Haggard Parsed, at Least Approximately

The reports of Ted Haggard's written confession and apology to his church underline the tragedy of his situation. We will make a few observations about the nature of the case as revealed, to whatever degree anything is revealed, by his letter.

First, Haggard's accuser, Mike Jones, says that he wanted to expose Haggard's hypocrisy, as Haggard supported a ban on gay marriages. We think that's imprecise. Haggard's hypocrisy was in concealing his actions that he believed and preached were wrong. That's classic hypocrisy, and it's different from the politicized view of hypocrisy asserted by the gay-rights crowd.

For Jones and others, hypocrisy is experiencing same-sex attraction and not supporting moral equivalency for gay sex ("Jones told CNN he went public with his allegations because of Haggard's support for a state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage that is on the ballot this Tuesday in Colorado"). Per them, if you want to have sex with a person of the same sex, you should not only act on the desire, you should believe that such action is right and good. If you feel this compulsion, you are gay, and to be true to your gayness, you must be in political solidarity with the gay political movement. Jones and company dismiss the possibility that one might feel something and believe that to act on the feeling is wrong.

Haggard is the kind of person that the gay rights movement doesn't want to allow to exist. We take him to be speaking honestly when he says that he regards this matter as "repulsive and dark." What he wants to do, he doesn't; what he doesn't want to do, he does.

He's no hypocrite for thinking that his desires are for something immoral. The fact is, everyone but the sociopath (we welcome members of the psychological community to sharpen our categories here) thinks that he has impulses that must be restrained. What the so-called gay-rights community advocates is that gay sex be viewed as the moral equivalent of straight sex. Hence, if you're of the persuasion that sex belongs in marriage, there should be gay marriage. If you're of the persuasion that sex belongs between consenting adults, regardless of marriage, then gays should have all the consenting, "safe" sex partners they want.

Haggard, a Christian who now confesses to a powerful sexual attraction to people of the same sex, instead believes that his impulses take him to something that is morally wrong. He, like many weak, sinful humans, chose to act on the impulses and conceal his actions, not just because others would condemn him but because he was himself rationally and consistently ashamed of them. And now, like many, his sins have gone public. And he's admitted to them, asking for forgiveness.

That ends his hypocrisy, in our view. For gay-rights advocates, his hypocrisy will end only when he endorses the moral equivalency of gay sex (for some, it may end only when he leaves his forgiving wife and five children and "lives as a gay man," but we'll ignore that for now).

Second, we acknowledge that Haggard's confession doesn't end the matter for him and those near him. But we hope and pray that it does mark a beginning of the kind of transparency and support that all sinners need in the community of Jesus Christ.

"Accountability" is a term used so much in so many contexts these days that we avoid it in our own conversation. But it can embody what everyone needs to mortify sinful selfishness. Without those who know us and are honest and gracious but firm with us, we have less reason to resist our impulses toward those things that are inconsistent with our identity as God's people. Those who fill that role incarnate God's own actions, as God knows all our secrets, instructs and corrects us, forgiving us while calling us to live in a way that genuinely reflects who we were created and recreated to be.

We pray that more Christians will find themselves able to confess before their brothers and sisters the temptations with which they struggle, and that those spiritual siblings can respond with the grace and love that does not condemn but forgives and challenges. It's not a panacea, but we've seen it help a lot.

Third, let's be clear about this. What Haggard did was no different from what various other Christian leaders have done with members of the opposite sex. He believes that sex is for permanent, monogamous, heterosexual marriage, but he hasn't lived up to that. If he had done what he did with a woman, the outcome would be the same.

But the solution is not to allow Haggard to marry a man, any more than the solution to Jimmy Swaggart's problem would have been to add multiple female concubines to his staff. We don't make our lives better by finding social accommodations or rationalizations for our sinfulness. The reign of God that Jesus brings means that we continually conform ourselves to the purpose for which God created us, not by attempting to revise what that purpose is. It's a hard task, but so was hanging on a cross.

Finally, the link between sex and power remains strong. Not all who misbehave sexually have power, but the occurrence of sexual misbehavior among the powerful is too frequent to ignore. The kingdom of God belongs to the weak. Those who count themselves in the kingdom do well to remind themselves of that, especially when they wield what the world calls strength.