Is It Sinful for a Christian to Attend a Same-Sex Wedding?

By: Omar Rushlive L. Arellano

Alistair Begg’s comment last year made mixed reactions, and indeed it is now making the rounds on social media as a meme. For some of his regular listeners, his comment appears to be uncharacteristic of his good reputation as a reliable preacher. For accuracy, this is what he said:

I hope that our church family, those who choose to read this book, that it might have an impact among us, because learning to say I’m sorry, learning to say “please forgive me”, learning to say “you know I’m not at my best at the moment, can you come alongside me”, learning to say “yes I know that these people believe a very different agenda that their lifestyle is oriented in another direction, and learning to say “but I have no basis upon which I could argue that I would myself would not be where they are were it not for the amazing grace of God, were it not for his compassion towards me.

And in very specific areas this comes across, I mean, you and I know that we field questions all the time that go along the lines of, “my grandson is about to be married to a transgender person, and I don’t know what to do about this, and I’m calling to ask you to tell me what to do”, which is a huge responsibility. And in a conversation like that just a few days ago, and people may not like this answer, but I asked the grandmother, “does your grandson understand your belief in Jesus?” “Yes.” “Does your grandson understand that your belief in Jesus makes it such that you can’t countenance in any affirming way the choices that he has made in life?” “Yes.” I said, “Well then, okay. As long as he knows that then I suggest that you do go to the ceremony and I suggest that you buy them a gift.” “Oh,” she said, “what?” She was caught off guard. I said, “Well here’s the thing, …your love for them make catch them off guard, by your absence, will simply reinforce the fight that they said these people are what I always thought, judgmental, critical, unprepared to countenance anything, and it is a fancy, it is a fine line isn’t it. It really is. And people need to work out their salvation with fear and trembling, but I think we’re going to take that risk, we’re going to take that risk a lot more if we want to build bridges into the hearts and lives of those who don’t understand Jesus and don’t understand that He’s a King.¹

The full context clarifies that Begg allows the grandmother to attend the same-sex wedding of her grandson, provided that her convictions are clearly known and that she is attending to communicate her love for him. While Begg disapproves of same-sex unions, he argues that attending might mellow down the general negative perception of Christians and therefore can be instrumental in winning the LGBT over to the faith. Unfortunately, this comment is something that Begg does not plan to repent of yet.²

Now, there are some who concur with Begg’s assessment. One example is Preston Sprinkle. He remarks in his pastoral paper that non-attendance in same-sex weddings may mar one’s relationship with the unbelieving individual and may render his witness ineffective. In his own words:

Sixth, you still should consider the long-term effects that attending or not attending a wedding will have on your relationship with the one getting married. The previous point emphasized the accommodation that your LGBT+ friend should consider making toward you. This fifth point highlights the accommodation that you should consider making toward your LGBT+ friend or relative. My friend Bill Henson encourages Christians to attend a same-sex wedding on the grounds of the long-term relationship between you and your LGBT+ friend. If you choose not to attend, this can (and often does) yield deep and lasting relational damage.

Being ‘right’ for one day can damage the opportunity to be a witness for thousands of days into the future.³

Now, to be fair, he clarifies in the same paper that God designed marriage to be a one-flesh union for one man and one woman, and that he would never facilitate a same-sex wedding. Under the heading Seven Things to Consider, he stresses the “need to be consistent with our convictions,” and also “if our relationship with the couple depends on our attendance to the ceremony, then perhaps it’s a fragile relationship,” but I find that his different considerations in his paper are inconsistent with each other, like consideration five, about our relationship with the couple being fragile if it depends on our attendance to their ceremony, and also consideration six, which is about considering the long-term effects of attending or not attending to the ceremony, which says that our non-attendance could lead to lasting irreparable damage to the relationship, which indicates the fragility in the first place.

Sprinkle also mentions that there are no clear prohibitions in the Bible for attending same-sex weddings, thus, he thinks that it is a Romans 14 issue.⁴

Romans 14

For the following section, it is helpful to look at Romans 14:1–12:

As for the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions. One person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables. Let not the one who eats despise the one who abstains, and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats, for God has welcomed him. Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls. And he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make him stand.

One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. The one who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God. For none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself. For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s. For to this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.

Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God; for it is written, “As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God.” So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.

