The Holy Scriptures and the
Teaching of the Church Universal
on Human Sexuality
The Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments present a consistent word about God’s intention for human sexuality. God creates humanity in His image, male and female (Gen. 1:27). He orders humankind to be fruitful and multiply (Gen. 1:28). Marriage is instituted by God as a means of furthering His creative will for humanity as a whole (Gen. 2:18; Mark 10:6-9). The disobeying of God’s will brings about a disordering of human nature (Gen. Chaps. 3-4ff.). This leads to different kinds of rebellion against God. For instance, sexual relations between male and male, or female and female, contradict God’s intention, and bring God’s judgment (Gen. Chaps. 18-19). God is merciful and long-suffering, however, and He presents a plan for the maintaining of His creative will and good purpose, through His choosing of Israel, His bride, and the provision of His good law (Exodus 20:1ff.). In this law, God’s will for creation, male and female, is reaffirmed (Lev. 18:21). Moral law is not for Israel alone, but extends to the neighbor in her midst and includes sexual conduct (Lev. 18:26-27).
In the fullness of time, God sends His only Son to bring to fulfillment a creative plan which was from the beginning, overcoming sin and estrangement in the world (Col. 1). God’s Son, Jesus Christ, gives His life for the Church, for the redeeming of the world. The Church is the Bride of Christ. Within the Church, for the blessing of the world, male and female are to be in a covenant relationship of marriage that reflects God’s eternal purpose (Eph. 5:21-33). Sin and rebellion continue to thwart this design, and homosexual practice continues to be viewed as a clear rebellion against God’s created purpose (Rom. 1:18-24; 1 Tim. 1:10).
This view of Scripture and of God’s intention was viewed by the early Church as plain. It was considered by the Fathers, East and West, as the continuous and clear teaching of the prophets and apostles. Homosexual practice is widely condemned by the Fathers in language that flows from this understanding of Scripture’s clarity, in this and other realms of moral practice. The cultural contexts of the early Church’s mission were diverse; so, too, the expressions of homosexual conduct in these contexts. It is wrong, therefore, to describe modern homosexual conduct as different in kind from the reality addressed by the Scriptures and the early Church. What early Christians knew about homosexual life and conduct was not different from what we know today.
It is for this reason that churches which understand themselves to be apostolic and catholic (e.g. Roman Catholic, Orthodox, and Coptic) have reacted to the decisions of ECUSA’s General Convention, in the area of homosexual approval, with immediate, forceful, and plain statements of denunciation and rebuke. The continuous teaching of the Church is seen by them, rightly, to be under assault. In these circumstances the purpose and hope of ecumenical discussion has been subverted. The Church cannot be one in witness to the world when, in the area of Scripture’s plain sense as received and passed on by the apostles, there has been introduced innovation and heresy as General Convention has done.
The notion that homosexuality is a particular cultural feature of the West, misunderstood and un-experienced by other modern world cultures, is wrong. African, Asian, and other non-Western cultures have the language, the lifestyle, and the support-systems for homosexuality familiar to the West. Christian churches in these places wrestle with bringing all sexual conduct into conformity with Holy Scripture’s plain sense and the teaching of the Church Universal, with the same challenges as the West.
The Primates of the Global South receive this as the plain teaching of Holy Scripture, passed on by the apostles, received and taught as God’s word by the Church Universal, and applicable in all parts of the Anglican Communion. As such it forms an integral and unassailable part of our mission in preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the world.
