The 2012 Barry Marshall Memorial Lecture was given this year by the Hon Michael Kirby AC CMG, who was, until his recent retirement, a Justice of the High Court of Australia.
Michael Kirby’s lecture was titled, Religion and Sexuality; Uncomfortable Bedfellows. Indeed, it would be hard to find a more qualified person in Australia to deliver this lecture than Michael Kirby. Not only does he have an incredibly insightful mind but he is also a practising ‘Protestant Anglican’ and has been in a committed same-sex relationship for 43 years.
Needless to say, he is a forceful advocate for change in our legislature to enable same-sex relationships to be recognised in law rather than be decreed as criminal behaviour. ‘By what right do we discriminate against sexual minorities in a secular country’, was his clear call. He noted that many countries in the world have decriminalised sodomy in their criminal codes, but not Australia, which, like other Commonwealth countries, inherited its common law from England.
Kirby noted that it was certain portions of scripture which formed the basis of the recent Melbourne publication, Five Uneasy Pieces. But as a lawyer who spent much of his time analysing the text of law and other legal documentation, he observed that the interpretation of such texts has changed from the plain or literal meanings of the text to an appreciation of the context and beyond to the purpose of what is written; in other words, looking from sentence to chapter to section to book.
Unfortunately, those who rely on certain passages of scripture are not doing this, even though they would not apply the same interpretive logic to passages which suggest ‘cutting off your hand’ or ‘plucking out you eye’ if these things offend. And, Kirby suggested that if the Bible can be summarised as a book all about the love of God, and one another, then we are obliged to love all of God’s creatures.
Science, Michael Kirby reminded us, now affirms that those who are attracted to same-sex relationships are ‘born and not made’. So, if this is the case and they are indeed all God’s people, then they cannot be outside the love of God.
It was a wonderful experience for us to be at this lecture; to hear Michael Kirby’s wisdom on this subject but also to see and hear him in the flesh for the first time.
Dr Andrew Bunting
Senior Theological Student, Trinity College Theological School
