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Group Name: ELCA HUMAN SEXUALITY DISCUSSION
Subject: DISCUSSION OF SEXUALITY ISSUES IN THE ELCA
This meeting serves as a place of informal conversation and dialogue for ELCA
members and others on issues of sexuality.Participants are asked to:1. Respect
one another and one another's opinions. Please keep in mind Luther's
explanation to the Eighth Commandment, seeking to put the best construction on
one another's postings. This means that participants will do well representing
their own thought and/or discussing the relative strengths or weaknesses of
another's post rather than demonizing or demeaning a person for that view2.
Respect the list. Please try to limit postings to no more than six a day per
individual member. Also, please delete all extraneous material from previous
messages. Quote ONLY what is necessary for your response. Be sure that all
quoted material is clearly distinguished from the current writer.If a list
member has concerns about any transgressions of these guidelines, the member
should address the concern in a private message or a posting to the list. If a
list member feels that raising the issue on list did not result in a
satisfactory outcome, the member may address the concern to one of the
moderators of this meeting.The meeting is moderated by BILL ESBORN.The following
terms are generally used in accordance with their definitions as found in
Wikipedia:Sex - refers to the male and female duality of biology and
reproduction.Unlike organisms that only have the ability to reproduce asexually,
sexedmale and female pairs have the ability to produce offspring throughmeiosis
and fertilization. The two sexes attract one another andcommunicate their
readiness to procreate through differences in theirbiology.An organism's sex
reflects its biological function in reproduction, notits sexuality or other
behavior. The female sex is defined as the onewhich produces the larger gamete
and which typically bears the offspring.In contrast, the male sex has a smaller
gamete and rarely bears offspring.In some animals, sex may be assigned to
specific structures rather thanthe entire organism. Earthworms, for example, are
normally hermaphrodites.Gender - in common usage, refers to the differences
between men and women.Encyclopaedia Britannica notes that gender identity is "an
individual'sself-conception as being male or female, as distinguished from
actualbiological sex."[1] Although "gender" is commonly used interchangeablywith
"sex," within the academic fields of cultural studies, gender studiesand the
social sciences in general, the term "gender" often refers topurely social
rather than biological differences. Some even view gender asa social
construction rather than a biological phenomenon.Sexual orientation - refers to
the direction of an individual's sexuality,usually conceived of as classifiable
according to the sex or gender of thepersons that the individual finds sexually
attractive. The most commonlyused categories of sexual orientation are
heterosexuality (being sexuallyattracted to members of the opposite sex),
homosexuality (being sexuallyattracted to members of the same sex) and
bisexuality (being sexuallyattracted to members of either sex).Sexual identity -
is a term that, like sex, has two distinctivelydifferent meanings. One describes
an identity roughly based on sexualorientation, the other an identity based on
sexual characteristics, aconcept related to, but different from, gender
identity.Gender identity - in sociology usually describes the gender with which
aperson identifies (i.e, whether one perceives oneself to be a man, awoman, or
describes oneself in some less conventional way), but can alsobe used to refer
to the gender that other people attribute to theindividual on the basis of what
they know from gender role indications(social behavior, clothing, hair style,
etc.). Gender identity may beaffected by a variety of social structures,
including the person's ethnicgroup, employment status, religion or irreligion,
and family.
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