Thomas Schreiner explains this to be about whether Christians should adhere to food laws and the holy days (such as the Sabbath) of the Jews. The strong, being convinced that all foods are permitted and that all days are the same, are instructed not to ridicule or mock those whose consciences are weak. Being convinced of the alternative, the weak are in turn commanded not to judge the liberty of the strong, knowing that one “stands or falls” before God who will judge all men on the last day. Their consciences can allow them to either eat or abstain from certain foods and to regard a day to be holy or not.⁵

With this in mind, Sprinkle references Romans 14 to support non-judgmentalism over Christians attending same-sex weddings, as they would be judged depending on their conscience. But is this a reasonable application?

Not a Matter of Indifference

This essay argues that same-sex weddings do not apply to Romans 14. Four arguments could help establish that attending a same-sex wedding is not a matter of indifference, which are: (1) Jesus’ views on homosexuality; (2) God’s design for marriage; (3) Paul’s response to incest; (4) That marriage should be followed even by unbelievers.

Jesus on Homosexuality

Some claim that Jesus supports homosexuality because He did not make any explicit statements about it. But this can be challenged by reading between the lines of His teachings. For example, He says in Matthew 5:27–30:

You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.

The scholar Michael Brown explains that Jesus’ reiteration of the moral laws in the Torah in His Sermon on the Mount confirms that He “did not come to abolish the Law, but to fulfill them” (Matthew 5:17). At face value, Jesus takes the moral laws to a higher level, pointing to the reality that they could also be disobeyed inwardly, so that lust in the heart is considered to be adultery, and hatred in the heart to be murder. Brown shows that the elevated righteous requirement must also cover the laws about marriage and sexual immorality. Since homosexuality is a prohibition of what Jesus did not abolish, Brown concludes that Jesus enduringly views homosexuality as a sin.⁶

God’s Design for Marriage

Since Jesus is God, what He says about marriage explicitly shows God’s very intention. When asked about divorce, Jesus answers the Pharisees,

Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.

Now, the context of the passage is about divorce, the Pharisees were testing Jesus by asking for His views. Brown explains this by saying that in Genesis, God established marriage as the union of one man and one woman, and in this context, Jesus recalls what was said and maintains that this was God’s intention from the start. He explains that this emphasizes that the unique union that comes when a man and a woman are joined together, is that they become “one flesh”. And God is said to be the one who joins the two together. This is the reason why divorce was never part of God’s original design. Brown explains that given this, then it becomes “unconscionable to imagine that Jesus would sanction male-male or female-female unions, since among other things, they fundamentally violate God’s design and intent “in the beginning.”⁷ Furthermore, Brown argues that Jesus would not agree with efforts in “eradicating gender” teaching concepts such as “genderqueer” to children, “gender binary”, and this is because for Jesus, the male-female distinctions expressed in the imago Dei “were the foundation of God’s order and the basis for marriage.”⁸

Jesus’ quoting of the Torah in the Sermon on the Mount and his discourse with the Pharisees implies that Biblical principles do not fade or become irrelevant over time. This entails that the definition of marriage is unalterable. Wayne Grudem helpfully words it as “the legal union of a man and woman as husband and wife”, describes its pervasiveness “in all cultures and societies throughout all of human history” and, remarks on the novelty of its attempted redefinition, “No society in all of recorded history ever permitted same-sex marriage before the 21st century.”⁹ This legal union is meant to last for as long as they both live. Citing Malachi 2:4, Grudem emphasizes the solemnity of the marriage covenant, in that God is called to witness it to hold the man and wife accountable. Grudem highlights the public nature of traditional marriage ceremonies, stating the need for society to know they are husband and wife, with God being a witness to the vows.¹⁰

It follows therefore, as Robert Gagnon also expresses, that one becomes a witness to the vows when attending a wedding, holding the parties accountable to the vow of matrimony. He describes that attendees are expected to happily support the couple. He writes that the gesture communicates, “I’m happy for you. I’m here to celebrate with you this sexual union, and to work for its longevity.”¹¹

So to attend a same-sex wedding would imply celebrating with the couple the sin and union that God Himself is against. If we will work for the relationship to be “lifelong”, then this would mean that we are supporting them to rebel against God “lifelong”. I don’t think a Christian would encourage and want a sinful relationship to happen permanently throughout their life. We would be expected to clap and be happy and congratulate people who are treating God’s design for marriage with contempt. Now, we expect that it’s normal for people who sin to feel bad doing it, but it would be a greater evil for people to be proud about sinning against God and celebrating it, and celebrating with them will make it seem that we are affirming them for it.

