[W]e also need faith communities to move beyond their traditional “non-marital chastity” ethic, so that we can engage unmarried adults seeking to make moral decisions about their sexuality. As a 30-year-old single man recently said to me, “Rev. Debra, how can I be a good Christian and still be sexual?”
–The Rev. Debra Haffner, director of the Religious Institute and Unitarian minister, who I suspect didn’t have the humility to respond to the young man with, “how the heck would I know?”
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May 3, 2010 at 9:07 pm
May I offer a translation?
You can’t have your cake and eat it too, buddy.
May 4, 2010 at 8:02 am
This is the danger that comes with the too often repeated slogan, “God accepts you just the way you are.”. This allows people like Haffner and many many others like her to offer the false blessing of a spiritual stamp of approval on an unchanged life. God doesn’t accept people just the way they are, and an authentically Christian community isn’t a bunch of folks affirming and celebrating each other’s unchanged status. Paul is very clear that God is about conforming us to the likeness of Christ (1C 15.49; 2C 3.18). By definition, this involves radical and comprehensive change in someone’s life if we accept the truth that we are sinful while Christ is not. God loves us so much that he doesn’t accept us just the way we are, but molds us and shapes us into something infinitely better. The potter/clay analogy of Jeremiah 18 is exactly on point here.
May 4, 2010 at 8:35 am
You’re exact;y right, Jason, though since Haffner isn’t a Christian, I doubt that she’d even understand what you’re talking about.
May 4, 2010 at 10:10 am
I guess Haffner wants to give the Nike answer: “Just do it”. Whatever happened to the cold showers? Maybe if Haffner were a Christian she would also know 2 Timothy 2:22 as well.
May 4, 2010 at 11:20 am
Have the guy read Proverbs 5 and ponder the differences between extra-marital and marital relations offered there?
May 4, 2010 at 1:08 pm
How about “Find a good woman and get married”?
May 4, 2010 at 2:13 pm
Doesn’t “the Rev. Debra” answer your question? If you aren’t going to be obedient to God regarding gender roles in the Church, why would you be obedient to God regarding human sexuality?