Gene Robinon was consecrated as a Bisop by the Episcopal church in 2003. His recent admission into an alcohol rehab clinic brings up many questions:
1. Does this hurt the gay cause?
Are they embarrassed, or since they embrace our weaknesses to the point of excusing sin, will they pooh pooh it and say "well, he’s human"?
2. Did the confirmation committee know about his alcoholism?
Did the committee reviewing his election to Biship know about his ongoing battle w/ alcoholism? If so, did they think it was acceptable for a Bishop? If not, why was it not considered? And was it for political reasons (he’s gay, we need a gay bishop) that it was overlooked?
3. Should he step down because of his sin?
When evangelical leaders sin, they step down, and go through a restoration process. Will the Episcopalians expect him to get his life under control before giving him back his position, or are they going to absolve him of responsibility, and call it a "disease" rather than hold him to a higher standard as a religious leader?
And what about evangelical leaders who don’t step down or go through a thorough restoration process before being put back into leadership? Who are they, and why don’t we call them out? Let’s do it. I mean, should child-molesting priests get a pass? Or grossly wealthy evangelists who lie about their finances?
4. What are the qualifications for a leader?
Here’s what the bible says. I’d say that even before he was elected, he didn’t meet these qualifications.
Leadership is fundamentally about character. When Paul describes the qualifications of leaders in the early church, he speaks almost exclusively about character issues. Here is his list of leadership qualities:
- Above reproach 1 Tim.3:2, Tit.1:7
- Husband of one wife 1 Tim.3:2, Tit.1:6 NOT
- Temperate 1 Tim.3:2, Tit.1:8 NOT
- Self-controlled 1 Tim.3:2 NOT
- Respectable 1 Tim.3:2
- Hospitable 1 Tim.3:2, Tit.1:8
- Able to teach 1 Tim.3:2
- Not given to much wine 1 Tim.3:3, Tit.1:7 NOT NOT NOT
- Not violent 1 Tim.3:3, Tit.1:7
- Gentle 1 Tim.3:3
- Not quarrelsome 1 Tim.3:3
- Not a lover of money 1 Tim.3:3
- Manages his family well 1 Tim.3:4, Tit.1:6 NOT – Left wife to be gay
- Not a recent convert 1 Tim.3:6
- Has a good reputation with outsiders 1 Tim.3:7
- Not overbearing Tit.1:7
- Not quick-tempered Tit.1:8
- Loves what is good Tit.1:8
- Upright and holy Tit.1:8
- Holds firm to the trustworthy message Tit.1:9
While we should be considerate of him as a person, as a Christian leader, you can’t live in sin and be a leader. Alcholism may have physiologic components, but if your life is not in control, you can’t be a leader – you can set an example, however, by stepping down and going through a restoration process through which you again demonstrate the character and virtue to be a spiritual leader. Not perfect, but mature enough to know how to deal with temptation without falling into major sins like sexual immorality, financial improprieties, or substance abuse.
If every alcoholic priest had to step down for "restoration," the Catholic Church would cease to operate.
I knew the gay-haters would jump on this. You are so predictable, seeker. Aaron next?
I was at a movie tonight, and it dawned on me that Seeker would write exactly the same post about any bishop with alcoholism. Which is why there have been so many posts about bishops with alcoholism. So many of them. Everywhere. Once a week practically. And so, Louis and FCL, I must ask to stand down. In no way is Seeker discussing this issue simply because of Robinson's sexuality.
Nonsense.
I saw this a couple of days ago, thought about how I could write on it in the "right" way and chose not to mention it.
Before I decided not to mention it, my post was going to simply say:
I disagree with seeker on that aspect of this. I don't think this has anything to do with Robinson being gay. It has to do with him being a fallen human.
Seeker has engaged in the usual fundamentalist bluster about homosexuality being a “sin”. As per usual he does not offer a coherent defense of his unwarranted attack upon those with a same sex orientation. Clicking your heels three times and wishing fervently may have gotten Dorothy back to Kansas but a Scriptural argument against homosexuality it does not make.
Your more serious error concerns your dogma that “liberal” churches “hardly qualify as Christian”. Who are you to make that determination? You may want to study Matthew 13:24-30 the Parable of the wheat and the weeds. In your crusade to “weed out” those who do not believe as you, you may harm those who are genuinely faithful. Indeed a judgment, a separation of the wheat and the weeds, will occur in the end but it will be God doing the separating. That is the clearest lesson you could learn form this passage; that God is God and we are not. Spiritual arrogance is unbecoming a Christian.
Seeker, do you really want your list, that you provided above, to be the passed by anybody proposing to preach God's word? Because I am almost certain that there are a miniscule number of human beings, much less preachers, who pass.
Sam, the list isn't seeker's it is straight from the Bible, so I would agree with him on that issue. That is the point that there will be a very small number of people qualified to be pastors. It is a difficult job and should be taken very seriously.
FCL, wishing may not make homosexuality a "sin," but the numerous OT and NT passages do. Unfortunately because it effects a minority of people, many Christians have placed it high above as some "super sin." This is wrong and sinful in and of itself. But any sex outside of man/woman marriage is a sin, not any more than a lie, not any less than murder (of course the earthly consequences of each have drastically different levels, but each on a spiritual level seperate us from God).
I am not going to say who qualifies for Christianity and who doesn't. I do think many churches are watering down the Bible and the faith to appeal to culture and to appear to be relevant. That is a sad fact, but I have no idea if that disqualifies them from being "Christian." That is up to God, but I would rather that question never be asked of me. I would rather be as close to God and His word as possible.
But wouldn't Apostolics, for example, make precisely the same argument about your version of Christianity (assuming that you're aren't an Apostolic). I mean, wouldn't the stricter sects of Christianity view yours as heathenous and treacherous?
Aaron is quite correct that homosexuality affects a small number of people. This fact makes the conservative/fundamentalist fixation on same sex relations all the more disturbing. Even if you think homosexuality is, in and of itself, sinful there are a hundred other sins to attack that have a greater and more devastating impact upon humanity. That conservative/fundamentalists do not choose to attack these myriad other, greater problems leads me to worry that they are animated by a great deal of anger and fear of gays.
Does Scripture declare homosexuality a sin? No. A shallow reading of the O.T. and N.T. will lead one who has already decided that homosexuality is wrong to find his “proof”. However, this “proof-texting” is an illegitimate and perhaps fraudulent use of the sacred texts. A complete reading of all of Scripture will lead one to a much different conclusion about gays; a conclusion that truly reflects the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Sorry, FCL, the evidence is there, from its beginnings (ie, the Hebrew goatherders on) Judeo-Christianity has been hostile to same-sexers. A gay christian makes as much sense as a Jew nazi.
Why is it that fundamentalists focus on passages like [pp] "A man shall not lie with another man" rather than [pp] "It is easier to fit a camel through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter Heaven"? or Jesus throwing the moneychangers from the temple (think Mega-Church)
Shouldn't fundamentalists be out protesting Enron and Bill Gates right now? Someone help me understand this.
