This will be the first in my series of posts that have a go at some common thoughts about the Bible/Christians/God. I'll try and make this a bi-weekly thing, we'll see how we go.
This first one I'm tackling, admittedly, is a bit of a hefty one. There's a - what I would say - fairly common idea that the Bible/God/Christians/all of the above are anti-gay people. And yes, there are verses in the Bible - from Paul, I believe - which certainly don't condone homosexuality. And yes, there are many Christians who will not be very happy with you if you suggest that God loves homosexuals too, ala this comic.
But I'd like to present you with two different ideas that counteract this.
Firstly is an idea that I read in a book called "God, Actually." (As an aside, very interesting read, though a fairly lengthy one.) The author makes the note that, in that day and age, they don't quite understand things like we do now. They didn't realise that homosexuality was something that you were born with, and was a part of someone's identity.
What exactly that amounts to, when it comes to all the Bible being "God-breathed" etc, I'm not sure.
Secondly is a slightly more simple idea. God loves his creation. The Bible says that pretty often; Genesis, right at the beginning, says a fair few times, "And He saw that it was good." Good, by the way, isn't so much how we use it today - that is, just OK. Good was a much higher up word that was used to describe God - similarly to how Jesus said when the man called him 'good teacher': "Why do you call me good? None but God is good."
And we are a part of that creation. Every person, including people that are homosexual. They are no less created by God than you or me. So God most definitely loves all his people, no matter what their anything is.
That's probably more an argument for God not being anti-homosexual than Christians or the Bible, but you would hope that the latter two would reflect the former; that is, after all, part of the idea. How well it is implemented, of course, varies dramatically.
That's me done for today. Until next Monday.
***Additional part: Recent idea I had, looking at a couple of the verses in the Bible that do talk about homosexuality. The common example here, for instance, is Romans 1:26-7. "Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error." My emboldening, obviously. I would argue here that the key difference is between lust and love. Here in this passage, it's talking about lust, not love. And I'd agree that if guys/girls that aren't generally homosexual are going into that sort of thing just to satisfy their lusts, that is wrong. But if it's actually love, then I don't think that's wrong, and I don't think that that's what this passage is talking about. I suppose that's my argument there.***
:D !!! Brilliant! Reminds me of a post I did…kudos to you! It is so sad that the Christian community tends to discourage homosexuals. Is their sin any worse than ours? Of course not. They're just not living in fear and shame about it. And after all, why should they be expected to justify themselves to the world? Only God has the right to judge, and, as you said, he loves us all. :D
ReplyDeleteOh, and yay! for my getting a quote on your 'Randomified' page. :D
ReplyDeleteThankyou :) My thoughts exactly.
ReplyDeleteHaha :D
There is certainly a big problem with discrimination in many areas with homosexuality, however it is would be horrible misconception to suggest "... in that day and age, they don't quite understand things like we do now. They didn't realise that homosexuality was something that you were born with, and was a part of someone's identity.". Homosexuality defies the nature of being born a certain gender. Sexual attraction on a subconscious biological level is basically a way of saying- I think *that* person would make a good mate; that person seems like a good genetic match for procreation. An argument I was faced with recently went something like this- a man can be born with a female brain and vica-versa so a gay man will have the wiring of a woman and vica-versa. In essence, the person might have the body parts of one gender, but is mentally the other. The issue here is that if this is to be considered true, then the people in question would have brains telling them that their parts are different and in the case of a gay man, that they (on some level) desire to be impregnated. Obviously this isn't possible. However, if these urges are very real given the chemical mal-structure of the brain, we wouldn't expect gay men to be be attracted to other gay men, we'd expect them to be attracted to straight men, just like straight women, with straight brains are, and vice-versa. The more you think down this path, the less sense it makes that you actually can be born gay, and the more sense it makes that individuals are nurtured in many various ways to make that lifestyle choice, be it the lack of a parental figure, or abuse as a child, or simply rebellion and the desire to be "different" and/or controversial or other factors.. By all means though, they still deserve to be treated as equals and have the same love and respect that anyone deserves.
ReplyDeleteI've got a bit of a problem with the "body of one gender, wiring of the other" argument. While that might be how it works biologically, you can see homosexual guys that are just as blokey as other guys, and homosexual girls that are just as girly as other girls.
DeleteEven if this isn't the case; you're treating attraction as if it's something logical. I'd say, in a large part, it isn't. When a guy's attracted to another guy, he may not even know whether or not that guy is gay or straight. And I know there are cases where a guy feels for a girl, she turns out to be gay, but he still loves her.
I'm also pretty sure it's biologically proven that you're pretty much born with it. Different levels of hormones and such. People can go against that, and society/culture/whatever could push them a little down one path or the other, but the fact remains that if they didn't have that different "wiring", it probably wouldn't be happening.
I can assure you, it hasn't been proven.. The point I'm making is essentially this- There is a difference between emotional attraction and sexual attraction. Realistically, it might seem odd, but when you think about it we all have emotional attractions to the friends we choose. We enjoy their company and laugh with them and have fun and all the rest. As far as gays go, I have no doubt that their "love" may be very real, but where does sex come into that? I love my male friends, but I have no desire to put my body parts inside them in places they simply don't belong. Homosexual sex has absolutely no biological function whatsoever; it is purely recreational for them unlike heterosexual sex which has the sole *function* of procreation, while recreation is simply an added bonus that we've taken advantage of as a species.. There's no *reason* for anal sex, or oral sex or any other alternative sexual stimulation apart from recreation alone. Emotions may very well be involved and heightened, but lust is the primary cause of homosexual sex. It's not natural.
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