Poll: Gay Marriage

[cobra_ky]

If only we could all line up like good little sheep and blindly accept the definition of "freedom" that gets handed out by people like you.
Forcing any ideology on an unwilling people, no matter how pretty it is, is just as bad as when the Church of England tried to force Christianity on the populace (and just as futile).

was the U.S. abolishing slavery just as bad?

 

[kjrubberducky]

Love is not sexual. I love my brother, but I am not gay. I would not marry him. Homosexuality has nothing to do with love; it is a sexual attraction, a.k.a. lust.

Sorry for the disjointed comments. I am a little tired.

THANK YOU.

It delights me when someone realizes that. Sometimes I want to ask others if they know any Greek, because Greek has several different words for 'love', such as brotherly love, sexual love, the love between a husband and wife, and friendship love. There's a good reason for that. Not all love is sexual. I feel sad for people that believe that it is.

We forgive you.

i feel sad for people who believe two husbands can't love each other the same way a husband and wife do. homosexuality has EVERYTHING to do with love.

Two men can love each other as much as they want, but that doesn't make them homosexual. It's SEX that makes it homosexual. Sex != Love.

 

[Lord George]

Love is not sexual. I love my brother, but I am not gay. I would not marry him. Homosexuality has nothing to do with love; it is a sexual attraction, a.k.a. lust.

Sorry for the disjointed comments. I am a little tired.

THANK YOU.

It delights me when someone realizes that. Sometimes I want to ask others if they know any Greek, because Greek has several different words for 'love', such as brotherly love, sexual love, the love between a husband and wife, and friendship love. There's a good reason for that. Not all love is sexual. I feel sad for people that believe that it is.

We forgive you.

i feel sad for people who believe two husbands can't love each other the same way a husband and wife do. homosexuality has EVERYTHING to do with love.

Two men can love each other as much as they want, but that doesn't make them homosexual. It's SEX that makes it homosexual. Sex != Love.

I'd classify someone as gay if they both have a physical and emotional attraction to the same sex. As a gay marriage would be formed out of love for each other not out of lust and that is after all what this threads discussion was about.

 

[Jerious1154]

I believe that in a free country the majority should not be able to vote down the rights of a minority. That's how the oppression of racial minorities and women happened.

Interesting. Because I believe that in a free country, the will of the people is sacrosanct and inviolable. I would much rather be oppressed by the majority than by a small group of people who think they know what's best for me.

Noones trying to tell you what's best for YOU. They're trying to supply equal rights for everyone.

Except voters, apparently.
What part of "inviolable" do you not understand?

The part where the will of the people became so damn sarcosanct. There's nothing sacred about a majority. They're just a bunch of people who happen to agree with each other on one issue. Liberty, Equality and Fraternity - the foundations of any free state - are not built on the invioable will of some amphormous mass. They are built on the rights of each and every damn individual, by god, and if you cannot see the injustice in this I truly despair.

If only we could all line up like good little sheep and blindly accept the definition of "freedom" that gets handed out by people like you.
Forcing any ideology on an unwilling people, no matter how pretty it is, is just as bad as when the Church of England tried to force Christianity on the populace (and just as futile).

What percentage of the American public do you believe was in favor of abolishing slavery in 1855?
What percentage of the South do you believe was in favor of the ruling in Brown v. Board of Education?

 

[Optix334]

I didnt say Marrige was invented in the Bible, i said it was described in the Bible. Homosexuality does not occur in nature. animals establih dominance, not make love. If you do not recognise God as legitimate, there are other things ot look at. If your evolutionist, wouldnt we have evolved a way for homosexuality to have some kind of effect other than aids? if thats not your thing then look at everything else, opposites attract etc etc. Your right about the prop 8 thing i did get it backwards. my bad. People will have to face it someday, homosexuality is not right/natrual/good in any way. And the Bible was written by many different people many dfferent times. Most versions say homosexuality is not right as do most religions. If any love is actually felt in homoseual relationships its because of a chemical imbalance in the brain, otherwise they are probably just mad that daddy didnt love them enough.

