Your statement, “I leave aside the possibility (very real in my judgment) of people possessing an implicit faith in Jesus Christ that they may not have conscious knowledge of or committment to” is also very real in my own judgment.

Also, I’d say the Salzmann/Lawler book represents a weakness of Catholic moral theology, which tends toward conceptual refinements at many removes from the bible. This insulation from the bible serves them well, for the bible is saturated with male/female nuptial imagery.

I am glad for the attention of Omaha’s previous and current archbishops to this matter, and to the UCCSB. But why is it no faculty member on The Hilltop will publicly call a BS on these guys?

John 10:18 has nothing to do with question of God’s “unconditional love” for humanity. The question in 18a is whether Jesus is giving up his life of his own accord, or of another. Is he being coerced by some power outside himself? The answer is no: he gives up his life voluntarily.

To the general question: “Steve” wants me to “cut some slack”. Does he mean he wants me to engage in sloppy theology? Here, at what is probably the most theologically sophisticated site on the internet? With all due respect, no.

Given the lack of any other scriptural texts or theological analysis in response to my query, I’ll state my position non-dialectically:
Neither scripture nor classical Christianity teaches that God loves humanity, or individual humans, unconditionally.

Yhwh’s love for the Israelites is passional, and therefore conditional. I recognize that the covenant is an eternal covenant, yet the blessings of the covenant had certain conditions. Violation of those conditions brought divine wrath. God in his mercy for his chosen people restrain the full measure of his wrath (see e.g., Ezra 9:13).

In the New Testament, the standard remains conditional: at the final judgment “God will give to each person according to what he has done. … …it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous (Romans 2:6, 13b NIV).”

The central problem of Romans then becomes: given that Torah obedience remains the standard for eschatological justification, and given that it is kept by neither Gentile (Romans 1:18ff.) nor Jew (3:1-20), how can anyone be righteous? The righteousness that “comes though faith Jesus Christ to all who believe (Rom 3:22).”

That’s conditional.

I leave aside the possibility (very real in my judgment) of people possessing an implicit faith in a Jesus Christ that they might not have conscious knowledge of or commitment to. Still, at the very root of Christian teaching is conditionality in God’s plan for humanity.

This is even true for a Calvinist who may react to my Arminian formulation: an atonement that is operative only for those predestined for salvation is conditional on God’s sovereign, eternal decree.

Can a homosexual get to heaven? That’s God’s call. Can a Stalin get to heaven? I can theologically imagine a God who takes a person with utter depravity–wickedness only limited by our finitude–and through long ages, only deemed finite because they eventually end, purge and purify the wickedness from that person, so that God can in the eternity of his final decree, truly and justly declare him just.

But…..

the church remains bound by Scripture and Tradition. Effeminate men (malakoi) and those who bed another male (arsenokoites) will not get to the kingdom of God (1 Cor. 6:10)

There is no justification by grace through faith without sin. God does not need to forgive us if there is no eternal wrath against sin. If we remove judgment against wicknessness, the whole of the Christian proclamation vanishes into thin air.

As a matter of fact, by virtue of its being a sacrament–one of seven–”marriage” does belong to the church. Words matter. You can’t re-define the word “murder”, for example, without creating a moral disaster and societal havoc. Why should it be any different for the word “marriage”? Homosexuals can’t have marriage, but they are legally entitled to civil unions.

The issue here is really that of homosexuals wanting equal rights under the law, which is, rightly, guaranteed to all in the United States. We’ve made accomodations for non-Christian heterosexual civil unions, and now homosexuals believe they should be similarly indulged. From a legal point of view, I understand.

Unfortunately, they also believe that their civil unions should be viewed with the same sanctity we reserve for marriages performed sacramentally–that they should be able to be “married” in a church or, at least, enjoy a relationship that contains the same amount of social respectability and legitimacy.

Uh, no. My own parents were joined in a civil union. They loved each other and were married for more than 50 years, but they did not live the kind of life together that would have been enjoined on them by having it performed sacramentally. They didn’t make the same promises to God, to each other, and to their fellow man. Marriage in a church is substantially more than an opportunity to have a storybook wedding. (Yeah, I know many heterosexuals have faithlessly held their weddings in a church, but hypocrisy is no reason to further debase a Christian sacrament.)

The danger in allowing gays to “marry”, as opposed to having access to “civil unions” lies in the debasement and abandonment of the original, cherished, theology of a sacrament of the church. To my mind, it is an act of vandalism.

Sez who? Do heterosexual couples marry so they can have sex, or is sex just one way in which they express their love for each other? Why would gays be any different?

Anyway, what is a “committed loving relationship”?

It’s the kind that makes you want to marry.

Will do, as soon as I get a spare month.