If only I could reach back in time a decade and warn you, and tell yhow right you were and what was to come…

I think what we have here is a three-level argument, pitting definitions from moral theology, psychology and common usage against each other.

I’d like to approach it from the standpoint of moral theology. which holds that (1) temptation is not sin, (2) to resist temptation is a sacrificial act of moral virtue and (3) the sinner is identified with the sin in act, not in absence of act.

Ergo a thief is not a thief until he steals. An adulterer (although contemplation of the act may be an act of adultery) is not actually an adulterer until he adulters. By the same token, neither is an individual a homosexual until he acts upon his temptation.

The writer who pointed out that the act in contemplation is a matter for confession, is correct. By the logic that a man who looks at a woman lustfully has committed adultery, so has the man who has seriously contemplated a robbery, committed one. These
should be confessed not as a matter of legalism, but to get the weight of it off of our souls, and to let the Grace of God in so that we might become less vulnerable in the future.

But we have not become what we contemplate until we act on it. This doesn’t make the act itself any less heinous, of course,
it simply means that we have not become identified with it, yet.

There is nothing in the content of the Faith that justifies homosexuality. There is nothing that calls the inclination anything but deadly or the act anything but abominable. That having been said, what do we do about it?

First, we condemn the sin, not the sinner. We are told this repeatedly, and need to simply obey it.

Second, we refuse to fall for the world’s claptrap that the individual “cannot be healed.” God can heal anything, and we need to bring sufferers of all sorts before Him, asking for His Grace.

Third, we must indeed call sin, sin. We must not call evil anything but evil, that those who are tempted to do evil may be dissuaded.

just two cents, from your brother in Christ,

Fr. James +

Hi, Leo–

It might help to clarify things, to explain that the Church is not answerable to the concepts of the world. It is the secular, essentially Godless world that separates things into “Left” and “Right,” and which talks in terms of supposedly self-defining sound-bites.

Now, to be sure, you can find such things here and there in Church circles, but they are not the way the Church thinks. They are brought in from the world, and reliance on them as part of one’s conceptual universe bespeaks a lack of proper Christian formation. If you are not a Christian, that’s the reason this sort of discussion is dismissed by Orthodox: they are not the categories we think in, nor wish to. It explains why phrases that to you carry weight and are self-evident, are meaningless to us and are treated as such. If you are a Christian, and you think in these terms, insufficient care was taken of you and for that, as a priest, I apologize on behalf of the Church. You deserved better.

When you say “social justice” to us, we do not flash on the organized promotion of sin. We flash on the corporal works of mercy: feeding the hungry, clothing the naked and sheltering the homeless. These are things we actually do, out of our own pockets and using our own time, and occasionally admitting a needy wanderer into our own house. So, we tend to be dismissive of people who hurl that phrase at us when what they actually mean is that we are insufficiently zealous about promoting some political position they wish we’d take.

When you say “peace” to us, we think of the life we have in Christ as distinct from the stressful, pressure-heavy life someone is subjected to when he tries to be his own god. The world is sinful. Wars and crimes happen. We preach against such behavior. The world rarely listens,
preferring instead to preach “peace” to people whom they would like to see made defenseless.

You say, “If we’re the Orthodox Church,” we should use a juridical approach to heresy. You’re thinking of the Roman Catholics. Heresy is heresy. It doesn’t have to be pored over or debated, it just is. And the matter is up to individual bishops to handle. Orthodoxy does not adhere to a secular (or even a Roman) model of jurisprudence, and most things are handled informally. The emphasis is on redemption, not condemnation.

Father Johannes remarks that he would like to see more substantive commentary from you. I suspect, however, that you believe that what you wrote is, in fact, substantive.

It is not. It is a set of pre-packaged collections of words designed to make those who speak them feel noble. It is not “thought,”
per se, but is rather a methodology for avoiding thought. It is not a statement, but a means to avoid making one. Then, when having been
offered nothing to which to respond, someone points out, “there’s nothing here to respond to,” the user of the method can further vindicate himself by claiming his opponent is “avoiding the issues.”

If this is how you have been taught to think, you have been victimized. I would suggest to you that there is a better and more satisfying way.

Stating an actual case, using examples and supporting reasons that you have researched for yourself, is hard work. Considering your opponent’s answers and explanations is even harder–he is, after all, your opponent. But this is how discussions like this become vehicles for the advancement of the store of knowledge, and not just games we want to win or angry punch-ups.

