Re: CA Supreme Court Ruling , Bush and Blair
OrthodoxNews
"veritas" <comin...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:lq2t249np1us0q2fm...@4ax.com...
> This isn't directly related to Orthodoxy but one might ask what an
> Orthodox response should be ?
>
> Read below :
>
> http://www.overthelimit.info/us/2008/05/16/here-comes-the-grooms/
>
> Bush and Blair how appropriate , both of them anti-Orthodox to the
> bone .Enjoy!
>
> Peter
***How can one be anti-Orthodox unless one knows exactly what the Orthodox
Church teaches? Dumb. Blair is a Roman Catholic newbie and Bush is a typical
mainstream protestant .
Alexander Arnakis
wrote:
>This isn't directly related to Orthodoxy but one might ask what an
>Orthodox response should be ?
>
>Read below :
>
>http://www.overthelimit.info/us/2008/05/16/here-comes-the-grooms/
>
>Bush and Blair how appropriate , both of them anti-Orthodox to the
>bone .Enjoy!
>
The Bush - Blair picture is just meant to be a joke.
Blair is already irrelevant, and Bush will be too in a few months.
The Orthodox response to gay "marriage" should be just what it's
always been -- ignore it. Certainly, anyone living in such open sin
shouldn't have the gall to ask for Communion. But for the
non-Orthodox, that's their own business.
David
> On Sat, 17 May 2008 16:39:23 GMT, Alexander Arnakis
>
>
>
> <inva...@address.none> wrote:
> >On Sat, 17 May 2008 17:41:23 +1000, veritas <coming_s...@yahoo.com>
> not a choice but biologically-genetically pre-determined?
Sometimes the best way to look at it is to turn it completely around
and see how it applies.
For example, the common reference to someone who strongly dislikes or
even hates homosexuals is "homophobic."
Obviously coined by someone who doesn't have a clue about Latin as it
makes nonsense out of the Latin, but I digress...
Getting back to your question.
What if it was determined that homophobia is not a choice but
biologically-genetically pre-determined?
Does that mean some homophobic buy who bashes gays can say, "Look, I
can't help it, God made me this way, and that means there's nothing
wrong with that. You have to respect it."?
I doubt that will be accepted.
Regardless of whether genes incline one to certain behaviors or lock
one into certain behaviors, genetics simply cannot be used as a basis
to judge the morality of actions.
> I must say , a young male member of my wife's family says he has
> homosexual impulses at the age of 15 yrs and it's different when it is
> a family member.Attitudes become less hard more tolerant.
>
> I guess , I want to be just and fair .I would hate to be in the shoes
> of a gay man struggling with Church doctrine .
>
> Some day the Church may be forced to visit this matter.But the
> Episcopalian solution is in open defiance of biblical teaching .
>
> So, I don't know what the solution is to this Gordian knot.I've asked
> my priest who is also my MD and he says that the church is clear.
> And he is the last man I would suspect of being a bigot.
>
> Peter
John Galt
"David" <davec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:e846a804-f2f4-4089...@w5g2000prd.googlegroups.com...
Sure. I've always assumed (without evidence, unless the recent behavior of
Catholic priests, few who were actually 'peophiles' can be taken as a data
point) that the clergy historically has held more than its fair share of
people with homosexual impulses, looking as they would for a way to work out
their salvation through this very difficult matter outside of family and
friends constantly questioning their status as a single person.
At any rate, there are all sorts of genetics that predispose one to sin.
Should homosexuality fit into this category, it does not excuse behavior.
JG
1st Century Apostolic Tradition Endorcer
"David" <davec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:e846a804-f2f4-4089...@w5g2000prd.googlegroups.com...
Is it not the same for heterosexuals, they were made subject to wanting sex
with another also, but God has decreed, only in the confines of marriage is
it to be indulged in.
Thus all sinful fornication and adultery is a matter of SELF-RESTRAINT
whether perverted homo or normal hetro.
> Regardless of whether genes incline one to certain behaviors or lock
> one into certain behaviors, genetics simply cannot be used as a basis
> to judge the morality of actions.
Absolutely true, David.
Some have weakness to thieve things, other to tell many lies, some to
violence, being drukards, that does not mean God's Laws can be broken or
reassessed of their seriousness.
Jeff...
1st Century Apostolic Tradition Endorcer
"John Galt" <whoisj...@bluebottle.com> wrote in message
news:vNRXj.135987$Tj3....@en-nntp-02.dc1.easynews.com...
Correct, human nature in itself is 'genetically' programmed to easily sin,
as the pair in the garden showed, as we want our own way of doing things,
it's only one's determined will-power and conviction that God is right and
must be obeyed, that gives the spiritual man the incentive to try and
restrain ourselves from doing wrong.
Jeff...
"9 The heart is the most deceitful thing there is and desperately wicked.
No one can really know how bad it is! 10 Only the Lord knows! He searches
all hearts and examines deepest motives so he can give to each person his
right reward, according to his deeds--how he has lived."
Jer 17:9-10 (TLB)
Alexander Arnakis
wrote:
>
>I am troubled by the attitude of our church . What if homosexuality is
>not a choice but biologically-genetically pre-determined?
>homosexual impulses at the age of 15 yrs and it's different when it is
>a family member.Attitudes become less hard more tolerant.
>
>I guess , I want to be just and fair .I would hate to be in the shoes
>of a gay man struggling with Church doctrine .
>
>Some day the Church may be forced to visit this matter.But the
>Episcopalian solution is in open defiance of biblical teaching .
>
>So, I don't know what the solution is to this Gordian knot.I've asked
>my priest who is also my MD and he says that the church is clear.
>And he is the last man I would suspect of being a bigot.
