It's Sunday - Take A Queer To Church

I've just about had it with the holier than thou far right religious conservatives and their crusade to force a marriage amendment on a small minority of Virginians -- especially when they do this in the name of Jesus and God and Holy Scripture. So if you are one of these so called Christians on your way to church I have this to say to you:

Matthew 19:9
“And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.”

I think the good book makes it quite plain that divorce is adultery. And are adulterers less bad than homosexuals in your mind?

For you to be fair-minded and consistent, then as a Christian I would think you’d be equally as vociferous against adultery as you are against homosexuals. And as divorce is the real threat to marriage and the family, I would think you (socially conservative Republicans) would adjust your priorities to go after divorce.

You may fool others – you may fool yourself – but you can’t fool God, and I expect He wants you to act in a fair and measured way and in the example of Jesus on this matter.

I will also share with you that recently even the very Orthodox Rabbi Elliot Dorff, vice chairman of the Conservative Law Committee and also a respected scholar, supports ordaining gays, saying "it is simply not natural" to demand that they remain celibate. "We have to interpret God's will in our time," Dorff said.

We have to interpret God’s will in our time. Certainly if you don’t interpret God’s will in context of the time in which we live – then you can only live a life of hypocrisy, since the word-by-word inerrant reading of scripture is impossible to follow precisely in 2006.

Now I expect your come back, if you make one, will be that this has nothing to do with the majority deciding to adopt such an amendment, and that God intended for marriage to be between one man and one woman.

I’m just saying that it is you who has brought God and religion into this political discussion -- so as you’ve introduced religion as your basis for championing this amendment, it is only fair that I be allowed to refute you on the same grounds.

And I did notice that you have again sidestepped the conclusions of a learned Baptist theologian that I earlier cited, who argues that even the Bible does not condemn loving, committed, monogamous gay relationships (only promiscuity, temple prostitutes, and pedophiles).

I hope you are not so intractable in your position that even if Jesus were to appear before you and say that gay marriage is OK, that you would argue against Him.

Comments

Anonymous said…
I agree with your comment, but wonder, too, about the language Jesus used when condeming divorce. IT seems that everytime the Bible referers to divorce, it is a husband divorcing his wife. It seems that has interesting implications for gender roles.
Sunday, September 10, 2006 9:40:00 AM
Bill Garnett said…
I think that biblical scholars and historians agree that until very recently most societies were patriarchal and that women had few rights, little access to power, and were treated as subordinate. I might add that the Church has historically taken this position and used scripture to support prejudice against women, not unlike they use scripture today to support their prejudice against gays and lesbians.
Sunday, September 10, 2006 10:01:00 AM
Anonymous said…
Yes, the old church doesn't seem to understand that it's possible to use the brains God gave us to understand the social context in which various parts of scripture were recorded. You can reject the social/legal context of 1st century Palestine without rejecting scripture. In fact, if you don't reject that context, scripture is pretty useless.

But that wouldn't be very politically useful for these "leaders," would it?
Sunday, September 10, 2006 2:20:00 PM
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