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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: gay sex - being and doing
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
I think that aggressively practising gays shout a lot, don't use KY jelly, and make love on the kitchen table, to the sound of 'Killing in the Name'.
But none of this seems incompatible with Christianity, does it?
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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LeRoc
Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
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Posted
Now you do what they told ya ...
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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ad Orientem:
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
I don't think "self-appointed-managers-of-other-people's-affairs" refers to state action, otherwise it wouldn't be "self-appointed". It more refers to things like the community enforcement of strict Sabbatarianism in Lewis - when some people decide they know what is best for others and involve themselves in private decisions. The sort of "persuasion" directed at gay people by churches that think they should be celibate or pretend to be straight comes out of the same oppressive playbook. It's the same sort of coercion that results in FGM and forced marriage.
BTW I'd love to know how you practice homosexuality "aggressively". ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
Surely a Church has the right impose certain conditions upon membership? If one happens not to like the conditions then one doesn't have to join, surely?
Depends. Why should any church have such a downer on certain sins while not taking such a hardline on others?
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ad Orientem:
Surely a Church has the right impose certain conditions upon membership?
Of course they have the right to. Should they? Absolutely not. It is not the job of the church to decide who is unacceptable to God.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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Starlight
Shipmate
# 12651
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
try "has serious doubts whether aggressively practicing homosexuals can be accepted as members".
We would, I hope, be open to demonstration that we've got that biblically wrong.
Let me be the first to express immense skepticism that you are applying your exclusionary criteria to all types of sin equally. Do you exclude the greedy, the hypocrite, the lover of money, the drunkard, the glutton, the liar, the adulterer etc with as much conviction as you do gay people? I doubt it. This almost never happens. Instead Church preachers find gay people a convenient third party that can be labelled as a sinner and condemned in their absence and the congregation can then shake their heads in disgusted judgement of "those evil gay sinners" and feel self-congratulatorily smug about themselves for not being sinners (like the Pharisee was about the tax collector). Meanwhile the sins that the congregation are committing are ignored and glossed over and felt to be excusable and irrelevant and not worth mentioning compared to the evils of those gay people over there.
From a theological point of view, it strikes me as a bit unusual to exclude people from membership because they are sinners. Usually the teaching is that we are all equally sinners and so all equally need the blood of Jesus, so there's not a lot of point trying to label some as worse sinners than others since we'd all be going to hell without blood of our saviour anyway, etc. But, hey, if your particular church doesn't believe that and believes something different and does have the theological teaching that its important to hold members up to a certain standard of living, okay good for you.
I don't personally agree with your biblical interpretation of the bible as teaching against homosexuality, but this thread is not the place for detailed discussion of that.
As far as your concern that you feel you / your group is being unfairly condemned for your actions to exclude homosexual people from your membership...
You're doing something, and other people want to judge it. Exactly like your OP suggested you should be able to do with gay people. Apparently you don't always agree with their judgement of your actions? Um, so what? People often have opinions, and they aren't always right or the same as yours or mine.
Are you being legally forced to accept gay members? That would be a slightly different situation, because clearly such a legal restriction would set a certain level of limit on your ability to live out what you feel your religion teaches and so is doing you some small level of harm. Overall I would tend to feel that the rather tiny dent in your ability to tell gay people they are bad and kick them out would be worth it to prevent the greater harm that you're inflicting on the gay people. And, meanwhile, you can enjoy kicking out those other 99 people you're kicking out for that giant list of 100 other sins that you're kicking people out of membership for, and then for the 100th you can sigh that the government has crossed off one of your list of a hundred sins that you're allowed to kick out people for. (But of course that isn't a realistic imagining because of course you aren't actually enforcing the hundreds of other sins the bible mentions with remotely as much enthusiasm as you've trying to kick out gays with, as I mentioned earlier.)
But the question of how strong anti-discrimination laws ought to be is clearly an open question around the world with different Western nations having struck different balances with regard to how they try and rule within the grey area to best limit the harms to both sides. (And which is why the wedding photography thread is many pages long) I would tend to have the opinion that it's probably best as a general rule to err on the side of a little bit of affirmative action in favour of the minority group to try and help them get past the prejudices that they have historically suffered from and bring them back up to a normal level of social acceptance. So I would tend to favour the strongest possible anti-discrimination laws, at least initially. Basically if Christians didn't have a 2000 year history of killing / imprisoning / castrating / denying fundamental human rights to gay people, then I would feel much more okay with letting Christians have whatever exclusion principles they wanted to have, be it excluding those people wearing funny hats or people born on a Monday or gay people.
