Gay Members of the Clergy

[Bishop Potts]

There are many relgions out there that now ordain minister who are openly homosexual. I undestand that times are changing and the church has to keep up with the rest of the world in order to minister to their needs. A common question that I recieve very often is my view of the 'Homoesxual Minister'. Now I ask you the very same question... Do you think it is right to ordain the openly gay? Please express your true feelings, I will respect you geatly for your honesty on this matter. :read:

[Robyn Banks]

Bishop Potts:
Do you think it is right to ordain the openly gay?
Not all of them.

But it shouldn't be a drawback in and of itself. God made them that way. Why should you object to God's Plan?

[Captain Ochre]

Layman's opinion:

Homosexual practice should be distinguished from homosexual desires, imo. Ordaining a person who is sexually attacted to members of the same sex, yet does not act on those impulses (especially if he (or she, opening up another can o' worms) does nothing to encourage an impure mental life) is not a problem any more than is ordaining a big-boned pastor or priest who loves to eat pizza to excess yet sticks to his diet.
On the other hand, open homosexual practice should not be permitted on the part of any elder or deacon (or equivalent church offices) unless or until "sin" is entirely redefined within church tradition (not recommended!). If we can excuse other apparent sins using the same rationales that accompany advocacy of practicing homosexual clergy, then the whole enterprise would appear clearly wrong-headed.

[Sozo]

Why not? The Catholic church has been ordaining pedophiles.

(I hear Michael Jackson is attending Mass on a regular basis)

[Captain Ochre]

Sozo:
Why not? The Catholic church has been ordaining pedophiles.

(I hear Michael Jackson is attending Mass on a regular basis)

Huh? I thought that Michael was a JW (where the Governing Body sits in for the Pope and tells you how bad the whole RCC church hierarchy thing is).

For real.

[Patroclus]

But it shouldn't be a drawback in and of itself. God made them that way. Why should you object to God's Plan?

As of yet, this is unproven.

I think everybody deals with sin. Some people need to deal with that sin, just as much as any other sin. However, if a person denies that it is sin and lives in that lifestyle, I would not want to see that person as a minister.

[Robyn Banks]

Captain Ochre:
Homosexual practice should be distinguished from homosexual desires, imo. Ordaining a person who is sexually attacted to members of the same sex, yet does not act on those impulses ... does nothing to encourage an impure mental life) is not a problem any more than is ordaining a big-boned pastor or priest who loves to eat pizza to excess yet sticks to his diet.
Hmmmmm. A homosexual should not have sex? Now, the Catholics have been trying this for years with both heterosexual and homosexual priests - and the repression of God's Natural Desire either results in an unhealthy symptom or an often unhealthy fetish. Is this the result you want? Or do you deny that it is the result of not allowing a person to have sex?

Captain Ochre:
On the other hand, open homosexual practice should not be permitted on the part of any elder or deacon (or equivalent church offices) unless or until "sin" is entirely redefined within church tradition (not recommended!).
Why not?

Captain Ochre:
If we can excuse other apparent sins using the same rationales that accompany advocacy of practicing homosexual clergy, then the whole enterprise would appear clearly wrong-headed.
Why is homosexuality a 'sin'?

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Robyn:
But it shouldn't be a drawback in and of itself. God made them that way. Why should you object to God's Plan?
Patroclus:
As of yet, this is unproven.
Everything about God's Plan is "unproven". This is an unconvincing objection.
Patroclus:
I think everybody deals with sin. Some people need to deal with that sin, just as much as any other sin. However, if a person denies that it is sin and lives in that lifestyle, I would not want to see that person as a minister.
You assume that God's Plan is a sin? That is blasphemy.

Is eating shellfish a sin?

Robyn

[Patroclus]

Robyn, pay careful attention to what I am saying:

1. That people are born as homosexuals is not proven.

I can give you scripture verses, which I am sure that you already know, that rather clearly state that homosexuality is sinful. Those verse are the reason for my objection. If you want to know why it is a sin, because you are dissatisfied with what the Bible has to say, you may never find an answer for that or many other sins. For instance, you mentioned blasphemy. Why is that a sin? Aren't we taught, as a society, to be free thinkers and speakers? Why would God call blasphemy a sin if society pre-disposes us to act accordingly? By societal standards, there is nothing wrong with it, but spiritual standards are higher.

2. Let us consider the possibility that there is a homosexualy orienting gene, and that God still does not want people to partake in these practices.

First, we know that it was not okay during the Old Testament time period (Lev. 18:22). So, regardless of time period or dispensation, people who may have been born with that gene were prohibitted from acting on it. Now, this may seem unfair, but it is not the only example of such seemingly cruel decrees by God. Remember that God commanded Hosea to take as, a wife, a prostitute? Obviously, he is pre-disposed to reject such a calling, yet he does so. How many other times are we told not to do certain things that we enjoy, or are pre-disposed to do? Science tells us that it is natural for men to lust, yet scripture tells us that lust is wrong.

Now, let us consider dispensational implications. If it is now made acceptable because we are in a new dispensation, and the rule of the law holds no legitimacy, then the following should be permissible:

1. Incest
a. With mother (18:7)
b. With your stepmother (8)
c. With sister or half-sister (9)
d. With your niece (10)
e. With your aunt (12-13)
f. With your daughter-in-law (15)
g. With your sister-in-law (16)
2. Sex with a woman during her period (19, though I will grant that this was for ritual cleansing purposes--note that there is no explanation for this in the scriptures)
3. Sex with a married woman ("your kinsman's wife" 20)
4. Sacrificing of children to idols, esp. Molech (21)
5. Partake in Beastiality (23)

So, if our new dispensation abolishes the prohibition of homosexuality, then what about these other sins?

It is my personal opinion that people who try to advocate homosexuality in a Christian context have a very weak foundation to stand upon. But, that is my opinion.

[Jin-Roh]

Why not? The Catholic church has been ordaining pedophiles.

That's was a below-the-belt don't you think? Yes its horrible and unacceptable, but I'm not sure if that jab was neccessary. I'm actually somewhat critical of the RCC btw.

Hmmmmm. A homosexual should not have sex? Now, the Catholics have been trying this for years with both heterosexual and homosexual priests - and the repression of God's Natural Desire either results in an unhealthy symptom or an often unhealthy fetish. Is this the result you want? Or do you deny that it is the result of not allowing a person to have sex?

There is no Biblical clause that says a church leader must not marry. I agree that mandated celibacy is part of the problem in the RCC. (Tradition should be a guide...) However, putting homosexuality on the same par as hetreosexuality is diffrent. I deal with sexual temptaion (like most guys) but I don't say "this is the way God made me, and I shouldn't avoid it" because that's the "food for the stomach, stomach for the food" arguement that Paul plainly refuted.

Personally, I feel that if a Pastor deals with homosexuality that's one thing, but it should not be condoned. Most pastors (in protestant circles anyway) will be married to begin with. So the homosexuality thing is kind of a non-issue since it would be superceded by marriage.

[Piebald]

As of yet, this is unproven.

I think everybody deals with sin. Some people need to deal with that sin, just as much as any other sin. However, if a person denies that it is sin and lives in that lifestyle, I would not want to see that person as a minister.


It's unproven and it's irrelevent. God doesn't make people with "defects" they get in the womb, either. Assuming that homosexual inclinations are caused in the womb, that's still no reason to engage in an activity that is forbidden. The same could be said for inclinations to overeating, violence, etc.

[dizzle]

Captain Ochre:
Layman's opinion:

Homosexual practice should be distinguished from homosexual desires, imo. Ordaining a person who is sexually attacted to members of the same sex, yet does not act on those impulses (especially if he (or she, opening up another can o' worms) does nothing to encourage an impure mental life) is not a problem

Agreed, we all have sinful desires.....

any more than is ordaining a big-boned pastor or priest who loves to eat pizza to excess yet sticks to his diet.

Disgreed in part. Despite a common misunderstanding I think among Christians, God does view all sin equally. Some sins are worse than others, and as I read through the Bible I find sexual sin to be very bad in God's eyes.


On the other hand, open homosexual practice should not be permitted on the part of any elder or deacon (or equivalent church offices) unless or until "sin" is entirely redefined within church tradition (not recommended!).

.... or unrepentant member....

If we can excuse other apparent sins using the same rationales that accompany advocacy of practicing homosexual clergy, then the whole enterprise would appear clearly wrong-headed.

[Robyn Banks]

Patroclus:
Robyn, pay careful attention to what I am saying:
I do pay careful attention. If you don't wish to be ambiguous, don't use words such as 'this'.

Patroclus:
1. That people are born as homosexuals is not proven.
Yes it is 'proven'. The evidence is that most homosexuals have felt an attraction to the same sex from early youth.

Even 10% of sheep are gay, according to recent reports. :)

Patroclus:
I can give you scripture verses, which I am sure that you already know, that rather clearly state that homosexuality is sinful.
I can give you scriptures verses which rather clearly state that eating shellfish is sinful. These ideas too have passed.

Patroclus:
Those verse are the reason for my objection. If you want to know why it is a sin, because you are dissatisfied with what the Bible has to say, you may never find an answer for that or many other sins. For instance, you mentioned blasphemy. Why is that a sin?
"Sin" is transgression against God. By definition blasphemy is transgression against God.

Patroclus:
Aren't we taught, as a society, to be free thinkers and speakers?
No, "we" are not.

Patroclus:
Why would God call blasphemy a sin if society pre-disposes us to act accordingly?
False analogy. Homosexuality is God's Plan, not society's plan.

Patroclus:
2. Let us consider the possibility that there is a homosexualy orienting gene, and that God still does not want people to partake in these practices.
Is this the action of a Demiurge God?

Patroclus:
First, we know that it was not okay during the Old Testament time period (Lev. 18:22).
Like eating shellfish.

Patroclus:
So, regardless of time period or dispensation, people who may have been born with that gene were prohibitted from acting on it.
And prohibited from eating shellfish.

Patroclus:
Now, this may seem unfair, but it is not the only example of such seemingly cruel decrees by God.
"seemingly" because they were written by men who imagined they were handing down the will of God. Unfortinuately, their laws nowadays are transparently products of their society, more than 'divine laws'.

Patroclus:
Remember that God commanded Hosea to take as, a wife, a prostitute?
Possibly a prophetic metaphor, but I do remember.

Patroclus:
Obviously, he is pre-disposed to reject such a calling, yet he does so. How many other times are we told not to do certain things that we enjoy, or are pre-disposed to do? Science tells us that it is natural for men to lust, yet scripture tells us that lust is wrong.
False analoogy. Homosexuality is not 'lust'. It is a sexual orientation. God created people to want sex. If he created some with homosexual orientation, God wants some men to have sex with other men.

Patroclus:
Now, let us consider dispensational implications. If it is now made acceptable because we are in a new dispensation, and the rule of the law holds no legitimacy, then the following should be permissible:
False reasoning. And I am not claiming that homosexuality is allowable because of a 'new dispensation'. I am saying that it was always God's Plan to make men who would have sex with other men. However, earlier Jews and Christians were not able to accept this because of their societal prejudices.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[Sozo]

Robyn Banks:


Even 10% of sheep are gay, according to recent reports. :)




And you know this first hand?

[dizzle]

Robyn Banks:
Yes it is 'proven'. The evidence is that most homosexuals have felt an attraction to the same sex from early youth.

Even 10% of sheep are gay, according to recent reports. :)

First point, if true, so what?? Some mass murderers have confessed they had an urge to kill from their earliest memories. I am not equating homosexuality with murder, just sinful desires which we all have from the moment our bottoms are spanked by the doctor, to other sinful desires.

I can give you scriptures verses which rather clearly state that eating shellfish is sinful. These ideas too have passed.

Category error and you know it. Shame on you, but that is nothing new.


False analogy. Homosexuality is God's Plan, not society's plan.

Nonsense. God's plan for sexaulity is lifelong monogamy.


False reasoning. And I am not claiming that homosexuality is allowable because of a 'new dispensation'. I am saying that it was always God's Plan to make men who would have sex with other men. However, earlier Jews and Christians were not able to accept this because of their societal prejudices.

Nonsense again, and the NT affirms this opposition to homosexuaity whcih was VERY accepted in Roman culture so try again.

Hope that helps.



Actually not at all but to demonstrate that you are confused in more issues than just the few I was previously aware of.

[Patroclus]

Robyn,

Most of your arguments against my arguments are based on a pre-supposition that some people are pre-disposed to be homosexual, and that God would create pre-dispositions for those acts that God forbids. However, you have not given one shred of evidence to prove:

1. That such pre-dispositions do exists (though you mentioned evidence (without citation) to suggest it).

2. That if the previous is true, that God would not forbid those acts that people are pre-disposed to do. Can you prove this, or does it just not fit into your philosophy of God?

[George Blaisdell]

>> Robyn Banks:

>> Even 10% of sheep are gay, according to recent reports. :)

> And you know this first hand?

Oh Sozo Mio!!

You be very naaaaaahsty boy!

No you read Dee Dee???

You wanna be saying MS WARREN in falsetto???:whip:

__________________
"I'm on a mission from God..."

You gonna be on a 'mission, alright!:bow: :whip:

:brow:

[ItalianGold]

My oh my! We have the same argument in our house all the time and NONE of it based on Christian ethics. We are (as a society) repressed by, distressed by and obsessed with, SEX. I could understand (maybe) all the fuss about gay ministers if Christians were also as adamant about other sins. It does seem to me that it's fairly easy to be a liar, a cheat, a thief, etc. and still become/remain a minister. And these are sins with victims.

I wonder how far some would go to peer into another's darkened bedroom. Is oral sex acceptable? Are BDSM practices okay? Is "spilling seed on the ground" (masturbation) still a sin?

I have more concerns about a leader's compassion and faith and about his/her ability to teach others to have compassion and faith, than I do about whom they love and how.

[Captain Ochre]

Robyn Banks:

Hmmmmm. A homosexual should not have sex?


Not with animals or people of the same sex, anyway.


Now, the Catholics have been trying this for years with both heterosexual and homosexual priests - and the repression of God's Natural Desire either results in an unhealthy symptom or an often unhealthy fetish. Is this the result you want?


Yes.
:duh:

I guess since it's impossible to kick non-celibate priests out of the ministry . . . what's that? It's not impossible?


Or do you deny that it is the result of not allowing a person to have sex?


Sure, it that's what it would take for you to present evidence that it *is* the result of "not allowing a person to have sex".


Why not?


First, why, if you don't mind.


Why is homosexuality a 'sin'?


Homosexual practice, you mean?
Apparently you disagree that differentiation between orientation & activity is desirable?

[spl_cadet]

Homosexuals should not be ordained, that was the whole problem with the recent crisis (almost all the cases involved teenage boys which is a homosexual thing, not pedophilia). Now then, as for celibacy being "wrong," there are a couple thiings I must point out.
Firstly, there are many married priests. In the Eastern Rites married men are allowed to become priests although the bishops are selected from the celibate. In the Latin Rite (which is what is used in Western Europe and the America's) there are married priests as well, mainly converts from Anglicanism or Episcopilianism who were priests and then allowed to become Catholic priests.
Secondly, it is indeed possible to kick them out of the ministry though this is used as a last resort. It is called laicization.
As for it being unnatural, Matthew 19:12 "For there are eunuchs who were born that way from their mother's womb; and there are eunuchs who were made eunuchs by men; and there are also eunuchs who made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. He who is able to accept this, let him accept it."
Those who can't handle this obviously are not supposed to enter the priesthood.

[spl_cadet]

ItalianGold:
I wonder how far some would go to peer into another's darkened bedroom. Is oral sex acceptable? Are BDSM practices okay? Is "spilling seed on the ground" (masturbation) still a sin?

All wrong.

[spl_cadet]

Sozo:
Why not? The Catholic church has been ordaining pedophiles.

