Beyond A Reasonable Doubt: Pt. 1
A Case for same-sex marriage and LGBTQ+ full inclusion in the church
Have you seen the movie My Cousin Vinny? I figure we’re passed the period of spoiler alerts since the movie is pushing 30 years old. The two main characters, William and Stan were surprised to be pulled over by the police at gunpoint for forgetting to pay for a can of tuna. They were all the more surprised to learn that it was for murder that they were being charged. Joe Pesci played the role of Vinny Gambini, the cousin of William, and the only attorney in the family. In this comedy he had to go to battle against the local prosecutor, who was charged with proving beyond a reasonable doubt that William and Stan were guilty of murder. This is how our American legal system works. If charged for a crime, it has to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the party is guilty. To be exonerated of a crime does not have the same standard. The slightest doubt is all it takes to be considered “not guilty” in a court of law.
Vinny showed that there was in fact doubt in the case. The witnesses could not see the altercation as good as initially described. Their time frame was off. Finally, it was discovered that their car could not have made the tire tracks that the actual murders’ car had made. This was the reasonable doubt that exonerated the two boys. Of course in the case of this movie, they found the real killers, so they were not just found not guilty, but in fact, the case was completely dismissed.
As the United Methodist Church is in hot debate regarding whether same-sex marriage should be recognized by the church, whether to remove the clause in the Book of Discipline stating “homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching,” and whether or not to maintain from our Discipline that “self-avowed practicing homosexuals” cannot be ordained as clergy, I am here to present a case. I will present a case that states that those that maintain this current language in our Book of Discipline cannot prove beyond a reasonable doubt that this is the position the United Methodist Church should hold. I would go beyond this to say that anyone that believes that from scripture and church tradition that homosexuality, specifically, same-sex marriage is sin, cannot prove beyond a reasonable doubt that this is in fact true. I will make the case as to why these parties should be the ones to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that homosexuality is in fact incompatible with Christian teaching rather than those wishing to open the sanctifying institution of marriage to same-sex couples.
I will finally make the case that it is absolutely crucial that as this is discussed and debated to remember that we are talking about human beings made in the image of God, not inanimate objects that can be objectified at a whim. This might be one of the most important things I am saying!
The burden of proof to prove beyond a reasonable doubt regarding who can marry should fall on those wishing to maintain the traditional Christian view because more is at stake. Biblically, more is at stake! What is at stake is the potential conflict between holiness and preventing access to grace. If you believe that marriage is only to be between a man and a woman, then at stake by granting those of the same-sex access to marriage is 1 Corinthians 6:9 claiming that those that engage in homosexual acts will not inherit the kingdom of heaven. What if, the prohibitions in Leviticus and the story of Sodom and Gomorrah are misunderstood thus misrepresented?
But…
What if our understanding of the context of such “clobber verses” as 1 Corinthians 6:9, its parallel passage in 1 Timothy 1:10, and the infamous Romans 1:26–27 are not being interpreted correctly? You might be saying, “Jon, I am just trying to be cautious here. It’s not that I am personally against people getting to marry the people they love, I just want to be cautious. I mean, we can’t change the definition of marriage because something MIGHT be misinterpreted.” I agree. We should be cautious.
So, about ten years back, my family and I were on vacation in Charleston, SC. It is an absolutely beautiful place. Just imagine a southern Boston, but a little more local and quaint. We saw a sign for a rooftop restaurant and bar. As we went to enter on this 90-degree day, the doorman stopped my dad and I and said, “I’m sorry, but gentlemen are required to wear a jacket and tie.” Due to the fact that on a hot summer day, my dad and I were not wearing a jacket and tie, we were barred from entering the establishment. Not only were we not allowed in, but also because of the attitude of exclusivity, even if we had a jacket and tie, we had no desire to ever go back to that place. It put a bad taste in our mouth.
