SOMETHING there is that doesn't love a wall,

That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,

And spills the upper boulders in the sun;

And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.

The work of hunters is another thing:

I have come after them and made repair

Where they have left not one stone on a stone,

But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,

To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,

No one has seen them made or heard them made,

But at spring mending-time we find them there.

I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;

And on a day we meet to walk the line

And set the wall between us once again.

We keep the wall between us as we go.

To each the boulders that have fallen to each.

And some are loaves and some so nearly balls

We have to use a spell to make them balance:

"Stay where you are until our backs are turned!"

We wear our fingers rough with handling them.

Oh, just another kind of out-door game,

One on a side. It comes to little more:

There where it is we do not need the wall:

He is all pine and I am apple orchard.

My apple trees will never get across

And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.

He only says, "Good fences make good neighbors."

Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder

If I could put a notion in his head:

"Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it

Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.

Before I built a wall I'd ask to know

What I was walling in or walling out,

And to whom I was like to give offence.

Something there is that doesn't love a wall,

That wants it down." I could say "Elves" to him,

But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather

He said it for himself. I see him there

Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top

In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.

He moves in darkness as it seems to me,

Not of woods only and the shade of trees.

He will not go behind his father's saying,

And he likes having thought of it so well

He says again, "Good fences make good neighbors."

Robert Frost (1874-1963). North of Boston. 1915.

Lighting of the Chalice, by Beth Hauck

May the light we now kindle

inspire us to use our powers

to heal and not to harm,

to help and not to hinder

to bless and not to curse,

to serve you, Spirit of Freedom

Spoken Meditation: A Lifelong Sharing, adapted from Mother Teresa, spoken by Tony Marconi

Love cannot remain by itself – it has no meaning.

Love has to be put into action and that action is service.

Whatever form we are, young or old, male or female,

Able or disabled,

Rich or poor, gay or straight,

It is not how much we do, but how much love we put in the doing;

A lifelong sharing of love with others.

Sermon: God Vs. Gays: The War That Never Was, Tony Marconi

My friend Heather, an American Baptist minister, tells the story about the first time she marched in a gay-pride parade. In a crowd of somewhere between 80 and 100,000 participants, there were about a dozen protesters standing on the sidelines. They held signs with the usual treats of hellfire and damnation if she and the other lesbians and gays who were marching didn’t somehow transform themselves into heterosexuals. As she passed this small group, she was hit hard in the head by an object one of them threw at her. She bent down and scooped up the projectile, only to discover that it was a pocket edition of the Bible.

As obvious as the irony in Heather’s story is, every time I think about it, I am absolutely amazed at how well it serves as a metaphor for what is happening now on a larger scale, state-by-state, across this nation. In a few days, Virginia will face the same kind of electoral test that Ohio failed just two years ago. Back in 2004, while tens of thousands of us were working on the presidential campaign, the Christian right was promoting a draconian anti-gay constitutional amendment known as Issue 1. Quite frankly, those of us involved in promoting social justice for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered persons didn’t really think of it as much of a threat. There were very few yard signs showing support, and most of our higher elected officials were speaking out against it. Even the normally conservative Columbus Dispatch editorialized that it was probably a bad idea, particularly because the amendment denied any semblance of marital-type domestic benefits for unmarried partners, either gay or straight. Besides, we knew that the religious right comprised only a fraction of registered voters, so we figured--when we thought about it at all--that the issue would go down in defeat.

Then came Election Day, and the results were devastating. Not only had we failed in the presidential campaign, but Issue 1 passed, 63 to 37%. Most of us were shocked and our feelings of depression lasted for many weeks after. We spent a lot of time comforting each other, but eventually we began asking ourselves how we were going to deal with this. The answer was not long in coming. Within months, the LGBT community and their straight allies had begun to mobilize. Where before there had only been fragmented groups of people, working independently on local causes, a new, statewide umbrella organization called Equality Ohio emerged. In the past 14 months, we have grown to over 10,000 registered voices that our elected officials are beginning to hear loud and clear. On the first year “banniversary” of Issue 1, Equality Ohio presented every legislator and key elected official with the first bound book from our Stories Project--over 100 testimonies and reactions of people--gay and straight--who were negatively impacted by this law. We followed that up this spring with Lobby Day, when 500 Equality Ohio members and their families gathered at the State House and met with legislators from every district. Nobody in our state government had ever seen that kind of turnout on behalf of LGBT issues before, and now political candidates on both sides of the aisle are actively seeking our endorsements. We have set a ten-year goal of getting Issue 1 repealed, and we have a workable strategy in place to accomplish this mission. Of course, it would have been nice if we hadn’t had to deal with this amendment to begin with. It is, after all, time consuming to have to backtrack to catch up to where we should already have been. And now, the state of Virginia is facing an almost identical piece of legislation, and the polls are not looking good. Oh, among those who understand the implications of this measure there is a strong opposition to its passage, but unfortunately, the religious right’s propaganda machine is out there creating the kind of self-indulgent hysteria that gets the non-thinking masses out to vote.