But of course, some would echo Begg's remark and say that the grandson knows of the grandmother’s Christian convictions, and I think I concur with Gagnon that going to such a wedding will not be a witness of Christ’s love, but we are saying that Christ is tacitly accepting the union, which I think is blasphemy. And if the right response for Christians in that context is to mourn, and the expected response for people who attend the wedding is a celebration, it does not make sense that we are there in the first place if we are not genuinely happy for those who are being wed.

Furthermore, Gagnon also mentioned the phrase ”speak now or forever hold your peace”. This could be seen in the Book of Common Prayer. The phrase says: “Therefore if any man can shew any just cause, why they may not lawfully be joined together, let him now speak, or else hereafter for ever hold his peace.”¹² With the lack of technology to instantly communicate to distant acquaintances, the Medieval folk deemed it necessary to include the line in their invitations. Marriages were announced three Sundays prior, so they could be informed ahead of time if a member of the couple was already “married, underage, unbaptized (church law), or forcefully coerced into the union”, or blood relatives. The person who knew of an illicit reason must urgently and dutifully object to the marriage ceremony.¹³ With this in mind, Gagnon is right in saying that one incurs grave guilt before God upon their refusal to object after the line is spoken. It would be really awkward to be the one who will spoil the celebration, but we are morally obligated to do so. So why even attend if we will be put in this awkward situation?

Paul’s Response to Incest

Robert Gagnon’s Encore: Is It Loving for a Faithful Christian to Go to a ‘Gay Wedding’? is a useful source of this argument. He reasons that Romans 14 concerns issues that are “matters of indifference” or things that do not affect our salvation. Homosexuality, however, is not a matter of indifference, but a practice that could lead to eternal destruction (1 Cor. 6:9).

Gagnon is aware that others get around this by using arguments such as “wanting to stay in relationship with a “gay” family member or friend” (as Sprinkle has recommended) or “imitating Jesus’ practice of eating with sinners” (as Begg intimates). So he responds with a parallel analogy of “attending an incestuous wedding between consenting adults”, remarking the “degree of severity and problematic aspect” to be comparable to gay weddings.

To prove this, he cites 1 Corinthians 5, where Paul strongly rebukes the church for tolerating incest, a sexual relationship that even the Gentile Greco-Roman culture condemned.

He highlights the absurdity of thinking that Paul would have consented to attending the incestuous wedding himself.

Furthermore, Gagnon comments that Paul regards their tolerance to be “puffed up” or inflated with pride (1 Cor. 5:2). He argues that while the disapproval of incest is made clear, Paul would still not have approved of their attendance to the wedding, maintaining that the Corinthians should mourn the offender’s actions, for bringing them at high risk of exclusion from the kingdom of God. Consequently, Gagnon says that attending for the purpose of mourning is preposterous, as the event celebrates the permanent union of two individuals, who publicly declare their intent to sin for as long as they live.

Hence, Paul orders the church to put the incestuous man out of the covenant community, and not to eat with him (1 Cor. 5:11). Gagnon comments that such an order would preclude worse things, such as “going to the wedding of a man celebrating the grave immorality of incest” and “going to a wedding that celebrates a gravely immoral union”. For these reasons, attending a same-sex wedding is a sin.

Gagnon’s further comments show how Paul’s actions may seem harsh, since contrary to the claims about “continuing the relationship to have future opportunities to witness”, we can see that the opportunity was cut off because of Paul’s removal of the incestuous professing Christian from the community. But instead of “cutting future opportunities to witness”, Paul was hoping that through the removal, the offender would have a big wake-up call. Thus, the phrase “deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh” was meant to save the person by calling him to repentance. In contrast, the “gracious and loving approach” of continuing to include the unrepentant in the community is unwittingly the highway to hell.

