Homosexuality and Religion

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Hmm......the real reason that the government oversees marriage is to prevent sexual sin? I didn't know that. Apparrently, I never got that memo. If, however, that actually were the intent of our marriage laws, wouldn't that just be another reason to change them? I seem to remember the bill of rights saying something like this:

 

While you might live there I have very difficult time believing in this. According to Wikipedia more than 80% of Danish population are members of the Lutheran Church and while I'm sure that most of these are inactive in their Church I do think that it's is very much exaggerated to call most of the Danish people atheists.

To me this phenomenon in the Lutheran church where people actually going to church every sundays etc. is just to show that religion is not in such a central role in people's lives. While they might hold the Christian beliefs they just won't bother to go to church and they don't feel the need to do so. Most people still have christian marriages, christian funerals, christian confirmation and christian baptism. Which would indicate that they still hold on to the core Christian beliefs.

 

what you most undestand morgoth is that some 25-30 years ago you where, when born pr automatic member of the danish lutheran church and when adult pays and extremely small tax to keep a state-payed christian church going, this has and still leads to a lot of debate, since we claim we have a separation between state and church, then way do one church recieve money through taxes. the automatic church taxes is now gone, so now instead of choosing not to pay it, you have to choose to pay it.
Regarding people having church weddings, funerals, baptism and confermation, has more to do with tradition then believe. just like christmass.

 

Oh believe you me I know since I live in a country with exactly the same system. And while I would agree that most people tend to be indifferent towards church and not be that spiritual anymore these days. However I would bet that if you polled Denmark and ask if they think that they are A) Christian B) Atheists C) Other, the Christian part would still win by a very dominant margin. This is naturally widely based on how I see religion in Finland but considering that our countries are in many ways very similar I would be suprised if things were so different there.

 

yes i belive that too, but if you asked them if they prey, go to church or actually have read the bible or follow it, the answer would be no in the large majority to all 4. so in practise they would be atheist. so its just a mather of definition.

 

That would have been a long time ago, when priests had to travel long distances to some areas that didn't have their own holy men. The Church would likely have recognized this to avoid trouble rather than fighting the battle of Church and State. Now that the mandate of the State differs in a more drastic manner, that battle is brewing...

 

@Equester:

Not so much. Intolerance is supported by whatever is popular and credible at the time. In WWII, the Nazis demonized the Jews (the herritage, not the religion I believe) with science, but they weren't the only ones doing this. Many American scientists were eager to show 'scientific' evidence that blacks were inferior, frequently using the same kind of arguements as the Nazis did. Since then, science has been used as much as religion. In the middle ages, science isn't used because science isn't considered credible. Religion is used to persecute the Jews, gypsies, and Arabs because it is still the main power in the world. Had science progressed to the WWII stage by then, it could just as easily been science that was used.

@Nataraja:

All irrational intolerance is so born, not just religious.

This makes no sense whatsoever. First off, of course day can exist without night (in a binary star system), and you can't prove by any means that good can't exist without evil. Second of all, you then replace 'good' and 'evil' with 'positive' and 'negative' which I assume refers to the similarities and differences between people. While 'good' and 'evil' may not equate to 'positive' and 'negative', 'good' and 'bad' certainly do, though I think you would have a hard time classifying most of our differences in either. And at the end, you contradict yourself. You say you can only have both at the same time, but there is no duality. Duality is having both at the same time. Duality is something (a person) having dual and opposed nature (good and bad characteristics).

And here you begin to equate 'good' and 'evil with 'positive' and 'negative', though I'm not sure which you consider homosexuality to be. This is obviously a mistake, since you already said you weren't talking about 'good' and 'evil'.

I think this is the most confused of all. Yes, if God created everything, then God created people who would be homosexuals, though it does not follow that God created them to be homosexuals. There could have been other influences after creation. God may have created everything, but there are plenty of things that can change things. Finally, religion and science can exist without each other, they are seperable disciplines. Religion has existed without science for thousands of years, and many scientists exist without religion. Science answers 'How' while religion answers 'Why'. While the two can certianly influence each other, they can also exist in a vacuum.

