Participants:
Series Code: IC
Program Code: IC180114A
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00:01 The following program discusses sensitive issues
00:03 related to sexuality. 00:05 Parents are cautioned 00:06 this presentation may be too candid 00:08 for younger audiences. 00:31 Welcome to Intimate Clarity. 00:33 I'm Jason Bradley, 00:34 and here with me is Jennifer Jill Schwirzer. 00:37 She is a licensed professional counselor. 00:40 And today, we're going to be discussing a sensitive topic, 00:43 but it's a conversation we need to have. 00:46 Jen, is same sex attraction evidence that a person is gay? 00:50 That's a really good question, 00:52 and I think you probably think it is, right? 00:55 I would say so, yeah. 00:57 That's the way, yeah, you've always felt. 00:58 Well, the reality is not necessarily. 01:01 Of course there's a gamut, you know, 01:03 and we can't say one thing for every person's experience, 01:06 but many people experience same sex attraction. 01:11 Let me blow your mind with a statistic in one study, 01:15 it says that up to 60%... 01:16 This is just one study, and you know how research is, 01:19 so please don't, you know, I shared this with my husband, 01:21 he like had a visceral rage response. 01:25 Sixty percent boys. 01:26 Sixty percent of pre-adolescent boys 01:30 engage at some point 01:31 in some kind of same sex activity. 01:33 Sixty percent. 01:34 Yeah, yeah, you're freaking out like my husband did. 01:36 Yeah, I'm freaking out. That means like 40%... 01:39 Are the ones that don't. Wow. 01:42 Yeah, but the thing is that 01:45 whether the 60 is correct or not, it may not be, 01:47 I've read other pieces that say it's 37%, 01:49 you know, it's just different. 01:51 That's a high percentage. 01:52 Research is not always particularly accurate. 01:56 It can, you know, anyway, so don't bank too much on that, 01:59 but believe me, 02:01 and I'm speaking as a counselor here 02:03 that talks to people about their stories all the time, 02:05 a lot of people have same sex encounters, 02:06 particularly in boys. 02:08 Wow. 02:09 You know, pre-adolescent boys 02:11 are wildly experimental sexually 02:12 and if they don't have any guidance 02:14 and any parental supervision, 02:15 they get into all kinds of things. 02:17 And so having a same sex encounter 02:19 or even same sex attraction does not necessarily mean 02:25 that you are homosexually oriented. 02:29 There's an expression these days, 02:31 it's very popular in the politically correct set 02:35 if I can say it that way. 02:36 Okay. 02:38 That sexuality is fluid, and we love that statement 02:41 because, you know, we want to be able to wake up tomorrow, 02:44 and if I feel like being a man tomorrow, 02:46 I can be a man or if I feel like having, 02:48 you know, a relationship with a unicorn, 02:50 I can have a relationship with a unicorn. 02:52 Sexuality is fluid, you know, whatever says goes, 02:54 there's no boundaries, 02:56 this is said often in order to deny the idea 03:00 that there's any kind of form 03:01 or structure to human sexuality, 03:03 but... 03:04 Yeah, I mean that's crazy, like... 03:06 And then when you look at Satan... 03:08 Yeah. 03:09 Like, his whole thing is do as thou wilt, 03:12 whatever you want, do it. 03:13 You know, like, that's Satan's philosophy. 03:15 Okay. 03:16 But I would say that there's an element of truth 03:19 to sexuality is fluid. 03:20 Okay. 03:21 I don't think it's fluid in the sense 03:23 that it's morally okay to do anything you want to do, 03:25 but I do think that we will acclimate 03:28 to things that we do, 03:30 so we can develop an appetite through participation. 03:33 By beholding we become changed. Yes. 03:35 And by participating we become changed. 03:37 So in that sense sexuality is fluid. 03:40 So this is what's said over and over again 03:42 to give people license in that set, so to speak, 03:46 but then you imply 03:48 that someone who is homosexual or gay 03:51 could maybe be fluid enough 03:53 to be attracted to the opposite sex 03:56 and you're told you're a Nazi, you know, 03:58 so there's like inconsistency there. 04:00 That sounds like a double standard. 04:02 It is. It's not, yeah. 04:03 It's extremely inconsistent. Yeah. 04:05 So I believe that sexuality is fluid 04:07 in the sense that we will adapt to what we participate in 04:11 and often develop an appetite for the thing that we do. 04:14 And that can work for good or for evil. 04:17 This is Alfred Kinsey. 04:18 He's the first sexologist in the field of psychology. 04:21 He spoke, worked back in the 1900s, and he said, 04:25 "The histories 04:27 which have been available in the present study 04:30 make it apparent 04:32 that the heterosexuality or homosexuality 04:34 of many individuals is not an all or nothing proposition." 04:40 That was way back in the mid 1900s. 04:42 And I agree with him. Sometimes it is. 04:45 I was born heterosexual. 04:48 I was always, 04:50 you know, I've been that way my whole life. 04:51 I'm pretty much dyed in the wool so to speak, 04:53 and I assume that you are dyed in the wool heterosexual. 04:55 Yes, yes. 04:57 And there are people I believe 04:59 that are pretty much same sex attracted 05:03 from as early as they can remember. 