The Christian Discussion Thread X: Originally there were 15

[Tarsonis]

Yes. And if you go back and find it you’ll see I was the one arguing that point.

The "Should Children by told about Hell" thread.

From my own personal viewpoint its not a problem though. But alas I am not a christian.

Eh okay might not have been me then, you can go back through the CDT and find me arguing that point. Hell is not the fiery place where demons torment you in accordance with your sins for all eternity. All that medieval imagery was more allegorical to demonstrate the pain of being in hell. The true pain of hell so being cut off from the presence of God. It’s like being thirsty and unable to drink, hungry and unable to eat, for all eternity.

[Tarsonis]

Alright at this point autocorrect is getting the best of me. I need to sleep. Good night all and blessings to you .

[Duhon]

An eternal punishment for acts in a mortal life isn't corrective when you have literally no chance to escape punishment and act on your corrections. That's punitive.

As I said, hell is not punitive, it’s forfeiture. Heaven is freely accessible to you, you have but to grasp it.

Frankly, this is why I wouldn't be an adherent to your god, proof or no. At least in rejection I can have some semblance of happiness in my existence, however cosmicly brief.

Quite possibly the dumbest thing I’ve heard but you do you boo boo

well
assuming you are discussing what i think you guys are discussing
this would be forfeiting not just a significant part of life, but literally someone's life from being lived

[Tarsonis]

As I said, hell is not punitive, it’s forfeiture. Heaven is freely accessible to you, you have but to grasp it.



Quite possibly the dumbest thing I’ve heard but you do you boo boo

well
assuming you are discussing what i think you guys are discussing
this would be forfeiting not just a significant part of life, but literally someone's life from being lived

And thus Essau forfeited his inheritance of all Israel, for a bowl of lentil soup

[Duhon]

well
assuming you are discussing what i think you guys are discussing
this would be forfeiting not just a significant part of life, but literally someone's life from being lived

And thus Essau forfeited his inheritance of all Israel, for a bowl of lentil soup

1) It's "Esau". And now that I'm not obligated by sheer abritary compulsion to go grammarian on you --

2) edom still got a sweet deal though

[Paleoconservative Citizens]

The "Should Children by told about Hell" thread.

From my own personal viewpoint its not a problem though. But alas I am not a christian.

Eh okay might not have been me then, you can go back through the CDT and find me arguing that point. Hell is not the fiery place where demons torment you in accordance with your sins for all eternity. All that medieval imagery was more allegorical to demonstrate the pain of being in hell. The true pain of hell so being cut off from the presence of God. It’s like being thirsty and unable to drink, hungry and unable to eat, for all eternity.

Hell is literal fire, but the worst part of it all is separation from God. In the story of the Rich Man and Lazarus, the rich man asked Abraham to send Lazarus to dip his finger in water and cool his tongue. Separation from God would not make you want water to cool your tongue, and Jesus talks about the Fires of Hell many times:

And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: it is better for thee to enter into life with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire.
Matthew 18:9 KJV

Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:
Matthew 25:41 KJV

And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.
Luke 16:24 KJV

[Nioya]

This argument is bellied by the fact that all evidence supports that it was St. Paul himself who originated the word, and all those other uses would be derivatives of the word, so they’re not necessarily indicative of St. Paul’s usage of the word. What is immediately graspable is that Saul of Tarsus was a Hellenized Jew and self professed Pharisee having intensive knowledge of the Scriptures in both Hebrew and Greek. The words arseno and koitai were not incidentally picked, but rather are the exact words used in the Septuagint translations of Leviticus. καὶ μετὰ ἄρσενος οὐ κοιμηθήσῃ κοίτην γυναικός βδέλυγμα γάρ ἐστιν.

You seem to have made a mistake in every single clause of this statement.

I) All the evidence? What evidence? There is no evidence St. Paul invented it himself. There doesn't seem to be much evidence anyone used it before him but we don't know if anyone did or not. He could have gotten it from someone else. II) There's no evidence to suggest Paul based this word he allegedly invented off the Septuagint. The words in question are used together but not joined. That's far from some smoking gun piece of philology. III) "all those other uses would be derivatives of the word" What? So there's this word no one knows the meaning of but this one guy used it and they all copied him so every other usage is invalid and can't tell us what it means? Do you not see the leaps of logic there?

