So why don’t I know any? Of course we lack a way of identifying Christians. I know the fallacies from generalizing from too few cases, but statistics starts to work around 30. Over the years, I have personally known way more than 30 people that were active in a Church. Of course, not all Christians are active church members and many active church members may not be Christians. Maybe our Westboro Baptist friends. I have heard they really are a bunch lawyers misusing their Kansas state legal positions to run a racket collecting fees from those that lose when they sue them. But that is a side issue.
The best I can remember is 2 members of a church I belonged to going to jail. I would like to declare the one wasn’t a Christian. Yeah, when he was a kid, his mother drug him to church, but as he got older, we saw less and less of him. He may have even been dropped from the membership role. After all, we lose money on non contributors because we have to cough up to denomination for each one. When he went to jail for armed robbery, the church reached out to him. The minister and others visited him in jail. When he got out, we even talked about creating a position in the church to give him a job. I talked about helping teach him maintenance skills. The wisdom of that falling through? I can’t buy the idea that that a fine Christian boy stuck up a gas station. No, we lost him before that.
About the same time a lady ended up in jail DUI. That church was not one that railed against demon rum. I do feel Christians must accept her as one of us. Yes, we could say if she truly believed, it would have saved her. In fact, I do think that years later she is still what we call a recovering alcoholic. Alcohol is a big problem and occasionally catches an active church member. DUI kills, but usually we don’t call them murders.
Another problem in that church was the leader of the youth choir living with a woman he wasn’t married to. I agreed that wasn’t right. I don’t remember how that was resolved. One thing the homosexual issue has done for the church is to remind us we need to hold high standards for heterosexual behavior. The church does often take prompt and strong action especially when clergy are involved.
So I stand by my original premise, the church does focus on sex because that is one of the most common areas for members to fall short. Sermons on armed robbery do little good for kids that haven’t been there for years.
So why do I waste my time here? Well I mostly don’t. I commented to that on somebody fighting a lonely battle else where. From a email: ‘‘That’s what I used to think as well about online witnessing until someone who used to lurk on R&S sent me an email saying she was loosing her faith but from the answers from Christians there she was encouraged to come back to Christ. We do what we can, God does the rest.’’
Because the present day government is stronger than the church and doesn’t allow it. And perhaps you simply come across as civilized enough that the Christians who do things like waylay gays and beat them don’t boast of it to your face or invite you to come along. Or perhaps you are doing the religious thing and practicing willful amnesia over all the times you have come across such Christians. And of course, you do seem prone to labeling any Christians who do bad things as not being “real” Christians"
Thelabdude,
I do not want to seem harsh, but when I said that history is full of murdering and robbing christians, well, what I mean is a little more along the lines of how REAL CHRISTIANS supported and participated in the enslavement of native inhabitants, the theft of native lands, genocide, physical and cultural extermination, and the persecution of people who were…what can I say ? Are you are rolling your eyes, and thinking-but those were NOT THE REAL CHRISTIANS—am I right?
[ol]
[li]Homosexuality does not lead to procreation[/li][li]In the desert, where Judaism (and thus Christianity and Islam) was born, anal sex was likely not a very clean experience, with, I assume, a dearth of clean water and cleaning supplies.[/li][/ol]
For (1), it’s clear that old societies wanted to grow as much as possible, so anything that went against that was forbidden (e.g. masturbation)
Regarding (2), they banned not only homosexuality, but also anal sex between a man and a woman, so it’s perhaps not the homosexuality aspect they were rejecting per se, but the resulting sexual act.
I’m sure there were other reasons, but the above two are pretty obvious ones for a small desert tribe trying to survive and thrive many centuries ago.
Christians should not hate gays anymore than they should hate adulterers, gamblers, or any other sinner. Perhaps the OP should be better defined as “why does religion consider homosexual acts immoral”?
Oh, please; that pretentious “hate the sinner not the sin” nonsense is just a way for religious people to paper over their rabid hatred for “sinners” while pretending they don’t hate them. It’s an especially obnoxious combination of bigoted hatred and dishonest self righteousness.