05:05 And in that sense, we could say they're homosexually oriented, 05:09 but I think there's a whole gamut of people in between 05:12 that can have varying degrees of flexibility 05:14 on these issues. 05:16 And so I just propose that we accept that, 05:19 "Yeah, sexuality by and large is a fluid thing." 05:24 So there are various things 05:25 that can predispose us to same sex attraction, 05:27 I'd like to cover some of those. 05:29 Okay. 05:30 There are, I believe, biological factors, 05:33 there's a big discussion in the scientific world today 05:36 about whether there's a gay gene or not. 05:40 And I'll try to flesh this out real quickly, 05:42 the Christian opponents of the homosexual lifestyle 05:45 will often say, "Well, no. 05:46 There can't be anything genetic influencing homosexuality. 05:50 It has to be your choice 05:51 because if you were born that way, 05:53 then that means God made you flawed 05:55 and God makes everything perfect." 05:57 Well, I don't think that's a complete view 05:58 of human nature. 06:00 God says we're made perfect and then we fell. 06:02 Yeah. 06:04 And all kinds of deviancies and maladaptive tendencies 06:07 came into human experience at that time, 06:09 so just the fact that you have an inclination 06:13 does not mean that God baptizes that inclination. 06:17 So I believe people can be born 06:19 with predispositions towards sin, 06:22 and that doesn't mean that they have an excuse 06:24 to commit that sin. 06:25 Yeah, if you're born, 06:28 you know, predisposed to being an alcoholic 06:31 or whatever the case may be, 06:32 it doesn't mean 06:33 that you have to venture down that path. 06:35 That's right. 06:36 My dad had a terrible temper, 06:37 I believe I received the genetics of his bad temper, 06:40 and I also watched him blow up, you know, in my childhood, 06:43 and I learned the lesson 06:44 that in order to get control of a situation 06:46 that makes me uncomfortable, I blow up, that's what I do. 06:49 And I learned that from him 06:51 and then I practiced it for a while in my adult life, 06:53 and it took some real prayer 06:55 and striving with the Holy Spirit 06:57 to try to understand how to change that, 06:58 but God was able to change that, 07:00 and I don't blow up at my husband like I used to, 07:02 thank God. 07:03 You can ask him about that if you want to. 07:05 But here are some of the... 07:07 I still get a little cheeky once in a while, 07:08 but it's not as bad as it used to be. 07:09 So here's some of the things that predispose 07:11 to same sex attraction, 07:13 there are biological factors. 07:14 There's something called 07:16 the fraternal birth order effect 07:18 or the older brother effect. 07:20 Okay, break that down. 07:22 What is that? Okay. 07:23 Fraternal birth order effect or older brother effect 07:25 is simply that with each subsequent male a woman bears, 07:31 there's a higher likelihood 07:33 that that male will be same sex attracted. 07:37 That's right. 07:39 They think, possibly, they don't really know why, 07:42 but they think possibly 07:43 it's because she creates certain antibodies 07:46 in bearing a male fetus. 07:47 Okay. 07:49 That then affect a future fetus in a way that feminizes 07:52 or somehow interrupts the sex differentiation process. 07:56 So there could be some biological factors. 07:59 And that really draws our hearts out 08:01 to people that have same sex attraction. 08:04 They may have come by very honestly 08:06 and in fact I think many of them do. 08:08 I don't think we lose anything from admitting that. 08:11 So there's that fraternal birth order effect, 08:13 and by the way they've controlled 08:15 for developmental process 08:17 so that means that things like 08:19 a boy being sexually abused by his older brothers, 08:22 they've controlled for all those variables, 08:24 and so they're pretty sure that it's a biological effect. 08:27 Another thing that can lead to same sex attraction 08:30 is same sex abuse in childhood. 08:33 It can, doesn't always, 08:34 but it can eroticize same sex relationships. 08:39 Also, maltreatment in early childhood 08:41 is heavily correlated with same sex attraction, 08:45 people that are abused. 08:46 Why is that? 08:48 I'm not sure the reasons why, 08:49 I think it's an attempt to numb pain probably 08:53 and that there's also 08:55 maybe an element of wanting to reject authority, 08:59 because authority harmed 09:01 and then rejection of authority 09:04 could lead to just experimenting 09:07 with all kinds of behaviors, I don't know. 09:08 So do you think is that, you know, if the abuser, 09:12 let's say, it's a guy in the house 09:14 or whatever, and then the abuser wasn't the father, 09:18 then the man you would think, 09:22 the man would become gay possibly or... 09:26 The child that abused? 09:27 Possibly, I mean, I'm saying that 09:30 aside from being abused by a same sex individual 09:35 and eroticizing a same sex relationship, 09:37 besides that, 09:38 just abuse in the home or maltreatment in the home 09:41 is correlated with same sex attraction. 09:43 Just generally when you have a chaotic home life 09:46 or an abusive home environment, 09:47 you're going to have higher levels of people 09:49 with same sex attraction. 