He reaches the right conclusion for many of the wrong reasons, and when his pro-homosexual allies call it dysfunctional—they are right.

Please look hard for that reassurance and when you find it, please, also, let us know where you find it.

I should find a rational response to this, but my real desire is to give him a whack on the head. Is there nothing and no way we can rid ourselves of T EC and creatures like this? This man’s response is surely the result of a soul that has become thoroughly corrupt, completely tainted, so this essay smells like chowder left in the sun, or roadkill at the end of the week. T here can be no defending this, no compromising, no indabarating, inclusivity-izing. Nothing. He is with Robinson. Period. Will we scour this dirty bowl clean or will we put it on the shelf to draw cockroaches? When do we make up our minds that we have had enough and too much?  Larry

BINGO, Larry!

My personal conclusion is that what St Paul and the Old Testament are condemning are not faithful, loving and stable same sex relationships as we see them today but rather matters of cultic sex, sex as the expression of a particular power relationship, and promiscuity.

I wonder what else is going to depend upon the bishop’s “personal conclusion”.

It seems strange to me that whenever Jesus or the disciples were moved to change the old ways of the Law they managed to clearly say what they meant, but whenever they talk about homosexuality it “must have been” something different to what they said. I am sure that when Paul was drawing up his list of unacceptable behaviours and went to put homosexuality on it he could easily have added (except in faithful, loving relationships) after it or “cultic or promiscuous” before it. He managed such parentheses everywhere else -as we know from some of his convoluted sections - but missed them repeatedly whenever he mentioned homosexuality.

What a strange argument this man makes! It makes me wonder if he actually thinks.

I am sure that when Paul was drawing up his list of unacceptable behaviours and went to put homosexuality on it he could easily have added (except in faithful, loving relationships) after it or “cultic or promiscuous” before it.

In his defense, you can’t argue this point from a translation, only from the original Greek. The point is not whether Paul expressed himself clearly or not. He no doubt did. Rather, the point is whether we are right to translate the word “arsenokoites” simply with “homosexual”; in technical terms, whether the semantic field of the Greek word is really the same as that of the English we use to translate it.

Having said that, like you and like most scholars, I disagree with the bishop. The cultic meaning has been debunked, and adding “power relationship, and promiscuity” to that is a fig leaf that isn’t convincingly supported either. The links with discussion of homosexuality elsewhere in scripture, with the same word in extrabiblical text, and the parallel between the word’s derivation from “arsen” (male) + “koite” (bed) and that of similar words like “metrokoites” (incest with the mother) all suggest that “homosexuality” is a pretty good translation. See the BDAG Greek-English lexicon for a potted discussion and references.

Unfortunately # 6, the notion of “identity” that we have is is not quite equivalent conceptually.  What scholars have to unpack is the myriad of signs that particular acts convey (say of empire, rape, dominance, power, etc).  This moves away from the abstract discussions about genital activity, which are only, in fact, known in pr0nography.  When we talk about the qualities of relationships, the discussion becomes much more clear.  I continue to be puzzled by the reasserter’s reduction of homosexual relationships to sex.  I would hope that this was not done to straight relationships.

What is interesting is that this bishop is someone who reads and studies the bible prayerfully and comes to a different conclusion than reasserters.  Instead:  Katherine and others impugn his motives.  This is unfortunate:  an demonstrates a willingness to sacrifice the person, and unwillingness to offer mercy to the bishop himself.  Again, we make the mistake thinking that what we want, is what God wants, which is contested between gay people who know they are not sick or disordered, and those people who insist that gay people are “insults” to God.  As Drummie has eloquently stated.

I sort of agree with John Wilkins’ conclusion.  I think it’s unfortunate that someone with his bias was elevated to bishop in a Church that officially disagrees with him.  However, he’s thinking theologically, and he’s explicitly submitting himself to the wisdom of the Church.  That wins points in my eyes, and describes what others have labelled “Worthy Opponents.”  We can discuss, dialog, indaba, and do mission with people that question with honor and mutual submission.  The real problem is with those who make end runs to establish facts on the ground before the theology is there.

To me, this is where we start to apply biblical concepts about wheat and tares vs. shunning.  Both are encouraged, but perhaps for different applications?