 

[Jenny Creed]

People will have to face it someday, homosexuality is not right/natrual/good in any way.

I've been saying that every argument against homosexuals are really about how homosexuals aren't like real people. It's nice that you admit it. I can only complain that you're stating your opinion as if it was fact.

Oh, and that you're saying I'm not right, natural or good in any way. That's not very nice.

The question of what's right and good is very much a matter of perception and hard to debate, but the word "natural" it's very debatable. If we use it to refer to the natural world, I would point out that nature doesn't actually allow things that are unnatural to exist. For example, a giraffe with a neck folded backwards through time is unnatural, because it doesn't exist in the known universe. The act of inserting your penis in someone's butt does occur in nature, and is therefore natural. Trust me, I've studied natural sciences.

 

[Windexglow]

Homosexuality does not occur in nature.

Actually, homosexuality is common in animals. There was some publicized penguins a while back who were both male and nested together. Gay animals though are much rarer than humans, simply because there are a lot more humans than animals.

If your evolutionist, wouldnt we have evolved a way for homosexuality to have some kind of effect other than aids?

Homosexuality is rare enough not to pose a significant threat for that species to evolve ways to avoid it.

People will have to face it someday, homosexuality is not right/natrual/good in any way.

Once again, homosexuality has been documented many times in nature across many species.

Most versions say homosexuality is not right as do most religions.

The bible (and many other books) say a lot of things which are silly today. I don't know about the original bible(Atheist here), but the modern bible was written by humans which makes it incredibly flawed.

If any love is actually felt in homoseual relationships its because of a chemical imbalance in the brain,

Isn't a chemical imbalance in the brain the origin of love itself? Body is flooded with chems when we see our mate, for example.

 

['Stache]

I believe that in a free country the majority should not be able to vote down the rights of a minority. That's how the oppression of racial minorities and women happened.

Interesting. Because I believe that in a free country, the will of the people is sacrosanct and inviolable. I would much rather be oppressed by the majority than by a small group of people who think they know what's best for me.

Noones trying to tell you what's best for YOU. They're trying to supply equal rights for everyone.

Except voters, apparently.
What part of "inviolable" do you not understand?

The part where the will of the people became so damn sarcosanct. There's nothing sacred about a majority. They're just a bunch of people who happen to agree with each other on one issue. Liberty, Equality and Fraternity - the foundations of any free state - are not built on the invioable will of some amphormous mass. They are built on the rights of each and every damn individual, by god, and if you cannot see the injustice in this I truly despair.

If only we could all line up like good little sheep and blindly accept the definition of "freedom" that gets handed out by people like you.
Forcing any ideology on an unwilling people, no matter how pretty it is, is just as bad as when the Church of England tried to force Christianity on the populace (and just as futile).

What percentage of the American public do you believe was in favor of abolishing slavery in 1855?
What percentage of the South do you believe was in favor of the ruling in Brown v. Board of Education?

More than 50%. the only reason those things couldn't be abolished through the democratic process is because a portion of the majority was being denied the vote. If blacks had not been legally/extralegally been prevented from voting, they could have easily voted down slavery.

This is in stark contrast to the gay rights issue, where the vast majority of the population is in opposition to extending certain privileges to a group, even if you include that group in the vote.

Look, I'm all for gay rights, but I care about democracy more. I don't want to live in a country where my vote is considered a suggestion.

EDIT: Wow, that's a lot of quotes.

 

['Stache]

If only we could all line up like good little sheep and blindly accept the definition of "freedom" that gets handed out by people like you.
Forcing any ideology on an unwilling people, no matter how pretty it is, is just as bad as when the Church of England tried to force Christianity on the populace (and just as futile).

was the U.S. abolishing slavery just as bad?

Uh, no, the reason being that that the vast majority of the population supported it (I include slaves in my estimates). By contrast, the vast majority of the US population today opposes gay marriage, even including the votes of homosexuals.

