Marriage defined by "love?" Or Children's interests? Why "Gay Marriage" is mista

>>Of course, they are wrong, based on your theology. But you advocate a society based on the Bible, and they can make a very strong case that their point of view is completely based on the Bible.<<

I not only advocate a society based on the Bible, I live in one. America WAS formed on Biblical ethics and morality. This simply can't be disputed. The 10 Commandments hang behind the bench of the U.S. Supreme Court. This is the only reason I think the Bible HAS to be discussed when talking about this issue. If we begin to dismantle the ethics and principles that formed this country, then we need to completely redo the entire legal system. Otherwise, what we are really doing is picking and choosing the parts of Biblical morality that, as human beings, we feel we've outgrown.

 

>>But, the Bible also, IMO, says many other things are sinful which the "best" Christians regularly do. Yet I do not hear of excluding liars ,or fornicators, or prideful ones, or those who do not love their neighbors, from the Church or from God's grace. Yet Scripture equally condemns such "sins."<<

Agreed. We are ALL sinners. The major difference is that we are supposed to repent and move forward in a less sinful way. A homosexual marriage not only shows a complete lack of repentence or a commitment to move forward in a less sinful manner, it actually calls sin "right." The homosexual marriage is actually a lifelong and legal commitment to live sinfully. By condoning this marriage we are condoning, accepting, authorizing, permitting, and assisting in this sin. If a politician publicly stated the following: I am a chronic liar, I cheat on my wife, I worship the Devil, I steal money whenever the opportunity presents itself, I'm proud of it and I promise to spend the rest of my life doing these things. Would you elect them to office? Would you condone the activity?

 

Of course it was. But being founded on what they founding fathers viewed as Biblical ethics and morality is a very different thing than being founded on the Bible. In every day of my life, I try to put into practice many of the things espoused in the New Testament -- Christian ethics and morality. But, regardless, most Christians think I am going to hell because I don't believe that Jesus was the Son of God/Was God/Was one-third God and still completely God and yet not exactly God, or whatever. In my religion (Unitarian Universalism), the way you put your faith into action is much more important than the specifics of your beliefs. Most Christians seem to disagree.

As I have said before, it is true that our Constitution was formed by people who believed in God and were, at least nominally, Christians, but they placed reason above doctrine. (Most were Unitarians, by the way.)

I don't have the hubris to claim that any statement I make can not be disputed, but I would certainly like to hear the arguments of those who believe that the founding fathers believed that the Bible should be the foundation for our government.

 

Hi Jeff,

Nice to see another unitarian on here. I don't think "most" of the founding fathers were Unitarians, however. A great number of them were Episcopalian or espoused no particular religious denomination if I recall correctly.

Thomas Jefferson, although friendly to Unitarianism, and said, "I trust that there is not a young man now living in the United States who will not die a Unitarian," was a Deist.

By the way, Jeffereson said the Revelation of St. John was the "the ravings of a maniac."

He also said, in a letter to John Adams, "The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter."

THE JEFFERSON BIBLE is a classic. It contains only the words of Jesus and is void of doctrine and creedal formulae. If we really want to know what Jesus said, read His words, not the words about him.

By the way, Jeff, although the UUA is not classical Unitarian anymore the UUCF and the AUC are trying to return the faith to the days of Channing and Ballou.

 

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Could it be...

Oh, it would. I fervently hope that I am not proven correct.

 

Perhaps I misspoke. What I meant is that most of the founding fathers who claimed by be Christians were Unitarians. (Perhaps I am even wrong in that. It's hard to say.)

True. Although I would argue that if the current Unitarian Universalist church had been around at the time, he would have been a UU. But that is beside the point.

Exactly my (somewhat irrelevant) point.

And, as I'm sure you know, this idea has been seized on recently with the production of the "Red Letter Bible."

Right. Doesn't make much difference to me. I'm not interested in theology. I'm interested in helping my fellow humans, particularly those in my community. I don't need a doctrine/theology to guide me in doing that. I just do it. I don't care to detail my activities in my community, because I don't think I need to. I know I am doing the right thing, to the best of my ability. And the funny thing is, I'm going to go to hell for doing that, right?

 

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Could it be...

That is certainly one thing we can agree on!

 

Well, if the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Christadelphians, and a whole host of others are correct, and hell is the grave, we are all going to hell.

I agree with you. Christianity (religion in James) is not about doctrine and creedal statements.

It's about how we treat our fellow human beings. The words of Jesus reflect this time and time and time again.

I will take the practical Christianity of Jesus and James over the theological nonsense of the likes of Paul and his ilk any day of the week!

"Well then, whatever you would have men do to you, do just the same to them; that is the meaning of the Law and the prophets."--Matthew 7:12 (Moffatt).

