In 2004 the band Straylight Run produced a song called “Existentialism On Prom Night” about a young couple that made the most of evening. “Sing me something soft, sad and delicate, or loud and out of key,” they wrote, “Sing me anything, we’re glad for what we’ve got, done with what we’ve lost, our whole lives laid out right in front of us.”

The song is about a couple that was done playing by the rules. They decided to create their own path with the hopes of experiencing utopia.

Existentialism and Sexuality 

This really is at the heart of the philosophy they reference in the title of their song. Existentialism is the belief that humans have no pre-existing design or purpose. We’re thrown into a cruel world at our births and we must decide our own destiny. We are the captains of our souls.

“Sing me a song,” we might repeat, “soft and delicate, or loud and out of key.” There are no ultimate standards. In other words, just sing me something I like. But can chasing what I like really make me happy?

Like the lyrics of the song, Rabbi Mark Sameth, writing in a recent piece for the New York Times, uses a musical analogy for human sexuality, “Gender . . . is more like music: Each of us has a key and a range with which we are most comfortable. Attuned to ourselves and to one another, we can find happiness and harmony.”

But does alternative sexuality, whether in action or identity, really lead to harmony? Does it lead to happiness? Does it contribute to human flourishing?

I should first define what I mean by alternative sexuality. I simply mean anything outside of the traditional Judeo-Christian understanding of sexual identity and sexual practice, the biblical model of marriage. Christians believe there is one way to get things right and about a million ways to get them wrong. Homosexuality and transgender lifestyles find their place on a long list that includes attitudes and actions flowing out of wrongly ordered opposite sex attractions, such as lust and adultery. The Bible uses the category of sin to describe any sexual practice outside of the covenantal union between a man and a woman.

The Standard and the Statistics

Now, the question I want to raise is related to human flourishing. Does deviation from the biblical model lead to increased human happiness? A recent study published with The New Atlantis by John Hopkins University professors Lawrence S. Mayer and Paul R. McHugh suggests that the answer is likely, “No.”

Their massive research is “written for the general public and medical professionals” to offer insights about “the health issues faced by the LGBT populations.” This is a good point of application for believers. Christians should be concerned about our LGBT neighbors, even while we hold to a biblical definition of marriage and sexual identity. Like the aim of the research project, we should be concerned about the health issues faced by the LGBT population.

“What we’ve found,” Mayer says regarding their study, “is that there is a large gap between, on the one hand the certainty with which beliefs are held about these matters and on the other what a sober assessment of what the science reveals.” In their effort to fill in the research gaps, what they’ve uncovered will certainly be met with controversy as to how it might be interpreted.

Let me offer a few bullet points taken from their executive summary:

• Compared to the general population, non-heterosexual subpopulations are at an elevated risk for a variety of adverse health and mental health outcomes.

• Members of the transgender population are also at higher risk of a variety of mental health problems compared to members of the non-transgender population. Especially alarmingly, the rate of lifetime suicide attempts across all ages of transgender individuals is estimated at 41%, compared to under 5% in the overall U.S. population.
• Compared to the general population, adults who have undergone sex-reassignment surgery continue to have a higher risk of experiencing poor mental health outcomes. One study found that, compared to controls, sex-reassigned individuals were about 5 times more likely to attempt suicide and about 19 times more likely to die by suicide.

• Children are a special case when addressing transgender issues. Only a minority of children who experience cross-gender identification will continue to do so into adolescence or adulthood.

The Media Explosion That Hasn’t Happened

Based on their summary, the research overturns many popular assumptions. And it reveals some dangerous implications. For example, less than five percent of the U.S. population attempts suicide. Within the transgender community that percentage is forty-one percent. Nearly half. Nearly half of those in the transgender community, across ages, at some point attempt suicide.

I think this research should provide grounds for outrage among secular humanists. If there was any other demographic (remove the sexual affiliations) experiencing this amount of distress there would be a national, nay, an international kerfuffle. On any other issue the lack of media attention would be considered discrimination.

As I write this I wonder how might Christians and secularists join together to raise awareness about the health concerns related to the LGBT lifestyle. But I fear, and I don’t think my fears are misplaced, that differences in convictions about the related topics would make cooperation difficult if not impossible. But if we share a common desire for human flourishing then we should be able to unite to better understand and educate others regarding sexual lifestyles that seem to correlate to increases in health risks, depression, and suicidal thoughts.

Is Christianity to Blame?

To be honest, I’m not sure how to describe these issues using merely a secular vocabulary. Perhaps that’s because I believe that the Bible is where answers to such human dilemmas are to be found. The passage that comes immediately to mind is John 10:10 where Jesus said, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”

Some might respond that this is the very sort of thing, an article like this, that creates a culture where transpersons experience angst. Conservative Christian views could be the culprit, some might argue. The research project seems to have anticipated a similar, if not related, concern when they included the following paragraph in their conclusion:

“One hypothesis, the social stress model — which posits that stigma, prejudice, and discrimination are the primary causes of higher rates of poor mental health outcomes for these subpopulations — is frequently cited as a way to explain this disparity. While non-heterosexual and transgender individuals are often subject to social stressors and discrimination, science has not shown that these factors alone account for the entirety, or even a majority, of the health disparity between non-heterosexual and transgender subpopulations and the general population.”

While opposing views always create tension, the issue, based on the study, seems much deeper. And while it will be met with conflicting interpretations, this study illustrates something that any Bible believing Christian knows to be true: The idea that sustainable flourishing can be found in direct opposition to God’s ways is patently false.

What It Means To Be Human

There is an interesting exchange on a video interview about the research project between Lawrence Mayer, coauthor of the study, and Adam Keiper, editor The New Atlantis. Here’s an excerpt I transcribed:

Mayer: “We are interested as psychiatrists in talking to people about what will make their lives be as full as it can be.”

Keiper: “So, human flourishing as the aim here of the therapy?”

Mayer: “Yeah, the aim is to make sure that people aren’t finding themselves in the misdirection of their life, that’s going to keep them from flourishing as people.”

Keiper: “And the idea here is a full understanding of what it means to be human?”

Mayer: “Yes.”

That’s an interesting statement isn’t it? Mayer hopes his research helps persons to avoid the “misdirection of their life.” I wonder who might consider a lifestyle where, for example, a person who has reassignment surgery is almost twenty times more likely to die by suicide, to be, in any realistic way, a path to flourishing.

This really comes down to existentialism on prom night. Will our sexuality be ordered by a design, the Designer, or will we simply sing any song we like, no matter how out of key? It’s really one way or the other. Life boils down to two options, our way or God’s. And even secular research illustrates which way is best.

For the love of humanity, and for the glory of God, we must point our families, our friends, our coworkers, our neighbors, to the one who came that they might have abundant life here and eternal life hereafter. He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no amount of political correctness can paper over that.

It’s at the core of the universe and the center of what it means to be human. As C.S. Lewis once said, “God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.”