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The question above was not asked in the third presidential debate in 2004. At least not literally.
Another question was asked, however, that presupposed some knowledge about the question above. The question Bob Sheiffer actually asked was, “Do you believe homosexuality is a choice?”
President Bush said he didn’t know. That was disappointing. Senator Kerry said it is not a choice. That was dehumanizing.
Kerry replied, “I think if you to talk to anybody, it’s not a choice.” He continued, “I think if you were to talk to Dick Cheney’s daughter, who is a lesbian, she would tell you that she’s being who she was, she’s being who she was born as.”
In other words, on the heart-felt matter of who we love and how, human beings are essentially choiceless, programmed by nature and nurture. To say that our birth and our genes determine our lives and our loves in a way that rules out choice, is to say we don’t have souls. It reduces humans to automated animals. What good is having a soul if all we can do is live on impulses, genes and instinct?
If I were the moderator, I would have followed up: “In other words, Senator, human beings do not have a choice over one of the most basic and intimate areas of our being--how and whom to love?” I would have probed, “So then, intimate human feelings and behavior are simply the product of genes and we cannot make decisions about them that are truly free?” I might have said, “So, you affirm choice with regard to aborting babies but deny choice with regard to inner motivation for love and sexuality?
It seems to me that if a soul does anything, it gives us the capacity and resources to make choices and live above the level of instinct and impulse.
John Kerry went on to say, “I’ve met people who struggled with this for years, people who were in a marriage because they were living a sort of convention, and they struggled with it. And I‘ve met wives who are supportive of their husbands or vice versa when they finally sort of broke out and allowed themselves to live who they were, who they felt God had made them. I think I have to respect that.”
Wait a minute! Can we respect it when a person breaks out of a marriage they vowed to preserve just to live, so to speak, “who they were?” Since when is this a viable moral position? The problem may be that they never really knew “who they were” in the first place and still don’t. Since when does a perceived “struggle” excuse us for shattering a sacred vow? And since when did God make someone homosexual?
Answer: Since we became our own gods, that’s when.
Let’s face it. If homosexuality is in no way a choice, then Christian conversion is in no way an option. Conversion requires both a soul and a choice. Precluding conversion is the worst possible anti-Christian heresy there can be.
I acknowledge nature and nurture as contributing factors, but I also think humans have a soul to oversee and shape those factors in our being. To suggest that human beings are without free will on such a basic moral level is to deny our humanity. Animals operate on impulse or instinct, but human beings make moral decisions, especially regarding the formation of families and relationships.
We have more choice in the matter than some seem to think. It is because we have souls (and choices) that we also have hope for conversion.
Christianity cannot be anemic on this matter. The idea that heart-felt attitudes, orientations and preferences cannot be changed is as unchristian as it gets. God’s power to transform sinners is beyond question for believers.
Paul meant it when he said that in Christ, I can become a “new creation!” He did not just mean new in actions, he meant new through and through.
Love is a decision. Make enough loving decisions and it becomes an orientation over time.
I cannot do much math. Yet, I believe I have the freedom within me to learn math. It might take decades, but as a human being with a soul, I could do it. It might take thousands of little decisions over a long period of time to cultivate a “preference” for math. It can also take thousands of little choices over time before a preference can be transformed or cultivated. And it can.
The Bible speaks of homosexuals who changed to no longer be homosexuals again (1 Corinthians 6:11). Because we have souls and because God has sufficient power to transform any sinner, it can be done.
Editor’s note: For a related article in this issue, see “Christianity and Homosexuality.”
Joel Mark Solliday , B.A., M.Div., is the editor of Campus CrossWalk and the pulpit minister of the Brooklyn Center Church of Christ in Minnesota. A Pepperdine graduate, he later worked in their Campus Life Office and at ACU as a Missionary in Residence. He earned his M.Div. at Fuller Theological Seminary.
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