The origin of love that homosexuals feel for one another

[LongingSoul]

But consider the sentence, “I desire what is best for you.” The phrase “what is best” here is ambiguous. I have an opinion about what is best for my wife. Now, if all I desire for my wife is *what I think *is best for her, then we’re talking about something subjective, not true love.

But if I desire for my wife what is *really *best for her, even if I don’t know what that is, then I truly love her. Even in this latter case, however, my ability to act on behalf of my wife is ALWAYS limited by my own subjective opinions about what is best for her.

I think that homosexual partners can love each other in this latter sense. I think that many homosexual partners would be willing to break up with each other forever, if they truly believed that would be a better life for the other person.

Again, I think you’re reducing love to something less than it is. ‘Desiring the best’ for someone limits their good to your desire. In fact, love is ‘willing the good’ of another. The CCC says… 1766 “To love is to will the good of another.” All other affections have their source in this first movement of the human heart toward the good. Only the good can be loved. Passions “are evil if love is evil and good if it is good.”

Our job is not to know what is best for the other in love. Our job is to pursue selflessness in ourselves to have the grace to will the good of the other. Truth is available to everyone who is open to Gods grace in true selflessness. On the other hand, selfishness can make even evil seem as though it’s a good.

 

[DexUK]

Which commentary on the Bible would you recommend?

As for the book of Romans, the Greek passage says, “μετήλλαξαν τὴν φυσικὴν χρῆσιν εἰς τὴν παρὰ φύσιν”, which means to “exchange the natural behavior (of the body) for an unnatural behavior.” I read ancient Greek, and that’s what the text says. I propose that the commentaries you are reading distort the text.

I would much prefer a person to simply reject Christian morality openly and honestly, instead of trying to force the Bible to conform to one’s own moral beliefs.

That’s not what natural law is. If it was, then deformities would be natural, since they occur in nature.

Natural law refers to the conditions for the flourishing of the species. Although homosexual friendships are certainly compatible with human flourishing, the act of sodomy (or masturbation, or oral sex to orgasm) is not compatible with human flourishing.

I actually read commentaries that are defined texts at Seminaries and have Imprimaturs, so hopefully they’re not distorting things!

In any case, your translation of the Greek is helpful. The operative word is “exchanging” - a decisive act to change one’s heterosexual behaviour. A homosexual doesn’t have heterosexual behaviour to start with in order to change it, therefore the proscription cannot apply to him (or her).

And as for sexual complementarity, well for a heterosexual person complementarity is met in the union of the male and female parts. But that would not be right for a homosexual person. Their complementarity is different. Naturally. As in, by their very nature.

It would be as wrong to force a homosexual person to act in a heterosexual way as it would be to force a heterosexual person to act in a homosexual way. Although, I suspect that you might object a little less for one than the other.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

Again, I think you’re reducing love to something less than it is. ‘Desiring the best’ for someone limits their good to your desire. In fact, love is ‘willing the good’ of another.

This is just semantics. I’m fine with love as “willing the good of another”. Everything I said applies perfectly well, if you just substitute “willing the good” for “desiring the best.” I suppose you might say that there is a gap between desire and will, so “will” is a better word here. I’m fine with that.

The CCC says… 1766 “To love is to will the good of another.” All other affections have their source in this first movement of the human heart toward the good. Only the good can be loved. Passions “are evil if love is evil and good if it is good.”

Well, right here, the Church says that ALL affections have their source in the inclination of the heart toward the good. This is true of sinful affections, too, then – which is just as Augustine taught.

Some people seem to be afraid that acknowledging a good desire behind cases of evil will somehow justify the evil. That’s just false. Every human action is rooted in a desire for goodness.

Our job is not to know what is best for the other in love. Our job is to pursue selflessness in ourselves to have the grace to will the good of the other.

How can our willing the good of another be translated into actions, if we don’t have any beliefs about what is good for them?

 

[Prodigal_Son]

In any case, your translation of the Greek is helpful. The operative word is “exchanging” - a decisive act to change one’s heterosexual behaviour. A homosexual doesn’t have heterosexual behaviour to start with in order to change it, therefore the proscription cannot apply to him (or her).

The text is not about people, it’s about body parts! That’s clear in the Greek. Greeks do not talk about people having “uses” (χρῆσιν). Body parts have uses. They exchanged the proper use of their body parts (urination, fecund sexuality) for an improper use. I’m not saying that Paul is right about the proper uses of body parts, but this is clearly what the passage means.

