Well, what we have all been waiting for is here! The ELCIC Study of Human Sexuality Document was released a few weeks ago. The National Church has invited all members to study it (Canada Lutheran, October/November 2009) and provide feedback before February 28, 2010. We would encourage you to take the time to read it, either as a group or individually and send your responses to the ELCIC.
Rev. Dr. Peeter Vanker, having already reviewed it, shares his thoughts with us......
It seems that the central thrust of the Study is found in Session 6, “Orientation” (Subtitle: “Sexuality and Orientation”). That session is preceded by two sessions, both essentially on the theme of justice, via “Families” (Subtitle: “Justice and Healing in Families”, and “Justice” (Subtitle: “Sexuality, Justice and Healing”). These three sessions reveal some of the key premises which are embedded in the study. I would like to consider those premises and offer my critique.
One of the premises embedded in the study seems to be that human sexuality is inexorably linked with the issue of social, political as well as personal justice. Many of the arguments focus on the social and political rather than on the personal sphere. The study would therefore have the reader simply proceed from the premise that the issue of human sexuality, whether in the social, political or personal realm has to be considered largely in the context of power and discrimination.
Another premise seems to be that the Scriptures are not a particularly helpful vehicle in a study of human sexuality because the ancient Scripture writers were unaware of modern social, political and cultural changes, and especially of the modern notion of sexual orientation.
A further premise is that sexual orientation is geneticalthough there has as yet been no definitive proof one way or the other. As Merton P. Strommen notes in his 2001 book, The Church and Homosexuality: Searching for a Middle Ground (p. 28), “Today’s most respected researchers say only that genetics may contribute a predisposition to a homosexual orientation. They generally agree that homosexuality – like most other psychological conditions – is due to a combination of social, biological, and psychological factors.”
A still further premise is that sexual orientation isirreversible. We note, however, the article by H. MacIntosh (1994) in the Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association cited by Merton P. Strommen in his book (p. 63) which reports that having analyzed 1,215 homosexual patients, “23 percent changed to heterosexuality from homosexuality and 84 percent of the total group received significant therapeutic benefit.”
The range of theological positions within the ELCICseems to be fairly presented in Session 6. However, the implication of such widely divergent and, I would argue,irreconcilable positions are not pursued except to suggest that the members of the ELCIC simply accept this reality. Furthermore, the ELCIC will allow members to opt out of specific situations as one’s conscience dictates. As Session 1 argues, “Such public statements do not obligate all members of the ELCIC to agree. Honest disagreements should not be seen as a sign of disunity, but as a means of forcing the ELCIC to new understandings and insights” (Session 1, p. 9-10). The participants should, the study suggests, “agree to disagree”. The study therefore appears to be institutionally “self-serving”, for the ultimate goal of the study is to maintain institutional unity at all cost.
Certain themes are chosen for the various sessions of the study which will further this goal. I have already alluded to the disproportionate amount of attention paid to the issue of justice.
There is a session on sin. However, the session on sin focuses largely on social, political and systemic sin and not personal sin.
A glaring omission is the absence of a session emphasizing repentance and personal transformation. There is no session which deals with the challenge to every believer to consider his/her need for a personal transformation in light of the entire spectrum of sins cited throughout the Scriptures, including the references to homosexual behaviour (e.g. Rom. 1, etc.).
It may seem at first glance that the study is centered onand flows from the Scriptures, for each of the sessions begins with a Scriptural passage. On closer inspection, however, it becomes clear that it is not the Scriptures buthuman experiences and personal views (“story telling”), along with social and political developments that occupy center stage and with respect to discussions about human sexuality at many of our national and Synodical conventions, this has also been the methodology used.
Because of the methodology chosen, the Scriptures play only a tangential and secondary role. In contrast to the lengthy sections on social and political justice issues in the study, there is, for instance, relatively little attention devoted to a re-examination of the key passages of both the Old and New Testaments that relate to human sexuality (marriage, family, children, etc.), including the Genesis account, nor to the negative behaviours cited in the Scriptures (extra-marital, pre-marital, divorce, etc.) which destroy individual marriages and family relationships. The study clearly reveals that the Scriptures are not to be considered the ultimate“authority” for our faith and life, but merely one of the possible authorities.
I would question, finally, the decision of the ELCIC not to identify the members of the Task Force and the writer(s) of the Study.
