[Dialogue] Spong Q&A

[KroegerD at aol.com]

October 11, 2006 
Questions and Answers  
To My Readers:  
The correspondence that this column engenders is both appreciated and  
amazing. I feel the need to make sure that my readers know that all of your  letters 
are read, even though the sheer volume makes even acknowledging them  
impossible without a full-time secretarial staff. The ones that we print  represent 
only the barest minimum of those received. I hope this does not  discourage 
you, for the letters I receive each week make me feel that I am in  dialogue with 
people all over the world. They greatly enrich my life and this  column.  
Periodically I run an entire column of your letters as a way of honoring my  
readers. That is what I am doing this week. I hope my response to these 
letters  will stimulate further response from many of you.  
While I have this opportunity, let me give you an update on the column. I am  
now about two-thirds through the series on the miracle stories in the gospels 
 and will complete that before the end of the year. Your response to this 
week by  week study has been deeply gratifying. I hope you understand that a 
series of  related columns will always be interrupted by events in our public life 
that cry  out for commentary. I plan a series on understanding the 
resurrection of Jesus  in the 21st century for the Lent and Easter season of 2007. I do 
not think  resurrection was originally understood the way people today seem to 
think. It  will be fun to explore that publicly.  
Finally, as I travel across this nation and Canada on the lecture circuit, I  
always ask "How many of you receive my weekly column?" The number of hands 
that  go up now is quite significant. My friends at Waterfront Media tell me 
that this  column is opened now over 100,000 times each week. When I was an 
active bishop I  did not speak to 100,000 each week! So I am pleased, humbled and 
excited about  this opportunity.  
I will be in Milton, MA, Jackson, MS, Orlando, FL, Norway, Sweden, Germany,  
France, New York City and Spring Lake, MI, between now and the first of the  
year. I hope to see many of you at these engagements.  
Enjoy the questions from your fellow readers.  
John Shelby Spong  
1. Jeff Jackson from Oklahoma writes:  
One of my dearest friends has been persistent in seeing if he can find an  
answer to this question he has about a Bible passage, so I thought that I would  
ask you about it. It's the story that appears in Matthew (Matthew 8:5-13) and 
 Luke (Luke 7:1-10) about the centurion who asks Jesus to heal his servant. 
Have  people asked you about this before? My friend was saying that in certain  
translations, "servant" is translated as "boy," as in, this servant may have  
been someone the centurion had a sexual relationship with. Since the passage 
has  Jesus saying to the centurion, "I have not found anyone in Israel with 
such  great faith (NIV)," is this an acknowledgement from Jesus that he doesn't 
care  about the centurion's possible homosexual relationship with his servant? 
Can you  shed some light on just how this passage is interpreted in its 
original form?  Thanks very much.  
Dear Jeff,  
Your question raises lots of issues so let me first seek to clarify them.  
There are actually three versions of this story in the New Testament, the ones  
in Matthew and Luke that you mention and a very similar but not identical  
narrative found in John 4:46-53. The Johannine differences are that the  
requesting person is not a centurion, which meant a Roman soldier in charge of a  
hundred men, but is rather simply a "high official." In Matthew and Luke, the  
sick person is a slave or a servant in the employ of the centurion. In John the  
sick person is the "high official's" son. In Matthew the servant is "paralyzed 
 and in terrible distress." There is nothing in Matthew's version to suggest 
any  motivation on the part of the centurion other than pity at human 
suffering.  However, in Luke, while we are not given a diagnosis, we are told that the 
slave  was either "valuable" or "dear" to the centurion. The Greek word can 
be read  either way.  
In Matthew's version, the centurion approaches Jesus directly. In Luke's  
version, he sent the "elders of the Jews" to plead this man's cause. These  
elders testify to the goodness of the centurion, "he loves our nation and he  built 
us our synagogue." A major theme in Luke's gospel is to blunt all  hostility 
toward the Roman government. That may be operating in these Lucan  changes. 
Only later in Luke does the centurion approach Jesus directly. The  story turns 
in both Matthew and Luke, less so in John, on the issue of  authority. The 
request is for Jesus just to say the healing word. The centurion  suggests that 
Jesus acts with the authority of God just as he acts with the  authority of the 
Emperor. Jesus marvels at the centurion's faith.  
The note that this servant is a child only comes in John's version. The word  
translated servant or slave is "doulos" and it means indentured, not free to  
leave. Slaves were generally prisoners of war. Servants were those who 
entered  into this indentured relationship for a specified period of time.  
It was not unheard of for lads in indentured servant relationships to be  
sexually abused, but that note is not present in this story. The only narrative  
that defines him as a boy is the one where his father, and therefore his  
protector, makes the request for healing. The text you quote in your letter is  
from the New International Version of the New Testament, which is the  
fundamentalists' Bible and has no standing at all in scholarly circles. In that  
translation it states, "I have not found anyone in Israel with such great  faith," 
which is at best a bit misleading. That same Matthean text in the  Revised 
Standard Version, says, "Not even in Israel have I found such faith."  The 
difference there that appears slight is significant. Jesus is surely not  referring 
to the centurion's private behavior. There is no suggestion that he  knows 
anything about that. His reference is that the man, though a Roman, and  therefore 
a Gentile, has attributed power to the God of the Jews acting through  Jesus 
beyond that which any of the Jewish people had yet been able to see. The  RSV 
makes that clear with the word "even." So I don't believe one can read a  
sexual relationship into this story.  
