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timetowaste85 wrote:

alarmingrick wrote:And whatever happened to "love thy neighbor" and "judge not"?

OYG, Christians make my head hurt....

It's not all of us, just the idiots who make the rest of us good Christians look bad

But they tend to make so much more noise than you guys

Extremists usually have the loudest voice as they scream so much, and the media focuses on them as that's what sells.

No matter what we say, people with the same mindset as GG believe they're right. Not a lot we can do there.

That being said, this is kind of the object lesson in why we need people like Santorum to be no where near office.

Many Christians are good people capable of recognizing where the stories of their faith are metaphorical, and where some things said by fallible human beings thousands of years ago are now in conflict with things we've learned since. Some of said Christians have posted in this thread. Let's not lump them all in with GG.

Heck, let's not be too harsh on GG. He has some hateful and destructive ideas, but he does seem to be working from a position of sincerity and honesty, and hopefully will eventually think his way out of them, as no doubt Christ would want.

generalgrog wrote:
Even though you and people like you would like to make people believe it's bigoted to call homosexuality sin, you may as well call me a bigot vs porn perverts too. And I guess in your world I am also a bigot towards adulterers and liars, and thieves.

Well, maybe not the latter three, though I suspect my facility for lying isn't something you would consider laudable, but I would say you're obstinately intolerant (ie. bigoted) with respect to homosexuals, and people involved with porn.

As an aside, related to my statements about pride:

Johnathan Edwards wrote:If on the proposal of the question [Are you humble?], you answer, “No, it seems to me, none are so bad as I.” Don't let the matter pass off so; but examine again, whether or no you don't think yourself better than others on this very account, because you imagine you think so meanly of yourself. Haven't you a high opinion of this humility? And if you answer again, “No; I have not a high opinion of my humility; it seems to me I am as proud as the devil”; yet examine again, whether self-conceit don't rise up under this cover; whether on this very account, that you think yourself as proud as the devil, you don't think yourself to be very humble.

It is a common problem amongst the pious-- they are humble and they are proud of it.

Essentially, saying "I'm proud of being Christian" is itself a sin.

Another quote on the insidious nature of pride as a sin....

C.S. Lewis wrote:During my afternoon “meditations,”—which I at least attempt quite regularly now—I have found out ludicrous and terrible things about my own character. Sitting by, watching the rising thoughts to break their necks as they pop up, one learns to know the sort of thoughts that do come.

And, will you believe it, one out of every three is the thought of self-admiration: when everything else fails, having had its neck broken, up comes the thought “what an admirable fellow I am to have broken their necks!” I catch myself posturing before the mirror, so to speak, all day long. I pretend I am carefully thinking out what to say to the next pupil (for his good, of course) and then suddenly realize I am really thinking how frightfully clever I'm going to be and how he will admire me...

And then when you force yourself to stop it, you admire yourself for doing that. It is like fighting the hydra... There seems to be no end to it. Depth under depths of self-love and self-admiration.

Melissia wrote:No, you're a bigot because you constantly hate-monger.

I don't think GG is a hate-monger.

Broadly, there are two types of people that make the "hate the sin, love the sinner" argument. The first is someone that genuinely hates homosexuals, and has found a convenient way of disguising that hate in polite society. The second is someone who is genuinely made very uncomfortable by homosexuals, but doesn't want to think of themselves as a homophobe.

I think GG fits in the second category.

How does someone being gay affect him?
Here is the answer. It doesnt. Plain and simple. It doesnt affect him. He just doesnt like the the world doesnt fit his narrow view.

dogma wrote:I don't think GG is a hate-monger.

Perhaps it's semantics, but in my mind being a hatemonger (or anything -monger really) is about what you say and do, rather than what you think and feel.

Just out of curiosity, where in the bible does it say that God doesn't like homosexuals? I'm genuinly interested. Or is it one of those things passed down from back in the day of the romans?

This is a good summary.

It's described as an abomination in Leviticus, which is in the old testament. A lot of things are abominations worthy of death according to Leviticus (including cutting your beard and working on the sabbath), and per Christianity those restrictions are supposed to be replaced by Jesus' new covenant, but you will find some flavors of Christians who reference them out of ignorance or because they like them.

In the new testament IIRC it's the gospel of Paul that primarily speaks ill of homosexuality.

Johnnysd wrote:Just out of curiosity, where in the bible does it say that God doesn't like homosexuals? I'm genuinly interested. Or is it one of those things passed down from back in the day of the romans?