So, then, is this just another lost cause? Or is there something the citizens of this state could be doing to effectively oppose this piece of legislative bigotry? Well, actually, there are at least three major actions any Virginian can take immediately to begin to counter this amendment.

First and foremost, you can vote and make sure everyone you know who is concerned about this law gets out and votes, too. Given the odds and stakes in your Senatorial race, this really shouldn’t be so hard to do. Even if the results go against you, the smaller the margin of a win for the other side, the easier it is going to be to overturn the amendment later. Win or lose, your vote is critical to ultimate victory -- and I promise you that victory is coming as it inevitably does for any people who fight for justice long and hard enough.

But even now, before Election Day, you can start to make a difference: Add your voice to the thousands of others across this state who are speaking out together through Equality Virginia. Yes, you already have a state-wide organization in place, and you can find them online at equalityvirginia.org

Finally, you can get involved on a personal level. Educate yourself about the facts of LGBT life. Speak out about the issues. This is an especially important thing for straight allies to be doing. Those of us who are straight are in a privileged position, and we have the power to keep bringing the issue of equality--particularly marriage equality--out of the closet. By keeping the conversation going, we keep it in front of the public, and over time, it becomes familiar and, ultimately, less threatening. Contrary to the saying, familiarity doesn’t breed contempt. It causes understanding. Good fences really don’t make good neighbors--we all know that. And we all need to be “that something that doesn’t love a wall; that wants it down.”

But how do you spill those upper boulders in the sun and make gaps that even two can pass abreast? How do you reach people whose ultimate argument is: “It says in the Bible...?”

Hey! I’ve got a radical idea. Maybe we could learn what the Bible really says about homosexuality and then enter into conversations with other people of faith about it.

What, try to talk to a fundamentalist? Isn’t that like trying to talk to that wall? Well, sometimes. But, in the end, that’s how walls are taken down: by the slow process of ideological erosion.

And Unitarian Universalists are, in many ways, ideally suited to be having these discussions. We are a people of faith whose first principle is honoring the inherent worth and dignity of every person--even those fundamentalists we so vehemently disagree with.

Of course, for many of us progressives, a working knowledge of what the Bible actually says about almost anything is, at best, sketchy. Since we don’t claim the Bible to be central to our lives in the way traditionalists do, we tend to be dismissive about its perceived authority. As a result, our own response to having chapter and verse thrown at us is to hurl back logic and reason--logic and reason as we see it; not as it is experienced by the other guy. And for all the good that does, we might as well be speaking in Klingon, because neither of us is hearing the other.

But, then, how can we overcome this obstacle? Is it even possible? Happily, the answer is, “Yes.” But it requires a little self-education on our parts. You see, there are only about five distinct arguments from Scripture that can be made against homosexuality. By knowing what they are and having a set of informed responses to them, we can actually dialogue with fundamentalists in respectful ways. While we may not necessarily change their minds, a dialogue will allow us to ratchet down the rhetoric that creates fortress mentalities. It also has the effect of creating opportunities to plant seeds of thought that may allow their opinions to evolve.

Now, since I have made it a kind of personal crusade to educate people on this subject wherever I go, I want to spend the rest of my time here giving you a few examples of the kind of information I find useful in responding to those oft-cited Scriptures. For those of you who may want more details--a kind of beginner’s primer, so to speak--I’ve prepared a handout that you can pick up at the back of the sanctuary on your way out of the service. Whenever I talk to a traditionalist, I try to seek some common ground about my faith and theirs. My stress is always on my reverence for the way Jesus taught us to treat each other. In emphasizing my reverence for Jesus’ teachings, I express my concern over the way some people who call themselves Christians show such little tolerance toward gays and lesbians. I confess that I just don’t understand this attitude in light of the fact that nowhere in the Bible does it say that homosexuality is a sin. Of course, I am usually contradicted at this point, so I politely ask them if they can show me where it does. Most of the time, they are more than happy to do so.

