Originally posted by undo
what people do with their body parts is not the issue.
what people do with their hearts, is.

According to this logic, Pedophiles would feel justified in their Filth.

and it does say that being celebate and unmarried is the ideal state of a christian, because you can dedicate your entire life to the pursuit of it and it won't be as compromisable because you don't have the responsibilities of marriage.

i've seen preachers in excess of 300 lbs condemning gays.
i've seen people who love money more than anything else, condemning gays.
i've seen people who've been married and divorced several times, often for no other reason than they are tired of trying to get along with the other person, condemning gays.
i've seen people who have no problem with porn, condemning gays.
etc, and you know what i mean, etc.

the issue at hand is not your sin or your flesh, it's your ability to be forgiven for that sin and your hopeful and eventual ability to rise above the circumstances of that sin. it isn't the action that condemns but the intent and therefore the desire.
meat sacrificed to an idol, ya know, is not sinful to eat. where the sin comes in is the stumbling block it provides for others who have weaker faith.

so what you're doing is expecting the gay to have stronger faith than you do, demanding they not cast a stumbling block at your feet, so you won't have to judge them, which is the real crux of the issue.

what did jesus say? did he say we inherit the kingdom due to our personal perfection?

these scriptures have an overal interpretation. they should be read as a cohesive unit and not cherry picked to assuage an aversion to a particular topic.

So subscribing to a particular Religious Belief is a prerequisite to criticizing Homosexuality?

Originally posted by undo
Well the battle is between the natural man and his spiritual side.
So what they are arguing is in essence, true. Nature does make
some odd decisions.

By the grace of god undo but we all have thorns in our flesh and this is the thorn in thiers and I will speak to it directly without worrying about others that insist I am singling out one sin, sensationalizing it as worse than others when I have mad no such comparison about all the other sins that have nothing to do with this thread.

It is the flesh and the spirit and with unbelievers it is BOTH for the have no concept of their bondage to powers and principalities that not only have the flesh but the spirit also. When I speak to them I am in large part speaking to those same powers and principalities

The battle with Christians is the flesh but not the spirit, we can do nothing about the flesh unless we walk in the spirit.

Notice the two fold message in this verse

Galatians 5:19-25 Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are [these]; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told [you] in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.

THAT WAS THE LAW without it their is no need for a savior. The law is what convicts the sinner and Christ is what redeems him.

in the below passage
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. And they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.

Galatians 5:18 But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law

if they are not led by the spirit ( and I think it's safe to assume they are not,) than GUESS WHAT

to leap over by the teachings of Jesus. But not because any particular aspect of the natural man is any more sinful than any other in God's sight,

Nor are they any less, undo. I don't know why I have to sugarcoat this particular sin this thread is attempting to inform as an excuse for homosexual sex. I am not the one bringing it up they are and I would be re-mis in my testimony if I was to skirt the issue because of the sensitivities of someone suggesting that I am using prosecutorial vindictivness ostrasizing a particular sin when the sin in question and the one being promoted here is Gay sex sin which is the question I was answering.

Why is that creating so much doubt in my testimony for you?

Do you not have enough faith in God to know that maybe what I am saying is just what someone needs to hear whether you or I think it isn't?

We got that part, already. The part we need help with is the ongoing, daily struggle, which we are all engaging in at various levels. You might be a shining example of spirituality in one area and a complete washout in another. Same for all of us.

Ok ok I see where you are coming from UNDO. I will abdicate my participation here in this thread.

Ultramediacorp@gmail.com

- Con




[edit on 27-6-2008 by Conspiriology]

con,

i don't see it as sugar coating, because, as you mentioned, if someone is trying to justify an action, they must realize others disagree and what those reasons are for disagreement. the gospel message is the opposite. it doesn't condemn, it forgives. i don't know how else to put it without making it sound as if you are completely wrong (cause you aren't, completely wrong... the NT does say this is an activity that needs to be refrained from). the issue at hand is whether that approach will solve the problem if the person isn't even aware he's in a battle to bring his flesh under submission. i mean, we have the benefit of being aware of that, and we still screw up.

[edit on 27-6-2008 by undo]

Undo, you are a very interesting person.
I usually react negatively when people introduce God and religion to everything around them. That is not because I have inherently anything against either of those things, but because very few people have your grasp and understanding of Christianity.

Nature in itself is neutral. The natural world just is. The forests, the animals, the clouds, have no conceptual position of themselves. Humans, depending on their society and culture, put concepts and labels to all that surrounds them.
Let me give you an example:
Let's say that in this moment a little baby girl is born in either of three places.

1. Thailand: In Thailand, no matter what our Western sensibilities might be, it is legal if she registers with the state, for her to become a prostitute at the age of 18. Not only that, but this girl will not be ostresized and will often be respected for supporting her family.

2. Saudi Arabia: According to their modesty laws women can't drive so as to not be exposed to potential sin.

RIYADH (Reuters) - Saudi police have detained a woman for violating rules banning women from driving in the conservative Muslim country, a newspaper said on Sunday.

The woman from Buraida north of Riyadh was stopped by a police patrol after driving 10 km to collect her husband, al-Hayat newspaper said.

The woman's "legal guardian" -- her husband -- was required to sign a declaration that he would not allow her to drive again, it said. It was not immediately clear if she was released or would face legal action.