In the end, I feel like this post was a buch of double-talk fit for a politician. I'm sorry if that offends anyone, and I don't mean to attack you Nataraja, but I hope your posts return to the logical caliber they once held.

@Rotku:

If 'tyrrany of the majority' is the majority forcing their opinions and beliefs on the minority, then you really can't have a democracy of any size without. There will always be some people that disagree with the rules the majority makes, even if it is only child molesters, rapists, and serial killers. In the strictest sense, this is still the tyrrany of the majority.

If you mean something else by the term, then I appologize.

@Nataraja:

Umm, I thought it was a republic. How do you get this?

@Gnarff:

These days I wouldn't be so sure. Remember, Satanism is a recognized religion in America today.

Cuchulainn:

But the discussion here seems to be keeping religion out of the bedroom, or is it keeping religion out of the government in the bedroom, or.. I'm confused.

Rotku:

1.) This is not the final version, thus it isn't what our government was founded on, though the final says similar.
2.) This is not a legal document and actually wasn't what this government was founded on. This is what the revolutionary war was founded on. Since then we've actually had 2 governments, one which failed rather quickly because it was poorly designed, and another based on our current Constitution and subsequent ammendments that seems to have done rather well.

There's a big difference between 'liberty' and 'liberal'. Liberty is freedom, in a general sense, and is later applied by the forming of a government. We don't, for example, have the freedom to kill anyone we want. Liberal is different. Liberal is a political stance roughly opposed to conservative. Basically speaking, liberal is change for the sake of change, while conservative is the same for the sake of the same. Both are rediculous positions. In a moral sense, liberal is the application of freedom whenever possible, i.e. doing everything you can just because you can. This is the whole 'if it feels good, do it' movement. Either one of these 'liberal's could be used as an insult.

Here we get into 'limited tyrrany'. How much can a majority enforce its views on the minority and not be in the wrong? Certainly in cases like murder, rape, and generally anything that causes significant harm on someone not of the minority, maybe even if it only causes harm to other memebers of the minority, or even only to the person doing it. But what if there is no apparent harm, or the harm is balanced by benefits. What determines the right of the majority to enforce its beliefs on the minority here? I know you'll say nothing, the majority doesn't have that right, and if you assume there is no absolute right and wrong, then I'd probably agree with you, but what if there is an absolute right and wrong. What if the minority wants to do something that is inherrantly wrong, and absolutely wrong, but doesn't cause any harm so far as you can tell?

This is rather an understanding that has been hoisted onto the original meaning. The original wording was 'Let congress pass no law conserning the establisment of religion nor inhibiting the free practice thereof.' The original intent of this was to prevent the government from forbidding a legitimate religion like England had at the time. Later, this was slowly expanded until the modern sense of 'seperation of church and state' was established. That has been even further confused by the media today so that many people think it means religion can't go within 100 yards of the state, when in fact it means a fair and even treatement of religion. A law is considered constitutional if it treats all religions and the lack thereof equally. This means that schools can have Bible study if they also are willing to offer Koran study and the like to those who want it (if any). The ACLU even tried at one point to use seperation of church and state to ban all religions messages of any kind from the radio, since radio liscensing is controlled by the state. That case was thrown out of court.

 

So you are perfectly fine then marriage been a purely religous thing?

I think you completely missed my point here - could be my fault in not putting it across properly. Let's clear a few points up, shall we.

(1) We're talking a hypothetical situation here.
(2) I know perfectly well that the law would support this (at least in some countries). What I want to know is is this right? Should it be supported just because the law supports it?

Please tell me you're joking? Your argument against homosexuality is based upon what someone (be it a god or a person claiming to have the ear of a god - the point is the same) wrote thousands of years ago. I'm 99% sure that the arguments against pedophilia have much more solid grounds - or atleast the actions associated with pedophilia.

