Trevor Thomas on homosexuality.

Truth about Homosexuality

C.S. Lewis wrote in the mid 1940’s that “…you and I, for the last twenty years, have been fed all day long on good solid lies about sex. We have been told, till one is sick of hearing it, that sexual desire is in the same state as any of our other natural desires…Our warped natures, the devils who tempt us, and all the contemporary propaganda for lust, combine to make us feel that the desires we are resisting are so ‘natural,’ so ‘healthy,’ and so reasonable, that it is almost perverse and abnormal to resist them.” He went on to discuss another lie which is, “any sexual act to which you are tempted at the moment is also normal and healthy.” Imagine what he would think if he were alive today! These same lies are at the heart of the propaganda currently being put forth by those who wish to justify the practice of homosexuality. (The same lies, of course, continue to be perpetuated in the heterosexual community as well, especially among pornographers and the like.) Gay marriage, high school gay clubs, gays in the Boy Scouts, gays adopting—all of these issues have one simple aim in the end: to legitimize, in as many people’s eyes as possible, men having sex with men or women having sex with women.

The Times, with Alma Bowen’s May 1 column, contributed to many of the myths about homosexuality. Mrs. Bowen’s use of phrases like “instinctive desires” and “gender identity” give the impression that homosexuality is an “in-born” trait. In other words, she is implying that there is some “gay gene” that exists in homosexuals. There is no science which supports this belief.

Jeffrey Satinover, author of Homosexuality and the Politics of Truth, had some interesting things to say about homosexuality in a recent World magazine interview. Dr. Satinover is a graduate of M.I.T., Harvard, Yale, and the University of Texas Medical School. He has practiced psychiatry since 1986. He currently conducts research at the University of Nice in France and teaches part time at Princeton. Dr. Satinover, based on scientific evidence, has concluded that the idea of “sexual orientation” is fiction. He refers to a 1994 University of Chicago study which states, “…it is patently false that homosexuality is a uniform attribute across individuals, that it is stable over time, and that it can be easily measured.” Dr. Satinover adds that, “Studies across the globe that have now sampled over 100,000 individuals have found the same. We now know that in the majority of both men and women, ‘homosexuality,’ as defined by any scientifically rigorous criteria, spontaneously tends to ‘mutate’ into heterosexuality over the course of a lifetime.”

These facts support the idea of many that homosexuality is not a genetic and unchangeable behavior. This idea is further supported by the fact that there are, of course, many people who have come out of the homosexual lifestyle. Dr. Satinover continues that, homosexuals are “human beings, no different than you or me, who are, of course, sexual beings. Like you and me, their sexuality is broken in a broken world. The notion that ‘homosexuals’ are in effect a ‘different species’ (different genes) is ludicrous beyond belief. There is not the slightest evidence for that as anyone who actually reads the studies (not reports on the studies) knows.”

However, since there is no evidence that homosexuality is “inherited,” many like to refer to homosexual activity as “chosen” behavior. According to Dr. James Dobson this is typically not the case. Dr. Dobson states that, “Homosexuals deeply resent being told that they selected this same-sex inclination in pursuit of sexual excitement or some other motive. It is unfair, and I don’t blame them for being irritated by that assumption. Who among us would knowingly choose a path that would result in alienation from family, rejection by friends, disdain from the heterosexual world, …No, homosexuality is not ‘chosen’ except in rare circumstances.”

If homosexuality isn’t genetically transmitted, and it isn’t typically chosen behavior, what is it? Until 1973 it was classified as a “disorder” by the American Psychiatric Association. That year, by a vote of 5,834 to 3,810, the APA removed the condition of homosexuality from its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual. Even though we are more than 30 years away from this decision, many still hold to the view that homosexuality is a disorder from which individuals can recover. Organizations like Exodus International and National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH) exist to help those who desire to come out of the homosexual lifestyle, and to help families who are struggling with this issue.

One other point must be made. Many regard homosexuality as some special class of sin, as if it were worse than others. To engage in name-calling, belittling, threats or acts of violence, or any other hateful acts towards homosexuals grieves the heart of God just as sexual sin does. There is to be no compromise when it comes to the standards that God has given to us, whether we are talking about sex or “loving your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus did say that the latter was of the utmost importance to the Father. C.S. Lewis puts it this way: “…a cold, self-righteous prig who goes regularly to church may be far nearer to hell than a prostitute. But, of course, it is better to be neither.”