A number of weeks ago I came across a piece written by a gay man, a Catholic, who had decided to go from being a Christian who was in a relationship with another man, a relationship that included sexual relations, to not having sex with other people. I don't know anything much else about his life than what he said about it, I don't know how the man he was in relationship with felt about that. Anyone who chooses to not have sex with someone else as the right thing for them to do is entirely OK by me, as long as it is a matter of mutual agreement with someone they may have made prior commitments to.
When he was giving his reasons as to why he not only chose that route for himself but was advocating it for others he said something that I can both understand and which I think oversimplifies a far more nuanced and difficult issue and which is hardly specific to gay men. He claimed that when he looked hard at the gay men he knew who were Christians, he saw little in their life choices and action that differentiated them from gay atheists or agnostics or those who called themselves "pagans" etc.
Now, I would be the first to agree that someone calling themself a Christian should lead to discernible differences in how you live your life. It is a requirement of real belief instead of mere baptized heathendom that you try to follow the Gospel, the Epistles, the Law and the Prophets. You should not lie, you should not break promises of fidelity, you should not act in ways that exploit people and endanger them, treating them like disposable objects but as representatives of God. That is especially those who by lesser strength, lesser intelligence, irrationality due to personality problems or through poverty and mere circumstance are vulnerable to those smarter, more rational, richer than they are. And certainly that includes those who are more physically powerful.
And anyone who has read much of what I have written will know that I have deeply criticized gay men, in particular, for what I assume is what this man meant by behavior which is consistent with atheism, agnosticism and "paganism". I would never go to a pride parade because from what I've seen in videos and pictures and read in articles, I can't agree with much of what I've seen celebrated in those. Treating people as sex objects, certainly high among those things, treating sadism, bondage, exploitation as acceptable lifestyle choices is an evil I have never supported and always rejected.
But my issue with what this newly chaste gay man says is that none of what he said is not as true of straight Christians, officially celibate Christians or those who are self-claimed practitioners of chastity. Straight men and women who are Catholics, married, unmarried, allegedly chaste, practice all of those sexual kinks and fetishes and practices, they break their promises, they commit adultery, they commit fornication in casual, uncommitted relationships probably in numbers that much different from gay men. What does that tell you about the moral status of straight sex and, generally, about straight sex?
Shouldn't, in light of the way straight people who do not really practice monogamous, faithful marriage mean that they are as inelligible for trying to have a moral, committed sexual relationship with a person of the opposite sex? If it's to be used to discredit gay sex, why not?
I don't know how strongly and well Lesbians are at keeping faith to the promises they make, how well they can have a committed, caring sexual relationship with another woman while not violating their obligations accepted when they considered themselves to be Christians. I know of gay men who I believe do both, though I will admit probably not as many as straight people who do. The long legacy of oppression and the relatively few years when it was possible to live in a committed, even avowed marriage is not going to be easily overcome. I think to assert, either by the "sex-positive" promoters of gay sex or anti-LGBTQ nay sayers, that such honest, faithful, committed relationships are not possible for gay men is going to hinder a time when it becomes the norm. At least as much of a norm as it is for other human groups.
And that is concentrating only on one of the general areas of moral corruption that are ubiquitious among ALL PEOPLE REGARDLESS OF THEIR GROUP IDENTITY. I don't think that gay men are any more prone to those venues of sin than heterosexuals are, many of the gay men and even more of the Lesbians I've known are far better at it than some straight folk and many, many of those who are the biggest fattest fans of mandatory chastity for LGBTQ poeple. Look at the right-wing in the Catholic hierarchy, in many of the Protestant denominations, clergy and the religious conservatives in those Christian and many other denominations. I don't think you would be likely to discern the principles of the teachings of Jesus or Paul from the lives of the "religious conservatives". Many of the worst of them are flaming pagans in their own moral observances.
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