It would be as wrong to force a homosexual person to act in a heterosexual way as it would be to force a heterosexual person to act in a homosexual way. Although, I suspect that you might object a little less for one than the other.

Um, it’s wrong to force anyone to have sex. I totally agree.

 

[Rau]

I also have significant trouble with the Biblical ‘proscriptions’ of homosexuality. All I can see is that it is the deliberate exchange of natural behaviour for unnatural behaviour that is condemned: St Paul condemns those who act contrary to their nature. Since one’s nature is God-given, to act contrary to it for any reason, including ‘fashionable behaviour’ such as might have been prevalent in some of the societies that St Paul evangelised, is to reject a gift from God. Rejecting anything from God (knowingly) is sinful.

In my eyes, it’s only the laws of man that speak against homosexuality, not the laws of God. We need to catch up with what God has taught us and do away with the crushing injustices that we heap upon our brothers and sisters who may not share the same desires we do, but have no other desires than those that they have been given.

A most basic thing from God is “male and female he made them”. The reality of that speaks against homosexual sex (though not directly against love). On another thread a poster defended homosexual sex by saying that sex is not just about procreation, but about showing love, giving pleasure, promoting companionship etc. Now this is true, but it fails to recognise that it is the genitalia that are central in sex -the penis emitting a fluid for reproductive purposes that seeks an egg in a woman’s body, and a vagina to receive the fluid. It must be evident that 2 men or 2 women “having sex” is a misuse. It is the wrong means to show love in this context.

 

[frobert]

A most basic thing from God is “male and female he made them”. The reality of that speaks against homosexual sex (though not directly against love).

Hold the thought “not directly against love”

On another thread a poster defended homosexual sex by saying that sex is not just about procreation, but about showing love, giving pleasure, promoting companionship etc. Now this is true, but it fails to recognise that it is the genitalia that are central in sex -the penis emitting a fluid for reproductive purposes that seeks an egg in a woman’s body, and a vagina to receive the fluid. It must be evident that 2 men or 2 women “having sex” is a misuse.

I can understand your reasoning, not sure I agree but that another topic

It is the wrong means to show love in this context.

This is an abstraction meaning you abstracted it from something which did not state it directly. I can agree with everything the church says about natural but it does not (to my knowledge) say anything about love and all the emotions and feelings tied up in it.

Would you say the opposite namely that sex is sinful for a married man and woman who hate each other? I don’t know if it is sinful but I would say that to use each other in such a way is a misuse of their genitalia. A silly thought just came to mind, perhaps we can say that they are raping each other. In any case, we can reason how genitalia can be misused yet be in accord with natural law. They are married, they are consenting and they are not using contraception.

You know what’s coming next. Remember I asked you to hold the thought “not directly against love.” Well you can figure out where I am going, namely that even if homosexual acts are a misuse of natural law, the misuse in and of itself does not preclude all the emotions and feelings of love that is freely given between lovers.

I do respect your thoughts and am grateful that I have an opportunity to post mine.

 

[Rau]

Hold the thought “not directly against love”

I can understand your reasoning, not sure I agree but that another topic

This is an abstraction meaning you abstracted it from something which did not state it directly. I can agree with everything the church says about natural but it does not (to my knowledge) say anything about love and all the emotions and feelings tied up in it.

Would you say the opposite namely that sex is sinful for a married man and woman who hate each other? I don’t know if it is sinful but I would say that to use each other in such a way is a misuse of their genitalia. A silly thought just came to mind, perhaps we can say that they are raping each other. In any case, we can reason how genitalia can be misused yet be in accord with natural law. They are married, they are consenting and they are not using contraception.

You know what’s coming next. Remember I asked you to hold the thought “not directly against love.” Well you can figure out where I am going, namely that even if homosexual acts are a misuse of natural law, the misuse in and of itself does not preclude all the emotions and feelings of love that is freely given between lovers.

I do respect your thoughts and am grateful that I have an opportunity to post mine.

I have no difficulty with the idea that a homosexual couple may love each other.

Sex without love, even in marriage, is wrong. In the worst case it may be rape. In the best case, it may fail to be unitive. So I think I’m with you on all those points.

 

[Sky_River]

I have no difficulty with the idea that a homosexual couple may love each other.

Sex without love, even in marriage, is wrong. In the worst case it may be rape. In the best case, it may fail to be unitive. So I think I’m with you on all those points.

How would you respond to people who say that the Christian idea of homosexuality being sinful is “bigoted” or “intolerant”?

 

[The_Reginator]

In any case, your point is moot, because ‘Nature’ has many instances of homosexual behaviour in other species (which are not subject to sin) therefore recourse to ‘natural law’ does not support your point.