You find out the meanings of words by how people use them in context. They're not decided a priori.

The most immediately obvious conclusion is that St. Paul created this word in reference to Leviticus 18. Which is a condemnation of homosexual sex.
This is further supported when one considers that Koine Greek is a male centric language. Unless femininity is denoted the base subject is always male. Thus arsenokoitai which roughly translates as “male bedder” would imply a male subject who beds males.

It only seems immediately obvious when you assume the conclusion before you start, and when you present all this false "evidence" you just did, and only so to you.

There is no such thing as a "male centric language". You made that up.

This isn’t even getting into The Church Fathers commentary on the passages,

Other than that the fathers use tons of words to refer to pederasty and gay sex and use none of the words in the traditional clobber passages to do it, so they probably don't mean what you say they mean.

or the fact that Judaism and Christianity have always condemned homosexual sex.

This is the claim. This is not the evidence.

St. Augustine is correct, love is the ultimate test of how to interpret scripture but it is not a license to override scripture. Tell me what is truly loving: informing their gay members on the true sinfulness of homosexual actions and encourage them to remain celibate in conforming to the Gospel and precepts is the moral law? Or condoning their sinful behavior and ordinating them toward perdition? Who really shows more love, those who want Gays to go to heaven an deliver the hard truth so they might get there? Or the ones who don’t care whether they get to heaven or not and tell them not to worry about it?

It is a sign of moral retardation to assume that God, an omniscient perfect eternal being of pure love, would eternally torture a finite, imperfect creature for not knowing something is morally wrong. That is not how this works.

Love is the touchstone of how to interpret scripture. How you choose to interpret must lead to loving practices. The exclusion or suppression of a minority on the basis of an inherent property they cannot change is not love; it is hate. You can see how Christian societies have abused LGBT people and know that it is not love. How you interpret scripture is subject to God's judgment. And you have chosen to reach hard to justify a homophobic reading of the Bible that you assumed was true with no evidence. That is not love. You have let prejudice redefine love for you. The logic you used was the exact same logic used to justify the torture and execution of heretics.

That’s not accurate. The Sacraments weren’t formally fixed until the Council of Trent, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t exist. Baptism is a sacrament, does that mean the early church didn’t practice Baptism? No it doesn’t. You’re reaching here.

That's not what I'm saying.

You could've looked up some basic sources to prove you wrong.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage_ ... lic_Church

https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2012/05/09/marriage-myth/

And we’re Christians, adherents of the one true faith.

The Roman Church's teaching are ridiculous, nonsensical, and unfaithful to the word of God. Christians often try to impose their ideas about marriage on everyone else and that's why I said that. I still maintain the "definition" is stupid and self serving.

All those other religions, times, places, cultures and religions are completely irrelevant. They do not matter with regards to Christian Doctrine, their precepts have no bearing on our precepts. All that matters is our Doctrines and our Teachings. And here’s what our teachings are:

Christ referenced this when he said:
“ He said to them, “Have you not read that He Who made them in the first place made them man and woman? 5 It says, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and his mother and will live with his wife. The two will become one.’ 6 So they are no longer two but one. Let no man divide what God has put together.”

Matthew 19:4-6.

I will point out the creation story Jesus references is genesis 2. In genesis 2 Eve is created as a companion for Adam, unlike genesis 1 where she is created to reproduce children. This does not bolster a view that marriage is about reproduction.

And what is this marriage covenant ordinated towards?

14 You ask, “Why does he not?” Because the Lord was a witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. 15 Did not one God make her?[d] Both flesh and spirit are his. And what does the one God desire? Godly offspring. So look to yourselves, and do not let anyone be faithless to the wife of his youth.
Malachi 2:14-15

You're quoting a latter prophet, a Jewish moralistic text to define marriage for you? This is reaching.

You know it doesn't say the covenant is "for" offspring, just that it's something God desires within marriage.

I just demonstrated through biblical scripture that you’re wrong. The defining of marriage as a covenant made
before God between man and woman, ordinated towards child rearing, predates the birth of Christ

You really didn't and you contradicted the fathers so your church goes against tradition.