In the same way, if there hadn't been a history of discrimination against black people in the world that had caused a great deal of historical suffering, then one small group in the present day wanting to exclude black people would likely have been tolerated. Whereas I think it's pretty clear to everyone that if your group tried to exclude black people from membership you wouldn't be allowed to get away with it. Even if your theology was that black people were descendents of Ham, and that their curse was a well-deserved consequence of Ham's actions (ie DOING and not BEING), and if you believed that sinfulness was inherited and that therefore the black people in the present were completely guilty before God as a result of Ham's doings which they themselves in spirit were participating in (think Augustine's version of Original Sin), and if you really and truly sincerely believed all that as core religious teachings of your organisation... then you wouldn't be tolerated for kicking out black people. There wouldn't even be serious discussion of whether your rights to religious freedom were being infringed, you just wouldn't be allowed to do it. I think the same level of protection ought to apply for gay people and for exactly the same reasons - prevention of harm in the present to a minority group that has a massive history of suffering harm from discrimination.
Posts: 745 | From: NZ | Registered: May 2007
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Curiosity killed ...
Ship's Mug
# 11770
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Posted
I can't remember the exact quotation now, it was six years ago, but in Bishop Gene Robinson's sermon at St Mary's Church, Putney he said that it isn't for the church to judge, the church is the welcoming committee opening doors to encourage people to meet God. It's for God to judge.
ISTM that many churches take upon themselves the judgement role of God. We cannot see into hearts and souls as mere humans, so what gives us the right to judge, measure and find our fellow men wanting?
ah well, cross posted with two others saying basically the same thing
[ 30. July 2014, 12:51: Message edited by: Curiosity killed ... ]
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
Posts: 13794 | From: outiside the outer ring road | Registered: Aug 2006
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Ad Orientem
Shipmate
# 17574
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
quote:
Originally posted by Ad Orientem:
Surely a Church has the right impose certain conditions upon membership?
Of course they have the right to. Should they? Absolutely not. It is not the job of the church to decide who is unacceptable to God.
We are all sinners, but that's not what we're discussing here, as far as I can see. Let's suppose someone wants to be baptised. The priest will ask them a series of questions, mainly if they believe what the Church believes, which also means do they repent of all their previous sins. If the answer to that is no, then the priest has an obligation to refuse baptism.
Posts: 2606 | From: Finland | Registered: Feb 2013
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
No baptism I have ever attended has required assent to a list of what is or is not a sin.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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Ad Orientem
Shipmate
# 17574
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Posted
Do not candidates go through a period of catechism?
Posts: 2606 | From: Finland | Registered: Feb 2013
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ad Orientem:
Do not candidates go through a period of catechism?
I didn't, and from what little I know of your religious history- correct me if I'm wrong- you may not have either,m for the perfectly good reason that we were babes in arms at the time. I was confirmed at 12, though, but at that stage I still don't think I was aware of a bat's squeak of sexuality in any direction.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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Steve Langton
Shipmate
# 17601
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Posted
by Starlight;
quote:
From a theological point of view, it strikes me as a bit unusual to exclude people from membership because they are sinners.
No, we don't exclude people simply because they are 'sinners'; as you say, we all are. That is why I used the phrasing "aggressively practicing gays" to mean someone who is not only a sinner (accepting that between us that may be in dispute in this particular case) but doesn't admit he is. As with other sins, there's an expectation of repentance.
As a non-gay example, Paul recommended a man at Corinth be excluded from the church for what appears to have been an affair with his step-mother (something which he implies would have shocked even the notoriously licentious Corinthians). Presumably the exclusion would continue until he was willing to admit his fault and change his ways.
by Starlight;
quote:
Do you exclude the greedy, the hypocrite, the lover of money, the drunkard, the glutton, the liar, the adulterer etc with as much conviction as you do gay people? I doubt it.
I personally don't get to do excluding and personally would hope to be as generous and sympathetic as possible in such matters. Those becoming Christians generally would need to positively repent of their most evident sins before their conversion was credible, if you think about it. With sins after conversion, the usual practice is to try to deal with them as lovingly as possible and exclude only in fairly extreme cases where there is considerable unwillingness to repent.
If we believe the Bible says gay sex is wrong, and there are people loudly saying "We do that and we're going to insist on continuing to do it, but we expect you to accept us anyway", I think we'd reasonably say they are excluding themselves by such an attitude.
One of the problems in the gay issue is that it has acquired an excessive prominence because in churches like the CofE it has ended up as a 'last straw' kind of issue which has made people in those churches really dig in about it. The combination of that digging in with being a state church (or following the wider 'Christian country idea) even today implies a degree of their view being state discrimination and/or coercion of unbelievers by the church , rather than just a disagreement on the part of a voluntary body.
Posts: 2245 | From: Stockport UK | Registered: Mar 2013
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Ad Orientem
Shipmate
# 17574
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Albertus:
quote:
Originally posted by Ad Orientem:
Do not candidates go through a period of catechism?
I didn't, and from what little I know of your religious history- correct me if I'm wrong- you may not have either,m for the perfectly good reason that we were babes in arms at the time. I was confirmed at 12, though, but at that stage I still don't think I was aware of a bat's squeak of sexuality in any direction.