On rare occasion, someone will begin this dialogue by referencing Sodom and Gomorrah. But since this is a story about attempted rape and a violation of hospitality laws, it’s easy to point out that rape has nothing to do with orientation. It is an act of violence in which sex is used as a weapon. It’s hard to find evidence of Divine displeasure with homosexuality if that wasn’t understood by Biblical writers to be the problem. And of the half-dozen Biblical authors who actually cite the sins of Sodom--including a quote in Matthew attributed to Jesus himself--not one identifies same-sex acts as one of those transgressions. In point of fact, the sin most often identified is Sodom’s severe violation of hospitality laws--something considered pretty much sacred in those times. Obviously, there’s a lot more that can be said about the story of Sodom, but since we have time limitations, I’ll simply refer you to that handout I mentioned for more details.

Another Scriptural reference that is usually brought up later in the conversations I have with fundamentalists is a passage in I Corinthians, which contains two words in a long list of sins, one of which is repeated in I Timothy. These two words were translated into English as “homosexuals” for the first time in 1948. Prior to that, various editions of the Bible gave them as catamites, boy-prostitutes, child molesters, people of infamous habits and even masturbators. The actual words in Greek are malakoi, which means “soft,” referring to effeminacy or excessive self-pampering--Arnold Schwartzeneger might say, “Girly-men.” But this is a reference to a cultural expression of what is considered manly, and it has to do with affectation, not orientation. The other word in Corinthians--the one that is repeated in Timothy--is arsenokoetai, which translates literally as “man-bed”and is most likely a reference to prostitution. If you look at the literary context, both these words appear in lists of excesses and abuses that do not even remotely relate to loving same-sex relationships as we understand them today. Nor do they contain any reference whatsoever to lesbians.

I always make it a point to explain to the traditionalist that nowhere in the Bible are women prohibited from having sex with each other, and that statement usually raises a few eyebrows. It also has the effect--if we haven’t yet begun discussing Paul’s letter to the Romans--of taking us to that place immediately. Since this passage provides the primary anti-homosexuality rationale for the conservative Christian viewpoint, it might be useful to take a look at exactly what it says. This text is from the King James Version, and you’ll find it on the insert in your order of service.

“Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man...Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness in their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves... For this cause God gave them up unto vile afflictions: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was meet.” (Romans 1:22-24, 26-27 KJV)

“ ...God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not fitting; Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, spiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant breakers, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful...” (Romans 1:28-31 KJV)

Boy, when Paul gets on a roll, he doesn’t much come up for air, does he?

Often a person who wants to find fault with homosexuality will begin quoting Romans at verse 24--that part about the “vile afflictions” of women and men behaving against nature in shameless ways. I always insist we go back farther to the beginning of the passage, verse 22. For although Paul expresses an obvious disapproval for male same-sex acts, he does not condemn them. In point of fact, the offense Paul is railing about in Romans is idolatry: “Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man.” The result? They commit ritually unclean sex acts and they indulge themselves in unrighteous thoughts and actions. Let’s take a look at the whole context. Paul wrote this letter in preparation for his visit to Rome near the end of his career. He’s hoping that the Christian churches there will eventually sponsor him on a missionary journey to Spain. But these churches were comprised of both Gentiles and Jews who were on the verge of splitting themselves apart over some very contentious issues: Do the Gentiles need to become Jewish -- and follow Jewish dietary laws and become circumcised -- before being considered full members of these faith communities?

Paul wants to settle this. His purpose is to convince both factions to live as “one body in Christ.” But how is he going to do that without turning one side or the other against him? In this letter, he attempts to enter the conversation by finding a safe topic on which to hang his arguments. And what is a safe topic in his time? Sexual misconduct as interpreted through Levitican law.

In my discussions about homosexuality and the Bible, this is my “go to” place for discussing Leviticus, if it hasn’t come up yet. Oh, we’ll get back to Romans. But first, I need to explain to you that for me, the key to understanding what Paul is saying in Romans is intrinsically tied up with how he feels about applying Jewish law to Gentiles.

Leviticus is a section of the Torah or Old Testament, written about 2600 years ago when the Levites--the priestly Jewish tribe--were being held captive in Babylon. The Holiness Code, as this part of the book is called, was an attempt to define rituals and behaviors that would keep Jewish identity separate from their captors’ culture. The core concept of the over six hundred laws governing every aspect of Jewish life was a concern for maintaining purity, particularly by avoiding unclean foods and unclean ways of doing things. This meant that you were never supposed to mix different kinds of things--even clean things--lest some kind of unclean thing come of it. Hence, two crops could not be grown in the same field. Clothing could not be made from more than one kind of fiber. Meat and dairy products could not be served on the same plate. And two men could not have penetrative sex together.