Justinian to be specific.

Emperor Justinian was trying to use homosexuality as a scapegoat to attack enemies and to blame for earthquakes.

Many of the most popular translations suffer from translator bias, so you see things like "neither female prostitutes nor male prostitutes should sell themselves in a temple" (a common practice in those days) is turned in to "prostitutes or sodomites" which is translated in to "male or female homosexuals".

ifStatement wrote:It's got some bs line about how a man shouldn't lay besides another

... in a woman's bed. Because a woman's bed is apparently sacrosanct and a man laying with another man in a woman's bed defiles it.

The crimes of Sodom are those of failing to practice proper hospitality to a guest, not of homosexuality.

Im christian, And im going to admit the bible says alot of stupid stuff.
Like the only meat you can eat or Ox, Sheep and goat.
I take out of it the stuff jesus would want us too. Basically 2 things
1: Dont harm Another
2: Do what you can to help others.

Melissia wrote:

ifStatement wrote:It's got some bs line about how a man shouldn't lay besides another

... in a woman's bed. Because a woman's bed is apparently sacrosanct and a man laying with another man in a woman's bed defiles it.

The crimes of Sodom are those of failing to practice proper hospitality to a guest, not of homosexuality.

Oh so buggery in the guest room is alright then? That seems reasonable, what's all the fuss about?

timetowaste85 wrote:

alarmingrick wrote:And whatever happened to "love thy neighbor" and "judge not"?

OYG, Christians make my head hurt....

It's not all of us, just the idiots who make the rest of us good Christians look bad

The problem is all you "good christians" that stand around and LET these types speak for you and your faith.

You should be out protesting them and voting them out of office and seperating yourself from them instead of standing by and letting them say what they say.

Silence equals acceptance in many cases...

It's more complicated than that, ifstatement, but essentially yes. Modern translations were often translated several times, reworded, and so on, often for political reasons. The KJV bible for example modified several sections to provide mention and condemnation of witches.

Johnnysd wrote:Just out of curiosity, where in the bible does it say that God doesn't like homosexuals? I'm genuinly interested. Or is it one of those things passed down from back in the day of the romans?

The old Romans had a fairly hedonistic Attitude from the things I've read, and it seemed like pretty much anything was alright in the later stages of their empire.

The later stages of the Empire were after it went Christian.

Mannahnin wrote:The later stages of the Empire were after it went Christian.

The christian roman empire was quite tolerant, you may be surprised to know.

More tolerant than the pagan Roman Empire?

The populace, not the leadership. And I don't know. I'd guess no.

The leadership of the Christian roman empire weren't intolerant so much as they thought an easy way to get rid of enemies was to ban homosexuality on religious grounds, therefor hey wrote decrees altering the interpretations of specific bits of text, such as the Sodom bit.

Melissia wrote:The leadership of the Christian roman empire weren't intolerant so much as they thought an easy way to get rid of enemies was to ban homosexuality on religious grounds.

They made it punishable by death.

You have some funny guys in the States. Our presidential candidates are much more dull.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:They had one credible candidate, one I might even have considered voting for, Huntsman.

I heard he was pretty decent indeed.
Isn't the problem that you've got like two real political parties ? So each side has to accept and deal with its nutcases at the risk of seeing them actually gather support like Jolly Rick to the detriment of moderates, who end up "squeezed" in the grey area.

Well back on the sheer stupidity of santrum(seriosuly i love bashing him) here is what he said of feminists
"Feminists have destroyed all notion of the conventional family, They have taught women that professionalism success is the key to happiness"

It's quite amazing to me the crazy upside down, mixed up world we live in now, where people call right, wrong.... and wrong, right. We live in a world where strait people would rather shackup and have babys out of wedlock then get married and homosexuals want to get married, we live in world where people basically bragg about being peeping toms(internet porn) and want people to think that this is "just normal behavior". 100 years ago maybe even 50 years ago people used to have shame. We are reaping the wirlwind of the social reformation (read disaster) of the 1960's.

I for one will not apologize for being "on the Lords side".

I do love you all..even though your hate for whats right has blinded you to the truth.

Peace.

GG

I was really tempted to make a facetious joke about "this crazy, upside down world" where black people can marry white people, and a woman is allowed to accuse her husband of rape. Where women are allowed to vote and a black person can become President of the United States. The kind of backward, anti-progress and anti-human rights thinking required to decry those things is the same as decries homosexuals being treated like decent human beings.