Some other posters have already addressed this, but I have to stress the problem here as well.
Just because we can observe a behaviour in other species DOES NOT make it “natural”. An anomaly perhaps, but not natural. “Nature” (IE God) has designed things in certain ways. It is obvious that ONLY male and female parts fit together. That is natural. To find any creatures trying to fit male with male, or female with female, is UNNATURAL, as in it goes against the design for those parts. THAT is “natural law”, following the laws we find in our biology, not in our minds.

Furthermore, we can never argue that since something is observed in other creatures it must therefore be natural for humans too. We observe cannibalism in nature …

 

[mdgspencer]

There are different kinds of love. There is the love of a girl for her doll. There is the love of friendship. The love of someone for his parents. A person may love watching a certain television show. There are also evil kinds of love. A criminal may love what he does, gaining great enjoyment from it. There are many different kinds of love between people, some of them not admirable. Some kinds of love it is better not to act on, which is why Christianity speaks so much of self-control.

 

[frobert]

How would you respond to people who say that the Christian idea of homosexuality being sinful is “bigoted” or “intolerant”?

I would say if you get joy out of telling gays they are sinful then you are bigoted, otherwise I would take it as face value that it is a Catholic belief.

 

[adrift]

There are different kinds of love. There is the love of a girl for her doll. There is the love of friendship. The love of someone for his parents. A person may love watching a certain television show. There are also evil kinds of love. A criminal may love what he does, gaining great enjoyment from it. There are many different kinds of love between people, some of them not admirable. Some kinds of love it is better not to act on, which is why Christianity speaks so much of self-control.

The problem I am seeing is that I believe everyone has an idea of what they think love means. One person said love is a feeling. This is a secular definition. A feel good one but inaccurate as to what love is.
The Catholic Dictionary defines love this way

To will good to someone. Also to please someone, either by sharing with that person what one possesses or by doing what someone wants. Basically there are two kinds of love. The love of concupiscence, or self-interested love, means that another is loved for one’s own sake as something useful or pleasant to the one who loves. The love of friendship means selfless love of another for that person’s own sake, for his or her good, to please him or her; it is the love of benevolence.

True love looks for the best interest. It is not in the best interest of homosexuals to be in a sexaul realtionship. It is a self-interested love.

 

[SMGS127]

True love looks for the best interest. It is not in the best interest of homosexuals to be in a sexaul realtionship. It is a self-interested love.

It is not self-interested love to the homosexuals themselves, who see their relationship as doing the best for their partner and taking care of them as best they can, which IS love. Just because they are sinning without realizing it, and just because they are expressing love in a disordered fashion, does not change the fact that the actions are still done with love and pure intent.

 

[adrift]

It is not self-interested love to the homosexuals themselves, who see their relationship as doing the best for their partner and taking care of them as best they can, which IS love. Just because they are sinning without realizing it, and just because they are expressing love in a disordered fashion, does not change the fact that the actions are still done with love and pure intent.

You cannot sin without realizing it. You can deaden your conscience and say a sinful act is not a sin but that doesn’t change the reality that you are not doing the best thing for someone else. Actively homosexuals can only have self-interested love otherwise they wouldn’t be active.

 

[SMGS127]

You cannot sin without realizing it. You can deaden your conscience and say a sinful act is not a sin but that doesn’t change the reality that you are not doing the best thing for someone else. Actively homosexuals can only have self-interested love otherwise they wouldn’t be active.

That isn’t true at all -_-. When I was dating my ex-girlfriend, all I wanted in the world was for her to be happy. I could care less about my own personal pleasure from the relationship. We talked for 8-10 hours a day, just trying to each stay up with each other’s lives, and we were always there for each other when the other was upset or hurt.

At the time, I thought religion was ridiculous because I had grown up with Methodist parents and surrounded by a homophobic media and culture that taught that people who were attracted to members of the same sex were “less attractive” than heterosexuals and just weren’t trying hard enough to like the opposite sex.

Obviously, later I gained an appreciation of Catholicism, but I had no working knowledge of the religion, of true, non-Protestant Christianity, when I was actively lesbian. And I guarantee you everything I did for every single one of my ex-girlfriends was out of love, even though I understand now the consequences of my actions on our souls.

 

[Sultan_Of_Swing]

Thank you for all the answers guys. They’ve helped!

