The church's position on marriage?

[danot]

They don't. In fact the Church of England and Church of Wales, as our established churches, will actually be banned in law from offering same-sex marriages. Other religious organisations will be able to "opt in" to holding ceremonies.

The details can be found here - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-20680924 - do you still refuse to read links or have you gotten over that now?

 

 

 

Sorry to disillusion you again but I doubt we are talking about a minority.

 

You are claiming an element of victimhood for either yourself or the Christian church by suggest grinding down and browbeating. The movement for equality is founded on a positive, inclusive desire for humanity to strive for civilisation. Now, re-examine your previous post - It is laced with negativity, divisiveness and otherness. That sounds more like grinding down and browbeating to me

 

 

 

 

That sounds very much like you are blaming homosexuals and those who support them for stoking the resentment and prejudice that exists against them by wanting equal rights to heterosexuals.

 

To each his own so long as homosexuals don't have equal rights? Or just stay out of the compassionate, caring, loving and open arms of your church?

 

Now, how about telling me if you believe whether or not every word of the bible should be followed to the letter? Have you looked at what is condemned in Leviticus? Do you abide strictly to it all?

 

My guess is you probably will not answer that. I hope you surprise me.

 

---------- Post added 17-02-2013 at 01:35 ----------

 

 

 

I am sure he is terribly disappointed in the level of commitment he gets from me as that level is zero.

 

The bible is full of bronze age thinking that our movement to civilisation has rendered anachronistic and obsolete. Progressive Christians understand that it was written through the prism of a much less sophisticated society than ours and, therefore, must be viewed and judged in this context. Then it can be philosophically edited and adapted to serve modern society in a sort of personal, individual version of the Council of Nicaea.

 

 

---------- Post added 17-02-2013 at 01:40 ----------

 

[/color]Seeing as I have asked posters to consider Leviticus here we are -

 

Here’s chapter and verse on a more-or-less comprehensive list of things banned in the Leviticus book of the bible. A decent number of them are punishable by death.

 

Unless you've never done any of them (and 54 to 56 are particularly tricky), perhaps it’s time to stop leaning on the good book?

 

1. Burning any yeast or honey in offerings to God (2:11)

 

2. Failing to include salt in offerings to God (2:13)

 

3. Eating fat (3:17)

 

4. Eating blood (3:17)

 

5. Failing to testify against any wrongdoing you’ve witnessed (5:1)

 

6. Failing to testify against any wrongdoing you’ve been told about (5:1)

 

7. Touching an unclean animal (5:2)

 

8. Carelessly making an oath (5:4)

 

9. Deceiving a neighbour about something trusted to them (6:2)

 

10. Finding lost property and lying about it (6:3)

 

11. Bringing unauthorised fire before God (10:1)

 

12. Letting your hair become unkempt (10:6)

 

13. Tearing your clothes (10:6)

 

14. Drinking alcohol in holy places (bit of a problem for Catholics, this ‘un) (10:9)

 

15. Eating an animal which doesn’t both chew cud and has a divided hoof (cf: camel, rabbit, pig) (11:4-7)

 

16. Touching the carcass of any of the above (problems here for rugby) (11:

 

17. Eating – or touching the carcass of – any seafood without fins or scales (11:10-12)

 

18. Eating – or touching the carcass of - eagle, the vulture, the black vulture, the red kite, any kind of black kite, any kind of raven, the horned owl, the screech owl, the gull, any kind of hawk, the little owl, the cormorant, the great owl, the white owl, the desert owl, the osprey, the stork, any kind of heron, the hoopoe and the bat. (11:13-19)

 

19. Eating – or touching the carcass of – flying insects with four legs, unless those legs are jointed (11:20-22)

 

20. Eating any animal which walks on all four and has paws (good news for cats) (11:27)

 

21. Eating – or touching the carcass of – the weasel, the rat, any kind of great lizard, the gecko, the monitor lizard, the wall lizard, the skink and the chameleon (11:29)

 

22. Eating – or touching the carcass of – any creature which crawls on many legs, or its belly (11:41-42)

 

23. Going to church within 33 days after giving birth to a boy (12:4)

 

24. Going to church within 66 days after giving birth to a girl (12:5)

 

25. Having sex with your mother (18:7)

 

26. Having sex with your father’s wife (18:

 

27. Having sex with your sister (18:9)

 