Well, I would happily argue that prisons are bad as well - but then that's another topic
Atleast prisons do have some clear, proven benefits. When it comes to using religous texts to support bigotry - against a group of people who there is no proven negative side effect of - then we're on a completely different level. As the saying goes, you can't compare apples with oranges.

This has nothing to do with any church. It's to do with peoples beliefs. It does not mean there are any ties at all between church and state, in any such way. Infact, it can work against religon as much as it can for religion.

Oh my god! Battle between Church and State is brewing! Most parts of the world this finished centuries ago - with the founding of the USA, with the development of the Anglican church in England, the French Revolution and Neapolianic wars, the Cultural Revolution in China and so on. It's only a select few countries who have jumped back a few centuries in which this 'battle is brewing'.

[Edit]How dare you post while I'm writting my own post, NOG
As I don't like editting huge amounts, I'll wait for osmeone else to post before replying

 

Yes. Now that this is settled, what the state does to accommodate the homosexual community should be a state matter, which should not impose on religion.

I didn't miss it. We're just not in agreement on where the line of right and wrong ios drawn. We both agree that segregation or apartheid is wrong, but I argue that homosexuality is wrong as well. That is why we differ on the state's relations with the homosexual community.

I wish I was, but there are lobby groups that want pedophilia legalized. The government's stance on whether homosexuality is right or wrong has changed, and by the same logic they want the stance on pedophilia to change. They argue that the line was moved to accomodate one group, it can be moved for them.

And they'd have the same agreement with you as you have with me. They will basically call into question what gives you the right to dictate your morals on them, just as you are saying to me...

Both discriminate not based on the person, but their actions. You do the crime, you do the time. You sin, you live with the consequences of offending God.

Democracy, from the Greek, means people rule. Religion has influence with the people, and since the people rule, religion influences the law. The more the state tries to oppose religion, the less support the state gets from the religious people. Therefore any problem that you have with religious influence on the state is a problem you have with the people.

In America, they did their best to play nice, but as some of the people wanted a change, the majority doesn't support it. Now we have a battle between two versions of what the state's mandate is. No matter who wins, one side will bitch.

 

The difference is in provable harm. Studies have shown the damage that sexual abuse does to children. But no Earthly harm has come upon the psyches of homosexuals, unless you count the consequences of them suppressing who they are. You may argue that they are harmed in the divine, but the only weight you've got backing that is your word, and that is not sufficient proof.

Sadly, this is true. Up until yesterday, I thought NAMBLA was just a joke. But it's not. They have members, they have sex with children, and they're lobbying to make it legal. Even I wasn't capable of the string of profanity such a revelation deserved.

 

uhm no. you got to be mental to think that.
You base your whole stance against homosexualety on one thing. A command of a God, a person/diety who cant be confirmed even excisting. While we know homosexualety hurts nobody.

First of, i would never draw in a command from something i cant even proof excist as my sole reason of being against anything. secondly im against pedophilia because its forced on the child and it hurts the child, leaving deep psychological scares.
again homosexuality is not forced, its a choice of both parts, which only envolve them and hurts nobody.
If you seriusly cant see the difference and only condemn both because god says so, you have a problem.

 

On the pedophilia issue, only some (ok, most) situations actually cause psychological damage. And even that wasn't really understood until recently. If, 100 years ago, when no one understood about psychology, the issue of the illegality of pedophilia being based solely on religion came up, where would you stand and why? Honestly, I'd like to hear from everyone. Now stop and think about the homosexuality issue. I'm not going to say its the same thing, because it isn't, but there are similarities. Here we have something that (it looks like) the majority of the population (in the US at least) condemns on some level or another, but we can't find any real harm coming from it (which is different from there being no harm to it). It has been illegal for centuries, the taboo agaist it is fairly well established, though there are those that are attacking the taboo (a lot more on this issue then on pedophilia, I admit).

