The Gay Megathread (see mod note on post #2212)

As an aside, the Vile Institute is at it again.

http://trinitynews.ie/university-times-threatened-with-legal-action-over-iona-institute-articles/

marienbad wrote: »

Quite simply philologos because you are defining Christian marriage and we are talking about civil marriage , and you know this.

Depending on ones definition of christian marriage the following marriages are void- between divorced couples , marriage to a divorced person, civil marriage, common law marriage - the list is endless .

So why not just defend your right to Christian Marriage for yourself as you define it , (Even though other christian groups may not accept it as marriage by their definition ) and let others get on with their own arrangement for civil marriage ? Why should it be any of your business at all ?

Well in fairness, phil is not so much restating the Christian definition of marriage as questioning why the civil definition, which has paralleled the Christian one this far, should now be changed in such a way as to diverge from the Christian definition.
My position is the civil definition was never a Christian one, it sort of piggybacked on the Christian marriage for the sake of gaining legitimacy and convenience of implementation.
At this point the two must diverge to accommodate changing requirements. For the life of me I can't see how this impacts in anyway on Christian marriage. Apart from a shared word the two will come to mean two different things, people will recognize both the common factors and the differences the context they encounter them.
phils big error is assuming people are stupid and will confuse the two.

philologos wrote: »

I'm not even doing this.

I don't see any reasonable justification even from a secular worldview that relationships which are fundamentally different in structure must be treated the same even legally.

I acknowledge and support the idea of the state being separate from Christian churches (possibly more so for the benefit of the churches not being infected by the secular ideologies of the world), but that doesn't mean that I can't clearly disagree with the state.

Going forward in the event that this gets through the Lords and becomes law in Britain, my policy on this will be the exact same as my policy on abortion. I disagree strongly with the state on this issue.

Life goes on. I live for the Gospel, and I trust in Jesus before anything or anyone including secular authorities.



I care primarily that we live in a world that chooses to reject it's Saviour. That's always priority number one by me. Irrespective of states or jurisdictions or anything else.

I care about this issue because it is about something far greater than this issue at its core.

Then I sorry if I misrepresented you. The thing is, christian marriage is what your talking about and it's structure. State marriage isnt defined by the same structures, it's a means of legislating for inheritance and next of kinship. It's a one size fits all legal contract. All it dose is confer legal rights to a couple that the society recognize as 'married' whatever that means to that society.
Again we are back to claiming ownership of a word, marriage, which dose not have any meaning that is exclusive Christian. The idea that we would create a new ceremony or just call the same ceremony something else because of the participants gender is nonsense in an equal society.
As to the problem that Christianity faces as society becomes increasingly accepting of homosexuality and homosexual relationships? well thats another line worth persecuting once we settle the issue of what the word marriage means in a secular context and whether the churches have any exclusive claim on it. (yes , by settle, I mean you admit we are right )

philologos wrote: »

I don't know what you're approaching so I'll look at it in two ways.

If you're referring to the fact that the State can regard different forms of marriages based on different faiths. I have to say, personally I don't care if the State didn't recognise Christian marriage. I know that God does, that's what's most important. Irrespective of the State, God is the most important standard and I submit to Him.

If you're referring to the fact that society can "accept" different religious beliefs. That's an absurdity in and of itself. Society doesn't "accept" beliefs. Society allows varying forms of belief to exist. However society doesn't accept it. Society doesn't in and of itself accept that Jesus Christ is Lord, and that He died in their place on the cross and rose again on the third day. Society tolerates it. Even if society didn't tolerate my beliefs, I would still believe in Jesus and I would still trust in Him irrespective of the consequences.

I hope that deals with your point.

What definitionof christian marriage are you referring to ?

philologos wrote: »

Well the original post I responded to wasn't clear at all.

The different but equal thing makes more sense in terms of civil partnerships than marriage. Same legal rights (at least here) and different.

The marriage analogy would be more akin to claiming that Judaism and Sikhism were the same.

How is two adult men or women entering into a civil marriage different in any way from me and my husband entering into a civil marriage. Children aren't relevant as we made no reference to them, no did such a reference form any part of the registration of our marriage.

philologos wrote: »

Well the original post I responded to wasn't clear at all.

The different but equal thing makes more sense in terms of civil partnerships than marriage. Same legal rights (at least here) and different.

The marriage analogy would be more akin to claiming that Judaism and Sikhism were the same.

Ah. But so far as the state is concerned, perhaps Sikhism and Judaism are the same.

They are not the same so far as the substantive content of their beliefs and practices go, of course. But that is no concern of the state. As far as the state is concerned they are both religiously-constituted or religiously-defined communities, which include some but by no means all citizens, and they have the same rights of conscience, freedom of belief and practice, etc that all religions do. As far as the state is concerned, then, they are the same, and they can safely be bracketed together as “faiths” or “denominations” or whatever, and recognised by law as such.

And this isn’t greatly altered by the fact that Judaism isn’t, strictly speaking, a “faith” – Judaism is all about how you live, not what you believe – and neither Judaism nor Sikhism are “denominations” in the strict sense. We don;’t get hung up on the terminology here.

