All of this is excellent news for same-sex couples, of course, but the emphasis on “committed, lifelong relationships” leaves out the single minister, the divorced minister, the widowed minister — whether gay, straight, or bisexual — who must still adhere to a standard of celibacy unless their partner status changes.
I’ve long believed that the major sexuality problem denominations face is that they are unable to acknowledge that celibacy until marriage doesn’t apply to most single adults. There are more than 75 million American adults who are single — more than at any time in history. We are marrying later, divorcing at high levels, and living longer, so more of us will be widowed. And as a whole, we’re having sexual relationships when we aren’t in marriages….
The Religious Institute has long called for a new sexual ethic to replace the traditional “celibacy until marriage, chastity after.” This new ethic is free of double standards based on sexual orientation, sex, gender or marital status. It calls for sexual relationships to be consensual, non-exploitative, honest, pleasurable and protected, whether inside or outside of a covenanted relationship. It insists that intimate relationships be grounded in communication and shared values.
By golly, the solution to the problem: instead of living into God’s call to us revealed through His word, we can instead take up Haffner’s “new thing”……. “It calls for sexual relationships to be consensual, non-exploitative, honest, pleasurable and protected, whether inside or outside of a covenanted relationship. It insists that intimate relationships be grounded in communication and shared values. ”
Isn’t it this type of wordly wisdom that has pretty much been the bain of human existence since the Fall? But then Haffner and her theological buddies don’t believe in the “fall” stuff do they?
Sure, why not rewrite the Christian sexual ethic for the modern, self-indulgent single who still wants to be seen to be a faithful servant of Jesus. After all, if he were walking the earth today, we would surely question whether his celibacy indicated some sort of dysfunction. Or else we’d be driven by our nosiness to question his orientation if we saw him hanging mostly with men. And what’s to stop us revising that ethic after having usurped the divine authority to rewrite the doctrines of remarriage, ord. of women and same-sex blessings/marriage? And now that the issue of polygamy is coming up again, let’s go for that too! It’s all of a piece.
The author the piece is a minister in the Unitarian/Universalist Church. They have done great things in the area of peace, concern for the poor and the environment, but they never met a traditional social more that they didn’t want to stand on its head.
Besides. she says that sexual relationships should be consensual, honest, non or exploitive inside or OUTSIDE of a convenanted relationship. That gives the green light to having sex with anyone as long as it meets her qualifications-no convevant required.
It wouldn’t surprise me if this article showed up on the 815 website – the reasoning forms the basis of the revisionist sex talk in all the mainline churches for the past 30 years.
#2 No- Supporting women’s ordination does not necessarily mean that one supports revising tradtional marraige ethics or endorses same sex blessings in the church. I am not wishing to get into a debate on women’s ordination or the authority of scripture, but I did want to make that point.
[blockquote] The Religious Institute has long called for a new sexual ethic to replace the traditional “celibacy until marriage, chastity after.” This new ethic is free of double standards based on sexual orientation, sex, gender or marital status. It calls for sexual relationships to be consensual, non-exploitative, honest, pleasurable and protected, whether inside or outside of a covenanted relationship.[/blockquote]
Oh please. This is nothing new. Call it free love, free sex whatever you want. It’s nothing more than offering a justification for good old fashioned fornication. I note that the author is an ordained Unitarian Universalist minister. I guess it is in keeping with the Playboy philosophy.
“The Religious Institute has long called for a new sexual ethic to replace the traditional “celibacy until marriage, chastity after.” ”
==============================================================================
This issue, which is not a new issue, is addressed in Scripture and the answer is NO.
And ECUSA revisionists want us to believe that this is not the next thing they are pushing for…
All I can say is that I am quite relieved that she is not an Episcopal priest (regardless that some here will say, “Same thing,” with regard to liberal Episcopal priests). I worried there for a moment, until I clicked to the website and found out she is a U.U. minster.
Haffner may be a UU minister, but the Religious Declaration her organization developed (with the help of Dr. Stayton who now works for the Satcher Institute and will be part of the Anglican Communion’s Continuing Indaba listening process) was signed by many Episcopal clergy members. You can read the declaration here:
http://www.religiousinstitute.org/religious-declaration-on-sexual-morality-justice-and-healing
and view the list of signers by clicking on the link in the upper left hand corner.