"You must love the Lord with your whole heart, with your whole soul, with your whole strength, and with your whole mind...and you must love your neighbor as yourself. The whole Law and the prophets hang upon these two commands."--Matthew 22:37-40 (Moffatt)

 

No, but we allow him to get married...

Price of eggs... price of eggs...

 

Not to get into the same kind of seemingly never-ending arguments we had on the Trinity, I am curious what your take is on Matthew 5:32 since you say "...there may be...grounds..."

Many feel there is a "Pauline privilege (1 Corinthians 7:15)" that justifies divorce. In other words, if an unbelieving spouse leaves a believer, the believer is free to remarry.

Some take carry this to an extreme position of "constructive desertion," saying one is free to divorce and remarry when abuse, neglect, etc., occurs because there is an equivalency to "desertion."

I have never read it, but Spiros Zodhiates, a Greek scholar par excellence, has written a book called MAY I DIVORCE AND REMARRY, that is considered by many to be the gold standard publication on this subject.

 

Don't look now pug but that is exactly what is happening. Do you pay attention to the Supreme Court rulings? Do you read the newspapers? The ethics and principles that formed this country ARE being dismantled. How about protesters not being allowed anywhere near WTO conferences? How about women's suffrage? How about gun control laws? How about taxation rates? C'mon pug, wake up. You're fearfully awaiting something that has already occurred.
Jack

 

<<Don't look now pug but that is exactly what is happening. Do you pay attention to the Supreme Court rulings? Do you read the newspapers? The ethics and principles that formed this country ARE being dismantled. How about protesters not being allowed anywhere near WTO conferences? How about women's suffrage? How about gun control laws? How about taxation rates? C'mon pug, wake up. You're fearfully awaiting something that has already occurred.
Jack>>

I wish I was sleeping but I am unfortunately wide awake. I'm not fearing the dismantling of our legal system, I am witnessing it and fighting it tooth and nail. My fear is that once the system is completely dismantled we will be living in a society that no longer honors a set standard of right and wrong. Once we, as a complete society, abandon a sense of absolute right and wrong, our days will be very short lived.

 

==

Jimmy maybe Mt 5:32 for adultery as well as 1 Cor 7:15 for departure of unbelieving husband? I myself am not divorced.

I could have a wrong interpretation. That happened once in 1961.


BTW, I am sorry about the wading pool crack in the quiz thread! ...I'm feeling guilty about that!

 

Well, I wanted to say much more, but given the civil nature of this thread, I will settle for this:

There were many Christians who said the exact same thing about interracial marriage. Do you agree that interracial marriage is a sin?

(Oh geez... Forget it. I don't want to hear your justification about how the parts of the Bible you like are ultimate truth and the parts you don't like only "apply to Hebrews.")

 

Bill, I have not been able to post. I have not been ignoring you. I was just curious about your understanding of of "moicheia" and "porneia."

Don't feel guilty. When I counsel concerning guilt I tell people there is real guilt and false guilt and the difference revolves around intentionality.

You didn't intentionally say that to hurt or degrade me. I am the one who has been somewhat "mean spirited"at times.

Anyway, I do have a pretty good understanding of what Augustine and Calvin meant by predestination.

I know Calvin believed God not only predestined people to salvation but also to faith itself: goal and means.

I think predestination has been, for the most part, misunderstood and unfairly maligned, to some extent.

 

You know, Jeff, none of the Christians who post here tries to justify every stupid thing every stupid Christian ever said. None feels--or should feel--constrained to do so. Nor need they feel obligated to denounce every stupid...etc. Conversely, nobody expects you to justify or denounce every stupid thing every stupid Unitarian ever said. Nor should you feel constrained to do so.

When did I ever say anything remotely resembling the "Oh geez" paragraph at the end of your post?

Why should I get "gotcha-ed" because of what somebody somewhere in some sect said about interracial marriage? If it would make you feel better for me to admit that every social injustice, especially those pertaining to race (these seem to be your favourites for discussion), is due directly to the baleful influence of Christianity, I could do it. I'd like you to be happy. But it would not be true.

If you want to believe that you and your religion are morally superior to Christians and Christianity in some guise or other, whether viewed historically or contemporaneously, go ahead. You may well be absolutely right. As that great (in every sense)Unitarian William Howard Taft once put it, "God knows."

Civil though the tone of this thread has been, it does occur to me that, while the opprobrium for self-righteous moralizing is almost always cast upon conservatives in our current set of cultural cliches, there has been enough wowserism to go around here from left and right alike.

(Anybody else ever notice how much alike Jerry Falwell and Rosie O"Donnell look? Just wunnerd.)

