NON-STRAIGHT HUMAN RELATIONS AND CHRISTIAN SPIRITUALITY

NON-STRAIGHT HUMAN RELATIONSHIPS AND CHRISTIAN SPIRITUALITY

From inception, God made it clear in Genesis 2:24 that a man must leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife and they shall become one flesh. With this idea, families were built around a man and a woman who were married with the consent of their respective fathers and mothers.

The family has been the basic units of society since creation with the man being the head and the woman being a co-head whose traditional duty has been to keep her husband in check to perfect the activities of the man as head. Marriage was in place before the Tower of Babel was built. It was in place before God confused the language and cultures of all people. It is interesting to note that every culture holds marriage in great esteem! Though there are different methodologies and requirements for joining a man and woman together, every culture has it in one way or the other.

UNIVERSAL REASONS FOR MARRIAGE
Marriage can be seen as the legitimate institution within which sex and romantic love can be given and taken to satisfy the natural desires of the human being.
Through marriage, procreation takes place and children are born to continue the human existence.
Also, through marriage, the weaknesses of a man can be complemented with the strength of a woman. Whereas the weaknesses of a woman can also be taken up by a man who may have the strengths in that field.

However, over the years, certain people have been involved in unnatural relationships. These unnatural relationships put sexual pleasure ahead of the main divine reasons for marriage. there are several types and they are outlined below:

AUTOSEXUALITY
Autosexuality or Autoeroticism is the sexual stimulation or sexual desires towards one’s own self. The British sexologist Havelock Ellis, defined autoeroticism as the phenomena of spontaneous sexual emotion generated in the absence of an external stimulus proceeding, directly or indirectly, from another person.

By definition, autosexuality involves people who have natural sex with the aim of satisfying themselves alone. However, the commost form of autosexuality is masturbation. In the world today, there is a wide range and varieties of sex toys meant to stimulate people sexually. Some of these toys are inflated to become like real human beings and they are controlled electronically to provide stimulation similar to natural sexual intercourse.

In the Bible, a case of autosexuality occurs in Genesis 38 which describes Onan. It says:

38:8 And Judah said unto Onan, Go in unto thy brother's wife, and marry her, and raise up seed to thy brother.38:9 And Onan knew that the seed should not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in unto his brother's wife, that he spilled it on the ground, lest that he should give seed to his brother.38:10 And the thing which he did displeased the LORD: wherefore he slew him also.
in standard English, the word onanism is synonymous with masturbation. Because God slew Onan for seeking his own sexual pleasure instead of procreation, autosexuality is frowned upon by many churches. The Roman Catholic Church for instance considers the use of condoms and birth control as sinful and similar to the sins of Onan.

HOMOSEXUALITY
Homosexuality is coined from the Greek prefix, ‘homo’ which means ‘same’ and he Latin root, ‘sex’ which means ‘sex’ or ‘gender’. Homosexuality has been kept in darkness for a long time. Its first known appearance in print is found in an 1869 German pamphlet by the Austrian-born novelist Karl-Maria Kertbeny, published anonymously. It involves people of the same sex, having sexual relationships together or living intimately as a husband and wife is supposed to do naturally.

The term homosexual can be used to describe individuals' sexual orientation, sexual history, or self-identification. Many people reject the term "homosexual" as too clinical and dehumanizing as it the word only refers to one's sexual behavior, and does not refer to non-sexual romantic feelings. As a result, the terms gay and lesbian are usually preferred when discussing a person of this sexual orientation, whose sexual history is predominated by this behavior, or who identifies as such. The first letters are frequently combined to create the acronym LGBT (which is also written as GLBT, in which B and T refer to bisexuals and transgender individuals). Bisexuals are people who have sexual attraction to both males and females. they are opposed to monosexuals who are either strictly heterosexuals or homosexuals. Some same-sex oriented people personally prefer the term "homosexual" rather than "gay", as they may perceive the former as describing a sexual orientation and the latter as describing a cultural or socio-political group with which they do not identify.
Researchers like Stephen O. Murray classifies homosexuality in three classes:
1. Egalitarian: This features two partners with no age limits. They both consider themselves as equal and they undertake their sexual activites with each other. Each of them will take turns in doing the same thing to the other.
2. Gender structured: In this type, each partner plays a different gender role. Whereas one plays the role of ‘husband’, the other would be considered as ‘wife’. Amongst lesbians, the ‘man’ is called ‘butch’ and the ‘wife’ is called ‘femme’.
3. Age structured: This involves two partners of different ages. Amongst men, this is sometimes referred to as pederasty which involves a man and a boy. The man keeps the boy for his sexual pleasure. This can be traced to the ancient Greeks and the other warring communities like the Roman soldiers and the Japanese Samurai who had anal sex with boys with the belief that the will be braver on the battlefield and the boys would also grow to become brave warriors in the future.
The Kinsey scale attempts to measure and record the number of people involved in homosexuality. In the United States during the 2004 elections, exit polls indicated 4% of all voters identified themselves as gay or lesbian. However, due to societal pressures, many who are homosexual may not be willing to identify as such.
In Canada, a 2003 report by Statistics Canada indicated that among Canadians aged 18 to 59, 1% reported that they are homosexual, and 0.7% reported to be bi-sexual.
In North Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia, where gender- or age-structured relationships are the rule, male homosexual practices are reported to be widespread, engaged in by many individuals secretly, who do not regard themselves as homosexual.
Homosexuality does not occur in animals. There are a few alleged ‘occurances’ in animal species closer to human beings like gorillas and dolphins. These cases have not been proven so strongly.

