In an op-ed piece that appeared in the PDN (June 16, 2009), a former resident of Guam, now living on the mainland, narrated how one of his friends urged him to join the current debate about same-sex unions and to share his experience of being “an openly gay man.” In reflecting on this request, the writer relates how he discovered his ambiguous feelings about being tagged “gay.” After all, as he says, “homosexuals are people, too.”

We who opposed Bill 138 could not agree with the writer more. In fact, we agree even more than he does. Our whole argument against the bill is that “homosexuals” and “heterosexuals” do not exist at all. There are just men and women going “through life with all of the same hang-ups, good times, problems, friends and family” that others have. As a consequence, we believe that one’s sexual identity is not derived from the orientation of one’s sexual appetites. It comes from the structures of our bodies. Not to accept this fundamental truth about the human person is not to accept one’s real sexual identity.

The notion that one’s sexual identity comes from one’s sexual orientation rather than from the body implies a separation of the person from his body. Instead of seeing myself as a man or woman because of my male or female body, I view myself as a person distinct from a body that has no intrinsic link to a given sexual identity. In this case, it is the orientation of my sexual appetites that determines my sexual identity. If my “orientation” does not match the orientation that complements my body, the “orientation” of my appetites decides the issue. In that case, however, I always have to wear a “tag,” the tag of the “gay man.” Even as the writer protests that he is first a man and wants to be accepted as a man, he nonetheless is forced to include the “gay” tag: “I am a man, and it just so happens that I was born gay.” What he does not recognize is that the tag is of his own making. Even though he sees how such the tag sells him short, he has to defend it. He cannot let go of it. If he did, the justification for his lifestyle would collapse. Sadly, I suggest that this is the real conflict that many in his situation experience.

To clarify the confusion regarding sexual identity it is necessary to remember that persons are neither “homosexual” nor “heterosexual.” They are simply male and female. True, they come with various inclinations and appetites that, because of Original Sin, need to be rectified (i.e., set straight). For this reason, everyone needs to cultivate the virtues that enable the passions and appetites to support a lifestyle in accord with right reason. When our faculties are not rectified, we become dominated by the vices. The virtue that rectifies the sexual appetites is chastity; the vice that results from the failure to rectify the sexual appetites is lust. All of us need the virtue of chastity so that the enslavement to our appetites by lust does not compel us to relate to others as the object of our “enjoyment.” Only those who are free to put other persons before the personal gratification of our sexual appetites are capable of love.

Marriage is about both love and sexuality. You do not have marriage without sexuality, but it is a sexuality that love puts in the service of life. This service to life is what gives marriage its intrinsic dignity. The same cannot be said of same-sex unions. If love is the point of same-sex unions, not sexuality, then same-sex unions have little relationship to marriage. If, however, same-sex unions have something to do with sexuality, then they will still not convey the same dignity as does marriage because same-sex unions do not allow those in them to put their love in the service of life. If the writer imagines that “[c]ivil unions represent the culmination of a lifetime of fighting against being seen as just a homosexual,” he is in for a big disappointment. The reality, unfortunately for him, will be that societal approval of the institutionalization of homosexuality will only make it more difficult to escape the “gay” tag. Instead of being seen as “an all-around good guy,” which the writer would very much like, he will always be seen as someone who lives in a same-sex union. He will never be able to escape the “gay” tag. It will be tattooed on his forehead.