09:50 We don't know exactly why. 09:52 It could be a host of reasons, 09:53 but one of the things that Nicole Parker brings out, 09:55 and she's done a paper on homosexual lifestyle, 09:58 and she's correlated difficulty resolving conflict 10:02 with homosexual lifestyle. 10:04 So it could be that people grow up 10:06 in these chaotic environments 10:08 and they attempt this lifestyle as a way of coping with it. 10:12 In any case, I think we need to have a lot of compassion 10:16 for people that struggle with same sex attraction 10:20 and still I don't think 10:21 the best solution is to live in that lifestyle, 10:24 in those behaviors, yeah. 10:26 And, you know, what we're asking, 10:28 what we're asking of people with same sex attraction, 10:30 and some of them have been that way 10:33 from the time they can remember 10:35 and can't even conceive of being anything else. 10:38 What we're asking of them, what we're saying to them, 10:41 and what I think the Bible is saying to them 10:43 is follow Jesus and be celibate. 10:47 And we need to be very sensitive to that 10:49 because we haven't put that on ourselves. 10:51 Now I do believe that there is no temptation taken 10:54 such as is common to man. 10:56 In other words, we all have temptations 10:58 and they're all similar, 11:00 but I haven't had to live as a celibate. 11:03 So I want to be extra sensitive. 11:04 And I want to say this too 11:06 that I think gay people in church 11:09 have to depend more on the church family. 11:13 If they're going to lead that celibate life 11:15 and not have a family of their own, 11:16 they're going to have to lean more on the church family 11:19 to get their emotional needs met. 11:21 And emotional needs are very real. 11:23 We can't deny them. 11:25 They're going to lean more heavily on the church family. 11:27 And that means that we that are in biological families 11:30 need to be extra compassionate 11:32 and really cultivate a healthy environment for singles. 11:37 You know, sometimes we make it seem 11:38 like the only way to be normal is to be married. 11:40 And what does that say to single people? 11:42 There will be single people in church, 11:44 they will not have a partner, 11:45 and we want them to have that family experience 11:47 where they can get their emotional needs met 11:49 in the family of God 11:50 so they're not tempted to go to the local gay bar 11:53 and get their emotional needs met there. 11:55 And so we want to cultivate that in church, 11:57 and that means really pouring ourselves out 12:00 for people in church, 12:01 and not just going home after church, 12:02 and taking a nap, lay activities. 12:04 Yeah. 12:06 And then just being all about us in our own people, 12:07 you know... 12:09 Yeah, being an active member in the church, reaching out, 12:12 loving, pouring out love on individuals 12:15 when they come visit the church, 12:18 and not judging on the outward appearance per se. 12:21 That's right. 12:23 You know, I think of the council, 12:24 I believe it is Paul's writings, 12:26 I don't remember exactly where, but he says, 12:28 "Treat older women as mothers, younger women as sisters..." 12:32 Then I think, "Older men as fathers." 12:34 And then he says, "In all purity." 12:36 So we are to have a family-like relationship 12:39 with the boundaries 12:40 that God placed over human sexuality 12:43 so that our love is pure, 12:45 but it needs to be a very intense satisfying love 12:48 in the body of Christ. 12:49 We should not be content 12:51 with just superficial relationships, 12:53 it's not going to do it. 12:54 And if we're going to ask homosexually oriented people 12:57 or people with same sex attraction 13:00 to give up on having a partner for life 13:04 and then not offer them anything to replace that, 13:07 not offer them warmth of fellowship to replace that, 13:10 what are we saying to them? 13:11 That's really kind of cruel. 13:12 So we need to provide that something better. 13:15 You know, God doesn't just take away something bad, 13:17 He gives us something better. 13:19 Absolutely. Yeah. 13:21 Man, this is... It's an intense discussion. 13:22 Interesting discussion. Yeah. 13:24 I still can't get past that 60%, 13:27 I'm still stuck on that. 13:28 That 60% is a big number. 13:31 But you've learned something here, haven't you? 13:32 You've learned that just because someone has 13:36 one same sex encounter or same sex attraction 13:40 doesn't mean that they are gay. 13:42 It's not an all or nothing proposition. 13:45 There are some that may never experience anything else, 13:48 but there are quite a few that are flexible 13:50 and can go either way. 13:51 And to pigeonhole them as being gay 13:54 when maybe they were just experimenting 13:56 is a mistake. 13:58 Yeah. 13:59 Wow, you have so much excellent content. 14:03 And I can't believe that our time is just about up. 14:06 Yeah. 14:07 It just goes by too fast. Yeah. 14:09 For more information 14:11 make sure that you go to IntimateClarity.tv 14:14 where you'll be able to access resources 14:17 that will help you as you grow in Christ. 14:20 God bless. |
Revised 2018-09-27