Need Intellectual Ammunition on Homosexuality? Read ‘Strained Relations’ by Bill Muehlenberg

Here is (Barbwire contributor) Dr. Michael Brown writing in the Foreword to “Strained Relations: The Challenge of Homosexuality,” a book by Bill Muehlenberg (another BarbWire contributor):

If you want to be attacked, vilified, demonised, slandered, libeled, misrepresented and verbally abused, then write a book that takes issue with homosexual practice or that opposes the goals of gay activism. Put another way, don’t even think about writing such a book unless you’re prepared to be attacked in the crudest and ugliest ways imaginable, not to mention face potential boycotts or even threats to your job or career.

Threats to your job or career? C’mon Dr. Brown. Surely that’s crazy talk. Except we all now know that it’s not crazy. See just two recent examples here and here.

This past weekend I finished reading Muehlenberg’s book, and while it contains a lot of bad news, let me start this review with some good news: It’s now available in paperback, and can be purchased at Amazon.com, and in Kindle format. I highly recommend it. Muehlenberg has compiled an encyclopedia of information that presents the ugly reality surrounding the controversial homosexual issue.

Here is the BarbWire.com version of author Bill Muehlenberg’s bio:

[He] was born in America, lives in Melbourne, Australia. He runs a web-based ministry of pro-faith, pro-family activism called CultureWatch: http://www.billmuehlenberg.com. Bill is widely sought out by the media for comments on social issues, faith issues, and family issues, and has appeared on all the major television and radio news shows, current affairs shows, and debate programs.

As one of those Americans who reads a lot of op eds and as many books about politics and history as time permits, it wasn’t easy to avoid being overwhelmed by the sheer amount of material in Strained Relations. Most non-fiction books I’ve read ease readers into each “big point,” and then afterward, they’re allowed a chance to absorb what they just read before being hit with the next.

This is not the case in Muehlenberg’s book — he covers a lot of ground in 270 pages. While reading I couldn’t help think of a boxing match where punch follows hard upon punch. If you want a rest, you’ll have to put the book down.

After I finished it I was relieved to learn that he spent nearly 20 years working on the book. Two decades of material isn’t easy to absorb all at once — especially when it seemed as if every single one of the 707 footnotes were attached to the kind of critical information a lot more Americans need to see.

Why did Muehlenberg take on the task of writing it? He answers that here:

The reason is simple: truth matters, and truth needs to get into the public arena.

The reason I have put so much time and effort into this book is that we are in a war. It is an ideological war, a cultural war, a political war, an intellectual war, and a spiritual war. It is certainly a war of ideas. And in any war of ideas we desperately need ammunition.

It is a war indeed — and too many clear-thinking people still act as if we’re in peacetime.

This book hopefully provides that intellectual ammunition. It offers a wealth of data, facts, quotes and research on the battle we are in. There are many dozens, if not hundreds, of quotations from the homosexual press, from homosexual activists, from homosexual books, and homosexual websites.

There are also numerous quotes from the scientific literature, the medical literature, the social science literature, and world experts and authorities on this topic.

The book certainly is a comprehensive work, divided into two parts. The first part covers “Social Science and Public Policy Concerns.” Chapters deal with everything from “Strategies of the Homosexual Lobby,” AIDS, just how many homosexuals there are, marriage, adoption, and a chapter titled “Homosexuality and Children.”

Part two covers “Biblical and Theological Concerns,” a section that is more important than ever as almost daily Christians in high places waver or walk away from Biblical teaching on homosexuality.

That Bill Muehlenberg is fearless goes without saying. But in the pages of Strained Relations you’re not just reading his opinion. What you learn is just how much information is available regarding this “lifestyle.” Strained Relations is packed with the kind of facts too few people are aware of, and too many would prefer to ignore.

It is tempting to include many more excerpts than the few below, but I hope these serve as examples for why this book is a must-have resource for anyone who is honest and open to the truth.

