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| More Lasting Unions: Christianity, the Family, and Society By Stephen G. Post Christianity and the Public Square Indeed, it would be impossible to replace the distinctive themes of Christian thought in the public debate. One distinctive theme, for example, is the impassioned prophetic critique of the bourgeois or aristocratic family that serves as the local and national agent of class hierarchies, unacceptable economic disparities, and racism. Latin American liberation theologians have criticized the family that contributes to political and social oligarchy. Such ruthless control of wealth and power was precisely the object of prophetic criticism in the Hebrew Bible. Prophetic social analysis must disagree with the libertarian bourgeois assertion of unlimited family accumulation put forward by some social theorists. In emphasizing that the family is the seedbed of virtue and the vital institution, which socializes and restrains without recourse to the potentially oppressive force of the state, certain scholars have been less than fully attentive to the injustice of the sometimes philanthropic but still self-indulgent family. The family that contributes to injustice and oppression ultimately harms a free commonweal. A certain form of non-Christian pro-family thought is, as John Rawls suggests, equivalent to being against justice for the needy. In speaking publicly for the family, Christians must be extremely careful not to assert stereotypes about any particular ethnic group. In this culture, African-Americans are particularly vulnerable to stereotyping: black men are frequently labeled as absent or uncaring husbands and fathers, and young black women are targeted as representative of the growing problem of unwed teenage mothers. But there is much to be learned from African-American men who are faithful to their wives and children despite overwhelmingly adverse circumstances. Furthermore, out-of-wedlock teen pregnancy is a problem that exists in all races and cultures. Christians must also avoid criticism of same-sex relations. These relations are complex and deserve the excellent treatment that better-qualified thinkers than I have already afforded them. Procreation as the union of a biological mother and father, in a manner that combines the genetics of two biological creatures with the social experience of raising children who appear in their physical likeness, is not possible in the same-sex context. It is the centrality of creation and subsequent procreation in Judaism and Christianity that makes an emphasis on the blessings of heterosexual marriage and family unavoidable. But this should never result in intolerance. At no point in the Gospels does Jesus indicate intolerance of homosexuality. On this point, personal history is relevant. As an adolescent, I quickly learned to accept the bisexual orientation of my older brother, a successful popular writer in New York City who died of AIDS in March 1983. Like many families, my family understood that his sexual preferences were what they were. The simple fact is that some men fall in love with other men. It is not my intent to contribute in writing to anything other than understanding in this regard. My working experience has only increased my sense of the need for greater acceptance in other areas of human difference as well. After college, I worked as a research assistant at New York Hospital—Cornell Medical College in the field of pediatric endocrinology and hermaphroditism. I have long questioned the ethics of forcing persons into binary male-female categories of physiology through surgical and endocrinological support. Nothing I write on behalf of permanence in marriage as a basis for optimal child rearing should obscure my respectful attitude toward human differences in sexual and gender orientation. The Christian voice in the church and in the public square, while affirming the centrality of marriage and family consistent with freedom, equality, and justice, must avoid co-option by intolerant and uninformed forces. The commonwealth is served well by a respectful, civil, and pluralistic discourse that does not diminish the contributions made by specific traditions of understanding and commitment. True democratic discourse celebrates pluralism and refuses to silence the content of the religious voice to assert a draconian secular monism. Edward Shils points out that "The first entry on the agenda of the Enlightenment was ... to do away with traditionality as such; with its demise, all the particular substantive traditions would likewise go." Traditions have in many ways stood against moral progress, but they can also be critically appreciated for their accomplishments and wisdom in presenting "the ideal of a morally ordered universe in which some things [are] sacred." Furthermore, traditions such as Christianity are always engaged in the process of gaining additional empirical evidence and self-understanding, so that new insight is possible over time. It is to some troubling empirical facts that I now turn.
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