Blessings,

Fr. James +

I believe that lust is in and of itself a sin whether it be hetero or homosexual. Christ spoke of committing adultery in one’s heart. There is a subtle distinction to be made here. I was recently in Ft. Lauderdale and went down to the beach. I could not help but notice some almost naked women there, but tried to divert my eyes lest I fall into lust. Had I stood there leering at these scantily clad women, I would have fallen into lust which would have been a sin. Therefore same sex attraction can easily lead to lust which is a sin even if no actual sexual contact takes place.
The problem is that our society has normalized immorality and declared morality mentally ill. St. Paul wrote about this in the first chapter of Romans. Thus the term homophobia used to attack anyone who does not accept the gay agenda. The who chick-fil-a scares me because it means that we no longer have freedom of speech or religion but must carefully adhere to the politically correct and basically anti-Christian orthodoxy or suffer such consequences as having our businesses attacked. That is fascism.
No one really knows what causes homosexuality. It is impossible to conduct truly unbiased and scientific research on the subject because the second any scientists begins to question the pro-gay orthodoxy he or she is in danger of being drummed out of the profession. There is a movement to have a professor at the University of Texas fired because he did a study that showed that children raised by same sex couples are not as well adjusted as politically correct orthodoxy demands. In California they are trying to make it illegal for a counselor to try to help a teen deal with homosexual attraction and develop normal opposite sex attraction. We are living in a very dangerous age because the forces of evil are actively attacking anyone who does not submit to the new normal which is immorality.
As far as Orthodoxy is concerned the teaching of our Church is clear. I and others will fight to keep from happening to our Church what has happened to the Episcopal and other Churches. If someone does not like what we believe on this subject, I suggest that they either learn the humility to accept the teaching authority of the Church or leave and join some other religion that is more to their liking. That includes seminary professors, bishops, clergy and laity. We do not decide what is right and what is wrong by popular vote in the Orthodox Church. We humbly recognize that the Holy Spirit has led the Church to proclaim the truth and that the truth does not change due to the changes in secular society.

Fr. John W. Morris

Rocky, like I told someone upstream, finger-wagging, moral approbation and so forth doesn’t get very far here. You are welcome to post, but you have to offer reasons and ideas for your disapproval, not just empty-headed scoldings.

Wow…you who are righteous?? Can I touch the hem of your garment? Can I have your autograph? Gee, if only I could be perfect, holy, righteous, and blameless like you guys!! If only.. The Lord Jesus frequently spoke about guys like you..but not in glowing terms. He referred to you as a brood of vipers. It’s amazing how history repeats itself. Forget about the word bully…how about a piece of self-righteous hypocritical cow dung?

As Chesterton said, tradition means giving a vote to the most obscure of all classes: the dead. Orthodox Holy Tradition listens first to the voices of the Church Fathers on these and all questions (and they are unanimous on homosexual passions). Secondly, the Church listens to the voice of the whole Church Militant (that’s the living, for you seminarians!), of which North America representas a thunderous one percent.

Here’s an experiment for those who find themselves in a theological head-to-head with the Church Fathers on this issue:

Take a trip to Athens, Moscow, Tiblisi, Sophia, Bucharest, Jerusalem, or any other place with a significant Orthodox Christian population. Set up a card table, and try to collect signatures on a petition to the local parliament to redefine the word “marriage”. When a small mob of grandmothers and average citizens carry you off to the local jail, ask to use their internet connection to post a, “Whoops, I’m sorry about that” message to Father John Whiteford for any silly things you may have said about his article.

He’s a great guy, and I know he’ll forgive you with no hard feelings.

And if you’re really nice, he’ll probably make the trip to bail you out of jail.

Mr. Stankovich, hope you read this. I just want to thank you–sincerely. The fruit of our contention has been quite good for me. It is part of the benefit of really being brothers in Christ despite our differences.

God Bless you and may he increase the fruits of your ministry.

Leo, if you expect any substantive response, you will have to offer more than euphemisms and cliches (…peace, social justice, anti-death-penalty, economic justice, etc.”). Moralistic bromides, scoldings, finger wagging, and the other detritus of undisciplined thinking doesn’t go far here.

Except when the Church doesn’t conform to you-all, like on Global Warming and economics … in which case you-all scream that the Church is off the rails, or your First Among Equals is. You-all are just like the conservative Catholics who stand up for all that those popes teach, except peace, social justice, anti-death-penalty, economic justice, etc. “Pick-and-Choose”-from-the-Right is still pick-and-choose. Dammit, if we’re the Orthodox Church, accuse heretics formally of heresy, so they can be prosecuted or acquitted conciliarly! Otherwise, you’re just playing more right-wing power-political games.

