Christians speak up for gays, civil union

By RUTH BERRY

Christians in favour of the Civil Union Bill yesterday took issue with groups who use the Bible to condemn homosexuality, saying the few Sodom and Gomorrah-type references are open to interpretation.

The Rev Margaret Mayman delivered the challenge in front of the parliamentary committee hearing submissions on the bill.

She was speaking on behalf of a Wellington-based ecumenical group, Christians for Civil Unions, set up out of a concern that the only Christian voices in the public debate were conservative and condemned gays and lesbians.

Ms Mayman said the group believed that in a secular country, contested religious values should not be imposed on the choices people made about their lives. But since a number of Christian groups opposing the bill and the accompanying Relationships (Statutory References) Bill had referred to the Bible and theology to back up their claims, the group wanted to point out that "theirs is only one Christian interpretation".

"Christian opposition to homosexuality is often supported by random Bible quotations," she said.

In fact, only six verses of the Bible referred to homosexual acts.

"It is widely accepted among biblical scholars that the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were not destroyed because they practised homosexuality, but because they failed to practise hospitality to the stranger."

Biblical ethics, written over 1000 years, varied but generally shared a concern for procreation and the continuation of the patriarchal family, Ms Mayman said.

But it was a fact that "most sexual activity in the developed world is not for the purposes of procreation but for intimacy, joy, and hopefully the expression of love".

"The Bible simply does not explicitly address loving, long-term, committed relationships between two people of homosexual orientation..

"Biblical people thought the Earth was flat, that women were the property of men and that slavery was an acceptable social institution.

"God gave us brains and the knowledge to use them, and the knowledge we have gained over the centuries includes understanding about the diversity of human sexuality."

Labour MP Taito Phillip Field asked Ms Mayman whether there could be more than one interpretation of "homosexuality is an abomination to God".

Ms Mayman said the verse actually said a man should not lie with another man "as he lies with a woman".

This revealed the writer had no concept of a distinct homosexual identity.

The bill

The Civil Union Bill sets up the legal status of a civil union for straight and gay couples.

For the first time it allows same-sex couples to have legal recognition of their relationships.

The accompanying Relationships (Statutory References) Bill changes more than 100 laws to end discrimination against civil union and de facto couples.

About 350,000 in de facto marriages do not have the same legal rights as married couples.