There’s nothing inherently oppressive or intolerant or authoritarian in seeking to identify who is an evangelical and who is not.  The Jews, for instance, have clear terms of definition.  If they did not, they would not have survived as a people for so many centuries.  Similarly, any group that wishes to maintain some semblance of coherence over time will need, so to speak, to patrol its borders.  That means examining boundary cases, cases that challenge you to formulate a more precise definition.

It is not oppressive or intolerant. It is authoritarian in the sense that doing it claims for yourself the right to do it. That amounts to quite a significant authority. That is why it has not happened.

He makes a good point about the long term survival of any religion depends on defining clearly what it is and what it is not. That is why evangelicalism today is very different from what it was 100 years ago. It will be different again in another 100 years if it exists at all.

He talks of "examining boundary cases." Great idea. What would that look like? One evangelical criticizing another? That happens all the time. It would need to be some more definitive criticism. Something beyond just disagreement. It is just unthinkable in the evangelical world.

This is a particularly acute question for evangelical seminaries.  This nation has seen countless Christian institutions of higher learning that have, over time, lost their Christian character.  Evangelicals have shown a lamentable eagerness to discover the latent heresies in Christian college and seminary faculty, to make mountains out of molehills and drive people from their jobs for minor theological transgressions.  But I cannot fault the general desire to cultivate a faculty that reflects the fundamental convictions of the institution.

Seminaries do have authority attached to them. They define what faculty members have to believe. It is not simple. It involves one of the biggest problems with Sola Scriptura. That is deciding which doctrines are essential and which ones are OK to disagree on. There is no list in scripture so seminary rectors are in an impossible position. They need to make decisions that are going to draw fire and they have no biblical basis from which to defend themselves.

Finally, saying that Person P is not an evangelical is not at all the same as saying that P is not Christian or does not have a saving relationship with God in Christ.  If I were to say that P is not an evangelical, that’s not intended as an insult or exclusion.  It’s not to say that P is wrong or unrighteous, an enemy or unwelcome.  It’s merely an observation of what evangelicalism means and an observation of whether or not P comports with that definition.  A community that does not define what is holds essential will not survive as a community for long.

You need to say someone is teaching heresy. That does not mean they are going to hell. But saying it is "merely an observation of what evangelicalism means" is too weak. If that is all you are saying then why bother? What you need to say is that you believe evangelism to be true. That truth has content.When we define the boundaries of that content we need to say there are spiritual consequences to leaving those boundaries. Otherwise why bother with the notion of "evangelicalism" at all? If you don't claim it just is the true Christian faith then what is the point?

So Dalrymple has some good thoughts but he dances around the central problem. Evangelicals as a group can't say anything. They cannot, in principle, be precisely defined. They can only be defined by consensus of human opinion. When the consensus breaks down there is no way to be sure whether that is a good thing or a bad thing.

What that means is we get what Catholics call scandal. People associated with evangelicalism do things that get people talking. They don't know if this guy is all wrong or if evangelical Christianity is now accepting this. They just get that something is rotten. When that happens in the Catholic church it is up to the pope and the bishops to clarify matters. For evangelicals it is done by consensus. If you have all the major leaders basically saying the same thing it can work. If you don't then the scandal does real damage to the church's mission.