I was baptised as a babe, yes. But then I also converted in my early adulthood. First to the RC and then to the Orthodox. Both involve a period of catechesis and then an affirmation that we believe what the Church believes. Of course, for those who are already members then the sacraments can be refused,in otherwords, minor excommunication.
Posts: 2606 | From: Finland | Registered: Feb 2013
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Macrina
Shipmate
# 8807
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Posted
Steve Langton, do you believe that having gay sex is the only conceivable way for someone to display their gayness?
Posts: 535 | From: Christchurch, New Zealand | Registered: Nov 2004
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
don't use KY jelly
How 1970s
I believe the taste led to a market slump.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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Steve Langton
Shipmate
# 17601
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Posted
by Macrina;
quote:
Steve Langton, do you believe that having gay sex is the only conceivable way for someone to display their gayness?
I might rather be thinking that gay sex is in Christian terms a wrong way for people to express their feelings for someone of the same sex.
Posts: 2245 | From: Stockport UK | Registered: Mar 2013
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iamchristianhearmeroar
Shipmate
# 15483
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I might rather be thinking that gay sex is in Christian terms a wrong way for people to express their feelings for someone of the same sex.
My view on the Biblical texts (all six of them or whatever it actually is) is that they are much closer to condemning gay sex as a wrong way for people to express their feelings for someone of the opposite sex.
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My blog: http://alastairnewman.wordpress.com/
Posts: 642 | From: London, UK | Registered: Feb 2010
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stonespring
Shipmate
# 15530
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
don't use KY jelly
How 1970s
I believe the taste led to a market slump.
Who on earth uses KY for anal? (Sorry lesbians and bi girls, I assumed that as is usually the case when Christians debate gay sex, they mean men having anal sex, as if there is not any other kind of gay sex.)
I'm a pretty avid devotee of Astroglide, although I've heard there are better things out there. The 70's were the era of Vasoline, or so this person who was not alive then (and may not have survived had he been) has heard.
[ 30. July 2014, 16:54: Message edited by: stonespring ]
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Macrina
Shipmate
# 8807
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Posted
Thankyou for your response, where would you draw the line and why?
Posts: 535 | From: Christchurch, New Zealand | Registered: Nov 2004
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by stonespring:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
don't use KY jelly
How 1970s
I believe the taste led to a market slump.
Who on earth uses KY for anal? (Sorry lesbians and bi girls, I assumed that as is usually the case when Christians debate gay sex, they mean men having anal sex, as if there is not any other kind of gay sex.)
I'm a pretty avid devotee of Astroglide, although I've heard there are better things out there. The 70's were the era of Vasoline, or so this person who was not alive then (and may not have survived had he been) has heard.
I think the hell thread devoted to you, is now going to just slide along, like a slippery eel on castors.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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Steve Langton
Shipmate
# 17601
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Posted
by Iamchristianhearmeroar;
quote:
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I might rather be thinking that gay sex is in Christian terms a wrong way for people to express their feelings for someone of the same sex.
Iamchristianhearmeroar in reply;
My view on the Biblical texts (all six of them or whatever it actually is) is that they are much closer to condemning gay sex as a wrong way for people to express their feelings for someone of the opposite sex.
![[Confused]](confused.gif)
Posts: 2245 | From: Stockport UK | Registered: Mar 2013
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iamchristianhearmeroar
Shipmate
# 15483
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Posted
Well, take Romans 1 26-27 as an example:
For this reason God gave them up to degrading passions. Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error.
This, to me, is clearly describing a situation where otherwise straight people are turning to gay sex to satisfy their urges. It is not dealing with a situation where gay people are having gay sex to satisfy their urges. Some distinction.
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My blog: http://alastairnewman.wordpress.com/
Posts: 642 | From: London, UK | Registered: Feb 2010
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Palimpsest
Shipmate
# 16772
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by Palimpsest;
The problem is that the issues have become so heated that at times there is also harassment of people who aren't like that.
For you, there's the Not All Like That Project
Can you tell me about more about real incidents of these poor non-political Christians being harassed? Give me two or three examples, I just haven't seen that in the United States.
You probably will get social contempt, if your theology leads you reject Gays as unworthy, just as racists do.
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by Palimpsest;
quote:
So you belong to a sect that doesn't want to oppose legal homosexuality or same-sex civil marriage but doesn't think homosexuals can be valid practicing members of your denomination?
NOT a complete response, but to make you think about it; try "has serious doubts whether aggressively practicing homosexuals can be accepted as members". That is, making the distinction between 'being' and 'doing' which your way of expressing it doesn't make. We would, I hope, be open to demonstration that we've got that biblically wrong. Thus far many of us are not convinced on that point.
Aggressively practicing homosexuals? Really? That is a rather loaded phrase. Who is the victim of this aggression? Should I refer to aggressively practicing Christians?
