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Sex and the Sacraments

Walter Sundberg

To understand the recent recommendations of the Task Force on Sexuality, we need only look at the opening chapter of Journey Together Faithfully, the study guide prepared by the Task Force for use in congregations. The study guide asserts that on the dividing issue of homosexual practice, “we enter the conversation as equals.” This is because “formed by Baptism and sustained by the Eucharist… we contribute different experiences, sensitivities, joys, sorrows, skills, and abilities,” (Journey, p. 5).

The relationship of the verbs in this quotation is intriguing. Just how do “formed,” “sustained,” and “contribute” relate to each other to describe the Christian life? Is it because we are changed by sacramental incorporation in the church that we contribute? Or is it because we are blessed as we are that we enrich the church? I would say that it is much more the latter than the former. The reason the study guide declares that we are “equals” in the church is simply that we participate sacramentally. Even if our point of view or way of life goes against the admonition of scripture or the explicit tradition of the church or the legal policy of the denomination, it makes no difference. Because we are baptized and go to Communion, we are to be accepted as we are and for what we think. Teaching, doctrine, tradition, biblical prohibitions are secondary to sacramental practice. Martin Luther, following Paul’s admonition to communicants to “examine themselves,” (I Corinthians 11:28), warned that while the Table is set for those who fall “because of weakness and prove by [their] acts that [they] earnestly desire to better [themselves],” it is closed to those who doubt Christ’s atonement and “are not minded to renounce their sins,” (LW, vol. 53, pp. 104-105). This type of thinking, which has to do with the privilege of sacramental participation and the sincerity of repentance, was so out of keeping with the dominant therapeutic mind-set of the Task Force, that it was simply ignored. In Journey Together Faithfully, the default position from beginning to end is an unexamined sacramental antinomianism.

In this context the recommendation of the Task Force made public in January is not at all surprising. It had been clear for months that progressives in the church did not have the support to change church policy on homosexual ordination and marriage. The rumblings of the constituency, especially that portion that attend church regularly and provide the majority of funds, was insistent and threatening. But what they did have the power to do is to make a forbidden practice legitimate by acknowledging its place at the Table. From henceforth there will be officially two sides on the issue of homosexuality at the “communion rail” of denominational policy: traditionalists who continue to judge homosexual practice adversely; and gays (bolstered by their progressive supporters) who fulfill their sexual destiny and are not disciplined. Everyone has a place at the Table. Everyone “contributes” by being who they are. Traditionalists contribute by upholding their vision of the heritage of the church and progressives contribute by being critical of that heritage and seeking a new way. Tolerance triumphs over doctrine; and it does so as a matter of sacramental theology. Tolerance of different people is the fundamental meaning of the sacraments. One can think of it this way. If, according to sacramental theology, a sacrament is made up of word and element, then the “word” here is tolerance and the “element” is the diversity of sexual practice.

This position is biblically incoherent. It is a wax nose that can be shaped in any direction. It raises a host of questions, not the least of which are the important matters of insurance and legal liability. Will homosexual pastors be incorporated into the medical and pension plan of the church, even when the policy of the church continues officially to forbid what they do? What will be coverage for their “significant other’? If a homosexual pastor engages in sexual misconduct, and the ELCA or one of its churchwide institutions (say, a seminary) is sued, will it have liability insurance? How can the church be protected legally and financially when it allows open defiance of its stated rules?

I hope the churchwide assembly this August, preceded by resolutions in synod assemblies, rejects the recommendations of the Task Force on Sexuality and affirms the present policy of the ELCA embodied in Visions and Expectations for pastoral ministry. But I have my doubts that this will happen. A sacramental argument, however sub-theological its content may be, often mesmerizes mainline Lutherans.

Walter Sundberg is Professor of Church History at Luther Seminary, St. Paul and a member of the WordAlone Theological Advisory Board

Heresy of “Antinomianism” defined:

Based on the Greek words, anti for “against” and nomos for “law”

The belief that there is no need for the law of God in Christian life. See Romans 6:15.