Part 2: A Response to Sean McDowell on Same-Sex Relationships

In a previous post I pointed out that Sean McDowell’s book review on Scripture, Ethics, and the Possibility of Same-Sex Relationships, does not address my key arguments. I am grateful to see that he took my concerns to heart and offered a more thorough review. His second post is much better. Unfortunately, it still falls short of engaging with my key arguments. Here’s why.

McDowell Still Does Not Engage Most of My Key Arguments

McDowell admits to not engaging my key arguments: Essentially, she claims that I fail to address her core argument . . . That may be the case . . .”

He says this is okay for two reasons. First, he claims most scholars have already addressed my arguments so he doesn’t need to. But that is not true.  The only citation he offers to support this claim is a book for single people in the church. He makes a claim about all four of my key arguments (that others have already addressed them), but cites a source that relates to only one of my arguments (re: celibacy).

Moreover, he cites a source that doesn’t actually engage my celibacy arguments. McDowell suggests the book on singleness refutes my chapter on celibacy because it rejects the notion of the “gift of singleness.” But McDowell’s source does not address my evidence. Unlike his source, I do not make a case based on 1 Corinthians 7:7 (where Paul wishes others had his gift). Instead,  I refer to Paul’s statement, “If they cannot control themselves, they should marry” (1 Cor 7:9). Notably, Reformer Martin Luther interpreted this verse the same way I do. Luther understood Paul to say not everyone can achieve life-long celibacy. So, this interpretation has already been acknowledged for hundreds of years.

Moreover, I provide much more evidence beyond Paul, drawing from Christian tradition, social scientific studies, and the writings of conservatives themselves. All teach that life-long celibacy is not possible for everyone. McDowell’s source does not address the arguments I provide on celibacy. And it certainly doesn’t address any of my other three key arguments (e.g. legal deliberation). Citing this source is not evidence that scholars have already addressed all my key arguments.

The second reason McDowell says it’s okay to ignore my key arguments is that the crux of the debate is complementarity and so there’s no need to discuss anything else. But I specifically state in my book concerning complementarity: “This is where the two sides tend to stalemate. To help the conversation forward I focus the rest of this book on additional arguments that are currently being overlooked.” In other words, the current crux of the debate is complementarity, but the whole reason I wrote the book is to go beyond the current stalemate. My book already assumes that some traditionalists will not be persuaded by progressive arguments on complementarity.

My Key Arguments Are Not Based on Cultural Relativity

McDowell says one of my “biggest claims” is the cultural relativity argument. Namely, that we can affirm same-sex relationships because the biblical authors were objecting to exploitative same-sex relations not monogamous, covenanted ones. While I indicate the existence of this argument, it’s not one of the four claims that I explicitly state I want my critics to engage. Cultural context is something we need to take into consideration as an aspect of the conversation, but I clearly indicate I wrote the book to go beyond only a cultural analysis.

McDowell Side-Steps My Arguments on Celibacy to Focus on a Side Issue

McDowell gives the false impression that I am making a major argument about how we should affirm same-sex relationships because celibacy causes suffering. Again this is not one of the four key arguments I ask critics to engage.  My argument is based on evidence that life-long celibacy is not possible for everyone, regardless of whether suffering is involved or not.

On another note, I find McDowell’s claims that the church’s stance has never led to suicidality for gay and lesbian people troubling. I went through periods of suicidal ideation and most gay and lesbian Christians I have met have also. It was directly connected to what we were taught in church about what it means to be gay. McDowell too easily dismisses the research study I provided. Just because the study did not answer all questions does not mean the study disproves causation. It points to the possibility. McDowell doesn’t seem to believe the testimony of gay and lesbian people who witness to harm, suggesting that gay people are confused about the reason for their suffering.

One of My Key Arguments Is Legal Deliberation

McDowell again, wrongly, says I claim the Bible supports same-sex relationships. No, what I describe is a legal deliberation process. There is a difference between saying there are explicit supportive statements about same-sex relations in Scripture (which traditionalists and progressives agree there are not) vs. saying the biblical authors teach us how to apply the Bible. Many traditionalists read Scripture in a prescriptive way. Thus, I assume the existence of the prohibition against same-sex relations and engage on the level of how we apply mandates from Scripture–including those believed to be a creation ordinance (e.g. Genesis 1-2). To his credit, McDowell does begin to address one of my key arguments in this post: legal deliberation. So I appreciate that.

McDowell seems to agree there is evidence of legal deliberation in Scripture, but claims: Paul and Matthew had unique apostolic authority. In other words, the biblical authors can do legal deliberation, but we cannot. But why draw this conclusion? On what basis? Rather Paul and Matthew are models for how to interpret Scripture. Does McDowell believe that Christians never have to engage in a deliberative process? Even the PCA, a conservative evangelical denomination, does not believe that. They conducted biblically based legal deliberation to address divorce and remarriage in the case of domestic violence, an issue not addressed in Scripture. This is exactly what Paul did when he deliberated about what to do when a spouse is abandoned, which Jesus had not addressed.

