No, you are incorrect. In fact, I’m gay, myself. I think that gay and straight people should be equal under the law.
Add The Marian Doctrines, infallibility, in persona Christi, Jesus as a continuation of the blood line of David and a handful of other things and you’ve basically got one reason I left, too;)
Thank you so much for clarifying. However, I’m either without too much sleep today or I’m unbelievably denser than usual, but I don’t think I was grasping what points you were trying to make earlier then. Can you help me out so I won’t feel so lost? Or at least, not more than usual. 
Yep, and the whole married/women priests thing. Although that’s kinda connected to their views on sex.
See, in everything else, though, really, Catholicism is really enlightened-science, education, social justice, etc. It’s such a pity.
Well, using the same arguments, there should be an encyclical encouraging Catholic legislators the world over to pass laws against remarriage following divorce.
Is there such an encyclical?
Thank you, Sparky. Now would you like a cookie, or should we just pet you on your head and send you out to play in the sandbox?
I think it comes down to what the church can pull off vs. a lost cause. There is no chance that the church can change anything about divorce now, OTOH, they might still have an effect on the gay marriage thing. If they could change divorce laws, I have no doubt that they’d go ahead and do it. In today’s environment, though, they’d just look stupid(er)
In other words, they’ll bully those they can bully and leave the kids who can hurt them back alone…
And you trying to force yours on us by the same process.
It’s called the democratic process, at least in America.
You do it, they do it, I do it. And we all complain about how unfair it is when the other guy does it.
Some more than others.
Regards,
Shodan
You know, I still think this whole problem could be solved if someone would just go up to the Pope and shake their finger in his face and go, “oh, you g’wan, you old Pope, you!” I’ll bet no one’s ever done that. and it’s probably just what he needs to take him down a peg or two.
[Omigod, I am channeling Charlene from Designing Women. That’s what I get for watching too much Lifetime.]
Nothing particularly unexpected in here, except for the Papal bitching that “the church’s message was being watered down in Europe.”
For some reason, I had images of my mom whining over a cup of tea. Except with the beehive crown. It was highly amusing, and has kept me entertained all day.
Gosh, Shodan, it’s such a nice change to be butting heads with you instead of Libertarian. She usually follows me into religious threads and humps my leg like a little puppydawg . . .
Andrew? Andrew Sullivan?
Is this the first time you’ve outed yourself on the board? I’m shocked to find that out since you seem to be such an apologist for the Southern Baptists and other Evangelical Christians, Strom Thurmond and the school admins who kicked the girl out of school for the Barbie is a Lesbian t-shirt.
This appeal to pragmatism, while almost certainly reflective of the true approach of the Church, does nothing to address the weakness behind the principled stance posited in Captain Amazing’s post.
Yeah, too bad Kate Hepburn left us. She could have really carried it off. 
Be kind to Mr. Sullivan. For all he may hold near-contradictory views, he has not been hesitant to slam those who probably require it (including Catholicism, his own religion). And he provides a pretty decent gadfly to the gay rights movement, which is nice.
Spoiler box contains overheated profanity in rant form.
That is Goddamned bullshit and you mutherfuckers know it. Noone FUCKING READING AGAIN YOU DUMB SHIT. NO ONE IS TRYING TO MAKE YOU QUEER. Asshole. We fucking don’t want your skanky ass.
What we are doing is defending our own INALIENABLE FUCKING RIGHTS.
We’re supposed to start with the assumption that we’re FREE in this society. You have to show why it’s in Society’s interest to limit freedom, otherwise it’s the default postion.
Allowing Gay people the right to marry harms noone and therefore the prohibition is unjustified. We’re not limiting your freedom in any way. We’re not compelling you to do anything. We’re not even forcing you to approve anything. We’re just fighting your coersive misuse of government to support your religious viewpoint. Some day, hopefully soon, the courts will acknowledge that.
I’ll buy the NRA comparison to the Gay Rights issue in the sense they are fighting for what they consider Constitutional Rights, as we do. However, forcing your religion as social policy is actually against the Bill of Rights.
I’ve been out on these boards for about a year and a half now. I don’t have any posts I can link to right now to show you, but could find them for you if you’d like.
As for the points you’ve raised, I don’t think I’m an apologist for Evangelical Christianity, but I do think people are too eager to condemn it without trying to understand it. There seems to be a tendency to dismiss the movement out of hand as evil, when in fact, Evangelicals tend to be well meaning, and they sometimes have valid concerns. And I think, generally, dialogue with evangelicals is more constructive, and has a better chance of changing their minds, than just shouting them down.
And I do have some sympathy for the “liberal” wing of the Southern Baptists, who were, and still are, if not pro-gay, at least not particularly anti-gay. and who were a mainstream southern denomination that valued free thought and religious freedom. Unfortunately, they’re no longer in control of the Convention, and the current Southern Baptist faction is a bunch of intolerant fucknuggets, who I don’t have any respect for at all.
I also don’t think I’ve ever said anything positive about Strom Thurmond on this board, and I know I’ve said a lot of negative things about him in real life. I think he was an amoral weasel, who embraced segregation when it was politically popular in South Carolina, and then, when the Civil Rights Act passed and blacks gained political power, in the words of Lyndon Johnson, “kissed all the black ass he could find.” And, I have no doubt that, if gay people ever had become politically important in South Carolina, Thurmond would have french kissed Bruce Vilanch. However, I do think it’s in bad taste to publicly rejoice at someone’s death, no matter how much you hate the bastard. It just seems uncivilized to me.
And I agree with the decision of the school administration not to let the girl wear the Barbie t-shirt. The shirt was disruptive and intended to be disruptive, and I think teachers have enough of a problem maintaining discipline and teaching without things like that T-shirt making it harder.
However, none of this changes the fact that I am gay, and support gay rights and gay marriage. and, in spite of my general poverty, donate to the HRC when I get the chance and have saved a couple of bucks.
I did consider asking for a Cite? before …
I did consider asking for a Cite? before …
Yup! Other than all the things I/we disagree with them on, they’re really not that bad;)