LGBTQ+ Rights and Religion

Except it [sleeping with a same-sex person] has exactly as much reason to be arbitrarly declared "sin" as eating unhealthy food: zero.

Edit: Not just premarital sex: Also sex with any form of birth control, or sex with a sterile, pregnant or menopaused wife.

edited 22nd Oct '12 3:12:19 PM by Medinoc

Yes: you should love and respect whoever they are. <shrugs> To be honest, fretting about who's in the bed if they're not doing the incest or adultery that can damage others or themselves is... shellfish.

edited 22nd Oct '12 3:12:16 PM by Euodiachloris

At the same time Max, your argument was that the term used in defining the offense gave it extreme severity precluding further discussion. And then I gave an example where not only was it overturned by a rather high figure, but in a rather flippant "seriously, you people are still on about this?" way.

My argument is that it's on the table and up for judgment, in relation to our growing knowledge of the world and ourselves. This is our moral responsibility.

EDIT: you answered the other thing I asked in an edit in another edit. edit edit edit edit.

ಠ_ಠ

edited 22nd Oct '12 3:19:35 PM by Pykrete

No, no Pyrete I saw your edit. My answer was we're not living under Levirate law and this isn't old Isreal. This is the Constitutional democratic republic known as the United States and we play ball differently here . Also, Timothy nullifies draconian marriage arrangements.

Sorry I didn't address your point. I get what you mean about the word abomination. My point was Shima is saying homosexuality is against tribal norms. I'm saying the Bible as I'm understanding didn't say it was bad because "that's not how we Jews roll." It said "it is an abomination before God." It totally skipped past social mores and literally said God was offended by it (in a manner similar to how God condemns fornication, and nobody debates that one).

My point to Shima, and you, is that I may be wrong because I'm misunderstanding something, but not because I'm doing like the WBC and making shit up.

Citation please.

Edit: Dammit Pyrete, you're like a Ninja Marine Special Ops MI 6 agent!

Edit 2: I believe is all true and accurate, including Timothy.

Edit 3: It's not the severity. It's the fact there's nothing that suggests the assertion was specific to a time and place, and because both Testaments would suggest it's wrong.

edited 22nd Oct '12 3:21:40 PM by TheStarshipMaxima

Well, sort of. You said we're not bound to it by secular law. Modern analysis points to Timothy being written falsely and thus moot. So, state law aside, is that widow under divine moral mandate to marry her in-law? Or can we feel comfortable looking back and saying "yeah that's not such a good idea"?

In the current Catechism, that only applies to birth control and voluntary sterilizing procedures. It does permit it when sterility is "for reasons independent of their will".

edited 22nd Oct '12 3:24:27 PM by Pykrete

I believe Timothy is as valid as Genesis. Nevertheless, the passage saying widows have to marry their brothers-in-law, like the ones about a rape victim marrying her rapist, have clear statements that they are being made in a specific time and place.

Also, Paul repeated the assertion that if you have a legal divorce or are a widow, it's like being a virgin, you can start from scratch.

We're talking about Christianity here, not some Catholic nonsense.

edited 22nd Oct '12 3:34:53 PM by TheStarshipMaxima

I hear people say adulterous straight men are in the same boat as all gay men. But last I checked, adultery is legal in the United States. And when's the last time a straight man was assaulted for sleeping around?

Exactly. That's why adulterous men who, while having crappy sexual morals, have a sense of fairness and decency and fight against that kind of bullshit.

Y'know, like me.

edited 22nd Oct '12 3:44:54 PM by TheStarshipMaxima

"you're not to lie with a man as you would with a woman."

Not to be picky but I am I the only person reading that passage as "Pick one or the other just not both". Hell you could even extend it to "no anal with a dude if you've done it with a girl". After all it specifically says "as you would with a woman" so as long as you're doing it a different way...

Hmm, at the risk of sounding ignorant, are there passages in the Bible condemning female homosexuality?

Nope.

There is "Mother and Daughter", but that is about Incest.

Also, I can't remember a passage condemning Polygamy, which clearly will have some Women on Women atleast once.(not every single marriage would, but some would for sure) There might be a passage, though.

Female homosexuality probably wasn't considered "real sex" during the Hebrew times so it makes sense they didn't bother to address it.

Homosexuality is called an abomination in some translations but the word in the original is the biblical word used for "cultural taboo". It is not called an abomination to God which are God's taboo's and once again uses a different word for abomination. It is the word best translated as "cultural taboo." That means that it's a cultural taboo. Not a sin. There's a different word that's used for all the actual sins. Not just the hygiene laws which are cultural taboos, not religious ones.

You're the one who keeps saying we need to take the whole Bible in context. If you do that, homosexuality isn't a sin.

edited 22nd Oct '12 5:05:35 PM by shimaspawn

It also is not specifically homosexuality either in that. And I'm not sure I buy the whole "women on women is not real sex" deal either. I don't see why it wouldn't be known to exist.

Likewise, from what I remember, there was, at the time, tons of male slavery(with male owners) where the whole "men on men" thing could be specifically referring to.

