Recap of the Conversation about Homosexuality with Ron Belgau

Recap of the Conversation about Homosexuality

with Ron Belagau

Thursday October 19th, 2017 we got the opportunity to chat with Ron Belgau about homosexuality from a Christian perspective. Ron has been done a lot of deep and personal thinking on this topic as someone who experiences same-sex attractions but is an orthodox Christian committed to the traditional biblical view of sexuality.

Ron has co-founded Spiritual Friendship, an increasingly popular blog dedicated to exploring how the recovery of authentic Christian teaching on friendship can help to provide a faithful and orthodox response to the challenge of homosexuality. Check out their About page for more information on the blog. 

Unfortunately we had some technical difficulties and were not able to record the conversation. But I sort of interviewed Ron for about an hour and then we had about 30 minutes for Ron to respond to a few questions from those in attendance. All in all, it was a great evening and conversation.

Ron was very well-spoken and open about his thoughts on homosexuality. From a young age he began to experience attractions to other men and today that still persists. (Here is a link to his post about his "coming out"). As a Christian he turned to the Scripture to determine what the biblical position on homosexuality was and concluded that it only affirms sexual relations within a man-woman marriage relationship; all sexual actions outside of that, which includes homosexual behavior, is prohibited. So began Ron's struggle - to resist homosexual actions, thus remaining single and celibate. But does that mean that the "gay Christian" is thus doomed to life of loneliness and a "vocation of 'no'"?

Ron unashamedly recognized that all of those committed to following Christ are commanded by Jesus to take up their "cross". This entails suffering. For some that means resisting homosexual behavior and living a life of singleness and celibacy. But, as Ron writes in his blog,

"The questions that interest me most seem simple and practical: how can I deepen my relationship with God? How can I live a joyful celibate life? How do I cultivate friendships which honor God and grow in intimacy?"

And so our conversation with Ron covered topics such as how the church can support the Christian experiencing unwanted same sex attractions, the value of singleness, spiritual friendship, and much more.

I would highly recommend you check out Ron's blog for lots more great thoughts and writing. In particular, check out his latest blog post outlining his recent talk to the University of Dallas. In that post he provides a lot of great links to help navigate his blog.

A special thanks to Ron for taking the time to chat with us!

Reminder about Tonight's Study on Homosexuality

As a quick reminder, we will be meeting tonight (October 23rd, 2017) to kick off our study on "the TRUTH about HOMOSEXUALITY: a COMPASSIONATE response".

We will meet in rooms 11-12 of Mt. Zion UMC's education building from 6:30 to 8pm. Today's topic is "What Does Scripture Say about Homosexuality?"

All are welcome. Hope to see you there!