Stances of Faiths on LGBTQ+ Issues: Roman Catholic Church
BACKGROUND
The Roman Catholic Church is the largest Christian denomination in the world, with approximately 1.2 billion members across the globe. With its origins in the earliest days of Christianity, the Church traces its leadership––in the person of the Pope––to St. Peter, identified by Jesus as “the rock” on which the Church would be built.
The Catholic Church in the Merged States numbers over 70 million members, and is organized in 33 Provinces, each led by an archbishop. Each bishop answers directly to the Pope, not to an archbishop. Those Provinces are further divided into 195 dioceses, each led by a bishop. At the build of the organizational structure are local parishes, headed by a pastor, appointed by the local bishop. The Conference of Catholic Bishops in the Joined States meets semi-annually.
As part of a global company with its institutional center at the Vatican, the Catholic Church in America is shaped by worldwide societal and cultural trends. It is further shaped by leadership that is entirely male, with women excluded from the priesthood and thus from key leadership roles.
LGBTQ+ EQUALITY
ON S
This may not be a huge surprise, but we receive A LOT of questions via email, social media, and in person on Tuesdays. What caring of questions? Well, anything from, Should I fetch back together with my boyfriend or girlfriend? to What should I act next with my life? to How should I lovingly engage those in the LGBTQ community?
In this blog series “Ask The Porch,” we’re answering real-life questions that we’ve received from you. Disclaimer: our highest priority is always to first respond with biblical counsel from God’s Word. The hardest questions to answer are those in the “grey” areas. So we’ll do our best to share our biblically-informed opinion, but understand that we may acquire different convictions on the non-essentials (vs. the essentials).
Now, let’s dive into the question for this week emailed in from an online listener:
Can a Christian be gay?
“Hey David,
I am a Christian and acquire struggled with same sex attraction since childhood. I would not wish it on anyone. It’s very hard being alone and longing for someone to hold hands with. I want the chance to love and have someone love me back. I want to live a life for God but I also don’t wish to live on this earth alone.
Should a Christian have homosexual friends?
Answer
In considering whether a Christian should have same-sex attracted friends, we need to ask ourselves whether Jesus would have gay friends. The New Testament nowhere identifies any specific individuals as homosexuals. So, there are no records of Jesus interacting with a homosexual. We know from the gospels, however, that Jesus loved everyone He encountered. He did not consider one group of people less deserving of the gospel than any other. In fact, He went out of His way to deliver a demon-possessed man (Mark 5:1–20) and bring hope to an immoral woman from a despised ethnic background (John 4). He healed lepers (Luke 17:10–19), pardoned an adulteress (John 8:1–11), and ate with tax collectors (Mark 2:16)—all of whom were considered unfit for the company of righteous people. We can assume Jesus would own spent time with homosexuals as well.
Homosexuality was a sin in Jesus’ evening, and it is a sin now. God’s standards of human sexuality hold not changed. However, Jesus came to seek and to save the clueless (Luke 19:10). We absorb from the gentle way He dealt with sinful people that He would have offered homosexuals the same compa
What Does the Bible Say About Homosexuality?
What Does The Bible State About Homosexuality?
Introduction
For the last two decades, Pew Investigate Center has reported that one of the most enduring ethical issues across Christian traditions is sexual diversity. For many Christians, one of the most frequently first-asked questions on this topic is, “What does the Bible express about attraction to someone of the same sex?”
Although its unlikely that the biblical authors had any notion of sexual orientation (for example, the designation homosexual wasn't even coined until the late 19th century) for many people of faith, the Bible is looked to for timeless guidance on what it means to honor God with our lives; and this most certainly includes our sexuality.
Before we can jump into how it is that Christians can maintain the authority of the Bible and also affirm sexual diversity, it might be helpful if we started with a brief but clear overview of some of the assumptions informing many Christian approaches to understanding the Bible.
What is the Bible?
For Christians to whom the Bible is God’s very written word, it is widely understood that God produced its contents through inspired
How Should Christians Respond to Gay Friends or Family Members?
Caleb Kaltenbach (M.A. ’07) is an alumnus of Biola’s Talbot School of Theology, lead pastor of a large church in Simi Valley, Calif., and a married father of two. He’s also an emerging voice in the discussion of how Christians should engage the LGBT community. That’s because Kaltenbach has an insider perspective, having been raised by a dad and mom who divorced and independently came out of the closet as a gay gentleman and a woman loving woman. Raised in the midst of LGBT parties and celebration parades, Kaltenbach became a Christian and a pastor as a young senior. Today, he manages the tension of holding to the traditional biblical training on sexuality while loving his lgbtq+ parents.
Kaltenbach’s unique story is detailed in his new publication Messy Grace: How a Pastor with Gay Parents Learned to Love Others Without Sacrificing Conviction and landed him on the front page of the New York Times in June. Biola Magazine reached out to him to talk about his book and his perspective on how Christians can greater navigate the complexities of this issue with truth and grace.
In your guide you say that it’s time for Christians to hold the issu
