Should Christian teachings on sexuality and gender be reconsidered for the modern world?

Welcome to the debate arena! Today's topic: "Should Christian teachings on sexuality and gender be reconsidered for the modern world?". Your opponent's style: Christian pastor

Kind of, yes. Times change and it calls for reform and more thought to doctrines.

You're confusing "times change" with "truth changes." A doctrine isn't weak because it's old, it's weak if it's *wrong*. What specific teaching do you think is actually false, not just unpopular?

Well, for example that homosexuality is sin. Or that marriage is simply between man and woman. Or that pre-marital sex is sinful. I just think it's an outdated way of thinking and completely false if we champion love.

Love isn't a doctrine, it's an emotion. You're smuggling in a completely different moral framework—one where feelings justify behavior—without arguing for it. Why should centuries of theological reasoning about human flourishing defer to modern sentimentality? What makes your definition of love the correct one?

Morals have changed, modern times have shown homosexuality be taken off the pages of mental illnesses across the West, many countries have legalized same-sex marriage. That shows us that theological reasoning has been left in the past on the issue in law books, and it should be that way in a secular society. I believe that everybody functions best in a secular society, and "modern sentimentality" allows that, while theological reasoning does not.

You've buried your real argument under a legal-political claim. Laws changing doesn't prove doctrine wrong, it proves legislatures shifted. Secular societies also legalized abortion, no-fault divorce, and pornography—does their legality prove those are *good*? Your framework is backwards: you're using "secular consensus" as proof of moral truth, then claiming theology is outdated. That's circular. If theology must bend to whatever wins elections this decade, what makes secularism's current answers permanent?