So I agree, we should be cautious. We should be cautious that we do not stand in the way of people as they approach God. What if our condemnation of same-sex marriage in the name of caution is driving people from church, from means of grace? We may not just be preventing them from marriage, but we may be preventing such people from a life with God, by leaving a similar distaste in their mouth that my dad and I had in Charleston, except here, the stake are much higher!
Jesus warns of such a practice when he admonishes the Pharisees stating, they tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others; but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them. He goes on to say to them, for you lock people out of the kingdom of heaven. For you do not go in yourselves, and when others are going in, you stop them. Jesus doesn’t stop there. He then refers to them as “snakes” and “brood of vipers” before going on to say they have blood on their hands and are in danger of hell. Jesus says their new converts will be “twice the children of hell as they are.” Jesus continues, Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful, but inside they are full of the bones of the dead and of all kinds of filth.
I do suggest being cautious. I suggest that we are cautious that in the name of piety that we do not stand in between human beings created in the image of God and God, God’s self.
So, what if I am wrong here? What if I lead the church in the wrong direction, not for personal gain, but out of grace for people that have been abused, for people that are going through something far beyond what I can understand? The scope of the New Testament seems to show grace for behavioral sins over the sin of religious hypocrisy. If we as the church are trying to be faithful, but make a mistake, the gospels are full of such stories of grace, but if we are causing harm to people in the name of God, remember these words from Jesus. Yes, scripture warns of false teachers that lead people astray, but my goal is not to do that but to lead us to be more faithful in following Jesus with radical hospitality toward “outsiders” in a grey direction. I do this with fear and trembling, but knowing that I do it for the right reasons. If I am wrong, I pray God gently corrects my course.
Perhaps these people, deeply in love with someone of the same sex are like defendants in a trial like that of My Cousin Vinny. William and Stan were not guilty of murder. They were wrongfully accused. They still ended up in court, in jail while going through the hearing, and having to prove their innocence. Could this be similar to what is happening to same-sex couples today in the church? Could they be the ones going through such a hassle, ordeal, and often-downright humiliation, because of a crime they did not actually commit, yet are being tried for? They and LGBTQ+ allies are often being accused of perverting scripture, or downright disregarding it, but what if we, the gatekeepers of the church’s polity, are actually guilty of such a crime?
I am not suggesting we disregard scripture. I am actually suggesting that we honor it! Do we trust the Holy Spirit? Do we trust that the Holy Spirit will convict and change the hearts of all of us in whatever ways we need to be convicted and changed? If God wants to lead someone to celibacy, or to life with a different partner, God will do that. As a former pastor of mine, John Burke, once said, “You can make people conform, but you cannot make people become, the better path is to lead people to trust God. What if our pressuring people to conform to a mold is preventing such people from experiencing God’s grace. The body of Christ is supposed to be a means of grace, not a means of exsanguination. What if the people we are trying to conform to a certain behavior in the name of becoming, are already becoming the persons God wants them to be? I say becoming in this present active tense because we are always becoming, we are always in progress toward God.
Saints, it is no coincidence that the harshest words from Jesus are toward the religious people that praise their own piety while placing unmanageable burdens on others. This audience that Jesus was speaking to were the religious establishment. They were the “churched.” They were not the “heathens of the world,” the “secular left,” or people of other religions. I ask that we examine our teaching and consider that maybe the traditional church stance has been wrong. The stakes are too high. Over the next two weeks, I’ll be further dissecting the “clobber verses” previously mentioned. I will illustrate that there is indeed such a great amount of doubt in the historic stance, that such an argument for marriage being only between one man and one woman cannot be proven beyond a reasonable doubt, and that those attracted to and in love with people of the same sex need the charges against them to be dropped. I cannot prove that God approves of same-sex marriage, but I am arguing that one cannot prove beyond a reasonable doubt that God is against it, and that the burden of proof must lie with the nay-sayers because the emotional and biblical stakes for being wrong in the name of traditional religious piety are far higher than the stakes for being wrong in grace, inclusion, and acceptance.