Every time I discuss gay rights, this comparison comes up (usually twice). Let me say here: the two situations are not analagous. Please stop trying to make me out to be a racist.

 

[Skutch]

Only thing I feel like saying to be honest is "The Fall of Rome."

Sigh... so true. It's unfortunate that history may repeat itself.

It's unfortunate you obviously have little knowledge of the history that you are apparently so afraid of.
It took almost one thousand years for Rome to fall, and another thousand after that for the last remnants of it to be conquered. The US has only existed as an independent country for 233 years, has been a world power for less than half of that, and has only been a dominant superpower for the last 60 years. That'd barely be take up a footnote on the pages of human history.
It's also widely accepted that Rome's downfall had more to do with the consolidation of power by military leaders and a succession of horribly inept emperors that eroded the power of the Senate, causing the people to lose their confidence in the strength and integrity of their government. The Western Roman Empire was actually brought down when its own military turned against it.
The assertion that homosexuality or social progression in any way contributed to the downfall of an entire Empire is patently absurd, and is at best disingenuous. It has been well documented that homosexuality was common and socially accepted long before the Roman Empire was even founded. If Rome fell on account of it catching a big ol' case of The Gay, it sure took a while to kick in.
It's a little more telling that it took less than a century after Christianity was adopted as the religion recognized by the state for Rome to collapse, especially considering that adoption resulted in sanctioned persecution of the remaining more socially tolerant, polytheistic religions.

I never said that the US would fall in tomorrow. I simply said that it seems that we are following the same path as Rome, and that will probably end the same way.

But in what way is the US following the same path as Rome?

 

[Skutch]

I didnt say Marrige was invented in the Bible, i said it was described in the Bible. Homosexuality does not occur in nature. animals establih dominance, not make love. If you do not recognise God as legitimate, there are other things ot look at. If your evolutionist, wouldnt we have evolved a way for homosexuality to have some kind of effect other than aids? if thats not your thing then look at everything else, opposites attract etc etc. Your right about the prop 8 thing i did get it backwards. my bad. People will have to face it someday, homosexuality is not right/natrual/good in any way. And the Bible was written by many different people many dfferent times. Most versions say homosexuality is not right as do most religions. If any love is actually felt in homoseual relationships its because of a chemical imbalance in the brain, otherwise they are probably just mad that daddy didnt love them enough.

Homosexuality refers to sexual as well as romantic attraction, and that does happen in nature. A lot. Where your statements contradict your own purported faith is that you are referring to gay Love, which the bible never mentions at all. The only thing the bible even refers to is gay SEX.
And I don't know what kind of biology you've studied, but animals (including people) have sex for the purpose of propagating the species or because they find it pleasurable (people, certain primates, some marine mammals). Dominance only enters into it the case of the more social animals, and even then it is a method to ensure the furthering of ones own genes over those of competitors.
You know what else is not natural? Technology. Every tool ever invented and used by man. Buildings. Cheese. Bread. Wine. Cooked meat. Pretty much everything we eat. Guns aren't at all natural. The internet certainly isn't. Herding and breeding other animals isn't natural at all. There's lots of that kind of stuff in the bible.
Religion isn't natural either. If it was, it wouldn't have to be taught. We would all be born knowing and believing. It would be instinct.
Still. It must be really convenient to be able to pick and choose what parts of reality to acknowledge, and to have an ideology that allows you to get away with never thinking things through for yourself.