To #5 FenelonSpoke: Point taken. Thanks.
As for Unitarians, I love what Garrison Keillor said about “Unitarian missionaries” who founded a town near his fictional Lake Wobegon: “They’re not interested in converting anybody TO anything, but AWAY FROM what they happen to believe at the moment.” Their operatives in TEC are having some great success.
SO MANY OF US saw this coming. And I recall there is one Episcopal diocese that passed a resolution about qualifications for ordination, etc. which explicitly opened the door to those in any sexual relationship outside of marriage, stating exactly this, that it was unfair to discriminate unmarried heterosexuals, etc. I think it was Olympia? I’ll see if I can find it…
Hey, my memory and my Google search skills are pretty good! 🙂
Here you go:
http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_80158_ENG_HTM.htm
Olympia Dio Convention October 2006 passed a resolution to
affirm and call upon the bishops and Standing Committee to affirm the full inclusion in all areas of the life of the Episcopal Church of “our otherwise qualified brother and sister Christians who are single or partnered heterosexual gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered persons, [b]and those who are in non-celibate heterosexual relationships and those who are divorced,[/b] as well as the full inclusion of the Episcopal Church in the full life of the Anglican Communion;”
Man, I might have to reconsider being in TEC, maybe even think about going the clergy route…it seems like just the thing to get in on all the hot ‘n’ heavy action.
Jeffersonian-
You might consider going the clergy route in the Diocese of Olympia. You don’t have to hold to any specific belief about sexual activity: just do what you think works. Or, as they say in Judges, just do what is right in your own eyes.
Does it surprise anyone that both Gene Robinson and Susan Russell are on the list of endorsers?
Reminds me of what the song in Rocky Horror Picture Show (to which I confess seeing during and after my college days) said about the “hero”, Dr. Frank N. Furter, the “transvestite from transsexual Transylvania” – “His lust is so sincere”! Well, as long as they’re sincere, that’s all that counts!
#11 Ian+, to that you might add the one about what you get when you cross a Jehova’s Witness with a Unitarian Universalist – someone who knocks on doors but doesn’t know why he’s doing it.
A major problem is, Milton, that, for folks who think like Rev. Haffner is that it either isn’t lust (I know a clergyman who says, “I don’t know why people get so charged up about sexual mores), lust is something other people have, or they assume that in order to have a meaningful, “sincere” relationship with someone you date, you MUST have sex.
Milton #18 (also #17), thanks for a good laugh!
With all due respect, fellow commentators, putting your head in the sand won’t help. I have not yet met a single couple under the age of 40 who hasn’t had some sexual encounter before marriage. It’s hard for people to get worked up about it. Especially when we worship athletes and movie stars.
What would ministers “push” for? Most young people don’t want any relationship blessed: they want particular relationships blessed with the person they love. Yelling at people for not obeying the bible just makes them deaf.
I’m all for giving the old traditions a try, but perhaps, then, we should be content with the country being post-Christian. Unless we want government to write and enforce laws about the bedroom.
Nobody is shouting, John. We were expressing strong disagreement with the thoughts of a writer who probably isn’t reading Kendall Harmon’s site, and if she is she’d shrug. No shouting here. I do, however , note some finger wagging condescension on your part. “Can’t all you folks with your heads in the sand get with the post modernist secular program?!! How archaic of you.” How groovy that you think we should give those old “traditions” a try. John. It makes us sound like you think we wear racoon coats and say”Twenty-three skiddo”; Good grief.
John,
It is a sad commentary that even the clergy of the Church have lost the will to proclaim the goal – even if we can and do fall short of it. Just because everyone does it, does not make an action less sinful. It is our duty as clergy to teach what the Church teaches and to call people to be conformed (by God’s grace) to that teaching – while at the same time being conformed to it ourselves – also by God’s grace.
The poor job we have done in Christian Formation is at the root of a lot of what we see in the Church today.
YBIC,
Phil Snyder
Maybe you move in the wrong circles John. I’m 31 and I know three or four couples my age and younger off the top of my head who waited until they were married. And before you generalize, the least educated among them has an MS in computer science, and another was a volunteer for the Obama campaign.