>
control what he does *in response* to those desires. It's a matter of
discipline. Just as we don't try to grope every attractive woman that
we encounter on the street (unlike what the Moslems seem to think men
would do), so too homosexuals shouldn't indulge their fantasies.
The evident purpose of sex is procreation. Clearly, homosexual
activity doesn't serve the needs of procreation. It's a dead end as
far as God's plan is concerned. We shouldn't need Scripture to tell us
that.
1st Century Apostolic Tradition Endorcer
"Alexander Arnakis" <inv...@address.none> wrote in message
news:7svv241jb2maus3ml...@4ax.com...
Yes! it's all quite simple really.
Jeff...
Dana Prescott
and really have no intention of having children, but nonetheless find
great value and delight in their personal love and support and
closeness? Where does the "Biblical procreation mandate" factor into
THEIR relationship, and the value they find it it? Of course the
Vatican makes exactly this argument -- that their non-procreative
marital relationship is "sinful and illegitimate" -- and so, not
surprisingly, the Vatican is roundly "laughed out of court" by the
vast majority of young married Catholic heterosexual couples! Whatever
love and support they share in their relationship, it's clear that
faithfully-bonded same-sex couples are perfectly capable of sharing
those qualities as well.
And this isn't even looking at the massive contradiction involved in
out-of-control planetary procreation -- far beyond our means to
physically support such a huge population. The Bible said, "Be
fruitful and multiply". Well, humanity did it. Now we're FULL UP!
Biblical mission accomplished. Time, perhaps, for a rational
assessment of the state of the world -- since it's being overrun with
more babies than we can possible support, short of ruinously stripping
the whole planet down to its life-supporting roots?
As I've said so many times: you don't need to "check your brain at the
door" to be a perfectly faithful professing Anglican Christian.
OrthodoxNews
> On Sat, 17 May 2008 16:39:23 GMT, Alexander Arnakis
> not a choice but biologically-genetically pre-determined?
> I must say , a young male member of my wife's family says he has
> homosexual impulses at the age of 15 yrs and it's different when it is
> a family member.Attitudes become less hard more tolerant.
>
> I guess , I want to be just and fair .I would hate to be in the shoes
> of a gay man struggling with Church doctrine .
>
> Some day the Church may be forced to visit this matter.But the
> Episcopalian solution is in open defiance of biblical teaching .
>
> So, I don't know what the solution is to this Gordian knot.I've asked
> my priest who is also my MD and he says that the church is clear.
> And he is the last man I would suspect of being a bigot.
>
***If we believe the bible is God's Word, then what it teaches, subject to
the Church's interpretation, seems to me to be carved in stone.
OrthodoxNews
condemned in Holy Scripture.
"David" <davec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:e846a804-f2f4-4089...@w5g2000prd.googlegroups.com...
Alexander Arnakis
<high...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>So what about MARRIED HETEROSEXUAL COUPLES who practice birth control,
>and really have no intention of having children, but nonetheless find
>great value and delight in their personal love and support and
>closeness? Where does the "Biblical procreation mandate" factor into
>THEIR relationship, and the value they find it it? Of course the
>Vatican makes exactly this argument -- that their non-procreative
>marital relationship is "sinful and illegitimate" -- and so, not
>surprisingly, the Vatican is roundly "laughed out of court" by the
>vast majority of young married Catholic heterosexual couples! Whatever
>love and support they share in their relationship, it's clear that
>faithfully-bonded same-sex couples are perfectly capable of sharing
>those qualities as well.
>
There's a nexus between hetersexual conduct and procreation, even if
the particular heterosexual acts don't necessarily result in
procreation. That is, the theoretical *possibility* is there, even if
there are factors such as age, medical conditions, the practice of
birth control, etc., that would practically preclude a pregnancy.
Also, heterosexual conduct is a "modeling behavior" or "exemplar" that
would at least prepare the particular couple, or others, for eventual
pregnancy. In other words, it sets a standard.
With homosexual conduct, there's *no* nexus with procreation, not even
a theoretical one. It's self-indulgence, pure and simple. It insults
the God-given standard discernable through Natural Law.
I would add that the Natural Law argument for heterosexuality doesn't
concern itself with the marital status of the participants. That is,
an unmarried couple can procreate as easily as a married one. The
marriage stricture is a social convention, not a biological one,
although there's much to be said for the social stability that arises
from the marital relationship.
I'm not sure that the Vatican would go so far as to condemn all sexual
activity within marriage that did not *necessarily* result in
pregnancy. For example, the Catholic Church is on record as approving
the "rhythm method" of birth control (periodic abstinence during
fertile days). Of course, what the Vatican says is not binding on the
Eastern Orthodox.
>And this isn't even looking at the massive contradiction involved in
>out-of-control planetary procreation -- far beyond our means to
>physically support such a huge population. The Bible said, "Be
>fruitful and multiply". Well, humanity did it. Now we're FULL UP!
>Biblical mission accomplished. Time, perhaps, for a rational
>assessment of the state of the world -- since it's being overrun with
>more babies than we can possible support, short of ruinously stripping
>the whole planet down to its life-supporting roots?
>
So are you proposing as a solution that we substitute homosexual sex
for heterosexual sex? Sure sounds like it! It's possible to restrain
the birth rate while still keeping the model of heterosexual behavior.
Also, there may be overpopulation in some places, but there's clearly
*underpopulation* in others (the former Soviet Union, for example).
Alexander Arnakis
<Orth...@nospam04.net> wrote:
>
>***If we believe the bible is God's Word, then what it teaches, subject to
>the Church's interpretation, seems to me to be carved in stone.
What the Bible teaches just happens to be congruent with Natural Law.
It seems to me that Natural Law is the stronger argument.
OrthodoxNews
"Alexander Arnakis" <inv...@address.none> wrote in message
***Just happens? I think it is rather deliberate by Our Heavenly Father.