Homosexuality
State of the
Question
Homosexuality/homosexual acts constitute
genital acts performed between persons of the same sex.
Divine Revelation
Genesis 19:1
The
two angels reached
Before
they went to bed, all the townsmen of
They
replied, "Stand back! This fellow," they sneered, "came here as
an immigrant, and now he dares to give orders! We'll treat you worse than
them!" With that, they pressed hard against
Then
the angels said to
Leviticus 18:22
You
shall not lie with a male as with a woman; such a thing is an abomination.
Leviticus 20:13
If
a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them shall be put to death for
their abominable deed; they have forfeited their lives.
Romans 1:26
Therefore,
God handed them over to degrading passions. Their females exchanged natural
relations for unnatural, and the males
likewise gave up natural relations with females and burned with lust for one
another. Males did shameful things with males and thus received in their own
persons the due penalty for their perversity.
And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God handed them over
to their undiscerning mind to do what is improper. They are filled with every form of
wickedness, evil, greed, and malice; full of envy, murder, rivalry, treachery,
and spite.
1 Corinthians 6:9
Do
you not know that the unjust will not inherit the
1 Timothy 1:8
We
know that the law is good, provided that one uses it as law, with the understanding that law is meant not
for a righteous person but for the lawless and unruly, the godless and sinful,
the unholy and profane, those who kill their fathers or mothers, murderers, the
unchaste, practicing homosexuals,
kidnapers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is opposed to sound
teaching, according to the glorious
gospel of the blessed God, with which I have been entrusted.
Catechism of the Catholic Church
2357 "Homosexuality
refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or
predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a
great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its
psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred
Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity. Tradition
has always declared that 'homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.'[CDF, Persona humana 8.] They are contrary to
the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not
proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no
circumstances can they be approved."
The Magisterium of the Church
The teachings of Church on
homosexuality are directed toward homosexual acts and not toward the homosexual
condition as she is accustomed to teach against heterosexual acts--against the
sins not the sinner.
The constant and consistent teaching
of the Church on the morality of homosexual acts has been unequivocal in her
history--homosexual acts are of their very nature seriously wrong.
“For
according to the objective moral order, homosexual relations are acts which
lack an essential and indispensable finality. In Sacred Scripture they are
condemned as a serious depravity and even presented as the sad consequence of
rejecting God.[18] This judgment of Scripture does not of course permit us to
conclude that all those who suffer from this anomaly are personally responsible
for it, but it does attest to the fact that homosexual acts are intrinsically
disordered and can in no case be approved of.” (Sacred Congregation for the
Doctrine of the Faith, 1975, Persona
Humana, Declaration on Certain
Questions Concerning Sexual Ethics, no. 7)
“At the present time there
are those who, basing themselves on observations in the psychological order,
have begun to judge indulgently, and even to excuse completely, homosexual
relations between certain people. This they do in opposition to the constant
teaching of the Magisterium and to the moral sense of the Christian people.
“A distinction is drawn, and it seems with some reason, between homosexuals
whose tendency comes from a false education, from a lack of normal sexual
development, from habit, from bad example, or from other similar causes, and is
transitory or at least not incurable; and homosexuals who are definitively such
because of some kind of innate instinct or a pathological constitution judged
to be incurable.
“In regard to this second category of subjects, some people conclude that their
tendency is so natural that it justifies in their case homosexual relations
within a sincere communion of life and love analogous to marriage, in so far as
such homosexuals feel incapable of enduring a solitary life.
“In the pastoral field, these homosexuals must certainly be treated with
understanding and sustained in the hope of overcoming their personal
difficulties and their inability to fit into society. Their culpability will be
judged with prudence. But no pastoral method can be employed which would give
moral justification to these acts on the grounds that they would be consonant
with the condition of such people. For according to the objective moral order,
homosexual relations are acts which lack an essential and indispensable finality.
In Sacred Scripture they are condemned as a serious depravity and even
presented as the sad consequence of rejecting God.[18] This judgment of
Scripture does not of course permit us to conclude that all those who suffer
from this anomaly are personally responsible for it, but it does attest to the
fact that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered and can in no case be
approved of.” (Persona Humana: Declaration On Certain Questions Concerning Sexual
Ethics, VIII, Sacred
Congregation For The Doctrine Of The Faith, December 29th, 1975)
Ecclesiastical Tradition
Didache (c. 80-140
AD)
You shall not commit adultery; you shall not
commit pederasty (7.377).
Clement of Rome (c. 96)
It is well that they should be cut off from
the lusts of the world, since "every lust wars against the spirit"
and "neither fornicators, nor homosexuals ... will inherit the
Aristides (c. 125)
Some polluted themselves by lying with males
(9.269).
Athenagoras (c. 175)
They do not abstain even from males, males
with males committing shocking abominations, outraging all the noblest and
comeliest bodies in all sorts of ways (2.143).
Theophilus (c. 180),
Show me yourself whether you are not an
adulterer, a fornicator, a robber, or a thief. Show me that you do not corrupt
boys. ... For God is not manifest to those who do these things (2.89).
Clement of Alexandria (c. 195)
Men play the part of women, and women the
part of men, contrary to nature. Women are at once both wives and husbands.... O
miserable spectacle! Horrible conduct! (2.276)
Clement of
Alexandria
(c. 195)
The whole earth has now become full of
fornication and wickedness. I admire the ancient legislators of the Romans.
These men detested effeminacy of conduct. The giving of the body to feminine
purposes, contrary to the law of nature, they judged worthy of the most extreme
penalty (2.77).