This has been a problem for me accepting Christianity throughout my life… what I percieve as blatant mischaracterizations of Scripture based on personal beefs.
I didn't say it had anything to do with him being gay. I said that this is probably a black eye for the gay community, and that his gayness should have disqualified him from leadership in the first place, as does his losing battle w/ alcholism. If he got both healed, he would certainly have a testimony worthy of leadership.
FCL, I'm not trying to weed out anyone. In fact, there are believers and unbelievers in every church, both liberal and conservative. The passage you quote, however, is talking about how God will judge. However, this does not mean that we should not promote good doctrine, and reprove those who contradict it – we should reprove people with patience, but scripture is clear that bad doctrine is to be confronted. Many liberal churches, like those that teach that the bible does not condemn homosexuality as sin, are just plain NOT christian on this, and many other doctrines, because in my mind, Christian means following the bible with fidelity. Not as a hyper-literalist or hyper-metaphorist, but as one that applies valid hermeneutical principle to interpret and apply scripture. Louis is absolutely correct to intimate that gay apologists that try to teach that the bible does not condemn homosexuality are either poor scholars or self-deceived liars.
As to Xianity's "fixation" with homosexuality, they are merely responding to the hyper-aggressive gay minority who are trying to mainstream and norm their maladaptive disorder. Christians are also "fixated" on saving the unborn, feeding and clothing the hungry, and preaching the gospel. If any other group came to the fore pushing their own sinful agenda, then Christians would also focus on that – it's not some "fixation" as you would like to portray it – it's merely a response to one of the more pernicious and destructive heresies of our time – that homosexuality is not a disorder, but just another mode of being. Yeah, just like adultery, fornication, promiscuity, and the list goes on.
Adultery, fornication, and promiscuity are all decisions. Being gay isn't. No gay decided to be gay. Plenty of gays have decided to closet themselves, or worse, guilt themselves into alleged "reform."
Lonnie – that passage you quoted has a context. Jesus certainly warned that riches can and will compete with our allegiance to God, and that we should be wary. He also said that riches are deceitful. But the scriptures do not condemn being rich, for money is not the root of all evil, but rather, the LOVE of money.
The passage you quote comes as a lesson to the disciples after a rich young ruler refuses to follow Jesus becuase he loves his riches more than the will of God for HIM. In fact, when Jesus says this to the disciples, they are astonished because they realize that what Jesus has told them means that almost NO ONE could get into heaven.
Matthew 19
“Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven. 24 Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” 25 When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished, saying, “Who then can be saved?” 26 But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
And the balanced xian position on money is midway between two extremes – asceticism and selfish prosperity gospel type of stuff. It’s OK to have money, as long as it doesn’t have you. In fact, there are over 2300 passages about money in the bible. Here’s a nice post on money from a mega church.
While the love of money most certainly is a problem in xianity today, xians don’t focus on it for two reasons. One is, they are selfish fallen human beings who find it easier to talk about other people’s sins than their own. The second is that sins like abortion and not helping the poor are much more destructive and ought to be addressed first.
Helping the poor is "destructive?" What?
Also, gosh Seeker, there you go identifying one of the problems – "(Christians) are selfish fallen human beings who find it easier to talk about other people's sins than their own."
So why don't you live up to that and focus on your own problems?
you missed the word "not" helping the poor
Look, we all need to apply truth to ourselves successfully before telling others to do the same. But that doesn't mean I can't promote biblical ideas about sins I haven't committed that I think are destructive. Can I condemn murder or financial impropriety if I have never comitted them? Yep. And the issues I focus on, mainly homosexuality, evolution, apologetics, bible exposition, music, etc. I have personal experience with, so I feel qualified to discuss the issues.
I do focus on my own problems in my personal growth (although, I COULD do more of that), and much of what I talk about IS from that growth. But I will not back down from discussions of other topics just because you think I have no right to offer my opinions.
Adultery, fornication, and promiscuity are all decisions.
Actually, I think a lot of people don't think these are decisions – their biology MADE them that way. Same with people with anger management problems. Why call it a sin? It's genetic.
Maybe we should promote these as viable alternate lifestyles.
You made a nice attempt Louis to paint Christianity as anti-gay but it won’t wash. Pointing to certain texts as “proving “your point is exactly the fraudulent use of Scripture to which I referred earlier. Furthermore your analogy of a gay Christian to a Jewish Nazi is offensive and betrays you as one as narrow minded as Seeker.
Seeker claims to be doing nothing more innocuous than promoting “good doctrine”. However, it should be clear that in his drive toward “good doctrine” he has so narrowed the circle of Christian fellowship as to place literally millions of faithful Christians on the outside looking in. These are people who have given their lives to Christ and who give great and effective witness to the Gospel. To so narrow your field of vision is to cut yourself off from your fellow faithful in a most unhealthy way.
Speaking of unhealthy attitudes, listen to your language Seeker. “As to Xianity’s “fixation” with homosexuality, they are merely responding to the hyper-aggressive gay minority who are trying to mainstream and norm their maladaptive disorder.” I truly feel sorry for your fear and loathing of these people. The venom that courses through the language you employ would be, if not for the final victory of Christ, disheartening. I will offer a prayer that God will soften your heart and get you to realize that this is not the way He wants His children to treat each other.
Sorry, but your criticism just won't wash. I don't merely point to a few texts taken out of context, but to the entirety of christian thought and history. For instance, the entire bible itself displays a patriarchal bias, and assumes a heterosexual outlook. Everything from genesis onward assumes hetero-orientation as, not just the norm, but the way its god designed things. The only mention of same-sex is very negative. As to other interpretation of these texts, I just can't imagine that the writers would be any more accepting of gays today than they were in their own time. Just imagine the reaction of Saul/Paul to gay marriage for instance (not to mention rampant acceptance of queers)!
Also, the history of christianity and the behavior of christians towards queers has to be taken into account. And this is a litany of persecution and oppression that I find hard to ignore. Even if christians are not imprisoning, torturing and executing us as they once did, they still form the most vocal and stubborn resistance to any form of gay liberation or equality. And in other monotheistic cultures (I'm think of islam here), we're dead meat. Hell, even gay Palestinians flee to Israel to escapt torture and death!
I'm not a mindless bigot like seeker. I attempted to be a practicing xian for years. However, I just couldn't fool myself anymore. I got tired of constantly being on the defensive. I just don't believe it. It's not credible. And it's just too hetero-centric. It's too bad, really. Some of xian ideals are good. But it doesn't live up to them, and it carries too much negative baggage.
I can see where one might try to maintain some kind of belief in a monotheistic god, but I can't swallow that in the context of organized monotheism. I prefer Buddhism as closer to my experience of reality.
You call that venom? I mean, I’m not using expletives or calling for violence, nor am I looking down my nose – I’ve had my own maladaptations and sins to work through, and still do. The difference is, I’m not still in denial about them.