This probably won't change any minds, but at least it will give the supporters of homosexuality a look at the actual perspectives of those who criticise it.

 

Indeed, it does. Now that some attention got diverted to what's actually harmful and what isnt, pedophilia ended up banned, whereas homosexuality made progress, socially, legally.

The irony of your perspective.

The negativity of it all is saddening me. Let's change that! Any major advantage of homosexuality has yet to surface (which is different from there being none).

Much better, I think. No gloom, with the added benefit that it reflects reality. What more can we want for? Presents you with a challenge, however: Living your faith without turning it into an assault on others.

Yah, that's gonna happen.

[ October 31, 2006, 23:53: Message edited by: Dendri ]

 

Bull****. Granting equal rights to homosexuals has nothing to do with giving adults the legal right to sexually abuse children. These issues, on no planet (or any alternate dimension that I've heard of), have ever had anything to do with each other. NAMBLA only has 1100 members on the books. I'd hardly call that a significant number......and I think it is the worst kind of exaggeration (if not outright dishonesty) to compare the "growth" (actually, their numbers have been dwindling) of a huge 1100 person group to the growth of a movement that counts its supporters in the millions and counting.

 

So whats your point? that we should keep condeeming homosexuals because the bible does that and people did it a 100years ago when rules more often was based on what the bible said. Then we might as well invoke slavery again and take away womens rights, they didn't have that a 100 years ago, and its only some 200years ago we had slaves. hell black people had to fight for basic rights 50years ago.

and honestly i dont need god to tell me that raping children is wrong...

 

That's not what I'm saying at all, but I've heard a lot of people on this board that seem convinced they know everything about the topic that there is to know. Humans will NEVER know everything that there is to know about any topic, and assuming that there are no downsides to it just because we can't see them now is just as bad and more dangerous than assuming there are no up sides because we can't see them now. All I'm saying is take a step back and look at some of the things you (or others) have said and make sure that's really reasonable.

 

im prety sure demanding equal rights for people that hurt nobody but still are treated as leser people, purely because of thier sexual preferences is quite fair.

 

I'd say it's fair that people should be allowed a legal ceremony which gives them the same legal rights as a religiously married couple.

 

I was just listening to some songs written by a gay band. Most people would only be so lucky as to have such joyful and rewarding friendships as the ones described in the songs.

Check out 'The Soldiering Life' by the Decemberists:

"The bullets may singe your skin, and the mortars may fall; but I...I never felt so much life than tonight! Huddled in the trenches, gazing on the battlefield, our rifles blaze away ....we blaze away!

....
But you, my brother in arms, I'd rather I'd lose my limbs than let you come to harm!"


Brokeback Trench in song!

 

And they will have lawyers and experts that will call that evidence into question, thus slowly but surely budging the nation off their moral absolute, until they get their rights...

And that will be scrutinized and called into question and torn to shreds in court by the pedophile rights activists...

What if there IS no positive to this? Further, the negatives are only believed by a segment of the population, but others think less of them...

Let's change faith to beliefs. When the Aetheist movement started to make waves, they didn't do as you suggest, but directly assaulted ours, condemning prayer at public assembly. When the gay rights movement started, they assaulted the religious notion that homosexuality was morally wrong. Now, our beliefs automatically constitute assaults on other groups. The more you crowd the field of morality, the more often competing voices will trample each other's toes.

Mutual consent means none of your business. At least that's what people in this thread have been telling me all along. Face the facts, we all toe a moral line somewhere. I'm asking a more rigid moral line than many of you are willing to toe, but by the time you are willing to join me in this opposition, it will be too late.

Gay Rights had to start somewhere, and they get their way not by crunching numbers, but by taking numbers out of the equation. These 1100 argue that it is morally wrong to deny them their chosen sexual partners (assuming consent).