wade-w

I notice you decided to ignore my larger point about your habit of criticizing other poster's spelling.

Criticizing your opponents spelling and/or grammar amounts to an ad hominem fallacy. You will find that around here, continually making the same fallacies is not going to win you any points. I would advise you to stop. You have also referred to the strawman fallacy, though for the life of me, I couldn't see how it applied.

I suggest you peruse a book or article on logical fallacies. There is a good reference in the secweb library.

danielius

Being the eldest child from a family of nine, I think I would have to disagree with your claim that I have no idea of what motherhood is like (though naturally you have the edge!)

To have dignity is to be worthy of respect. I respect mothers more than anyone else. More than kings, more than presidents, more than high-falutin' businesspeople, more than celebrities etc.

I did not say that the five pillars were all that Islam is comprised of. And I am anything but dismissive of Islam. My best friend of thirteen years is a Muslim, I've read and found exceedingly beautiful much of the Quran, I've listened to my friend give the call to prayer in Arabic, I've long studied and admired large parts of the Islamic faith. By the way, Karen Armstrong's biography on Muhammad is excellent, precisely because it is balanced and fair, and I have really enjoyed reading it.

I haven't changed it. As I say, if there are verses in the Bible which you feel contradict my position, please give the necessary references and I'll look into them for you.

Jinto, I would like to apologise to you for criticising your spelling.

That's the first thing. As to the above point, which we will now complete moving on from, I was talking your argument over with my partner, who matter-of-factly pointed out that he does the same thing at work everyday - he also writes one thing while thinking or discussing another. However, he pointed out that what he is actually doing is darting from one distinct line of thought to another and back again, often at split-seconds. One of the miracles of the brain. Still, this is what I had thought myself and appreciated his own feedback. It may simply be impossible to know for sure whether in the course of doing two or more things at once, you are actually doing them somehow simultaneously on multiple paths of thought, or actually jumping very, very quickly from one path to another path and back again. I support the latter view. But enough of this...

Re: Love and Freedom

I assert again that love requires commitment, but that love and freedom are not incompatible. Loving my partner, being committed to him (and not therefore to other men), gives me the freedom to love him completely and unconditionally.

How can I be sure that my beliefs aren't just conditioning? Well, for one thing, we are all conditioned in some way and to some extent by our beliefs/peer group etc. I'm aware that it happens, though I would say that I am one of the least likely people to believe something just because other people believe it. I do test my views and beliefs, do examine them thoughtfully and critically. I do expose myself to other viewpoints, such as your own.

Peer pressure just isn't a factor. I'm self-employed so I spend most of my time at home. I don't even go to church regularly (I don't have a car and the nearest church is one hour walk away). My best friend is a Muslim, my parents and family are generally atheist/agnostic. My cats are wonderful, but they don't influence my thinking that much either

'I am I' is a meaningless statement. You might as well have made it a little more poetical and written: 'I am I am I'.

I think an old African proverb has it right: 'I am because we are'.

Jinto, I don't let other people 'dictate' my identity. Relationship, including that between net forum correspondents, is a two-way consensual thing.

I believe in mitigated free will, and in mitigated personal responsibility.

My core identity is fixed - my mother will not stop being my mother (even when she dies), I will always be her child. I will always be my father's son.

I am made up of many, many different relationships, of varying strengths. Some of these relationships will not be adequately supported and will diminish over time, others will be regularly reaffirmed and remain strong. It is not the number of relationships (which is in fact very many), but the unique context which arises from their combination. I share the same relationship to my friend as he does to me, yet we are very different people. I hold that this is because it is not just the relationship we share that matters, but how it interacts with the other relationships in each other's life.

It is impossible that 'everyone decides you ought to be a certain person' so this argument is not really something that can be reasonably addressed. Suffice it to say, the other person(s) in relationship with me are as affected by the relationship with me as I am by the relationship with them.

No-one earns an award by themselves. No actor walks onto a set that they have planned, organised, created themselves or reads words they have prepared, selected and written themselves. Do they talk to themselves? Do they interact with themselves? Did they teach themselves (no books, nothing) by themselves how to act when they were younger? It's entirely appropriate that they thank others for their award.

By the way, just because you barely remember someone doesn't mean you don't owe a debt of gratitude to them. I don't really remember my grandparents very much (I was a teenager when they died), but I still think of them and know that I owe them a lot.

But this is an appeal to precedent, it speaks nothing to the principle at hand. If we arrested everyone who was guilty of breaking the law, we would have to arrest every single person. The courts are obliged to be unfair, but it doesn't mean the rest of us stop being guilty.

No, I never said that humanity was fundamentally evil. However, we know things, such as that children are dying every day in Africa from HIV/aids, and yet a very many of us do nothing - nothing - about it. Do we donate money to charity? No. Do we campaign for better government funding for aids research? No. Do we lobby corporations for more equal access to life-saving medication? No. This is what I meant when I said that our knowledge outweighs our compassion. We know these things happen, but we do nothing about them, unless they affect us directly (one of our siblings adopts an African orphan with HIV for example).