I suppose you have such kind words for other maladaptations like condependency, or pornography addiction that you don’t think you can even bring them up! Ooh ooh, maybe I shouldn’t use the word “addiction” because it has negative connotations. (note: Elijah used some very fine mockery when in a contest with the prophets of Baal – I guess a little sarcasm might even be Christian ;)
I’m using technical, scientific words to call a spade a spade. You are offended, so you call it venom. Please, stop hiding behind your nicey nicey version of faith and act like someone with courage rather than coddling people.
Take Paul the Apostle or Jesus as examples.
Paul in Romans 1
——————-
“Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.”
> he is soooo intolerant of other religions. What an awful Christian Paul was
“Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves…. For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.”
> you’d have to be really twising your hermeneutic to think this is not referring to homosexuality. Paul is soo hateful, using words like “shameful, dishonorable, impure” and “due penalty”
“And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. though they know God’s decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.”
> Oh boy, Paul just let a string of insults out. What a pathetic excuse for a Christian.
Maybe Jesus will do a better job.
———————————-
Matthew 23:15
“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel across sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves.”
> OMG, how can he be so intolerant of other people’s approach to faith? Namecalling? Calling their followers “children of hell”? As if HIS way is the only way.
John 2:15-16
And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. 16 And he told those who sold the pigeons, “Take these things away; do not make my Father’s house a house of trade.”
> There he goes again, telling people that their way of doing faith is not right. How intolerant. And angry too – I mean, premeditated violence! What a pathetic excuse for a spiritual teacher!
>I guess that if we emphasize Jesus’ teaching, we must be just as intolerant. Finally, another word from Paul
2 Timothy 3
These men also oppose the truth, men corrupted in mind and disqualified regarding the faith. 9 But they will not get very far, for their folly will be plain to all….
Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed…. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.
> Man, how judgemental of Paul. Calling people evil and imposters? And reproving people with scripture? Especially those who are Christian imposters? What a jerk!
The point is, Paul most certainly expects us to reprove other christians with good doctrine, to confront those who twist the scriptures to justify sin, and to inspect our own lives. Your view that christian love means always being nice is just flat out wrong. Being good sometimes means you aren’t perceived as nice. I’m not trying to use that as an excuse to be coarse or insensitive, but the effeminate, milktoast Jesus is a fable that we should abandon.
Congratulations Seeker – you've just given me far more reasons to find Christianity hateful. You seem to have no conception of love, or generosity, or being nice. Your love of God seems based more on the harshness of it.
As for FCL, man, s/he's whipping you all over this blog. Good.
Seeker, when did I ever make the claim that you could not tell someone they were wrong and what do you think I have been telling you throughout this thread?
Maybe I need to be clearer. You are wrong. You have been misinterpreting Scripture and mangling the Gospel of Jesus Christ. You have been painting the face of Christianity as one that is narrow-minded and hard-hearted. What I have been doing is using Scripture to reproof and correct you. Get it?
Now let’s get down to particulars. Your quote from Romans 1 is not a condemnation of homosexuality at all. Paul argues that when people turn their back on God (disobedience) they take up sinful practices, of which homosexuality is a prime example. Essentially Paul is arguing with the logic of “If A then B”: If people turn their back on God then they will sin (by being homosexual). He is not saying that all homosexual behavior is the result of disobedience, but that those who disobey may engage in homosexual acts. If it is true that “If A then B” it does NOT logically follow that “If B then A” is true. Paul’s claim does not apply to all homosexuals, just to those whose actions were the result of prior sin.
As for the rest of your quotes; it is true that Paul and Jesus castigated many who were in error. This is as it should be; that is why I am correcting you. You are so hung up on “doctrine” that you forget the “weightier matters of the law”. You ignore that the core of the Christian challenge is in John 13:34. We are to love one another as God loves us. It is failure to love and forgive one’s neighbor fully that is the essence of sin. Who is our neighbor? Everyone is (Luke 10:25-37). How many times shall we forgive them? Forgive him one more time than you think you should. (MATT 18:21-22). It is not that you are wrong in wanting to correct your brothers. It is that you want to “correct” them in a way that leads down the sterile path of insipid dogmas worthy of no one but a Pharisee. Christ’s corrections and rebukes were always intended to focus people’s attention on their own failure to love one another fully.
Near the end of His Earthly ministry, when Christ would give everything out of love, he hosted the Last Supper. Who got invited to this First Communion? Peter the coward, who would deny our Lord three times before the cock crowed; Thomas, whose faith was so weak that he had to place his hands in the side of the risen Lord before he would believe; and most amazingly of all was Judas, the one who would betray Jesus. If even Judas can get invited to break bread and commune with our Lord how can we in good Christian conscience treat any of our brothers and sisters any less than this, regardless of sexual orientation? In the end there may be those who do not accept the invitation. God will do what is just. In the meanwhile it is our obligations to build up in Christian love all of our fellow man, particularly those who have given their life to Christ, regardless of sexual orientation. If you think living out that challenge is milquetoast, then brother you really do need correction.
FCL,
I like you. I really like you. But not in a gay way.
Yes, FCL is adept at twisting the scriptures. You're a match made in heaven.
Are you saying that the words like "shameful" and "abandoning the natural use of a woman" – that whole passage is not frowning upon homosexuality, but only on those who have turned their back on God? If so, your gymnastics are impressive, though hardly correct.
Tell me FCL, how do you dismiss the OT condemnation of homosexuality?
Matthew 23:23
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness.
Your application of being hung up on the minutae of doctrine may apply to someone intent on people keeping the law to the nth degree, but I doubt that applies here. As you can see above, he is not saying that they are unloving, as you are trying to apply this text. Rather, that they are emphasizing minor points.
Throughougt the NT, christians are warned to avoid sexual immorality – this is not some narrow minute doctrine – in fact, that's why it is mentioned as a qualification for leadership – because sexual purity is a core doctrine of xianity – not for salvation, but for leadership.
While the "weightier" matters may include mercy, they also include "justice" and "faithfulness". Justice may be caring for the poor, etc., but faithfulness certainly includes teaching the scriptures faithfully, and it does NOT preclude warning of the consequences of sin. The passage you quote, I believe, is saying somethign other than what you want it to say.
Look, maybe you are angry because the sriptures call sexual sins SINS. I am not weilding them to injure anyone. I am merely arguing from a natural and sociological point, as well as scriptural, that homosexuality is unnatural, a developmental disorder (with some data to support that contention), against those who want to putrefy the culture by norming it. This is just another social movement, like our promotion of teen sexuality and promiscuity, the creation of no-fault divorce, and the devalutation of motherhood, which is damaging the family, the foundational unit of society. I am in a defensive position, and intend on holding my ground.
And morally, the scriptures in Romans 1 are clearly referring directly to homosexuality when using the adjectives debased, perverted, unnatural, shameful, as well as some other value-laden adjectives.
You call that hateful? Then have your party without me.
Additionally, the Apostle Paul, who penned many a scripture about love, also had unkind things to say about those who pose as teachers of the law, yet are "evil imposters", who justify sin, as well as those who force others to live under the law as if that justifies them. Twin errors – legalism or licence. By preaching that homosexuality is OK, you are making the error of license.