[Kernen]

An eternal punishment for acts in a mortal life isn't corrective when you have literally no chance to escape punishment and act on your corrections. That's punitive.

As I said, hell is not punitive, it’s forfeiture. Heaven is freely accessible to you, you have but to grasp it.

Frankly, this is why I wouldn't be an adherent to your god, proof or no. At least in rejection I can have some semblance of happiness in my existence, however cosmicly brief.

Quite possibly the dumbest thing I’ve heard but you do you boo boo

You may as well ask me to grip hot coals. The belief system is repugnant to me, and I would be miserable adhering to it in life.

By rejecting your god, I find my free will. If your god wants me to worship him so badly as to punish me for all eternity if I dont, he has ample reason to lie about my state of will. By rejecting your god's reward, I have verified that I have the power over my own destiny by rebelling more surely than I could by submitting.

It plays nicely into the gamble I'm running on the side, which is that your god doesn't exist.

[Lost Memories]

Actually it’s called justice. Government operates on the same principle. You technically don’t have to abide by the law, but if you don’t follow the law, there are consequences for breaking the law.

Last I checked, if we didn’t like the law, we could change it, move somewhere else, or if it got extremely bad, overthrow the government.

Yeah, you can’t do that with God.

A better example would be gravity. Or other physical attributes.
You are subjected to gravity, but you can still decide if to move by taking advantage for it or going counter it.
You can also decide to jump off a building and let gravity do its thing, is gravity responsible for your self harming tendencies? No.
Same with hell, it's like someone deciding to jump off a building. The law of god is like gravity. It isn't democratic, it's an universal law.

Arguing god should not allow people to go in hell, by not letting people to do dumb shit like jumping off buildings, is like saying there should have been bars to every window. But wouldn't that be like living into a prison?

The talk about hell being the place where the unrepentants go, so hell being a matter of forfeiture, has to do with forgiveness.

The common view of hell, which most atheists also have, is the place where people go after they have been judged guilty by a sort of divine tribunal where god is the judge. He slams the divine hammer and bam you go to hell, eternal fire and all that. That's not how hell is understood for those christians who aren't literalists. (which cuts off a number of protestants, who too often are literalists)(incidentally, most atheists are literalists too)

The view of hell used by non-literalists, is the place where people go when they are unrepentant of their sins.
To play along with the little kids theatre exposition: after theguy died he went into a place, there was god with some papers who said to him "this is the list of all the bad shit you've done while you were alive, wow you've done a lot of shit" god then continued "let's go over this list". They then went over every single bad shit listed, for each one god said "you've done this bad shit, i forgive you for it, what do you have to say about it?". For the most theguy felt sorry and a bit ashamed at remembering all the dumb shit he had done in life, but he was relieved to have been forgiven.
But eventually they came across one specific bad shit about which theguy just couldn't accept to be in the wrong. He said "i don't need to be forgiven because i did nothing wrong" at which god raised his eyebrows saying "are you sure? even when it's me(the creator of everything™) telling that what you did was actually bad?" but theguy continued "yes, i know better, i don't accept that forgiveness cause i'm in the right" with regret god then said "i can't force you to accept my forgiveness, but if you ever change your mind just give me a call, i'll be waiting, k?".
Theguy then started to wander around, while repeating to himself "i'm definitely in the right, i'm never going to call god", but even from far into heaven the light of the forgiveness of god continued to reach theguy. At some point theguy got annoyed by the light of forgiveness, "i don't need forgiveness, stop shining on me" so he went to look for a place where the light of forgiveness couldn't reach, he found a cavern in the depths of the earth where there was no light nor forgiveness. That place was hell.
(all the characters depicted are fictional and figurative, the existence of the eyebrows of god is a mystery)

[Philjia]

Vatican launches e-rosary: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-50081466

How do fellow kids do you wish to praise the lord electronically?

[Sundiata]

Vatican launches e-rosary: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-50081466

How do fellow kids do you wish to praise the lord electronically?

That is so cool.

