William Lane Craig, a renowned apologist, had this to say:
[I]f the Nazis had won World War II and succeeded in brainwashing or exterminating everyone who disagreed with them, so that everybody would think the Holocaust had been good, it would still have been wrong, because God says it is wrong, regardless of human opinion. Morality is based in God, and so real right and wrong exist and are unaffected by human opinions.
I’ve emphasized this point because it’s so foreign to what a lot of people in our society think today. Today so many people think of right and wrong, not as matters of fact, but as matters of taste. For example, there isn’t any objective fact that broccoli tastes good. It tastes good to some people, but tastes bad to others. It may taste bad to you, but it tastes good to me! People think it’s the same with moral values. Something may seem wrong to you, but right to me. There isn’t any real right or wrong. It’s just a matter of opinion.
Now if there is no God, then I think these people are absolutely correct. In the absence of God everything becomes relative. Right and wrong become relative to different cultures and societies. Without God who is to say that one culture’s values are better than another’s? Who’s to say who is right and who is wrong? Where do right and wrong come from? Richard Taylor, who is a prominent American philosopher—and not a Christian, by the way—, makes this point very forcefully. Look carefully at what he says:
The idea of . . . moral obligation is clear enough, provided that reference to some lawmaker higher . . . than those of the state is understood. In other words, our moral obligations can . . . be understood as those that are imposed by God. . . . But what if this higher-than-human lawgiver is no longer taken into account? Does the concept of a moral obligation . . . still make sense?1He says the answer is “No.” I quote: “The concept of moral obligation is unintelligible apart from the idea of God. The words remain, but their meaning is gone.”2
He goes on to say:
The modern age, more or less repudiating the idea of a divine lawgiver, has nevertheless tried to retain the ideas of moral right and wrong, without noticing that in casting God aside they have also abolished the meaningfulness of right and wrong as well. Thus, even educated persons sometimes declare that such things as war, or abortion, or the violation of certain human rights are morally wrong, and they imagine that they have said something true and meaningful. Educated people do not need to be told, however, that questions such as these have never been answered outside of religion.3
Do you catch what even this non-Christian philosopher is saying? If there is no God, no divine lawgiver, then there is no moral law. If there is no moral law, then there is no real right and wrong. Right and wrong are just human customs and laws that vary from society to society. Even if they all agree, they’re still just human inventions.
He continues with this argument:
Does the Bible in fact forbid homosexual behavior? Now notice how I put that question. I did not ask, does the Bible forbid homosexuality, but rather does the Bible forbid homosexual behavior? This is an important distinction. Being homosexual is a state or an orientation; a person who has a homosexual orientation might not ever express that orientation in actions. By contrast, a person could engage in homosexual acts even if he has a heterosexual orientation. Now what the Bible condemns is homosexual actions or behavior, not having a homosexual orientation. The idea of a person’s being a homosexual by orientation is a feature of modern psychology and may have been unknown to people in the ancient world. What they were familiar with was homosexual acts, and this is what the Bible forbids.
Now this has enormous implications. For one thing, it means that the whole debate about whether homosexuality is something you were born with or is a result of how you were raised really doesn’t matter in the end. The important thing is not how you got your orientation, but what you do with it. Some defenders of homosexuality are very anxious to prove that your genes, not your upbringing, determine if you’re homosexual because then homosexual behavior is normal and right. But this conclusion doesn’t follow at all. Just because you’re genetically disposed to some behavior doesn’t mean that behavior is morally right. To give an example, some researchers suspect there may be a gene which predisposes some people to alcoholism. Does that mean that it’s all right for someone with such predisposition to go ahead and drink to his heart’s content and become an alcoholic? Obviously not! If anything, it ought to alert him to abstain from alcohol so as to prevent this from happening. Now the sober truth of the matter is that we don’t fully understand the roles of heredity and environment in producing homosexuality. But that doesn’t really matter. Even if homosexuality were completely genetic, that fact alone still wouldn’t make it any different than a birth defect, like a cleft palate or epilepsy. That doesn’t mean it’s normal and that we shouldn’t try to correct it.
. . .
So, once more, the question is: Does the Bible forbid homosexual behavior? Well, I’ve already said that it does. The Bible is so realistic! You might not expect it to mention a topic like homosexual behavior, but in fact there are six places in the Bible—three in the Old Testament and three in the New Testament—where this issue is directly addressed—not to mention all the passages dealing with marriage and sexuality which have implications for this issue. In all six of these passages homosexual acts are unequivocally condemned.
He is, of course, partially wrong. His words make one point while completing missing another point: homosexuality and homosexual behaviour are one and the same. To argue and say that you were "born this way" is to admit that you were born in sin! Being born in sin does not make what we do or desire right or normal by any means. Nevertheless, let us use his above argument to prove our case against homosexuality.