Just because morals aren’t trendy doesn’t mean they should be abandoned. Sin should be forgivien, not re-classified as being OK. There is a difference.
Re #21
Unless we want government to write and enforce laws about the bedroom.
Pure red herring. The story is about clergy and what standards they should be held to by the religious organizations they work for. The responses have held to that. Why bring in the government?
I should also note that the attitude you display with regard to this issue would wreck havoc on a variety of others. To wit:
Why call Christians to help the poor? We’re always going to have them with us. The MDGs are unattainable, so let’s just toss them by the wayside.
Why should Christians care about the environment? After all, most of the world’s pollution is done by corporations and Third World countries, not Christians. What can we do to stop them? And if we can’t do enough, why say anything at all?
Why would any pastor ever preach about peace? We’re not in charge of the military, and there are always wars going on somewhere.
Etc.
I guess I would put it differently: let’s see if we can help people have high quality marriages first. I just think it’s a losing battle. The main people who are convinced that waiting for marriage is the way to go are people who are already married or are about to marry. I’m sure a few people who are convinced Christians will disagree with me.
I think there may be something to the idea of encouraging people to marry young, when they are biologically suited for having children. I am perpelexed, however, when we insist that the church must be univocal.
Andrew 717, I do tend to hang out a bit more with the sinning crowd. My work is with the unbelievers, not with those who need affirmations about their own orthodoxy. They don’t think the church has much interesting to say about sex, because they just don’t think that having sex before marriage is immoral, nor do they think God would care. I might point to them that the bible says so, but that, for them, is evidence that the bible is outdated and unwise. I first have to convince them that God exists; and then I have to convince them that the bible represents truth; and then, perhaps there’s Jesus. A few people I know have met Jesus, but have little use for sexual puritanism.
One scholar friend said that he wished that the church could at least say, “don’t have sex after you’ve been drinking” or even “you should at least know their name.” But we can’t even say “use protection” because its all a sin, its all evil.
#21 John+, you disappoint me. After a couple of previous comments that acknowledged that orthodox-believing churchgoers tend to be the most committed and tend to build up congregations the most (if I may paraphrase your comments, please correct any misunderstanding), now you seem to be saying we should just capitulate to the culture instead of calling people to repent of past and current sins and live up to Jesus’ stated standard for sexual relationships.
1 Corinthians 6:9-11; 18-20 comes to mind, as well as Revelation 2:14-15; 20-22 for starters. Or more concisely:
Romans 6:1-2
1What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase? 2May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?
John, you don’t really mean to imply that Paul was “putting (his) head in the sand” about the heterosexual sin of his day in the Greco-Roman culture, do you? It seems hard for good burghers in 1930s Germany to have gotten “worked up about” what they saw increasingly around them, and then the stench that drifted over town when the wind was right. Of course we shouldn’t be “yelling at people”; Jesus yelled at the Pharisees, not at the woman at the well or the woman caught in adultery or at the woman who anointed His feet. But he did tell the woman at the well the truth in love about her life, and her hunger for forgiveness, cleansing and new life sprang up into questions for which Jesus revealed Himself as the Answer. He assured the woman caught in adultery that He, the Lord, did not condemn her, and to go and sin no more. He didn’t need Simon the leper to tell Him that the woman was a “sinner” (a prostitute) who poured her dowry of nard perfume worth at least a year’s salary on His feet, not His head, and who washed His feet with her tears of repentance and let down her hair (a scandal in public, only to be done in private intimacy with the husband at home) to dry the tears. Jesus had the audacity (now called rudeness) to point out that her sins He forgave were many, and by implication needed forgiveness and a changed life, not affirmation and continuation. Do you really think she went back to her old life?
Just to “give the old traditions a (half-hearted, perfunctory) try” and then dismiss them as archaic is at best to rob people of the joy they could have in being set free of the sins that enslave them even while they find momentary pleasure in them. Far more likely, it is to condemn them to eternal slavery and torment of hopeless regret resulting from their fleeting “freedom” and “pleasure”. For God’s sake and for people’s sake, John+, be willing to take some flak lovingly and still stand there afterward loving people with the truth that will set them truly free and give them abundant and eternal life, for which they hunger and will give their will over to God’s will when you lovingly outlast their belligerence.
