Why The Horrible Attitude Towards Homosexuality?

robindch wrote: »

As I mentioned above, if religious people refrained from making a public song and dance about what gay men (and women) do in private, then I can't imagine anybody bothering to make a song and dance in response to what christians think about homosexuals in the privacy of their own minds.

I don't think you're being fair there Robin. In my experience Christians rarely initiate discussion about homosexuality (although when they do it tends to get well-publicised). I have found that it is much more frequent for non-Christians (well, more anti-Christians actually) to initiate the debate in order to air their stereotypes about what Christians actually believe.

However, such debates give us the opportunity to clarify what we actually do believe. So now Obni, who previously thought we were homophobes, has now come to realise that Jakkass and me are actually eloquent, compassionate, tolerant and admirable homophobes. Such is life.

And upon the same grounds, you'd be happy for -- say -- a senior public figure who hated Romanian people to air their views in Belfast too? Or do you believe that they should keep quiet and pretend to be a reasonable person?

That's a good point. I wouldn't be happy about it, because I know that it would likely result in violence against the Romanians living in Belfast. Neither would I be happy about such a person passing muster for beiung respectable. I would like their views to be exposed in a way that would make them a figure of mockery and end their political career, and in a way that would not endanger anyone.

And that is how I would see Iris Robinson's nonsense. Having lived in (and been beaten up in) Belfast myself I don't think the kind of people who take Iris Robinson seriously are the kind of people who commit violence. Neither do I think her comments were seriously likely to endanger anyone. If I'm wrong about this, and believe it or not it has been known for me to be wrong, then I would certainly take a different view of the matter.

Splendour wrote: »

Nonsense. This would mean that Christians have a phobia with alot of people (including ourselves...) i.e. gossipers, adulterers, liars, cheats etc...

I never said it was homophobia, I said it results in homophobia and can cause harm to people, regardless of the original intentions. I think most people, christian or not, would agree that gossiping, commiting adultery, lying and cheating are immoral. Consenting adults having sex with each other in private are not in the same league. (By which of course I mean consenting gay adults who are not commiting adultery, lying, cheating or gossiping. They're not murderers, rapists or thieves. They don't even have any outstanding parking tickets! Their only "sin" in the context of my point is having sex with each other. Didn't think I'd have to spell that out given the topic of this thread but there ya go)

Go around saying that a certain group are "sinners" because of what they do, especially if many in society view you as a moral authority, and you make it easier for prejudices to exist against that group. The "generations of so called 'Christian teaching' whereby people were taught that homosexuality is a step above other sins" that you refer to is a perfect example.

PDN wrote: »

So consenting adults having sex with each other in private is not in the same league as adultery? That's strange, I always thought adultery was consenting adults (albeit ones that are married to someone else) having sex with each other in private.

Do you see the nonsense we get when people start using weasel words and parrotting the same old tired phrases?

Consenting adults having sex and adultery are two similar but different things. What's your point in relation to mine?

I'm gonna give you the benefit of the doubt here and assume you didn't understand something in my previous post so I've edited it in the hope you'll get my point this time. Otherwise your post comes across as being the very same nonsense as what you were accusing me of.

studiorat wrote: »

So it's good to see Chinas views on homosexuality changing slowly but surely. Just as christianity's is to. Leviticus the book in the bible which has more direct quotes from God than any other, instructs the Christian not to lie with a man as with a woman, but it also prohibits men from shaving their beards, eating prawns and Bats (because they are birds!) and offers advice on how best to keep their slaves among other nonsence. Leviticus is also the source of the Jehova’s Witnesses’ belief that you should not accept blood transfusions because it is an abomination to eat blood. (black pudding out the window too!)

Leviticus is valid where it deals with moral laws. Legal and ceremonial laws have been fulfilled by Jesus Christ.

Matthew 23:23 wrote:

‘Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill, and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. It is these you ought to have practised without neglecting the others.

As for kosher eating, Jesus Christ also fulfilled this in the Scriptures.

Mark 7:18-23 wrote:

He said to them, ‘Then do you also fail to understand? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile, since it enters, not the heart but the stomach, and goes out into the sewer?’ (Thus he declared all foods clean.) And he said, ‘It is what comes out of a person that defiles. For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.’

Interestingly you ignore that homosexuality is forbidden in both testaments. When Jesus refers to "fornication" in Mark chapter 7, he is affirming the previous scriptures on sexual morality of the Torah. (Leviticus 18, Deuteronomy 22, Exodus 22:16-17)

Part of being a Christian is living as Jesus aimed to live, this also includes interpreting the Jewish scriptures as Jesus would have interpreted them.

The question is those people who are attempting to change the Christian standpoint on sexuality, are they doing so on the merit of God or on the merit of their own will?

Malty_T wrote: »

As far as I understand it, Jesus Himself never made any comments about homosexuality, infact I know I'm going to be shot to pieces here but weren't suggestions made before that Jesus Himself could have been Gay or Bisexual?.

That's true, it's precisely because Jesus didn't elaborate upon it that I can't determine that He had no issue with sexual immorality. Infact his inference to fornication in that Scripture is Jesus commanding people to live their lives according to God's standard for sexuality as defined in the Scriptures.

Where Jesus elaborated on divorce, He did so by speech. Where Jesus elaborated on anger, He did so by speech. The same is the case for lustfulness and adultery. In all these things where He found that people had been lacking He spoke out about it.

If Jesus was looking to speak on the law and sexuality, He would have done so in the Gospels.

robindch wrote: »

It's far more likely that either contemporaneous authors didn't write down what Jesus said about sex, or else, what they did write was subsequently edited out by people who had more sympathy for Paul's distinctly unenlightened views.

Thank you for that bit of 100% biased supposition based on zero evidence. It pretty well confirms my opinion of how some atheists think and why they post in this forum.

robindch wrote: »

None of the gospels contain direct quotations from Jesus on the topic of sex

Really?

"You have heard that it was said, 'Do not commit adultery.' But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart." (Matthew 5:27-28)

"It has been said, 'Anyone who divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce.' But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, causes her to become an adulteress, and anyone who marries the divorced woman commits adultery." (Matthew 5:31-32) (Also quoted in Mark 10:11-12 and Luke 16:18)

For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. These are what make a man 'unclean'; but eating with unwashed hands does not make him 'unclean.' " (Matthew 15:19-20) (Also quoted in Mark 7:21-22)

"Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the beginning. I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, and marries another woman commits adultery." (Matthew 19:8-9)

"Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, honor your father and mother,' and 'love your neighbor as yourself.'" (Matthew 19:18-19) (Also quoted in Luke 18:20)

the absence is certainly interesting and worth some speculation which rises above the catty.

The absence, like your speculation, exists only in your own head. I don't think it's catty to point that fact out.

The fact is, Robin, that you have no idea whatsoever what Jesus taught about homosexuality. Therefore to say that it is 'more likely' that his teaching was ommitted in preference to the more 'unenlightened' views of Paul is without any foundation whatsoever.

You are doing what you have a habit of doing. You think of the explanation that will prove the most unpalatable to Christians and on that basis alone, without a single shred of supporting evidence (indeed in this case you ignore the evidence and make a totally false statement about a non-existent absence of Jesus teaching about sex), you post it on here with the sole and express intent of riling the natives. That is trolling pure and simple, and I find it disappointing that a moderator of one forum chooses to behave that way in another forum. It does you, or your cause, no credit whatsoever.

amen wrote: »

could you tell me where?

Where what?