Now, some may respond that this only applies to same-sex couples who claim to be Christians. But this reasoning still fails to justify going to a celebration of what God is against. He hates this sin regardless of their affirmation of faith. And if it is a must to be consistent, as Sprinkle warns, we should not attend weddings between a believer and an unbeliever, a believer who went through an unbiblical divorce and decides to remarry, and a couple (I assume they profess to be Christians) who were sexually active before marriage and were never repentant of it.

Marriage Meant to be Adhered to Even by Unbelievers

Grudem argues for this point by saying that the foundational teaching about marriage goes way back to the creation of Adam and Eve, prior to sin entering the world. And since Jesus claims that this marriage was God’s intention from the beginning, then they “belong to the essence of God’s creation of us as male and female.”¹⁴ For this reason, marriage as a lifelong union between one man and one woman has always been God’s intention; and this has to be obeyed by all, regardless of culture, society, and even periods in history. And this is to be expected until the beginning of the new heaven and new earth.

Other arguments that Grudem shows to support this is that God was just to judge non-Jewish cities such as Sodom and Gomorrah (for widespread homosexual conduct; Gen. 19:1–28; Jude 7), that God judged Pharaoh, king of Egypt, for almost taking Abram’s wife (Gen. 12:17–20). In the New Testament, John the Baptist rebuked Herod Antipas, an Idumean, for taking his brother’s wife, hence, committing incest.¹⁵ Thus, if God judges people who are not believers for violating His standard for marriage, then all people will be held accountable by God for disobeying this standard in the context of same-sex marriage as well.

Conclusion

In light of the discussions about Jesus’ views on homosexuality, God’s design for marriage, Paul’s response to incest, and God expecting universal adherence to His standard for marriage, it can be established that it is sinful for a Christian to attend a same-sex wedding. Moreover, this means that those who justify attendance as a “Romans 14” issue, whose concern of “not attending will remove opportunities of future relationships with the LGBT” are clearly compromising. Their recommendations are deceiving Christians to make actions that would be construed as a “tacit acceptance” and “celebration” of an immoral union. It is our humble plea for Alistair Begg, and the people who agree with him, to repent and change their minds about this. This is not an issue that allows for differences of opinion.

Reference:

1. Begg, Alistair. “‘The Christian Manifesto’ Interview — 09/17/2023,” September 17, 2023. 28:05–30:26, https://youtu.be/rXDYYPLwgYE?si=ARPH9S__n5TjTpsI
2. Giatti, Ian. “Alistair Begg: ‘I’m not ready to repent over’ same-sex wedding advice”. Christian Post. https://www.christianpost.com/news/alistair-begg-im-not-ready-to-repent-over-gay-wedding-advice.html?fbclid=IwAR1tkUPRglNCqtCd8OmkCTE-Xl_xjevNejzQckUrLe2ZVBKoWj3EyUH7ERQ
3. Sprinkle, Preston. “Pastoral Paper: Should Christians Attend a Same-Sex Wedding Ceremony?” The Center for Faith, Sexuality, and Gender. CFSG_Pastoral Papers_1 (centerforfaith.com)
4. Ibid.
5. Schreiner, Thomas. Romans. ESV Study Bible, edited by Lane Dennis and Wayne Grudem. Wheaton: Crossway, 2011.
6. Brown, Michael. Can You Be Gay and Christian?: Responding with Love & Truth to Questions About Homosexuality. (Florida: Charisma House, 2014), 130–131.
7. Brown, Can You Be Gay and Christian?, 133.
8. Ibid.
9. Grudem, Wayne. Christian Ethics: An Introduction to Biblical Moral Reasoning. (Wheaton, Crossway, 2018), 700.
10. Grudem, Christian Ethics, 701.
11. Gagnon, Robert. “Encore: Is It Loving for a Faithful Christian to Go to a “Gay Wedding”?”. Christ Over All. https://christoverall.com/article/concise/is-it-loving-for-a-faithful-christian-to-go-to-a-gay-wedding/
12. “Book of Common Prayer”. The Church of England. https://www.churchofengland.org/prayer-and-worship/worship-texts-and-resources/book-common-prayer/form-solemnization-matrimony
13. Zlotnick, Sarah. “The History Behind “Speak Now or Forever Hold Your Peace””. Brides. https://www.brides.com/speak-now-or-forever-hold-your-peace-5100968
14. Grudem, Christian Ethics, 711.
15. Ibid.