Fr. Robert Hart on Opposing Caesar on Same-Sex "Marriage"
Dearly beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight of God, and in the face of this congregation, to join together this Man and this Woman in holy Matrimony; which is an honourable estate, instituted of God in the time of man's innocency, signifying unto us the mystical union that is betwixt Christ and his Church. (Book of Common Prayer)
Following the news of the Supreme Court's ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges on June 26, 2015, there have been warnings among the editorial writings in papers and posted on the internet to the effect that, having made same-sex "marriage" the law of the land, the courts might very well start taking away the religious liberties even of churches themselves. That may very well be true. Strange things are coming out of court rulings these days, and I would not dismiss anything as impossible anymore. What seems more likely in the foreseeable future, however, is that the government will take away tax-exempt status from churches that do not fall into line and that refuse to march in lockstep.
But whatever the powers-that-be may throw at us, no faithful Christian clergyman will ever, under any circumstances, perform a so-called same-sex wedding. It isn't going to happen; end of discussion. As St. Peter said, "We ought to obey God rather than men" (Acts 5:29). In response to the times we live in, that means (among other things) that the Church has no authority to recognize or perform same-sex "marriages." This is a matter of doctrine, coming from God and recorded in Scripture.
Some people speak as if they have never heard of civil disobedience. For a Christian, those words of St. Peter in Acts 5 lay the foundation for civil disobedience. Some may ask, "But what if they make us comply?" Or, "What if they rule against us in some future court case?" The answer remains, "We ought to obey God rather than men." For ancient Christians, this meant dying as martyrs rather than offering incense to Caesar as a god. And, indeed, we are speaking of choosing to obey either human authority or God when the two conflict. So, what has God revealed?
Clarity in God's Word
In Matthew 19, we have been given God's word on the matter. Here, Jesus quotes Genesis 2:24, but he deliberately modifies that passage by inserting the word "two" into it, thus ruling out polygamy for his followers. What we have, therefore, from the teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ, is his word that marriage is between one man and one woman (Matt. 19:4–6).
A little later Christ says that "some have made themselves eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven's sake" (v.12). Christians have always understood this to mean there are two states of life for believers. One is marriage, and the other is complete abstinence from sexual relations, whether one remains open to marriage in the future or lives as a celibate by vocation.
Also, we have the teaching of sacramental marriage, that is, that marriage is God's own work. For, after declaring that the married couple are "no more two, but one flesh," the Lord says, "What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder" (v.6). Not simply the Church, not simply the power of the state, not simply the man and woman making a covenant between themselves, but God makes the man and the woman one flesh. This is the sacramental marriage that we celebrate and bless in the Church.
Clarity in Vocabulary
Moreover, the vocabulary in both Genesis and Matthew makes it clear that two people of the same sex cannot be married in the eyes of God. The Hebrew words in Genesis are unmistakable. The words for "woman" and for "wife" are one and the same: ishah. The word for "man" is ish. The same applies to the Greek original in Matthew. The word for "wife" is gyne (from which comes the English word "gynecology"), which means a woman of any age, and which also means "wife."
Furthermore, this is in accord with the words from Jesus' own mouth: "Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female," making the following words obvious in meaning: "For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain [two] shall be one flesh" (vv. 4–5). Sexual complementarity, something two people of the same sex do not have and cannot have, was created by God for marriage as a sacramental bond, to produce children and establish the family.
It is quite understandable why the English Bible translators used the word "wife" rather than "woman" in both Genesis and Matthew. In English, to say that a man shall cleave to his woman might suggest something other than marriage to lazy ears, even though it is clear from the context that the only possible understanding of the words is in reference to the marriage relationship. But in this day and age, we need to know that both in Hebrew and in Greek the words for "woman" and "wife" are the same, with the obvious meaning of a married couple derived from the context.
Absurd Redefinition
I was made aware of some celebrity championing same-sex "marriage" with the argument that its advocates do not want to change the definition of what marriage is. That statement is absurd on the face of it. Of course it is a redefinition. In the whole history of the world, every civilization has known that sexual complementarity—male and female—is of the very essence of what marriage is. It has never been understood in any other way. From the teaching of Scripture we see why: marriage is literally a part of God's creation and not a man-made institution. Its roots do not originate in jurisprudence. It is a part of human nature itself, as anthropology confirms.
This celebrity went on to bring up women's suffrage and the civil rights movement as if there were a connection between those important accomplishments and this new thing. But there is no genuine connection, none whatsoever; only what some want to create by the power of suggestion rather than by reason and logic.
One might as well argue that a triangle has the right to be defined as a type of circle, and that expanding the definition of the word "circle" to include "triangular circles" would not change the nature of circularity. But if a circle can be defined as either triangular or round, then we have lost the distinctive meaning of the word "circle." The new definition is too inclusive to be meaningful. If the cause of recognizing a triangle as a circle were fortified by the ruling of a court, all that would happen is that mathematics teachers could no longer teach geometry—at least not legally.
Well, the courts could force mathematics teachers to obey, I suppose, if it ever came to that. But if they tell us to disobey God and to obey them instead, they would be wise to get this message and never forget it: We will not obey you under any circumstances, no matter what force you bring to bear upon us. Christians have been persecuted many times, and are being persecuted even to the death in faraway lands today. "We ought to obey God rather than men," and so we will. •
Robert Hart is Rector Emeritus of St. Benedict's Anglican Catholic Church in Chapel Hill, North Carolina (Anglican Catholic Church Original Province). He also contributes regularly to the blog The Continuum.
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