To the editor:

I am less certain than Jean Wright that the biblical passages she cites do in fact “speak against same sex relationships” (Public Forum, March 31). Three of them disapprove of “filthy acts” (porneias in the original Greek), but filthiness, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder (1 Thess. 4:3, 1 Tim. 1:10, Jude 1:7). True, Timothy goes on to condemn “pederasts” (Greek senokoitais), i.e. men who have sex with boys, but this concerns child abuse rather than gay marriage.

To properly understand Rom. 1:1-32, which Ms. Wright also cites, requires long and careful exegesis, which has been provided by the late Gareth Moore, a Dominican friar, in his book “A Question of Truth,” which systematically expounds all of the biblical passages that supposedly condemn homosexuality. He has convinced me to vote against the proposed constitutional amendment.

Richard Kay,

Lawrence