Here are just a few items put into bullet points:

  • [A] recent study of the sexual profiles of 2,583 older homosexuals published in Journal of Sex Research found that only 2.7 per cent claimed to have had sex with one partner only. It also found that homosexual men had a mean lifetime number of 251 partners.
  • Moreover, various studies show that homosexuals account for the majority of new cases of sexually-transmitted diseases. For example, a male homosexual is 14 times more likely to have syphilis than a male heterosexual, and eight times more likely to have hepatitis.
  • The problem of cruising and sexual encounters in public places also needs to be pointed out. A recent newspaper report noted that a Myer department store had to close customer toilets due to rampant homosexual activity taking place there. A homosexual website claims to list more than 15,000 locations around Australia “where gay and bisexual guys meet for sex”. These include well-known Sydney buildings, parks and beaches, even the Sydney Opera House toilets.
  • A survey done by two homosexual authors revealed that three-fourths of homosexuals had at some time had sex with boys 16 to 19 or younger.

Under the subheading “Unhealthy Practices and Lifestyle Concerns” is this:

One writer has summarised the situation this way: “For the vast majority of homosexual men, and for a significant number of homosexual women – even apart from the deadly plague of AIDS – sexual behaviour is obsessive, psychopathological and destructive to the body.”

Yes, of course that’s footnoted. After a few more devastating facts, Muehlenberg writes:

However, given that so many people — for ideological reasons — will wish to dismiss all of the evidence provided above, let me conclude by offering more medical testimony, as presented in the homosexual press, and by a homosexual doctor. People can dismiss my remarks, or those of straight people, but when homosexual doctors writing for the mainstream homosexual press make this case, then perhaps we do need to listen carefully.

I refer to homosexual MD Frank Spinelli who wrote an important article for the major American homosexual publication, The Advocate. He begins this way:

Imagine for a moment that you’re a doctor – a gay doctor with a practice that predominantly treats gay men. Now guess how many text and phone calls you might receive during any given weekend involving questions that have to do with recreational drugs, penile discharge, or the risk of contracting HIV from unprotected sexual encounters. Now take that number and multiply it by 10 if that weekend should occur around Gay Pride, Folsom Street Fair, Gay Days at Disney, or any one of the Atlantis cruises. Welcome to my world.

Muehlenberg summarizes:

Similar stories by other doctors — both heterosexual and homosexual — can be repeated time and time again. What we have here is a reckless, irresponsible and unsafe lifestyle that no one should be engaging in, let alone promoting and seeking to normalise.

Two more passages. In Chapter 5, “Once Homosexual, Always Homosexual,” is this:

Dr Elizabeth Moberly has worked with homosexuals for decades now, and she has found a very common theme: “The homosexual – whether man or woman – has suffered some deficit in the relationship with the parent of the same sex; and … there is a corresponding drive to make good this deficit – through the medium of same-sex or ‘homosexual’ relationships.”

One counselor who has spent decades working with adult men dissatisfied with their homosexuality said this:

At the root of almost every case of homosexuality is some distortion of the fundamental concept of gender. … Self-deception about gender is at the heart of the homosexual condition. A child who imagines that he or she can be the opposite sex – or be both sexes – is holding on to a fantasy solution to his or her confusion. This is a revolt against reality and a rebellion against the limits built into our created human natures.

Under the subheading “Born That Way?” is this:

A two-year study involving nearly 860 individuals and 200 therapists found that change is clearly possible. The study found that:

… before counseling or therapy, 68% of the respondents perceived themselves as exclusively or almost entirely homosexual, with another 22% stating they were more homosexual than heterosexual. After treatment, only 13% perceived themselves as exclusively or almost entirely homosexual, while 33% described themselves as either exclusively or almost entirely heterosexual. One male respondent said: “Change is extremely difficult and requires total commitment. But I have broken the terrible power that homosexuality had over me for so long. I haven’t been this light and happy since I was a child. People can and do change and become free.”

That this kind of information rarely makes it into the dishonest media or the shallow pop culture is a call to arms for those who want to see the dissemination of the truth about homosexuality.

The sections I’ve included in this review represent a small handful of the hundreds of footnoted facts in this important book. You can buy your copy at Amazon.com.