But it's not really a joking matter.

I don't hate much of anything, aside from harm done to innocent people. GG, your attitude (and that of people like you) towards homosexuals is directly responsible for the suicide deaths of a lot of homosexual teenagers. That is evil in the world. Their deaths, not the people they love or are attracted to. And your blindness is abetting and promulgating this evil.

GG, your religion forbids you to judge, yet you do it anyway. Mine has no such prohibition, so I am not a hypocrite when I judge you as a person propagating evil in the world. I hope one day you wake up to it and amend your ways. Hopefully before you teach your children to hold homosexuals in contempt, and to mistreat them.

generalgrog wrote:It's quite amazing to me the crazy upside down, mixed up world we live in now, where people call right, wrong.... and wrong, right.

"What I believe is the truth, all else is false; empirical evidence be damned."

I said before that I would return the analytic favor if you continued to be self righteous, so here goes:

You need to feel you have access to truth. But not truth in the sense of knowing that uncertainty exists, but truth in the sense that you can answer any possible question. I will support this argument hearkening back to comments you have made regarding your prior status as a strident atheist, which essentially an inversion of your present belief set.

generalgrog wrote:
We live in a world where strait people would rather shackup and have babys out of wedlock then get married and homosexuals want to get married, we live in world where people basically bragg about being peeping toms(internet porn) and want people to think that this is "just normal behavior".

I would certainly rather shack up, though the sex is better if you have feelings for the person. I hate children, though, so that's not the objective. And, really, whether or not someone is married has no bearing on their regard for their children. It is possible to have very supportive, unmarried parents.

As to "peeping toms" there is a clear difference. A person showing you their naked body intentionally is not the same as doing the same by accident. If that distinction did not exist, then looking at your wife when she is not wearing clothes would make you a "peeping tom".

generalgrog wrote:
100 years ago maybe even 50 years ago people used to have shame. We are reaping the wirlwind of the social reformation (read disaster) of the 1960's.

Oh, people still have shame, its just directed at different things.

I imagine, for example, that you would not express these views in unvetted company.

generalgrog wrote:
I do love you all..even though your hate for whats right has blinded you to the truth.

I'm sorry, but I actually laughed at this. Let me explain why:

You're essentially arguing that anyone who does not agree with you is blind. This is, of course, a variant on "people are sheep" argument. The reality here, as in the issue of sheeple, is that you love yourself, and what you want others to be, and not the people in question.

I consider this position disgusting. Its one of the few arguments I have a visceral reaction to.

generalgrog wrote:It's quite amazing to me the crazy upside down, mixed up world we live in now, where people call right, wrong.... and wrong, right. We live in a world where strait people would rather shackup and have babys out of wedlock then get married and homosexuals want to get married, we live in world where people basically bragg about being peeping toms(internet porn) and want people to think that this is "just normal behavior". 100 years ago maybe even 50 years ago people used to have shame. We are reaping the wirlwind of the social reformation (read disaster) of the 1960's.

I for one will not apologize for being "on the Lords side".

I do love you all..even though your hate for whats right has blinded you to the truth.

Peace.

GG

Loads of marriage end in divorce, many unmarried couples stay together for life. Children are raised well by single parents, gay and straight parents, being married does not ensure a good home environment for children. All families are different, and different people make for happier families and better kids. It's not about their genders or how many there are or whether they are married. Where you see hate for anything contrary to your 'norm' or 'the truth', I see greater acceptance for the love between people in all sorts of diverse relationships.

If you think people and families of 50 or 100 years ago were some sort of ideal we should aim for again you have a very simplistic and idealistic grasp of history. Things weren't better then, people just stayed quiet and kept up appearances. Beaten partners and homosexuals stayed in sham marriages because of the 'shame' from society. Using prostitutes even within marriage was hardly uncommon and people suffering sexual abuses were told to stay quiet or be 'shamed'.

Just because divorce is more acceptable and people are able to have same sex or single families does not mean that things are worse than years ago. Where you think that people 'had shame' and acted more appropriately, what they did was simply hide away and make everything look much happier than it did. It's sad that you want to live in a world where people put on false pretences and live sham lives to satisfy some 1950s ideal where everyone gets married to a member of the opposite sex before having children. Because that obviously makes people happier and better, even when that isn't what they want.