[blockquote]It is a sad commentary that even the clergy of the Church have lost the will to proclaim the goal – even if we can and do fall short of it. [/blockquote]
You give the author too much credit, Phil. It’s not that he’s lost the will to speak the truth, it’s that he agrees with the sinners.
I used this quote on another thread, but it applies her as well:
“Many a religious leader has worn himself out and spiritually bankrupt his church in futile efforts to win credibility with self consciously post modern people for whom secularity is fundamental to modernity.”
From a quote in the religion “First Things”
Whoops; Meant in the religion journal, “First Things”
John does have a point about reaching the lost. People have to be brought along towards the goal of a godly life – one that is lived out of God’s grace and in cooperation with the Holy Spirit. Some people just don’t (or can’t) see the harm in a few “friends with benefits” relationships.
But, we should never bless “FWB” relationships nor should we ever say “that’s OK. don’t worry about it.” When asked about sexual relationships, we should be clear about what God desires and help them to understand why God desires that. “Because the Bible says so” has little weight with non believers.
When working with the lost, we should try to move them to a relationship with Jesus Christ and then let the Holy Spirit work on their hearts (through our catechesis) so that they abandon their lives of sin. Thomas Merton said that we surrender to God last the things we like about our lives most. That will probably include our sexual lives – particularly if we a rather enjoying our relationshipless hookups and easy sex.
But, we should never ordain a clergy person who cannot teach what the Church teaches – including sexual morality. It may be one thing to not stress sexual sin when dealing with a young adult who is not a Christian. But when the time comes, we need to be clear that a relationship with Jesus Christ will change the person and that not all the changes will be pleasurable to start with. In fact, some of God’s changes in our lives can feel like having our teeth pulled – especially if we resist them.
YBIC,
Phil Snyder
Well said, Phil; Thanks.
As for John Wilkins-Please try to refrain from the condescension…” My work is…not with those who need affirmations about their own orthodoxy”
Please just coment on the subject matter at hand.
John,
As a priest in the Church, you also should have a ministry with believers – people who need to be trained in the orthodox faith. This is why priests are given the title “Father” (or “Mother”) It is because they are like the head of the family and the family members are, in one sense, children who need to be taught.
I reach many lost while in prison. In the prison world there is a lot of sex (both gay and straight) and a lot of other vices. While I don’t bring up the vices to them men when I am talking about God’s love for them and His desire for a relationship with them, I will (and often do) counsel them on avoiding sexual sins. If any man has a “I don’t have a productive outlet for my sexual urges” excuse, it is those in prison. I still tell them that sex was designed by God for marriage and to exercise sex outside of marriage is sinful. The same goes for gambling, drugs, extortion, and using others as well as any other sin with which I am confronted.
My work among the unbelievers in prison does not lead me to diminish my work among the believers (or even unbelievers) at my parish. I hold them to no higher standard nor do I lessen the standards among those in prison. I may emphasize different aspects of the faith among different people, but I will not change the faith nor the teaching of the Church to win one. There is no sin, be it ever so venial, that will not keep us from God if we insist on keeping that sin instead of desiring God.
YBIC,
Phil Snyder
The problem is as always that satisfying lust is so much fun while restraining yourself by self-discipline is worse than no fun at all. How will you convince those who want pleasure to practice self-restraint? Everybody else is getting laid night after night and you’re standing there with virtue for company? Some bed warmer.
But my question is serious, not do I have an answer for it. How do you show one who wants pleasure and can obtain it cheaply and easily that he should neither want it nor obtain it? Where’s the benefit? This is like telling a thirsty man that he will be healthier if he forgoes water. His response is, “Yeah. Right. Then you do it.” Larry
Larry (and all), the root of the problem goes all the way back to Eden. Erwin Luetzer (Moody Bible Church) put it quite well, “The power of any addiction comes from its counterfeiting the promises of God.” Our problem is not that we are thirsty and trying to live without water. Our problem is that our fallen nature causes us to shun the Fountainhead and drink at polluted streams or stagnant reeking puddles or alkaline salt flats. God made us thirsty so we would thirst after Him and fill ourselves with Living Water. Only then will lust be transformed into love for Jesus which orders and transforms and sanctifies all other loves.