(I hear Michael Jackson is attending Mass on a regular basis)

Why do I get the sneaking suspicion that your location in the "From:" field isn't quite accurate?

[Robyn Banks]

Sozo:
And you know this first hand?
I'm from New Zealand.

(I've seen them.)

[Sozo]

Robyn Banks:

I'm from New Zealand.

(I've seen them.)

What about pedophile sheep?

Have you seen any male sheep having female wool envy?

Just for confirmation, could you play some Bette Midler music and see if any of them get aroused?

[Sozo]

spl_cadet:


Why do I get the sneaking suspicion that your location in the "From" field isn't quite accurate?

The only difference between a Homo and a pedophile is ease of availabilty.

[Robyn Banks]

Dee Dee Warren:
First point, if true, so what?? Some mass murderers have confessed they had an urge to kill from their earliest memories. I am not equating homosexuality with murder, just sinful desires which we all have from the moment our bottoms are spanked by the doctor, to other sinful desires.
Most people have either a homo- or hetero- sexual orientation, DD. Very few people are psychopathic murderers. So that's a quite extreme and emotive analogy.

It is not a 'sin' to have a natural desire for sex with another person, according to one's natural (God-given) sexual orientation.

It may however be a sin to repress one's natural (God-given) desire. It is also a sin to obsess about one's natural desire, thus giving glory to something other than God.

Patroclus:
I can give you scripture verses, which I am sure that you already know, that rather clearly state that homosexuality is sinful.
Robyn:
I can give you scriptures verses which rather clearly state that eating shellfish is sinful. These ideas too have passed.
Dee Dee Warren:
Category error and you know it.
Incorrect. The ancients had a lot of 'queer' ideas about ethics, which mean little to people today. One example is the injunction against eating shellfish. Another example is the injunction against homosexuality. Neither is a 'sin'.
Robyn:
Homosexuality is God's Plan, not society's plan.
Dee Dee Warren:
Nonsense. God's plan for sexaulity is lifelong monogamy.
Here you confuse two separate issues. The issue I was commenting on was whether people are created by God to be homosexuals. The issue you raise is whether people are created to be in "lifelong monogamy". Lifelong monogamy is an option for both homosexuals and heterosexuals.

Robyn:
And I am not claiming that homosexuality is allowable because of a 'new dispensation'. I am saying that it was always God's Plan to make men who would have sex with other men. However, earlier Jews and Christians were not able to accept this because of their societal prejudices.
Dee Dee Warren:
Nonsense again, and the NT affirms this opposition to homosexuaity
... which is just what I said: earlier Jews and Christians were not able to accept this because of their societal prejudices.

The early Christian, Paul thought that long hair on a man was 'unnatural'. He not only was too narrow-minded to realise that this was only his cultural idea, but had forgotten about Nazarenes (which, given his devotion to Christ, was more than a little short-sighted).

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Patroclus:
Most of your arguments against my arguments are based on a pre-supposition that some people are pre-disposed to be homosexual,
Do you pre-suppose that God created all men to be attracted to women, and vice-versa?

I don't, based on inductive reasoning from the examples of homosexual men and women who recognised their homosexual orientation from a very young age, and the homosexuality of a percentage of animals as well.


Patroclus:
and that God would create pre-dispositions for those acts that God forbids. However, you have not given one shred of evidence to prove:

1. That such pre-dispositions do exists (though you mentioned evidence (without citation) to suggest it).
Gay sheep here:
http://www.libchrist.com/other/homosexual/sheepandanimals.html

Other gay animals here:

Agar, M.E. & Mitchell, G., 1975
Behavior of free-ranging rhesus adults: a review. In Bourne, G. (Ed.) The Rhesus Monkey (Vol. I, Chapter 8). New York: Academic Press, pp. 323-342

Carpenter, C. R., 1942
Sexual behaviour of free-ranging rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta). II: Periodicity of estrus, homosexual, autoerotic and nonconformist behavior J COMPARATIVE PSYCH. 33: 143-162

Dagg, A. I., 1984
Homosexual behaviour and female-male mounting in mammals - a first survey. MAMMAL. REV. 14(4): 155-185

Edwards, A-M. A. R. & Todd, J. D., 1991
Homosexual behaviour in wild white-handed gibbons (Hylobates lar) PRIMATES 32(2): 231-236

Erwin, J. & Maple, T., 1976
Ambisexual behavior with male-male anal penetration in male rhesus monkeys. ARCH. SEXUAL BEHAV. 5(1): 9-14

Fairbanks, L. & McGuire, M., 1977
Homosexual behavior and female aggression in rhesus macaques. Paper presented at the Western Psychological Association meeting, Seattle, Washington, April.

Fox, G. S., 1977
Social dynamics in siamang. Doctoral dissertation, University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee.

Goy, R. W. & Goldfoot, D. A. 1975
Neuroendocrinology: animal models and problems of human sexuality ARCH. SEXUAL BEHAV. 4(4): 405-420.

Kling, A. & Dunne, K., 1976
Social-environmental factors affecting behavior and plasma testosterone in normal and amygdala lesioned M. speciosa PRIMATES 17(1): 23-42

Kuroda, S., 1980
Social behaviour of the pygmy chimpanzee PRIMATES 21: 181-197

van Lawick-Goodall, J., 1968
The behaviour of free-living chimpanzees in the Gombe Stream reserve ANIM. BEHAV. MONOGR. 1(3): 161-311

Yamagiwa, J., 1987
Intra- and inter-group interactions of an all-male group of Virunga Mountain gorillas (Gorilla gorilla berengei) PRIMATES 28: 1-30


Patroclus:
2. That if the previous is true, that God would not forbid those acts that people are pre-disposed to do. Can you prove this, or does it just not fit into your philosophy of God?
God may do anything, Patroclus. He may create men with strong attractions to other men - just to ensure that they are either unhealthily repressed for their entire lives, or subjected to eternal hell-fires. He may even create homosexual sheep, just to have them roasted in Sheep-Hell.

But these are all man-made ideas about God. Can you prove otherwise, or do other options just not fit into your philosophy of God?


Hope that helps.

Robyn

[spl_cadet]

Sozo:
The only difference between a Homo and a pedophile is ease of availabilty.

If you believe that, you'll also have to believe the same abut heterosexuality and pedophilia as pedophiles can go for opposite sex as well (nad probably more often), something you'd know if you watched the news at all last year.

[Sozo]

spl_cadet:


If you believe that, you'll also have to believe the same abut heterosexuality and pedophilia as pedophiles can go for opposite sex as well (nad probably more often), something you'd know if you watched the news at all last year.

I would refer to them as rapists, and perverts. (However, homos and pedophiles can be rapists, and all of them are perverts)

[Rubia Warren]

Sozo:


What about pedophile sheep?

Have you seen any male sheep having female wool envy?

Just for confirmation, could you play some Bette Midler music and see if any of them get aroused?
LOL If Bette doesn't get a response, try a little Cher, or "I Will Survive" by Gloria Gaynor.

[Sozo]

La Rubia:

LOL If Bette doesn't get a response, try a little Cher, or "I Will Survive" by Gloria Gaynor.

I was thinking for the "Lesbian" sheep, Cher would be perfect "Do Ewe Believe In Love"


And for the boys... "I Just Wanna Be A Macho Ram"

[George Blaisdell]

From Robyn:

> Do you pre-suppose that God created all men to be attracted to women, and vice-versa?

> I don't, based on inductive reasoning from the examples of homosexual men and women who recognised their homosexual orientation from a very young age, and the homosexuality of a percentage of animals as well.

The fact of the matter is that God created man, the human race, in His image, and that what we find in the world is that image fallen in sins, and the sins proceed from our attachments to our passions, our likes and dislikes, our attractions and our repulsions, our desires and our fears, fueled by the fallen world in which wehave a life of pleasure and pain, and death...

And God's plan for our salvation entails our turning away from these worldly fixations of flesh and self, and indeed to die to them, in baptism and repentence, and to be born anew from above in the Body of Christ, where there is neither male nor female, servant or master...

So that one's orientation from birth to the same or to the other or to no sex is not really relevant to anything at all. In Adam, as a fallen people, we procreate that our race goes on, and in this, and in what is appropriate to it, we find God's warrant.

The matter of pleasure seeking solely on the basis of self satisfaction is a turning away from God, and a turning toward self, and when we do this, be it in adultery, in homosexual relations, in sexual relations outside the mystery of marriage, in masturbation, in all these is enmity with God, because their focus, their purpose, is gratification of the flesh for self satisfaction...

And having said that, please let me hasten to add that we have no business whatsoever judging our brothers and sisters in their actions and in shaming them, whatever their deeds, for our own sins are greater than those of anyone else... And it is commanded... Judge not. In judging one another, we condemn ourselves, and lose whatever claim we might otherwise have of eternal life...

The Bible is clear in its determination of the enmity of the fleshy mind with that of the spiritual mind of the new person in Christ. That body you are looking at will be slime and ooze one day... And that is for us all...

geo

[Sozo]

George Blaisdell:

And having said that, please let me hasten to add that we have no business whatsoever judging our brothers and sisters in their actions and in shaming them, whatever their deeds, for our own sins are greater than those of anyone else... And it is commanded... Judge not. In judging one another, we condemn ourselves, and lose whatever claim we might otherwise have of eternal life...
geo

I hate it when someone spoils my fun by being right! :argh:

[Captain Ochre]

Hamster:


It's unproven and it's irrelevent. God doesn't make people with "defects" they get in the womb, either. Assuming that homosexual inclinations are caused in the womb, that's still no reason to engage in an activity that is forbidden. The same could be said for inclinations to overeating, violence, etc.

Well now, I agree with the above.

:cheers:

[Captain Ochre]

Robyn Banks:


Yes it is 'proven'. The evidence is that most homosexuals have felt an attraction to the same sex from early youth.

Even 10% of sheep are gay, according to recent reports. :)


Evidence of early predisposition to homosexuality in humans consists of subjective reports (adults or young adults with homosexual desires recount a type of attraction to the same sex when they were younger).
Some kids feel like they want to be policemen when they grow up, too, or have an aversion to buttermilk.
Banks, the evidence you're presenting is extremely weak.

Unless sheep are demonstrated to be moral agents unto themselves, mentioning them in the context of prescribed behavior is nonsensical, afaics.

[Patroclus]

Incorrect. The ancients had a lot of 'queer' ideas about ethics, which mean little to people today. One example is the injunction against eating shellfish. Another example is the injunction against homosexuality. Neither is a 'sin'.


... which is just what I said: earlier Jews and Christians were not able to accept this because of their societal prejudices.


What is your standard? It seems that you do not trust the Bible if it does not fit the rest of your world view. It seems that you think little more of the Torah than just a document that Moses and Co. used to control the nation of Israel.

How can you prove the Homosexuality is not a sin? I have reasons (from the Bible) to suggest, very strongly, that it is. All you have is a philosophy and some scientific data, but science cannot make moral judgments and philosophies are not always correct.

[Robyn Banks]

George Blaisdell:
So that one's orientation from birth to the same or to the other or to no sex is not really relevant to anything at all.
I agree. One's orientation from birth, whether homosexual or heterosexual, is not relevant.

George Blaisdell:
In Adam, as a fallen people, we procreate that our race goes on, and in this, and in what is appropriate to it, we find God's warrant.
We don't just have sex to 'procreate', George. Sometimes we have sex for fun. That's why our God-made parts feel pleasure.

George Blaisdell:
The matter of pleasure seeking solely on the basis of self satisfaction is a turning away from God,
So homosexuals who have sex as an act of worship to God are OK?

George Blaisdell:
and a turning toward self, and when we do this, be it in adultery, in homosexual relations, in sexual relations outside the mystery of marriage, in masturbation, in all these is enmity with God, because their focus, their purpose, is gratification of the flesh for self satisfaction...
You say no more than "heterosexual sex is right; homosexual sex is wrong". But God made all the little homos, too. Homosexuality doesn't have anything to do with sin. It is the way God makes some people.

To deny God's work is a sin, hwoever.

George Blaisdell:
it is commanded... Judge not.
So you're fine with ordaining homosexuals? Or will you judge them in some circumstances?

George Blaisdell:
The Bible is clear in its determination of the enmity of the fleshy mind with that of the spiritual mind of the new person in Christ.
The homosexual mind is a spiritual mind.

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Captain Ochre:
Unless sheep are demonstrated to be moral agents unto themselves, mentioning them in the context of prescribed behavior is nonsensical, afaics.
To the contrary, the fact that sheep are gay shows that this is not a question of 'moral choice' - but simply the way 'we' animals are made.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[Socrates]

Some animals commit rape and cannibalism. By Banx' "logic", it must be OK for humans to commit these acts too. After all, God made the male member and teeth, so we are made to do these things. Not of course that Banxie really believes that God made anything -- this is just pseudo-pious lib-speak.

Also, if a practising homosexual is unhappy with the Biblical teaching, then why bother to seek ordination in an organisation which is constitutionally required to uphold the Bible?

[Robyn Banks]

Robyn:
Incorrect. The ancients had a lot of 'queer' ideas about ethics, which mean little to people today. One example is the injunction against eating shellfish. Another example is the injunction against homosexuality. Neither is a 'sin'.

... which is just what I said: earlier Jews and Christians were not able to accept this because of their societal prejudices.
Patroclus:
What is your standard?
Reality.

Patroclus:
It seems that you do not trust the Bible if it does not fit the rest of your world view.
It "seems" that to people who don't wish to trust in God's reality, but who prefer man-made LIES.

Patroclus:
It seems that you think little more of the Torah than just a document that Moses and Co. used to control the nation of Israel.
That is a part of what Torah was.

Patroclus:
How can you prove the Homosexuality is not a sin?
I already have.

Homosexuality is present in very young people, and also in animals. It is not linked to moral choice. It is a physical, natural (God-made) condition.

God created some men to have sex with other men.

God created some women to have sex with other women.

God's Plan is Not Sin.

Patroclus:
I have reasons (from the Bible) to suggest, very strongly, that it is.
These are not reasons. The Bible simply includes some absurd opinions by man. Why do you trust in the opinions of man, rather than in God's truth, as manifested in his creation?

Patroclus:
All you have is a philosophy and some scientific data, but science cannot make moral judgments
Absurd strawman. I never claimed science 'makes moral judgments'. That is a misuse of science.

Patroclus:
and philosophies are not always correct.
Philosophies are never correct.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Socrates:
Some animals commit rape and cannibalism. By Banx' "logic", it must be OK for humans to commit these acts too.
Ludicrous false analogy.

Homosexuality is a 'natural' condition of 10% of many animals. It is also a natural condition of humans, based on homosexuals' early knowledge of their homosexuality. God created men to have sex with other men.

Rape is an abuse of a natural condition, harming another person. Homosexual sex is not an abuse of homosexuality - it is its natural God-Willed fulfilment.

Socrates:
After all, God made the male member and teeth, so we are made to do these things.
Even more ludicrous false analogy. Patroclus argues ineptly.

Socrates:
Not of course that Banxie really believes that God made anything
Silly ad hominem, revealing deep-seated prejudice and Inability to Argue Properly.

Socrates:
-- this is just pseudo-pious lib-speak.
Patroclus resorts to labels when he fails to think.

Socrates:
Also, if a practising homosexual is unhappy with the Biblical teaching, then why bother to seek ordination in an organisation which is constitutionally required to uphold the Bible?
The Church is not "constitutionally required to uphold the Bible". The Church is constitutionally required to uphold God. This is mindless Bible-worship: Bibliolatry.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[Patroclus]

Hey Robyn, please make sure that you cite the right Greek. I am not now, nor have I ever been Socrates, nor he me.

