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If you reject the Bible then what is the foundation of your faith? Warm fuzzy feelings? In addition, we have the great deceiver who I believe is really working through this issue to sow division and confusion among Christians. Those who stand firmly on the Word of God will be on the side of truth.
Apparently, you prefer to use the "Crucify him/them" card, while exalting yourself.
I "get" that some want to control others, but why don't we just let them play with their problems? Why do we need to talk about it? What do we have to gain by pointlessly trying to change the foolish and unchangeable?
I hear you Thoreau. But, my experience denies that it's pointless.
For most of my life I was a person who believed that homosexuality was an abomination to God and that those who were homosexual were so by choice (not by nature) and were hell-bound. Not long before I joined this board, thanks to discussions in other venues, I had grown enough to realize that, even though I still believed it was a sin, it was not my responsibility to try to "save" anyone, and that whatever sin was in their lives, it was between them and God. After some time here, reading and participating, I began to be convicted that I was passing judgment on something (in my own mind), that I had no business judging as wrong OR right because it was not a moral issue at all.
This is not an issue that I would have received balanced input on in my real world life and my own narrow view could have gone unchallenged until I died. My growth would have been severely stunted. And, let me tell you why this matters even more to me: my daughter came out to me a couple of years ago. Thank God, PRAISE GOD, that the people here and elsewhere took their precious time and energy to express truth in this place and others online, so that my daughter did not become a victim of my ignorance.
But...but...but, Wrathful God, like, ya know? Where does that fit into your 'Love One Another' nonsense? We need Wrathful God, because, ya know--because.
without consequences and wrath, love can't be known.
No one is suggesting that God is not love. Of course he is. But if you believe that God is only love, your god is too small.
Of course I have an answer. Well, you got me to laugh out loud with that dismissal of my argument, so you put the "fun" in Fundie!
"I think"---meaning it is my personal contribution to this discussion. But certainty is overrated! Wardendresden is offering good advice on this one. Certainty is the "easy" way out of an ethical issue that asks more of you.
Tell me when you have some way of giving me an objective answer of what morality is, and what is immoral.
Even the aforementioned love is a subjective standard. To this point all you have is your opinion, and your opinion is worth no more than mine, or anyone else's.
I hear you Thoreau. But, my experience denies that it's pointless.
For most of my life I was a person who believed that homosexuality was an abomination to God and that those who were homosexual were so by choice (not by nature) and were hell-bound. Not long before I joined this board, thanks to discussions in other venues, I had grown enough to realize that, even though I still believed it was a sin, it was not my responsibility to try to "save" anyone, and that whatever sin was in their lives, it was between them and God. After some time here, reading and participating, I began to be convicted that I was passing judgment on something (in my own mind), that I had no business judging as wrong OR right because it was not a moral issue at all.
This is not an issue that I would have received balanced input on in my real world life and my own narrow view could have gone unchallenged until I died. My growth would have been severely stunted. And, let me tell you why this matters even more to me: my daughter came out to me a couple of years ago. Thank God, PRAISE GOD, that the people here and elsewhere took their precious time and energy to express truth in this place and others online, so that my daughter did not become a victim of my ignorance.
I "get" that some want to control others, but why don't we just let them play with their problems? Why do we need to talk about it? What do we have to gain by pointlessly trying to change the foolish and unchangeable?
Go to Mighty Queen's opening of this thread and see her explanation of why this is an important topic to discuss. For me (and I believe this is in line with MQ's opening post) it is showing those in the LGBTQ community that Christianity is not all fundamentalist condemnation that unfortunately many see as the whole of Christianity. That there are those that love and accept and welcome.
For me, my heart was in that camp to welcome but I grew up in an evangelical tradition that while not as legalistic as some, still used a small fraction of the overall scriptures to condemn and reject and cause harm to Christians that found themselves with a sexuality outside the approved norm. I love the scriptures. I believe they are inspired and God breathed. This thread (and the previous one it replaced) have helped me to reconcile what on the outside look as trump cards for the LGBTQ condemners but when studied in context of who wrote them and to whom they were written, cannot be used as wholesale condemnation of homosexuality at all. Several here have been founts of wisdom on that end.
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