Interesting Piece by Melinda Selmys<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"She is\u00a0a chaste and faithful\u00a0same sex attracted woman\u00a0who has become a Catholic and chosen to pursue heterosexual marriage.\u00a0 She writes here on how to\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/markshea\/2013\/04\/interesting-piece-by-melinda-selmys.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Interesting Piece by Melinda Selmys\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"She is\u00a0a chaste and faithful\u00a0same sex attracted woman\u00a0who has become a Catholic and chosen to pursue heterosexual marriage.\u00a0 She writes here on how to\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" 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{"id":43382,"date":"2013-04-02T09:12:22","date_gmt":"2013-04-02T16:12:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/markshea\/?p=43382"},"modified":"2014-12-29T23:46:05","modified_gmt":"2014-12-30T06:46:05","slug":"interesting-piece-by-melinda-selmys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/markshea\/2013\/04\/interesting-piece-by-melinda-selmys.html","title":{"rendered":"Interesting Piece by Melinda Selmys"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

But Mark, you\u2019ve been plenty critical of gays too.\u00a0 Sure.\u00a0 I write defenses of the Church\u2019s teaching against militant gays who attack it.\u00a0 But I\u2019ve also written repeatedly on same-sex attracted people who live faithfully according to the teaching of Jesus Christ<\/a>.\u00a0 So my posture with respect to homosexuality is to defend against attacks from that sector and highlight, where possible, examples of SSA folk who demonstrate discipleship.<\/p>\n

What I tend to avoid is telling SSA people what they need to be doing.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 C.S. Lewis explains it all for you.\u00a0 He tells us in Surprised by Joy<\/em> that he never commented on two sins: pederasty (rampant in the school he attended) and excessive gambling.\u00a0 That was because they were two sins to which he himself felt no temptation and since he always resented it when the officers gave moral lectures to their subordinates on matters they themselves were not struggling with, so he refused to do it himself.\u00a0 He then goes on and tells us that if we are wondering about all the other sins he does comment on in places like the Screwtape Letters<\/em>, the answer is \u201cYes.\u00a0 I have been tempted to all of them.\u201d\u00a0 Elsewhere he says, \u201cMy heart\u2013I need no other\u2019s\u2013showeth me the wickedness of the ungodly.\u201d<\/p>\n

The reason I don\u2019t hand out free advice to homosexuals is that I have never been tempted to homosexuality.\u00a0 I also don\u2019t hand out free advice to heroin addicts for the very simple reason that I have never been tempted to drug abuse, particularly with any drug involving (brrrr) needles.\u00a0 Lewis remarks, in a way that will scandalize Pharisees, that his failure to be tempted in the area of pederasty and gambling probably signals the lack of some corresponding virtue.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat!\u201d the Pharisee squawks, \u201cWhat could possibly be virtuous about pederasty?\u201d<\/p>\n

Well, nothing.\u00a0 Just as there is nothing virtuous about excessive gambling or heroin addiction.\u00a0 But since sin is disordered love, there is some love there which, rightly ordered, would be virtuous, such as noble friendship (now often taken for pederasty even when it is only friendship), or the courage to take risks (which is what excessive gambling and even the person experimenting with drugs\u00a0perverts).\u00a0 In Lewis\u2019 case, I think his immense capacity for rightly ordered friendship precluded a homosexual temptation and his (self-confessed) cowardice made him too timid to be tempted to gambling.\u00a0 I suspect my own ineptitude for passionate friendships and loves has rendered me immune from homosexual temptation.\u00a0 I have a lot of acquaintances, but few deep loves and friendships.\u00a0 It\u2019s something I would love the Holy Spirit to change in me, particularly with regard to friendship.\u00a0 I have a deep longing for true friendship.\u00a0 I suspect that part of the reason I both spend time on the web and find it so intensely frustrating is that I am looking for friendship in a place where it is not to be found.<\/p>\n

Anyway, I think Selmys\u2019 piece is interesting because she is speaking heart to heart with SSA persons who, like all the rest of us, long for Christ whether they realize it or not.\u00a0 She can do that because she\u2019s been there.\u00a0 I can\u2019t do that because I haven\u2019t.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"