[Tarsonis]

This argument is bellied by the fact that all evidence supports that it was St. Paul himself who originated the word, and all those other uses would be derivatives of the word, so they’re not necessarily indicative of St. Paul’s usage of the word. What is immediately graspable is that Saul of Tarsus was a Hellenized Jew and self professed Pharisee having intensive knowledge of the Scriptures in both Hebrew and Greek. The words arseno and koitai were not incidentally picked, but rather are the exact words used in the Septuagint translations of Leviticus. καὶ μετὰ ἄρσενος οὐ κοιμηθήσῃ κοίτην γυναικός βδέλυγμα γάρ ἐστιν.

You seem to have made a mistake in every single clause of this statement.

I) All the evidence? What evidence? There is no evidence St. Paul invented it himself. There doesn't seem to be much evidence anyone used it before him but we don't know if anyone did or not.

So we have no evidence of this word ever being used before St. Paul did. Hmm, Well Then, that would suggest that he’s the one who invented it would it not? You know first appearance in history, without contradicting evidence, generally means origination does it not? At least until we find an earlier usage?

He could have gotten it from someone else

But without evidence to support that notion, that’s just idle speculation now isn’t it....

II) There's no evidence to suggest Paul based this word he allegedly invented off the Septuagint. The words in question are used together but not joined. That's far from some smoking gun piece of philology.

And a spade really isn’t a spade now is it.

Since you want to talk philiogy, this type of conjunction is quite common when forming gerunds. The Greek OT uses both halves of the word to condemn homosexual sex. Combining them together to refer to the people who have homosexual sex would be a pretty typical form of gerund.
Other examples of this type of thing;
People who “wet the bed” are called “bed wetters”. Men who frequently go on Journeys are called ”Journeymen”. It’s a common practice when creating a gerund.

Sure it’s not definitive, but it’s the conclusion that requires the least amount of assumptions. Sometimes some things are just true on their face.

III) "all those other uses would be derivatives of the word" What? So there's this word no one knows the meaning of but this one guy used it and they all copied him so every other usage is invalid and can't tell us what it means? Do you not see the leaps of logic there?

You find out the meanings of words by how people use them in context. They're not decided a priori.

If a person creates a word, then their apriori intention is what it means. For example Shakespeare coined hundreds of words in the English languages. Many of them can have multiple meanings. Those multiple meanings are irrelevant to how Shakespeare used them. When reading his works you read how he intended them to be used.

Now yes we use context to infer meaning, but Arsenokoita doesn’t have context to give us meaning now does it. It appears in a list of sinners.. So we must use literary criticism and philology to suss our what it means.

The most immediately obvious conclusion is that St. Paul created this word in reference to Leviticus 18. Which is a condemnation of homosexual sex.
This is further supported when one considers that Koine Greek is a male centric language. Unless femininity is denoted the base subject is always male. Thus arsenokoitai which roughly translates as “male bedder” would imply a male subject who beds males.

It only seems immediately obvious when you assume the conclusion before you start, and when you present all this false "evidence" you just did, and only so to you.

False evidence?

Saul of Tarsus was born in, you guessed it. Tarsus. Tarusus is in southern Turkey where Hellenized Judaism was centralized in the first century AD. Tarsus itself as recognized as being one of the centers of Hellenized Judaism. And he wrote all his epistles in Koine Greek. This isn’t even contested in academia man.

Further He calls himself a Pharisee multiple times in his letters. Pharisees at that time were a sect that were strict traditionalists. They did everything in Hebrew, and even memorized the Torah. This means St. Paul was born and raised a Hellenized Jew and belonging to this group would have made him quite familiar with the Law in both Hebrew and Greek.

Further I copy and pasted right from the Septuagint. No false evidence there.

There is no such thing as a "male centric language". You made that up.

Yes. Yes there is. Greek is a patriarchal language. It reflects the attitudes of the ancient world which saw males as the default sex and female as a subordinate sex to the male sex. Hell even Aristotle postulated that women were just human beings that hadn’t gestated at the right temperature.

I mean shit isn’t that why feminists flip a shit over the Male Centric words of the English Language? Words like spokesman, Chairman, manhole, doorman, etc etc? You think that’s unique to English? The terms Male and fe-male literally imply that the female is a subordinate to the male. Same with man and wo-man. Which is why many feminists use the word womyn instead.