 

[Lady Nilstria]

Homosexuality refers to sexual as well as romantic attraction, and that does happen in nature. A lot. Where your statements contradict your own purported faith is that you are referring to gay Love, which the bible never mentions at all. The only thing the bible even refers to is gay SEX.
And I don't know what kind of biology you've studied, but animals (including people) have sex for the purpose of propagating the species or because they find it pleasurable (people, certain primates, some marine mammals). Dominance only enters into it the case of the more social animals, and even then it is a method to ensure the furthering of ones own genes over those of competitors.
You know what else is not natural? Technology. Every tool ever invented and used by man. Buildings. Cheese. Bread. Wine. Cooked meat. Pretty much everything we eat. Guns aren't at all natural. The internet certainly isn't. Herding and breeding other animals isn't natural at all. There's lots of that kind of stuff in the bible.
Religion isn't natural either. If it was, it wouldn't have to be taught. We would all be born knowing and believing. It would be instinct.
Still. It must be really convenient to be able to pick and choose what parts of reality to acknowledge, and to have an ideology that allows you to get away with never thinking things through for yourself.

Ah, I can't help myself. I'm numbering my argument for the ease of myself.

1. I shall refer you to Leviticus 18:22-25, and Matthew 5:27-30. Therefore, not only is the act terrible in and of itself, but even doing something terrible in your heart is as good as doing it. Since adultery was what was referred to as an example, I used it, since that is also a sexual sin.

2. God shouldn't have to mention it. If He did write out every sin, the list would go on and on. As humans, the only creatures ever to be made in His likeness, and with an eternal spirit given by Him, God does expect us to have a bit of common sense. It's not His fault if we don't, but of course, that's one reason why He's there. To remind us what common sense and morality are.

3. Please reference these assumed biological studies so that I may study them and thus deal with them in a mature manner befitting this argument.

4. Refer to Genesis 1:26, 1:28-30. Secondly, what about technology is unnatural? There are several definitions to the word 'natural', so please specify to which one you are referring. (I assume you are using def. 2 and or 10-12 in the Merriam-Webster; whereas I am using 6 and 12b.) God is a God of creation. He loves to make new and exciting things. As His children, I see no reason why we shouldn't gladly do the same.

4. That's right! Religion is not natural. Which is why I love being a Christian so much. I'll let you think about how contradictory that sounds, while it actually isn't.

5. To quote part of Hosea 4:6- My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge...

Supplementary reading: Romans 1:26-32

 

[cobra_ky]

Uh, no, the reason being that that the vast majority of the population supported it (I include slaves in my estimates). By contrast, the vast majority of the US population today opposes gay marriage, even including the votes of homosexuals.

Every time I discuss gay rights, this comparison comes up (usually twice). Let me say here: the two situations are not analagous. Please stop trying to make me out to be a racist.

i'm not trying to accuse you of racism, it's just the most of the precedent in America had to do with racial issues. school segregation and anti-miscegenation laws were both overturned by the supreme court, regardless of the will of the people, because they violated the 14th amendment. I'd argue that gay marriage bans do the same, but that's obviously up for debate.

Regardless of the constitutional issues, however, gay marriage bans are much more likely to be overturned by legislative than judicial action. if you oppose gay marriage, then i suggest you vote for representatives who share your views. Of course, since support for gay marriage rights is consistently growing, especially among younger voters, in a few decades the point will be moot.

 

[Dioxide20]

Only thing I feel like saying to be honest is "The Fall of Rome."

Sigh... so true. It's unfortunate that history may repeat itself.

It's unfortunate you obviously have little knowledge of the history that you are apparently so afraid of.
It took almost one thousand years for Rome to fall, and another thousand after that for the last remnants of it to be conquered. The US has only existed as an independent country for 233 years, has been a world power for less than half of that, and has only been a dominant superpower for the last 60 years. That'd barely be take up a footnote on the pages of human history.
It's also widely accepted that Rome's downfall had more to do with the consolidation of power by military leaders and a succession of horribly inept emperors that eroded the power of the Senate, causing the people to lose their confidence in the strength and integrity of their government. The Western Roman Empire was actually brought down when its own military turned against it.
The assertion that homosexuality or social progression in any way contributed to the downfall of an entire Empire is patently absurd, and is at best disingenuous. It has been well documented that homosexuality was common and socially accepted long before the Roman Empire was even founded. If Rome fell on account of it catching a big ol' case of The Gay, it sure took a while to kick in.
It's a little more telling that it took less than a century after Christianity was adopted as the religion recognized by the state for Rome to collapse, especially considering that adoption resulted in sanctioned persecution of the remaining more socially tolerant, polytheistic religions.