ATTEMPTS TO DESTROY THE PRACTICE
Homosexuality has at times been used as a scapegoat by governments facing problems. Notable examples include Nazi Germany's treatment of homosexuality based on the understanding that it was a threat to masculinity as well as contaminating the "Aryan race". During the early 14th century, accusations of homosexual behaviour were instrumental in disbanding the Knights Templar under Philip IV of France. In the 1950s, politicians in the United States tried to discredit Senator Joseph McCarthy by noting one of his aides was homosexual. A recent instance is the burning of 6,000 books of homoerotic poetry of 8th c. Persian-Arab poet Abu Nuwas by the Egyptian Ministry of Culture in January 2001, to placate Islamic fundamentalists.

HOMSEXUALITY AND THE LAW TODAY
In most developed countries, same-sex relationships are accepted, and are accorded legal protection. Many governments have established formal structures for confirming legal relationships (either as marriage or partnership) between people of the same sex. They are however not given the right to adopt children.
In some cultures homosexuality it is still considered unnatural and has been outlawed (see sodomy law, victimless crime). In some Muslim nations (such as Iran) it remains a capital crime.
The homosexual activist groups continue to seek the legalisation of the act. They form groups that are organised into gay and lesbian clubs and discos where they meet. In Europe and the Americas a homosexual man is identified by his dressing. A man who wears an earring on his right ear is a homosexual. Men who wear earrings on their left ear however, are not gay.
NATURE VERSUS NURTURE DEBATES
Many people consider homosexuality to be a natural thing that people are born with. Others also believe that it is a habit that is developed over the years by contact with other people who were homosexuals or lesbians. In actual fact, many involved in homosexuality approach psychiatrists and psychologists with tears to receive therapy secretly but they are never successful. This connotes that they do not like the habit or they consider their sexual life as being negative inwardly.

Manifestation of homosexuality has often been attributed to the confinement of people of the same sex in a restricted area like boarding schools and prisons. Due to this, most armies do not take up homosexuals. However, in the US Army, if you are a homosexual and you reveal it, you will be thrown out but if you disclose it by your actions or say it, you will be thrown out this is the ‘Don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy. Homosexuality is often disregarded by many but when they come in contact with practicing homosexuals, they find it appealing afterwards. It can be said to be contageous.

Others however insist that some people are born into the act. They are never initiated into homosexuality but they initiate others into the act. This debate has been going on for many years and it has been used by homosexual activists to gain equality in rights for many years.

RELIGION AND HOMOSEXUALITY
In many Non-Abrahamic religions, homosexuality has been considered sacred. However, with Abrahamic relgions like Christianity, Judaism and Islam, homosexuality has been frowned on. The most critical is Islam which in some places have a death penalty for the act.

In the Roman Catholic Church, homosexuality is seen as a disorder and against natural law. They do not encourage it in their churches. However, many challenges have sprang up against this policy in recent times. Amongst the Anglican and the Liberal Protestants, attitudes have been liberalised but many still see homosexuality as sinful.

THE BIBLE AND HOMOSEXUALITY
The Bible has a straight verdict towards homosexuality. From the Old Testament to the New Testament, homosexuality is condemned totally. The earliest account was in Genesis 19, where it is observed that the men of Sodom were mainly homosexuals and they were involved in gang rape since they tried to rape God when He visited Lot as a Man. Homosexuality has therefore been identified with Sodom and lesbianism with Gomorrah. The verdict pronounced on the citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah by God was blindness followed by total destruction of the city by sulphurs of fire.

After Genesis 19, Leviticus 18 outlines many unnatural human relationships. In verse 22, God says “Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.” The penalty for this act and all the rest is given in verse 29 which says “whosoever shall commit any of these abominations, even the souls that commit them shall be cut off from among their people.”