Let me, however, now that the subject has been raised, talk about sexual  
activity between an adult and a minor. It is certainly now before the nation in  
the case of former Republican Representative Mark Foley of Florida. Any sexual 
 relationship between an adult and a minor is, I believe, always improper and 
 therefore is always abusive. Inevitably such a relationship not only 
violates  but also diminishes the victim. If sexual relationships are to have the  
potential to be holy and life giving, they must be fully consensual and they  
must be grounded in mutual love. Otherwise they are exploitative, meeting the  
needs of one but not the other. That is why rape is always wrong; it is the  
imposition of one with power on one without power. That is why sex with multiple 
 partners is wrong, for it reduces sex to a loveless thrill, not a sustaining 
and  loving relationship. The sexual use or abuse of a child is also always 
wrong  because the victim is not a consenting equal. When anyone is used 
sexually, they  are not loved. When sex is part of a power equation, forced by the 
stronger on  the weaker, it cannot help but be destructive. I do not think it 
is ever a  proper use of the sacred text to seek to justify exploitive 
behavior.  
My understanding of the basis for Christian ethics is very simple. Love  
enhances life; the absence of love diminishes life. If something is good, it is  
because that action brings life and wholeness to those who participate in it. 
If  something is evil, it is because that action brings the diminishment of 
humanity  and brokenness to those who participate in it. To treat a person as a 
"thing"  that exists to gratify the needs of another is to diminish both the 
victim and  the perpetrator. People are to be loved, things are to be used. When 
we love  things and use people, we have violated the meaning of the humanity 
that we all  share. The biblical text that spells this out for me is found in 
John (10:10),  where Jesus is quoted as having said: "I have come that they 
might have life and  have it abundantly." That is my standard of judgment. Let 
me repeat, for an  action to be called good it must serve to enhance the life 
of all of the people  involved in that action. Exploitative sex which makes a 
victim out of one  partner to meet the needs of another is always diminishing 
of the life of both  the exploiter and the exploited, for one does not 
dehumanize another without  dehumanizing oneself. It therefore fails to meet the test 
of the purpose of  Jesus to bring abundant life to all and cannot be justified 
by appeals to holy  scripture.  
Thank you for your question.  
John Shelby Spong  
2. This letter, received on 8/22/06, is printed without comment but with  
great appreciation. Although it was signed, I have chosen to preserve the  
writer's anonymity but his message is one that I believe we all need to hear.  
John Shelby Spong  
Thank you so much for your consistent support for those of us who are gay!  
I am a priest of the church - now retired - but ordained 44 years ago when  
being gay was anything but acceptable. For all of my life I have had to live a  
lie. I got married because it would "cure" me. It didn't. I have kept quiet 
in  the church because I would probably lose my job. My marriage ended some 14 
years  ago but not because of the gay issue.  
It was only after my marriage ended that I was confronted with my "lie" in  
therapy and came to terms with who and what I was. The freedom is beyond  
description. No longer do I feel dirty and cheap and somehow rejected by God.  
But I must tell you - God does have an immeasurable sense of humor. My next  
to last Bishop (I guess penultimate) urged me to take a job at a large church 
to  replace a man who was fired because he admitted to being gay! I took the 
job and  lasted for four years before retirement was possible - at which point 
I could no  longer pretend about who I was - so I left but quietly. I have 
steadfastly  refused to come out to everyone because I do not wish any shame or 
harm to the  church that I love so dearly. But neither am I willing to take the 
abuse and  rejection that dedicated Christians in their ignorance and folly 
heap upon  persons like myself.  
It is beyond belief that anyone could think that we would be willingly choose 
 a situation where we are despised, rejected, humiliated and treated as if we 
 were God's chosen enemy...but then when I look at those words, it is what 
God  showed me through Jesus the Christ. We do manage to live through it with  
integrity, with a self-image intact, and with our love for God and his church - 
 though wounded - still a reality.  
So thank you - thank you - thank you - for all that you do to help the church 
 and the world come to terms with the realities of life and all existence.  
Your ministry is so very important - and I thank God for your persistence!  
A retired priest of your church  
3. Dr. Allan Miller, via the Internet, writes:  
What book would you recommend to understand the Dead Sea Scrolls?  
Dear Dr. Miller,  
There are a number of books on this subject but my favorite is Elaine Pagels  
"The Gnostic Gospels." Dr Pagels is a professor in the Department of Religion 
at  Princeton and one of the finest minds working in the area of early 
Christianity  in the world. She is also good communicator and writer.  
For additional resources I would go to her bibliography in this book.  
John Shelby Spong 
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