I never said that the US would fall in tomorrow. I simply said that it seems that we are following the same path as Rome, and that will probably end the same way.

But in what way is the US following the same path as Rome?

The citizens are slowly realizing that they can vote themselves more money. People are figuring that, "Hell i don't need to work, I can just live off the governments dollar." Politicians aren't doing anything radical because if they don't get reelected they lose their seat of power. The businesses are outsourcing every possible part of their development cycle, meaning less jobs for people and as a result less money to buy the products the companies are producing. Politicians are catering to anybody to get more votes for themselves. The list goes on...

 

[Shaoken]

Gay marriage, you say? Why, this stems all the way back to Sodom and Gommorah. I doubt it's going to stop any time soon.
Not to say that I agree with it, because I most assuredly don't. I'm Christian, and since the Bible says the following:

1 Cor. 6:9, 12-20:

Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.
And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
"Everything is permissible for me"-but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible for me"-but I will not be mastered by anything.
"Food for the stomach and the stomach for food"-but God will destroy them both. The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.
By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also.
Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself? Shall I then take the members of Christ and unite them with a prostitute? Never!
Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, "The two will become one flesh." [fn]
But he who unites himself with the Lord is one with him in spirit.
Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body.
Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own;
you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.


Therefore, I vehementally oppose homosexuality. Not because of personal opinion, or the Constitution, or tolerance, but because my God says so. I do not hate homosexuals, please do not misunderstand. I hate the deed, not the person.

Sadly your arguement is flawed from the getgo. Do you realise how long the stories from the Bible were passed down verbally before being committed to paper? Imagine a game of Chinese Whispers, except the whisper is much longer and the chain lasts from decades-to-hundreds of years. And then you get to the originators of the stories; humans. Ordanary humans. And a key part of being human is making mistakes. Ergo you are putting 100% stock in the retellings of the stories of a man who might have screwed up in his original story, or had a faulty memory of one part. Even the various Churches don't take the Bible as the Word of God, they acknowledge it's man's interpretation of the word of God (since in order for it to actually be the Word of God, YWHY would of had to have written it).

And that's not even getting into all the alternations done after it was written. For instance; Sodom and Gommorah. You used it as proof that homosexuallity is wrong, because those cities were destroyed because it allowed Homosexuals (yet somehow Canada, New Zealand, those 3 US states, etc. etc. seem to be doing much better then it's neighbours socially). Did you know however that God destroying those cities for Homosexuality was only invented just shy of 2000 years ago? Christians interpretted the stories that way, but the original Jewish veiw was that those cities were destroyed for their lack of hospitality (if you're interested, Islam subscibes to both views). And let's not forget that the only just man in Gommorah was the one who turned his daughters over to a mob to get raped. So already your main point is shot out of the water.

And let's get into the other sections where Homosexuality is specifically brought up; Leviticus. A lot of religious arguements comes from this section, yet everyone who brings it up is being a massive hypocrite, because there are a lot of other laws in that part of the bible, yet the only ones subscribed to today are the parts against Homosexuality and Masturbation. None of them stone people who work on the Sabbath (day God rested, Saturday for Judaism, Sunday for Christianity. Islam's Holy Day is on Friday, but they don't believe God rested), none of them see it proper to sell daughters into slavery, they can wear clothing made of two different fibres etc. etc. The other big one is Paul's view on homosexuality. Of course though, he's human so he makes mistakes; he interpretted Homosexuality as a product of an immoral lifestyle. Again, the fact that all the areas that have legalised Gay Marriage have not descended into a cesspool of immorality; Paul fell into the Corralation Fallacy. He believed that the homosexual acts caused an immoral lifestyle, when in reality it's just that he found some immoral people that engaged in homosexual acts. A similar example would be if he said that a stone he found kept away lions; the stone is there and there are no lions. He proved a corrolation, but not causation.

