Speechless in New England
Karl Stephan on Breakfasting with Cultural Antagonists
One morning, at a bed-and-breakfast in New England, my wife and I met a well-dressed woman from the West Coast. This woman—I will call her Mrs. B.—proved to be an engaging and intelligent conversationalist. An Episcopalian and a Democrat, she was no fan of President Bush. She feared that conservative and fundamentalist Christians—she used both modifiers—were a serious threat to freedom. She was convinced that the President is issuing little-known executive orders to further restrict Americans’ freedoms beyond what has been done already through such well-publicized measures as the Patriot Act. His ultimate goal, she said, is to take the country back to 1950, or even earlier if possible.
One of her daughters is a lesbian rabbi, who with her lover has adopted two boys (or perhaps given birth to them—she was not clear on that point). They had to go through the legal process of adopting the boys and carefully chose the only judge of those available who typically granted such applications to lesbian couples. Mrs. B. feared that even this relative freedom would soon be swept away in the tidal wave of repression that will come about during the sovereignty of the Republicans, who are in turn controlled by conservative Christians.
Mrs. B. had an interesting view of the relationship between Episcopalianism and Christianity. “I love my faith,” she said, but because of what conservative Christians have been doing, she no longer publicly identifies herself as a Christian. She will still admit to being an Episcopalian, however.
Fighting Mrs. B.
I am by nature a somewhat inoffensive soul. Fights and arguments distress me, and if I can see any way to allow people to get along without arguing, I will, as long as I do not have to lie outright. After hearing Mrs. B. say all this, I therefore refrained from stating my frank opinion about lesbians being rabbis and having children. But I can imagine what might have happened if I had tried to explain my position.
Suppose I had steeled myself to say, “You know, Mrs. B., historic Christianity condemns homosexual behavior as a disordered misuse of sexuality. A society that puts children in the care of lesbians is adding scandal to the sin.”
Given Mrs. B.’s strong feelings about the matter, she might not have let me get any farther than the first sentence. At the very least, she would have immediately classified me as one of those conservative Christians who have been conspiring for the last three decades to take over the country. She might have jumped up and stomped out of the room, leaving the table and the B&B too. The B&B owners had been the soul of hospitality, so for this reason alone I was reluctant to say anything that would have spoiled the cordial atmosphere of our breakfasts together.
But if what I believe is true, Mrs. B. believes something that is false. Her lesbian rabbi daughter is not only living a sinful life, but is also teaching others to do so by both example and precept, if lesbianism ever comes up in discussions with the members of her synagogue (and you can be sure that it does). On the other hand, considering Mrs. B.’s point of view, it is hard to conceive of an argument against homosexuality that she would even listen to, much less believe.
There are some women for whom their children’s behavior is above criticism. Mrs. B. did not impress me as one of them. Her personality seemed forceful, yet balanced. I believe she was fully capable of criticizing or correcting her daughter’s behavior, but she did not believe lesbianism something to be corrected. After all, she has grandchildren living with the lesbian daughter as well as with her more conventional daughters.
If she took the position that lesbianism is sinful and to be avoided, she would be endorsing a policy that, if embodied in law, would either deny her daughter the right to raise children altogether, require her daughter to repress or change her sexual inclinations, or force her daughter to lie about her lesbianism to qualify for adoption. Mrs. B. would not have found any of these options acceptable.
Karl Stephan is an associate professor in the Department of Technology at Texas State University-San Marcos in San Marcos, Texas.
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