Being equal does not mean being the same. Of course, we are all different. However, in essentials we are as loving, as reliable, as complex, as unique as everyone else. Many have used the idea of inequality in the past to justify their positions: Hitler said that the Jews were not equal to the Aryan Germans (we know where that viewpoint led), Eugenists argued that the poor were not equal to the wealthy (the poor should not be allowed to reproduce they said - even today many non-christians hold this view).

I hold that a Jew can be just as faithful and devout as a Muslim or a Christian, that a poor mother can be just as loving as a rich mother. Not only aristocrats can govern, so can grocer's daughters or circus acrobat's sons. In the event of an emergency, a florist or baker can be just as much heroes as a police or fireman.

We are all equal in our humanity. This is a fundamentally Christian view, I hold it is a fundamentally reasonable view and have given some indication why above (I'm more than happy to develop my arguments further if the point is seriously disputed by the atheists here).

Source: http://www.studylight.org/com/bcc/vi...le&chapter=027

Yes, I am orthodox - I believe in the divinity, bodily resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ. Many 'liberal' Christians dispute even this much. I wanted to make it clear that I was not a 'liberal' Christian, but am instead very happy with the 2,000 year new version.

Christianity isn't an 'organisation'. And as I have said before, anti-gay feelings seem to be not limited to the church or even religion in general - I've come across many atheists who were against the idea that homosexuality is an okay thing.

Danielius

Biff the unclean

Yes, I am orthodox - I believe in the divinity, bodily resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ. Many 'liberal' Christians dispute even this much. I wanted to make it clear that I was not a 'liberal' Christian, but am instead very happy with the 2,000 year new version.
Then if you are happy with the 2000 year old version you must reject the changes that the Liberal Christians have adopted in only the last twenty to twenty-five years. Meaning that the unconditional love you and your partner feel for one another is a mortal sin against God and an abomination against man by your own avowed philosophy.

Christianity isn't an 'organisation'. And as I have said before, anti-gay feelings seem to be not limited to the church or even religion in general - I've come across many atheists who were against the idea that homosexuality is an okay thing.
But you have never found an Atheist who has said it was a sin and that you would burn in the pit of Hell forever because of it.
The Orthodox Church considers it not only a mortal sin but a crime worthy of capital punishment. Need I remind you that a slanderous term for Gays is "Faggot?" A faggot has nothing to do with homosexuality but is a bundle of twigs whose sole purpose is to be burned. The term comes from the Orthodox Christian Churches standard treatment of homosexuals. Burning them alive to send them to the fires of Hell. I wouldn't say that Orthodox Christianity in their Christ like ways thought being gay was just not an "okay thing" they are a tad more forceful than that.

Danielius, you might be fooling yourself but not us. You claim to be an Orthodox Christian and you claim it is a reasonable world-view but you have had to change what it preaches in your own mind to make it reasonable for you.
By your own need to change it you have demonstrated that it is not a reasonable world-view.

AJ113

Or a meatball. A faggot is also a meatball. But I don't think this fact really helps, does it?

Wait! meatballs can be fried in oil.................

danielius

To Biff...

I am not arguing on behalf of any church, but for Christianity. Therefore, if you really do believe (as clearly you do) that the Christian religion teaches explicitly that homosexuality is an abomination and all gay men will go to hell for it, I would like to see passages from the Bible, with references, to support that contention. I'm not saying that there aren't passages in the Bible that might be interpreted as being anti-gay, just that as you keep on this, and now assert that it proves Christianity's unreasonableness, I would like to see you provide evidence for such an assertion.

Appeals to precedent are often anything but compelling. Homosexuality has always been a hot potato for people, christian or otherwise, as it seems to go against evolution/biological norms etc.

I have used the word 'orthodox' to describe my christianity as being fully in line with the major dogmas and doctrines of the Christian faith (including Christ's divinity, bodily resurrection, ascension etc.) It does not mean that I subscribe to the views or interpretations of those commonly known as the 'Christian right'.

Danielius

Amaranth

I can't wait to see what kind of dodges come out of this!

From the King James Verion (KJV) and New International Version (NIV) respectively:



Leviticus 18:22

NIV - Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable.

KJV - Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.




Leviticus 20:13

NIV - If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.

KJV - If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.




Romans 1:27

NIV - In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.

KJV - And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.


Pretty unequivocal, which makes it all the more fun waiting to see how they will be twisted.

Biff the unclean

I am not arguing on behalf of any church, but for Christianity. Therefore, if you really do believe (as clearly you do) that the Christian religion teaches explicitly that homosexuality is an abomination and all gay men will go to hell for it, I would like to see passages from the Bible, with references, to support that contention.

