Not Proud

This is Pride Month. Did you know that? I bet you did. There’s a presidential proclamation announcing it, you know. And everybody’s getting in on the act.  Commercials go out of their way to let us know that, whatever it is they’re hawking, and whether we even know or care what they’re trying to sell us, they want us to know they’re all about Pride. Rainbow logos everywhere!  Major league baseball games feature players wearing special rainbow logos on their caps.  The Marine Corps – for crying out loud, the Marine Corps! – has a Pride Helmet logo.  Oh yes.  It’s decorated with rainbow colored bullets. If that image seems incongruous, what about this.  To celebrate the beginning of Pride Month, an LGBT+ Pride flag was flown at the U.S. Embassy at the Vatican.

But I’m not proud, not proud at all, not proud of what Pride Month says I ought to be proud of. And why should I be? Sex in itself is nothing to be proud of; and even less, the mere desire to have sex, with whomever, and however one likes.  There’s nothing to be proud of in that. That’s just people doing what they want to do. There are things to be proud of in this world to be sure, things that make a real difference, that make the world a better place – and not only for ourselves.  People who control and channel their desires, for example, rather than merely satisfy them. The world is built by people who do that, who say no to themselves, who sacrifice, and we ought to be proud of and celebrate such people. Sex alone doesn’t do anything for the world. It doesn’t make the world a better place. At best it satisfies a personal desire for the one doing it.  At best. 

Stop and think about this.  Should I really be proud of some healthy young man who wants to sleep with some pretty young woman, and then go his way?  Rather, I’ll be proud of a young man who will not sleep with a pretty young woman to whom he’s not married—no matter how attracted he is to her, and even if she begged him to.  I’ll be proud of that man.  There’s nothing to be proud of that some straight guy merely wants to have sex. Is it any more laudatory that the guy who just wants to have sex is gay?

Someone might say, though, that LGBTQ+ Pride is not about being “proud of sex”.  It’s about being proud of, and celebrating, who you are. Well, in the first place there’s nothing particularly to be proud of in merely being who you are. We ought rather to be proud of becoming what we ought to be. Except for perfect people, “who we are” is usually where the problem is. Secondly, to the extent that Pride month means pride in being who you are, it appears that to the LGBTQ+ community, what you are is what kind of sex you like to have. What else of note distinguishes this group? The only thing that holds all these letters together (and the ‘+’ sign also) is that they designate sexual orientations or proclivities or identities that are not of the traditional mold.

Am I being Intolerant, here? I don’t know. I haven’t touched that subject. This is Pride Month, not Toleration Month. I’m not being asked to be tolerant of LGBTQ+ behavior anymore.  Now I’m told I should be proud of it.  I’m not proud of people just because they want to have some kind of non-traditional sex just for fun, nor that they are willing openly to admit it.  Do I want to try to stop them from having their fun?  I, as a pastor of a church, have better things to do. And who am I to judge those outside the Church? They will reap what they sow. And anyway, I’m not writing to people outside the Church. I’m writing to and for Christians. And we Christians ought ourselves to know well, and to teach and raise our own children to know well, and ought to say publically and without embarrassment to the world at large, that when it comes to sex there is something far greater than fun and self-fulfillment here.

There is great irony, actually, in all this talk of sex by itself producing nothing, because sex is perhaps the most constructive and productive activity most of us will ever do. But not in and of itself, not just because it feels good or meets some perceived emotional or psychological need, but because of the children it produces. Getting married, staying married, having children and raising them well—which is what sex is for—makes the world a much better place. But that kind of sex isn’t just fun.  It is fun, but it costs a lot, and it requires sacrifice.  I’m not proud that people want to have sex or can now have sex with whomever they want. I am proud of people who want to undertake the sacrifice involved in having and raising children for the glory of God. Or even just for the betterment of our world. You don’t have to be a Christian to see the value to society in having children and raising them well! The next generation depends on that! But our corporations and our government and the LGBTQ+ community don’t celebrate that.  There is no such thing as “Married with a Big Family” Pride. No month, no flag, no logo.

I’m being rather snarky here, I know. And yet, how often have Christians been told not to foist their morality on others! Wow. Pride Month: The LGBTQ+ community foisting its morality on others, even on Christians. Am I Tolerant?  Intolerant?  I don’t know. But I’m not proud, that’s for sure. Not proud of any of this.

James D. Burns
Pastor, First Lutheran Church (LC-MS)
Benton, Arkansas