Now, if you want me to be gentler and more kind in my use of these ideas, I suspect I could be. It is hard not to respond sternly when posters make purposely illogical statements, straw men, and personal slights.
Look, Jesus was nice to sinners, but he did not condone sin. Go and sin no more are his words on that. But for the unrepentant, Jesus told his disciples to "shake the dust off of their feet" and move on, because on the day of judgement, "it will be more tolerable for them than for the city of Sodom", who as you know, were destroyed by fire. Paul says "knowing the terror of God, we pursuade men." (2 Cor 5:10-12)
A new convert to xianity may struggle with sins like homosexuality for a long time – deep psychological maladptations may take time to fix. But to accept their behavior and inner sickness as normative, rather than something that time, truth, and love can heal, is a heresy. And to put someone who still is a slave to sexual sins is a mistake.
Oh, and one more thing. The command to forgive has little to do with public policy, or with allowing the unqualified into leadership.
In addition, if my neighbor is sinning and not aware, *I* sin by not telling him, especially if he is a Christian brother.
But back to the matter at hand. No one has answered any of the questions I put forth – shows you how much people like to get off topic to ride their hobby horses.
And Sam, I'm sorry you find those scriptures "hateful" – what they really are are "truthful" – but then again, if we don't like the truth, then to call it "hate" is a nice dodge.
I think that's why Jesus talked about the day of judgement when there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth" – Mirriam Webster defines gnashing as "A grinding or striking of the teeth in rage or anguish."
I'm sure that many will rage at God, thinking him unjust and hateful, when really, he is just pure and holy, something we are not. When we see how right he is, and how wrong we have been, it may be a shock. I just don't want to be on the wrong side on that day.
seeker has, unwittingly, made my case. Far from being a lone nutcase, or a fanatic, he has enunciated the doctrine xianism has promulgated for centuries. Is it any wonder that thinking, intelligent people have abandoned the hate-religion, xianism?
Whenever I feel even the slightest inclination towards xianity, whenever I am tempted to believe its advertized propaganda regarding love and reconciliation and "good news," I have only to recall what is behind it, what its REAL message is – ie, seeker's diatribe above – and I am disabused of any inkling towards believing it. It is beyond belief that any thinking person could accept this trash as real. I don't know what Jesus really did, but I do know what has been made of his life. And it is something human beings have to reject.
"Man will not be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest." – Diderot
If God exists Seeker, he isn't a dick. Unlike…well, look. All I know is that if I took the time to create the entire planet, I wouldn't have been such an idiot as to create or allow things I didn't approve of. Makes no sense.
The Levitical laws are not binding upon us. In any event if they were do you advocate adhering to LEV 20:13 as well as LEV 18:22. If so then you are advocating death to homosexuals. If one is binding then both are. As it stand neither are binding.
The destruction of Sodom & Gomorrah is due to a failure to adhere to the law of hospitality. When this story is referenced later the focus is not on homosexuality but upon the ultimate punishment that ignoring God’s law can bring (see EZK 16:49). I do not need to “dismiss” the O.T. condemnation of homosexuality, because such condemnation is not there to dismiss.
Yes the misuse of sexuality is a sin. It expresses a profoundly unloving attitude toward one’s neighbor and should be chastised. It does not follow that homosexuality, in and of itself, is such a misuse. As I stated earlier a homosexual could misuse their sexuality to harm another, just as a heterosexual can; it does not follow from Scripture that same-sex orientation is inherently sinful. Simply asserting over and over that sexual immorality includes homosexuality per se does not an argument make. You have ignored this fact in order to make Scripture conform to your anti-gay agenda. In so doing you have set aside justice, mercy and faithfulness toward our fellows in Christ who happen to be of a different sexual orientation. You and I can argue until the Second Coming about whose view of Scripture is correct, it’s just that I have reason and correct exegesis on my side. That makes you a well-intentioned tool for the false teachers who would distort the Gospel to “prove” how hateful Christianity is.
As for staying on the original topic, I addressed the issue of Bishop Robinson. I stated clearly that he might very well be unqualified to hold his office. His sexual orientation is not among those reasons. Your desire to use his misfortune (and possibly poor qualifications for his job) as a platform to spew Biblically unsound “theories” became THE issue. It became a germane issue because the proclamation of the Gospel is too important to leave in the hands of those who would use it to advance an agenda of hate. That Louis and Sam have come to agree with your warped view of the Gospel shows how much damage you and your ilk have already done and how much work the faithful have to do to overcome this pernicious influence.
Whoever FCL is, s/he rules. Absolutely rules.
Well, you articulate the pro-gay theology almost as well as the published books. I understand it, but think it faulty. But I will double back and re-examine it. Looks like you've won a fan in Sam – who knows, maybe your preaching will convert him.
Yes, well, you would probably have a hard time with both Jesus and Paul with your definitions of what is hateful. I and many many others have addressed your question of Levitical law, but the short version is this – the ceremonial and dietary laws are gone, but not the moral law (are we no longer bound to keep the other laws like murder and hospitality – is it ok to injure a woman and cause a miscarriage? Your logic would indicate so). And as to the Jewish punishments for the moral law, many argue well that, while the moral law stands, we are not under obligation to carry out those punishments.
The classic case is the woman caught in adultery (I guess that part of the moral law we should still observe?). Jesus did not condone her stoning, but he did say "go and sin no more.
And that's what xian should and so say today. If you are gay, no one is going to stone you, because we are all sinners. Yet, God's command to all of us is go and sin no more. Homosexuality is and always will be a sin, and those who try to explain it away with faulty theology in the guise of love are merely leading people astray. Upon judgement day, all teachers, including these "evil imposters", will have to answer to God. God help them.
…maybe your preaching will convert him.
To what, exactly? If Christianity actually went against very basic universal biosocial and biological facts like the complementarity of the sexes for the sake of comporting with the Leftist mind that cannot seem to read a text to save its life, then it really would be a sham religion. It would lead to the decadence, destruction and death typically found at the end of civilization.
From the beginning:
As per usual he does not offer a coherent defense of his unwarranted attack upon those with a same sex orientation.
Since your own terms drawn from psychologists, what is their clinical definition of a sexual orientation?
Note that the Bible may not say anything about whatever it is you think you are saying if you don't know what you're saying in the first place.
I disagree with seeker on that aspect of this. I don't think this has anything to do with Robinson being gay. It has to do with him being a fallen human.
I have little to say about subjective terms like "being gay" which can mean anything from an effeminate kid in highschool being called gay by other students and coming to believe that the term or state of being applies to himself to a man having sex with hundreds of men while rejecting the term.
But perhaps you can explain why this intersection of behavior patterns has been observed repeatedly:
(The New England Journal of Medicine.
N Engl J Med 1994; 331: 923-930. October 6, 1994
Section: Special Article. Homosexuality.