Clement of Alexandria
(c.195)
The fate of the Sodomites was judgment
to those who had done wrong, and instruction to those who hear. The Sodomites
had fallen into uncleanness through much luxury. They practiced adultery
shamelessly and they burned with insane love for boys (2.282).
Tertullian (c. 197)
The Christian man confines himself to
the female sex (3.51).
Tertullian (c.200)
I find no dress cursed by God except a
woman's dress on a man. For he says, "Cursed is every man who clothes
himself in woman's attire" (3.71).
Tertullian
(c.
200)
The coupling of two males is a very
shameful thing (3.509).
Origin (c. 245)
Such sins are committed by fornicators,
adulterers, abusers of themselves with men, effeminate men, idolaters, and
murderers (9.500).
Apostolic
Constitutions (compiled c.
390)
The sin of
The Teaching of the Fathers and
Doctors of the Church
St. Thomas, II-II, q. 154, 11
I answer that, As stated above (A6,9) wherever there
occurs a special kind of deformity whereby the venereal act is rendered
unbecoming, there is a determinate species of lust. This may occur in two ways:
First, through being contrary to right reason, and this is common to all
lustful vices; secondly, because, in addition, it is contrary to the natural
order of the venereal act as becoming to the human race: and this is called
"the unnatural vice." This may happen in several ways. First, by
procuring pollution, without any copulation, for the sake of venereal pleasure:
this pertains to the sin of "uncleanness" which some call
"effeminacy." Secondly, by copulation with a thing of undue species,
and this is called "bestiality." Thirdly, by copulation with an undue
sex, male with male, or female with female, as the Apostle states (Rom. 1:27):
and this is called the "vice of sodomy." Fourthly, by not observing
the natural manner of copulation, either as to undue means, or as to other
monstrous and bestial manners of copulation.
St. Thomas, II-II, q.
154, 12
I answer that, In every genus, worst
of all is the corruption of the principle on which the rest depend. Now the
principles of reason are those things that are according to nature, because
reason presupposes things as determined by nature, before disposing of other
things according as it is fitting. This may be observed both in speculative and
in practical matters. Wherefore just as in speculative matters the most
grievous and shameful error is that which is about things the knowledge of
which is naturally bestowed on man, so in matters of action it is most grave
and shameful to act against things as determined by nature. Therefore, since by
the unnatural vices man transgresses that which has been determined by nature
with regard to the use of venereal actions, it follows that in this matter this
sin is gravest of all. After it comes incest, which, as stated above (09), is
contrary to the natural respect which we owe persons related to us.
With regard to the other species of
lust they imply a transgression merely of that which is determined by right
reason, on the presupposition, however, of natural principles. Now it is more
against reason to make use of the venereal act not only with prejudice to the
future offspring, but also so as to injure another person besides. Wherefore
simple fornication, which is committed without injustice to another person, is
the least grave among the species of lust. Then, it is a greater injustice to
have intercourse with a woman who is subject to another's authority as regards
the act of generation, than as regards merely her guardianship. Wherefore
adultery is more grievous than seduction. And both of these are aggravated by
the use of violence. Hence rape of a virgin is graver than seduction, and rape
of a wife than adultery. And all these are aggravated by coming under the head
of sacrilege, as stated above (10, ad 2).
Human Reason
The Bible
teaches that the sexual differentiation of the human race into male and female
is divinely willed (Gen 1 and 2); that male and female complement each other
and that marriage, rooted in the irrevocable consent of man and woman to be
"one flesh" for life, alone respects the goods of human sexuality.
Thus, Scripture teaches that marriage provides the normative condition for
genital sexual expression; all other expressions of this kind, whether between
man and woman or between members of the same sex, are to be evaluated in the
light of this norm.*
Natural
law reveals in considering
the right and good use of human sexuality one has only to think through the use
of male and female genitalia in design and function to understand what is God's
will to the use (intercourse) and the end (procreation) of human sexuality.
There is no
other cavity of the body that is an apt receptacle to the male penis than the
female vagina to satisfy the natural purpose to deposit of semen and its nature
to open itself to the creation of new life. There is no natural and complementary
design to human bodies to accommodate same sex union. Human bodies have a
design created by their Manufacturer.
The constant teaching of the Church is
that the nature of homosexual acts is naturally and morally wrong. This
teaching is clearly based on Scripture and is rooted in the biblical
under-standing of sexuality. The Bible teaches that the sexual differentiation
of the human race into male and female is divinely willed, that male and female
complement each other and that marriage, rooted in the irrevocable consent of
man and woman to be "one flesh" for life, alone respects the goods of
human sexuality. Thus, Scripture teaches that marriage provides the normative
condition for genital sexual expression; all other expressions of this kind,
whether between man and woman or between members of the same sex, are to be
evaluated in the light of this norm. In addition to this general scriptural
account of human sexuality, there are specific biblical passages referring to
homosexual acts, and in each of these passages such acts are unambiguously
condemned.
Bibliography/Additional
Reading
Lawler, Rev. Ronald, O.F.M. Cap., Boyle,
Joseph, Jr., and May, William (1996). Catholic
Sexual Ethics: A Summary, Explanation, and Defense Updated. Our Sunday
Visitor, Inc.: Indiana
Persona
Humana,
Declaration On Certain Questions
Concerning Sexual Ethics, Sacred Congregation For The Doctrine Of The Faith,
December 29, 1975
Unless
otherwise noted, all Scripture texts are taken from the New American Bible
with Revised New Testament and Revised Psalms © 1991, 1986, 1970
Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Washington, D.C. and are used by
permission of the copyright owner. All Rights Reserved. No part of the New
American Bible may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing
from the copyright owner.
©
2011 Robert J. Schihl
Email
comments to rjschihl@catholicapologetics.org