Understand The Times, International

In a section of his New Testament letter to the Romans (1:22-27) dealing with God�s admonitions against same-sex relations, St. Paul was actually writing about heterosexuals who engage in same-sex acts and not homosexuals, said the Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, the first openly gay bishop in the Episcopal church.

So my question is, was St. Paul right in�about engaging in homosexual acts as being against nature?� Bishop Robinson answered: �The question you ask takes about two days to answer, but I�ll try to give you the Cliffs Notes version which is: One of the things we have to understand is that any piece of scripture needs to be understood in its own context. We have to understand that the notion of a homosexual sexual orientation is a notion that�s only about 125 years old.

�That is to say, St. Paul was talking about people that he understood to be heterosexual engaging in same-sex acts," said Bishop Robinson. "It never occurred to anyone in ancient times that a certain minority of us would be born being affectionally oriented to people of the same sex. So it did seem like against their nature to be doing so.�

Robinson added, �The question is, are there any answers there for what we�re asking today, which is the rightfulness of faithful, monogamous, lifelong-intentioned relationships between people of the same sex, and the Bible simply does not address that.�

CNSNews.com asked the follow-up question, �So you would say then that St. Paul is incorrect in this passage?� Bishop Robinson said, �No. I think St. Paul was absolutely correct in his own context given what he knew, and given the behavior which he was describing. The questions we�re asking today are about a completely different set of circumstances.