It comes across as indecisive, and at times a bit defiant as if playing the part of a reluctant pupil with his ear caught firmly in the hand of the head master or the victim of a procaine-less root canal, but the Royal College of Psychiatrists has made the startling admission that sexual orientation is not “immutable” and in fact is impacted by a combination of biology and environment. In the statement issued in April 2014, the Royal College of Psychiatrists specifically states: “sexual orientation is determined by a combination of biological and postnatal environmental factors.” The College is very quick to offer qualification to that shocking statement however in the very next sentence with some impressive backpedaling: “There is no evidence to go beyond this and impute any kind of choice into the origins of sexual orientation.”
The rest of the statement goes on to explain how homosexual behavior should not be considered a psychiatric disorder. In addition, the College derides the idea of “conversion therapies” and calls for them to be legislatively banned. Such therapies are “potentially harmful” the college says, a truism which is applicable to all therapies, according to the British Christian organization Core Issues Trust. Of the statement, Dr. Mike Davidson, director of Core Issues Trust, says, “This is a major admission. It implies that if a child does not encounter such postnatal life experiences, he/she will grow up heterosexual.”[sic] Andrea Williams of Christian Concern, another British Christian organization says, “The assumption that people are ‘born gay’ has become deeply rooted in our society and has driven huge political, social and cultural change.” This statement by the College, she says, “is a step in the right direction,” in that it admits “things are not so simple and that post-birth environmental factors play a part.”
Among the other appeals made by the College in the statement is a call “that lesbian, gay and bisexual people are and should be regarded as valued members of society, who have similar rights and responsibilities as all other citizens.” This is something with which the Church agrees and something it should do a better job of explaining. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in the “Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on the Pastoral Care of Homosexual Persons” boldly denounces homosexual behavior, that stance of the Church is well known (if poorly understood). However, that same letter also boldly proclaims the value and dignity of all people engaged in homosexual behavior. “Homosexual activity prevents one’s own fulfillment and happiness by acting contrary to the creative wisdom of God. The Church, in rejecting erroneous opinions regarding homosexuality, does not limit but rather defends personal freedom and dignity realistically and authentically understood.” Furthermore, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith writes, “The human person…can hardly be adequately described by a reductionist reference to his or her sexual orientation.” By striving to define anyone by their sexual orientation, the Royal College of Psychiatrists, and our contemporary peers do that individual a great disservice. A person should not be considered “homosexual” or for that matter “heterosexual” but rather as a person created in God’s image. “Today, the Church provides a badly needed context for the care of the human person when she refuses to consider the person as a ‘heterosexual’ or a ‘homosexual’ and insists that every person has a fundamental Identity: the creature of God, and by grace, his child and heir to eternal life.”
The College understandably makes the assumption that sexual orientation cannot be changed (though how this fits into their earlier statements that sexual orientation is not immutable and attributable to an amalgamation of factors is unclear). Indeed apart from practicing virtue and the grace of God, there is little hope for chastity regardless of the most common sexual desires someone is experiencing. Here too the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith offers counsel: “As in every conversion from evil, the abandonment of homosexual activity will require a profound collaboration of the individual with God’s liberating grace.”
The Church teaches that all are called to live a life full of the virtue of chastity, regardless of sexual desires. The Catechism, quoting Gaudium et Spes, states, “’Man’s dignity therefore requires him to act out of conscious and free choice, as moved and drawn in a personal way from within, and not by blind impulses in himself or by mere external constraint.’” Call it “self-mastery,” call it, denying yourself, taking up your cross, and following Christ, call it what you will. What matters is that one chooses to let the grace of Christ control them and ultimately change them. This statement by the college may be a “step in the right direction” or it may be an indication that the debate surrounding the issue of sexual orientation is not nearly as decided as some might have you believe. Those looking to learn more of the Church’s teaching on homosexuality should read Persona Humana, the Letter to the Bishops mentioned earlier, and Part Three, Section Two, Article six of the Catechism; those are great places to start learning and thinking more.
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