Does the Bible condemn gay homosexual people?
Portal of the Church of Pilgrims, in Washington, DC, with a LGBT banner. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) It is the sin for which Sodom gains its reputation as ungodly, wicked, and deserving of divine judgment ( Genesis 18–19). Terms used in the Hebrew (yādaʿ) and the Greek (synginomai) meaning “to know” (Genesis 19:5) must have a sexual connotation and are among several euphemisms for sexual intercourse used in the Old Testament . Homosexuality is the sin or crime that the Benjaminites committed at Gibeah (Judges 19–20), which so enraged the rest of Israel that they almost eradicated the Benjaminites. None of the passages will sustain the view that the sin involved at Sodom or Gibeah was merely inhospitality or violence; none of the texts cites inhospitality. Revisionist attempts to use patristic interpretations fail. The church fathers simply do not support these arguments. The references in Deuteronomy and Kings refer mainly to male prostitutes used in religious settings. This mu...