With same-sex marriage now legal in California, people of faith are renewing a passionate debate over whether homosexuality is sanctioned by God.
Christians, Jews and Muslims on both sides of the issue cite the holy writings of their religions. Some note that the Bible depicts man-lying-with-man as an "abomination," while others say it speaks of God's love for all people created in his image.
Both sides defend their positions with the zeal of the biblical warriors who inhabit their scriptures.
"Homosexual intimacy is out of bounds. It's not what God created us for," said Richard Mouw, president of the evangelical Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena.
Mouw cites Romans 1 in the New Testament that decries men and women abandoning "natural relations" and men "inflamed with lust for one another" committing "indecent acts with other men" -- behavior that carried death as punishment.
"Sexuality within the context of marriage is the order of creation," he said.
Nonsense, says the Rev. Mel White, a former Fuller professor and evangelical author who married his partner of 27 years in a ceremony Wednesday at All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena.
White calls the Bible a living document that must be understood in its historical context -- a view shared by reform-minded clergy and theologians from other faiths.
Early Jews and Christians, White said, defended a heterosexual ethic to ensure the continuity of tenuous tribal communities. These religious pioneers, he added, had no way of foreseeing modern advances in psychology and other fields that would reveal homosexuality as an orientation rather than a choice.
"The Bible says as much about sexual orientation as it does about toasters or nuclear reactors," White said. "We have to grow with the times."
Other clergy reject the scientific argument and say homosexuality is a choice.
A decision by the California Supreme Court last month allowed weddings to go forward starting Tuesday, and set the stage for a statewide initiative on the November ballot aimed at amending the state Constitution to ban same-sex marriage.
Theologians and biblical scholars trace the origins of the dispute to a handful of passages in the Torah, New Testament and Koran.
Perhaps the most frequently cited is Leviticus 18:22: "You shall not lie with a man as one lies with a woman: It is an abomination."