But what has that got to do with a mixing of kinds? Well, let’s look at what Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 say. “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination” and “If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall be put to death; their blood be upon them.” To understand why male same-sex activity would constitute a mixing of kinds, it helps to know that in Hebrew, the first verse reads, “With a man, you shall not lie the lyings of a woman; it is to’eva”-- the word that’s translated as “abomination” in King James. The Hebrew word for woman is “naqeba,” or orifice-bearer. The lyings of a woman were receptive; of a man, penetrative. For a man to “lie as a woman” would be a mixing of kinds in one person -- mixing the male’s penetrative capacity with the female’s receptive role.

Now, because women were incapable of “mixing kinds” and because no penetration could occur that would “spoil” their status as property, the “rubbings of women,” as later rabbis would come to describe female homogenital acts, were considered inconsequential. Thus, neither Leviticus 18:22 nor 20:13 was considered to be applicable to women. But, what about that word “abomination”? Isn’t an abomination something that would make God want to vomit? Actually, the Hebrew word “to’evah” simply refers to some kind of violation of code. The severity of the violation depends on an understanding of the particular text in which it appears. Fortunately, we know exactly how the Jews understood these offenses because two centuries before the birth of Christ, their scholars translated the Hebrew Torah into the Greek Septuagint, and in Leviticus 18:22, to’evah is given as “bdelygma,” which literally means “ritual offense.” Ritual offense. There is no implication of moral evil. None. Nada. Zip. Nor was this law ever meant to apply to Gentiles, since it was intended to keep Jewish cultural identity intact.

So, back to Paul. Remember that Paul accused his Gentile readers in Rome of idolatry, and he cited two consequences that befell them because of their actions. First, their minds became “unclean” and, as a result, they dishonored their bodies with sexual acts that were shameless, unseemly, or degrading. Second, God gave these Gentile idolaters over to the real wickedness that was in their hearts. Paul then enumerates these wicked thoughts and deeds in verses 28-31, but in his entire list of these serious evils -- murder, deceit, backbiters, haters of God -- there is no mention of same-sex acts of any kind.

Paul purposely separates the differences between “unclean” sexual behaviors and actual sinfulness, but to understand why, we have to look at the language he used.

Let’s start by examining Paul’s wording when discussing “unnatural” sex among women. By the way, you should know that this is the only place in the Bible that fundamentalists can find any rationale for their condemnation of lesbians. So, for the fundamentalist, “against nature” for women is often regarded as parallel to the same-sex lusts of the Roman men described in the next phrase. But that interpretation is questionable when we look at Paul’s wording in the Greek. He uses the phrase “para physin,” traditionally translated into English as “against nature.” But, para physin actually means “contrary to nature” or “uncharacteristic.” Think of the sentence, “Contrary to her nature, Jean got up and danced all night.” Jean didn’t violate the laws of the cosmos by her actions. She simply did something out of character for her: Para physin.

But what sexual activities would Paul have considered out of character for women? Most likely, the cultural and ritual offenses given in Leviticus, since this is the topic he’s discussing. But, these would not have included homogenital behavior -- remember, women sleeping together was never forbidden by Levitican law. More likely, Paul is talking about behaviors that were unacceptable in Jewish culture--especially those that inhibited conception: Sex while standing up. Sex during menstruation. Heterosexual oral or anal sex. Even sex between Jew and Gentile was considered “para physin” because it was a mixing of kinds.

Consider this: Same-sex relationships between women weren’t forbidden by the very law Paul is talking about. Nor are they mentioned anywhere else in the Bible, even by Paul himself. So why would toss out a brief phrase--something totally out of character for Paul when he talks about sin--in order to make an issue out of something that had no relevance to his audience and then never even bring it up again?

But, that said, it is indisputable that Paul’s description of the “para physin” behaviors of men definitely does include same-sex acts. But -- and this is key -- in Paul’s worldview, homosexuality as we know it today doesn’t exist. There are only heterosexual males. Therefore, he is decrying lustful self-gratification by heterosexual men with other heterosexual men--not an uncommon practice in the Graeco-Roman world of that era. But these behaviors are not acts of love and commitment between male homosexuals, about which Paul says nothing. For Paul, these para physin homogenital acts committed by heterosexual men are “atima,” which means unseemly or degrading. And, they make the participants appear “aschemosyne”, that is, shameless or dishonorable. But they are not morally condemned. When Paul does get around to blasting the real wrongdoings and wicked behaviors of the idolaters, enumerated in Romans 1:28-31, he uses the words “asebia” and “adikia,” which relate specifically to moral, not social, offenses.

