Hailed in a Pink News headline as ‘Tremendous News and Progress’ the Church of Scotland General Assembly has voted 274 to 136 to allow ministers to conduct same-sex wedding ceremonies. This makes the CofS the largest denomination in the UK to have taken this step.

One of the main arguments used consistently over the years in the debate over homosexual practice within the church has been along the lines of ‘homosexuality exists, get over it’. According to this position, the church that welcomes same-sex marriage simply embraces the existence of assortment and diversity within the created order.

Speaking before the vote, the Reverend Scott Rennie, who is in a same-sex marriage, urged the Assembly to back the change on those grounds. He told the Assembly: “I want to say that marriage is a wonderful thing. My marriage to my husband Dave nurtures my life and my ministry.”

This argument that homosexuality exists in creation and is valued by some and so should be blessed by the church fails on two grounds: the philosophical and the theological.

Faulty reasoning

Philosophically, this is an example of the ‘is-ought’ problem, or ‘Hume’s guillotine’. In his most important work, A Treatise of Human Nature (1738), David Hume argues that there is a difference between descriptive statements and prescriptive statements, and that we cannot legitimately derive one from the other. An ‘ought’ cannot be derived from an ‘is.’ In other words, just because something exists it does not mean that it ought to exist.

This line of argument was developed by GE Moore who, in Principia Ethica (1903), argued that a naturalistic fallacy occurs whenever the attempt is made to prove a claim about ethics by appealing to a definition of the term good in terms of natural properties. ‘Good’ is not a natural property, neither are natural properties automatically ‘good’; existence does not equal ethical goodness.

The consequences of arguing that existence implies either validity or moral approval is clear if we consider paedophilia or bestiality. People exist with such propensities; they claim that they cannot help themselves, that they were made that way; a few even claim that God made them that way. Yet none of sound mind would argue that this means, therefore, that men should be allowed to groom and rape primary-school boys or couple with donkeys. (This is not intended as a like-for-like comparison, but simply to demonstrate the faulty reasoning employed.)

Contrary to faith

The simple theological error which proponents of the blessing of same-sex marriage make is to ignore the Fall.

According to those who argue for the blessing of homosexual unions, if a human trait exists then God must have made it so; therefore all who have this ‘gift’ should indulge it and the Church should celebrate it and bless them.

This is akin to Adam’s claim that it was not his fault that God’s one law was disobeyed: “The woman you put here with me – she gave me some fruit from the tree and I ate it” (Gen 3:12). According to Adam, it wasn’t his fault, it was the woman’s; and so ultimately it was God’s fault for creating the woman in that way.

Scripture teaches that the Fall has infected every single part of creation. We do not live in a normal world but one which is distorted in every aspect, both by our initial rebellion against God in the Fall, and our continuing condition. There is no indication in Scripture that the only aspect of creation which is unaffected by the Fall is our sexuality. Homosexual activity is clearly condemned numerous times in the Bible from Leviticus 18:22 to Romans 1:27. The very real temptation some have to indulge in such action is the result of the Fall and not of God’s creative intention.

Choosing the world over God

In embracing the naturalist fallacy and voting to conduct some-sex marriages, the Church of Scotland has denied the core of the Christian faith and in a very real way has chosen the world over God. The Bible says we are sinners living in a fallen world who are declared righteous before God by grace through faith in Christ Jesus. The General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in effect has just said that the sin itself has been declared righteous before God without the need of grace or faith in Christ.

The question the Church of Scotland has failed to answer correctly is at heart straightforward: Does God justify the sinner or the sin?