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If I ever become important enough to be misquoted, or quoted out of context, here's all of the material my opponents will ever need. In fact, if you want to get me in trouble with half the human race, don't read this column; just quote the title. For the rest of you, please continue on.

When someone in the church is trying to justify homosexuality from a Christian perspective, a standard operating procedure is to plow through the scriptures, find something that no one seems to take seriously any more, or some instruction that is almost universally ignored today, point it out and say, "Ha, you don't adhere to that, do you?" The implication is that proscriptions against homosexuality are like proscriptions against eating oysters. Those restrictions simply don't apply, and any thinking person knows that. Part of this argument can be deflected by pointing out how the New Testament deals differently with Old Testament moral law as compared to how it deals with the dietary laws and those having to do with temple sacrifices.

But, then the gay apologist, if he or she has some knowledge of the New Testament, will go on to the role of women in the New Testament. A favorite challenge that will come at me is, "Do you think that women should be required to keep their heads covered in church?" This is an easy one for me. I simply reply, "Yes, I think they should". Usually, at this point, my opponent decides I'm hopelessly reactionary, or else I'm pulling their leg. In either case, the discussion usually ends right there.

Now, you who are reading this are likely my friends, or at least not my opponents, so I ask you to hear me out. I am serious.

I am a great believer in the tremendous power and significance of symbols. Dealing with people who have a broken or incomplete sexual identity, I know the power that symbols have to attract, to repel, to teach, to convict, to affect our lives in so many ways. The typical male homosexual, longing for masculinity, is tremendously drawn, sometimes even in bondage, to those things that symbolize masculinity. Symbols, whether they are a set of muscles, a big car, a degree on the wall, whatever, tend to be outward and visible signs of some reality, of some trait or characteristic that can be terribly important to us.

I believe that when Paul tells us, in I Corinthians, Chapter 11, that women's heads should be covered, he is dealing with symbols. I believe that God is saying to us in this Scripture that it will always be important to acknowledge the difference in roles between men and women. I don't think it would have mattered too much if we had been told that women should go bare headed and men should wear hats--as the Jews do in the Synagogue today. Could it not be that God foresaw that one day we would try to deny the differences between men and women, and that this would be terribly harmful to us? The head covering was offered as an outward and visible sign of our differences, not I might add, of any inherent superiority or inferiority.

Thirty-five years ago women in almost all churches wore hats. I don't know what brought about the change, but in a fairly short time, a symbol was abolished. A few years later, there arose a myth that men and women differed primarily only in their reproductive functions. The fact that history, biology, anthropology, and almost every other field of knowledge contradicted this seemed to have little bearing. That we could so quickly abolish the symbol indicates that we had already lost our appreciation of the underlying reality. For this reason, I don't think women wearing hats again will, in and of itself, accomplish a thing. But I do pray that we will once again come to understand that God did create us male and female, and that it is a glorious thing to be a man and it is a glorious thing to be a woman, and the differences and complementarity are also glorious. At that time, I am sure we will adopt symbols that express this truth.

P.S. I know you want to ask: Does my wife wear a hat to church? No, she doesn't. She read this column and agrees with it (phew!), but feels that at this point, her wearing a hat would be a sign of eccentricity rather than a symbol of her special identity in Christ.