[Sozo]

Robyn Banks:

To the contrary, the fact that sheep are gay shows that this is not a question of 'moral choice' - but simply the way 'we' animals are made.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

So you're calling God an animal?

[Patroclus]

So you're calling God an animal?

Sozo, I can see the argument of anthropomorphism coming a mile away. I doubt that you want to get into that at this time. Though, I could be wrong.

[Patroclus]

Robyn Banks:
The Church is not "constitutionally required to uphold the Bible". The Church is constitutionally required to uphold God. This is mindless Bible-worship: Bibliolatry.


From whence does the church derive this constitutional mandate? Is it from tradition, special revelation, the scriptures or all three? It seems to me (and I am sure that you will correct me if I am wrong) that, by your views, the Bible is not authoritative. Is that correct.

Assuming that it is correct (for the moment), if scripture is not authoritative, then mandates from scripture are insignificant and can be ignored. Therefore, traditions based off of scripture have little weight. All that is left is special revelation. However, where is the definition and identity? God could be anybody, or anything. Are you a universalist? I am just curious.

[Sozo]

Patroclus:


Sozo, I can see the argument of anthropomorphism coming a mile away. I doubt that you want to get into that at this time. Though, I could be wrong.

You're probably right. I much prefer to just scan threads and make sarcastic comments at these ludicrous statements.

[Rubia Warren]

Shake yer groove thing, shake yer groove thing- yeahyeah! Show 'em how ya do it, now! :yipee:

[George Blaisdell]

Sozo writes:

> I hate it when someone spoils my fun by being right!

Good grief, Sozo! Aaah'm stunned! I mean, what happened? Did you have a nasty encounter with the MS WARREN??? You singin' sprano these days???

[+8-)>>>

And all this just when I thought I wouldn't have to respect you in the morning! Back to plan A! [or was it B?]

Ya jes gots me dis-com-boodled...

I mean, how dare you think I am right?

How rude!

I mean, What a GUY!!!

OK - I'm kinda over it now...

And that icon? 'Tis a myopic and amused hieromonk... Not the oxymoron you might suspect!

God Bless...

geo

[phantaz sunlyk]

**8** to Bishop Potts--
i disapprove of homosexuality and think it objectively morally wrong. i don't (as far as i know) have any over-riding stereotype that i place on gay people qua persons--the girl i used to date (it turns out) was in fact gay (bi). we're still friends, though she knows i disapprove of that aspect of her life.
however, as someone else pointed out, a distinction needs to be made between a mere felt desire and the acting upon that desire. the latter must be excluded absolutely from the clergy, the former is open to question. i haven't either the psychological or social data to back it up, but i would exclude such people from the clergy provided it is necessarily affirmed concomittantly that they are not thereby excluded from the family of God.
by the way, is your church in communion with, and approved of by the See of Rome?
to ROBYN BANKS--
what about pedophilia or bestiality?
my opinion of you has gone down the tubes. you now seem to me to be an obnoxious person who argues from outrage--you wish to rid the world of blind-faith clumsy-religionism, and your weight has wound up so far to the other side that you are an equal distance from the truth. there is nothing so ridiculous as dogmatic subjectivity with an ideological axe to grind.
thou sayeth--

The Church is not "constitutionally required to uphold the Bible".

**7** which Church might this be? the one that appeals to your underdeveloped ethical-gut-feelings?
ya said--

The Church is constitutionally required to uphold God.

**8** and you have his cell number, or what? where ya git ya information from, huh (so whatchawhatchawhatcha want????)?
hope that helps, if it doesn't, its only in ya mind anyway.
Chamber no. 9, Verse 32
Brooklynnnnnnn Zoo!

[George Blaisdell]

Robyn writes:
So you're fine with ordaining homosexuals? Or will you judge them in some circumstances?

They have no business, unless in full repentance, in the priesthood, and have no place in the communion of the Church if actively having homosexual relations, just as adulterers are not in communion, and masturbators, etc. They are taken out of communion until they get on top of their problem...

quote:George Blaisdell:
The Bible is clear in its determination of the enmity of the fleshy mind with that of the spiritual mind of the new person in Christ.

The homosexual mind is a spiritual mind.

No, my friend, the homosexual mind is the carnal mind, just as is the adulterous mind, and the promiscuous mind, and the masturbatory mind - All these are carnal...

Sorry...

Robyn

[Socrates]

-----------------------------------------------------------------
Socrates:
Some animals commit rape and cannibalism. By Banx' "logic", it must be OK for humans to commit these acts too.
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Ludicrous false analogy.I.e. Banxie can't refute the argument, which is actually a reductio ad absurdum of his/her/its crazy position "what animals do is OK."

Homosexuality is a 'natural' condition of 10% of many animals. It is also a natural condition of humans, based on homosexuals' early knowledge of their homosexuality. God created men to have sex with other men.I wonder how Robyn worked that out. I suppose we are supposed just to take his/her/its word for it.


Rape is an abuse of a natural condition, harming another person.So? Animals do it, so it must be natural for them -- under your own ludicrous viewpoint!! And so what if it harms someone or is an abuse? Your objections are just the result of internalizing an ethic that abuse is wrong, but this has no objective validity, according to your own oft-stated philosophy!Homosexual sex is not an abuse of homosexuality - it is its natural God-Willed fulfilment.Once again, Robyn expects us to believe that God (which he/she/it doesn't believe in anyway) revealed this to him/her/it. I would rather trust that God revealed things to Moses and Paul. E.g. that men having sex with men is an "abomination".


The Church is not "constitutionally required to uphold the Bible". The Church is constitutionally required to uphold God. You're wrong, even as a matter of constitutional fact. Most churches still have the Bible as their official supreme authority. This may be direct, as with the Baptists, or indirect with the Anglican and Presbyterian Churches which have creeds as secondary standards that uphold the Bible as supreme authority (39 Articles, Westminster Confession).

This is mindless Bible-worship: Bibliolatry. No, just a claim that the true God whom Christians worship has revealed His will in the Bible. I also wonder what mindless can possibly mean for someone who believes that the "mind" is just an epiphenomenon of the brain, e.g. a memeplex, that has evolved for survival advantage in some ape-life creature.

this is just pseudo-pious lib-speak.
---------------------------------------------------------------
Patroclus sic resorts to labels when he fails to think.Just noting the dishonest way liberals use language. And of course Robyn's reply is just liberal intellectual snobbery, although I would back my intelligence against Robyn's any day.

[Captain Ochre]

Robyn Banks:

To the contrary, the fact that sheep are gay shows that this is not a question of 'moral choice' - but simply the way 'we' animals are made.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

It helps needlessly re-illustrate the fact that you're taking your conclusion for granted, afaics.

The supposed "fact" that sheep are gay tells you simply that sheep are (supposedly) gay (we'll accept the percentages you provide for the sake of argument--or lack thereof). The most that should tell you with respect to human beings is that a predisposition toward homosexuality *might* be genetic (we are not sheep except perhaps by analogy).
I've suggested that predisposition and activity should be distinguished, and you have proceeded to actively avoid doing so. Certainly that is your right, but you're needlessly hamstringing communication in the process.
If the sheep has no either/or choice for which the sheep is responsible, then the comparison is irrelevant ot prescriptive practice. Ignore the distinction to the detriment of communication.

[Robyn Banks]

Bozo:
So you're calling God an animal?
I'm not.

Are you?

[Robyn Banks]

phantaz sunlyk:
what about pedophilia or bestiality?
They're not my cup of tea.

phantaz sunlyk:
my opinion of you has gone down the tubes.
That's Ok. If I were pandering to popular opinions, I would say inane things, and add dancing bananas.
:yipee: :yipee:

phantaz sunlyk:
you now seem to me to be an obnoxious person who argues from outrage--
:) This is projection. I argue from points. I am not particularly emotional about my points. Maybe a bit amused, but that's about it.

phantaz sunlyk:
you wish to rid the world of blind-faith clumsy-religionism,
Do I?

phantaz sunlyk:
and your weight has wound up so far to the other side that you are an equal distance from the truth.
What is the "other side"?

phantaz sunlyk:
there is nothing so ridiculous as dogmatic subjectivity with an ideological axe to grind.
I find it absurd, too.

phantaz sunlyk:
The Church is not "constitutionally required to uphold the Bible".

**7** which Church might this be?
The one Church.

phantaz sunlyk:
the one that appeals to your underdeveloped ethical-gut-feelings?
You project emotion. I make points based on fact.

phantaz sunlyk:
ya said--

The Church is constitutionally required to uphold God.

**8** and you have his cell number, or what?
or what.

phantaz sunlyk:
where ya git ya information from, huh (so whatchawhatchawhatcha want????)?
From the way of things. :)

phantaz sunlyk:
hope that helps, if it doesn't, its only in ya mind anyway.
Chamber no. 9, Verse 32
Brooklynnnnnnn Zoo!
Did something I say upset you? Your excessive use of question marks etc indicated this.

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Socrates:
I.e. Banxie can't refute the argument, which is actually a reductio ad absurdum of his/her/its crazy position "what animals do is OK."
Nonsense. My actual argument was that animals (including humans) are homosexual, due to their God-created nature, and that this shows that it is not a moral choice, but God's Plan.

'Rape', by contrast, is an action, not a 'nature' - it is a use of sexuality, not sexuality itself.

Your reductio is absurd.

Socrates:
I wonder how Robyn worked that out. I suppose we are supposed just to take his/her/its word for it.
If you choose to block your ears to quite widely publicised accounts of homosexuals discussing their self-knowledge of their homosexuality, then so be it. If you choose to discount psychologists who discover young pre-pubescent children to be homosexual by their God-given nature, then please do so. But don't say that there is 'no evidence' out there. There is plenty. It is always a choice what you or anyone else will do with a lot of evidence. You may always choose to disbelieve the countless studies that show an animal's preference for homosexuality. But you cannot say there is no 'evidence'. There is plenty.

Socrates:
So? Animals do it, so it must be natural for them -- under your own ludicrous viewpoint!! And so what if it harms someone or is an abuse?
'Homosexuality' cannot harm someone else. Wrong use of homosexuality (and wrong use of heterosexuality) can harm someone else.

Socrates:
Your objections are just the result of internalizing an ethic that abuse is wrong, but this has no objective validity,
Now you're getting it! Ethics have no objective reality. Imagining that ethics have 'objective reality' is a fantasy.

Socrates:
Once again, Robyn expects us to believe that God (which he/she/it doesn't believe in anyway) revealed this to him/her/it.
Silly and incorrect ad hominem. Socrates prefers to attack the person instead of think logically.

Socrates:
I would rather trust that God revealed things to Moses and Paul. E.g. that men having sex with men is an "abomination".
I would rather trust in God, than trust in the writings and ideas of man.

Socrates:
You're wrong, even as a matter of constitutional fact. Most churches still have the Bible as their official supreme authority.
Only heretical churches.

Socrates:
This may be direct, as with the Baptists, or indirect with the Anglican and Presbyterian Churches which have creeds as secondary standards that uphold the Bible as supreme authority (39 Articles, Westminster Confession).
These churches are all heretical. The orthodox church does not elevate the Bible heretically.

Robyn:
This is mindless Bible-worship: Bibliolatry.
Socrates:
No, just a claim that the true God whom Christians worship has revealed His will in the Bible.
No - you place the Bible above God.

Socrates:
I also wonder what mindless can possibly mean for someone who believes that the "mind" is just an epiphenomenon of the brain, e.g. a memeplex, that has evolved for survival advantage in some ape-life creature.
I also talk about the sun rising and setting at times. :rofl:

Socrates:
Just noting the dishonest way liberals use language.
Just noting your switch from discussing the points, to attacking the person. Actually, thinking about it, this is not a 'switch', because you have been doing it all along.

An ad hominem is only employed by someone who cannot argue logically.

Socrates is becoming overly emotive. He may yet question my 'honesty' in referring to "sunsets" and "sunrises"... :brow:

Socrates:
And of course Robyn's reply is just liberal intellectual snobbery,
"Snobbery" is emotional nonsense.

"Socrates' reply is just fundie intellectual snobbery"

Socrates:
although I would back my intelligence against Robyn's any day.
:rofl: You're too funny, now!!!

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Captain Ochre:
The supposed "fact" that sheep are gay tells you simply that sheep are (supposedly) gay (we'll accept the percentages you provide for the sake of argument--or lack thereof). The most that should tell you with respect to human beings is that a predisposition toward homosexuality *might* be genetic
Exactly right! Inductive arguments from observed facts to specific points are always 'might be' arguments. In 'fact', the whole of science is a big 'might be'.

Captain Ochre:
I've suggested that predisposition and activity should be distinguished, and you have proceeded to actively avoid doing so.
Incorrect. I have always distinguished homosexuality from homosexual sex. This is a banal point you have made, one that we are well past in other discussions, and yet you appear to have imbued the distinction with a great significance out of all proportion to reality.
Captain Ochre:
If the sheep has no either/or choice for which the sheep is responsible, then the comparison is irrelevant ot prescriptive practice.
It is quite relevant. If God's Plan in nature is to make some animals gay, and some straight, then it is the 'natural' conclusion that he wants his animals to have gay sex and straight sex. In order to qualify this conclusion, you are forced into the perverted suggestion that God creates a percentage of humans with an attraction to the same sex, but wants them to be bound to the opposite sex. This is as perverse as a hypothetical God who ordains that heterosexuals, who are attracted only to the opposite sex, should only have gay sex. It is quite absurd to consider.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[kiwimac]

Socrates,

You appear to be missing the point. Robyn seems to be arguing (to me anyway) that since there are sheep and / or other animals which are by nature homosexual and since you cannot argue that the sheep made a choice to be homosexual, ie, this is a "lifestyle choice" on their part it must be (Occam's razor applies dear boy) that they were born with an inclination towards their own sex.

Ergo humans' who are homosexual are therefore not making a choice but responding to a genetic imperative as the sheep are seen to be doing.

If that is indeed so, it is hard to see how you can argue that being homosexual is an abomination.

Moreover I would challenge you to prove to me that you keep the other commandments in Exodus and Leviticus that surround the passage in question, remember that "To'evah" is a word used for worship of other God's as well so its meaning is somewhat more complex than simply "filthy" or "dirty"

To'ebah

BDB Definition:
1) a disgusting thing, abomination, abominable
1a) in ritual sense (of unclean food, idols, mixed marriages)
1b) in ethical sense (of wickedness etc)
Part of Speech: noun feminine "

More to the point the words which Paul uses to describe homosexuality almost all have nothing to do with what we would understand/describe as homosexuality today BUT they do have quite a bit to do with Temple prostitution.

Kiwimac

[Robyn Banks]

kiwimac:
You appear to be missing the point. Robyn seems to be arguing (to me anyway) that since there are sheep and / or other animals which are by nature homosexual and since you cannot argue that the sheep made a choice to be homosexual, ie, this is a "lifestyle choice" on their part it must be (Occam's razor applies dear boy) that they were born with an inclination towards their own sex.

Ergo humans' who are homosexual are therefore not making a choice but responding to a genetic imperative as the sheep are seen to be doing.

If that is indeed so, it is hard to see how you can argue that being homosexual is an abomination.
Hole in one. It takes a Kiwi to think so 'straight'. :cheers:

[Solly]

Time to throw tuppence worth into the ring...

kiwimac:
Socrates,

You appear to be missing the point. Robyn seems to be arguing (to me anyway) that since there are sheep and / or other animals which are by nature homosexual and since you cannot argue that the sheep made a choice to be homosexual, ie, this is a "lifestyle choice" on their part it must be (Occam's razor applies dear boy) that they were born with an inclination towards their own sex.

Ergo humans' who are homosexual are therefore not making a choice but responding to a genetic imperative as the sheep are seen to be doing.

If that is indeed so, it is hard to see how you can argue that being homosexual is an abomination.

