On the alleged sinfulness of same-sex attraction

A celibate gay Christian welcomes us into his head

Gregory Coles (center) displays two of his books alongside staff from his publisher, InterVarsity Press, at the 2022 Urbana missions conference.

For me, one of the most surprising aspects of evangelical discourse on LGBTQ issues has been the insistence by some believers that same-sex attraction is a sin even if one doesn’t act on it. For example, many within conservative Presbyterian denominations in the US hold the view that “recognizing same-sex orientation/identity as legitimate for a believer is itself unbiblical.” In 2022, Memorial Presbyterian Church in St. Louis and its celibate gay pastor, Greg Johnson, withdrew from the Presbyterian Church of America after facing considerable opposition to Johnson’s ministry within the denomination.

Gregory Coles, senior research fellow at the Center for Faith, Sexuality, and Gender and author of Single, Gay, Christian, has engaged with that position, from the perspective of one who experiences same-sex attraction. He graciously agreed to answer a few questions in his typically straightforward, irenic manner. I hope you will find his comments useful and worth sharing.

People who consider same-sex attraction a sin obviously can’t get into your head and experience what you feel every day. What would you most like them to know?

The day before the release of my book Single, Gay, Christian, I published a blog post that began with these words: “In my ideal world, being gay and celibate wouldn’t occupy a great deal of my thought life. (Not-having-sex doesn’t take very much time, after all.)”

Central to the debate over the alleged sinfulness of same-sex attraction is this question: What goes on from day to day in the mind of the celibate gay or same-sex-attracted person? Are people like me stuck in a permanent state of sexual temptation, which we’re continually giving in to by engaging in permanent same-sex lust? Or do we, perhaps, have brains that function more or less like other people’s brains?

When I say “I’m gay,” what I mean is this: “I’ve noticed over the course of my life that, when sexual attraction or temptation happens, it’s always directed toward the same sex.” I’m not saying I experience temptation (or mentally give in to that temptation by lusting) during every moment of every day. Quite the opposite. In proportion to everything else happening in my life and brain and heart, the fraction of time I spend experiencing sexual temptation is rather miniscule.

To be clear, I do experience sexual temptation. (I’d guess that most folks reading these words do too, in one way or another.) But when temptation comes, I find it most helpful to remember that Scripture’s message to people who experience temptation is one of exhortation and solidarity, not condemnation (see 1 Corinthians 10:13; Hebrews 4:15).

These words of Scripture are true for me and other celibate gay folks, every bit as much as for any other Christian. One can argue for the opposite position—but not, in my view, with much fidelity to Scripture.

You’ve engaged intensely in discourse, oral and written, with people of varying views on this topic. Has this experience shaped your own views in any way?

One of the many things I admire about folks like Denny Burk and Rosaria Butterfield is their apparent passion to see disciples of Jesus faithfully honor him for their entire lives. I share this passion with them. Though we’ve reached some notably opposing conclusions, I never want to lose sight of our underlying commonalities. In fact, we sometimes seem to reach our opposing conclusions precisely because of our shared motivations.

Consider my 2023 debate with James White over whether Christians can identity as “gay.” White proposed that people who start out by describing themselves as celibate gay Christians will tend, over time, to trend toward affirming same-sex marriage. The implication of White’s assertion seemed clear: Christians should avoid using the word “gay” to reduce their risk of departing from historic Christian sexual ethics.

I share White’s desire to see Christians remain committed to their faith and, more particularly, to historic Christian sexual ethics. If I thought White were correct that use of the word “gay” disproportionately leads people to abandon either of these things, I would join him in advising Christians not to use the word. But as I shared in my response to White during that debate, I haven’t seen this happen. In fact, in my observation, well-meaning but ill-advised attempts to change people’s sexual orientation are a greater threat to people’s faith in the long term.

Consequently, White and I find ourselves on the opposite side of this debate about the use of the word “gay,” yet our underlying reason for claiming our respective positions is strangely aligned. We both want to see followers of Jesus follow him faithfully for their entire lives. White considers my position theologically incorrect and pastorally unhelpful, damaging people’s discipleship. I consider White’s position similarly incorrect, unhelpful, and damaging. Nevertheless, I celebrate his apparent underlying concern for fostering discipleship. I hope he’d say the same thing about me.

The more time I spend interacting with folks in the camp of White, Butterfield, and Burk, the more persuaded I am that we need to be generous with and look for the good in those who disagree with us—even, in fact especially, when those folks do not seem committed to being generous with or looking for the good in us.

Many believe that evangelicals’ traditional stance on LGBT issues is hurting our outreach to the surrounding culture, especially the younger generation. Do you agree? How could we do better?

There are plenty of missteps regarding which I believe evangelicals can and should repent. For instance, we can repent of our false promises and failed attempts to “fix” people attracted to the same sex by turning them into heterosexuals. (See Greg Johnson’s excellent book Still Time to Care.) We can repent of the religious right’s gleeful celebration of gay men dying during the AIDS epidemic. (See Tony Scarcello’s forthcoming Love All Our Neighbors.) Our collective refusal to repent of these errors is indeed hurting our outreach—as it should, since falsely promising sexual orientation change and celebrating the tragic deaths of our neighbors are not the way of Jesus.

On the other hand, I don’t believe Christians can or should repent of historic Christian sexual ethics. Jesus’ call to his followers to steward our sexuality obediently—either in lifelong marriage between one man and one woman or in celibate singleness—is certainly countercultural today. But it was also countercultural two thousand years ago. Just think of the disciples’ horrified response when they learned Jesus’ views on remarriage after divorce: “If this is the situation between a husband and wife, it is better not to marry” (Matthew 19:10). Rather than apologizing for the oddity of Christian obedience, let’s embrace it as a fitting subset of the whole radical oddity of the cruciform way of Jesus. As I once wrote of my own story, a bit tongue-in-cheek, “Gay celibacy is weird, and that’s a good thing.”