Fabio writes:

Also, it is irrelevant if homossexuality is “nature or nurture”. Psychopathy is natural for some people. They were “born that way”. And it does not make it less evil. Also, to learn if something is good or sinful “being changeable” is irrelevant. Again, psychopathy is not reversible in most people who have it and yet it is not something good. Homossexuality, being less serious than the lack of empathy or compassion, falls in the same case: its natural causes, its reversibility, are of utter irrelevance.

I must disagree with the way you have expressed things here. In English, the words nature and natural have specific meanings among the Orthodox, and they do not mean whatever we find in this world, because everything in this world is fallen, disordered, and mischievous, on account of being disconnected from its source of being, God. St. Maximus writes that “everything that has been made by God is good and fair.” Likewise, St. Augustine writes that evil is “not a nature of any kind, but the loss of the good has been given this name.”

Mr. Leite, this is an awful lot to read, digest, and respond to. Could you summarize it into a brief, succinct statement focused on a main point to which we could respond without writing our own lengthy treatises? This is, after all, merely a blog. Also, if you still wish to use quotations, could you use the “b-quote” button so that we can all see what are your words and what are someone else’s? Thanks.

At first glance, I think there are better ways to explain things than what you have quoted here, which does not accord with others such as St. Maximus the Confessor. The obvious problems include the supposed distinction between “desire” and “inclination,” which might make sense in Greek but doesn’t much in English. Another problem is that the distinction of two wills seems only to be another way of expressing the confusion of the blinded, fallen will — what St. Maximus calls the gnomic will — which, being turned away from God, cannot tell good from evil. The third problem is the absurdity that desires are not good or evil in and of themselves. How can it be right to desire a wrong thing? Clearly the desire for wrong things is an indication that there is something wrong with us. There is nothing wrong with the desire to eat cake, but there is something wrong with the desire to eat dirt.

As for Patristic sources on the issue:

“All honor to that king of the Scythians, whoever Anacharsis was, who shot with an arrow one of his subjects who imitated among the Scythians the mystery of the mother of the gods . . . condemning him as having become effeminate among the Greeks, and a teacher of the disease of effeminacy to the rest of the Scythians” (St. Clement of Alexandria, Exhortation to the Greeks 2 [A.D. 190]).

“[God forbade the Jews to eat certain foods for symbolic reasons:] For that in fishes the roughness of scales is regarded as constituting their cleanness; rough, and rugged, and unpolished, and substantial, and grave manners are approved in men; while those that are without scales are unclean, because trifling, and fickle, and faithless, and effeminate manners are disapproved. Moreover, what does the law mean when it . . . forbids the swine to be taken for food? It assuredly reproves a life filthy and dirty, and delighting in the garbage of vice. . . . Or when it forbids the hare? It rebukes men deformed into women” (Novatian, The Jewish Foods 3 [A.D. 250]).

“If you [O, monk] are young in either body or mind, shun the companionship of other young men and avoid them as you would a flame. For through them the enemy has kindled the desires of many and then handed them over to eternal fire, hurling them into the vile pit of the five cities under the pretense of spiritual love. . . . At meals take a seat far from other young men. In lying down to sleep let not their clothes be near yours, but rather have an old man between you. When a young man converses with you, or sings psalms facing you, answer him with eyes cast down, lest perhaps by gazing at his face you receive a seed of desire sown by the enemy and reap sheaves of corruption and ruin. Whether in the house or in a place where there is no one to see your actions, be not found in his company under the pretense either of studying the divine oracles or of any other business whatsoever, however necessary” (St. Basil, The Great, The Renunciation of the World [A.D. 373]).

“All of these affections [in Rom. 1:26–27] . . . were vile, but chiefly the mad lust after males; for the soul is more the sufferer in sins, and more dishonored than the body in diseases”

“And sundry other books of the philosophers one may see full of this disease. But we do not therefore say that the thing was made lawful, but that they who received this law were pitiable, and objects for many tears. For these are treated in the same way as women that play the whore. Or rather their plight is more miserable. For in the case of the one the intercourse, even if lawless, is yet according to nature; but this is contrary both to law and nature. For even if there were no hell, and no punishment had been threatened, this would be worse than any punishment” .
(St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Romans 4 [A.D. 391]).