It could be contended that the sheep are not "by nature" homosexual - and presumbably we mean male sheep performing penetrative sex, as opposed to the range of activity humans engage in, both male and female? The stupid sheep could just be wrong, their minds clouded by their mating impulse hormones running wild, so they just grab anything in sight. My dog used to hump the leg of anyone who stood nearby. However, unlike animals, humans do not have rutting seasons; it is a very conscious act, involving a choice. Unless you would like to admit that the urge to sex generally should be allowed, and rape is just one of those things.

Also, one should be careful with the "God made me so, so it must be alright" argument (the same one used, as it turns out, by those who seek the ordination of women). Did God make paedophiliacs that way? Or bestialisers? Paul points out that God gave humans over to reprobate minds, working that which is unseemly. He didn't make them so, he left them to follow their sinful, God denying impulses. It therefore, from the biblical view, doesn't make it right or allowable; in fact it is supposed to make people think: hey, society's going down the pan, what's up?

So, to answer the question, No to practising homosexual clergy (and church members).

[Sozo]

Robyn Banks:

I'm not.

Are you?


Ewe said that we are animals.

Are ewe sure?

In the words of MJ "You're Baaaa 'd"

[Piebald]

The only difference between a Homo and a pedophile is ease of availabilty.


That's incredibly wrong. I'm speaking as a Christian who experiances homosexual feelings daily (doesn't act on them) and never feels attracted to children.

[Piebald]

remember that "To'evah" is a word used for worship of other God's as well so its meaning is somewhat more complex than simply "filthy" or "dirty"


It just means "disgusting" - or abomination. It's used for things other than just temple worship.

E.G.

Pro 29:27 An unjust man an *abomination* to the just: and [he that is] upright in the way [is] abomination to the wicked.

Pro 17:15 He that justifieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even they both [are] *abomination* to the LORD.

[Piebald]

Nonsense. My actual argument was that animals (including humans) are homosexual, due to their God-created nature, and that this shows that it is not a moral choice, but God's Plan.


It doesn't show that. No more than it shows that Cattle who are born with extra legs because their mothers were living under power-lines are part of the nature that God intended. Furthermore sheep are a whole different species of animal. It is perfectly okay for God to have a double standard (sheep and Human beings) because we are two different species. God does not expect self-control from sheep, but he expects it from Human Beings. Human beings can be observed practicing self-control (and even celibacy), therefore celibacy and self-control are part of God's intended nature... according to your reasoning, anyways.

[Captain Ochre]

Robyn Banks:

I have always distinguished homosexuality from homosexual sex. This is a banal point you have made, one that we are well past in other discussions, and yet you appear to have imbued the distinction with a great significance out of all proportion to reality.


Pardon me if I don't find your rigid distinction between homosexual desire and homosexual practice apparent.
The greater error you're making is converting "is" to "ought" based on observations of the animal world.
If, for example, sheep are creatures with a capacity for choosing right & wrong, then it remains distinctly possible for sheep who practice homosexuality to be (simply) wrong in what they do, and no model at all for humans. The fighting that animals do among their own kind, and the frequent willingness to dine on members of their own families, for instance, contribute to make your observation mol irrelevant as it stands. It has no greater application to human moral behavior than does a rampaging colony of army ants.


It is quite relevant. If God's Plan in nature is to make some animals gay, and some straight, then it is the 'natural' conclusion that he wants his animals to have gay sex and straight sex.


You're correct to the point that this portion of the topic has been dealt with in conversation. I refer to the reduction to the absurd (at least one of which you found (:thumb:)) absurd. I love it when somebody reads a reduction to the absurd and finds it absurd.
You're left with the same absurdity as Lao Tzu. If you make everything natural the prescription for what ought to be, and you make everything that "is" natural, then your moral prescriptives become either pointless or at least contradictory.


In order to qualify this conclusion, you are forced into the perverted suggestion that God creates a percentage of humans with an attraction to the same sex, but wants them to be bound to the opposite sex.


Uh, maybe I'd be "forced" to that conclusion if you had produced a strong deductive argument except a weak induction . . .


This is as perverse as a hypothetical God who ordains that heterosexuals, who are attracted only to the opposite sex, should only have gay sex. It is quite absurd to consider.


Mrs. Smith only enjoys her stew when it's got one of the Banks family added to it.
How perverse to expect her to eat anything else but a Banks stew! The poor lady is only following her natural inclination. Won't you help her, Robyn, and step into the pot?

[Sozo]

Hamster:


That's incredibly wrong. I'm speaking as a Christian who experiances homosexual feelings daily (doesn't act on them) and never feels attracted to children.

That's because you are a Christian and not a homosexual. A homosexual is void of conscience, they know not God.

Christian's can have all kinds of aberrant desires, but unlike homosexuals, they know they are wrong.

[Piebald]

That's because you are a Christian and not a homosexual. A homosexual is void of conscience, they know not God.


Ahh, okay... well, can't speak for non-Christians with homosexual feelings. Though I don't think that Homosexuality nescessarily means someone is going to have 'pedophile' feelings. There are many 'heterosexual' pedophiles as well.

Peace :smile:

[Sozo]

Hamster:


Ahh, okay... well, can't speak for non-Christians with homosexual feelings. Though I don't think that Homosexuality nescessarily means someone is going to have 'pedophile' feelings. There are many 'heterosexual' pedophiles as well.

Peace :smile:

Let's just say that all homosexuals are perverts, and if given the opportunity, age would hold little meaning.

[dizzle]

If you make everything natural the prescription for what ought to be, and you make everything that "is" natural, then your moral prescriptives become either pointless or at least contradictory.


Exactly which was my point with confessed killers who have confessed that the urge to kill has been with them since their earlist memories. Robyn dismissively hand-waved that away because it is "rare" - well then is what is natural, and therefore 'right', determined by some kind of numbers game? Eh? I don't think so...

And also Robyn did not object to my comment that God's purpose for sexualtiy was lifelong monogamy, he just stated that homosexuals could be monogamous as well..... hmm, hmm, hmmm, how intolerant then of the people I know who claim that monogamy is unnatural for them!! Would God's plan for them, then change. What about those who just feel "natural" desires for their sibling or parents? Pandora's box is chock full of nuts.

[George Blaisdell]

KiwiMac writes:

> Robyn seems to be arguing (to me anyway) that since there are sheep and / or other animals which are by nature homosexual and since you cannot argue that the sheep made a choice to be homosexual, ie, this is a "lifestyle choice" on their part it must be (Occam's razor applies dear boy) that they were born with an inclination towards their own sex. <

> Ergo humans' who are homosexual are therefore not making a choice but responding to a genetic imperative as the sheep are seen to be doing.<

> If that is indeed so, it is hard to see how you can argue that being homosexual is an abomination.>

>Moreover I would challenge you to prove to me that you keep the other commandments in Exodus and Leviticus that surround the passage in question, remember that "To'evah" is a word used for worship of other God's as well so its meaning is somewhat more complex than simply "filthy" or "dirty"<

We are born with a whole lot of inclinations as "natural" [fallen] creatures, and if this is Robyn's point, that the sexual desire for homosexual relations is present from birth, and is not chosen by the person having such desires, then who can disagree that this is at least often true? We are born with many inclinations.

The issue is, as Christians, as those called out from the world, yet still in it, as a people chosen of God, how are we to treat our 'natural' inclinations, which exist in a 'natural' world, for our problem is that when Adam fell, the world fell with him, and his seed as well. And we are his fallen seed, living in a fallen world, into which the God that created the world and created Adam incarnated, that we might live as not fallen, and as unto the age to come, becoming one with our creator, turning away from the cares and concerns of the world and our fleshy and soulish minds thereof, and seek in heartfelt contrition and repentance unity in obedience to His commandments with our Lord and creator. And within this communion with God, what has gratuitous, meaning fun and pleasurable, sex got to do with anything? Does it constitute obedience to Christ? Or is it, as the word for abomination [unto desolation] seems to imply from the Hebrew, the worship of another god than Christ? Would this god be the god of the flesh, and the god of the fulfillment of the lusts thereof?

For you see, Robyn thinks that the homosexual mind is the spiritual mind, so that from his perspective, turning away from carnality, and especially that of homosexuality, is a turning away from the spiritual, so that for him, the spiritual is the carnal.

For the Christian, the establishment of proper relationship of God to man entails the subordination of the body to the mind of Christ, and a turning away from pleasure and pain as rulers of our souls and bodies. [It entails a lot more besides!] WE find the freedom of Christ in obedience to Him. Paul tells us to "make no provision for the flesh"... And in this, we all fall short, at least mentally and emotionally, but we can and must come to physical control of our actions as a preliminary step toward the faith in basic areas, and sex is the most fleshy arena, as is gluttony, and on and on.

So that to subordinate one's actions to the impulses of the body is indeed an abomination in the OT sense of being a turning away from God and a worship of one's fleshy desires. And there is a seductive spirituality that can accompany this turning away, and it can take many forms - So that Robyn is right, it is spiritual, this homosexuality, and from a Christian perspective, it is a dangerous spirituality that worships through the flesh.

That was what Paul was dealing with in Galatians, where they had attained enlightenment unto Christ, and then were taking that holiness back into sexual practices, what he called porneiras. And he told them to stop, and if they could not contain themselves, to marry one spouse, and to take care of their lack of control within the marriage bed, and even that only sparingly... by mutual consent...

The practice of homosexuality, along with adultry, and masturbation, is not tolerated in the communion of the Church, and especially not within the clergy and priesthood. We do not give communion to someone having an episode of homosexual behavior, because such communion would be unto that person's harm. Instead he is prescribed fasting and additional prayer as medicine for his soul, and labors to tire his body, until such time as he can overcome his impulses, defeat his demons, and return to the cup... We do the same for adulterers and masturbators and a lot of other major sins... We even give soldiers returning from war a couple of years to prepare themselves for communion, if they were in the thick of the killing fields...

And we pray for all these, and annoint them, and lay hands upon them, and join with them in opposition to their impulses, for the 'natural' of the world is not the natural for God, for in the world we will find tribulation, but in God, peace...

geo

[Robyn Banks]

Solly:
It could be contended that the sheep are not &quot;by nature&quot; homosexual - and presumbably we mean male sheep performing penetrative sex, as opposed to the range of activity humans engage in, both male and female? The stupid sheep could just be wrong, their minds clouded by their mating impulse hormones running wild, so they just grab anything in sight.
No - they are talking about sheep which have a preference for gay sex (not just the occasional 'accident').

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Hamster:
God does not expect self-control from sheep, but he expects it from Human Beings.
The people who would prefer that homosexuals would refrain from homosexual relationships also believe that homosexuals should 'cleave unto a wife'. There simply is no appreciation by Biblical writers that a homosexual may have a natural homosexual relationship with another. The Biblical writers, constrained as they were by their societies, associated homosexuality itself with sin, because they did not know about a healthy homosexual relationship. You may be aware that it is as 'wrong' for a homosexual to seek a wife as it would be for a heterosexual to seek a gay partner. But the only option presented in the Bible is of marriage to a woman OR restraint. And this is a unenlightened dichotemy.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[dizzle]

The Biblical writers, constrained as they were by their societies, associated homosexuality itself with sin, because they did not know about a healthy homosexual relationship.

Wow, in Roman society where homosexuality was condoned and accepted, are you actually suggesting that none of them had what you would call a "healthy" homosexual relationship? Tsk, tsk. What modern chauvinism.

[Sozo]

Robyn Banks:

No - they are talking about sheep which have a preference for gay sex (not just the occasional 'accident').

Robyn

Robin... are you the pink sheep of the family?

[Sozo]

Robin... which one is you?

[Robyn Banks]

Captain Ochre:
The greater error you're making is converting &quot;is&quot; to &quot;ought&quot; based on observations of the animal world.
Not at all. I am demonstrating that homosexuality is as natural as heterosexuality. This is in order to provide evidence for an inductive argument that homosexual sex is good. The naturalistic fallacy, which you identify, applies to a deductive argument.


Captain Ochre:
If, for example, sheep are creatures with a capacity for choosing right &amp; wrong, then it remains distinctly possible for sheep who practice homosexuality to be (simply) wrong in what they do, and no model at all for humans.
Sheep practice morality? Interesting innovation!

Captain Ochre:
The fighting that animals do among their own kind, and the frequent willingness to dine on members of their own families, for instance, contribute to make your observation mol irrelevant as it stands.
Now it is you who is confusing homosexuality with homosexual practice. Homosexuality is a genetic predisposition in sheep and in humans. These other things you mention are 'willed'.


Captain Ochre:
If you make everything natural the prescription for what ought to be,
Not at all. That would again be the naturalistic fallacy. I am arguing that the genetic God-made disposition to homosexuality in all animals, including humans, is evidence for its allowability. Otherwise, you are left with the strange circumstance that God creates men to desire other men, and wills them to be married to a woman (thus creating an unhappy marriage). Time to think beyond the ideas of some men from ancient times.

Captain Ochre:
Uh, maybe I'd be &quot;forced&quot; to that conclusion if you had produced a strong deductive argument except a weak induction . . .
There are no deductive arguments for morality. Your comment is again absurd.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Sozo:
A homosexual is void of conscience, they know not God.
This is a silly blanket statement.

Fundamentalist Christians who say it is "God's will" that a homosexual man be cleaved to a wife or remain celibate are "void of conscience" - they know not God.

Captain Ochre:
Christian's can have all kinds of aberrant desires, but unlike homosexuals, they know they are wrong.
God made men to sexually desire other men.

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Bozo:
Let's just say that all homosexuals are perverts, and if given the opportunity, age would hold little meaning.
The Christian position soon becomes quite transparent with comments like this. Bozo bases his bias against homosexuality not on the Bible, but on a hatred and fear of homosexuals.

What a way of thinking - to despise God's Creation!

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[dizzle]

Sheer unbiblical assertion and utter nonsense.

Did God make Jeffrey Dahmer have a desire to eat people?

[Robyn Banks]

Dee Dee Warren:
Wow, in Roman society where homosexuality was condoned and accepted, are you actually suggesting that none of them had what you would call a &quot;healthy&quot; homosexual relationship? Tsk, tsk. What modern chauvinism.
No - I am saying that in a Jewish mindset, homosexuality was always bad. If you recall, Jews wrote the Bible, not Romans.
:rofl:

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Dee Dee Warren:
Sheer unbiblical assertion and utter nonsense.
Did God make Jeffrey Dahmer have a desire to eat people?
You like these extreme examples, but ignore that God makes 10% of some animals gay?

Do you harbour a secret fascination for eating people yourself, DD?

:rofl:

Robyn

[Sozo]

Robyn Banks:

God made men to sexually desire other men.

Robyn

"But because of immoralities, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband."

"'You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination."

"If [there is] a man who lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of them have committed a detestable act; they shall surely be put to death. Their bloodguiltiness is upon them."

[Robyn Banks]

Bozo:
Robin... which one is you?
Ah yes - the intended ad hominem. Bozo demonstrates what really drives the fundamentalist position - not a love of the Bible, but a hatred of homosexuals.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[Sozo]

Robyn Banks:

No - I am saying that in a Jewish mindset, homosexuality was always bad. If you recall, Jews wrote the Bible, not Romans.
:rofl:

Robyn

God gave His Word to the Jews. What God are you claiming made homosexuals the way they are?

Perhaps your God, the Devil.

[dizzle]

Robyn Banks:

No - I am saying that in a Jewish mindset, homosexuality was always bad. If you recall, Jews wrote the Bible, not Romans.
:rofl:

Robyn

Back tracking eh?? Thought so. But at least you are not claiming that Jonathan and David were homosexuals.

[yxboom]

Robyn Banks:

You like these extreme examples, but ignore that God makes 10% of some animals gay?

Do you harbour a secret fascination for eating people yourself, DD?

