Skip to main content
Log in

Sex, sin, and the church: The dilemma of homosexuality

  • Published:
Journal of Religion and Health Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

A parallel is suggested between the way blacks have been treated in this country with the way some people view homosexuality. A critique of the origins of the homosexuality taboo and of the argument that homosexual persons are uniquely pathological follows. Though the Judeo-Christian tradition seems to have played a negative role in the past, the contemporary church, in concert with other institutions, can generate a moral force to help overcome homophobia.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. The founding fathers, as a group, apparently deemed it self-evident that women, too, were inferior beings. Abigail Adams importuned her husband John to “remember the ladies” in formulating the new laws, but in vain. As a matter of fact, it took the fifteenth (and latest) edition of Bartlett'sFamiliar Quotations (first published in 1855), before Mrs. Adams and her notable ideas even made it into the book (1980 edition).

  2. Stanton, W.,The Leopard's Spots. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1960.

    Google Scholar 

  3. Szasz, T.,The Myth of Mental Illness. New York, Hoeber-Harper, 1961.

    Google Scholar 

  4. Hooker, E., quoted inPsychiatric Opinion Quarterly, 4, 3, June 1967, 31–32.

    Google Scholar 

  5. Fenichel, O.,The Psychoanalytic Theory of Neuroses. New York, W.W. Norton, 1945.

    Google Scholar 

  6. Cooley, C.H.,Human Nature and the Social Order. Glencoe, Ill., Free Press, 1956.

    Google Scholar 

  7. Baldwin, J.,Giovanni's Room. New York, Dial Press, 1956.

    Google Scholar 

  8. I Corinthians 11:7–9.

  9. United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.,Sexuality and the Human Community, 1970.

  10. Scalcione-Conti, D., ed.,A Voice for Lesbian and Gay Rights: Unitarian Universalism. Boston, UUA Pamphlet Commission (unpaginated), February 1986.

    Google Scholar 

  11. Largey, G., and Taft, L.,National Catholic Reporter, January 24, 1975 (National Opinion Research Center, National Sampling Data).

  12. Olmstead vs. United States, 277, US 438, 478 (1928).

  13. Quoted in Szasz, T.,Law, Liberty and Psychiatry. New York, MacMillan, 1968, p. 249.

    Google Scholar 

  14. Ibid..

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Additional information

This paper is based on a presentation to the annual meeting of the Association for the Scientific Study of Religion: Southwest, Dallas, Texas, March 1986.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Berliner, A.K. Sex, sin, and the church: The dilemma of homosexuality. J Relig Health 26, 137–142 (1987). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01533684

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01533684

Keywords

Navigation