From the Department of Psychiatry, Columbia
University College of Physicians and Surgeons
(R.C.F., J.I.D.), the New York State Psychiatric Institute (J.I.D.), and the Department of Psychology,
Adelphi University (R.C.F.) — all in New York
Friedman, Richard C.; Downey, Jennifer, I.)
Sorry, FCL, the evidence is there, from its beginnings (ie, the Hebrew goatherders on) Judeo-Christianity has been hostile to same-sexers.
Why do you suppose this is:
(Sexual Taboos and SocialBoundaries
By Christie Davies
American Journal of Sociology,
Vol. 87, No.5, Mar., 1982 :1032-1063)
Resilient goatherders, interesting how their creation narrative is virtually the only story that makes a general sense given its metaphors, purpose and frame of reference as well.
A gay christian makes as much sense as a Jew nazi.
There were some Jews that tried to be Nazis. There are some people who believe in "being gay" who try to "be Christian" too.
I think I can predict the answer to the problem of substance abuse among gays. They will say that it is due to persecution, and low self-esteem caused by the societal, and Christian rejection of homosexuality. The cure? To make it societally accepted.
Now, I think that societal rejection definitely does play into gay's self-loathing or low self-esteem. No argument from me at all.
However, I think there is another thing at play, and that is that, because it is a disorder in which they have rejected their own gender, they must quiet that pain as well. Rather than seeking to be healed, they must justify their SSA, sear their conscience by training it to not feel guilty about homosexual sex, and whatever of their true nature that cries out to them to be honored is then medicated with sex, food, and substance abuse. QED.
I think I can predict the answer to the problem of substance abuse among gays. They will say that it is due to persecution, and low self-esteem caused by the societal, and Christian rejection of homosexuality.
The empirical facts do not support that answer as the rates of "social deviance" tend to stay the same across cultures. E.g., it is said that the Netherlands is tolerant yet high suicide rates tend to stay the same. So either the Netherlands isn't tolerant of homosexuality or there is no supposed intolerant culture left to blame for the behavior patterns typical to addicts that correlate with suicide. And if the Netherlands and the like are not "tolerant" of homosexuality then one is left wondering just how much tolerance or approval is supposedly necessary.
E.g.
(Regent University Law Review 2002
14 Regent U.L. Rev. 383
Article: Homosexuality: Innate and Immutable?
By A. Dean Byrd and Stony Olsen)
Another comparison that might be reasonable is a comparison of "gays" (the term would have to be defined) to blacks, as that is often the comparison that self-defined gays make anyway. So empirically, what is the suicide rate among blacks as compared to gays? And so on, the empirical facts go against the arguments typical to gays once again. There are any number of ways of seeking the truth if that is what one is of a mind to do. But people who self-define by their own sexual desires and so claim their own desires as "the truth" are not interested in the truth. I should note that if I did that then I would probably be in a strip-club right now. I am glad that I'm not, as the people who are become flat-souled and jaded. They are killing their Selves already, suicide is often just the last manifestation of what has already happened to those who are dead in the head. They set Life against Death and enjoy the sweet taste of dying for a time.
I have done the same but take comfort in the talk of forgiveness and even Paul writing about a new man fighting his old ways and so on.
…their true nature that cries out to them to be honored is then medicated with sex, food, and substance abuse.
And what if people who take on the gay identity and so on come on internet forums seeking condemnation and then go back to their medication? It's a common cycle.
Unfortunately, as anyone who has dealt with an addict knows, there may be no breaking some cycles no matter what you do. So you could change the tone of your writing to focus on grace and they would simply come to use that in their own patterns. If you focus on righteousness and Law then they find ways of feeding on that too. Perhaps some of the best witnesses have emphasized Law then Grace to the point that they almost seem a contradiction. This would make sense given a religion in which the very Logos of things breaks itself apart out of love, thus the gift of grace. Yet I meander.
Unlike you Seeker, FCL appeals to what appears to be the best of religion. Love, acceptance, and so forth. You appeal more to the "God kill kick the crap out of you for doing whatever it is that he doesn't like, so I'm going to go ahead and legislate that to the best of my ability."
You can understand, of course, why FCL is more appealing. But appealing enough to make me a Christian? Don't get your hopes up. I have no intention of ever being religious. As I have explained, religion doesn't appeal to me.
Drug use is higher among gays? Than who, straights as a whole? Can you show me where that statistic is coming from Mynym? I find that very difficult to believe.
By the way, the twin extremes are "god hates sin and threatens you with punishment" and "god loves you and accepts anything you do." Neither is correct. God warns of punishment, which is true, but he also loves us and wants the best for us, hence Jesus, hence "it is the goodness of God that leads men to repentance."
Notice that it is the goodness of God that motivates us, but not to be our best selves, but to REPENT. As those at AA know, we can not save ourselves, and require a higher power to help us.
And despite the abuse of the the truthful and scary, threatening news of the consequences of our sins, sometimes we need a whack in the head, because gentle wisdom finds no place in us. Hence "the rod of correctio is for the back of the fool" and "the fear of the Lord is the BEGINNING of wisdom" i.e. sometimes we need some fear to wake us up to our foolishness.
I think your characterization of my approach is extreme, but perception is reality, so I will work on how I present these ideas, however true they may be.
However, I again assert that I am not writing this in order to gently convert anyone, but to confront the bad ideas (read "lies", if you are not too sensitive) promoted as psychological and spiritual truth.
Seeker,
I'm always considered by that "rod of correction" argument. Parents who don't want to take the time to teach, reteach, and rereteach tend toward the "not spare the rod" argument. People can be changed through education that doesn't involve "wacks" or any other such verbiage.
Interestingly, you make a distinction between God is love and God is hate, but appear not to between gentle education and rod-based-education. The answer in education is somewhere in the middle too.
Fallen Christian Leaders?
Seeker and I hate one another. We have long-standing feuds concerning a number of issues that basically amount to: we so totally disagree with one another so regularly that we've reduced our debates to hate filled vitriol. As readers of…
Fallen Christian Leaders?
Seeker and I hate one another. We have long-standing feuds concerning a number of issues that basically amount to: we so totally disagree with one another so regularly that we’ve reduced our debates to hate filled vitriol. As readers of…
Terrible news Seeker! I've put Jerry Falwell into your rubric of good pastors, and he fails even worse than Gene Robinson. I'll await your post on this stunning development…or, maybe I won't. I don't have all of the time in the world after all.
mynym I truly feel sorry for your hate, but I will pray for you as there is always hope. I don’t know if the statistics you cite about substance abuse, domestic violence, etc. are true or false. I don’t know, if they are true or false, why they are true or false. This was not the subject of the discussion. The question was whether Bishop Robinson was disqualified to be Bishop based solely on his homosexuality.
