The church should solicit state support against homosexuality
Nov 11, 2003
On Sunday, November 2, Bishop Gene Robinson, an openly gay clergyman, was consecrated and enthroned as Bishop of New Hampshire Diocese in the USA amidst worldwide protests. This is a turning point in Church history.
By Asuman Bisiika
On Sunday, November 2, Bishop Gene Robinson, an openly gay clergyman, was consecrated and enthroned as Bishop of New Hampshire Diocese in the USA amidst worldwide protests. This is a turning point in Church history.
These protests however, represent a debate, the outcome of which will depend on how we look at homosexuality: is it a social or a moral issue? Although most contemporary religions are vehemently opposed to homosexuality, Christianity faces the biggest challenge from homosexuality because of its tendency to tolerate Pop culture.
Pop Culture can be defined as unbridled social disposition. In fact, the worldwide uproar sparked off by the consecration of Bishop Robinson represents a clash between Pop culture and Christianity. However, given the trend of the global appreciation of Pop Culture beyond the Judeo-Christian domain of western civilisation, this clash is not limited to Christianity.
The influence of Pop Culture on Christianity can be traced to the 17th activism for reforms in the Church. By the time the Native Anglican Church was formed in protest against strict Roman Catholic doctrines and dogma, the cultural power of Christianity as the defining influence of contemporary Western civilisation had waned very drastically. This was a departure from the image and disposition of Christianity as an institution from which states that devolved from the Roman Empire derived moral justification to exercise power.
In his book titled Homosexuality in History, the Rev. Robert Buchanan traces homosexuality to early Greek and Roman civilisations. It is said that 14 of the first 15 emperors were homosexual. During the republican period of the Roman Empire, Cicero, a contemporary of Julius Caesar, declared without challenge that there is nothing illegal about a man taking another to the country in order to enjoy his erotic sensual pleasures. In one of writings, Cicero argued:
“Although one could easily have sex with his wife at home, a man in the baths, a prostitute in the brothel, and a slave in a dark corner, he would have only been criticised if he were not able to keep everything in its place.â€
According to Rev. Buchanan, the anti-homosexual attitudes towards the Roman Empire can therefore be attributed to the rise of Christianity as ‘a state religion.’ The opposition against homosexuality was so strong, that even the rise of intellectualism and the Protestant Reformation did little to change the negative attitude towards homosexuality. The Spanish Visigoths punished homosexuals by castration. The Reformation brought even stronger condemnations of those who committed homosexual acts.
France punished homosexual behaviour with loss of the testicles for the first offence, loss of the penis for the second offence, and death by burning at the stake for a third offence. Henry VIII of England outlawed homosexuality in England in 1533, with penalties including loss of property and death. This practice continued until the early 1700s.
The earliest record of a death penalty for homosexual acts in what was later to become the United States was in St. Augustine, Florida in 1566, when a man was executed by the military. The Untied States maintained the death penalty for convicted ‘sodomites’ until about 1779, when President Thomas Jefferson proposed that Virginia drop the death penalty for the crime and replace it with castration.
The revolution in France brought an end to criminal laws regarding sexual activities in 1810 under the Napoleonic Code. England abolished the death penalty for acts of homosexuality in 1861. Rev. Buchanan attributes the rise of tolerance towards homosexuality to the interaction of many subcultures in the 13th century.
With the Catholic Church’s influence, Western Europe gradually changed its attitude toward homosexuality. The state, in partnership with the Church officially opposed homosexuality. However, this was certainly not what was always practiced.
According to Rev. Buchanan, King Charlemagne of France, who considered himself personally responsible for the creation of a Christian Europe (Christendom), is said to have been shocked upon hearing that some of the monks in his kingdom were sodomites.
He sought to preserve the monks from such evils, but no civil legislation against homosexuality was enacted.