:rofl:

Robyn I am willing to wager that a higher percentage of animals are cannibalistic than the mere 10% of confused sheep.

[dizzle]

Robyn Banks:

You like these extreme examples, but ignore that God makes 10% of some animals gay?

Do you harbour a secret fascination for eating people yourself, DD?

:rofl:

Robyn

What nonsense... but let me ask you something Robyn... let's say that I did, and I have always felt that way, would it be wrong? Would not have God made me this way? And what if Sozo did in fact homosexuals, didn't God make him that way? LOLOLOL... your tar baby is bawling... go change the diapers.

[Robyn Banks]

Bozo:
&quot;But because of immoralities, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband.&quot;
Yes - you have found the very verse showing the limited mindset of the ancient Jew. Well done.

Bozo:
&quot;'You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination.&quot;
And shellfish is a moral abomination, too!

"Whatsoever hath no fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an abomination unto you."

:rofl:

Whatsoever hath no fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an abomination unto you.

Bozo:
&quot;If [there is] a man who lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of them have committed a detestable act; they shall surely be put to death. Their bloodguiltiness is upon them.&quot;
And long hair is "unnatural", too! :rofl:

Now there are some moral ideas. NOT!

Robyn

[Sozo]

Robyn Banks:

Ah yes - the intended ad hominem. Bozo demonstrates what really drives the fundamentalist position - not a love of the Bible, but a hatred of homosexuals.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

At least you have represented yourself as the pervert that you are.

You have blatantly perverted the bible, God, man, and now love.

You know nothing of God, man, the bible or love, but it appears you think you have intimate knowledge of sheep.

[Robyn Banks]

Dee Dee Warren:
let's say that I did, and I have always felt that way, would it be wrong?
Ethics is a subjective issue. Ethics are created by a society.

Our only guidance is reality: God's Creation. And this provides only inductive evidence. Yet, this reality is subject to society - ie. is always already subjective.

That 10% of many animals display gay preferences, and homosexual men and women usually recognise that they were homosexual from a pre-pubescent age provides strong evidence of that in nature (God's creation) which constrains our society's moral choice. The few statements in the Bible, by contrast, are ingnorant of such inherent homosexuality, and driven by the Jewish hatred of homosexuality - and provide no guidance for Godly moral judgment today.

Dee Dee Warren:
let's say that I did, and I have always felt that way, would it be wrong?
Would not have God made me this way?[/quote]
I don't know if God would have made a few rare people to be cannibals. But let's assume that he did. This rarity provides little evidence for our society's moral choices. You are an abnormality. Homosexuality is still normal.

Dee Dee Warren:
And what if Sozo did in fact homosexuals, didn't God make him that way?
? You think that Sozo 'did' homosexuals? I don't know what to say to that!!

Dee Dee Warren:
LOLOLOL... your tar baby is bawling... go change the diapers.
Hopefully you may one day begin to appreciate my position. But blind adherence to misguided teachings may satisfy you in the meantime.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Sozo:
At least you have represented yourself as the pervert that you are.

You have blatantly perverted the bible, God, man, and now love.

You know nothing of God, man, the bible or love, but it appears you think you have intimate knowledge of sheep.
Ah yes - a sheep joke, and 'accusations' (!) that I am gay. Shouldn't you be in school, Sozo?

Robyn

[dizzle]

Correction to my earlier statement... which should have read what if in fact Sozo did hate homosexuals.. if you want to seize upon a typo at someone else's expense, well, that says a lot.

And thank you for clarifying that if I were a cannibal it would not be wrong, and that God would have made me that way. LOLOLOL.... the baby is shrieking now Robyn, for Pete's sake, change that diaper already.

[Sozo]

Robyn Banks:

Ah yes - a sheep joke, and 'accusations' (!) that I am gay. Shouldn't you be in school, Sozo?

Robyn

I am in school. I am the teacher and you are the student, but instead of doing your schoolwork, you keep glaring out the window at the sheep. Now pay attention!!

[dizzle]

Sorry about the typo Sozo. I will give you a "ten cheap shots at Dee Dee" card to make up for it.

[Robyn Banks]

Robyn:
No - I am saying that in a Jewish mindset, homosexuality was always bad. If you recall, Jews wrote the Bible, not Romans.
Dee Dee Warren:
Back tracking eh??
? Ah - no. You may be confusing me with someone else. But, you don't often read that well, DD.

Dee Dee Warren:
Thought so. But at least you are not claiming that Jonathan and David were homosexuals.
The reading of the Jewish writings which sees homosexuality practised and only temple-prostitution condemned is misguided. It is driven more by liberal readings, than correct interpretation. The Bible condemns homosexuality. But its writers were wrong, and against God.

Robyn

[Brian]

Hello Everyone!

I wish more people were gay. The world seems to be such an unhappy place as it is. :tongue:

Brian

[Robyn Banks]

Dee Dee Warren:
if you want to seize upon a typo at someone else's expense, well, that says a lot....

the baby is shrieking now Robyn, for Pete's sake, change that diaper already.
You are babbling now, more than usual, DD. Discussion of your typos was more fruitful than discussion of your stuck-in-the-rut point of view.

Robyn

[Sozo]

Dee Dee Warren:
Sorry about the typo Sozo. I will give you a "ten cheap shots at Dee Dee" card to make up for it.

That isn't necessary, were all laughing at you when you're not looking anyway!

(9 to go)

[Robyn Banks]

Brian:
I wish more people were gay. The world seems to be such an unhappy place as it is. :tongue:
Hee hee! :smile:

[dizzle]

Ah, the Gospel according to Robyn. Must be part of the much minor Apocrypha.

Robyn are you are pedophiliacs beleive that they were born that way?

[Captain Ochre]

Robyn Banks:

Not at all. I am demonstrating that homosexuality is as natural as heterosexuality. This is in order to provide evidence for an inductive argument that homosexual sex is good. The naturalistic fallacy, which you identify, applies to a deductive argument.


You're sidestepping/ignoring my point, whether intentionally or because you don't see it.
In what way is flamer sheep behavior "natural" in keeping with your presentation? Simply in the fact that it occurs. In terms of anatomy, it isn't natural at all that the sexual organ should have communion with the exit end of the alimentary canal. In the sense you're using, it is "natural" for whales to beach themselves unto death.
Such thinking is bankrupt.


Sheep practice morality? Interesting innovation!


I don't know whether or not sheep practice morality. I am not the Amazing Criswell. The relevance of your comparison depends on sheep being moral agents. If they are not, then the behaviors you describe are simply things that happen, and perhaps we should be looking at another set of animal behaviors (polygamy, monogamy, torture, theft) in order to really muck up the conversation.


Now it is you who is confusing homosexuality with homosexual practice. Homosexuality is a genetic predisposition in sheep and in humans. These other things you mention are 'willed'.


Ah, so since you read the minds of the animals, you know that they are not genetically driven to feed on their own kind & the like, and you are able to detect the thought-life of sheep who "prefer" same-sex sexual activity?
Sorry, Banks, but unless you're far more psychic than Gary Spivey, Uri Geller, and Madame Cleo combined, you simply haven't mustered the evidence to support your claims. Thus you cannot be taken seriously despite you Lego avatar.



Not at all. That would again be the naturalistic fallacy. I am arguing that the genetic God-made disposition to homosexuality in all animals, including humans, is evidence for its allowability.


In that case, you'r arguing that point without relevant evidence, because you don't know what the sheep is thinking--or do you?
("Ever since I was a little lamb I knew that my feelings for rams were . . . 'different' . . ."???).

Evidence in humans for a genetic link are tenous, based primarily on the configuration of brain structures. Experiments on mice have indicated that behavior influences brain structure. So, you're still arguing based on the "naturalistic fallacy" and subjective reports.


Otherwise, you are left with the strange circumstance that God creates men to desire other men,


Sorry to interrupt, but why would it be a strange circumstance for God to permit men to begin their existence desiring evil (such as same-sex desires, for the sake of argument)?


and wills them to be married to a woman (thus creating an unhappy marriage). Time to think beyond the ideas of some men from ancient times.


Marriage and sex aren't biblically mandatory, afaict. You have a pretty good collection of straw men.
Why must a marriage between, say, a man and a woman with one of them having predominantly homosexual desires be unavoidably unhappy? Such couples report that they are, in fact, happy. Probably those subjective reports are incorrect, while the subjective reports of early realization of homosexual orientation are dependable--eh?


There are no deductive arguments for morality. Your comment is again absurd.


Heh? Tell me all about it, while you reveal what studies prompted you to announce that "all animals" practice homosexuality.

Mrs. Smith only enjoys her stew when it's got one of the Banks family added to it (she recalls that she's always had a special affinity for Banks stew).
How perverse to expect her to eat anything else but a Banks stew! The poor lady is only following her natural inclination. Won't you help her, Robyn, and step into the pot?

[Captain Ochre]

Robyn Banks:

And shellfish is a moral abomination, too!

&quot;Whatsoever hath no fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an abomination unto you.&quot;

:rofl:

Whatsoever hath no fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an abomination unto you.


IIRC, the practice of homosexuality (along with some other sexual sins) was described as an abomination, while shellfish were decreed by God to be an abomination among the Israelites (IOW, the Israelites were to regard eating such as an abomination).
It's an apples and oranges comparison, when the text perhaps should be seen as suggestive of the notion that shellfish avoidance was peculiar unto the people under that covenant, while the former is suggestive of a theocratic law whose institution was based on the action being an offense against the God of Israel aside from specific obedience to the given law.

[Bishop Potts]

I thank each and evry one of you for responding to the topic "Gay Clergy". You all have very interesting views and I respect each and everyone. My views are both liberal and conservative on this issue.

Liberal in the sence that I believe all men should be allowed to fulfill their calling as they feel the Lord has called them. Whether they be gay or straight, it should have no barriers on their desisons. The Bible says that every man should work out his own salvation before the Lord with both fear and tremmbling. Therefore if he sets his "problem" before God, then God will direct him as the Lord sees fit. I do not believe that one who is gay should sit down from the work of the Lord, whether or not he/she has desided to act on his feelings or not. Only God is the judge of that matter.

Conservative in the sence that I still believe in a pure Church and one that is not defiled. If you are a gay minister, please choose to minister in a gay friendly/open church. I am currently the presiding bishop for the Arkansas Diocese of the United Liberal Apostolic Catholic Church of America, Inc. and we have several members of our clergy who are openly gay with partners who live together in true love for one another. So in a way I am pulled in the middle on this isue.

[dizzle]

What Robyn is advocating.....

Nothing is wrong.... "society says" relativism, well then you have basis for declaring our "opinions" wrong Robyn. My social circle says homosexuality is wrong, who are you to say otherwise. You complete system implodes upon itself at every turn.....

Professing to be wise, they became fools....

Ouch, how God's Word (which you deny) cuts to the chase here.

[Robyn Banks]

Dee Dee Warren:
Nothing is wrong.... &quot;society says&quot; relativism, well then you have basis for declaring our &quot;opinions&quot; wrong Robyn.
Yes, I agree: I do have basis for declaring your opinions wrong.


Dee Dee Warren:
My social circle says homosexuality is wrong, who are you to say otherwise.
I am Robyn Banks! And I seek the Truth, and She reveals Herself to me from On High.


Dee Dee Warren:
You complete system implodes upon itself at every turn.....
No - my 'complete system' works completely well.



Dee Dee Warren:
Professing to be wise, they became fools....
Is this your confession, DD? I absolve you of your guilt. Go now and apologize to a homosexual, for penance.

Dee Dee Warren:
Ouch, how God's Word (which you deny) cuts to the chase here.
I do not deny God's Word. I affirm God's Word. I deny Man's Opinions Falsely Worshipped as God's Word!!

Robyn

[Captain Ochre]

Bishop Potts:
I do not believe that one who is gay should sit down from the work of the Lord, whether or not he/she has desided to act on his feelings or not. Only God is the judge of that matter.


Of what importance or relevance are the NT instructions regarding qualifications for elders and deacons? The NT appears to explicitly encourage judgement regarding those in church leadership positions.

I can only agree with what I see as your view to a minor degree, in that each person is tied to their own view of what the truth is (assuming, I suppose, that such views aren't overridden by divine intervention).
Admonitions against judgement warn of using a separate measure for your neighbor compared to the one by which you measure yourself, and against judging things that we cannot know (such as the condition of a person's heart concerning God). Judgement of actions is encouraged, afaics.
What do you do with those verses, Sir?

[Sozo]

We live in a world of whiners, cry babies, and spiritual eunuchs who haven't got the TF to just tell the truth without fear of offending people's fragile egos!

The church of this generation will be remembered for "fuzzy feeling" people right to Hell!

[Captain Ochre]

Sozo:
We live in a world of whiners, cry babies, and spiritual eunuchs who haven't got the TF to just tell the truth without fear of offending people's fragile egos!

The church of this generation will be remembered for &quot;fuzzy feeling&quot; people right to Hell!

The problem is that you bible-thumpers are wrong because you think you're right while others are wrong!

:bonk:
:rofl:

[dizzle]

Sozo:
We live in a world of whiners, cry babies, and spiritual eunuchs who haven't got the TF to just tell the truth without fear of offending people's fragile egos!

The church of this generation will be remembered for &quot;fuzzy feeling&quot; people right to Hell!

True love tells the truth. I love homosexuals enough to tell them the truth. It would be truly homophobic not to.

[Sozo]

Captain Ochre:


The problem is that you bible-thumpers are wrong because you think you're right while others are wrong!

:bonk:
:rofl:


I'd rarther have the bible to thump with, than the groins that most people use to think with.

[Sozo]

Dee Dee Warren:


True love tells the truth. I love homosexuals enough to tell them the truth. It would be truly homophobic not to.

Thank you Dee Dee!

[Socrates]

Yes - you have found the very verse showing the limited mindset of the ancient Jew. Well done.
So not only is Robyn a chronological snob; he's an anti-semite as well!


---------------------------------------------------------------
Bozo:
"'You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination."
---------------------------------------------------------------

And shellfish is a moral abomination, too!

"Whatsoever hath no fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an abomination unto you."This is a command given only to Israel in the Mosaic Dispensation. The reason is the purity standards reflecting how the Mosaic Law was intended to keep the Messianic People be undefiled from paganism. In this case, the prohibition against shellfish reflects their crossing ritual boundaries between land and water (they live there but don't swim like fish do). These laws are now inoperative since the Messiah has come, and removed the wall of separation between Jew and Gentile (Eph. 2:11 ff.).

I've already pointed out a few articles about this, e.g. The Law of Moses and the Law of Christ (http://www.ariel.org/ff00006f.html) and a slightly different perspective Why Do Christians Not Keep the Law? (http://www.tektonics.org/lawrole.html) by Tekton -- ya know the site you can't actually refute in the slightest but merely cheaply plagiarize?

However, the law against homosexuality was reaffirmed in the Law of Christ (Romans 1:26-27), because this goes all the way back to God's created design. I.e. according to Genesis, and affirmed by Jesus Himself, a man and a woman are the two that become one flesh. This would explain why the pre-Mosaic Sodomites were culpable for their homosexual activity.

[phantaz sunlyk]

**7** say hey--

I am currently the presiding bishop for the Arkansas Diocese of the United Liberal Apostolic Catholic Church of America, Inc.

**8** second time. is your Church in communion with and approved by the Roman See?
peace.

[Socrates]

Robyn Banx:
He may yet question my 'honesty' in referring to "sunsets" and "sunrises"... Not at all, because these are LITERALLY correct, because it is physically valid to use ANY reference frame you like. When Galileo was apocryphally asked, "Does the Earth move?", he should have replied, "Relative to what?"