They do hate homosexuals; rabidly, and often to the point of violence. Often to the point of being willing to abuse their own children or attack strangers.
I think the point Qin Shi Huangdi was making is that homosexuals are almost always mentioned in scripture with other kinds of sinners. Liars, cowards, idolators (tebow fanatics maybe?) and many more.
Guess what sometimes I am coward some times I evlevate things above their proper place (idolatry) sometimes I lie. So I must hate myself huh?
Well I dont hate myself and I dont hate my friend who is cheating on his wife and I dont hate gays either and couldn’t care less if they get married.
It is just the ignorant fringe that really hate gays.
The battle over SSM is more over the benefits that married couples get. I for one dont think we need to be subsidising marrige anyway. Do away with the benefits and many of those who are fighting against SSM will just walk away.
Yes it does; that’s exactly what you are doing with your insistence that people are only Christian if they follow “very specific conditions” defined by you.
I knew I should have saved the link, but recently I saw something about Christianity being genetic. The decline now and in past times could be explained on the power of Christians to pressure others. Often it has been dependent on the state.
Of course if Christian are born that way, should they be tolerated as helpess to resist? Fits with the doctrine of the elect and dammed. Think of the time it would save Christian witnesses if everybody got genetically tested and wore little elect and dammed pins.
Neither the church, state, or both forbiding things stops them. While it is fairly easy for members on my church to do stuff behind my back, there are limits to what they can keep out of the newspaper. When I was a manager, I lost a good black worker for a while. I think it had more to do with him being shacked up with an attractive blond than anything else. That details wasn’t in the paper. That was close to 30 years ago, but think it could still happen here now.
I have admited that the Westboro Baptists no matter how badly I feel are mislead. may have to be accepted as Christians. I know they exist, but am not acquainted with them, nor child molesting priests, people that shoot abortion doctors, thieves, and murderers. While many see our society as Christian, it is unfair to label many of the dregs of society that have had little if anything to do with the church as Chrisiian. Did some of these become Chrisitian just before their last parole hearing?
Pretty sure it’s the other way ‘round. Least in theory - I realize many ardent churchmen over the histories have been known to enjoy the sin very much :). Then again, it’s not a Christian teaching to begin with. Gandhi said that.
Which is kind of odd of him, all things considered. He was typically not one to be hatin’.
[QUOTE
. Fits with the doctrine of the elect and dammed. Think of the time it would save Christian witnesses if everybody got genetically tested and wore little elect and dammed pins.[/QUOTE]
Question???
I would love to save a christian witness a little time.
In the doctrine of the elect and damned, what little pin do you believe that gays ,in general, would be wearing (since unfortunately genetic tests are not yet available for this).
Because they wanted people to make lots of babies and stick around to raise them.
I don’t think the point someone else made about gay men still being able to have kids just by reluctantly shagging their wives once in a while contradicts this; humans don’t go on heat like most mammals; it’s difficult to tell when a woman is fertile. And human women often have irregular cycles.
If a man and woman were to have sex once every couple of months then the likelihood of her getting pregnant would be much lower, and if he were permitted to have a marriage-like bond with a man as well then he’d shag his wife even less and be less attached to her and any babies they managed to make.
Lesbianism has generally been ignored by religions because you can just make women have sex with men by force and by economic necessity. If ‘homosexuality’ were really the issue, then lesbians would be talked about as much as men, but most of the language is specifically about men.
Well, I daresay that’s because the “language” of religions are almost always written by men, with women described as something to be controlled, resisted and otherwise not given a lot of thought to.
I’d just like to say that my religion is Judaism and we don’t hate gays. There are some Jews that hate gay people, but they can kindly go fuck themselves. Just because one is of the extreme ‘right’ doesn’t make them the normative standard by which we measure laws by. Seriously.
Yes, about women being controlled, etc. That was my point.
But I’m not talking about the use of ‘man’ to mean ‘humans.’ It’s all specifically about men laying down with men rather than women and is pretty unambiguous in the genders concerned. Men meaning human would be nonsensical there. The other verses are the same. If women laying down with women as with men is mentioned anywhere, then I missed it.