This thread is gay.

[quote=Robert A. Heinlein]"The Bible is such a gargantuan collection of conflicting values that anyone can prove anything from it."

"God is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent - it says so right here on the label. If you have a mind capable of believing all three of these attributes simultaneously, I have a wonderful bargain for you. No checks, please. Cash and in small bills."

"History does not record anywhere at any time a religion that has any rational basis. Religion is a crutch for people not strong enough to stand up to the unknown without help. But, like dandruff, most people do have a religion and spend time and money on it and seem to derive considerable pleasure from fiddling with it. "

"Of all the strange crimes that humanity has legislated out of nothing, blasphemy is the most amazing - with obscenity and indecent exposure fighting it out for second and third place."

[/quote]

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Um, what? The bible claims homosexuality is a sin and non-adulterous/non-fornicating sex is NOT a sin. That is a double-standard according to your logic.

He's saying that homosexuality is not being singled out among sins as a special sin. It's a sin just like stealing or fornicating or murdering is. The point being, you're born with this desire, it's a sinful desire, because humans are naturally sinful, and like any sinful desire, you just have to fight it and accept jesus as your savior, and his payment covers it. Regardless of the sin.

No one is going to argue that the bible doesn't say homosexuality is a sin, yeah, it's being singled out in that sense. Duh.

Well then the Bible is evil and I mean that quite emphatically.

Homosexuality is not a choice and the rest of those things on your list like stealing are.

I know this isn't exactly relevant, but, I love this quote:



Damn, I'm an ignorant hatemonger of those damn ignorant hatemongers!

Well, stealing is a choice, but so is acting on homosexual urges. Wanting to steal isn't really a choice, if someone tells you to stop wanting something, you'd be hard pressed to figure out how to do it. The idea is that it's not bad (relative to any other thing) to BE a homosexual, only to act on it.

By the way, I am entirely an atheist and fully think the bible is a load of crap the likes of which we will never fully recover from.

It is evil to forbid homosexuals from acting on homosexual urges while expecting heterosexuals to act on heterosexual urges.

anyway, coveting is a sin. So that point is invalid.

About the "Jesus pays our way into heaven" bit: I don't quite understand that. Ignoring the stupidity of the original sin, the impossibilities of half the bible, the fact that our loving God sent hundreds of people to hell before he sent Jesus, and the blurry explanations of Jesus' divinity, the following is what I understand:

God makes mankind too incapable to understand him, but able enough to go against his will.
When mankind does go against his will, he swears a grudge against all of mankind and forever banishes us from the sweet life.
After a few generations of his imperfect people doing imperfect things, he kills everyone off in a big flood except a handful of people and animals.
Then he decides to send his divine son to be brutally murdered by mankind.

His sons death somehow let God forgive us for the original sin. How does that make any sense at all?

And then his son's going to come back with the anti-Christ, they're going to wage war, and Jesus kills all the bad people and is taking the rest of us home with him. These revelations aren't justified and don't have anything to do with this sin business, but it's gonna happen.

To me it seems like all of this is a lot more believable as a poorly crafted story that takes elements of reality, and then twists them on end with the supernatural; a story meant to manipulate and encourage goodness in people. Suddenly all of the emotions and silly bets/agreements god makes with mankind seems a lot clearer if it's just a personification of favorable ideals in a functioning society? When the words of Jesus are compared to other philosophical writers, and other non-religious texts that refer to Jesus, he suddenly seems like nothing more than a new age Jew with criticisms of the Roman rule, speaking mystical proverbs of morality. The acclaimed revelations look a lot like a fear mongering tactic intended to keep the sheep baaing, as the same God claims peace and love as the road to him, not fear and damnation.

Maybe I'm putting too much faith into reason?

Nah I think you're putting too much reason into faith.

If everyone just followed:

1) Love thy neighbour
2) Do unto others as you would have done unto yourself

(Forgive paraphrasing)

Then everybody would be happy. Jesus appeared to have it right just there, but everyone else stuck their oar in.

That's why I just try to live by roughly those rules, and throw any sort of idea of religion in the bin.

What if your neighbor rapes your dog?

Kidding, thats basically the rule I live by also. I can further shrink it down though. It ends up as this:

Thou shalt not be a dick.

I can sum it up in a single word: kindness.

Actually, those are both the second one. The first one was "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind." Neither were original material he just made up on the spot either -- Jesus was making a statement on legalist outlook on religion (as he often did). He said a lot of other things too, not just that stuff.

I think the original topic has been answered as best as it can already, and I have no interest in diving into the other stuff that has naturally come up.

I think it's pretty ironic that Christianity has become exactly what Jesus said was so bad with Judaism at the time.

If that's so, then homosexual people should be allowed to marry their loved one and have monogamous marital sex, right?

Kirbs, you neglected to mention the extra mind-**** that comes with believing in the trinity too. Since God and Jesus are the same we have God sacrificing himself to himself to save his creations from himself (ie his judgement). I asked a minister about it once and he waffled about God having to suffer his own "infinite wrath" to forgive us for being what he made us. :downs:

Guys here in the apartment were having a discussion last night, and one of the guys brought up an interesting idea. He doesn't think that he could ever consciously be attracted to another guy. So for those who think that homosexuality is a choice, look at yourself and whether you could ever decide to be attracted to someone of the same sex. Is it a choice for you?

No they aren't. There's nothing wrong with the emotions by themselves. How you act on them is where the problem may lie.