28. Having sex with your granddaughter (18:10)

 

29. Having sex with your half-sister (18:11)

 

30. Having sex with your biological aunt (18:12-13)

 

31. Having sex with your uncle’s wife (18:14)

 

32. Having sex with your daughter-in-law (18:15)

 

33. Having sex with your sister-in-law (18:16)

 

34. Having sex with a woman and also having sex with her daughter or granddaughter (bad news for Alan Clark) (18:17)

 

35. Marrying your wife’s sister while your wife still lives (18:1

 

36. Having sex with a woman during her period (18:19)

 

37. Having sex with your neighbour’s wife (18:20)

 

38. Giving your children to be sacrificed to Molek (18:21)

 

39. Having sex with a man “as one does with a woman” (18:22)

 

40. Having sex with an animal (18:23)

 

41. Making idols or “metal gods” (19:4)

 

42. Reaping to the very edges of a field (19:9)

 

43. Picking up grapes that have fallen in your vineyard (19:10)

 

44. Stealing (19:11)

 

45. Lying (19:11)

 

46. Swearing falsely on God’s name (19:12)

 

47. Defrauding your neighbour (19:13)

 

48. Holding back the wages of an employee overnight (not well observed these days) (19:13)

 

49. Cursing the deaf or abusing the blind (19:14)

 

50. Perverting justice, showing partiality to either the poor or the rich (19:15)

 

51. Spreading slander (19:16)

 

52. Doing anything to endanger a neighbour’s life (19:16)

 

53. Seeking revenge or bearing a grudge (19:1

 

54. Mixing fabrics in clothing (19:19)

 

55. Cross-breeding animals (19:19)

 

56. Planting different seeds in the same field (19:19)

 

57. Sleeping with another man’s slave (19:20)

 

58. Eating fruit from a tree within four years of planting it (19:23)

 

59. Practising divination or seeking omens (tut, tut astrology) (19:26)

 

60. Trimming your beard (19:27)

 

61. Cutting your hair at the sides (19:27)

 

62. Getting tattoos (19:2

 

63. Making your daughter prostitute herself (19:29)

 

64. Turning to mediums or spiritualists (19:31)

 

65. Not standing in the presence of the elderly (19:32)

 

66. Mistreating foreigners – “the foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born” (19:33-34)

 

67. Using dishonest weights and scales (19:35-36)

 

68. Cursing your father or mother (punishable by death) (20:9)

 

69. Marrying a prostitute, divorcee or widow if you are a priest (21:7,13)

 

70. Entering a place where there’s a dead body as a priest (21:11)

 

71. Slaughtering a cow/sheep and its young on the same day (22:2

 

72. Working on the Sabbath (23:3)

 

73. Blasphemy (punishable by stoning to death) (24:14)

 

74. Inflicting an injury; killing someone else’s animal; killing a person must be punished in kind (24:17-22)

 

75. Selling land permanently (25:23)

 

76. Selling an Israelite as a slave (foreigners are fine) (25:42)

 

https://www.google.co.uk/webhp?sourc...w=1280&bih=687

 

 

 

I hope that puts the scriptural line of oppression in context. Some are sensible, others are nonsense and utterly anachronistic in a modern and enlightened society.

So basically, your're saying that any parts of the Bible that have been undermined and devalued by modern day values and ideals should be viewed as nonsense, and any parts of the Bible that don't conflict with modern day values and ideals are sensible? I like your style.

 

---------- Post added 17-02-2013 at 10:59 ----------

 

Are you a Christian? Or is this another example of you telling other people what to think and what to do?

 

 

 

Why not?

 

 

 

How can you decide what 'being a Christian' is about? Are you one?

 

 

 

Again, I think it's bizarre and slightly ridiculous that you're spouting about a faith you don't have and deciding how those that do express it.

You're like a teetotaller haranguing people about how they should drink.

 

---------- Post added 17-02-2013 at 06:56 ----------

 

[/totalle

 

 

If you look you'll find groups within most religions and churches that are welcoming of gay people.

And how many of these groups within religion would actually recognise the marriage of a same sex couple? To use an alternative analogy to your teatotaller analogy, Isn't it a simple case of- 'If god say's two types of tea cannot be mixed together, then I cannot mix them together. Now who's brow beating others into how they should drink? 'I don't do it so no one should'... Isn't that how it is?

