Musings on the Gay Gene

In response to the gay marriage issue and his Christian faith, Dem presidential candidate Howard Dean made the remark that:

"The overwhelming evidence is that there is very significant, substantial genetic component to it. From a religious point of view, if God had thought homosexuality is a sin, he would not have created gay people."

Mark Byron makes some interesting points about the possibility of a gay gene that is said to predispose some to be homosexual. In essence, Byron notes that natural selection would have some say as to the elimination the gay gene from the pool.

David Heddle's point is that the acceptance of a gay gene or not is immaterial to theological debate:

I will make a bold, inflammatory statement: Any Christian who thinks it is vital to affirm that homosexuals are not born that way is severely deficient in his or her understanding of a vital Christian doctrine: Original Sin.

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The scientific question is really just a secondary-cause issue. God uses gravity to move the planets around. No doubt He could use our genes to encode original sin."

Heddle makes a great point and returns the crisis away from existence back towards the issue, "So now what do we do?" What must be asked is given such propensity, is a person still in charge of and in control of their actions?

Genetics aside, Byron then moves on from the existence of the gay gene to the question of, "What now?" I found agreement with this quote from Byron:

". . .If you have a genetic disposition to do something is it's OK to do it? No. Some people are predisposed to violence, yet we'll still punish them when they do so. . . .We're all sinners and we were born that way. That still doesn't make it correct to sin. We're supposed to contain those desires that aren't good for us, even if we're prone to do them. Dean may well be correct in his genetics, but is wrong in his theology."

I agree wholeheartedly with Mark.

In my book, rejection of one's deeds is not rejection of the worth of the individual. In this case, disapproval of homosexual practice is not rejection of the individual. The various deeds (sinful or not) that a person carries out does not have say as to how God values the person. Indeed, Jesus saw through the deeds to love and serve those who were not within the religious high class. By extension, I am also held to value people just as much.

In practice, however, rejection of homosexuality has been and is viewed by a lot of people in society (on both sides of the debate) as rejection of the individual and the denial of worth. Because the practice of homosexuality has become such a part of the identity of those people who practice (and find community within) homosexuality, the debate against homosexuality attacks their very being*. It is also true on the opposite side. The debate has become so polarized that we have internalized the debate--to win and lose is a matter of personal identity.

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*This is interesting because what if we were to apply such a model of self worth to heterosexuals? We would say that a heterosexual's self worth is tied to their practice of heterosexuality and ties to the heterosexual community. Of course, this kind of model (applied to both homo- and hetero-) is a simplification because each individual finds self worth in more than one factor--hopefully.