Some years ago, I went to a presentation about religion and psychoanalysis, "Is there a meet?" The speaker was a respected colleague, an academic Biblical scholar who was also a Pastoral Psychotherapist. It was a good presentation with lots of interesting ideas, but there was one point at the end that stood out. He said that while religion and psychoanalysis shared the goal of understanding behavior, religion was obligated to deal with the issue of sin. I suppose that that should have been obvious to me, but I hadn’t really thought much about it before in quite that way – that judgement is an integral part of religion, at least Christianity.
At the time, I recall thinking about a number of things after the talk. I wondered if it was possible not to judge. One of the principles of psychotherapy and psychoanalysis is "neutrality" – positioning oneself on no side of a conflict, often meaning not taking the side of conventional morality in trying to understand what one was hearing from a patient. As I thought back over various examples, I concluded that my own approach to what he was calling sin was to understand it as a failure of empathy – ignoring the impact of one’s behavior on others. So there it was – the Golden Rule was still living and well in my mind! My concept of "sin" was doing something harmful to others.
As I thought about it, what the speaker was talking about was that – and more. There were certain things that were sins that did not fall into that category. The issues of the modern Religious Right come to mind. Two of them, Stem Cell research and abortion, I can see as related to the Golden Rule – at least one interpretation of the Golden Rule. They see an ovum and a fertilized embryo as "life." So using Stem Cells for something other than producing human beings, or aborting a fetus as hurting, killing an unborn child. While I don’t agree with that definition of "life," I can see how that might fall into the category of "sin" to some.
But I don’t get why homosexuality, or gay union, is "sin." Sexual behavior that is mutual by consenting adults seems to me to be outside my own understanding of the Golden Rule – and none of my business. I certainly think that the overwhelming evidence is that sexual object choice is biological. Listening to homosexual patients confirms that as well – it’s just part of "being." But that aside, I cannot see how any harm is being done. So homosexuality is at the center of the difference he was talking about [though this speaker would probably agree with my thinking in this particular area].
"Pastor Ted," Ted Haggard, of the New Life church in Colorado Springs, Colorado, is a paradigm for this conflict. In many ways, he was himself something of a moderate voice in the otherwise harsh views of the Evangelical Religious Right. He supported gay "Civil Union," though he opposed gay "Marriage." That’s fine – a reasonable enough compromise. However, he did preach that homosexuality is a sin, though softly compared to many of his colleagues. But to the point here, he held the view that "sin" is defined as "what the Bible says," not what makes sense. And in other ways, for example in the area of "creationism," he was as destructive as his other fellow Evangelical Fundamentalists.
By all appearances, Ted Haggard is a gay man – appearance, voice, behavior – one of those countless homosexual men who has chosen to live in the heterosexual world, expressing his homosexuality in secret. In many ways, this is a role that society has forced on him. In other ways, it’s a choice many such men make in order to have children and a traditional family life. So where is his "sin?" Has he hurt anyone?
His parisheners and fellow Evangelicals? I doubt it. A dose of truth never hurt anybody. Maybe some of them will "get it" that this view of sin is silly. His children? Maybe short term, but not indelibly. I’ve seen several patients whose fathers have come out of the closet, and there were no visible scars from the process. The parent child bond, if anything, was solidified by knowing the truth. Ironically, I think the "sinned against" are other homosexual people and his wife. He has been a force in the assault on the self esteem of homosexual people, and he could have been a force on the other side, knowing the problem from the inside.
But watching his wife in the car during that interview yesterday morning, with some of her children in the back seat, I found myself feeling very sad. She’s written a book – Embracing Life:
As the wife of a man involved in ministry, you sometimes may feel trapped by unrealistic expectations and overburdened by obligations. The constant demands on his time and yours–as well as the feeling that your life is always on display–can lead to discouragement and frustration.
But ministry life isn’t about enduring challenges, says author Gayle Haggard. It’s about embracing joy. After more than 20 years of working alongside husband Ted Haggard, she believes that women supporting their husbands in ministry truly can be free, happy and fulfilled as they recognize the value of their unique vocation.…Crosswalk: How much influence does a wife have on her husband’s ministry or work?Haggard: She most definitely has influence and it is up to her whether that influence is positive or negative, whether she helps and encourages him or discourages him and weighs him down like excess baggage. How we see our husbands can have a powerful influence on how they see themselves. If we see them with eyes of love and respect and encourage them with our words, we can inspire them to be their best. That is what Abigail did for David (I Samuel 25). But if we see our husbands as disappointments and failures, as Michal saw David in II Samuel 6, then we might discourage them so much that they lose heart and fail. They might even despise us as a result. Instead, we need to discover how to be our husbands’ greatest strength and encouragement, their help, and a resource for godly influence.
Crosswalk: Is A Life Embraced written just for pastors’ wives, or does it also apply to women married to men involved in other ministries?
Haggard: I wrote A life Embraced for all wives married to men in ministry, but actually, I think it applies to all women. What the Scriptures say to wives of ministry leaders—that they "are to be women worthy of respect, not malicious talkers but temperate and trustworthy in everything" (I Timothy 3: 11)—should be the goals of all Christian women. The thing that sets us apart as wives of leaders is that we have the opportunity to model this for others. This is not a burden; it is an honor to be able to influence others and to help them through our lives as we mature in Christ.…I’ve even gotten some great feedback from the men who have read it. It basically describes my journey toward maturity in God and the things I’ve learned along the way. I think many of these lessons apply to all of us. This book reveals the principles that have brought both Ted and me tremendous freedom in our lives, in our marriage, and in ministry.
And he has certainly hurt America. He has been supporting a force that is solely responsible for electing an incompetent man as President of the United States, based only on pandering to the Evangelical Voters. And a driving force in that support has been the persecution of homosexuals. And Pastor Ted had every way in the world to know better. That is sin by any criteria. I hope he knows that too…
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