| My wife, who is Catholic, attended mass one Sunday. I went with her and both of us heard from the priest, from the pulpit, that homosexual orientation was not sin, but just the homosexual acts are. It's rather confusing! I've always thought that the orientation and the act are all one, the act goes hand-in-hand with orientation, with all of it being sin. Am I correct?
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| Making a distinction between homosexual orientation and the act of homosexuality is confusing. We would have to ask what the person means by "homosexual orientation". It is sinful to have homosexual desires, even if they don't lead to homosexual activity. There is no doubt that a recovering homosexual person may struggle with homosexual thoughts and desires his or her entire life. Yet, those thoughts and desires are still sinful, just as it is sinful for man to have sexual thoughts and desires for someone other than his wife. Jesus said, "Anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.". This would also apply to a man who looks at another man lustfully, or a woman that looks at another lustfully.
It sounds as though the priest was trying to say that "God hates sin but loves the sinner". This, too, is a confusing statement. On the one hand, we can say that God loves us even when we sin. Yet, the fact remains that God hates the sinner as well as the sin. He condemns sinners and not just sins. He sends sinners, not sins, to eternal punishment.
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