This is one of my better papers that I wrote this past year. Unbeknownst to me until the day I turned it in, we had to read it in front of the class and then receive constructive criticism. I might have chosen a different topic for my clearly homophobic classmates had I have known in advance, but maybe it was an eye-opening experience for some of them. See what you think:
Christianity, Biology and the Question of Human Sexuality
If someone were to introduce themselves as a Christian, lesbian scientist, you would most likely have a few questions for them, the first being, "How do you reconcile those beliefs with each other?" Speaking from this exact perspective, I would like to explain how I have come to terms with my faith, my beliefs about the world and how it works, and how I, as a variant from the social and what would appear to be the "natural" norm, fit into the greater scope of life. My understanding, reading and observations of the wide variety of the natural world have shown me that though different from the majority of humanity, I am not that unusual in comparison to the vibrant life around me. The comfort in knowing that God created it all has put my soul at peace after much internal conflict. In explaining my views, I will not refer to the Bible (the Romans passages and such) very much, as this is a tangent argument from the one I present to you now. However, I would like to start there, in Genesis, at the creation of the world...
Genesis describes the beginning of the world from the bleary-eyed, primitive perspective of the early peoples searching for a reason for the world around them. The myths were told generation to generation, passed down orally until finally a distant descendant wrote it down. This is all that can be proven. We will never truly know what happened because none of us were there to see it, nor can our human sciences prove beyond reasonable doubt what must have happened. We are therefore led back to the old myths, the ancient stories, or - for the more scientifically inclined - the new theories that have come from our ever increasing technology. Evolution is one such theory. Creationism is its Christian counterbalance. Oftentimes it happens that we choose one or the other, believing that they cannot co-exist. I beg to differ; this isn't an argument between Origin of Species and Genesis, nor does it need to be. Because Genesis is primarily a story - an ancient one, passed down by word of mouth for centuries - I don't put too much stock in its literal words. Seven days, seven years, seven millennia: we'll never know exactly how long the world took to form, only that it did. Most likely, our scientists are correct; life formed from the primordial soup, from living chemical compounds called DNA with the unique ability to copy themselves. But this simple explanation leaves something to be desired, some comfort that God is our loving Creator who watches over us still. I personally believe that God is our Creator - I just believe that seven days to God might translate into a lot longer span in human time. As to Adam and Eve, for all we know they were paramecium. That does not matter. God's true plan, by its very nature is far beyond the grasp of human understanding. To simplify God's masterful handiwork to a simple myth loses some of the appreciation for the complexity of life and the careful planning it must have taken for everything to happen the way it did. Thus, I manage a careful balance between the two; God created the beginning of life, forming a road map for evolution and the direction of the cosmos. Then God released it to be what it may, carefully steering us in the right direction when we need guidance.
I've found great comfort in balancing my faith with what I, in my stubborn practical-mindedness, believe about the powers of observation and the scientific process. But this peace did not cause me to lay down my quest for knowledge; if anything it awakened more questions than I had originally. One question in particular stirred me from this peace and spawned a lengthy list of other questions. I am a lesbian, which by the traditional sciences would seem highly unnatural, and from a Christian perspective, immoral. Biologically speaking, humans were engineered for sexual reproduction, which requires both a male and a female to work. This would in itself seem to conflict with what I believe of myself and at first it seemed like an impossible equation. I now realize that if taken in the larger context of the diversity of life, it is just as natural as heterosexuality. There are many, many types of "natural" reproduction in the world, and with time and evolution, they can change to better adapt to the circumstances. Some examples of non-heterosexual, natural reproduction are hermaphroditism, asexuality and same-sex species. Asexual reproduction occurs when a fragment part of an existing organism forms a whole new organism or an organism splits, doubles, or "buds off" its parent organism. Examples of asexual animals include sponges, hydras and most single-celled animals. Hermaphroditism occurs when both male and female parts exist on the same animal at different points in its life or when they co-exist at the same time. Examples of this might be annelids (worms) which are both male and female simultaneously and could reproduce with themselves or with other worms, or clownfish, which are all born male and become female only if they are the second largest in their hierarchy or if the primary female dies. Finding Nemo would have been a very different movie if it had followed the true biological patterns of clownfish!
The last example, same-sex species, is best explained using the prime example of the whiptail lizards. These lizards are all female, and they stay female for their entire lives. They reproduce asexually by laying eggs, which by a miracle of nature undergo meiosis and mitosis on their own, (the process is known as parthenogenesis) doubling their own chromosome number using their single mother's DNA. In effect, they are clones of their mothers. However, these lizards did not appear to always have been asexual, nor does `asexual' truly describe their sexual patterns. Whiptail lizards have male cycles in addition to their female cycles, which tie directly to egg production. Right before a whiptail lizard lays her eggs she undergoes a surge of estrogen, which assists in the egg-laying process, but right after she lays her eggs, her estrogen drops to a low level and her testosterone levels surge. This is referred to as her male cycle, and she inclined to behave sexually with other lizards in their female cycle. They never actually become males; the only behave like them during their male cycles. Sexual activity and stimulation has scientifically proven to increase their egg count; lizards isolated from lizards in their male cycles produced far less eggs than lizards that had had sexual activity with other lizards before egg-laying. Essentially, this creates a homosexual species. This species in particular has come under great scientific scrutiny for possible ways to help humans by its unique implications. Some scientists even predict that humans will eventually become like the whiptail lizard; human sperm counts have reached all time lows in recent history. Another thing I have noticed concerns the history of humanity. Homosexuality is most prevalent and open in affluent cultures such as ancient Rome and Greece, as well as present-day America. This points to a natural-built population control; non-reproducing animals (many times birds) which live with others of their same gender also appear when population levels become elevated or affluent.
In light of the colorful variety of the natural world, I have come to realize that what many humans consider natural is a very narrow slice of what our Creator considered natural. If God believed that heterosexuality was the only natural sexuality, then why would God also create species such as the whiptail lizard, which reproduces exclusively homosexually? Clearly, God must have different ideas, higher ideas than what humans have been able to understand thus far. Though the Bible is a wonderful set of guidelines, it could never logically be considered a comprehensive, definitive rulebook for all times and places. To consider it as such grossly inflates our concept of God and at the same time diminishes the mysterious, all-knowingness of God. Again I reaffirm these beliefs that I have come to: God is our Creator, whose plans are carried out in structured rhythms that can be named and described and at the same time are indescribable miracles (a prime example being the birth of a child, which can be scientifically described, but remains a miracle nevertheless). This same God who created us also created a colorful variety of sexualities and did not limit nature to simple heterosexuality. Yet again, we might not be entitled to the full knowledge of God, but that shouldn't prevent us from looking at the world around us and the world inside us for clues to the answers. Only then might we be able to make peace with ourselves, though it would appear that our beliefs conflict with each other.