And to repeat what has been pointed out earlier, what about those Christians who have "serious doubts whether those aggressively practicing interracial marriage can be accepted as members". Is it ok to hold them in contempt as racists even if they're only criticizing doing and not merely being a member of a minority? Even if they're open to theological argument that they're wrong? Even if they think it will help correct the ungodly actions of others? I would certainly hold them in contempt. They may have the right to have such a church, but they're despicable racists in my opinion.
I'll also point out your desire to "reconcile" seems to be more about protecting yourself from criticism for your actions than actually ameliorating the damage you are doing. You mentioned a website in an earlier post that you liked. It actually had posts about "stop hurting gay people" and not "Poor us we're being oppressed when we hurt Gay people". By comparing the two as equivalent, you're adding insult to injury.
Posts: 2990 | From: Seattle WA. US | Registered: Nov 2011
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Steve Langton
Shipmate
# 17601
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Posted
by Iamchristianhearmeroar;
quote:
Well, take Romans 1 26-27 as an example:
For this reason God gave them up to degrading passions. Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error.
This, to me, is clearly describing a situation where otherwise straight people are turning to gay sex to satisfy their urges. It is not dealing with a situation where gay people are having gay sex to satisfy their urges. Some distinction.
OK, see your point. Not at all sure it is a valid interpretation, though.
Romans 1; 26-7 is part of a long argument going back to v18 and going on to the middle of ch 2 as an argument about human sin in general; after that he moves on to consider the position of his fellow Jews who might be thinking this doesn't apply to them, and he argues (in a way meaningful to his then audience) that Jews are equally sinful before God. THe argument culminates in ch 3; 9-20 with a declaration that ALL have sinned; in v21ff he starts to show how this need is met by the gospel. That goes through to ch 9 where he starts a different line of thought about the place of the Jews in the 'New Covenant'. Finally from ch 12 he gives instructions on how Christians are to live in their world context.
Going back to ch 1, and paraphrasing for brevity, he starts with the basic idea that men rejected God and attempt to be their own god(s). Given human limitations that doesn't work so the actual result is they end up as idolaters, worshipping unreal gods of various kinds from the old idols to modern pop and other 'idols'. They thought they were being clever and asserting freedom, but actually end up as slaves.
Not only are they now 'disjointed' from God; they also become disjointed within themselves, which God allows, again expressing a fitting and appropriate judgement through the natural results of their rebellion. As a dramatic example of this disjointedness, Paul uses sexual dysfunction - the order God created becomes a disorder in which among other things, the male/female complementarity created by God turns into 'unnatural' urges such as same-sex acts.
Not only are men disjointed from God and within themselves, even to the depths of their sexual nature, they are also socially disjointed so that all kinds of things go wrong between men and in society, v28ff.
Finally (for this part of the thesis) in 2; 1-16 he makes the point that even Gentiles, who don't have the Jewish Law, have enough moral awareness to be judged by - in effect, even your own judgements, when God applies them to your own deeds, will condemn you as sinful.
Paul is not making the argument as you've understood it, Iamchristianseemeroar; he wouldn't really have accepted the idea of being 'gay' as we understand it, in his thought this is about people practicing sex wrongly. Having said that, I think his words can be interpreted to imply that wrong sexual urges are among the many such disjointed urges humans have due to what is sometimes called 'original sin' (though I don't necessarily accept Augustine's interpretation of it). Like those other wrong urges, by comparison with the way of life God intended, that we have such urges is not to be interpreted as meaning they are natural and OK to follow out.
Posts: 2245 | From: Stockport UK | Registered: Mar 2013
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
don't use KY jelly
How 1970s
I believe the taste led to a market slump.
It's those shortsighted Lutherans' fault. Anyone could have told them that it's not what you use to make jello salad, but no...
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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stonespring
Shipmate
# 15530
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
quote:
Originally posted by stonespring:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
don't use KY jelly
How 1970s
I believe the taste led to a market slump.
Who on earth uses KY for anal? (Sorry lesbians and bi girls, I assumed that as is usually the case when Christians debate gay sex, they mean men having anal sex, as if there is not any other kind of gay sex.)
I'm a pretty avid devotee of Astroglide, although I've heard there are better things out there. The 70's were the era of Vasoline, or so this person who was not alive then (and may not have survived had he been) has heard.
I think the hell thread devoted to you, is now going to just slide along, like a slippery eel on castors.
What, you start a topic in DEAD HORSES. About gay identity vs. GAY SEX, and you don't get to talk about GAY SEX, even when someone has already made a joke about it, just because I'm gay? (Am I even gay?). I don't think you're one of the people upset by all this, quetz, but I find it humorous nonetheless.
Plus, STRAIGHT PEOPLE HAVE ANAL SEX TOO. And I don't think they should use KY for that either. ![[Smile]](smile.gif) Thanks you.
Posts: 1537 | Registered: Mar 2010
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Steve Langton
Shipmate
# 17601
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Posted
by Palimpsest;
quote:
Aggressively practicing homosexuals? Really? That is a rather loaded phrase. Who is the victim of this aggression? Should I refer to aggressively practicing Christians?
