Nothing is impossible with God!

by Gordon Copeland
Having read and prayed about it, I feel compelled to respond to Joy Cowley’s article, “Why are we so ungay about ‘gayness’,” and the way it challenges the
teaching of the Church (NZ Catholic October 5-18).
There are a number of issues, but let’s begin with the statement that “Jesus
did not say anything about homosexuality”.
In Mark’s Gospel (7:20-23) Jesus includes adultery, fornication and sensuality among the evils which come from within and render us impure.
It would be ridiculous to claim that he was referring only to such actions
in the context of heterosexuals to the exclusion of homosexuals. So why can’t
we just say that such actions are sinful in either context?
After all, the teaching of the Church has long been “love the sinner but not
the sin”, and we are all sinners.
Perhaps more importantly, however, is the reality of the Trinity; that is,
three persons in one God. Since the Holy Spirit is the principal author of
the Scriptures then God clearly sets out in both the Old and the New Testaments
the sinful nature of homosexual and heterosexual actions outside of marriage. Jesus does not need to repeat what has already been written.
Joy’s quotes from Leviticus concerning the death penalty for a variety of sinful actions needs to be read in the context of the New Testament
modifications introduced through the teaching of Jesus. He did not demand
death by stoning for the woman taken in adultery but, while making it clear
that her actions were sinful, sought her repentance.
Instead of demanding her death, as required by the levitical law, Jesus shortly afterwards gave his life for her sin and for ours. That reality is the joy
of the Gospel.
We cannot assume that people with same-sex attractions are, as Joy claims, “as God made them”. Such a statement is the same as saying that adulterous heterosexuals are “as God made them”. Clearly original sin was not part of God’s plan, and his loving response was to send his only Son to die so that, through his blood, our sins can be forgiven.
As the catechism says (2357), “by prayer and sacramental grace” those with same-sex attractions can also aspire to Christian perfection. I have several
friends, female and male, who are doing just that and I love and admire
them. They are living testimony to the teaching of the Church and God’s unlimited enabling power. Indeed I know two leaders of the “gay rights” movement
who, following an encounter with Jesus Christ, married and remained married. Nothing is impossible with God!
They are not the only ones. Richard P. Fitzgibbons, MD, of the United
States has written extensively on the origin and healing of homosexual attractions, including his letter “Hope and Healing” to the US Catholics
bishops.
As for the sacrament of marriage, Jesus could not have been clearer (Matthew
19:3-6).
It is the joining together, by God, of a man and a woman. As Pope John Paul
II said in reference to the New Zealand Civil Unions Bill: “It is an attempt to
defeat the divine plan.”
At the end of the day, same-sex marriage can only be created by a redefinition of the word “marriage” as set out in the Scriptures and as it has been practised as a universal reality by all cultures and all religions since “the
beginning”.
Gordon Copeland is a former general manager of Wellington archdiocese and a
former MP.