Newsweek's story [<------- click here] provides an in-depth debunking of many of the popular myths about Scripture that the religious-right has used time and time again and should be read by everyone in our community.
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2 years ago
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A point by point response to this article obviously cannot be posted in the comments section of this blog. I'll try to hit a few important points.
The article says
//As a religious institution, marriage offers something else: a commitment of both partners before God to love, honor and cherish each other—in sickness and in health, for richer and poorer—in accordance with God's will. In a religious marriage, two people promise to take care of each other, profoundly, the way they believe God cares for them.//
The authors make a big point of pointing out things that aren't actually stated in the Bible. And here they are, at best embroidering on scripture as they accuse opponents of doing, with absolutely no text cited in support of what they say. "Religious marriage" is what they say it is because Genesis says a man shall leave mother and father and cling to his wife and the two shall become one flesh in to fulfill the command to be fruitful and multiply and because St. Paul told wives to be submissive to their husbands in the same way the Church is submissive to the Lord and husbands to love their wives in the same way the Lord loves the Church.
As for polygamy, Jesus basically throws it out along with divorce when he appeals to how it was "in the beginning." And the authors are wrong when they say that "examples of what social conservatives would call 'the traditional family' are scarcely to be found." There are Adam and Eve, Noah and his wife, Lot and his wife, Hosea and his wife, Manoah and his wife (parents of Samson), Hannah and her husband (parents of Samuel), Ruth and Boaz, Ananias and Sapphira, and others mentioned by Paul in his letters — to mention those that readily come to mind without looking anything up.
It is true that many Christians have become comfortable with the travesty of marriage that the contemporary practice of divorce provides.
Not to go on too long, I'll conclude by noting that the attempts to explain away the texts against homosexuality still leave us with the fact that there is no biblical passage which specifically approves of sexual activity between members of the same sex, but there are numerous texts against it. And most importantly for a Christian there is Jesus' appeal to "the beginning" where God created them male and female in order that they might be fruitful and multiply in a relationship where man and woman become one flesh in the image and likeness of God in his life-producing love.
This is not to disparage the love in friendship or between parents and children, or among siblings. But the command to love is not a command to have sex except for husband and wife.
"Numerous" is putting rather a spin on things:
OT:
Leviticus 18:22
Leviticus 20:13
Deuteronomy 23:17 in some, but not all, translations
With the coming of Christ, we are allegedly under grace and no longer bound by OT law. So that's those gone.
NT:
Romans 1:26-27
1 Corinthians 6:9
1 Timothy 1:9-10
All three of these NT mentions are in the writings of Paul. Paul's words are Paul's words and the meaning of some (arsenokoitai, in particular) is uncertain to this day.
Paul is a man, not God. I know many people consider his words divinely inspired but that's not enough for me to accept them as the word of God. Especially considering he is opposed to even opposite-sex marriage, except as a last resort for those who cannot remain celibate. This is directly in conflict with God's admonition to go forth and multiply. So, who is in charge here? God or Paul?
OT again:
Twisting Sodom & Gommorah In Genesis and the tale of the Levite in Judges as being about homosexuality is way off the mark. Both tales involve offers of women to be gang-raped by violent mobs. In Genesis, Lot offers his virgin daughters up for rape. In Judges, the Levite throws his concubine to the mob and she dies by morning from injuries sustained during her rape. Yet we are to accept both of these as righteous men? And we are to condemn homosexuals in general because of these tales rather than the rapists involved? No.
BTW, when I mentioned the story in Judges to someone recently, he excused the action of the Levite by saying, "She was just a sex slave." From his comment, then, it would appear that owning slaves for the purpose of non-marital sexual enjoyment is OK but being gay is not. BULLSHIT.
Hey Steevo, Tristan here from Rent-Boy. Happy holidays to you and yours, i hope its a lovely one.
Also, i see that you are commenting on "Into The Wasted.. the Polish blog? Will you please suggest to hom that he open his comments to anonymous readers? I cant comment there at all.. it may be why hes posting about feeling no one cares. Many bloggers dont like to go thru the hassle of registering with another blog provider just to leave a comment.
Thanks and peace... Tristan
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