Personally, taking into consideration what you’ve all said, I guess homosexuals can feel strong emotions of philia, eros and even agape with each other, and these things are of God, however that does not mean they are related in the slightest to their homosexual relationship itself and the sex act itself, as two extremely close friends could feel the same things but with no sexual relationship.

Is that a fair understanding?

 

[SMGS127]

Well, while I will qualify what I am about to say by completely affirming the Church’s teaching that homosexual activity is gravely sinful, I will say this. When I would have physicality with my ex-girlfriend, it was like being able to go to a different world; it made me feel super-close to her and the happiness I was able to bring her through it meant more to me than anything in the world. In addition, the physicality greatly increased the deep affection I had for her and the love I had, wanting to do everything for her. I’d imagine sex is similar for heterosexual couples, just properly ordered. I think homosexuals experience love in exactly the same way as heterosexuals do with each other from a physical and emotional standpoint. The spiritual standpoint is where the two sexualities differ.

So no, I wouldn’t call it the same love as between two friends. It might appear so externally but it is certainly a stronger love. However, none of this changes the Church’s teaching of course. But I do believe that the strong passionate love one feels for their partner can exist whether straight or gay. It’s the obedience to God that is present or not present. I have chosen to stop having relationships with women in order to be obedient to God, not because I somehow can’t love women in the same way.

 

[Rau]

Thank you for all the answers guys. They’ve helped!

Personally, taking into consideration what you’ve all said, I guess homosexuals can feel strong emotions of philia, eros and even agape with each other, and these things are of God, however that does not mean they are related in the slightest to their homosexual relationship itself and the sex act itself, as two extremely close friends could feel the same things but with no sexual relationship.

Is that a fair understanding?

I don’t understand what you mean by the bolded text. In an environment of love where one believes a sexual relationship is a proper component, then one will likely exercise that component. Sexual engagement is progressive - affection leading to a desire to be ‘close’, leading to an arousal, leading to increased arousal leading to sex. I would imagine that homosexual relationships may experience the same progression.

Love alone does not confer morality on all actions that may be attributed to it, nor a right to proceed all the way down that progression. It is a necessary, but not sufficient precondition.

 

[mgoforth]

But I do believe that the strong passionate love one feels for their partner can exist whether straight or gay.

Strong feelings can exist in many contexts. But that’s not really the definition of marital love in a Christian sense. The true definition of the love Christ intends for married people is the same that He has for the Church.

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her” Ephesians 5:25

Christ indeed has strong feelings toward the Church, but that’s not what His love is. His love is the choice to give Himself up for us. To put our good as His highest priority and sacrifice Himself to achieve it.

It’s the same type of love that He asks of Peter toward the end of John’s Gospel:

"A third time he asked him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter was hurt that Jesus asked the question a third time. He said, “Lord, you know everything. You know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Then feed my sheep.” John 21:17

In the Greek, Jesus asks if Peter loves Him using the word “agape”, meaning “unconditional, self-sacrificing” love. Peter responds using the word “phileo”, meaning “brotherly love”. Of course, later Peter learned to have agape love for Christ.

The point is that agape is not an emotion. It’s not a “strong passionate love one feels”, although those strong feelings may accompany agape at times. Agape is a choice.

We’ve all heard that if you love someone, you have to set them free. I think of a little child who wants to have a wild animal as a pet, but the parent gently convinces him that living in a cage is not what’s best for the animal. God, of course, is the perfect fulfillment of this idea. He gives us free will itself so that we can choose to love Him or not.

In the same sense, the only way that someone with homosexual attractions can show Christian love for another person with similar attractions is to “set them free”. To participate with them in a sexual relationship is like caging their soul. It’s not what’s ultimately best for them.

 

[mgoforth]

I don’t understand what you mean by the bolded text. In an environment of love where one believes a sexual relationship is a proper component, then one will likely exercise that component. Sexual engagement is progressive - affection leading to a desire to be ‘close’, leading to an arousal, leading to increased arousal leading to sex. I would imagine that homosexual relationships may experience the same progression.

Yes, but those stages of progression you describe are not love, they’re emotions. Christian marital love is not an emotion, it’s a choice.

That’s one indication of its sacramental nature. It’s a choice to move closer to God ultimately. The spouse becomes the partner in moving toward God, and the two help each other along the way. In doing so they should imitate the self-sacrificing love Christ has for the Church, as well as the trusting obedience the Church shows Christ.

Unfortunately, what most people think of as love is actually affection, as you correctly labeled it. It’s more of a chemical reaction than anything else. Christian love is not bound by affection, and can exist where there’s no affection at all. Feelings are a “nice-to-have”, but they’re not love.