If you insist, there is---
If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them. -- Lev.20:13

Then you have Genesis 13:13, 19:4-5, 24-25, Leviticus 18:22 &20:13, Deuteronomy 22:5, 23:17-18, 1 Samuel 18:1-4, 19:2, 20:30 & 20:41, 2 Samuel 1:26, 1 Kings 14:24, 15:12, 22:43 &46, 2Kings 23:7, Isaiah 3:9, Joel 3:3, Romans 1:26-28, 1:31-32 where Paul says that Gays and even their supporters are "worthy of death", 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, 1 Timothy 1:10, 2 Timothy 3:3, Jude 1:7-8, and to wrap it up Revelation 22:13 where Saint John the Divine calls Gays "dogs" and condemns them to Hell (making them hot dogs?)

I'm sure that I've missed a few but these should be a good start.

I am not arguing on behalf of any church, but for Christianity.
I'm not arguing against any church but against Christianity.

I'm not saying that there aren't passages in the Bible that might be interpreted as being anti-gay, just that as you keep on this, and now assert that it proves Christianity's unreasonableness, I would like to see you provide evidence for such an assertion.
What I am asserting is that YOU think that Christianity is unreasonable because YOU are the one who changes what it says.
Myself I think it's unreasonable because it cannot produce a God or any evidence that Jesus ever lived aside from killing anyone who speaks against them. I try to make my arguments against it by sticking strictly only with the claims it makes. I can't help but notice that Christians rarely if ever do this.

I have used the word 'orthodox' to describe my christianity as being fully in line with the major dogmas and doctrines of the Christian faith (including Christ's divinity, bodily resurrection, ascension etc.) It does not mean that I subscribe to the views or interpretations of those commonly known as the 'Christian right'.
You really have to make a choice here. You can either keep your cake or you can eat it. You can't hold Liberal views and still call yourself Orthodox. If your Christianity is fully in line with the major doctrines then you must consider yourself (now let's see what's that word the bible uses?) an "abomination." If you don't think that you are an abomination then you are a Liberal Christian whether you like it or not.

danielius

On the Romans verse...

An extensive article on the verse, including the above quote, can be read at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontl...e/boswell.html

On Leviticus passages...

Another extensive article on Leviticus and homosexuality can be found at http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/4497/indexlev.html

Danielius

Bill Snedden

To be completely fair, "Orthodox" in the context of "Christian" means that one is either:

A) a member of the Eastern or Greek "Orthodox" Christian churches

B) a subscriber in a base set of doctrines that describes what it means to be Christian. That would be, properly speaking, one of the various creeds, or belief statements (the Apostles Creed, the Nicene Creed, St. Athanasius' Creed, etc).

"Orthodox" in the sense of B is usually spelled with a lower-case "o" to avoid confusion.

To be perfectly fair, there's nothing in orthodox Christianity that ascribes any status, negative or positive, to homosexuality as such. You probably meant to say mainstream Christianity, as interpreted by mainstream or mainline denominations. The majority are certainly condemnatory of homosexuality, but that says nothing necessarily about Christianity per se.

We as non-Christians have a tendency to speak of "Christians" as though they were some sort of single body of believers with one set of doctrines. But that's no more true of Christians than it is of atheists! Christianity has no unitary doctrine outside of the creeds, which really don't specify a lot of the things we ascribe to "Christians".

my apologies if this was covered in the thread previously and I didn't read it!

Danielus -

Now, to ensure that this is "on-topic", when one asks "Is Christianity a reasonable world-view" it becomes necessary to ask, "What do you mean by Christianity?" Do you mean the set of statements laid down in the Nicene Creed? (for example).

Regards,

Bill Snedden

P.S. I've heard some anecdotal information that Boswell's scholarship wasn't exactly the best. Not sure of how true it is, so take it with a grain of salt. Knowledgeable persons with whom I've discussed this have recommended Robin Scroggs' The New Testament and Homosexuality as a clear, unbiased approach. I have the book and have found it to be rather good (if somewhat dry). It deals peripherally with the OT (in how they informed later Jewish writers) and makes an excellent case (IMO) for the important difference between what the Jewish Hellenistic writers would have understood homosexuality to be and what modern homosexuality actually is (IOW, what Paul was really condemning).

Biff the unclean

Twist what the bible says all you want, I could care less. Just don't pretend that you consider it to be reasonable when you don't
Saint Paul didn't want the "wrong people" butt f**king? That's believable…yeah right. All of those "straight" people having same sex sex must have been confusing.
It's too bad you aren't Jewish, you could sing the Nazis praises too.

When my kids were little one of their favorites was the "Frog & Toad" series of books by Arnold Lobel. In it a great big snake looks at the heroes and says "Hello Lunch" By calling them "Lunch" he left no doubt about his intentions. For two thousand years Gays have been "Faggots" to Christians again leaving no doubt as to intentions.