Larry #34,
My answer to your question may not be relevant to what you tell an unbeliever. I like what Phil wrote in #31 about not trying to preach Christian morals to an unbeliever – first we need to preach Christ to them. Once they are in relationship with Him and have the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit can help them change and give the desire to change.
But let me address your question of how do we persuade people to give up worldly pleasures. It’s a good question. Basically it comes down to a recognition that the pleasure of knowing Jesus and being in intimate fellowship with Him is greater than the passing pleasures of sin. See Hebrews 11:24-26
Heb 11:24-26
24 By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh’s daughter.
25 He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a short time.
26 He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward.
Moses by faith saw something greater than the wealth and prestige of Pharaoh’s court and he was thus willing to give up all those pleasures for a greater promise. Likewise, I’ve found it most effective when battling sin in my own life to pray the Lord would continue to stir up my desire for Him and my love of being in His presence, because a greater desire for Christ is the best antidote to sin in the world.
There was a really great blog entry at Steve Wood’s blog this week about reasons not to sin. It is quite relevant to this discussion:
http://treadinggrain.com/2009/quite-a-young-lady/
Well,yes, Milton, you are right enough, but this doesn’t answer my question. In fact, it sharpens it. Here we have a man/woman who wants to enjoys the pleasures of free and equal sex. They say to you,”Why give this up for the dry and unsatisfying words that you have spoken? I could be in bed right this minute with my friend with benefits and you want me to quit the opportunity? For what? Filling myself with Living Water? Please. What pleasure is there in that? I could be cranking up the heat, and you offer me words? ”
There it is, Milton. You offer words. Your respondent wants readily available pleasure of an ancient sort; he/she does not want lust transformed. He/she wants the pleasure that lust satisfied
produces. What do you have to offer that is of equal force and attractiveness? Larry
Larry, I think you are buying into the world, the flesh and the devil’s lies, that worldly pleasure is really all that pleasurable. I think you’ll find that a lot of people who seem to have all of this world’s pleasures are actually deeply unhappy. They’ve tried everything under the sun and it doesn’t satisfy. Like the woman at the well. She WAS thirsty for living water…
Sure, not all will admit or recognize their emptiness, but many do.
Larry, Karen answered your question for me. I wasn’t interested in knowing Jesus for the unreasonable joy of His sheer presence in my 20s or most of my 30s, either. In those years I prayed C. S. Lewis’ “prayer” of a foolish young man, “Lord, make me chaste,…but not just yet”. How I have regretted since the hurt I caused and the lost opportunities, some of which I will pay for until the other side.
Most of us have to “hit bottom” in our sin and come to the bitter dregs before we see the emptiness of pursuing pleasure and avoiding pain as a way of life. Even Solomon, who methodically pursued and achieved power, success, wealth, victory over enemies, and the pleasures of men, many(!) concubines (700 wives, 300 concubines) found it all vanity, futility, hated his life and despaired of all his works under the sun. Still today, people pursue pleasures of the flesh and self-will to deny their own despair, not knowing how to fill the void inside or even why it is there. We must always be ready, as Peter insisted, to give a reason for the hope that lives within us. Larry, if you are not feeling that hope very much, go to Jesus and let Him recharge you! Then, stay connected to Him so you don’t drain down to empty again.
Larry, for something to “sell” to the worldy seeker of pleasure, consider the following little piece the Lord gave me several years ago when I asked Him how to do that very thing:
Larry, re-reading your #37 again troubles me. You equate the Living water with mere words. I pray you will find deep true and lasting joy and satisfaction in knowing Jesus. He is so much more than words!
#41 Absolutely. “As you have freely received, so freely give”, not words, but the living God made man and the Holy Spirit indwelling with power and grace and peace and joy!
You have mistaken me and my purpose. I was presenting you with an argument that the broadly secular world now makes, not an argument that I personally believe in.
