The Way Liberace Used to Walk
In the previous post, the one where I mentioned that homosexual acts ought eventually to be prohibited by law, one commenter asked about my “constant hammering” on this issue. Why do I keep going on about it? Why don’t I write about sins my parishioners might actually be committing? Well, actually I do that too — one of my books was written for that express purpose. So that front is actually covered.However, the central part of this question still needs to be answered. But before answering it, let me set the stage first.
Sodomy was a felony in all 50 states as recently as 1962, when I was nine-years-old. The establishment narrative — a very clever perversion of the Whig view of history, which was in its turn a perversion of postmillennialism — is that we are all of us gradually emerging from the dark woods of old-timey superstitions, and that these things take time. That gradual evolutionary emergence has us leaving behind the way we “used to be” and walking toward the higher mountain meadows of egalitarianism, where everything is bright and sunny, and the clouds are fluffy.
As a result of this narrative, we see a facile equation of “civil rights” for homosexuals with the actual expansion of civil rights for other minorities.
“From Seneca Falls to Selma to Stonewall” is an illustration of this narrative in action. But prior to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 it wasn’t a felony to be black. It was perfectly fine to be black — it simply wasn’t fine to be black and doing the same things that whites were doing, like attending the same school.
I grew up in a segregated town, which meant that blacks were prohibited from attending the same school I went to, simply on the basis of the color of their skin. They were treated as different, and were thus excluded from being allowed to do the same things I was allowed to do (in this case, attend Germantown Elementary). Different people were not allowed to do the same thing. That is a crucial point, and I would plead with you to keep a weather eye on it.
Homosexual agitators argue that this is precisely their situation. They are different, and they are not allowed to do the same thing straights are allowed to do (e.g. marry). But this is so absurd that it is astonishing to me that the entire country has been able to debate this thing for years without getting a fit of the giggles.
If we are to treat men equally, this means that when one man marries a woman, a different man should be allowed to do the same thing — marry a woman also. You have different men doing the same thing. In the case of hetero and homosexual marriage, you have different men doing completely different things, and . . . here is the key point, the agitators insist that we all call it the same thing, under penalty of law.
They will go in an opposite direction, but if you point this out, you must be filled with hate. The body politic demands of us that we all say this particular set of quite distinct actions are precisely and exactly the same action. But whenever doublespeak is demanded of me, I start looking around for Big Brother. And well, look, here he is! Right on schedule!
As I hinted a moment ago, this is not simply a matter of dealing with a particular sexual vice. The reason for singling out sodomy for particular political attention right now is the homo-activists have made it their central political weapon. Other sins can still be addressed by pastors for what they are — sins. In the 1950′s, when a pastor was counseling a homosexual parishioner, he was doing what pastors now do when they have members with a porn problem, for example. He was trying to help someone with a personal struggle — and he was not having to deal simultaneously with a culture-wide insistence that this personal struggle be universally-recognized as a matter of personal pride instead of personal shame. At that time, sodomy had not yet been made into a flag for a movement.
Think about it. There are no Adultery Pride Marches. There are no Masturbation is Cool Stadium Rallies. There is no such thing as Secret Porn Stash Pride Day. Of course, since we live in absurd times, all this must be qualified with the word yet. So right now, as we speak, same sex couplings are being used by our ruling class in a completely different way than are these other sexual vices. We are experiencing a culture-wide full-court press on this subject. If there is a continuum between Selma and Stonewall, there the time is coming, and now is, when it will be just as unacceptable to say anywhere, including from the pulpit, that sodomy is an offense to God. Any minister who tries it will be treated the same way a minister today would be treated if he preached a sermon on race relations, using the phrase “colored people” throughout, and illustrated it with heart-warming video clips from Song of the South.
We are up against a very potent demand that we make our public demeanor toward homosexuals one that walks very gingerly, like a cat on hot bricks. I think it was Spurgeon who said that some ministers exegete a text the way a donkey eats a thistle, that is to say, very carefully. If you continue to believe, in the deepest recesses of your heart, that same sex activity is not exactly what God wants us doing, you currently have to express this sentiment, if you express it at all, by saying that you do not believe, at the end of the day, that same sex attractions are able to present us with an optimal opportunity for human thriving. You are not allowed to say, unless you are prepared to be a pariah, that sodomy is a very bad sin. Thanks for asking the question. “And kind of gross, if you think about it.” The zeitgeist is currently insisting that we mince our words the way Liberace used to walk.
So the reason I go on about this is that there are many ministers, in conservative, evangelical and Reformed circles, who are currently bending to these demands. But friends, the last thing we should do, when dealing with an angry mob on Lot’s front porch, is any bending of any kind.
Sodomy is therefore a political act, and those engaged in the movement know it. They have made no secret of it. So I don’t really feel bad for noticing this, and for refusing to go along with it. And in refusing to go along with it, I believe that such refusals should come as soon as you realize what road you are on, and not come when you balk at going the last half mile of it.
Incidentally, asking a woman to marry you, and to walk with you as you bring up children in the Lord together, is also a potent political act. But, in contrast to the sodomy revolution, it is a political act that actually bears fruit. More people who live that way should know about it. Somebody should tell them.
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