I define homosexuality as “1.Sexual orientation to persons of the same sex. 2.Sexual activity with another of the same sex.” It is true that the concept of homosexuality as an orientation is relatively new idea. It was a notion that would have been alien to the authors of Scripture. This provides further proof that this is clearly not what Paul was referring to in Romans 1. You seem to be suggesting that this is a made-up term (I really am not sure, your prose was somewhat obtuse). The modern conception came not from some imaginative activist but from greater knowledge of the human condition. (It’s a concept of knowledge acquisition generally called progress.) What Paul is referring to in Romans 1 is an indulgence in one’s passions, lust, hate, etc that leads one to mistreat one’s neighbor. It is passion that Paul sees as the threat to how we treat one another. The same is true of the sins of Sodom. The inhospitable acts are a result of power relationships which are the very opposite of love, same-sex or otherwise. These mistreatments of fellow people constitute sin. Therefore do not ever suggest that I would label inhospitableness as anything other than sin.
Inhospitableness is what summarizes your attitude to gays. You have concluded that homosexuality is wrong and then set about to show how Scripture agrees with you. Yet time and again you come up short. I know because I was once like you. I entered into a study of this issue at my church. I entered into the study with the express desire to find a way to Scipturally “stick it to” gays. I even ungraciously referred to them as “buggerers”. Yet the Holy Spirit was with me and forced me to look carefully at the texts, to understand how to approach Scripture and to reasonably interpret the Bible. It was at this point that I realized that the condemnation I so longed for was simply not there. Immediately I lost my fear and hatred of gays, proving that there is indeed a “heart in the head”. I pledged to spend the rest of my life proclaiming the Gospel of love and redemption that is Jesus Christ. It is not “gay theology”, it is simply good theology. It is a theology that will not be muzzled or silenced or frightened. It is a theology and a Gospel that will ceaselessly stalk the hatred that has infected His Church. In the end we will be successful because Jesus promised us that the “gates of hell” would not prevail against his Church. (MATT 16:18) Amen.
Sam,
the rod of correction isn't supposed to be the main method of training your children – it is for the foolishness that is in our hearts – as I said, it is for us when we are hardened and foolish, when we don't respond to wisdom. We have to learn that there are consequences to stupidity, and the rod of correction, applied with love (I'm sure you understand this concept, but if you don't, then I'm sure you see all correction as mean-spirited. But if you misunderstand corporal punishment this way, go read James Dobson's books on teh Strong Willed Child) is much better than learning the hard way. Again, it's for fools who don't listen to wisdom. Like those who keep breaking the law – they go to jail, not because we are cruel, but because they need correction. They don't call em correctional facilities for nothing.
FCL,
Your humanistic gospel twists the scriptures left and right – of course mistreatment of people is a sin, but so is mistreatment of the truth. Don't try to buttress your poor logic and exegesis with accusations of hate and appeals to being gentle – you love gays so much you would let them play in traffic, because to correct them might be unloving. I'm sorry you were in a church that despised them and called them names, but you've swung to the opposite extreme, forsaking truth in a sentimentality that masquerades as love. Disagreement is not hate, as I have to oft repeat to those who have no stomach for doctrinal or moral disagreement.
I'm glad that you have forsaken your hate and fear of gays. Me, I don't have that problem. I love my gay friends and family, and they are welcome and feel welcomed in my home.
But I do hate lying (which God also hates), and those who teach others that sin is OK are liars, enemies of the truth, and of God, and in Paul's words "are worthy of death." Not that anyone is going to come after you (because Paul is not advocating that), but God's judgement will certainly be upon those who teach others to disobey the moral law of God – Jesus said "it would be better for them if they had a millstone hung around their neck and were thrown into the sea, than to have to meet the anger of God that will come upon such teachers." (my paraphrase).
Seeker,
You're right – I have no concept of children. Oh, sure, I have my own, and I spent three years working with children on the extremes of society (the victims of terrible abuse, which went unpunished in our oh-so-effective justice system), so please, educate me about the "rod of correction." What's strange is that I was able to make progress with all of my kids without once ever hitting them. Strange huh?
Read a book by James Dobson? You're kidding me, right? I can get all of the gay-hate I need from you, thank you very much. I wouldn't waste a dime on James Dobson.
As for correctional facilities, they function as correction for only some of the people who end up there. Surely you, hard-headed as you might be, acknowledge this. What jails have to do with the rod-of-correction, I don't know. But, still, it seems that maybe our society needs more than walls and barbed-wire to rehabilitate the criminals amongst us.
If you loved, or perhaps knew, anybody who was gay, you wouldn't suggest that gays are "lucky" not to be killed, which you have done in the past. Why you can't admit your hatred is beyond me.
That is the problem – it is beyond you because you fail to listen. In fact, you can not. The fact that you constantly misrepresent what I say shows that you are incapable or unwilling to understand – the fact that you won't even read a book by Dobson shows that you have no interest in being fair, but would rather pre-judge.
Me, I have books by gay theologians. I have books that I've read by Buddhists and mormons and new agers. Some of the books are quite good. But if you only want to read those who agree with you, while condeming those who do not (without reading or understanding them), I get it.
And me, I never said you don't understand children – I said you may not understand the concept of loving discpline and correction as it applies to corporal punishment, nor the proper and improper uses of such – I meant that if you think all corporal punishment is cruel, you should read Dobson. But I guess you are not interested.
As usual, I say one thing, you hear it through your "hate" filter (you hate religion, and anyone who opposes gay rights is a hater), and dismiss it.
FCL appeals to what appears to be the best of religion. Love, acceptance, and so forth.
If that's the best of religion and morality then I suppose that you should love and accept Seeker.
Actually, the best of Christianity is the marriage of the truth and love, justice and mercy, with nothing too much and nothing found wanting. Justice cannot be served without mercy just as love cannot be defined as such without the truth. You and FCL want one pattern of being to be over another, to be the "best," yet you are just making that which is complementary to be contradictory. When you do that you will find neither love nor the truth.
Drug use is higher among gays? Than who, straights as a whole? Can you show me where that statistic is coming from Mynym? I find that very difficult to believe.
Some of the statistics, note how patterns generally merge together when it comes to such things. E.g., alcoholics tending to higher rates of domestic violence and so on. For instance, with respect to adolescents:
(American Academy of Pediatrics
Pediatrics 1998; 101: 895-902
May, 1998 Section: Articles
The Association Between Health Risk Behaviors
and Sexual Orientation Among a School-based
Sample of Adolescents Robert Garofalo, MD.
R. Cameron Wolf, MS; Shari Kessel, ScB;
Judith Palfrey, MD and Robert H. DuRant, PhD)
I find that very difficult to believe.
Well, you shouldn't, if you'd just think about it for a moment what you are setting up is a religion of hedonism. Or perhaps you would call getting your identity and sexual ethics from your own sexual desires as well as "coming out" to proselytize and witness for your decision while condemning heretics who "live a lie" by not getting their sexual ethics from their own sexual desires and so on, and on, something else? What else can all that be called?
mynym I truly feel sorry for your hate, but I will pray for you as there is always hope.