Plus, Paul had issues when it came to sex, and considered it to be an immoral act. Best not to take his biased view on the matter too seriously.

And for the record...anybody remember Adam and Eve? First marriage.

Adam and Eve were just a metaphor, they never really existed in the first place. Besides, part of the point of that story was that women were inferior to men (Lilith, Adam's first wife, was cast out of Eden and cursed to lose her children because she would not submit to Adam despite both of them being made the same way. And Eve of course, ate the forbidden fruit of knowledge.). So not only do you have a sexist creation story which has been disproved completely by science (not that it had a chance of being true anyway; an all-powerful being limited to thinking only in 24 hour days?), it was also the first divorce and justification for women being second-class citizens.

 

[Shaoken]

Look, I'm all for gay rights, but I care about democracy more. I don't want to live in a country where my vote is considered a suggestion.

Your country is not a true democracy. There are plenty of provisions in it to prevent the majority from supressing the minority. So your arguement about caring about democracy more doesn't hold water; there are certain rights that should be protected, majority be damned. Need I go on about all the times where people's rights were held down because the majority didn't think they should have them?

Every time I discuss gay rights, this comparison comes up (usually twice). Let me say here: the two situations are not analagous. Please stop trying to make me out to be a racist.

The problem is that the two situations are at the very least analagous, or rather the Civil Rights and Gay rights movements are. The arguements against the former and the arguements against the latter are very similar.

 

[Lady Nilstria]

*snip*

There's no way that I can convince you otherwise, because cynicism is what it is. I can tell that you seriously believe what you're saying. I admire such conviction. There are people more qualified then myself to defend the Bible, but the way I see it, the Bible defends itself. You can believe that the Bible is an interpretation and not the divine Word of God. Can't stop you there.

Ever heard of Barbara Cartland? She used to be a romance author before she died. Anyway, she never actually wrote her stories down. She laid out on her couch, turned on a tape recorder, spoke the entire story, and then gave it to an assistant to put on paper. It cannot be said that they were not her creations just because she wasn't the one who wrote it down.

On to your misinterpretation of my saying of Sodom and Gomorrah. I didn't say they were destroyed because of homosexuality. That was probably assumed because of this thread, but that would be erroneous. You know, I'm surprised that I haven't brought up Ezekial yet. Huh. Could have sworn that I had. Anyway, Ezekial says the true reason why those two cities were destroyed.

Ezekial 16:49- Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy.

By that, we can assume that homosexuality was a byproduct, not the actual cause.

I've never heard of this Lilith. Where did you hear of her? I'm quite curious. Message me, please, because that would be off topic in this thread.

Also, Eve was taken from Adam's side, not his head, or his feet. What about that is sexist? God made them as equals.

Lastly, if you are right about all of this, none of us are any the worse for it. Good for you. Really. However, if I am right, which I most whole heartedly believe I am, you are not going to be happy with the consequences. Having said that, as a Christian, I will pray for you, because I don't want that result for you. God doesn't either.

Thank you for debating with me in a mature manner. I'm glad this thread hasn't resulted in a flame war.

 

[cobra_ky]

Ah, I can't help myself. I'm numbering my argument for the ease of myself.

1. I shall refer you to Leviticus 18:22-25, and Matthew 5:27-30. Therefore, not only is the act terrible in and of itself, but even doing something terrible in your heart is as good as doing it. Since adultery was what was referred to as an example, I used it, since that is also a sexual sin.

i've never been 100% sure of this, since i'm not a christian theologian, but it seems to me that the prohibitions against homosexuality in leviticus are judicial or ceremonial precepts, which according to Aquinas applied only until the coming of Christ. Again, i'm not sure if i'm interpreting it right and if you're not roman catholic you may not even care.

of course, this is all mostly irrelevant to the legal question over gay marriage.

