Charts to Spur Conversations with Affirming and “Big Tent” Concerns

Written by Lora A. Copley

Background

I’ve been on a state university campus for about a year and a half now, and dialoguing with students –hearing their stories, examining ideas together–is one the best parts of my job. (Add refillable coffee and an open Bible, and voilà, chef’s kiss. )

Like all of us, I don’t approach these conversations as a blank slate. I happen to come with a worldview formed by the Bible and 2,000 years of Christian articulation on doctrine and ethics. So when our campus group (Areopagus at Iowa State University) explored the matter of sexual ethics this past fall, we did so from the perspective of the historic Christian sex ethic. We were helped in our discussions by Butler’s Beautiful Union, Butterfield’s Five Lies of Our Anti-Christian Age, Pearcy’s The Toxic War on Masculinity, and especially by Dr. Preston Sprinkle’s Does the Bible Support Same-Sex Marriage? (You could put these all on your “read next” list. They are that good.) What follows are two charts much indebted to particularly Sprinkle’s work. (It is also much indebted to the Areopagus student group for their insights and dialogue. Thank you, team!)

What These Are and Are Not

A few thoughts on how to understand these charts:

●    These charts are not intended to bypass conversation. Far from it! Rather the hope is they will encourage good listening and conversation. Sometimes we get intimidated by the intensity of the cultural moment and so we shut down, not engaging at all with friends who think differently. We need on-ramps and frameworks to get a sense of the issues and gain equilibrium enough to even begin a conversation.   

●    These charts are not complete. More can, and should, be said. I may have gotten some things wrong too, and there may good counterpoints to any of the points for consideration. These charts are starting blocks, not finish lines. So let’s not view these charts as a kind of  “answer key” for any of these important debates. Again, our hope is to provide a tool so conversation is engaged and augmented.

●    Finally, these charts are of limited value. We humans are complex creatures – a mix of rational, emotional, intuitional, relational, and contextual (not to mention, spiritual and sinful!) parts. These charts approach these affirming and big tent concerns only on one level –the intellectual. Many other levels need to be engaged if you are hoping to touch a heart or change a mind. But we think it all starts with relationships, and relationships are helped by talking.

So let’s get to it! May God use the charts of conversation to help you as you have good conversations of your own.

“Examine everything carefully. Hang on to what’s good; say no to every kind of evil.” 1 Thes. 5:21

We started our discussion by identifying points of agreement between three views of sexual ethics.  Here are a few points all three views would agree on:

1)     We agree that people are people and are to be loved; we esteem each human as His image bearer;

2)     We agree that sex is a beautiful gift from God– it is bigger than a purely chemical or physiological phenomenon; 

3)     We agree that there is complexity regarding the origin and interplay of temptation, attraction, inborn desire, indwelling sin, and inclination. 

4)     We agree that God does have lines regarding sexual expression, for human flourishing.

From there, we engaged in two categories of conversation:

The first category is the affirming category; these arguments posit that there are good reasons to revise the historic Christian sex ethic and affirm same-sex marriage (chart 1).

The second category presents arguments of a “big tent” nature-- that same-sex marriage is a disputable matter and therefore both a historical sex ethic and an affirming sex ethic may be subscribed to by Christ-followers (chart 2).

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Lora A. Copley is blessed to be a wife, a mother to four children and an ordained minister in the Christian Reformed Church. She serves as a director for Areopagus Campus Ministry, a ministry of the CRC classes of Iowa at Iowa State University.