Even if we were to accept McDowell’s unsupported claim, the fact that Paul and Matthew were inspired by God to adapt the divorce mandate reveals a profound truth about God’s heart concerning mandates. Namely, human need matters. Paul and Matthew knew that blind obedience to the divorce law does not arrive at the will of God. Enforcing a no-divorce law in the case of infidelity or abandonment is cruel.

Jesus teaches the Pharisees (and us), who are not inspired authors, how to interpret mandates. He critiques the Pharisees on their biblical exegesis, “Have you not read what David did?” Jesus knows they are familiar with the text, they just aren’t applying the principle that is there. Jesus instructs them from the case of David unlawfully eating the holy bread because he was hungry (Mark 2:23-28). David was innocent despite technically breaking the law because human need matters. McDowell provides a strained defense in response. Despite the fact that Jesus explicitly says that what David did was “unlawful,” McDowell claims “David, who was God’s anointed one, had authority to enter the House of God and eat the bread of Presence . . .” Nowhere in the passage is there any such statement! Nor did the Mosaic law allow exceptions for kings or prophets. The bread was only for priests. And not only priests, but direct descendants of Aaron. David and his companions, who ate the bread with him, were neither.

Similarly, the Pharisees object to Jesus’s disciples gathering grain on Sabbath because of hunger. Reaping on the Sabbath is prohibited by Mosaic law (Exod 34:21). The Israelites could not even collect a little bit of manna for a snack on the Sabbath during their wilderness wandering (Exod 16:22-30). Yet, Jesus explains that the Pharisees are wrong for being upset with the disciples because God’s law is made for humankind not humankind for God’s law. As Paul says, the purpose of the law is to do no harm (Rom 13:10). The disciples needed to eat.

McDowell says: “It is never good to disobey God’s moral law.” If that’s true, then Corrie ten Boom and her family sinned by bearing false witness to the Nazis in order to save Jews. The reality is that ethics are never as simple as blindly following a prescription. Law requires discernment to fulfill God’s will.

Conclusions

McDowell’s second post is improved but still manages to avoid most of my key arguments. He does engage in-depth with one of the four arguments: the deliberative process. But his objections are not satisfying. He needs to demonstrate 1) that Scripture does not contain legal deliberation; or 2) that if it does exist, the deliberative process is only for inspired writers.

McDowell would be hard pressed to find many biblical scholars who will deny legal deliberation exists in Scripture. Even he seems to acknowledge this initially, but then spends energy, unconvincingly, asserting that legal deliberation does not occur. If he does believe it occurs, he needs to clarify where he sees it happening and how the purpose of it differs from what I claim.

Note: For those who want a start at studying legal revision in the Bible, check out Bernard Levinson’s book Legal Revision and Religious Renewal in Ancient Israel.

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Postscript

McDowell spends much of his second post talking about complementarity. But, as I state above I wrote the book to go beyond the stalemate on complementarity. Moreover, what he writes covers much of what has already been said in our previous exchange. I don’t want to rehash but here is the short version:

Biology: In my book I explicitly reject arguments that deconstruct sex and gender because men and women both bring good things to the world (if deconstruction means erasing cisgender male and female people). But, I also acknowledge the existence of people who are intersex, people who are infertile, and who don’t fit the norm. I don’t believe biology is irrelevant. In fact, it’s because I am paying attention to biology, namely that some have atypical sexual development, that I make my case. Male and female exist and are good. People with atypical sexual development also exist and desire family. Both are simultaneously true.

Jesus and Marriage: Again, it’s anachronistic to read Jesus’s statements about divorce as though he was actively making a case about male-female marriage. He simply wasn’t. That was not the concern of their conversation. The Pharisees would have been quite puzzled if Jesus was arguing that they should accept male-female marriage (as if they didn’t already). Jesus does not refer to Genesis to argue for male-female marriage. His reference to male and female is a short-hand reference to the creation of humankind, which chronologically precedes, and therefore is superior to, the Mosaic law that the Pharisees argue from.

Marriage and One-Flesh: McDowell clarifies that even if heterosexual couples have damaged genitals preventing penis-vagina sex, he still sees complementarity there, even if broken. Okay. But, from a scriptural standpoint, the authors connect the importance of sexual differentiation to procreation. Traditionalists are now seeking to infuse more meaning into sexual differentiation, which is fine, but goes beyond Scripture. I should add that it’s possible to see Genesis as descriptive and not prescriptive.