I don’t think anyone is seriously advocating government action against churches on same-sex marriage.
What potential government action are you suggesting is in play? Is Alito similarly suggesting?
Because while interpretations are always evolving, the Bible does contain a lot of pretty direct stuff, and the prohibition on homosexuality is as direct as anything.
There’s none seriously in play, but looking off into the future, there could be attempts to take away tax exempt status from churches that don’t do what the government wants. The churches would almost certainly win, but it is a distant threat.
Heck, I’m okay with revisiting the issue of tax-exempt status now. Not in this particular thread mind you, as it seems off-topic, but in any case Alito and anyone else is free to continue vilifying anything they want, and if they get vilified and want to whine about it, they should grow a spine or a thicker skin or whatever body part they clearly lack.
The prohibition on divorce is much stronger, and spoken by Jesus himself.
But there are an awful lot of divorced (and remarried) Christians out there.
Heck, if you want a concept that isn’t subject to voting, try physics. If engineers tried to be as selective about what formulas to use as religious people are about what bible verses to follow, bridges and building and planes would be crashing left and right.
Not according to this guy. Sure, he may not be particularly religious, but he makes compelling arguments concerning exactly what the text says. While it’s clear that people who engage in homosexuality are seen as scornful, there are reasons to believe it’s not the homosexual behavior itself that is the cause of that scorn. Sexual relations between men at the time the Bible was written were not acts of love, but of either power (dominion over slaves/conquered foes) or paganism (ritual sex). No one at the time contemplated homosexual activity as part of a monogamous life-long pair-bond. There is absolutely no indication in the New Testament that the acts themselves are sinful, the Leviticus passage is as irrelevant as the prohibitions on pork, tattoos, etc.
http://www.westarinstitute.org/resources/the-fourth-r/davidlovesjonathan/
http://www.westarinstitute.org/resources/the-fourth-r/what-the-new-testament-says-about-homosexuality/
http://www.westarinstitute.org/resources/the-fourth-r/when-a-man-lies-with-a-man-as-with-a-woman/
Plus, as mentioned above, the condemnation of divorce is much stronger, and people no longer care.
Yes, the prohibition on divorce is as clear as anything. As well as sex outside of marriage. That’s why I’ve never gotten the fury at gays demonstrated by many religious sects. It’s a sin, and it will always be a sin, because the Bible says it’s a sin. But so is divorce, so is fornication in general, and so is envy, lust, greed, etc.
But no one is ever going to ask a church for a divorce. It’s strictly a secular concept. And gays are of course free to marry now, in terms of government recognition of their union. But the religious view of marriage, the “sacrament” of marriage, is still denied them in most cases. And denied to many interfaith couples, remarriages, and even some interracial couples. Which is their business, of course, religions are private clubs that can do what they want as long as they don’t go around hurting people.
No, it isn’t. Even putting aside the issue of whether or not a Catholic annulment is effectively a divorce, Jews have had the get ritual since, pretty much always. Deuteronomy 24:1.
Annulment is usually BS from what I understand, didn’t John Kerry get an annulment after years of marriage?
Yes, the get, how could I forget that? But Jews don’t have a prohibition on divorce anyway. Christianity does.
I don’t know what Kerry may have done, but I understand some Catholics take annulment very seriously and some don’t, which just highlights how completely arbitrary the whole thing is. Similarly, Christians who don’t like divorce but do like condemning homosexuals (or the other way around, for that matter) are arbitrarily choosing what parts of the Old Testament to follow. If they’re okay with angering their God but can’t handle some earthbound vilification, too bad for them.
As a side note, Jesus warned that believers would be villified, so really it should be no problem for them.
Yeah, it’s only polite to vilify them; it makes them feel important.
I find it very telling that, in most cases, Christians love their God because his viewpoints seem to match each and every viewpoint that they already already possess.
Absolutely. People shop for religion that exalts themselves, that tells them they are a good person and someone is looking out for them. Probably a better way I should have explained it is churches where the people essentially believe that God serves them, vs. churches where the people believe that they serve God.
So is the prohibition of women ever being in charge over men or speaking in church or going around with their heads uncovered or wearing jewelry or fancy hair. Didn’t stop people from interpreting them differently.
Or, if you’re sticking with the Old Testament, then you’ve got a whole host of very direct laws that are interpreted as no longer being relevant to Christians.
There’s already an argument that the Bible doesn’t really prohibit homosexuality–that’s why there are homosexual Christians. There are arguments that the Old Testament commands are as invalid as the rest of them, and that the New Testament words don’t actually describe homosexuality–seeing as the only place they were ever used to mean that is in the Bible itself.
I think it’s quite likely that homosexuality is going to be seen as less and less sinful over time. The trend has already started, and the framework is in place, even for the literalists.
BTW, did I mention that the Bible is expressly says “Slaves, obey your masters”?
Neither does it ban polygamy, so at least there won’t be much of a fight over that one when it comes up.
Says you. This isn’t a factual assertion, it’s just an opinion (and an interpretation), and others disagree.
It’s prohibition against homosexuality is just as direct as its prohibition against eating shellfish. So I’m going to believe they take this stuff dead serious when I see them picketing Red Lobster. And not until.
IF they’re cool with that, and they would seem to have no issue, then they should take the same tolerant attitude and apply it to SSM.
If they just want to cherry pick, we needn’t be concerned about their book and its rules.