Explained above. Finding 'unloaded phrases' in this kind of context is almost impossible; there's always someone going to make out it was far more 'loaded' than you'd realised when you used it.
quote:
(a blog SL referred to said) "stop hurting gay people" and not "Poor us we're being oppressed when we hurt Gay people". By comparing the two as equivalent, you're adding insult to injury.
I'm not particularly complaining about 'us being oppressed when we hurt Gay people' - there have been a lot of petty examples in the UK of 'PC' behaviour at the expense of Christians in all kinds of areas; some I have thought the Christians were asking for it, others I didn't and thought the parties objecting had gone too far.
If even just disagreement with you constitutes being 'hurt', that's not a legitimate complaint.
As far as I'm concerned there are a lot of things Christians disagree with, including gambling. Imposing a law on the state to stop such conduct would be wrong; but believing things to be sinful and seeking to persuade people of that, and persuade them to voluntarily follow Jesus instead of the current beliefs of the society around them, is legitimate.
Posts: 2245 | From: Stockport UK | Registered: Mar 2013
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
See, I think gambling is demonstrably harmful and there should certainly be tight restrictions on it. The only reason not to have an outright ban is that the social consequences of prohibition tend to be worse than those of the thing being prohibited.
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iamchristianhearmeroar
Shipmate
# 15483
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Paul is not making the argument as you've understood it, Iamchristianseemeroar; he wouldn't really have accepted the idea of being 'gay' as we understand it
My instinctive reaction to that is that if Paul really has nothing to say about being 'gay' as we understand it, then why on earth would we look to his writings for teaching about it? For if Paul is only writing about same-sex sex in the context of, of let's say, ritual sex acts in pagan worship and associated prostitution (which is another interpretation), why would we look to apply what he had to say about that to sex between consenting adults of the same sex?
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
OK, see your point. Not at all sure it is a valid interpretation, though.
Well, it's an interpretation, as your interpretation is also an interpretation. Another interpretation I've heard about the Romans 1 passage I mentioned is that the reference to women exchanging natural intercourse for unnatural refers to women having anal rather than vaginal sex with men (vide St Augustine and Clement of Alexandria). Nothing to do with same-sex sex (is one interpretation).
Still another interpretation (that I alluded to above) of the reference of men committing shameless acts with men is to sexual acts in the context of pagan worship. The men involved in these rituals would get themselves worked up into such a frenzy that some even ended up castrating themselves - Paul's reference to them having received in their own persons the due penalty for their error may allude to that. (vide Wisdom 14:23-28)
All interpretations, but no more and no less of an interpretation than your interpretation.
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Romans 1; 26-7 is part of a long argument going back to v18 and going on to the middle of ch 2 as an argument about human sin in general
I get that.
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I think his words can be interpreted to imply that wrong sexual urges are among the many such disjointed urges humans have due to what is sometimes called 'original sin'
That is if one thinks Paul is simply denouncing same sex attraction and same sex sex. I don't think it's as simple as that. I find the arguments that Paul is referring to things like temple prostitution convincing enough to doubt the "traditional" reading of this passage (which is not all as traditional as it may seem).
And this is before one even looks at the Greek original...
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My blog: http://alastairnewman.wordpress.com/
Posts: 642 | From: London, UK | Registered: Feb 2010
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ChastMastr
Shipmate
# 716
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Posted
Since we've addressed the critical "church rules should not be the same as secular law" issue, then perhaps the key issue might be how a church deals with its rules for its own members. May I suggest, for sexual conduct matters, just not singling out gay sex? I think that's a large chunk of the issue--being sexually active (in various senses, depending on the rules) with someone of the same sex is usually treated as some sort of freakish alien "other" thing while being sexually active outside of marriage (or even, in some churches, within second or later marriages) is treated as more OK, even a peccadillo. If a church just said "here are things we believe are not right" and included "sexual intercourse (defined as whatever) outside of faithful male-female marriage, presumed to be lifelong (or lifelong apart from certain kinds of divorce, etc.)" then the way gay people feel singled out might not be the kind of problem it is. Remember, regular old-fashioned male-female adultery, fornication, etc. have been capital offenses in some OT times, and in the NT Jesus says that people that get divorced and remarried (unless the marriage was itself broken by adultery) are themselves committing adultery. But for the most part churches don't treat "gay stuff" as being on the same level as teens losing virginity, or adults on their second or third spouse, or even adults just breaking their marriage vows. (Unless a pastor is involved.)
Just some thoughts here, but a double standard has gone on for so incredibly long now that this may be a major part of the problem.
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My essays on comics continuity: http://chastmastr.tumblr.com/tagged/continuity
Posts: 14068 | From: Clearwater, Florida | Registered: Jul 2001
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Steve Langton
Shipmate
# 17601
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Posted
by Arethosemyfeet;
quote:
See, I think gambling is demonstrably harmful and there should certainly be tight restrictions on it. The only reason not to have an outright ban is that the social consequences of prohibition tend to be worse than those of the thing being prohibited.