One might ask: where is the capacity for self-criticism? It need not be limitless (as some may demand). But it ought to be discernible in the adherents of any mature body of thought, whether religious, philosophical, political, or pertaining-to-the-public-rhetoric-of-sexuality-and-sexual-preference (if "genderrhetorical" is not a word, it oughta be). Christians with a lively sense of personal and corporate sin, morally inferior though they likely are to those who, in Channing's words, see themselves the happy achievers of "salvation by character," may be more likely to need--that is not in dispute--and to ask--forgiveness, whether from other humans or from the Deity.

Nobody is less impressed by openly meretricious pleas for forgiveness in public fora, unaccompanied by improvement in concrete action and behaviour, than the suspicious old Carpathian. True public self-criticism, however, whether personal or corporate, is scarcely fostered by a public discourse dominated by themes of victimhood, "righteous" outrage, and pride.

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P.S. Ag shame, I meant what I said earlier about being off this thread. Now look. Please forgive me. No, really. Accept or reject what I said, but I have nothing more to say on this thread. Nothing. Really. Bye.

 

I guess this is guilt night. I want to apologize for my remarks about "circumlocutions" and not proving anything.

Actually, you speak very clearly, not always succinctly, however (HA!), and your made your points quite well from the resources you have.

I don't agree with some of what you say but I don't need to be mean in my disagreements.

One thing I have come to regret in my discussions with you is that I no longer have all the commentaries, dictionaries, lexicons, etc., I used to.

I can see from your responses and replies how valuable they are.

When I decided (subjective, I know) that Aramaic was the original language of the NT I just gave away all Greek-oriented materials keeping only STRONG'S CONCORDANCE.

I did purchase a Vine's and a few other books for my Greek and Hebrew courses at GSST but certainly admire the library you have accumulated over the years.

Every now and then I regret having given away some books over the years.

I do have a pretty good library of Syriac study materials including the excellent A COMPENDIOUS SYRIAC DICTIONARY by R. Payne Smith.

Anyway, Bill, won't assail your replies, knowledge, and years of study anymore.

 

Re: Re: Marriage defined by "love?" Or Children's interests? Why "Gay Marriage"

Of course not. But if the unions are not normally procreative, as with gays, why should the state recognize it? Why would society, via the state, care what gays do or don't do?

IF gays want state santioned marriages, why don't they simply have children first?
(I see no indication that they are or will...but I am pragmatic on the possibility of technology to change this for future generations. But psychologically or socially, where's is the evidence that such radical change is just around some corner?)

And where is the "democracy" in robed tryrants of the bench changing the primary institution of civilization?

This "theology" is (liberal/socialist/politically correct) statism.

They believe the sexes are arbitrary "assignments" of culture, termed "gender." Either is a good as the any other. Hence even 18 or 19 year old girls belong on Division I football teams. If young men are bumped from the team and cheated from testing themselves for a potential career as a consequence, as happened so famously at the University of Colorado, females can't possibly be expected to anticipate that those mean rapacious men may be mean and resentful toward's them!!

But the growing evidence of evolutionary psychology contradicts these ideologues. In fact, women's studies, subsidized by the multi-billion dollar Ford Foundation for decades, have been created by the many many hundreds in colleges and univerities throughout the US. They have, in fact, systematically mis-educated American youth into believing that the above fantasies are true and sensible expectations. Elementary facts of human development that made textbooks in the 70s have been wiped out since - for example, that male sex drive (via testosterone levels) climax at 18, while for females it is after 30. Therefore a mismatching of interests, curiosity, and drives toward intimacy among the young, resulting in conflict, is entirely to be expected - if also, sometimes, extremely difficult to survive.

Contrary to the feminists and their allies in the PC gay lobby, women do not make better "fathers" on average than men do, nor do men make better "mothers" than women - and children do better with both a father and a mother than without them both, on average.

Do we really want this societal norm to change now just because a few judges insist this is simply "discriminatory" instead of brute psycho-biological reality? Or is narcissistic personal self-interest now more important than societies interest in future generations? Has nature so become vilified that we must remake the most natural of our millenially evolved institutions?

Contrary to the headlines of virtually all our newspapers, only our elite, unelected judicial theocracy has forced Bush into proposing a consititutional amendment to counter this rolling revolution against realism and the nature of human devolpment.

Therefore, I am against robed theocracy, too.

--Orson
PS Recall the "Ban Gay Marriage" headlines; imagine "Feminists Advocate Baby Killing" as a heradline. You'll never see it. But both smear terms reveal their bias: it tilts the public debate, and "proves" that Republicans are mean spirited and nasty, seeking out minorities to deprive instead of looking out for our better social interests to defend. Will anyone besides me say that the media are "stooges for the Dems?" Stooges for PC causes - like state authorized gay marriage? Its obvious.
c.f. the book "Coloring The News"