 

[Lady Nilstria]

i've never been 100% sure of this, since i'm not a christian theologian, but it seems to me that the prohibitions against homosexuality in leviticus are judicial or ceremonial precepts, which according to Aquinas applied only until the coming of Christ. Again, i'm not sure if i'm interpreting it right and if you're not roman catholic you may not even care.

of course, this is all mostly irrelevant to the legal question over gay marriage.

You have a point. I have been straying from the legal aspect. Though, I am merely giving my reasons why I think it should be illegal.

For the record, I'm not Catholic. (Just in case you were curious.) ^__^

 

[Shaoken]

Ever heard of Barbara Cartland? She used to be a romance author before she died. Anyway, she never actually wrote her stories down. She laid out on her couch, turned on a tape recorder, spoke the entire story, and then gave it to an assistant to put on paper. It cannot be said that they were not her creations just because she wasn't the one who wrote it down.

I wouldn't say this is a fair comparison, since Barbara is dictating the story still. It would be more akin to Barbara living out these stories, having these stories witnesses by several people, and having those people verbally retell them for a few generations before it is committed to paper. And that isn't a completely accurate comparison either because the Bible deals with the divine. So take my above example and add in supernatural elements that defy the explanations of the witnesses and factor that in.

A good example is the story of the Great Flood. Virtually every ancient culture has a story of a Great Flood (and science has proven that a lot of the Earth was flooded a long time ago). So you have what is most likely multiple explanations of a single event. So in this case imagine another group of people watching Barbara and her adventures, but seeing them from a different angle. Their stories would turn out differently from the first groups.

On to your misinterpretation of my saying of Sodom and Gomorrah. I didn't say they were destroyed because of homosexuality. That was probably assumed because of this thread, but that would be erroneous. You know, I'm surprised that I haven't brought up Ezekial yet. Huh. Could have sworn that I had. Anyway, Ezekial says the true reason why those two cities were destroyed.

Ezekial 16:49- Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy.

By that, we can assume that homosexuality was a byproduct, not the actual cause.[/i]

Maybe, of course we get back to interpretation. I doubt God explained it's actions; (sidenote: I try to refer to God in gender-neutral terms, since Mosses said that God has no physical form and gender is a mortal concern) apart of the point of the Book of Job is that God owes humans no explaniations for it's actions.

I've never heard of this Lilith. Where did you hear of her? I'm quite curious. Message me, please, because that would be off topic in this thread.

I've heard from her from several sources, and there are quite a few different versions of the story. I'll message you with the specific one.

Also, Eve was taken from Adam's side, not his head, or his feet. What about that is sexist? God made them as equals.

See the Lilith story, but basically it's because Eve was made from Adam's rib, hence she's a derivitive of Adam. If Eve was equal to Adam, she would have been made directly from the Earth.

Lastly, if you are right about all of this, none of us are any the worse for it. Good for you. Really. However, if I am right, which I most whole heartedly believe I am, you are not going to be happy with the consequences. Having said that, as a Christian, I will pray for you, because I don't want that result for you. God doesn't either.

In my situation I started to move away from mainstream Christianity (I'd be an agnostic if I didn't believe in Christ as the Messiah) is that I find it to have a too simplistic view of Good and Evil, too much black and white and not enough of the gray that you find in existence. But that would be much better suited in a topic about Good and Evil.

Thank you for debating with me in a mature manner. I'm glad this thread hasn't resulted in a flame war.

Small Miracle, considering the emotions connected to this issue. The Pro-Gay Marriage side view it as an attack of the human rights of homosexuals, and the Pro-Religious side view it as an attack on marriage. And factor in the other sides to the issue and it gets a lot more murky.

Although I will say that the religious arguement that their stance is protecting marriage is faulty; what they are doing is defining Marriage. Defending Marriage would be to protect it against divorce, which pretty much directly stabs Marriage in the metaphorical heart.