mjmjr25 wrote:
@Dsh, so now, per your words, "Focus on the Family" and the AFA are mainstream. This is contradictory to the way you've been portraying them. Either they are radical fringe elemets or they are the mainstream thought? You'd have to give me a quote from Dobson or Warren to argue against, it would be irresponsible to say most Christians, or myself, agree or disagree with such a general concern of yours. But before we even do that...its futile. You may find a hateful comment or a misguided comment, you may find dozens of them. They are men who may or may not be speaking in and through Christ - only God knows for sure. So finding a poor stance or unfortunate comment of theirs does nothing to the whole of Christianity. You seem to want to throw out the baby with the bathwater here. I don't think what you are looking for can be appeased in this instance. You want to wholly condemn something and lump it in with racism, et al.
-I think AFA, Focus on the Family, The Catholic League, etc. are representations of mainstream Christianity in the USA becasue their programming is on almost every Christian radio station, their materials are found in almost every church library, and their public events are inclusive of a wide swath of Christian denominations. A quick visit to their websites will give you all the evidence you need that they actively and aggressively promote anti-gay rights agendas (often in language echoing pro-racial segregation rhetoric). I never said those groups were fringe, I did say they were vocal. Fringe groups would be stuff like Westboro Baptist and their ilk, who are both fringe and vocal. No one likes them, of course.
You state lusting for children is clearly a sin. Yet lusting for a member of the same sex is not? There are more references to homosexual acts and perversion than pedophilia. So why do you so easily say one is a sin and one is not? Likely, because you find pedophilia abhorrent - that isn't fair though, you just changed the criteria. If it suits your belief system, then you are now willing to accept that is a sin. If it doesn't, then you continue to argue against it?
I frankly don't give a shit if anything is classified as a sin by one faith or another or not. I do care that pedophilia is
demonstrably harmful to the physical, emotional, and mental well being of an individual and thus is rightly classified as a crime and not condoned. The same
is not true for homosexuality. At best you can argue that it is spiritually harmful based on religious views of it as a temptation, but we've already covered why legislating temptations is a fool's errand unless you want to live in a theist state.
You want everything spelled out, black and white. That is not belief or faith. Blessed are those who have not seen, and yet still believe. It is a hard thing to do, but you want it to be easy. Not the way it works.
Bullshit. At the end of the day the way that you exercise your "blind faith" has material black and white consequences in the real world that discriminate and harm people on the grounds of they don't believe as you do. Have faith in whatever you want, but stop imposing that faith's morals on the rest of us.
Also, still waiting on this:
I actually think I kind of understand your argument better now. Is this a fair assessment?
1. You think that you can suggest that your religious views should be the governing laws of the land because you believe they are what is best for everyone, even if some refuse to see that.
2. You think any direct/indirect "teaching" or "acknowledgement" by an institution that is not in line with Biblical principles creates a "victim" (this is closely related to #1).
3. You think that secular law, whenever possible, should be reflective of your view of an accounting in the afterlife. (again, pretty much #1)
4. All "rights" are granted by God, so distinctions such as "legal," "civil," or "human" don't matter.
5. You left the debate (at least for a bit) becasue you felt that your point of view was being twisted and lampooned with derisive and detracting posts.
All that pretty much accurate?