Since the Bible merely condemns the acts of homosexuality (according to the argument above), and not the homosexual himself, then, likewise, the Bible merely condemns the acts of lying, stealing, murdering, etc., and not the liar, thief, or murderer themselves. I am sure you can already see the problem with this line of reasoning, but let us continue.
If a person is born a liar and the Bible says that "You shall not [lie]" (Ex. 20:16), and informs us that "all liars will have their part in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone" (Rev. 21:8) because liars "will not inherit the kingdom of God" (1 Cor. 6:9-11), what ought we to conclude? If this person is born a liar, they looooove their lying. Since the Bible condemns lying behaviour, and tells us not to lie, that means the liar has to renounce and forsake his lying ways and live in a manner that is honouring to God. But notice how the text does not say "practicing liars" or "those who engage in lying behaviour" will have their part in the Lake of Fire. It says "all liars." Again, you can see the problem with this line of reasoning.
Likewise, if a person is born a homosexual, the Bible informs them that "You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination" (Lev. 18:22). In like manner, it means that all homosexuals "will have their part in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone" (Rev. 21:8) because "homosexuals...will not inherit the kingdom of God" (1 Cor. 6:9-11). Since the Bible condemns homosexual behaviour (Lev. 18:22; 20:13; Rom. 1:26-27), that means the homosexual has to renounce and forsake his homosexual ways and live in a manner that is honouring to God. In other words, regardless of their desires, they are to abstain from and exclude same-sex relationships because that behaviour is strictly prohibited in and by Scripture. To do otherwise is to be in rebellion against God's standards and created order.
Since the Bible says "such were some of you" (1 Cor. 6:11), indicating not only behaviour or acts, but also the intentions of the heart (Jesus made everything about the intentions of the heart), it implies changes that took place in these individuals—by renouncing and forsaking their behaviours—to make them different from what they once were and/or once practiced. Since God's standard is truth, lying behaviour must be condemned. Since God's standard is heterosexuality—one man and one woman united together for life, homosexual behaviour must be condemned. The argument above still supports the fact that homosexuality—not just homosexual behaviour—is condemned by Scripture. If the behaviour alone is condemned, the person committing that behaviour, in order to find favour with God, has to live a life contrary to their desires. If they desire to lie, steal, or murder, they have to fight those urges and live contrary to their desires. The same is true for homosexuals. For someone who desires to be saved, this is precisely what they need to
do, and then Christ Jesus will change them and remove the sinful desires from
them, conforming them to His image. Many ex-gays have confessed this
precise point.
The problem with the above argument, as I am sure you have noticed, is that in order to renounce and forsake something, that means you have to be
doing it in the first place. Otherwise, how do you come to the point of "such were some of you" (1 Cor. 6:11)? To say you can be a liar without ever committing the act of
lying, or that you can be a murderer without ever committing the act of murder, or that you can be a homosexual without ever committing the act
of homosexuality, is ludicrous and ridiculous. It is sheer nonsense. If you fight the urge to lie, because your natural disposition loves to lie, how can you be called a liar if you have never committed the behaviour of lying? If you fight the urge to murder, because your natural disposition loves to hurt people, how can you be called a murderer if you have never committed the behaviour of murder? Likewise, if you fight the urge to commit homosexuality, because your natural disposition loves to lust after people of the same sex, how can you be called a homosexual if you have never committed the behaviour of homosexuality?
If some people have a natural orientation toward the same sex, then so too (according to the argument above) do some people have a natural orientation toward children, beasts, etc. So too do some people have natural orientations toward rape and murder. So too do some people have natural orientations toward lying and stealing. Modern psychology is a joke; telling people whatever they want to hear just so they can milk you for your money. You might want to read this:
http://www.greeleygazette.com/press/?p=11517.
Whether or not you have a natural orientation toward anything does not make it right or natural. You cannot argue that one is natural while the others are not, especially when conscience, logic, and common sense inform us that they are all unnatural; you know, those little things God instilled in us that inform us something is wrong regardless of our attempts at convincing ourselves otherwise. Furthermore, orientation has to do with direction. Directions can change. Have you ever heard someone say, "Let me get my orientation"? Or "I'm feeling disoriented"? Homosexuals might want to learn a thing or two from that...
The Bible does not merely condemn the behaviour alone, but the practitioner of that behaviour also. "You shall not [lie]" (Ex. 20:16) because liars "will not inherit the kingdom of God" (1 Cor. 6:9-11) and "all liars will have their part in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone" (Rev. 21:8). Likewise, "You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female" (Lev. 18:22) because "homosexuals...will not inherit the kingdom of God" (1 Cor. 6:9-11) and all homosexuals "will have their part in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone" (Rev. 21:8). The Bible does not just condemn the behaviour, but those who commit that behaviour. Homosexuality is homosexual behaviour.
1 Richard Taylor, Ethics, Faith, and Reason, 83-84.
2 Ibid.
3 Ibid, 2-3.