I care little for your feelings about my supposed feelings, which are more likely projections of your own feelings. That's the way touchy feely feelings are sometimes, your own that you merely project out while assuming that others feeel the same way as you do. Putting your feelings aside, it seems that you've reduced the God of the Bible and his commandments to the level of a Jerry Springer show: "Now, don't be hatin'!" But the fact is that hate is not the whole measure of Good and Evil in any worldview, let alone a worldview shaped by distinct principles and concepts drawn from the texts of the Bible as your own supposedly is. But then, you seem to be shaping all text to comport with whatever your own feelings are rather than seeing it for what it is. At any rate, reality is more complex than "Don't be hatin'!" E.g., even if I was full of hate, oh just full of hateful hate(!), the empirical facts would still be what they are and a text would still mean what it means provided that the truth of it was sought and found.
It is true that the concept of homosexuality as an orientation is relatively new idea. It was a notion that would have been alien to the authors of Scripture. This provides further proof that this is clearly not what Paul was referring to in Romans 1.
The whole “not specifically said” argument is a faulty understanding of the spirit of the Law that has to do with very basic natural categories. The Bible says little on zoophilia, pedophilia, necrophilia, etc., and actually seems to say more specifically about homophilia, so what shall we conclude by what is supposedly not said or not specified?
You seem to be suggesting that this is a made-up term .
Given what you’ve reduced it to it is sexual desires and sexual behaviors. As far as the Bible, it would seem to be clear about both. Typically, those with little concern for the truth merge sexual desires with sexual behavior, as if sexuals desire should be acted on. That is a form of religious hedonism in which the sexual ethic comes to be merged with and defined by one’s own sexual desires, which often has little to do with the Bible.
The modern conception came not from some imaginative activist but from greater knowledge of the human condition. (It’s a concept of knowledge acquisition generally called progress.) What Paul is referring to in Romans 1 is an indulgence in one’s passions, lust, hate, etc that leads one to mistreat one’s neighbor.
Actually, what he is referring to from the beginning is putting the creation before the Creator. E.g., “I was born in Nature this way. I can’t be born again so I’ll try to crawl back in Mommy Nature’s womb now.” That’s his very first claim, after all. Much of the rest of what he says could have been based on observations in his day, as empirical observations can be made to this day. Other philosophers noted the same things, but I suppose Paul was referring to natural revelation there. It would seem that anyone can refine knowledge that they already have about such things, all are without excuse.
-I listen (read) to you all the time Seeker. I don't like what I hear. Why on Earth would I ever read a book by James Dobson? I only have so much time, and money, and I'm dedicating neither to James Dobson, a man who hates gays.
-The fact that you endorse corporal punishment is shameful Seeker. The idea that you hit your kids is revolting. There is nothing loving about corporal punishment; it is lazy parenting. Any lesson can be taught. And frankly, after working with the victims of abuse, I have no interest in reading anybody defending the hitting of children as "loving." That attitude is simply prehistoric.
-Hate religion? I don't hate religion. I have no problem with you being religious Seeker. I have a problem with you throwing a tantrum every time people who aren't religious seek equal treatment. I have a problem with you that allowing gay marriage is somehow a great evil. I have a problem with religion's general intolerance of all things different. But I don't hate religion. As I've made clear. Numerous times.
-How you can accuse me of not listening to you when you clearly do precisely the same sort of thing to me is, again, hypocritical.
Hey Mynym,
If you care so much about the Ten Commandments, why aren't you calling for legislation against adultery? You seem to be on board for legislation against gay marriage and homosexuality – so important to God that he left it out of the Ten Commandments – but I don't see you advocating a legal ban on adultery.
Also, can you post a link to that quoted information? I'd like to see where you got it from. Thanks.
Sam, I'll answer for mynym here
1. You ask a good question – why are some of the ten commandments considered really evil (stealing, killing), while others are considered wrong but "less" evil (adultery, lying) while some are considered purely religious and perhaps not moral at all (graven images, keeping the sabbath).
2. Just because homosexuality is not mentioned in the 10 commandments doesn't mean it's not important – it is condemned later in the next chapter. It may have been left out because it was considered so beyond the pale, i.e. so morally repugnant, not to mention such a small minority practice, that it didn't need to be mentioned in a list of the more common human sins.
3. You bring up another good point – maybe xians need to do more legislatively to criminalize adultery, like sodomy. However, I don't think that this is really worth doing. As I say, some things need to be neither condemned nor condoned.
However, if adulterers started pushing for legislation approving of adultery as acceptable, and giving adulterers the same rights as married folks, you'd see xians out there fighting it. I think they should remain, as you like to say, "second-class citizens". Because they would be pushing for "rights" which are really just asking for special treatment for aberrant, unnatural behavior.
Seeker,
1. Well? What's the answer?
2. Lots of practices are talked about later in the Bible in negative ways. You blatantly ignore these rules, gleefully even. "They don't count anymore," is how I think you like to phrase it. Just seems…oh, what's the word…hypocritical? (And of course, the other possibility is that homosexuality isn't mentioned in the Ten Commandments because it wasn't a big deal. Isn't that possible?
3. Adulterers make a choice Seeker. Gays are born gay. We've discussed this. There is a huge difference.
3.
1. I don't know.
2. Adulterers may choose, but I have a feeling it's a combo of choice and inner drives – I mean, who's to not say that they were made that way – that their nature compels them to have multiple partners? So maybe they don't choose.
I don't agree with the "gays choose their orientation" idea – I think they are driven by subconscious, unmet gender needs that often predate concsious memory (like starting at age 2), and that their biolgy plays a part. But that doesn't make it any more right than adultery. They can CHOOSE to examine the roots of their behavior and change it through therapy and medication, just like those with other tendencies that they may not have chosen consciously.
Seeker, there is no evidence to suggest that adulterers are born adulterers. There is plenty of evidence about gays being born gay – namely, the almost uniform explanation from gays that they knew something was different right from the beginning.
And in regard to unmet gender needs, what are you talking about? You mean boys without fathers and girls without mothers? What on Earth does that have to do with same sex attraction?
Finally, what medications would prescribe Dr. Seeker? What is the ungay medicine?
If you care so much about the Ten Commandments, why aren’t you calling for legislation against adultery? You seem to be on board for legislation against gay marriage and homosexuality – so important to God that he left it out of the Ten Commandments…
Homophilia is left out along with zoophilia, pedophilia and other sexual disorientations given the spirit of the ethical Law that can be seen in the laws given to the Jews and it has been generally admitted to as Natural Law as well because it is not that complicated. Homosexuals themselves admit to it.
…but I don’t see you advocating a legal ban on adultery.
As far as public policies, sexual perversions may well be treated differently than normal forms of sexual behavior that are immoral or illegal. It’s not all the same.
For instance, military discriminations, according to the DIS 20-1-M, the DIS will not ordinarily investigate allegations of heterosexual conduct between consenting adults.” Other sexual conduct including homosexuality, bestiality, fetishism, exhibitionism, sadism, masochism, transvestism, necrophilia, nymphomania or satyriasis, pedophilia and voyeurism is considered a:
(Department of Defense, DIS Manual for Personnel Security Investigations :DIS 20-1-M)
An example from history lends some support to the policy:
Note that many Nazis were sexual perverts of various types. Perhaps the “private lives” of public officials impact the public more than American Leftists are willing to admit.
