Path: utzoo!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!bcm!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: djdaneh@pacbell.com (Dan'l DanehyOakes) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: Imposing Christian morality on nonbelievers Message-ID: Date: 9 Mar 91 03:33:42 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: Pacific * Bell, San Ramon, CA Lines: 108 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article ta00est@unccvax.uncc.edu (elizabeth s tallant) writes: >While none of us are perfect, we should at least try. Absolutely. > I am not judging you. For all I know, you may be a heterosexual who is >pulling a prank. I am simply stating that the Bible forbids homosexuality. You *are* judging me: you are assuming that anyone who writes such a thing seriously must be gay. I am not. I am about as heterosexual as they come, married with kids. I also have the advantage of knowing a number of gays well, and knowing that it is perfectly possible to be gay and still love Jesus and call him Lord. . . a possibility you dismiss out of hand. *If* it is sinful to be gay, a matter which is not as open and shut as you seem to think it is, then all that means is that you can't be gay and be perfect. None of us, or durned few, will achieve perfection in this life. I'm reasonable certain I won't. All of us are sinners. I have a short temper at times. My fellow Christians try to help me control it, through prayer and reminders. What I don't understand is: why does this *particular* sin make you ineligible to be a Christian, while a short temper, or the willingness to assume another person must be either gay or joking, does not? Is it intrinsically worse than all those other sins? And who says so? Isn't trying to say whose sins are worse than who else's sins *also* a form of judging? >This is absolute blasphemy. It's like saying that two people in an >adulterous relationship are close to God when they are "doing it", or that >a murderer is close to God when he kills. What I said was not that gay sex _per_ _se_ brings one closer to God. What I said was that *ANY* act committed in a spirit of love, is more godly than *ANY* act committed in a spirit of hate. >The Bible clearly shows that homosexuality is a sin. Sin separates one >from God. It does not bring him/her closer to God. The Bible also "clearly shows" that eating crab is a sin. Do you ever eat shellfish or pork? Do any useful work between sunset Friday and sunset Saturday? By your own logic, if you do these things, you are not a Christian. The history shown in the Bible is one in which a series of Covenants supercede each other, each being more "advanced" in godliness than the one before. Christ's Covenant, the final Covenant, freed us from the complex, prescriptive and essentially negative nature of the Mosaic Law (thou shalt not, thou shalt not, with the occasional thou shalt thrown in so people would have *something* to do), *WHICH* *WAS* *NEVER* *BINDING* *ON* *ANYONE* *BUT* *THE* *HEBREWS* *ANYWAY*, and replaced it with a simpler, descriptive, and positive Law, stated in the two Great Commandments: Love God, and Love your neighbor as yourself. (Note that, implied in that second, is a certain degree of self-love: not vanity or pride, but accepting that, since God loves you, you must be worthy of love, despite your sinful condition.) St. Paul spent years of his life struggling with this, as shown in the New Testament, and finally realized that Christians were not bound by the rituals of the Mosaic Law, but only by the law of Love, _caritas_. We are required to obey the laws of the land (rendering unto Caesar), but beyond that, our acts are bound only by Love. Love of God must come first, of course. >So, this is what it comes down to. I simply reiterate what the Bible says, >and because you don't want to accept it, you indirectly accuse me of hating >you. What a cop - out. No, I do *not* accuse *you* of anything. I believe that many Christians attack gays out of hate. I do not know why you attack gays in the way you do. I do not accuse you of hating gays. Even if I did, it would not be accusing you of hating me. I am, as I said above, not gay. I merely believe in treating gays with the Love they deserve as God's creatures, whom He loves, whom He loved enough to die for. If he did that, can we do less than love? >My question would be, is one more interested in doing the Lord's will, >no matter what it may be, than he is in sticking to his/her own version >of right and wrong? "One" is interested in doing the Lord's will, as embodied in the words He spoke while He walked among us. "One" is interested in trying to live up to the sacrifice He made for us. "One" is interested in loving His creatures, more than my own idea of what is right and wrong, including "one's" own ideas about sexual morality. "One" has some definite ideas about what is right and wrong, but if "one" were to start applying them to others, "one" would be loving "one's" own ideas more than those others. If the commandments of Love are the "greatest," then any other commandments -- including any commandments concerning sexual morality -- must fall by the wayside in favor of _caritas._ May the Lord bless you and keep you, and all who read this, Dan'l