And I think we can reason back from this to the marriage equality question. If it’s acceptable – and arguably even a requirement of justice – to have a status of “civil partnership” whose civil legal rights and incidents are identical to those of (opposite sex) marriage, what is the problem with the state bracketing these two relationships together as “marriage”? If, from the state’s point of view, they are identical, then it makes sense that they should be named with a single term. OK, an individual Christian believer might say that the same-sex union is not “marriage” as he understands it, but if the particular characteristic that makes it “not-marriage” in his eyes is of no relevance so far as civil legal status is concerned, why is it necessary that the state should reflect his understanding in its terminology? If Jews and Sikhs can put up with being called “faiths” and “denominations” when this isn’t the terminology they would choose for themselves, surely Christians can put up with the word “marriage” being applied to a relationship which they don’t see as a marriage in the full sense, but which as far as the state is concerned is not different from opposite-sex marriage in any way that matters?

Once it’s conceded that the state should, or even can, afford same-sex unions a civil status identical to that of marriage, then further argument about whether it gets called “marriage” or not looks incredibly petty.

And worse than petty, perhaps, since it discloses and expectation that the state will accept and endorse Christian terminology over non-Christian terminology, even in relation to something which is no concern of the state’s.

philologos wrote: »

Christianity doesn't face a problem is what I'd say to you.

The Gospel is relevant and applicable to every age. Indeed the churches that are growing the fastest are the ones that hold to Scripture. The churches which are most compromising are in decline.

From a Christian point of view my policy on this is identical or almost identical to my position on abortion. Even if the State acts in one way I can still wholeheartedly disagree with the State and claim that it's reasoning is flawed.

For me it matters little ultimately what the State says because God will have the last say. In terms of Christianity however there are reasons why we shouldn't be complacent or say that unrepentant sin is OK. If we care genuinely about other people we should long for them to be saved.

I think for Christians who are willing to compromise on this issue there needs to be some consideration as to how serious sin is, what happened at the cross, the Lordship and authority of Jesus, how we are submitting to the Gospel, and the sufficiency and authority if Scripture.

This applies to be also but I think the view which compromises the Bible in respect to sin is extremely serious for those who profess to be Christian.

That's got absolutely nothing to do with the state legislating for gay marriages, performed by state employees. You might as well try to link the rules of the local golf club to gay marriage, what private clubs like christian churches think of gay marriage is their own affair, and nothing to do with civil marriage legislation.

philologos wrote: »

Well the original post I responded to wasn't clear at all.

The different but equal thing makes more sense in terms of civil partnerships than marriage. Same legal rights (at least here) and different.

The marriage analogy would be more akin to claiming that Judaism and Sikhism were the same.

May I remind you that as I am Irish, living in Ireland and posting on an Irish site I am referring to Ireland.

Civil Partnership legislation here has over 150 differences to Marriage legislation. Civil Partnership where you are may be nearly the same, but it still wasn't exactly the same so- *gasp*- same-sex marriage is about to be introduced so 'you' have lost that battle already.

As for 'Same legal rights (at least here) and different' but no need to use the same term for both- in that case who gets to use the word 'religion'?

Hinduism has a strong case due to generally being considered the oldest religion in the world still being practiced today.

'Over there' Druids trump priests as they were there first so perhaps they should insist the word religion in a British context is theirs and object to these upstart Johnnie come lately Christians 'redefining' it to include their monotheistic version when traditionally religion was polytheistic ?

'The marriage analogy would be more akin to claiming that Judaism and Sikhism were the same' = can you tell me how these religions are treated differently under the law?

Does the Civil State see them as equal and treat them as such in legislation.......?

philologos wrote: »

I don't see any reasonable justification even from a secular worldview that relationships which are fundamentally different in structure must be treated the same even legally.

Tradition for personal moral belief is not a sufficient justification for continuing discrimination against a particular class of person.

In the absence of a justification for continued discrimination the state should be obligated to to remove discrimination where it can. Not allowing same sex couples to use the term marriage is discrimination. As it is without justification there is no reason or the discrimination to remain in place, therefore the state should remove the discrimination.

You say you can't see a reasonable justification. Whilst there may be others, that the state should do all it can to reduce and remove discrimination, unless that discrimination can be justified, should be sufficient reasonable justification in and of itself.

MrP

Maybe the (prospective) new Pope might bring in new thinking to the topics of gay marriage, women priests and abortion.

philologos wrote: »

3) Why is determining what is sin a problem? - Why is this a problem? If God has revealed Himself to us, and most supremely in His Son who was nailed to a cross for our sins so that we might be forgiven, why is determining what is sin an issue? Is it because we can't find it in His word? Or is it because we don't like what it says?

Why is your interpretation of God's will the only right one?

"Time flies like an arrow" - I know exactly what I mean by that sentence. Do you? Lets say I can implant my meaning within you so that you do. You then write down what I said and pass it on. Did you write down my meaning? Did you interpret my meaning? What happens when, 10 links down the chain, it gets translated to French, which doesn't have an exact equivalent of certain contexts. Is it interpreted again by the translator?

Language is inherently an imperfect tool. And when it's a two thousand year-old document whose writing is spread out over several centuries, by dozens of authors, in thousands of contexts, in a handful of languages and subsequently interpreted through a handful of others, these imperfections are multiplied a million times over

philologos wrote: »

Reading isn't subjective.

That's an absurd statement. Even laws, which are written with the express intention of being as clear and unambiguous as possible are constantly challenged and re-interpreted. The Bible is full of allegory, metaphor and context-dependent situations. To say it has a single possible interpretation is nonsensical.

Texts are 'butchered' or, to put it another way, critically analysed all the time. Every scholar will have a different interpretation of Austen, or Joyce, or Shakespeare. Scored music or dance will be different every time its performed. Art critics 'read' art differently.
The bible is no different and cannot and should not be off limits in terms of different readings, interpretations and critiques. Its like any other book.