Also, can you post a link to that quoted information? I’d like to see where you got it from. Thanks.
I fit it with further research here. As for a link, there is no public link available to Pediatrics that I know of. Perhaps you can find a way to access it yourself online these days, the citation is above. The empirical facts on such patterns are general and do not seem to change, the only thing that does is the explanations given for the empirical facts by various researchers.
Uh oh mynym, now you are calling gays nazis. You better clarify.
Finally, what medications would prescribe Dr. Seeker? What is the ungay medicine?
Short answer, there is none. Ironically, if there was then Gays© would be mobilizing to stop people from being able to get it just as they mobilize against treating gender identity disorders and the like. Homophobic and all that, don’t you know, some people do not want a cure for their dis-ease, as then they would not have anymore cycles of unease leading to self-soothing and so on. And what of the community of inhospitable abusers, they certainly wouldn’t want their “culture” being dissolved by sound treatment.
You think they all necessarily want an end to their choices?
Perhaps you do not want an answer either, but here’s an interesting case having to do with your question anyway:
(Adventitioius Change in Homosexual Behavior During Treatment of Social Phobia With Phenelzine
by D.H. Golwyn and C.P. Sevlie
Journal of Clinical Pychiatry 54: (1) (Jan. 1993) :39-40)
See also:
(Paraphilias, Nonparaphilic Sexual Addictions and Social Phobia
by D.H. Golwyn and C.P. Sevlie
Journal of Clinical Pychiatry 53: (9) (Sep. 1992) :330)
Also note:
(Homosexuality Treated Advantageously in a Stuttering Therapy Program: A Case Report Presenting a
Heterophobic Orientation
by J.F. Porter
Australia and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry 10, no. 2 (1976) :185-89)
Uh oh mynym, now you are calling gays nazis. You better clarify.
Emotional conditioning, activate! Re-read, the text is already clarified. At any rate, many Nazis were Gay© in the modern sense of taking part of their “identity” from it, they learned their lessons well from German psychologists.
By “many,” I mean almost a whole wing of the Nazi movement. And note how they regarded themselves:
(American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 87, No. 5, Mar., 1982
Sexual Taboos and Social Boundaries
By Christie Davies :1057-1038)
Gay© pride? It doesn’t change anything, as that historical example indicates the most dangerous people to Gays© are the people in their own community/gemeinschaft, pride and all. They’re typically taught to be proud of being ruled by and defined by their own feelings and desires, after all. Is it surprising that they turn into people ruled and defined by their own momentary passions and feelings, including rage and hate? That’s why they project about it so often combined with phobias, although empirical observations indicate that they’re often turning away from dealing with their own phobias.
But what does the nazi link imply or mean for modern gays who are generally not nazis at all?
Regarding ungay medication, mynym gave one possible example, but until the genetic or physiologic mechanisms are understood, we can only guess. It may be as simple as giving testosterone shots ;) However, as I have said, I suspect that it is both genetic and environmental, but mainly the latter, so I suspect that medication alone will probably only help little.
Seeker, Mynym,
I mean, testosterone shots? Do you -genuinely- believe that all gays are effeminate? Or that all lesbians – whom you never discuss – are simply too mannish? That in it of itself is such an offensive stereotype. Seriously.
Nevermind comparrisons to Nazis, or beastiophiles. I wonder, Mynym, if you have any actual understanding of paraphilias. But this is obviously going nowhere.
Well, I meant that as a bit of humor (note the smilee in the original), but I guess that was missed ;) But testosterone levels, or other sex hormone levels, MAY have something to do with sexual attraction, who knows? It's conceivable, not because gays are effeminate, but because these hormones may affect the brain.
Your comment reminds me of an old joke:
Q: How many feminists does it take to change a light bulb?
A: One, and it's nothing to joke about
Do you -genuinely- believe that all gays are effeminate? Or that all lesbians – whom you never discuss – are simply too mannish? That in it of itself is such an offensive stereotype. Seriously.
I don’t care what offends you or how you feel about rather basic empirical facts because such things go to your emotional conditioning and how you tend to spread your own conditioning to others.
For instance, as to that issue:
(Queer Science
by Simon LeVay (The MIT Press: 1996) :166)
Clinically, it’s a form of gender identity disorder. Notice how some would you believe that sexuality is not relative to culture but is genetic (of all things) yet also argue that sex and gender are cultural and simple matters of choice. That’s how absurd the inversions can become.
Some of the empirical facts that LeVay is referring to there are reports like these that indicate that 46% to 64% of boys with untreated gender identity disorders develop homosexual or bisexual orientation during their
adolescence:(Davenport CW: A follow-up study of 10
feminine boys. Arch Sex Behavior. 15: 511, 1986.)
(Green R: The “sissy boy syndrome” and the development of homosexuality, New Haven. Conn. 1987, Yale University Press)
(Zucker K.J: Cross-gender-identified children. In Steiner BW, editor Gender dysphoria: development. research, management New York,
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There is a myth illustrated in the argument: “Why would anyone choose to be this way?” You tell me, because Gay© activists have sought to stop such research as well as any “miracle drug.” They seem to want to be Gay© and choose to work towards making other people live with their decisions and their sexual ethics.
But what does the nazi link imply or mean for modern gays who are generally not nazis at all?
It’s something that they should be aware of just as people, not as so-called “gays” who are defined and blinded by their own supposed identity. Why should they be aware of it? Because it’s a dangerous pattern to them, as people, as well as many others. So they should be watching in their own movements and the like, yet most do not.
Regarding ungay medication, mynym gave one possible example, but until the genetic or physiologic mechanisms are understood, we can only guess.
It’s not really much of an example because despite Western myths given the prevalence of Christianity in the culture sexuality is generally not fixed over the life-span for the majority of people. So you’re talking about treating something that is cultural as if it is a medical issue, when it is a medical or physiological issue for a very small number of people. E.g.
(The Cross-CulturalStudy of Human Sexuality
Annual Review of Anthropology,Vol. 16, 1987,
By D. L. Davis and R. G. Whitten :69-98)
However, as I have said, I suspect that it is both genetic and environmental…
Sex is genetic, sexual desires generally are not, yet one does have to do with the other, obviously…and so on. I think the main issue here is that most gay activists of the West want, choose, support and promote the notion of “being gay,” so they’ll work against such research anyway. Their goal is political and to shape the culture into agreement with their sexual ethics.
Well, we differ a little here. I think that most human characteristics, both normal and abnormal (disease, disorders etc.) have both genetic and environmental components.
Now, some are exclusively genetic, like eye color and some cancers. However, many behavioral states, like aggression, hyperactivity, and depression, have both genetic and environmental/psychological roots, and each case may have more of one or the other factor.
I just figure that homosexuality may have different variants, some with almost purely environmental causes, and some with significant genetic/hormonal causes. At this time, we just don't know for sure. However, as I have argued, just because something is genetic doesn't make it normal – e.g. cancer or aggression. That's how I look at it.