Maybe so. It doesn't really matter. What makes less sense is how god apparently becomes angry and surprised by the acts of men. How can an all-knowing being ever be surprised?

Just for information sake, in the olden days, "perfect" really means "complete". As in "The perfect storm".

Emon, I don't see any problems with God becoming angry over something. It's quite possible to know something's going to happen and still be angry after it does.

As for being surprised, I don't know that the Bible ever describes an event where God is "surprised". Can you provide a reference or references?

Well he certainly doesn't seem to know when Abel is killed... he goes asking Cain where his brother is.

But on the subject of the topic, since you've dodged responding to this thus far, wouldn't you agree that Christianity really does single out homosexuals unfairly for special treatment? It treats their attraction to each other as a sin under all circumstances unlike that for heterosexuals.

What? Christianity doesn't single out homosexuals. At least I don't think so. From what I read in the Bible, half the men in it are gay their selves.

If you mean these "followers" of modern day...

I guess I mean the specific dos and don'ts written in the Bible. It's the sole justification for calling homosexuality a sin, and while there are all sorts of rules for heterosexuals too, they at least are allowed to marry and have monogamous sex without it being a sin.

Do you believe in evil?

I'm pretty sure that wasn't being asked because God didnt know.

Imagine you come into a room and your toddler's scribbled all over the walls. The toddler also has marker all over his arms. You know what happened obviously, but you still might ask the kid to see what he/she says. Same concept. God asked, because he was giving Cain and oppurtunity to come clean.

What's evil?

Sarn, can you answer my question(s) about homosexuality?

I don't know about "surprised" but certainly he doesn't know what will happen.

He created the flood to kill everything because "God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth" (Genesis 6:5). Then vows never to do it again because it didn't solve the problem because humans are inherently evil (Genesis 8:21).

Whether homosexuality is a choice or not is irrelevant. God originally designed sexuality to be expressed between one man and one woman in a family unit. (e.g. Adam and Eve) When humanity fell, everything got corrupted, and man became hostile towards righteousness and given over to depravity. As far as God is concerned, you are either fully justified or fully condemned; there is no middle ground between the two.

Regardless of how you sow to the flesh, you are going to reap corruption. Homosexuality is just another sin of the flesh, and some people are merely more susceptible to it than others, just as some people are more susceptible to violence, rape, or stealing. (although some sins are worse than others) People who are straight are really no better off because they are merely enslaved to something else, even if they aren't aware of it.



God has been saving people throughout human history, long before Christ came. (such as Adam/Eve, Moses, Enoch, David, Elijah, and many others) Christ had to come so God could be justified in saving people, because otherwise how could a righteous God show any mercy to sinful people without being unrighteous? God dispensed swift and immediate justice to Satan, yet showed mercy to humanity. In a human analogy, you would probably consider it unjust if a judge pardoned (on a whim) a convicted murder who had been found guilty by jury.

As the progeny of Adam, every human is born into sin by default, and has no hope of escaping condemnation apart from God's mercy. Man originally had a full understanding of and harmony with God (Adam and Eve regularly communed with God prior to the fall) yet immediately after the fall, Adam and Eve ran from God in terror. Although God was merciful by sparing Adam and Eve, (while delivering the promise of Christ) man has been separated from God ever since, and Christ is the only bridge that links God with man. If not for Christ, I (and all other Christians) would have no salvation and God would have no choice but to destroy me and everyone else who has ever lived.

Why? Because you want to know how Christians believe or because you want to argue and try and pick apart what I say to make me sound stupid?

edit: this was a response to Page.

Yes, and that's exactly why Christianity is a horrible religion. Condemned for something you didn't even do. Why anyone would choose to become a christian is beyond me.

Oh wait. Christianity isn't a choice, you're born with it

Page, so no one can have a personal relationship with God ever again? That's one of my problems with Christianity, it is too prescribed. It seems all about telling me exactly what my relationship with God, Jesus, etc is without me having any part in it.

Can you name even one person who managed to go through life without sin? (aside from Christ) If you are human, sin is inevitable because it is something that everyone has been contaminated with.

Sarn:
You said they weren't singled out. As if somehow Christianity was being as harsh on them as everyone else. I'm not picking apart what you said, I'm simply responding. Stop playing the victim and if you feel it makes you look stupid that's not my fault. I'm genuinely interested as to what Christians think about this.

Page:
But Adam and Eve never existed, so there is no original sin. A lot of Xtians complain about how creationists give them a bad name, but in truth, evolution completely screws up one of their central tenets regarding sin.

Still, let's ignore that. God's omniscient and he made Adam and Eve with full knowledge of what they'd do. In which case it seems pointless and in fact cruel to punish them for being what he made them. And then to pass that punishment onto everyone else is even worse.

I have never sinned.

I don't let 2000 year old fairy tales arbitrarily tell me what I can't do.

Salvation is God's sovereign choice. By default, man is an enemy and hater of God and everything that has to do with God. God has to actively call people before they can respond to him; by his own volition, man is incapable of pleasing God.

To truly have a relationship with God, you have to be given a completel new soul that is imbued with God's own righteousness. I certainly had nothing to do with that. It is all a work of God, so no man can have a claim of having anything at all to do with his own salvation.

I don't understand how you can say that man is naturally an enemy and hater of god. Does he extend the olive branch to everyone when they are born? People hating God doesn't seem like an innate thing so much as a leaned one. Children typically grow up interested in everything and enjoying God's creations. When does the hating part kick in?