I basically agree; my point is that if there are to be laws in the state, they need to be based on such a widely shared perception of harm, not just on the views of one religion which may include concerns that only that religion accepts. That is, ideally a democratic decision of the kind where even if you're the majority you're required to respect other beliefs. Not just "This is a Christian country, it's a sin in Christian terms, so ban it on our say-so".
And as was shown also by the example of Prohibition in the USA, there must be a willingness to recognise practicalities and the 'law of unforeseen consequences' so that your idealistic law doesn't end up doing more harm than good.
Posts: 2245 | From: Stockport UK | Registered: Mar 2013
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Louise
Shipmate
# 30
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Posted
hosting
Quetzalcoatl, please do not allude to Hell threads about other posters on this board in order to make jokes at their expense. It's a breach of C4. The Hell board exists to keep personal conflicts entirely separate from the other boards.
Stonespring could you please only to respond to Quetzalcoatl's post on the Hell board and not here? That post shouldn't have been made on this board.
I've had to warn other posters about this recently - could people please stop doing this? If you are calling someone to hell, a simple non-contentious link is fine, but otherwise people should not be discussing hell calls or hell threads about other posters anywhere except Hell.
thanks!
Louise
Dead Horses Host
hosting
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Now you need never click a Daily Mail link again! Kittenblock replaces Mail links with calming pics of tea and kittens! http://www.teaandkittens.co.uk/ Click under 'other stuff' to find it.
Posts: 6918 | From: Scotland | Registered: May 2001
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Pomona
Shipmate
# 17175
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Posted
Steve Langton - surely 'sexually active gay people' is quite an obviously less loaded term than 'aggressively practicing homosexuals'?
As others have said a lot on this thread, separating 'being' and 'doing' for non-straight people but not doing so for straight people is both weird and seriously problematic. It's just not something that's possible in the way you think it is. Aside from the fact that the OP (and most subsequent comments) entirely ignores non-monosexuals, you are aware that there is no sexual activity that gay people do that straight people don't also do, right? There is no list in the Bible of OK and not-OK sexual positions.
Also, what about queer (using queer as an umbrella term for non-straight people here, it's not just gay men who aren't straight) culture? Surely a celibate lesbian who is fully into her local queer community (volunteers at the local gay bookshop, drinks at the gay pub, names her cats Tegan and Sara) is more of a 'practicing gay' than a man who has sex with other men in secret and does not identify as gay? This isn't to repeat the tired idea that queerness is a lifestyle choice, just saying that for many queer people (admittedly mostly white middle-class urban queer people) there is a strong cultural/community aspect. It's partly why being queer but not identifying with your particular community can be really difficult when coming to terms with your identity (eg me being a queer woman but about as butch as Barbie caused me some identity issues as a teenager).
Also - reinforcing a binary view of sexuality (straight v gay, acceptable v unacceptable, quiet aka hidden v loud aka open/unashamed) is deeply harmful, not least because bisexual people and other non-monosexuals and our experiences get erased and ignored. We are still queer, we are not just super slutty straight people and we're not some kind of half-hearted homosexuality. Also viewing celibate queer people as OK because they're not as queer as sexually/romantically active is really awful, and is offensive to both groups. One's queerness is not defined by how sexually active one is.
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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]
Posts: 5319 | From: UK | Registered: Jun 2012
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Steve Langton
Shipmate
# 17601
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Posted
by Jade Constable;
quote:
Steve Langton - surely 'sexually active gay people' is quite an obviously less loaded term than 'aggressively practicing homosexuals'?
Yes, less loaded, but didn't quite convey the situation I was thinking of in which the people concerned are not just 'sexually active' but may be quite aggressively making a point of it - as explained above, "We're sexually active in a way you consider wrong, we have every intention of carrying on that way, and we still expect you to accept us regardless".
I did struggle to find a way of stating the point with reasonable brevity; and I accept I didn't entirely succeed. But I still can't think of a brief version that would make my point neatly. It's rather that kind of situation.
by Jade C;
quote:
As others have said a lot on this thread, separating 'being' and 'doing' for non-straight people but not doing so for straight people is both weird and seriously problematic.
I don't make that separation, it's just an aspect I haven't got round to yet. I don't have infinite time to be on the Ship, I've had a hectic week and the thread has attracted a great deal of comment in a short time; I need to breathe occasionally!
by Jade C;
quote:
you are aware that there is no sexual activity that gay people do that straight people don't also do, right?
Though I seem to recall that last time you made a similar assertion you also had to admit that doing those activities often involved 'marital aids' - which seems just a bit at odds with the claim that gay sexual activity is 'natural'?
bby Chastmastr;
quote:
Since we've addressed the critical "church rules should not be the same as secular law" issue, then perhaps the key issue might be how a church deals with its rules for its own members.