[Halibut]

And how many of these groups within religion would actually recognise the marriage of a same sex couple? To use an alternative analogy to your teatotaller analogy, Isn't it a simple case of- 'If god say's two types of tea cannot be mixed together, then I cannot mix them together. Now who's brow beating others into how they should drink? 'I don't do it so no one should'... Isn't that how it is?

 

Jesus would approve of gay marriage; that's good enough for me.

 

---------- Post added 17-02-2013 at 11:39 ----------

 

It's a matter of definition. If someone defines themselves as a "true follower of (the Bible's) teachings", then they have to follow it without deviation.

I am not a true follower of the Bible, so I can pull out bits that I like, and reject a lot of (say) Leviticus.

 

Quite - and I'm not sure there are many people around (thank goodness) who profess to follow all Biblical teaching literally and without compromise. Trying to do so can produce all kinds of un-Christian behaviour.

 

---------- Post added 17-02-2013 at 11:40 ----------

 

And how many of these groups within religion would actually recognise the marriage of a same sex couple?

 

I don't know. Quite a lot I would guess. Not quite sure what your point is really?

[mikem8634]

So basically, your're saying that any parts of the Bible that have been undermined and devalued by modern day values and ideals should be viewed as nonsense, and any parts of the Bible that don't conflict with modern day values and ideals are sensible? I like your style.

 

 

No, I am afraid that you are extrapolating the comment I made on the list from Leviticus to cover the bible in its entirety.

 

---------- Post added 17-02-2013 at 14:56 ----------

 

Your statement is incorrect, only an all knowing God could know the opinions of everyone.

It may be your opinion along with many other people but it isn't the opinion of everyone who cares about equality and living in a civilised society.

 

I'm afraid you are incorrect because in my opinion if you oppose same-sex marriage then you do not care about equality and living in a civilised society.

[danot]

Jesus would approve of gay marriage; that's good enough for me.

What makes you so certain that Jesus would condone gay marriage? Why would he oppose the wishes of God? Is there anything on record, any instances where Jesus opposed the wishes of God?

 

 

posted by halibut

 

I don't know. Quite a lot I would guess. Not quite sure what your point is really?

My point is quite straightforward. Which religious groups recognise a gay marriage as a marriage that has the blessing of God?

[mikem8634]

 

My point is quite straightforward. Which religious groups recognise a gay marriage as a marriage that has the blessing of God?

 

You could start with Unitarians, Quakers and Liberal Judaism. You could do a quick Google you know.

[Spiky_Head]

 

 

 

If you look you'll find groups within most religions and churches that are welcoming of gay people.

 

Id like you to point out the ones you were referring to please.

[PaliRichard]

Id like you to point out the ones you were referring to please.

 

Buddhists have nothing against gay people as a matter of doctrine.

[RootsBooster]

Then let them do so but why does any other church that chooses not to marry gays have to have a gay agenda pushed on it?

 

True freedom and equality is allowing people to live in the beliefs and the ways they choose and not grinding down and browbeating everone to accept what a minority say is "good for everyone in the name of equality"

 

That kind of thinking only leads to resentment, the creation of prejudices that may not have been there before and the inevitable backlashes.

 

To each his own and leave it at that

 

Which Churches are having a "gay agenda" pushed on them?

[MrSmith]

I'm afraid you are incorrect because in my opinion if you oppose same-sex marriage then you do not care about equality and living in a civilised society.

 

The problem with your opinion is that it only applies to you and cannot be projected onto everyone else. You might have an opinion that everyone who cares about equality supports your stance but that would just make you deluded.

[RootsBooster]

What makes you so certain that Jesus would condone gay marriage? Why would he oppose the wishes of God? Is there anything on record, any instances where Jesus opposed the wishes of God?

 

Because Jesus said we should love one another and God never said anything about forbidding gays from marrying (as far as I'm aware).

Nothing opposing there.

 

---------- Post added 17-02-2013 at 16:30 ----------

 

The problem with your opinion is that it only applies to you and cannot be projected onto everyone else. You might have an opinion that everyone who cares about equality supports your stance but that would just make you deluded.

 

Mike is right, if it's not the opinion about those who care about equality, then they don't truly care about equality. By definition, anyone who cares about equality will care about gays having equal marriages.

 

What's that? "Equal but different already?" Do I really have to copy and paste the posts from the other thread, which clearly show this is not the case?