I don't think it's appropriate for people to use The Bible as a justification to restrict gay rights. To my knowledge (and I am willing to be wrong) Jesus doesn't say anything about homosexuality. A lot of people like to say that Jesus was sent to make a new covenant, one human sacrifice to cover the sins of the world so we don't have to go around sacrificing animals or follow all the strict laws of the Old Testament. A lot of Biblical homophobia comes out of the Old Testament. So seriously, unless you're preparing to give up shellfish, or stop wearing clothing with two kinds of textiles, please give it a rest with the gays.
And besides the fact that Jesus himself (the very Central Figure of the religion) never mentions homosexuality, one thing He does mention is to love one another. I'm not sure he could have made that more clear, but there you go. How does "love one another" and "gay people can't get married" exist together?
I want to go on about the problems with the oft-spouted idiom "love the sinner, hate the sin", but I'm not going to, at least not here. I also want to give a piece of my mind to a certain Kentucky county clerk, but I don't think that disgusting story needs any more attention.
So, what do we find when we look into the real world? How do we see the church responding to the presence of homosexuals? Not with love. We see families disowning gay children. We see people fighting tooth and nail to place legal restrictions on how consenting adults choose to express love toward one another. We see people trying to become president who would use their faith to justify making laws restricting the expression of love. We see the faithful always drawing strange correlations between homosexuality and pedophilia or even bestiality. Whose fucking business is it? Does God seriously care what we do with our genitals (as long as we're not hurting others)? Don't you think He/She would be primarily concerned with how we treat one another?
Doesn't this seem weird to anyone else?
I mean, doesn't anyone realize that there is a lot of mystery surrounding the origins of The Bible? I think it's perfectly fine to find inspiration there, or to even base your whole life on what's printed inside. But because we have no actual guarantee on it's authenticity outside of one's personal faith, it's probably not good to force other people to legally adhere to it's teachings.
As it is, no one can agree on what The Bible says. This is clearly evidenced by the number of Christian denominations. Should Christians speak in tongues or not? Does true faith healing exist anymore? Should there be drums in a worship service? Can a woman become pastor? Can gay people become pastors? Are there valid supplemental books to the Bible (like "Doctrine and Covenant" and "The Pearl of Great Price")? These, and many, many other details separate denominations into sub-denominations and sub-sub-denominations, etc.. How many denominations do you think there are? I'm not even going to google it, but I assure you, there is a lot.
This should raise at least an eyebrow. Should we as a society require our citizens to adhere to the moral teachings of a text like this? I think we can all get on board with not murdering or raping, but shouldn't we let people make up their own minds about how they will express mutually consenting romantic love? Do we really need to make laws about this?
Because, believe it or not, this is not a Christian nation. Our forefathers made sure to include the separation of church and state for very important reasons. And I dare say if modern Christians knew anything about the actual religious beliefs of many of the forefathers, they would probably be shocked at the amount of secularism found there.
For one example, take Thomas Jefferson's book "The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth", otherwise known as "The Jefferson Bible", which is more of a compilation than an original work. You see, Thomas Jefferson took a literal razor to the gospels and removed any reference of Jesus as the son of god, as well and any miracles Jesus performed. Why do you think he did this? Why did he think this was important? Would a devout Christian today produce such a work? Would the world crack in half if Mike Huckabee suddenly published a version of the new testament that was scrubbed of all of Jesus' supernatural attributes?
I'll leave you with a quote from Thomas Jefferson from a letter to Francis Adrian Van der Kemp on July 30th in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixteen:
"Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. Ideas must be distinct before reason can act upon them; and no man ever had a distinct idea of the trinity. It is the mere Abracadabra of the mountebanks* calling themselves the priests of Jesus."
(from Dictionary.com)
*mountebanks: 1. a person who sells quack medicines, as from a platform in public places,
attracting and influencing an audience by tricks, storytelling, etc.
2. any charlatan or quack.
And besides the fact that Jesus himself (the very Central Figure of the religion) never mentions homosexuality, one thing He does mention is to love one another. I'm not sure he could have made that more clear, but there you go. How does "love one another" and "gay people can't get married" exist together?
I want to go on about the problems with the oft-spouted idiom "love the sinner, hate the sin", but I'm not going to, at least not here. I also want to give a piece of my mind to a certain Kentucky county clerk, but I don't think that disgusting story needs any more attention.
So, what do we find when we look into the real world? How do we see the church responding to the presence of homosexuals? Not with love. We see families disowning gay children. We see people fighting tooth and nail to place legal restrictions on how consenting adults choose to express love toward one another. We see people trying to become president who would use their faith to justify making laws restricting the expression of love. We see the faithful always drawing strange correlations between homosexuality and pedophilia or even bestiality. Whose fucking business is it? Does God seriously care what we do with our genitals (as long as we're not hurting others)? Don't you think He/She would be primarily concerned with how we treat one another?
Doesn't this seem weird to anyone else?
I mean, doesn't anyone realize that there is a lot of mystery surrounding the origins of The Bible? I think it's perfectly fine to find inspiration there, or to even base your whole life on what's printed inside. But because we have no actual guarantee on it's authenticity outside of one's personal faith, it's probably not good to force other people to legally adhere to it's teachings.
As it is, no one can agree on what The Bible says. This is clearly evidenced by the number of Christian denominations. Should Christians speak in tongues or not? Does true faith healing exist anymore? Should there be drums in a worship service? Can a woman become pastor? Can gay people become pastors? Are there valid supplemental books to the Bible (like "Doctrine and Covenant" and "The Pearl of Great Price")? These, and many, many other details separate denominations into sub-denominations and sub-sub-denominations, etc.. How many denominations do you think there are? I'm not even going to google it, but I assure you, there is a lot.
This should raise at least an eyebrow. Should we as a society require our citizens to adhere to the moral teachings of a text like this? I think we can all get on board with not murdering or raping, but shouldn't we let people make up their own minds about how they will express mutually consenting romantic love? Do we really need to make laws about this?
Because, believe it or not, this is not a Christian nation. Our forefathers made sure to include the separation of church and state for very important reasons. And I dare say if modern Christians knew anything about the actual religious beliefs of many of the forefathers, they would probably be shocked at the amount of secularism found there.
For one example, take Thomas Jefferson's book "The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth", otherwise known as "The Jefferson Bible", which is more of a compilation than an original work. You see, Thomas Jefferson took a literal razor to the gospels and removed any reference of Jesus as the son of god, as well and any miracles Jesus performed. Why do you think he did this? Why did he think this was important? Would a devout Christian today produce such a work? Would the world crack in half if Mike Huckabee suddenly published a version of the new testament that was scrubbed of all of Jesus' supernatural attributes?
I'll leave you with a quote from Thomas Jefferson from a letter to Francis Adrian Van der Kemp on July 30th in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixteen:
"Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. Ideas must be distinct before reason can act upon them; and no man ever had a distinct idea of the trinity. It is the mere Abracadabra of the mountebanks* calling themselves the priests of Jesus."
(from Dictionary.com)
*mountebanks: 1. a person who sells quack medicines, as from a platform in public places,
attracting and influencing an audience by tricks, storytelling, etc.
2. any charlatan or quack.