I pretty much agree with that and the rest of your post there; unfortunately public issues like SSM have rather singled the gay issue out and given it what I think is indeed undue prominence. I've recently seen an example locally where arguably a church wasn't quite positive enough about a case of adultery, and I think the church is still being hindered by the unsatisfactory way it was dealt with; and of course if gay people were dealt with differently by that church they would, I feel, have some cause for complaint.
Subject to the shenanigans of some council workmen tomorrow morning I hope to be back with a kind of summary of how I see things so far.
Posts: 2245 | From: Stockport UK | Registered: Mar 2013
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Starlight
Shipmate
# 12651
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Posted
Steve Langton,
Most gay people who have been involved in Christian churches have been led or forced to study carefully and in detail what the bible says about gay stuff. Usually they have ended up studying the relevant passages vastly more than even those straight church members who are interested in the subject, because it comes up for them over and over again. So a lot of people on this board have well-informed opinions about the pros and cons of different interpretations of the various passages. There are about 5 main ways to interpret Rom 1:26-27 alone, and then there are multiple ways of reading each of the other relevant passages. I don't know that it gains us anything much to argue the details - since for example I don't agree with you nor Iamchristianhearmeroar on Rom 1:26-27, nor agree with your overarching reading of Romans as a whole for that matter. But the fact that Christians often disagree about biblical interpretation is a rather obvious truism - there are a lot of different denominations for a reason!
Rather it's simply worth noting that even among well-informed people there is substantial disagreements about the meanings of the various passages in the bible that mention gay things... only a very few such passages have anything even approaching a consensus on them among well-informed people on this board (there is certainly no consensus on Rom 1:26-27). And that diversity of sincerely held biblical interpretations is fairly typical of the diversity of interpretations that are common in Christianity on other issues.
So I'm happy to grant for the sake of this discussion that you have an interpretation of the bible that you personally think is right and which you sincerely believe, but which other Christians don't necessarily agree with, and that interpretation leads you to believe that the bible says some anti-gay things.
Posts: 745 | From: NZ | Registered: May 2007
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Pomona
Shipmate
# 17175
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Posted
Steve Langton - I didn't 'admit' anything. Why does the use of marital aids (not that they are compulsory...) make same-gender sexual encounters 'unnatural'? It doesn't. Many heterosexual couples use such things due to medication, illness etc, is their sexual activity unnatural? In any case, in my previous comment on this I was more thinking about heterosexual couples using them, though it works both ways.
Also, people really don't 'aggressively' make a point of saying they're sexually active - it's called just treating it as the normal thing it is. What would the acceptable alternative be to you, treating it as a shameful secret?
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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]
Posts: 5319 | From: UK | Registered: Jun 2012
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
Really, talking about gay sexual encounters as not "natural" because of sexual aids is equivocating on "natural." It's using the word in two completely different senses. In the relevant sense of the word, "morally permissible" sex (for want of a better term) does not go from being physikos to aphysikos if the two people involved bring in a physical object. You'd have to argue that K-Y jelly, or pillows (if used say to prop the hips) were unnatural and (on an unnatural=sinful reading) therefore sinful.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Crœsos
Shipmate
# 238
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
No, we don't exclude people simply because they are 'sinners'; as you say, we all are. That is why I used the phrasing "aggressively practicing gays" to mean someone who is not only a sinner (accepting that between us that may be in dispute in this particular case) but doesn't admit he is. As with other sins, there's an expectation of repentance.
So despite your generous and sympathetic suggestion to gay people that they get divorced, devote themselves to lifelong celibacy, and put their kids in the foster care system they display "aggression" by not obeying your dictates? How arrogant of them! ![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
Yes, less loaded, but didn't quite convey the situation I was thinking of in which the people concerned are not just 'sexually active' but may be quite aggressively making a point of it - as explained above, "We're sexually active in a way you consider wrong, we have every intention of carrying on that way, and we still expect you to accept us regardless".
It's the last bit where you fall down. It's not so much "we still expect you to accept us regardless" as it is "your acceptance is irrelevant to us". I think that's the real sticking point for anti-gay folks; the idea that they are no longer universally accepted as the arbiters of morality. It's that rejection that's intolerable.
A similar observation from Fred Clark about a year and a half ago:
quote:
For decades, the religious right has been pre-occupied with two issues above all else: abortion and homosexuality. And on both of those issues, they have wielded power and influence by claiming the moral high ground — claiming to represent the godly, “biblical” truth of right and wrong. Anyone who disagreed with them on these issues was portrayed as less moral, less godly, less good.
That claim — that framing of these issues as right vs. wrong, good vs. evil, biblical vs. unbiblical, moral vs. immoral — was asserted and accepted for most of the religious right’s 30-year run.
But not any more. That claim is still being asserted, but it is no longer being accepted.