But yeah I do question your honesty, because under your own ethical system, honesty may be merely something people internalize, rather than being an objective moral good. So why should we trust ANYTHING you say, because [b]under your own system[b], it would be perfectly consistent to use dishonest argumentation. After all, you give credence to the child molester Kinsey's fraudulent studies, which are the source of the 10% claim.

[Captain Ochre]

phantaz sunlyk:
**7** say hey--

I am currently the presiding bishop for the Arkansas Diocese of the United Liberal Apostolic Catholic Church of America, Inc.

**8** second time. is your Church in communion with and approved by the Roman See?
peace.

Must be fairly modest in membership & activity, since it didn't cause so much as a blip following a Google search.
Is the Arkansas diocese the only diocese, perchance?

[phantaz sunlyk]

**7** cha-ching.
thus spake Robyn re the moral status of bestiality and pedophiles--

They're not my cup of tea.

**8** misses the point, since some actually do dabble in both cups. the question is whether or not you think these things are 'natural' to those who are so disposed, and if so, whether or not that makes it o.k.?
Robyn saith--


If I were pandering to popular opinions, I would say inane things, and add dancing bananas. :yipee: :yipee:

**7** was that an admission?
thus spake Robyn--

Do I?

**8** forgive me, i was operating under the common assumption that people argued with conviction and placed their money where their mouth is.

I find it absurd, too.

**7** your world isn't small enough to accomodate the universe; to be inconvenienced by absurdity isn't an option for you. i ask your pardon again.
Robyn doth say--

The one Church.

**8** that really cleared things up.
numbers are a fiction of human language users arbitrarily imposed upon phenomena. stop the 'insanity'. :thumb:
The word of Robyn--

You project emotion.

**7** i evoke emotion from those i think incapable of a rational response.
ya say--

I make points based on fact.

**8** you impose an ideology on arbitrary data, and are too narrow-minded to realize that you're stacking the deck.
ya say--

or what.

**7** then, given your flying in the face of common Christian sentiment, how is it that you speak with such certitude in His place?
ye say--

From the way of things. :)

**8** morality comes from heaven in the hopes of correcting 'the way of things', not vice versa.
ya said--

Did something I say upset you?

**7** yup.
hope that helps. if it doesn't, don't worry; its only in ya mind!

[yxboom]

Wow look at all those **7** and **8**

The secret quote of nutmeats :hrm:

[ItalianGold]

[QUOTE]spl_cadet:



quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ItalianGold:
I wonder how far some would go to peer into another's darkened bedroom. Is oral sex acceptable? Are BDSM practices okay? Is "spilling seed on the ground" (masturbation) still a sin?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



"All wrong."

So, masturbation is still considered to be a sin, is it? Just curious how y'all live with that much sin in your lives?

:rofl:

[kiwimac]

Lordy, Lordy!

Do you really think God is concerned about what folk do in their bedrooms?

Goodness me!@

It is to laugh!

:argh:

[ItalianGold]

Socrates:
Not at all, because these are LITERALLY correct, because it is physically valid to use ANY reference frame you like. When Galileo was apocryphally asked, &quot;Does the Earth move?&quot;, he should have replied, &quot;Relative to what?&quot;

But yeah I do question your honesty, because under your own ethical system, honesty may be merely something people internalize, rather than being an objective moral good. So why should we trust ANYTHING you say, because [b]under your own system[b], it would be perfectly consistent to use dishonest argumentation. After all, you give credence to the child molester Kinsey's fraudulent studies, which are the source of the 10% claim.


If this weren't so frightening, it would be funny. You call Alfred Kinsey a "child molester." He has NEVER been convicted, even tried, even indicted, even arrested, even...oh well, you get the idea. But there is one odd little old lady, Judith Reisman, who claims that someone who once worked with Kinsey whispered to her that "he was a child molester." Aside from her bizarre accusations, and her obsession with Kinsey as the man who blames for the "60's Sex Revolution," no one else seems to know anything about his "pedophilia." So obsessed with this man is Ms. Reisman that she begged Liam Neeson not to play Dr. Kinsey in a movie. Keep in mind that the Kinsey report came out in 1948 with a followup 5 years later. But after nearly 50 years, Reisman is still reeling in shocked disgust and disbelief to learn that man is a VERY sexual animal. Tsk tsk Socrates !

I wonder if the Bible considers Lesbianism a sin? Or were they not even aware that it existed? Or perhaps because there was no penis involved, it couldn't be that important anyway. And aside from the Onan episode of "spilling his seed on the ground" to avoid impregnating his sister-in-law, (which I always thought was the argument against birth control) where does the Bible teach that masturbation is a sin so grave that you are claiming a minister engaged in such a practice ought to be defrocked? Again, are women likewise doomed? There is no "spilling of seed." Just asking.



:eek:

[dizzle]

I wonder if the Bible considers Lesbianism a sin? Or were they not even aware that it existed?

Are you serious?

Romans 1:26-27 - For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. 27 Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.

There you go. Yes, and yes.

[Solly]

Captain Ochre:


Must be fairly modest in membership &amp; activity, since it didn't cause so much as a blip following a Google search.
Is the Arkansas diocese the only diocese, perchance?

Cap

He has a web page. Seems to be a breakaway movement from the RCs, though I find the link to UPCI disconcerting.

[George Blaisdell]

Italian Gold:
So, masturbation is still considered to be a sin, is it? Just curious how y'all live with that much sin in your lives? ROTFL

KiwiMac:
Do you really think God is concerned about what folk do in their bedrooms? It is to laugh!

The kingdom of heaven is not to be found in the pursuit of the pleasures of the flesh, and indeed excludes them... Nor is it to be found in the avoidance of pain, for this is also excluded... But is to be found in turning from the world [repentance] and in turning unto God...

If you are masturbating, then repentance involves, as a part of repentance, stopping doing it, and then stopping the thoughts that lead to it, and this in prayer and askesis, for outside of these, the web of self deception is too sticky - Remember our Lord saying that there are some demons that are only cast out with fasting?

And once cast out, keeping vigilance against additional intrusions, in events, in people, in magazines, and most importantly in the mind and the imagination.

Mac, do you really believe that there is some PLACE of human action with which God is NOT concerned? Some arena of actions and deeds that we commit that God just turns a blind eye toward?

Or do you join with the commandment that we love God with "all our strength, and all our heart, and all our soul"? Is there some ambiguity in this word "all" that is troubling?

If a Christian is called to live a holy life, what part of this holiness will he or she find in pursuit of sexual pleasures? The Corinthians already tried and failed in that error...

Would you have Christians be sexual hippocrites? Professing God and living in the worldly pleasures of the flesh??

geo

[Socrates]

Socrates:
But yeah I do question your honesty, because under your own ethical system, honesty may be merely something people internalize, rather than being an objective moral good. So why should we trust ANYTHING you say, because [b]under your own system[b], it would be perfectly consistent to use dishonest argumentation. After all, you give credence to the child molester Kinsey's fraudulent studies, which are the source of the 10% claim.
--------------------------------------------------------------

Italian Gold:
If this weren't so frightening, it would be funny. You call Alfred Kinsey a "child molester." He has NEVER been convicted, even tried, even indicted, even arrested, even...oh well, you get the idea. But there is one odd little old lady, Judith Reisman, who claims that someone who once worked with Kinsey whispered to her that "he was a child molester." Aside from her bizarre accusations, and her obsession with Kinsey as the man who blames for the "60's Sex Revolution," no one else seems to know anything about his "pedophilia." So obsessed with this man is Ms. Reisman that she begged Liam Neeson not to play Dr. Kinsey in a movie. Keep in mind that the Kinsey report came out in 1948 with a followup 5 years later. But after nearly 50 years, Reisman is still reeling in shocked disgust and disbelief to learn that man is a VERY sexual animal. Tsk tsk Socrates !One day these politically correct liberals might surprise us all and actually come up with a refutation of Reisman rather than her size and age. One website article (http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/2482.asp) summarizes her well documented case:

However, Kinsey's reliability has recently been questioned. According to a recent critique, Kinsey's statistics were derived by interviewing a sample of the male populace, some 25% of which were ex-prisoners, prison inmates and sex offenders. Kinsey stacked his results by distorting his sample, thereby effecting the findings he wanted. Further, his researchers were also chosen for their bias. One applicant was personally blackballed by Kinsey after confessing that he believed homosexuality to be abnormal, bestiality ludicrous and adultery harmful to marriage. Kinsey also claimed that children from infancy are sexual and benefit from sexual encounters with adults. In the name of Kinsey's 'science', children from as young as two months were subjected to masturbation by Kinsey's 'technically trained' sex offenders.The article further points out that even the 10% claim is not actually what Kinsey said, and in any case, the figure is far lower anyway, more like 1%. This article also points out that even many homosexual activists dispute the argument that they were "born that way".

Italian pyrite continues :rant:

And aside from the Onan episode of "spilling his seed on the ground" to avoid impregnating his sister-in-law, (which I always thought was the argument against birth control) The article Was God Unfair to Onan? (http://www.tektonics.org/onanbash.html) sums this up, and in case you're too closed-minded to study it, I'll quote his main points:

Onan refused to carry out his responsibility as the brother of the deceased.
Onan not only refused, but repeatedly refused.
Onan not only repeatedly refused, but pretended that he wasn't refusing.
Onan was therefore setting it up so that he would get the big bucks and leave Tamar penniless and helpless.
Italian pyrite continues :argh:


where does the Bible teach that masturbation is a sin so grave that you are claiming a minister engaged in such a practice ought to be defrocked?I thought this thread was about homosexual ministers -- why do you have this obsession with masturbation?

[spl_cadet]

With Onan I might point out that the penalty for refusing to give your brother's wife children was public humiliation, not death.

[spl_cadet]

kiwimac:
Lordy, Lordy!

Do you really think God is concerned about what folk do in their bedrooms?

Goodness me!@

It is to laugh!

:argh:

Considering that He does state that several bedroom activities are wrong, yes.

ItalianGold

So, masturbation is still considered to be a sin, is it? Just curious how y'all live with that much sin in your lives?

Annoyingly.

[Robyn Banks]

Lesbian Japanese monkeys challenge Darwin's assumptions
By David Derbyshire, Science Correspondent, in Denver
(Filed: 19/02/2003)


The promiscuous sex life of lesbian Japanese monkeys is challenging one of the central tenets of Charles Darwin. He argued that females are coy, mate rarely and choose mates to ensure the best genetic inheritance for their offspring, while males are promiscuous and fight among themselves for female partners.

But after studying Japanese macaques in the wild, Dr Paul Vasey, of the University of Lethbridge, Canada, begs to differ. He found that bisexuality is common in females and that they often compete with males for sexual partners.

"In some populations, female Japanese macaques sometimes prefer same-sex partners," he told the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Denver. "That occurs even when they are presented with sexually motivated, opposite-sex alternatives."

Males are often prompted into sexual intercourse only if they are first mounted by females. Dr Vasey said: "Female-male mounting in Japanese macaques is an adaptation that sexually motivated females employ to prompt sluggish or uninterested males to copulate with them."

He observed that the females gain pleasure from mounting males, often rubbing themselves against a male's back or stimulating themselves with their tails.

Dr Vasey said that once they evolved the capacity to mount males, they could gain the same sexual gratification from mounting females. "I see females competing for males all the time," he said. "I see males ignoring females that are desperate to copulate with them."

Dr Joan Roughgarden, a biologist at Stanford University, said the macaque was just one of many species that did not fit Darwin's theory of sex selection.

Female langur monkeys promiscuously mated with many males, for instance. Homosexuality in animals - at least 300 invertebrates practise it - was also unexplained by Darwin.

Dr Roughgarden said that a more comprehensive theory of sex selection should take into account social as well as sexual selection. Mating could function to build and manage relationships as well as to reproduce. "Female choice, I am pretty sure, has much more to do with managing male power than it does with trying to obtain good genes."

[Captain Ochre]

Robyn Banks:
Lesbian Japanese monkeys challenge Darwin's assumptions
By David Derbyshire, Science Correspondent, in Denver
(Filed: 19/02/2003)


The promiscuous sex life of lesbian Japanese monkeys . . .

Obviously, these monkeys should be excluded from consideration regarding the priesthood.

[HeDied4all]

No matter how I feel about it, I have to go with what the Bible says about this and it is very clear on where God is on this subject.
Isn't it!

[kiwimac]

All

The problem is that we are interpreting what the Bible says about homosexuality through modern eyes. For goodness sake, the word "homosexual" wasn't used in English translations of the Bible before the 18th century.

We Christians insist on doing this, we strain at gnats and ignore things like justice and mercy, compassion and the kind of tolerance & acceptance Jesus showed to those who his society ostracised.

Why do we do this? Because we then can build a list of things we don't do and we can thus extol our righteousness!

What a crock of fertiliser!


Kiwimac

[Sozo]

kiwimac:
All

The problem is that we are interpreting what the Bible says about homosexuality through modern eyes. For goodness sake, the word &quot;homosexual&quot; wasn't used in English translations of the Bible before the 18th century.



When was the first chapter of Romans written?

[spl_cadet]

kiwimac:
The problem is that we are interpreting what the Bible says about homosexuality through modern eyes. For goodness sake, the word &quot;homosexual&quot; wasn't used in English translations of the Bible before the 18th century.

Your point being? It still condemns homosexual acts. Different words, same meaning.

[George Blaisdell]

KiwiMac writes:

> The problem is that we are interpreting what the Bible says about homosexuality through modern eyes. For goodness sake, the word "homosexual" wasn't used in English translations of the Bible before the 18th century.<

The Bible clearly teaches us to turn away from the mind of the flesh, and the homosexual mind is concerned with the pleasure of the flesh... Homosexuality is but a subset of the mind of the flesh.

> We Christians... strain at gnats and ignore things like justice and mercy, compassion and the kind of tolerance & acceptance Jesus showed to those who his society ostracised. <

Indeed we do strain at gnats and ignore important matters, but the embracing of the lusts of the flesh in homosexuality hardly qualifies as a gnat, for it involves a wholesale turning away from Christ and unto carnal self-satisfaction... Nowhere is it condoned, as neither is adultery, as in the case of the freshly caught in the very act adulterous woman. Christ did not judge her, but told her to go and not sin again... Do you really think she will find salvation if she continues in her adulterous behaviors and ignores Christ's instruction?

Yet indeed we strain at gnats, and ignore important matters...

> Why do we do this?

For as many reasons as there are reasoners...

> Because we then can build a list of things we don't do and we can thus extol our righteousness!

Many do indeed...

What a crock of fertiliser!

Indeed - the really smelly stuff... Extolling one's own righteousness is a crock of kaka... No question!

geo

[kiwimac]

George,

The "sins of the flesh", as you put it, are no more inherently sinful than any other. I suspect, please tell me if I am wrong, that you are someone who has a problem with the wants / desires of the body and are thus sensitive to these particular sins?

Kiwimac

[Xmansmommy]

Just a thought....
Ge:6:6: And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.Ge:6:7: And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and, beast and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them.
Ge:6:11: The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. Ge:6:12: And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. Ge:6:13: And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Ge:6:17: And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and every thing that is in the earth shall die. Ge:7:21: And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man: Ge:7:22: All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died. Ge:7:23: And every living substance was destroyed which was upon the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and the creeping things, and the fowl of the heaven; and they were destroyed from the earth: and Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark.

Do we not see how "all flesh" is corrupt before God, including sheep with homosexual tendencies? :huh:....

[Socrates]

KatipoMac:
We Christians insist on doing this, we strain at gnats and ignore things like justice and mercy, compassion and the kind of tolerance & acceptance Jesus showed to those who his society ostracised."We" Christians? Liberalism is a cult, not a form of Christianity, as Gresham Machen pointed out long ago. Also, you forget that Jesus told the adulteress "Go and sin no more", not "I forgive you; keep it up."

The "sins of the flesh", as you put it, are no more inherently sinful than any other. Yes they are because the body is the Temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19).

