Not Normal or Healthy

After reading this commentary, some might accuse me of being homophobic. If by that they mean I hate or fear homosexuals, I plead innocent with a clear conscience. (As the saying goes. “Love the sinner; hate the sin.”) However, if they mean I hate or fear what the radical gay-rights agenda and the “gay lifestyle” are doing to individuals and to society, then I proudly say: “Guilty as charged.”

It’s interesting that homosexual-rights advocates have been able to successfully label critics with the ad hominem charge of “homophobia,” as if this is some kind of recognized mental illness. Doubly interesting, since only in the last three decades have the American Psychiatric Association and the American Psychological Association rejected thousands of years of social norms and religious teaching to declare that homosexuality is not a disorder in itself.

Actually, the evidence continues to show that homosexuality is a profound disorder that should prompt compassion and treatment, not gay-pride parades. As a matter of fact, “gay” is an ironic label for people made in the image of God who are trapped in homosexuality. According to two studies published in the Archives of General Psychiatry, homosexually oriented men and women experienced higher rates of psychiatric disorders than their heterosexual counterparts.

And another study, of 7,000 homosexuals in the Netherlands, found: “Homosexual men had a much larger chance of having had 12-month and lifetime bipolar disorders, and a higher chance of having had lifetime major depression.... the greatest differences were found in obsessive-compulsive disorder and agoraphobia. The 12-month prevalences of agoraphobia, simple phobia, and obsessive-compulsive disorder were higher in homosexual men than in heterosexual men.”

There are many factors involved in homosexuality, including genetics, dysfunctional family relationships, personal choice, and sexual abuse. Supporting the idea that homosexuality is not normal or healthy, the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality notes that many homosexual men were victims of homosexual abuse when they were children who were lonely and starved for male attention, thus throwing off their internal sexual gyroscopes.

“When this lonely boy receives flattering attention from an older male, then a link is established between love and homoerotic sex,” NARTH says. “The boy comes to believe, ‘If I want love from men, I must have sex with them.’ Thus the normal and natural developmental need of same-sex love and approval has become eroticized. The boy may then develop a compulsive, promiscuous sexual habit pattern, which in gay life is seen fairly frequently.”

While gay-rights advocates strongly deny any link between homosexuality and pedophilia (denying through torturous reasoning that a homosexual act is a homosexual act), consider the following facts presented by Timothy Dudley of the Family Research Council:

· Almost all pedophiles are males;
· Although heterosexuals outnumber homosexuals in the general population by roughly 20 to one, as many as a third of child sexual abuse victims are boys;
· A study in Archives of Sexual Behavior found that homosexual men are commonly attracted to young males;
· Homosexual researchers found that 73 percent of homosexuals had sex with males aged 16 to 19—or younger.

It’s no wonder, then, that the Catholic Church in the United States found itself embroiled in a massive scandal in which priests took advantage of their spiritual role to abuse children. Many of the incidents were homosexual in nature. It’s also no wonder that last month Pope Benedict XVI approved stricter new rules to ban homosexuals—even those who are celibate—from the priesthood. (The church’s catechism calls homosexuality “objectively disordered.”)

Yet while homosexuals constitute only between 1 and 3 percent of the American people, they wield influence far beyond their numbers. Their leaders seek not just tolerance of the “gay lifestyle” (which is not hard to get in today’s pluralistic climate), but active affirmation that homosexuality is normal and healthy. This is the reason for the incessant push for so-called “gay marriage” and for efforts in many denominations to allow practicing homosexuals to be church leaders (in open defiance of Christian doctrine).

In addition, these advocates wish to punish anyone who holds a contrary view. For example, on September 28 the Republican-controlled House of Representatives provided 223 votes for a “hate crimes” bill that lists “sexual orientation” as a specially protected class. Similar measures have been introduced in several states, Canada, and Sweden.

Of course, no right-thinking American would sanction hatred or violence against people caught in homosexuality, but critics fear these kinds of laws eventually could be used to restrict the free speech of Americans who refuse to toe the politically correct line on homosexuality.

Like this one.