Part of what happened on Tuesday was that millions of people rejected that claim on moral grounds. This was not just a political or pragmatic disagreement that preserved their essential claim of godly morality. It was a powerful counter-claim — the claim that the religious right is advocating immoral, unjust and cruelly unfair policies on both of its hallmark issues. Knee-jerk opposition to legal abortion and to gay rights weren’t just rejected as bad policy, but as bad morals — as being on the wrong side of right vs. wrong, good vs. evil, biblical vs. unbiblical, moral vs. immoral.
Of course gay people still demand legal acceptance as full and equal citizens, but you claim not to oppose that.
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by Jade C;
quote:
you are aware that there is no sexual activity that gay people do that straight people don't also do, right?
Though I seem to recall that last time you made a similar assertion you also had to admit that doing those activities often involved 'marital aids' - which seems just a bit at odds with the claim that gay sexual activity is 'natural'?
First off, I'm not sure "natural" is synonymous with "good" or that "unnatural" necessarily means "bad". Vaccinations are "unnatural", but we don't regard them as evil because of that. Second, I'm pretty sure JC is right.
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Humani nil a me alienum puto
Posts: 10706 | From: Sardis, Lydia | Registered: May 2001
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ChastMastr
Shipmate
# 716
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
unfortunately public issues like SSM have rather singled the gay issue out and given it what I think is indeed undue prominence.
I don't believe that gay people trying to attain equal legal rights (including SSM) can be blamed for churches mistreating and singling out gay people.
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My essays on comics continuity: http://chastmastr.tumblr.com/tagged/continuity
Posts: 14068 | From: Clearwater, Florida | Registered: Jul 2001
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
I'll happily accept a church taking issue with the sexual behaviours of gay and lesbian couples when it takes equal issue with the same sexual behaviours in heterosexual couples.
And I'll happily accept a church saying that the only good kind of sex is faithful monogamy in marriage when it either (1) recognises that same-sex marriages can meet that requirement or (2) excludes non-procreative heterosexual couples from being married.
I note that the number of Christians treating (2) as a serious option appears to be vanishingly small, despite the fact that it has a logical consistency.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Starlight
Shipmate
# 12651
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Posted
Crœsos,
If there was a Like / +1 / Amen button in these forums I'd be pressing it for your post. Well said.
I am always amused when I encounter people who believe that the word "moral" means something along the lines of "what God said in the Bible", and who thus struggle to mentally cope with the fact that increasing numbers of people in society now use the word "moral" to mean something along the lines of "that which is just, kind and loving, and which is beneficial to others and minimizes harm". I've met quite a few Christians who just can't get their heads around the fact that so many people now view bible-based Christian opposition to gay rights as immoral, because they think that by definition no bible-based position can ever be immoral and therefore they are confused and offended when other people claim the moral high ground.
Posts: 745 | From: NZ | Registered: May 2007
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
Yes, the other day I said to a fundie that his ideas on gay sex struck me as vile and depraved; I don't think he got the irony.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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ChastMastr
Shipmate
# 716
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Yes, the other day I said to a fundie that his ideas on gay sex struck me as vile and depraved; I don't think he got the irony.
Oh, now I'm madly curious about what he said! Do tell!
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My essays on comics continuity: http://chastmastr.tumblr.com/tagged/continuity
Posts: 14068 | From: Clearwater, Florida | Registered: Jul 2001
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ChastMastr:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Yes, the other day I said to a fundie that his ideas on gay sex struck me as vile and depraved; I don't think he got the irony.
Oh, now I'm madly curious about what he said! Do tell!
He said: "The back passage is exit only. So sex is only possible between one man and one woman. Anything else is misuse of the reproductive organs."
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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ChastMastr
Shipmate
# 716
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
He said: "The back passage is exit only. So sex is only possible between one man and one woman. Anything else is misuse of the reproductive organs."
There... are so many... responses... one could give to this guy (not to mention that he seems to be... rather... "back passage focused," shall we say, and apparently with no imagination to speak of)...
![[Killing me]](graemlins/killingme.gif)
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My essays on comics continuity: http://chastmastr.tumblr.com/tagged/continuity
Posts: 14068 | From: Clearwater, Florida | Registered: Jul 2001
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Palimpsest
Shipmate
# 16772
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Posted
So you're talking about the hardships of "Aggressive Christians"? To use your descriptive terms;
quote:
the people concerned are not just 'theologically active' but may be quite aggressively making a point of it - as explained above, "We're theologically active in a way you consider wrong, we have every intention of carrying on that way, and we still expect you to accept us regardless".
Posts: 2990 | From: Seattle WA. US | Registered: Nov 2011
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Lyda*Rose
Ship's broken porthole
# 4544
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Posted
![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif)
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"Dear God, whose name I do not know - thank you for my life. I forgot how BIG... thank you. Thank you for my life." ~from Joe Vs the Volcano
Posts: 21377 | From: CA | Registered: May 2003
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