There is no basis for claiming "all sins are equal". 1 John 5:16 clearly says that some sins are worse than others:

If anyone sees his brother commit a sin that does not lead to death, he should pray and God will give him life. I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death. There is a sin that leads to death. I am not saying that he should pray about that.

[dizzle]

Good point XM - and pointing to behaviour in animals to claim normalcy for some alleged corresonding human behaviour is not the road I would ever want t take. Some creatures habitually kill their mates, can we then not judge a human who does so?

[Xmansmommy]

Agreed DD! Using the "arguement" that b/c sheep do it and they don't have a choice is simply ridiculous to me. Go figure. :xmm:

[George Blaisdell]

KiwiMac writes:

George,

> The "sins of the flesh", as you put it, are no more inherently sinful than any other.

Sin is sin; it is turning away from God and unto other concerns. And Lord knows, I turn away from God throughout most of every day. And the sins of the flesh are not the flesh sinning, but the mind of the heart turned toward them. The flesh-mind, the soulish mind, which is opposed to the spiritual mind. For our flesh is unto corruption and death, and the mind that is turned from God and unto the flesh is turned toward death, and lives in the sins thereof unto death.

Until I entered Orthodox Christianity, I flat out did not understand repentance. I really didn't "get" it. And I struggled for years trying to understand it. [Simple things are so often like that for me.] It is not for nothing that the Greek word for Church is ekklesia, the "out from called" - Our English word using the 'called' root is the word for the sound of a bell: "!!CLANG!!"... That word caught me early on as an unchurched Bible Christian - Called out from WHAT, may I ask? And Christian scholars assured me that it was just the Greek way of naming an assembly - Folks called away from their ordinary occupations for some meeting or other - That is all it means...

But you see, they did not understand repentance. Repentance is a 180 from one's entire pre-repentive life in the world, in whatever way it is that we 'have' the world, such that we should 'have' Christ, and this through faith that begins with the work of repentance. Repentance itself is one's response to the calling [there's that clang word again, do you see?] that a person has received... It is a turning from the cares and concerns of the world, which are unto death in the world, and a calling out [clang again!] to God for His mercy upon us who cry out unto Him, and in this repentance and in this calling on the name of the Lord that we seek the One who called us...

And along comes sexuality 101 - And you are right, it is but one particular category of sin, albiet with lots of subcategories - And we are asked by our body and our soul to fulfill the pleasures and desires that are of sex, whatever they should turn out to be. And the Bible is very clear on our prescriptive response to these, as is common sense, for inasmuch as we are turned toward our unpurified soul's desifes for pleasures found in ghe flesh that is unto corruption and death, we are turned from Life and Light, and what has Light to do with darkness? We are called away from, and out of, the darkness, and unto the Light that is Christ. Having accepted this call [clang!], we cannot keep it by re-embracing what we were called FROM, you see...

So all these issues of "sexual fulfillment" are to be turned from, together with gluttony, and all manner of fleshy desire and focus of mind and heart and soul... Whatever its form, "making no provision for the flesh..." And the beginning of this is the obvious acting out of these desires, such that sexual continence and fasting are often the first things to be acquired in one's repntive life - They are in effect Repentance 101...

> I suspect, please tell me if I am wrong, that you are someone who has a problem with the wants / desires of the body and are thus sensitive to these particular sins?

It would be great for your 'position' if that were true, and if you could simply say "Well, this guy's got a problem, so his witness is only a witness of his own particular problem with his own particular bodily wants and desires." By this means, you could ignore God and the Bible by simply saying of those who disagree with your interpretation of it that "They have a problem..."

The truth is, my sins are as scarlet, and far beyond any sins of anyone else, and I do not, indeed cannot, judge anyone else's sins... yet my personal sins, however scarlet, are not what is at stake here, but the role of homosexual behavior in the life of a Christian. The fact that homosexuality is "not my cup of tea", as Robyn quipped of the wooly beastlies and the desires of the flesh in their connection, has nothing at all to do with the establishment of a context of understanding for ALL the desires we have for fleshy matters, for the flesh is unto corruption and death, and such desires are desires unto death as well. We are called unto Christ, not unto the flesh, and there is no equivocation in Christianity in this matter.

The whole enterprise of making the fulfillment of the desires we have in connection with the flesh an appropriate Christian activity is simply wrong, and the sexual desires between same sex partners, however psychologically supportive [soulish, psuchike in Greek], are particularly troublesome in that they involve another person, and are solely for sexual and sensual gratification, in that they are a 180 even from male-female relations, which are unto procreation.

In my tradition, there are three 'grades', so to speak, the normal sensuality of the world, from which we are called to repentance, and below this, the abnormal sensuality of the world, from which we are also called... And then there is the healthy, radiant, repentant life, that is indifferent to pleasure and pain, and seeks only the things of God. These are few... And precious... The living saints... The rest of us are struggling somewhere along levels one and two...

I mean, you could argue that there is no difference between the sins of "depravity" and those of "normality", I suppose, and say that lusting for so-called 'normal' heterosexual relations is no worse than lusting for sexual relations with others of the same sex, or with sheep, or with children, and there is indeed a way that this is true, in that all are turned from God, yet the early Church, when a man continued to have sex with his mother, and was proud of himself, excluded him from the Church, and Paul turned him over to demons for his own good, yet worked in oikonomia with the Corinthians, and had them marry one another to deal with porneiric sexual urgings... One husband with one wife... And that in moderation...

geo

[Robyn Banks]

Dee Dee Warren:
pointing to behaviour in animals to claim normalcy for some alleged corresonding human behaviour is not the road I would ever want t take. Some creatures habitually kill their mates, can we then not judge a human who does so?
Such an argument would be wrong. And you have been consistently wrong to imagine this is being argued. But just so you don't perpetuate a strawman, I will summarise my views (which you have ignored till now).

The existence of gay sheep provides evidence against the perverted idea that homosexuality is 'chosen' or 'willed' by some men and women.

Homosexuality is natural and normal. It is wrong to tell a homosexual created by God for homosexual desires, to marry someone of the opposite sex.

Moreover, homosexual men and women recognise that they are homosexual from a young, pre-pubescent age. This too is more evidence that they are not 'choosing' homosexuality, but are born to it. This is inductive reasoning, but one with plenty of scientific observations of animal behaviour, and plenty of psychologists' observations of human behaviour to support it. And while you may always dispute these findings, the mountains of evidence for genetic predisposition to homosexuality is significant if you are truly interested in discovering the truth.

At no point do I agree with the 'naturalistic fallacy' - which says that which is, also ought to be.

But when God makes a significant portion of animals (including humans) with homosexual in orientation, we may observe that this is not a 'choice' by men and women. And we may also observe that the Biblical injunction for men to 'cleave themselves to a woman' would result in a very bad marriage, and a mentally tortured homosexual person (as also his wife). In fact, homosexuals who have been pressured to marry - often because of a Christian background - are usually quite scarred as a result. Would you make a heterosexual male have gay sex with a homosexual male? Of course not. And the same goes for homosexual males made to marry women.

If society wishes the ends of a psychologically happy homosexual (and a psychologically happy heterosexual would-be wife/husband), then it would choose well to admit that gay men should not be 'cleaved to a woman'.

Hope this helps you understand, DD.

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

Xmansmommy:
Using the &quot;arguement&quot; that b/c sheep do it and they don't have a choice is simply ridiculous to me.
Quite right. This is the naturalistic fallacy. That is why I never attempted such an argument (although DD had trouble understanding this).

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[Robyn Banks]

HeDied4all:
No matter how I feel about it, I have to go with what the Bible says about this and it is very clear on where God is on this subject.
Isn't it!
No - it isn't 'clear' where God is on this subject, from reading the Bible. It is clear what culturally-limited men felt in ancient times. But it is not clear at all what God's will is.

Although, the evidence does show that God makes lots of homosexual boys and girls. And that fact 'demands a response' from society.

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[Captain Ochre]

Robyn Banks:

Quite right. This is the naturalistic fallacy. That is why I never attempted such an argument (although DD had trouble understanding this).


Count me in as not understanding why you're not committing "the naturalistic fallacy".

Here, you explain why it's not the naturalistic fallacy:

The existence of gay sheep provides evidence against the perverted idea that homosexuality is 'chosen' or 'willed' by some men and women.

Homosexuality is natural and normal. It is wrong to tell a homosexual created by God for homosexual desires, to marry someone of the opposite sex.


You're either using an irrelevant sense of "natural and normal" (equivocation), or you're committing the naturalistic fallacy, afaics.

Does "natural and normal" mean morally good, to you? Answer plainly. If yes, then you appear guilty of the naturalistic fallacy.

Does "natural and normal" mean that it occurs in the natural world? If yes, then you're mentioning an irrelevancy (possibly qualifying as a red herring fallacy).

You state that it is "wrong" to tell a homosexual "created by God for homosexual desires" to marry someone of the opposite sex.

Animals don't (ordinarily) practice monogamy, suggesting that they have a "natural and normal" desire for more than one sexual partner. Surprise! We find that many humans desire more than one sex partner.
Thus, it is wrong to tell a randy dude that he should keep monogamous marriage vows (or suggest that he take such vows).

I find it outrageous that you deny committing the naturalistic fallacy, quite frankly. I look forward to a cogent explanation of why you aren't committing the very fallacy you deny.

[flipper]

Capt. Ochre

Animals don't (ordinarily) practice monogamy, suggesting that they have a "natural and normal" desire for more than one sexual partner. Surprise! We find that many humans desire more than one sex partner.

Not to change the subject, but is there any place in the bible, particularly the OT, where polygamy is expressly prohibited?

[ItalianGold]

[QUOTE]George Blaisdell:
And along comes sexuality 101 - And you are right, it is but one particular category of sin, albiet with lots of subcategories - And we are asked by our body and our soul to fulfill the pleasures and desires that are of sex, whatever they should turn out to be.

Our soul has sexual urges?

and the sexual desires between same sex partners, however psychologically supportive [soulish, psuchike in Greek], are particularly troublesome in that they involve another person, and are solely for sexual and sensual gratification, in that they are a 180 even from male-female relations, which are unto procreation.

It is, in my opinion, very odd to believe that only a union which can result in pregnancy is without sin. That any physical joining which is only for gratification or psychological support is somehow dirty. Why then do Christians use birth control? Even RC use the rhythm method so they can gratify their lust without it resulting in pregnancy. (Presumably this is a loop-hole which tricks God) Are you saying that women who refuse their husbands on the basis that they just want to satisfy the flesh (which is generally the case) are somehow justified, even holy for preventing their husband from sinning? Why then are women taught to "submit" to the desires of their husbands? Are barren couples supposed to be celibate? Are post-menopausal couples required to stop making love? How far do you want to take this? If, in fact, the only reason S-E-X is sinful is because it calls us away from God and into the pleasures of the flesh, then the same can be said for any activity which is an obstacle to our focus on the Divine. Why is it that other such sins aren't called "dirty" or "disgusting" or equated with not just guilt, but deep shame? Why is the emphasis on sexual sin? As you say, it's only one catagory of sin. Why does it seem to fuel the fanatic with such anger? Why does it seem that no other kind of sin arouses such wrath from the pulpit?

[Captain Ochre]

flipper:
Capt. Ochre



Not to change the subject, but is there any place in the bible, particularly the OT, where polygamy is expressly prohibited?

Not so far as I'm aware, however the pattern set with the creation of Eve for Adam set a precedent that those of the Jewish faith have had success in detecting.

[George Blaisdell]

Italian Gold writes:

> It is, in my opinion, very odd to believe that only a union which can result in pregnancy is without sin.

Good grief, I hope I didn't say that! The "pregnancy warrant" is but that of a kind of sexual pleasure that is needful for the creation of life...

> That any physical joining which is only for gratification or psychological support is somehow dirty.

Nobody said this either. It is simply a turning from God unto the flesh, which is unto death.

> Why then do Christians use birth control?

I should imagine to avoid conception. ???

> Even RC use the rhythm method so they can gratify their lust without it resulting in pregnancy.

No doubt... I cannot speak for them...

> (Presumably this is a loop-hole which tricks God)

I should hope they do not think that!

> Are you saying that women who refuse their husbands on the basis that they just want to satisfy the flesh (which is generally the case) are somehow justified, even holy for preventing their husband from sinning?

No. Paul writes "be not defrauding one another except by mutual consent..."

> Why then are women taught to "submit" to the desires of their husbands?

Spouses are taught to submit to each other...

> Are barren couples supposed to be celibate?

No, but they perhaps are barren because they are celibate??

> Are post-menopausal couples required to stop making love?

The married ones? Only by mutual consent...

> How far do you want to take this?

To heaven...

> If, in fact, the only reason S-E-X is sinful

Sex is not sinful.

> is because it calls us away from God and into the pleasures of the flesh, then the same can be said for any activity which is an obstacle to our focus on the Divine.

You are beginning to catch on...

> Why is it that other such sins aren't called "dirty" or "disgusting" or equated with not just guilt, but deep shame?

Social shaming for sins is not Christian... Of any kind of sin. Yet we should have shame for our own sins, and contrition... We have logs in our own eyes, you see... And when those who have gotten these logs out of their own eyes act in the Christian agency of healing, as Ananias healed Saul of blindness, they do not judge the person they are healing...

> Why is the emphasis on sexual sin?

That was the thread topic, and homosexuality is a sub-category of sexuality, which is a sub-category of sensuality. We haven't even begun to get to pride yet... :-)

> As you say, it's only one catagory of sin. Why does it seem to fuel the fanatic with such anger? Why does it seem that no other kind of sin arouses such wrath from the pulpit?

The pulpits from which speakers point wrathful fingers at sinners and shout out what they imagine to be the wrath of God are not pulpits of righteousness, but of error... There is unimaginable arrogance in them, like the Pharisitical hippocrites who wanted to stone to death the woman caught "in the very act" of adultery... All Christ had to do was to draw with his finger upon the ground as each came to him, and that one, confronted with his or her own hypocracy, had to walk away humbled - A great blessing for each...

So that you are right, the fanatical anger from the pulpits against homosexual practices is error and hypocracy. And on the other hand, the kingdom of heaven is not to be found in the passions of corruptible flesh. And we are to turn from the flesh, and unto heaven... And the clergy is to exemplify this, and has no business practicing homosexuality, child molestation, or any other overtly sinful actions of the flesh... [gluttony, for instance...]

And I am sorry that the Christian west is so awful in its unChristian lac of Christian regard for their brothers and sisters, but take heart, for they are not all so awful... But the basic matter is that you will not find the kingdom of heaven either in your navel or your genitals...

geo

[Robyn Banks]

Captain Ochre:
Count me in as not understanding why you're not committing &quot;the naturalistic fallacy&quot;
Briefly, the naturalistic fallacy only applies to a deductively logical argument, such as:

All physical actions or conditions which have x qualities are wrong.
'A' has x qualities
Therefore 'A' is wrong.

What is wrong with this deductive argument is the first premises. ie. one can always say 'but that is not wrong' (the naturalistic fallacy rebutted).

My argument is an inductive argument of the type:
There is certain evidence for x qualities in nature.
Therefore, x is not merely a matter of moral choice.

As opponents of homosexual behaviour consider it a matter of moral choice, this may be countered with evidence to the contrary.

The counting of homosexual behaviour as morally good or bad is judged by society. But given that God created man as homosexual (a natural consequence of accepting inherent homosexuality and theism), the conclusions are either that:
1 God willed homosexual men to marry (be 'cleaved to') heterosexual women - thus ensuring both of their mental distress
2 God willed homosexual men to marry other homosexual men.
3 God willed homosexual men to desire other men, as heterosexual men desire women - but willed that their God-given and Blessed Desire be frustrated.



