Based on several relevant Bible passages, it’s also pretty clear that Christianity must call homosexuality a sin. That doesn’t mean that we have to impose that belief on other people who aren’t Christians. But note that God made man and woman to be man and woman, and instituted marriage way back in Genesis. Marriage is a part of the creation covenant, the way the universe is set up. That means it’s common to all human beings, so we really shouldn’t be too worried about telling them so. The natural law argument against homosexual marriage certainly is still young and needs some work. I may work on it a bit myself, but all that to say that marriage is worth defending, and not just on Christian grounds. Homosexuality is not a case of murder like abortion is, but it is a case of trying to redefine human beings as something we’re not, and that’s still pretty darn bad.

However, all that was just running over some of the legal issues of abortion and homosexuality. The point of this essay is that the legal issues are not very important. Well, of course they are very important, but not nearly so important as helping people. The point of this essay is to point out, firstly, that at present (we’ve been doing this for 30 years) some evangelicals (the Catholics do a great job too) have just about figured out the abortion issue. We’ve come to realize that it’s not enough to try to make laws. It’s even more important to help unwed mothers, young mothers, girls who are pregnant because they’ve been raped, women who can’t afford to care for their children. The best example of the fact that some of us have finally figured out this issue is the large number of crisis pregnancy centers. Texas Baptists of both conservative and moderate persuasion do a great job at this. These crisis pregnancy centers offer free ultrasound, pre- and post-abortion counseling, and even practical assistance for mothers in need, like helping them find a place to stay. Our CPC’s need the support of the Baptist populace (if your home church doesn’t already support one, suggest to your pastor that they look into it). Abortion is such a social issue, not just a legal issue. Writing laws is necessary, but the church’s job is to help people. With all the money our mega-churches spend on carpets, we can certainly afford to feed, clothe, and house any number of unwed mothers and their children. A few of us are trying to do this (thank God), and it’s time the rest of us got with the program.

Of course, I wasn’t around 30 years ago. I daresay a few Christians knew to help both mothers and children way back then. So I speak without knowledge when I make this wild guess that it took 30 years for a lot of us who now know this to realize the obvious. The point of this essay is that we should try to avoid a 30-year wait on figuring out the homosexuality issue. My friends at the DBU Snipe site say a lot about truth and love and how we need to have both. That’s what the CPC’s represent for the abortion issue. Who really knows what it would look like for the homosexuality issue in terms of where our money goes and what institutions and programs we run? But I can guess what it’s like down at the human-to-human level in our daily lives and prayers and Sunday mornings.

Homosexuality is a sin, just like that last time you lusted or gossiped, and the last time I was prideful and the last time someone at DBU did something wrong and the last time the DBU Snipe overstated its case against someone involved with something wrong at DBU. Homosexuals need our help. They don’t need to be judged, unless it’s the same way we judge ourselves. They need to be loved: that means being informed that homosexuality is a sin (no worse than any other sin) and that healing is ready and waiting through prayer and persistence.

I can even get just a little bit more practical than that. Homosexual men usually had bad relationships with their fathers, and the same is true of lesbian women and their mothers. That means that they’re really hurting and could use some Christian love. It also means that a lot of them would benefit from counseling and other psychological stuff like that. Gay men need male mentors in a local church who love and affirm them in a non-gay way, and lesbian women need female mentors who do the same.

So please, please, please think about emailing your representatives at www.house.gov and www.senate.gov and maybe even www.whitehouse.gov, but don’t lets forget to respect gays and lesbians as human beings (the fallen image of God), decry their sin as something that needs to go, and commit to helping them out with that through friendship and prayer.

Click here for a good article on the same topic.