Saudi Arabia is the only country in the world that forbids women from driving on the basis of fatwas, or religious opinions, from clerics who say it is un-Islamic.
Reuters Sun Jun 15, 2008

3. USA: Here, neither of those two extremes are acceptable.

Same girl, born in three different cultures, all of them convinced that under their cultural interpretation of their religion, have their moral compass absolutely right.
Three cultures that all have their "doctormcauley/Conspiriology" and will judge each other's morality from their own blinder assisted view.
But this little girl is the same little girl no matter where she is born. Same thing applies to homosexuality. No choices here, just natural babies being born, the luck of the draw will determine if they are fortunate enough to be born into a tolerant culture.

[edit on 27-6-2008 by schrodingers dog]

Much of the unfounded opinions expressed on this thread from those who reject homosexuality as an inherent behavior is based on the following false premise:

Argument from Incredulity

The argument from incredulity is a type of argument from ignorance, as it argues that the absence of evidence (or a convincing explanation) of some premise is evidence that the premise is false (or unexplainable). There are two forms of this fallacy, depending on whether it's the arguer's own incredulity or the incredulity of science (or the populace as a whole):
"This is unexplainable" (meaning, of course, "I can't explain this"). This is the argument from personal incredulity, and it contains the (usually unwritten) assumption that the speaker is a superhuman genius who should be able to understand everything -unless he or she is missing an assumption. So the superhuman genius concludes that some assumption ('God did it', 'aliens did it', 'psi was involved' or whatever) is true, because it makes things easier to understand. For example:
"There is no way I can explain how the human mind really works using conventional physics. (Unwritten assumption: If the brain really was governed by simple physics, I should be able to understand it). Therefore, it must be tapping into the computational power of the quantum universe."
"Scientists cannot explain this" (meaning, of course, "as far as I know, science can't explain this"). This variation contains the unwritten assumption that scientists are superhuman geniuses and should be able to understand everything unless they are missing an assumption. This undue veneration of scientists is a form of scientism, or using science as an ersatz religion. On top of that, it is simply not true in many cases - scientists do have an explanation, and the speaker just doesn't know it. For example:
"Scientists are at a loss to explain the evolution of the platypus by Darwinian evolution. (Unwritten assumption: If it was of a Darwinian origin, scientists should know how it happened). Therefore, it didn't evolve."
Wikipedia

As a believer and gay I'd like to say that a person is not the job he has, his status or in this case his sexuality. We are first children of God and spiritual siblings. No matter how much it saddens me to witness all that intolerance and lack of acceptance I am calm and certain, because I know that He loves me infinitely as He loves each one of His children.

There is no other thing that makes me feel happier than when I experience or see unity in diversity. I hope I'll live long enough to see that realised on Earth among her people...

Alexandros

I'm going to post this incase some of you might have missed it. This is quite profound, actually, and explains quite a lot:

Yes and not only then, but today as well. Consider the Mormon church for an example (and this could easily be any number of denominations or even outside of Christianity, and any denominations of any faith of superstitious belief in some god), and their mandatory 10% tithing practice. Take the average yearly income for an adult male and lets say 40 years of working, and supposing that this one Mormon male who is being "fruitful and multiplies" has 5 children who each have 3 children...then do the math and figure out the total revenue take by the church over those 4 decades among the family. Now, what if one or two of the kids were gay? What if the dad was gay? He could repress it, stay married and in the church and it would result in all of that revenue, however if he does not repress it, comes out and leaves the church, then the church looses all that money. Calculate it all up, you'll see we are talking about millions and millions of dollars throughout the organization, and the same goes for the Vatican, and other organized religions. Thus there is a strong incentive to support translation interpretations that do not accept the homosexual.

(using $40,000.00 average annual income for the example)

40 (years) x 40,000.00 (annual income) = 1,600,000.00
1,600,000.00 x .10 (LDS tithing rate) = $160,000 per working person between ages of 20 & 60, assuming they retire at 60 and start at 20)

5 children by age 25 (assuming their 20 years until they work) so 15 years of working time at 40,000 = $600,000.00 times the 5 kids gives us: 3,000,000.00. 10% of that finishing up the 40 years would be: $300,000.00

Add up the 5 Kids (remember this whole estimate only covers this one man's family for 40 years) and the dad gives us $460,000.00, but he has a wife and she probably works now as well, so using the same average yearly income we add another $160,000.00 to this, and now we have $620,000.00 in revenue for the church...now let's finish this off with the 3 kids each that the five all have now say for the last five years of grandpa's working life and this would mean 3 x 5 = 15 kids at $40,000.00 for 5 years = $3,000,000.00 X 10% = $300,000.00

So I get a total of $920,000.00 for this one guy in revenue for the church. Now of course average incomes will vary and change over time. Some of the kids might be female. Not all will stay "believers", others might be excommunicated, maybe two will have incomes in excess of $100,000 per year....maybe grandpa works until he is 70, and maybe the kids all start working at younger ages etc...but this is just a rough estimate.

Almost a million dollars lost, if he goes gay before his mission (and this does not include adjustments to the revenue value over time as a result of returns on each yearly revenue streams investment...or interest if they hold the cash in a fund... if so, we would be talking about significantly more than a million dollars). Obviously someone being gay is a big threat to the church treasury.

Oh, and also we didn't account for all of these people having gone on a two year mission for the church (which the family pays for themselves) and say each one gets two new long standing members for the church each...well you just added a ton more money revenue stream for the church on top of that previous million or so...perhaps even $millions more.

Nope, I'm afraid god frowns on loving one of the same sex it would seem. It's so bizarre why so many continue to believe and give their money to such rackets!


[edit on 28-6-2008 by skyshow]