Local Option is Suicidal for the Church

The question of ordaining Self-Acknowledged Practitioners of Homosexual Acts (SAPHAs) is one of the few historical instances in which theological purity, ecumenical outreach, and practical self-interest happen to coincide. For the fact is that, according to the teachings of the Bible from cover to cover, it has never been God’s will that people should give themselves over to whatever sexual urges they have. From Moses to Jesus, legitimate sexual activity has always been exclusively confined within the bonds of marriage. And from the days of Adam and Eve, marriage has always been defined as between one man and one woman for one lifetime. This standard has been upheld first by the Jews and then by the Christian Church as long as history has been written.

Moreover, it is a standard that is embraced by the vast majority of Christians all over the world today. Those who call themselves Christians but who abandon such a divine, universal standard thus cut themselves off from the witness of the Church throughout both space and time. Practically speaking, governing bodies that ordain SAPHAs risk losing whatever ties they have to international partners.

Finally, sessions that choose to ordain SAPHAs would be placing severe limits on the potential growth of their congregations. Parents with young children would be unlikely to expose them to people who endorse perversion. Meanwhile, biological fact would dictate that people who engage in homosexual activity are much less likely to have any children of their own. By cutting itself off from a principal method of congregational growth, a session that ordains SAPHAs would be giving itself a death sentence.

In sum, a church that embraces sexual perversion as a moral good must and should wither away, cut off as it is from God’s truth, from the Apostolic Church, and from healthy human society.