Right, that no one had an issue with.

No, a variety of things.

But I would say in large part, my work is focused on reaching conservative Christians.

And this is not a group that has ever been our number one supporter, right? We all know this.

But I think...

I'm a little bit of a canary in the coal mine in the sense that I am not at all, I feel like so often we can become ensconced in our social media bubbles, in our subgroups, where we don't really listen to people outside of the group unless we're just making fun of them.

And so people, I think there has been a triumphalist attitude among many LGBTQ communities, this idea that we won same-sex marriage and really Greater liberalization is inevitable that like everybody who is against it is basically just going to disappear.

problem with that and I don't even have kids.

Um, Matthew, I wonder if you could tell us about your background growing up as a Christian and what led you eventually to an affirming view on sexuality.

sexuality.Yes. Well, first of all, again, thank you so much for having us, and thank you, David, for being here.

I'm really looking forward to this.

I grew up in Wichita, Kansas, in the Bible Belt of the United States, in a Christian home and, uh, part of an evangelical Presbyterian Church.

The most important thing that my parents wanted to share with me and my sister was their faith in Jesus, and I think they did that very well.

So from as young as I can remember, my faith in Jesus has really been the foundation of my life, my beliefs, and my worldview, and that has never changed.

My, I've, my commitment to Scripture as well has been foundational to my understanding of my faith.

How, how is that, Matt?

I'm genuinely curious because it's questions that I've dealt with for a very long time.

Right.

No, it's a good question, and to be clear, I do think that the Bible...

I mean, I don't argue that the Bible explicitly supports same-sex marriage.

I don't think that it does explicitly support it, and I do think that Paul and the biblical authors, if you had just asked them, "Same sex, yes, no?" Obviously they would've said no, and I think that that's been clearly communicated.

So it's more a question of what is the reasons for why they are saying no, and do those reasons extend to the sorts of same-sex relationships we're talking about today? So I guess if you could persuade me that the moral logic of the biblical text on same-sex relations should extend to all forms of same-sex unions in our context, well, in order to persuade me of that, then I would need to know what the moral logic is.

And part of the, part of my, like, beliefs about the Bible or approach to the Bible is I don't think that the Bible should be understood as arbitrary.

But I wonder in the case of the moral legitimacy of same-sex relationships, you know, if you embark on this study of the Bible and you become convinced that it teaches that actually the same-sex relationships are morally illegitimate, whatever the reason might be, maybe an incorrect underlying moral logic, would you be like William Lane Craig and say, "The Bible must not be inerrant," or would you potentially say, "You know what? Actually, my belief in inerrancy is stronger, and therefore, I may have to adjust my lifestyle"? Does that-- do you kinda see what I'm zeroing in on?