” What does the Bible say about LGBT concerns”? you may have asked yourself late: mainly due to an continued correct- wing trend to equate Christianity with heterosexuality, and the.
Well, first it’s important to note that when Pope Francis was asked about his views on homosexuality in February 2023, he:” This]laws around the world criminalising Gay people ] is not right.
People who exhibit queer proclivities are God’s children. God loves them. They are condemned by God, but that is a crime. It is unfair to criminalize those who have a queer tendancy.
And in November of 2023, as any other child should be in the capacity of a witness or godparent. In December 2023, the pope announced that people in the world were in need of him.
This is n’t the first time Pope Francis has shown himself to be a when it comes to, among other things, LGBT Catholics.
Some high-ranking priests and regular Christians, both on the American continent and elsewhere in the world, hold this position.
Some of these Catholics may refute Pope Francis ‘ interpretation of the Bible or the Bible in regard to Gay issues. But is it?
Scripture is especially critical for Christians. When church officials refer to” the Bible “or” the Writings”, they often mean” the Bible as we understand it through our religious beliefs”. Our churches constantly interpret the Bible through one of their certain theological lenses.
As a scholar of the Bible, I advise pastors to thoroughly read the Bible when they exclude homosexuals from their cultures and their philosophy. Instead, they allow their masculine anxieties to obstruct it by seeking to find evidence in biblical texts that will assist anti-exclusion beliefs.
My place is being made clear in a number of passages in the Bible. Here’s what the Bible says about LGBT problems:
Love of God and neighbour
Mark’s Gospel, found in the New Testament, documents that Jesus entered the Jerusalem church on three occasions. First, he visited briefly, and” looked around at everything” ( ).
He then proceeded, driving “out the people who were buying and selling in the temple, and turning the tables of the money changers and the doves ‘ seats” ( ). Jesus especially targeted those who harmed the poorest members of the temple’s population.
Jesus spent a lot of time inside the temple on his third visit ( ). He met the whole range of church administration, including key priests, teachers of the rules and elders. Each of these management groups used their own interpretations to remove rather than to include.
The” ordinary people” ( and ) recognised that Jesus proclaimed a gospel of inclusion. As he entered the church, they joyfully embraced him.
Jesus addresses the Greeks, who were the famous great priests of old Israel and were crucial in the construction of the temple. They were among those who confronted Jesus and used their own interpretation of the Bible to exclude the group who held a traditional religious viewpoint. Jesus responded to them,” Do you not know the Bible or the power of God, for this reason?”
Jesus understood that they had chosen to interpret the Bible in a way that made it impossible to comprehend it in a non-traditional manner. Therefore, they restricted the scope of God’s power to what was considered to be his. Jesus was claiming that the Philosophers were unable to own all of God’s creation. The common people who followed Jesus understood that he had a distinct view of God.
When Jesus is later confronted by a single scribe ( ), this message of inclusion becomes even clearer. Jesus succinctly summarized the theological ethic of his church in response to the scribe’s inquiry regarding the most crucial laws: love of God and neighbor ( ).
Inclusion, no rejection
The Old Testament, and especially the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, is where those who would remove gays from God’s country choose to turn otherwise. Their understanding of the account is that it is about sexuality. It is n’t. It relates to kindness.
The story begins in when three visitors ( God and two angels, appearing as” men” ) came before, a Hebrew patriarch. What were Sarah and Abraham doing? They offered generosity.
The two spirits finally left Abraham and the Lord and travelled into where they met Lot, Abraham’s brother. Lot’s actions were what? He offered generosity. The two kindness incidents are explained in a single language.
The, as the Bible describes them, did n’t offer the same hospitality to these angels in disguise. Instead of threatening to murder them, they sought to embarrass them. Because Lot offered his virgin daughters to them in an effort to defend himself and his guests, they were homosexual.
Heterosexual assault of men by people is a common work of shame. This is an extraordinary type of brutishness. Extreme hospitality ( Abraham and Lot ) and extreme indolence ( in the story ) contrast with this. It is a tale of addition, no exclusion. Abraham and Lot included the neighbors, the gentlemen of Sin excluded them.
Clothed in Christ
People who disagree with Pope Francis’s method will likely turn to various books when confronted with the diverse gospel of Jesus and a careful reading of the tale of Sodom as one about kindness. Why? because they are looking for any Scripture that may support their position because they have a masculine agenda.
However, careful reading is also required for the other Bible they use. and, for instance, are no about” lgbt” as we now understand it – as the nurturing, caring and intimate relationship between people of the same sex. These texts deal with relationships that transcend the lines between ethnicity ( Israelite and Canaanite ) and purity ( between clean and unclean ).
In in the New Testament, Paul the apostle strives for a Christian group where” there is no greater Jew or Greek, there is no more slave or free, there is no more male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”
Paul built his religious discussion on the Jew- Grecian distinction, but subsequently extended it to the slave- completely distinction and the adult- female distinction. No matter what denomination they belong to, Christians may adopt Paul and apply it to the heterosexual-homosexual difference.
We are all” clothed in Christ” ( ): God only sees Christ, not our different sexualities.
This content has been republished under a Creative Commons license. Learn the.