But you have not answered the problem either. Are those who indulge in the pleasures of the flesh secretly miserable and desirous of giving up this pleasures? You clearly don’t know many college kids. Karen B and Milton: Your answers are reasonable and credible to those who already know what you know. You are, however, clearly in a minority, taking America as a whole.
For the rest, therefore, your words are dry bread being offered too those who have access to croissants and Starbucks. Why give up these goodies? To have ones sins forgiven? Why? They impede the actors not at all. Look at what you have to give up to get the “benefits” of having your sins forgiven! You’re not going to sell the “sin” business (as seriously bad) to people who aren’t pained by sinning or who see it as nonsense (which appears to be the bulk of the US. Are you going to sell this line to VGR? Or Gov. Sanford? Please.)
No I haven’t bought into the world sins. But I DO know what one must give up to acquire self discipline and self-restraint, and I want you to tell me how to sell this hard line to those who see not benefit in it as great as the benefits they get from the pleasures of money, and the sweet and perfumed flesh. If you are in prison and you see that your behavior has brought you to real misery, then one may have a willing audience for the Christian sales pitch. But the BULK of the US is not in this condition. Tell me, how do you sell self restraint (in the pleasures of the flesh stuff) to college students who haven’t the faintest reason to give up such pleasures. Or give up that idiot twitter. Or obsessive video games. Or marijuana, whose acceptance is spreading like poison ivy. That’s what I want to know. How do you sell people what they don’t want and have no real use for?
Or do we have to wait until the bulk of the US crashes and burns so we can sell the cures to the pain?
I should add that I am my church’s Outreach Director, and I have discovered that I am a voice crying in the wilderness – with a vengeance! Larry
I wondered at first if you were asking what you have now made clear is your real question – “Tell me, how do you sell self restraint (in the pleasures of the flesh stuff) to college students who haven’t the faintest reason to give up such pleasures. Or give up that idiot twitter. Or obsessive video games. Or marijuana, whose acceptance is spreading like poison ivy. That’s what I want to know. How do you sell people what they don’t want and have no real use for?”
Welcome to reality as it has been from the Incarnation and will continue until the Judgment! Did someone “sell” you a line that brought you into the Kingdom? Were you persuaded by reasoned, logical argument? I very much doubt it. I certainly wasn’t. I had to lose much that was good and finally despair of my own goodness, my own power to change or even will to change, and I suspect it is the same for most. God had mercy on me and saved me in spite of my awful, filthy, selfish, cold, arrogant, self-sufficient and self-determined SELF, and I thank Him every day that He did!
A. W. Tozer once said that he had given up on trying to convince or persuade people into the Kingdom, because the next day someone else would persuade them right back out again. Remember what Jesus said about the many and the few. Sad, frustrating, but true then and true today.
Remember also the sower who broadcast the seed, most of which seemingly went to waste. But there is some fertile soil, however seemingly little, and some fertile hearts, however seemingly few. We never save anyone ourselves, only the Holy Spirit can do that. But He can use us as willing instruments and bring us together with those God has predestined/preveniently graced to turn to Him for salvation and new life, and He will always answer our prayers for Him to do so with us.
So give over the burden to God that is His alone of transforming rebel hearts and take up instead Jesus’ easy yoke and light burden of sowing the seed faithfully and to go, preach, baptize, and make disciples of those whom only the Lord can make converts. C. S. Lewis, as always, puts it in a nutshell:
Or more simply and generally, you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink. It’s called limited free will. Our abuse of that will to make wrong choices started in Eden and, absent grace to convict us and impel us to confession, repentance and humbly asking God’s forgiveness and Jesus’ new life, each of us will inexorably make wrong rebellious choice after choice ending in death outside of Christ, which fixes our nature eternally in rejection of God. God gives us the terrible dignity of ratifying our choices as having the real and eternal effect of separating us from Him forever of being united with Him and all the serving angels and all redeemed humanity in ever-increasing, never-ending peace, joy, pleasure and growth, ever-new yet ageless, ever-youthful yet mature.
Larry, Godspeed to you and your ministry. Keep crying in the wilderness, not with a vengeance, but with the voice of the Shepherd searching for the lost sheep and my God open wide a door for effective service for you!
Oops! The last sentence should of course read “…and may God open wide a door…” Dueling fingers!