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Church of England in turmoil over gay wedding
BillieTheBot
Posts: 8,721 Bot
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article4142107.ece
Pity that, in common with most other religious denominations, the CoE is more concerned with its obsession with homosexuality than with anything else.
Maybe a split is what it needs, so the homophobic nutters can create their own splinter church. Ideally I'd like the CoE disappear altogether, with all other religions, but since that's unlikely to happen in our lifetime it'd be good if the bigots piss off and create their own little club.
Pity that, in common with most other religious denominations, the CoE is more concerned with its obsession with homosexuality than with anything else.
Maybe a split is what it needs, so the homophobic nutters can create their own splinter church. Ideally I'd like the CoE disappear altogether, with all other religions, but since that's unlikely to happen in our lifetime it'd be good if the bigots piss off and create their own little club.
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But if they want my theological opinion (I'm sure they don't), then I have to side with the homophobes. It's quite clear in the scripture. A practicing gay person would be a sinner. Now obviously in Christianity, everyone struggles with sin, but that's quite different from actually accepting it. But Jesus goes even further. On the subject of adultery, for example, he states that you have already sinned if you have thought about committing it. It's not merely enough to follow the Jewish law, you've got to quell your mere desire to break it. Since he was talking about the Jewish law in general and giving examples, I assume that I'm permitted to take this concept as an example to the remainder of the teachings. And so in that context, imo a person who openly lusts after a member of the same sex would be convicting themselves of these thought-crimes in the Christian faith. So a homosexual wedding between two clergymen would be a pretty cut and dry issue to me if I wanted to follow Christianity. But having said that, when was the last time any churches followed what the bible says?
As I'm With Stupid said, the scripture makes it quite clear that homosexuality is a grave sin. Therefore the CoE should not be forced to accept homosexuality.
When it comes to religion, we need to TELL IT LIKE IT IS. We need to stop pretending that the religion accepts something that it clearly doesn't. The fundamentalists will always have the scriptures on their side afterall.
If we tell it like it is, then people will have a very clear choice of whether they wish to accept or reject the teachings of their religion, and I'm quite confident that any sane person in the 21st century would choose to reject.
Only then will these religions die out.
A 'marriage' or 'wedding' is the union between a man and a woman.
If same sex couples wish to give legal status to their partnership, then by all means do so. But don't call it a 'marriage'.
To be honest, I don't think that anyone is forcing them to accept homosexuality. This is an entirely internal struggle. Let's get down to what this is really about: money and power. The church will preach whatever gets them the most bums on seats and the most political influence. Of course there's a delecate balancing act to be done there of constant liberalisation of their interpretation of the bible, and trying not to alienate their existing parishiners. In a way, this is one of the positive things about having a state-funded church. They have to move with general consensus of the population on morality and fit their religion around that, because if they started getting too extreme, then it wouldn't be long before their special status was removed. You can see what happens when it's left to the free market in America. People will go elsewhere to fulfill their spiritual needs, and there will be more than a fair share of the end is nigh, God hates fags, evolution-denying, fire and brimstone pastors to fill the shoes of the CofE. But I'd be more than prepared for that.
Considering that nearly 2 out of 3 'straight' marriages end in divorce, I don't think straights have got the hang of 'marriage' either. The Bible, in almost every situation, forbids divorce so if most straights don't comply, why should they be the sole users of the term?
Because I put it to you and everyone else that virtually nobody who has ever lived has not, at some point, broken at least one of them.
Thus, by that reasoning nobody at all deserves to be married in the Church.
All sins are equal in Christianity. The point isn't the sin, it's the willingness to accept the sin and ask for forgiveness. Accepting your homosexuality and actively engaging in such activities wouldn't be behaviour that suggests asking for forgiveness or even recognising the "sin" in my opinion. Of course the CofE is highly hypocritical in this regard on a hell of a lot of other matters, I'm just giving my opinion based on what the bible itself says.
:yes: Nobody has exclusive use of the term marriage. They were around a long time before Christianity, and will be around a long time after it. They were around a long time before marriage was an exclusive thing for a single man and single woman too. Indeed many states currently accept marriage as being between 1 man and several women (oddly not so much the other way around :chin:). In fact some Christian churches do, or have in the past.
There is nothing in the bible that elevates one sin above another. All have the same punishment and all are forgiven by accepting Jesus. Incidentally, I first heard this from American evangelicals, so it's not an exclusively Catholic concept even in practice.
Basically, my point is that this just says that even breaking one small thing means you can't say you uphold the "law" in its entirety. It doesn't mention whether some things are worse than others.
So why would you assume they are? You have to keep God's law. If you break one part of it, you break all of it. And if you break God's law and don't repent, you go to hell. That seems pretty clear to me.
Rich people, for instance. It says it very clear on the Bible that rich people don't have a hope in hell of going to Heaven. As damning an act as they come. Yet, do we see the Church banning rich people from marrying within the faith unless they renounce their wealth?
And since the homophobes choose to justify their bigotry and prejudice based on a some versicles, most if not all of them confined in the OT, why not choose others? Why accept to marry off people who work on the Sabbath, or who eat shellfish? They should be stoning them to death, not marrying them off!
No. Even by their own rules it does not compute. It is unjustified discrimination and plain bigotry and hatred masquerading as 'the will of God'. It doesn't wash even by the Church's own rules- not for as long as they keep ignoring some 'sins' while concentrating on others.
It says the law must be taken in its entirety or not at all. And the punishment for not obeying the law in its entirety is hell. It doesn't need to explicitly state that they're the same. They're all one law, so by definition, they're all the same.
I don't really see why you're getting so worked up about it anyway... Let people believe whatever they want.
I still feel like it's out of topic in this thread though.
If the church marries off a heterosexual couple who've broken the 10 commandments then that doesn't mean that the church endorses the fact that they broke the 10 commandments. How would the church know that they broke the commandments anyway?
On the other hand, if the church 'marries' off a homosexual couple then they're clearly accepting/endorsing homosexuality, which is completely against the scripture and would enrage God immensely.
I completely agree with the traditionalists who object to this ceremony.
Why the hell would a homosexual couple want to get married in the church anyway?
Like what? Claiming divine responsibility for natural disasters?
So why does the Church welcome rich people and marry them off without a word of protest then? In many cases it is public knowledge they are rich, and they certainly haven't got any intention to give away their wealth to comply with the will of God.
As for why would any gay man want to marry in the church, I guess it's because they are Christian and believe in the message of love Jesus gave, rather than in the disgusting views in the OT promoting sexism, homophobia, racism, violence, murder, slavery and hatred.
Dude, condemning people to hell to facilitate the indoctrination of people into their fruity little club is what the church is all about! This really is their bread and butter.
But that's not what the church is doing. By marrying a heterosexual couple (who happen to be rich), the church is merely commemorating the union of a man and a woman in holy matrimony.
The sin of homosexuality
The sin of being rich.
The scenarios below show how they would compare in regards to the church and what I've mentioned previously:
In scenario 1, the individuals getting married may be sinners, but the church is not endorsing the sin.
In scenario 2, not only are the individuals sinners, but the church is also accepting/endorsing the sin.