More thoughts on homosexuality

One of my 'liberal' views on this topic is that the Sodom story should be read in parallel to the story of Gibeah in the book of judges: a very similar story but where no same-sex act took place and yet the town was still punished by God. I have therefore stated that these stories are about hospitality, not homosexuality.

Now I have to concede that I am at least partly wrong, because Jude 7 says "Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion".

So clearly, God's word states that the problem was their sexual imorality and perversion.

However, we must be careful not to read too much into this. You might latch onto the word 'perversion' and say 'there you are, it's obviously homosexuality", but there are plenty of other perverse sexual practices. Raping visitors to your town is sexually perverse! And if through other study that i have done I have concluded that homosexuality may not actually be sexually perverse in itself, then the Jude passage does not prove that homosexuality was the sin of Sodom. We really have to be careful to read what the Scripture really says, not what our Christian heritage has made us think it it says.

Consider also the definition of Sodom's sin in this passage: Ezekiel 16 " 49 Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. 50 They were haughty and did detestable things before me."

OK, a conservative scholar might jump to the conclusion that 'detestable' means 'homosexual', but this is not a safe conclusion and even if it were, it comes last in a long list of other stuff that most Christians are guilty of everyday but think nothing of it.

(And note that Sodom is charecterised as a female, which is strange if she is meant to represent male-to-male sexual penetration)

So while I have to refine my position, it turns out to make little difference in the grand scheme of things.

All refs from Biblegateway.com (sorry if this is a breach of copyright)