In the New Testament, Paul said somehting about homosexuality and lesbianism in Romans 1 that

1:22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,1:23 And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.1:24 Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:1:25 Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
1:26 For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:1:27 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 recompence of their error which was meet.
It appears that Paul did not see homosexuality as sin. Instead, he saw it as an ‘uncleanness’ inflicted on people as a result of excessive sin amongst a people against God. It was a form of spiritual state of human beings more extreme than the ordinary because the practitioners feel they are so wise and through that, have resorted to practising homosexuality or lesbianism.

Paul saw it as something you graduate into when your sins multiply into iniquities. From spiritual analysis of Paul’s definition of the act, homosexuals and lesbians would need to break the ‘foolishness’ or ‘animalistic view of God’ placed upon them before they can come back into a position where they can benefit from the salvation of Jesus Christ fully.

REAL LIFE SITUATION
Personally, when growing up in a boarding school in Ghana, Africa where homosexuality was unthinkable and could not be perceived by any of us as children, there was a classmate who was identified by the younger boys as molesting them with homosexuality. Everyone discarded it because nobody could understand what the younger ones were talking about. This boy was born in London and he was always accused as touching other people in funny and wrongful ways. Nobody could apprehend him further because nobody could imagine what homosexuality was.

Years after leaving basic school, the boy entered a boarding secondary school and in his final year, he was dismissed for having a homosexual affair with another student. It was then that the issue dawned on everyone that all those evil reports of his homosexuality were true. Surprisingly, none of his brothers born in Ghana had the history of homosexuality.

After encountering the Ministry of Deliverance, I have come to realise that the boy was under the influence of controlling forces. Probably, whilst his mother was pregnant with him, she came in contact with a homosexual who transferred the spirit of homosexuality into him. Another possibility is that during his birth, his mother was assisted by a homosexual doctor who transferred the spirit into him or as he was growing up, there was a modification by a homosexual who transferred the spirit to him. These are the only logical spiritual explanations for a boy who grew up in a society where nobody knew anything about homosexuality.

Assuming this boy had grown up in London where homosexuals are recognised, he would have argued that he was born as a homosexual. This would have been a total misconception.


OBSERVATION

Homosexuality is a spirit that can be transferred mainly through sexual intercourse with a homosexual.
Spiritually, homosexuality becomes a bondage and a controlling force that manipulates the people who are involved in it
Homosexuality is a spiritual thing that is beyond other ‘ordinary’ spiritual statuses and to benefit from the salvation of Jesus Christ, one’s spiritual status must be stabilised to get even with God.

HOW THE CHURCH CAN BE VERY EFFECTIVE IN FIGHTING HOMOSEXUALITY
Homosexuals and lesbians are normal human beings like everyone else. Jesus Christ came to die to save everybody if and only if he or she believes! Salvation is not for Christians in the church only, but people outside the church who are prepared to follow the principles and teachings of Jesus Christ, rooted in the law of God outlined in the Old Testament.

However, it is outlined in I Corinthians 3 states that that:

3:16 Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?3:17 If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.3:18 Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise.3:19 For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness.

It is therefore outlined clearly that to benefit fully from the salvation of Jesus Christ, one has to accept, believe and confess Jesus Christ as His Saviour and also follow the principles of Jesus Christ. With this scripture in the Bible, it is difficult for homosexuality to be allowed in the life of a Christian. This scripture makes it difficult for a homosexual to have personal fellowship with God in a clear conscience. This draws two lines in the life of a homosexual or lesbian; whether to choose from practising his or her sexual orientation or following Christianity. Many end up shunning Christianity altogether because they accept their status as one they cannot change.

Since homosexuality is an extreme spiritual state, it is only the concept of deliverance that can break people from the bondage it brings. Since there are many people who cry and sob each day because they are autosexuals, homosexuals and lesbians and they want to change, there is the need for churches with the unction for deliverance to step into the case. The best way out would be to encourage homosexuals and lesbians to come into the church and then subject them to a special programme preferably prayers and fasting through which they can be delivered. Because this concept of deliverance is not common in USA and Europe, many of the homosexuals and lesbians have accepted their status as normal and this makes them come out to demand for their rights. Salvation message cannot be of much benefit to them as implied by the Apostle Paul. However, a strong deliverance message can knock out the practise spiritually from the root.

For spiritual direction in breaking away from the practise of homosexuality and lesbianism through spiritual deliverance, the following websites could be beneficial for counselling and direction; www.purefire.20m.com and www.mountain-of-fire.com

References:
Wikipedia Encyclopaedia