The thing is, regardless, it does not actually imply Homosexuality at all. It could mean it, but not necessarily. Likewise, it's also mentioned during the "hygiene and cleansliness" section. Which only the mentioned Incest bit is any real exception to(and one could argue having sex with direct family outside of being married is unclean anyway). Related, an enema was probably extremely difficult to do around that time, meaning anal was particular dangerous. Another thing that passage could be referring to. There's multiple ways to take it. I will not say that it couldn't mean Homosexuality, but it's not as "iron clad" or as "specific" as people think it is. It's extremely vague. And I still will say the fact it doesn't mention women on woman, at all, despite mentioning mother and daughter(even with another man, it's still a form of women on women, if only in part) in another passage, means homosexuality is not the actual likely meaning.

I hope that all made sense.

Ohh! I really want to see Starship respond to this.

Calling the bible the Word of God seems less like a way to worship God, and more a way to worship the Council of Niceas, who arranged what we know as the Bible today by committee.

@post 4316:

The bible is ambiguous. Next is us attempting to decipher ancient Greek poetry and figure out exactly what the author meant. Can we just leave it at "There is no definitive answer" and get on with it?

It's not like everyone agrees about the rest of the bible, look at the differences between Catholics and Protestants... and between individual protestants.. and just EVERYTHING. I don't see the sacraments in the bible after all, but you don't see protestants going after catholics still for murdering the bible or whatever. In the end Christianity is the sum of many different things, and I think we all just need to accept this and move on.

Sure it's unacceptable in certain branches of Christianity. Woopdiedoo.

edited 22nd Oct '12 7:53:02 PM by Aqueos

Funny story.◊

Seriously though, I don't think I've ever personally gotten more than a brief ribbing over it.

edited 23rd Oct '12 12:02:03 AM by Pykrete

Starship, you seem to constantly say that the people you argue against are making really good points... but then you say you disagree anyway.

Or at least that's the impression that I'm getting here.

edited 23rd Oct '12 4:18:46 AM by kay4today

Happy to oblige, although I've stated this before. This is not a case of me saying "Guys take the Bible in context here but not here." People make it appear that way, but it isn't. I say "Guys, the Bible must be taken exactly as it is. If the Bible says something is wrong because it's flat-out wrong, or if it says something is allowable under certain set conditions, or if it says something was wrong but isn't any longer; then those are three separate statements, each to be taken on it's own word.

What Shima's been arguing for awhile now is something different. Shima isn't finding any passages that say "Homosexuality was wrong, but is now allowed," or "Homosexuality is against the tribe of the Isreal." She's arriving at that point by way of questioning translations and the like. That's a different thing.

My approach is to take the Bible at face value. Her's is to question if the words on the page are the words on the page. She's entitled to that approach, it's one that many take, especially in the gay rights bloc. I do not.

When the Bible says fornication is a sin, I don't question if the Greek word for fornication really meant "sex without a condom" or "sex standing up" or "sex with your best friend's ex". I take that it means "you can't have sex with someone who's not your wife."

The Bible actually has a verse that says to the effect "He who subtracts from even a word of the Scriptures subtracts from his blessings, and he who adds even a word to Scripture adds curses to his life." Thus why I take it the way I do. It may be right, or it may be wrong, but that's my approach.

Well Kay, I find that people, especially the ones on this website, tend to be far too intelligent and savvy to make blatantly stupid, wrong statements. And even when they're wrong, the logic is so well thought out and so well presented, it is still good for knowledge.

Lawyerdude and Scriblerian have made erroneous statements that Christians and Christianity are the source of much of the world's misery (previously). They were wrong, but if you look at the posts, many of the statements are undeniable fact and the logic is sound, up to a point.

I know sometimes I seem like I just take the contrary view for the lulz, but I don't. I examine each argument because there's something of value when intelligent people combine heads.

The trouble is, Starship, that in other areas than homosexuality you seem more willing to interpret the scripture loosely.

What is it, exactly, that makes the NT statements against women speaking in church products of their context while NT statements against homosexuality are set in stone?

edited 23rd Oct '12 7:10:21 AM by LoniJay

Starship, the whole issue boils down to translation, though: heck... it's even a translation when it was put into the written Temple Hebrew it ended up in, as it was oral tradition and scraps of written well before it got "modernised" and standardised into the Torah. And, it's always been like this.

Not to mention there's been the argument that the whole "don't sleep with another man as if with a woman" could actually mean "make sure if you do, you're the topper" (which was the cultural bias of the time and the region, anyway).

It's that bleeding vague what was originally meant.

edited 23rd Oct '12 7:14:24 AM by Euodiachloris

I don't know where you got the idea I think the NT passages on women speaking in the Church is not as set as the statements against homosexuality. Much like homosexuality, there's a lot of "Well, the translation says....." where those verses are concerned. To me it seems the Bible is saying women can do anything they like, except be preachers in Church.

Much like homosexuality, I don't see where the Bible says that a Church with a female pastor is going to be smitten with hellfire. In other words, I don't find it that big a deal, so I don't press the issue past that point.

Well, maybe not hellfire, but the bible does say that those who engage in guy-on-guy homosexuality should be put to death. The fact that most Christians ignore it doesn't change the fact that it's there.

edited 23rd Oct '12 7:35:33 AM by Morgikit