Located at the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Catholic Handbook
PURL: http://purl.oclc.org/NET/lgbh/
[A PURL is an OCLC maintained "Persistant URL" 
which will always point to the real location of a website]
  
A Married Lay Woman's Thoughts 
 
Thu, 9 Dec 1993 
From, Kathy Hutchins KATHY@FALCON.IUPUI.EDU 
on email list CATHOLIC CATHOLIC@AMERICAN.EDU 
 
Lance Simmons specifies: 
 
I do not (repeat DO NOT) want to get into a discussion of whether 
homosexual genital activity is ever morally permissible. I merely 
request a clarification of the term "coming out". Those of us who 
accept the Roman Catholic teaching on same-sex genital activity 
can fill in the other variables for ourselves. 
 
Paul Halsall gets normative anyway, and clarifies that "coming out" 
requires acknowledging that 
 
GAY IS GOOD 
 
This proposition is analyzed by all and sundry, using various 
analogies: 
 
Robert King says: 
 
We can love the sinner while hating the sin.  I am very close to  
several gay people, but I do not agree with, approve of, or support 
their behavior.  Neither do I hate them or any gay people I don't 
know.  I simply think they are wrong and that their behavior is  
sinful. 
 
Lance Simmons fires a double barrel: 
 
These seem to me much different situations. If a son or daughter of 
mine came to me and said "I am often tempted to steal, and 
nothing I have been able to do has rid me of the temptation, and at 
times in the past I have been unable to resist the temptation," I 
would feel much differently than if they said "I prefer a life of 
crime to the lifeof 'straight' people, and I intend to act based on my 
preferences." 
 
It is also misleading to say there is "nothing wrong" with being 
gay. There need be nothing morally wrong with having a 
homosexual orientation, just as there need be nothing morally 
wrong with being blind or deaf. But it is _better_ to be born 
sighted than blind, and anyone who denies this is in the grip of a 
theory. There IS something wrong with being born blind -- but it is 
not something for which the blind person can be held in any way 
responsible. Note, however, that if the blind person became blind 
by deliberately poking out her eyes there is something wrong with 
that. Likewise, it seems that if a person played any deliberate role 
in the development of his or her homosexual orientation, that 
condition would be blameworthy as well.  All of this is perfectly 
compatible with saying that God creates some people with a 
homosexual orientation, just as God creates some people blind, 
and deaf, and paralyzed, etc.... Still, to freely and knowingly 
perform acts that are blinding, deafening, or paralyzing is morally 
wrong, and there is something wrong with the conditions 
themselves, though not (necessarily) something blameworthy. 
 
When Paul throws a "hissy-fit" over these analogies, Dan Hydar 
defends Lance: 
 
This strikes me as extremely uncalled for... it's clear that Lance 
was just trying to illustrate his perspective by analogy. Basically 
these are two things (homosexual acts & theft) that related because 
the Church considers them immoral and he was trying to clarify 
the issue of orientation/preference vs. actions. Why go into 
hysterics? 
 
Why would Paul go into hysterics over all this trenchant 
commentary? Maybe because it's facile and shallow.  Maybe 
because when people like us who haven't ever been forced to 
grapple hand to hand with these moral issues spout off like this we 
do it the lazy way, without clearly thinking it through. 
 
I'm as guilty of this as anyone.  I've lumped gay people with 
unmarried straights and breezily recommended that they both 
follow the same commandment to be chaste.  That's easy enough, 
isn't it?  Of course, *I* don't have to follow my own advice.  I can 
(and did) marry.  I can (and do) share my life with someone I'm 
absolutely crazy about, I can (and do) revel in every aspect of that 
companionship, and I do so with the beaming approval of my 
family, my parish, and the Catholic Church. 
 
It's specious to tell gays that they're just being called to the same 
chastity that is commanded of everyone.  We are telling them that 
they may never, ever, express the fullness of their human love.  I 
believe that I must follow the Church's teachings and, unlike Paul, I 
believe those teachings are clear.  But then, what does it cost me to 
believe that?  What struggle does it force me to engage?  None.  
Obeying _Humanae Vitae_ is a piece of cake compared to this.  I 
think if each one of us who is deeply in love with a cherished 
spouse could empathetically understand that gays feel the same 
love, we would find it easier to love our neighbors as ourselves, and 
thereby commit less sin. 
 
Kathy Hutchins