Actually, when Paul’s letter is read as a whole, its entire structure is based on the premise that he does not consider para physin sex to be morally condemned. Remember, Paul wants to enter into the dispute that is raging between the Jews and Gentiles, but he has to approach the issue carefully, trying not to alienate either side.

So, first, he gains the sympathy of Jewish Christians by seeming to go along with their prejudices regarding Roman sexual practices. The Jews would have figured he had the Gentiles pegged on that one, and the Gentiles would probably have chuckled at the provincial attitude of the Jews regarding sex.

But, then, Paul decries the real wickedness caused by idolatry, and he immediately reminds the Jews that even though they have the advantage of the Law concerning circumcision and dietary cleanliness, they are still guilty of transgressions against God. Pressing this point further, Paul argues that in Christ, purity issues are superseded. They are no longer of paramount importance. What he says, in Chapter 14, verses 13-14 is this:

“Let us not therefore judge one another any more; but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling-block or occasion to fall in his brother’s way. I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself; but to him that thinks anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean.”

In other words, uncleanliness under Levitican law is in the eye of the beholder. Paul then urges the Jewish Christians to be more accepting of Gentile Christians. And, by way of wrapping up, he rebukes the Gentile Christians for any smugness they might be feeling.

In essence, Paul used the issue of sexual practices as a rhetorical device precisely because they didn’t matter all that much in the world of his time. Isn’t it ironic that the topic he picked to help him introduce his plea for unity is the one that threatens to tear mainstream churches apart today?

About the only other Scriptural reference on this subject I ever hear is the old “Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve” argument. The idea behind this one seems to be that since God created a man and a woman, that’s the way all love relationships were meant to be.

My response to this is short and simple. This is an argument framed in the negative: What isn’t mentioned must be condemned. But this implies that the reader’s mind is on par with God’s and is therefore capable of reading God’s thoughts about things that are not actually stated in the text.

Besides, even if we accept the story of Adam and Eve as literal, they obviously must have contained within their genetic and hormonal codes a wide variation of possible human traits. Almost none of them are mentioned in Genesis. These include race, eye and hair color, left or right handedness, gender identity, and sexual orientation. A preponderance of scientific evidence indicates a physiological origin for orientation. Singling out this single characteristic as something displeasing to God hardly seems consistent with an apparent Divine propensity to favor diversity.

In the end, I try to reach a point where the traditionalist and I can agree that there are different ways to interpret the Bible. Usually, since we’ve just had a discussion demonstrating that very point, they almost always acknowledge that this is true. It’s then that I ask them to consider a question that I was once asked and had to answer for myself. I tell them that I am not seeking an answer from them because their answer is none of my business. The question I ask them to consider is this:

Given that we all consciously choose how we want to interpret Scripture, why would anyone purposely choose an interpretation that drives them to diminish and make difficult the lives of millions of people and the thousands of children they are raising--an act that is in direct violation of the teachings of Jesus Christ?

I point out that there is not one recorded instance of any pronouncement by Jesus about homosexuals. But he did make it abundantly clear that it was never our place to judge others on God’s behalf. In Matthew, Chapter 7: "...first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye."

I make it clear that I am too busy working on prying the beam out of my own eye to judge whether or not my GLBT brothers and sisters are sinners. It’s for that reason that I maintain that we’re not doing God’s work by making gays and lesbians the targets of legal discrimination. Even if we believe that they are sinners, their sins are a matter between them and God--not them and God through us.

Nor should anyone’s perceived state of grace ever be the basis on which their civil rights are measured. To that end, civil marriage must be considered a civil right.

In summary, I believe that Jesus gave us the parable of the Good Samaritan as a guide of how we should act toward each other. The Samaritan found the Jew broken and bleeding. At no small expense to himself in terms of time and money, he took responsibility for helping make the Jew physically whole. He didn’t make conversion to his own faith a condition for his outreach. He didn’t require that the Jew confess that he was a sinner before his wounds would be cleansed and bandaged. The Samaritan simply saw a fellow human being in need of help, and in the same spirit of love that Jesus preached, gave of himself without question or pause.

The message of that teaching is as clear and unequivocal today as it was when Jesus first gave it. It is up to us to go beyond the confines of our religious differences and creeds in order to meet the needs of our brothers and sisters in ways that will make their lives whole. We must do this out of respect for their humanity--their inherent worth and dignity--that lies at the core of Jesus’ spoken words:

“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and all thy soul, and all thy mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like unto it. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”