The Bible Isn't Anti-Gay, It's Anti-Sex

I was recently exposed to a pro-gay-marriage argument along the following lines: St. Paul was anti-gay, but St. Paul said a lot of other things that we don't generally agree with anymore. Since we're already in the habit of picking and choosing from his teachings, we might as well toss out all of his anti-gay stuff along with the anti-women stuff.

Even though I may agree with the conclusion, the argument itself is crap. It's time to set the record "straight" (ha ha) about St. Paul and the Bible's stance on gayness.

Much of Paul's bad rap as a mysogynist is rooted in one particular statement from the first letter to Timothy.

A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet.
--1 Timothy 2:11-12

Although attributed to St. Paul, most modern scholars agree that both Timothies were probably written by someone else after Paul's martyrdom (perhaps as late as the mid-2nd century). It was common practice in ancient times to attribute authorship in this way to establish alignment with a particular school of thought.

St. Paul himself was actually opposed to ALL marriage (gay, straight, or otherwise):

Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do.
--1 Corinthians 7:8

It is speculated that Paul was gay and that homosexuality is the "thorn in my flesh" he refers to in 2 Corinthians 12:7. Fanciful interpretations go so far as to blame homosexuality for Paul's "misogyny," although, once again, a clear distinction between his authentic writings vs. the attributed ones reveals he wasn't hardly a mysoginist at all -- see http://pmrb.net/essays/st_paul_women.html

What it really comes down to is that the Bible doesn't make much of an effort to separate homosexuality and heterosexuality. The Egyptians, Babylonians, Greeks, and (later) Romans all lived in what we today would perceive as highly SEXUAL societies, in which heterosexuality and homosexuality were both widely practiced and even encouraged. In contrast, a key part of the ancient Jewish identity was that they distinguished themselves as being ANTI-SEXUAL, labeling all extra-marital sexuality as "fornication" and avoiding it like bacon.

So any argument that the Bible is pro-hetero and anti-homo just doesn't hold water. What the Bible really says is that ALL lust and fornication is a sin; that EVERYONE is guilty of that sin, and that we all deserve to suffer eternally in hell for it; but that we all have a "get out of hell free" card with our name on it (if we want it) because Christ loves us so much he was willing to suffer in our stead.

--Dan Colgate