Member-only story
Affirming Queer Sexuality in the Church Goes Beyond Gay Marriage
Does your way of supporting gay Christians hurt polyamorous, aspec, and arospec Christians?
Have you ever come across queer Christian-affirming arguments that say that sexual orientation is also who you fall in love with and see yourself spending the rest of your life with? For some people, these models work well in persuading others to affirm same-gender romantic relationships. However, this model can set people with incongruous sexual and romantic orientations up for a lot of heartache and confusion.
On one hand, some Christians, both affirming and non-affirming, may not understand that incongruity between sexual and romantic orientation can exist. They may push back by saying that we might find the right person eventually or that we have a mental illness. Others may say that romantic attraction is not a real concept and that we’re just confused about our true sexual orientation. Even in many so-called “progressive” churches, teachings on sex and marriage tend to be heavily amanormative and allonormative.
On another hand, some non-affirming Christians may use the split attraction model as a “gotcha” for justifying their homophobia. They may argue that, since romantic attraction and sexual attraction are not the same…