Captain Ochre:
Here, you explain why it's not the naturalistic fallacy:
Robyn:
The existence of gay sheep provides evidence against the perverted idea that homosexuality is 'chosen' or 'willed' by some men and women.

Homosexuality is natural and normal. It is wrong to tell a homosexual created by God for homosexual desires, to marry someone of the opposite sex.
Captain Ochre:
You're either using an irrelevant sense of &quot;natural and normal&quot; (equivocation), or you're committing the naturalistic fallacy, afaics.
... or you make a false dichotemy.

Natural and normal refer to reality. Homosexuality is reality for animals, including humans.

'Wrong' is a judgment of society. If society values its individual members' mental health over other possible values, it will not force heterosexual men to marry gay men. It will not force homosexual men to marry women.

Captain Ochre:
Does &quot;natural and normal&quot; mean morally good, to you?
Not at all.

Captain Ochre:
Answer plainly.
No.

Captain Ochre:
If yes, then you appear guilty of the naturalistic fallacy.
I agree.

Captain Ochre:
Does &quot;natural and normal&quot; mean that it occurs in the natural world? If yes, then you're mentioning an irrelevancy (possibly qualifying as a red herring fallacy).
It is quite relevant to the point I am making, that:
1. Homosexuality occurs in the natural world, and
2. God makes homosexuals - ie. He makes some men sexually dsire other men, and
3. Society should see homosexual behaviour as 'good'.

Captain Ochre:
You state that it is &quot;wrong&quot; to tell a homosexual &quot;created by God for homosexual desires&quot; to marry someone of the opposite sex.
Yes. And wrong to make heterosexual men have sex with homosexuals.

Captain Ochre:
Animals don't (ordinarily) practice monogamy, suggesting that they have a &quot;natural and normal&quot; desire for more than one sexual partner. Surprise! We find that many humans desire more than one sex partner.
The Patriarchs of Israel had more than one wife, too.

Captain Ochre:
Thus, it is wrong to tell a randy dude that he should keep monogamous marriage vows (or suggest that he take such vows).
Well - that is the naturalistic fallacy. My own argument is more complex - which makes it somewhat understandable that it has been simplified to a strawman by all but "Kiwi Mac" here.

Captain Ochre:
I find it outrageous that you deny committing the naturalistic fallacy, quite frankly.
That's OK. If you understood me, you would not find it "outrageous".

Captain Ochre:
I look forward to a cogent explanation of why you aren't committing the very fallacy you deny.
I look forward to you understanding my position. :smile:

Hope that helps.

Robyn

[spl_cadet]

ItalianGold:
It is, in my opinion, very odd to believe that only a union which can result in pregnancy is without sin. That any physical joining which is only for gratification or psychological support is somehow dirty. Why then do Christians use birth control? Even RC use the rhythm method so they can gratify their lust without it resulting in pregnancy. (Presumably this is a loop-hole which tricks God)

First off, you are misunderstanding Christian theology about sex. It is not required that it can result in pregnancy. What the Church does teach however is that the procreative function of sex (there are two functions, procreative and unitive) must not be deliberately frustrated. That is artificial contraception.

A good article about this. (http://catholiceducation.org/articles/sexuality/se0002.html)

Also, we don't use the rhythem method. Instead we use Natural Family Planning which is as effective as the pill.

[ItalianGold]

George,

As always, I appreciate the tone and thoroughness of your comments. Your humility and compassion plainly show that you strive to be a good Christian, a good witness.

I guess the point I was trying to make is that it seems that fundamentalism sometimes spawns self-righteous attitudes and an almost zealous mission to shame others. Add that there is also sometimes a gleeful anticipation on their part in describing the torments of hell, and you have one reason why many non-Christians are put off. I think ego gets in the way of the effectiveness of much edifying.

I would like to know your definition of "moderation."
One husband with one wife... And that in moderation...:eek:
And yes, I do know that I "will not find the kingdom of heaven either in your navel or your genitals..."

The Kingdom of God is within.

[Nathan]

(Presumably this is a loop-hole which tricks God)

Good point.

[George Blaisdell]

From Italian Gold:

> How much is too much?

>George,

>I guess the point I was trying to make is that it seems that fundamentalism sometimes spawns self-righteous attitudes and an almost zealous mission to shame others. Add that there is also sometimes a gleeful anticipation on their part in describing the torments of hell, and you have one reason why many non-Christians are put off.

I had a conversation with my priest, who was at that time particularly enamored of the idea that not all that long ago, in the 50s, the very idea of two people living together out of wedlock would have shocked a whole town... And he was ruing the loss of this morality, and especially with the spawning of sexual looseness and the birth of the drug culture of the 60s, looking back with a whistful nostalgia to the times when God meant something to people.

I was shocked at his understanding, and explained to him that it was the demon impregnated whore of fundamentalist Protestant moralistic relligionizing and public shaming in the name of Christ of the 50s that gave birth to the demonic excesses of the 60s. [Not all that easy for me to say, as I am in many ways a child of the 60s, not quite attending Woodstock...]

And I like to think that he does not idealize the 50s any more, at least not like he had done before our talk...

> I think ego gets in the way of the effectiveness of much edifying.

Indeed it does, and worse, the demon of moral self-righteousness starts directing traffic, exalting oneself and one's religion over those outside of it or fallen from it. It was one of the reasons I so rejected religion in those days...

> I would like to know your definition of "moderation."quote: One husband with one wife... And that in moderation..."

Just head over to 1 Cor 7, which starts out:

7:1 It is good for a man not to touch a woman.

7:2 Nevertheless to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband.

7:3 Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence, and likewise also the wife unto the husband.

7:4 The wife hath not power over her own body, but the husband; and likewise also the husband hath not power over his own body, but the wife.

7:5 Defraud ye not one the other, unless it be with consent for a time only, that ye may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again, that Satan tempt you not through your lack of self-restraint.

7:6 But I speak this by permission, and not by commandment.

7:7 For I would that all men were even as I myself am. But every man hath his proper gift of God, one in this manner and another in that.

The answer to your question is in 7:5. This simply means that couples in marriage, each having authority over the other, should agree to refrain from sex for specified periods of time so as to give themselves over to fasting and prayer, yet even this is only permitted out of the economia of human weakness and for those who are weak. It is not a license to "explore your sexuality"... Nor to make of the marriage bed a den of married licentiousness. It is to dethrone Satan who would defeat us through our weakness.

But Paul is clear from the opening and the closing: [1 & 7]
"It is good for a man not to touch a woman - For I would that all men were even as I myself am." This is how it should be, but when it cannot so be, due to our incontinence, then we should marry, so that we not be overcome by Satan in our fornications [pornerias]...

> And yes, I do know that I "will not find the kingdom of heaven either in your navel or your genitals..."

The matter seems that obvious to me - This whole idea that gratuitous sex, which homosexuality most certainly is, has Christian merit of some kind, this idea is really wrong, and not because of its distastefulness to so many, but because it is such a turning away from relationship with God in the pandering to bodily pleasures...

quote:The Kingdom of God is within.

And within you will find Him only in repentance from, and not in pandering to, the mind of the flesh and the lusts thereof.

This whole matter of people chiming in with derogatory insinuations about animals and imagined events, and these people claiming to be Christians, is opprobrious, for it carries no way forward, and betrays a hardness of heart in belittlement of others, and accomplishes only hardness of heart on all sides...

And the hippocracy becomes apparent when we poll the criticizers and the shamers of homosexuals and find out that none of them refrain from sexual relations in their marriages regularly for periods of prayer and fasting, as Paul commands us to do... I would bet that we would be hard pressed on this list to find ANY here who have EVER done so...

Who here regularly prays and fasts refraining from sexual relations with their spouse?

In Orthodoxy, there are 205 fast days each year... Lent alone is a 40 day strict fast [bread, water, fruits, vegetables and nuts only], and extends another two weeks in less strict fasting. All this time there is no sex... The Nativity fast [Christmas] is some 30 days - Same deal... These are the fasts of which Paul speaks, except I think the ones of the early church were even longer and more severe...

We have no boast over those who are stumbled in sexual matters - Such a boast is neither Biblical nor righteous - It belongs with the Pharisee who thanked God that he was better than the Publican...

geo

__________________

[johnransom]

In amongst all Robyn's naturalistically fallacious blather about not committing the naturalistic fallacy, he/she also commits the genetic fallacy, not once but twice:

Robyn Banks:

The counting of homosexual behaviour as morally good or bad is judged by society. But given that God created man as homosexual (a natural consequence of accepting inherent homosexuality and theism), the conclusions are either that:
1 God willed homosexual men to marry (be 'cleaved to') heterosexual women - thus ensuring both of their mental distress
2 God willed homosexual men to marry other homosexual men.
3 God willed homosexual men to desire other men, as heterosexual men desire women - but willed that their God-given and Blessed Desire be frustrated.


There is no logical necessity for "mental distress" to arise from the marriage of a homosexual man to a heterosexual woman, and just because a desire potentially comes from God does not imply it is blessed.

[Socrates]

Flipper:

Not to change the subject, but is there any place in the bible, particularly the OT, where polygamy is expressly prohibited?It goes right back to the foundation of marriage in Genesis 1 and 2, explicitly quoted with approval by Jesus in Mt. 19:3-6 and Mark 10:6-9. I.e., two become one flesh, ergo monogamy is the created ideal. It was later tolerated but never encouraged in the Mosaic dispensation, but is no longer allowed in the Christian dispensation. Answers in Genesis has a good article Does the Bible clearly teach monogamy? (http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/4074.asp).

[Captain Ochre]

02-20-2003 @ 10:17 PM
Robyn Banks:


Briefly, the naturalistic fallacy only applies to a deductively logical argument, such as:

All physical actions or conditions which have x qualities are wrong.
'A' has x qualities
Therefore 'A' is wrong.


Or, 'A has x quality, therefore x is right'
Sheep have homosexual sex, therefore homosexual sex is right.


My argument is an inductive argument of the type:
There is certain evidence for x qualities in nature.
Therefore, x is not merely a matter of moral choice.


That's an imaginative analysis, afaics.
You're saying that if God made sheep homosexual (which has a passel of hidden assumptions), then human homosexuality is a moral good (or perhaps morally neutral--except that you claim that its actually wrong to resist the supposedly moral neutral behavior, as by having heterosexual sex.
IOW, you're not merely saying that x is not a matter of moral choice, contrary to what you claim above.


As opponents of homosexual behaviour consider it a matter of moral choice, this may be countered with evidence to the contrary.


It may be, but you haven't done it without committing a logical fallacy.:smile:


The counting of homosexual behaviour as morally good or bad is judged by society. But given that God created man as homosexual (a natural consequence of accepting inherent homosexuality and theism),


Pardon the interruption, but that's not a given. You can continue for the sake of argument, of course.


the conclusions are either that:
1 God willed homosexual men to marry (be 'cleaved to') heterosexual women - thus ensuring both of their mental distress
2 God willed homosexual men to marry other homosexual men.
3 God willed homosexual men to desire other men, as heterosexual men desire women - but willed that their God-given and Blessed Desire be frustrated.


As was pointed out prior to this post (I'll get around to crediting the author, who did nice work imo), men and women with histories of homosexual behavior report happy marriages to the opposite sex. Do you have separate rules for subjective reports that favor your view as opposed to those that do not?


... or you make a false dichotemy.


"afaics" invites you to add another possibility that I don't detect, afaics. Maybe it makes you feel better to imply that I committed a fallacy . . .


Natural and normal refer to reality. Homosexuality is reality for animals, including humans.


Thanks. Did you see the beached whale analogy?

(removed portion that didn't further the discussion significantly imo)

('natural and normal'='moral good'?)

Not at all.

Watch the way your change your tune, below:


It is quite relevant to the point I am making, that:
1. Homosexuality occurs in the natural world, and
2. God makes homosexuals - ie. He makes some men sexually dsire other men, and
3. Society should see homosexual behaviour as 'good'.


You seem to have set your argument in the form of the naturalistic fallacy again.


(what about recommending that a lustful man refrain from marriage vows?)

Well - that is the naturalistic fallacy. My own argument is more complex - which makes it somewhat understandable that it has been simplified to a strawman by all but &quot;Kiwi Mac&quot; here.

Please specify the supposed complexity that frees you from the charge of fallacy.


I look forward to you understanding my position. :smile:


As I continue to look forward to a coherent explanation of your position.

[elysian]

Ok, I'm seeing two arguments here:

Animals do it, so it's OK for us. Next time you go to the zoo, watch the primates (monkeys and apes) throw feces at each other (and the only thing protecting human observers from the feces throwing fest is the plate glass), and as my son pointed out, watch the male primates indulge in self-stimulating activity. If you can't go to the zoo, cats are fun to watch. Observe how creatures unequipped to use toilet paper clean their hindquarters. Cats are possibly the fussiest animals about cleanliness, yet their hiney-cleaning method leaves a lot to be desired.

So saying it's OK to indulge in homosexual behavior "because animals do, therefore it's normal and natural" is implying that it's OK to throw feces at people because animals throw feces at each other. This would also mean it's OK to stimulate oneself in public because animals do, and also that it is perfectly OK to clean one's hindquarters (and one's friends' hindquarters as well) by licking them.

The other argument is "rules against homosexuality are from the OT, Christ represents the New Covenant."

So why did Paul make it a point to specifically state that homosexual behavior was not acceptable for Christian believers?

Romans 1:18-28 (NIV)
The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator--who is forever praised. Amen.
Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion. Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done.

ALL sin is abhorrent to God. Yet if we confess our sin, if we turn from our sin, God Who is just will forgive our sin and will continue to transform us to His will instead of abandoning us in our depravity.

Yes I will admit that it would be incredibly easy to succumb to the fleshly nature- I am a woman and I really like men, and I really enjoy sex with men. It was an area of bondage in my past that led to much heartache and regret (and I can only thank God there were no physical diseases as a result!) If not for asking God's forgiveness and help in living a chaste lifestyle (reserving sex for my husband only, and in context of the marriage relationship) yes it would be very easy for me to "just do it." But God's rules are given to us for our protection and our own good. With God's help we can confine sexual desire to His protective boundaries.

Homosexuality is not a healthy lifestyle and neither is heterosexual promiscuity. Both lifestyles are lies from Satan. God wants better than that for us. He wants us to trust Him and draw on His strength and healing to live the way He intends, not whatever way we can justify in our own minds.

Clergy are not perfect, however they should be examples for the larger congregation. Ordaining non-celibate homosexuals is sending the wrong message.

[Chuck Lee]

I could be mistaken, elysian, but I think you got things a little backwards here.




Animals do it, so it's OK for us.



The actual argument I've seen numerous times, is that:

Animals do it, therefore it's incorrect to claim that it's not natural.

In other words, it's an argument against the position that homosexual acts are unnatural. It doesn't in and of itself justify homosexual acts, because as you point out there are all sorts of animal behaviors that are inappropriate for humans. Different species have different standards of behavior.




The other argument is "rules against homosexuality are from the OT, Christ represents the New Covenant."



The actual argument I've seen numerous times, is that:

Using the rules in Leviticus to condemn homosexual acts is not appropriate, since nobody pays attention to the rest of those Levitican rules (since Christ represents the New Covenant).

As you point out, Paul also has a problem with homosexual acts.

[Daniel]

If we condemn homosexuality then we will be condemning many many priests and nuns!

Please don't quote the bible as this case proves that the bible ALONE cannot solve the problem. The word of God is not simply a book. It can be found in the deep of hearts. Now imagine a person born homosexual (or lesbian) reading some of your thoughts. He/she has to deny everything he/she feels or else commits suicide. Does not the fact that they try very hard and yet finally understand that is their way of life means that they are obeying to God's will? I'm speaking of persons who came to this conclusion after years and years of struggle, condemnation, labelling etc......