This gives credence to the argument that the Church needs the complement partnership of the state in order to appropriately deal with homosexuality. And to start with, the Church should not limit its protests to gay clerics in leadership roles, but should solicit for the support of the state to deal with homosexuality as a universal vice.
Ends
On Sunday, November 2, Bishop Gene Robinson, an openly gay clergyman, was consecrated and enthroned as Bishop of New Hampshire Diocese in the USA amidst worldwide protests. This is a turning point in Church history.
These protests however, represent a debate, the outcome of which will depend on how we look at homosexuality: is it a social or a moral issue? Although most contemporary religions are vehemently opposed to homosexuality, Christianity faces the biggest challenge from homosexuality because of its tendency to tolerate Pop culture.
Pop Culture can be defined as unbridled social disposition. In fact, the worldwide uproar sparked off by the consecration of Bishop Robinson represents a clash between Pop culture and Christianity. However, given the trend of the global appreciation of Pop Culture beyond the Judeo-Christian domain of western civilisation, this clash is not limited to Christianity.
The influence of Pop Culture on Christianity can be traced to the 17th activism for reforms in the Church. By the time the Native Anglican Church was formed in protest against strict Roman Catholic doctrines and dogma, the cultural power of Christianity as the defining influence of contemporary Western civilisation had waned very drastically. This was a departure from the image and disposition of Christianity as an institution from which states that devolved from the Roman Empire derived moral justification to exercise power.
In his book titled Homosexuality in History, the Rev. Robert Buchanan traces homosexuality to early Greek and Roman civilisations. It is said that 14 of the first 15 emperors were homosexual. During the republican period of the Roman Empire, Cicero, a contemporary of Julius Caesar, declared without challenge that there is nothing illegal about a man taking another to the country in order to enjoy his erotic sensual pleasures. In one of writings, Cicero argued:
“Although one could easily have sex with his wife at home, a man in the baths, a prostitute in the brothel, and a slave in a dark corner, he would have only been criticised if he were not able to keep everything in its place.â€
According to Rev. Buchanan, the anti-homosexual attitudes towards the Roman Empire can therefore be attributed to the rise of Christianity as ‘a state religion.’ The opposition against homosexuality was so strong, that even the rise of intellectualism and the Protestant Reformation did little to change the negative attitude towards homosexuality. The Spanish Visigoths punished homosexuals by castration. The Reformation brought even stronger condemnations of those who committed homosexual acts.
France punished homosexual behaviour with loss of the testicles for the first offence, loss of the penis for the second offence, and death by burning at the stake for a third offence. Henry VIII of England outlawed homosexuality in England in 1533, with penalties including loss of property and death. This practice continued until the early 1700s.
The earliest record of a death penalty for homosexual acts in what was later to become the United States was in St. Augustine, Florida in 1566, when a man was executed by the military. The Untied States maintained the death penalty for convicted ‘sodomites’ until about 1779, when President Thomas Jefferson proposed that Virginia drop the death penalty for the crime and replace it with castration.
The revolution in France brought an end to criminal laws regarding sexual activities in 1810 under the Napoleonic Code. England abolished the death penalty for acts of homosexuality in 1861. Rev. Buchanan attributes the rise of tolerance towards homosexuality to the interaction of many subcultures in the 13th century.
With the Catholic Church’s influence, Western Europe gradually changed its attitude toward homosexuality. The state, in partnership with the Church officially opposed homosexuality. However, this was certainly not what was always practiced.
According to Rev. Buchanan, King Charlemagne of France, who considered himself personally responsible for the creation of a Christian Europe (Christendom), is said to have been shocked upon hearing that some of the monks in his kingdom were sodomites.
He sought to preserve the monks from such evils, but no civil legislation against homosexuality was enacted.
This gives credence to the argument that the Church needs the complement partnership of the state in order to appropriately deal with homosexuality. And to start with, the Church should not limit its protests to gay clerics in leadership roles, but should solicit for the support of the state to deal with homosexuality as a universal vice.
Ends