This isn’t even getting into The Church Fathers commentary on the passages,

Other than that the fathers use tons of words to refer to pederasty and gay sex and use none of the words in the traditional clobber passages to do it, so they probably don't mean what you say they mean.

That’s quite a flimsy counter. I mean think about it. . So even though the church fathers write multiple times on the condemnation of homosexual sex establishing a system of theology that affirms homosexual sex as sinful, Something you’re inadvertently admitting here, (which completes undermines your point you make below,)you’re gonna cling to the most minute technicality to try to pretend that system doesn’t exist, and that said system doesn’t give us insight into what St. Paul meant?

or the fact that Judaism and Christianity have always condemned homosexual sex.

This is the claim. This is not the evidence.

Leviticus is one of the earliest books of the Bible ever written, explicitly condemns homosexual sex. Christianity is derived from Judaism. It’s not that hard to understand.

Further, you even confirmed that the early fathers taught on this undermining your attempt to claim its unproven.

St. Augustine is correct, love is the ultimate test of how to interpret scripture but it is not a license to override scripture. Tell me what is truly loving: informing their gay members on the true sinfulness of homosexual actions and encourage them to remain celibate in conforming to the Gospel and precepts is the moral law? Or condoning their sinful behavior and ordinating them toward perdition? Who really shows more love, those who want Gays to go to heaven an deliver the hard truth so they might get there? Or the ones who don’t care whether they get to heaven or not and tell them not to worry about it?

It is a sign of moral retardation to assume that God, an omniscient perfect eternal being of pure love, would eternally torture a finite, imperfect creature for not knowing something is morally wrong. That is not how this works.

You’re taking the point in a direction I wasn’t making. But follow that line of logic to its conclusion. Even acknowledge that sin requires knowledge to commit. You’re saying we shouldn’t tell someone something is sinful to perhaps spare them judgment? The logical conclusion of that is we should not tell people about Christ in hopes that it will spare them judgement. You’re saying we should deceive people for their own good? Unfortunately for you that’s not what Christ told us to do. He told us to make disciples of all nations, that includes catechising.

Love is the touchstone of how to interpret scripture. How you choose to interpret must lead to loving practices. The exclusion or suppression of a minority on the basis of an inherent property they cannot change is not love; it is hate. You can see how Christian societies have abused LGBT people and know that it is not love. How you interpret scripture is subject to God's judgment. And you have chosen to reach hard to justify a homophobic reading of the Bible that you assumed was true with no evidence. That is not love. You have let prejudice redefine love for you. The logic you used was the exact same logic used to justify the torture and execution of heretics.

On the contrary you’re the one allowing bias to influence your interpretation of scripture. You’re allowing your homosexuality to determine how you interpret the passages regarding homosexuality. We can haggle of arsenokoitai all you want, but it’s kind of undermined by the fact that it’s not even the only place in the New Testament where homosexuality is shown to be illicit.

Romans 1:

22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools; 23 and they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling a mortal human being or birds or four-footed animals or reptiles.

24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the degrading of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

26 For this reason God gave them up to degrading passions. Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, 27 and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error.

Despite your ad hominem attacks, I’ve not let my mind be clouded by “homophobia,” I’m arguing for what the texts explicitly say. Homosexual sex is explicitly condemned in multiple instances in the scriptures, as well as the commentaries of the early church. For all your accusations of eisegesis, you’re the one openly advocating for it. You’ve come to the conclusion independent of scripture that homosexuality is not sinful, and are trying to read that back on the text. I’m making an argument from scripture.

Now we can talk about the injustice that’s been wrought on communities, and for the most part I’ll even agree with you. But suffering that injustice does not change something that is sinful into something that is not.

That’s not accurate. The Sacraments weren’t formally fixed until the Council of Trent, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t exist. Baptism is a sacrament, does that mean the early church didn’t practice Baptism? No it doesn’t. You’re reaching here.

That's not what I'm saying.

You could've looked up some basic sources to prove you wrong.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage_ ... lic_Church

https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2012/05/09/marriage-myth/

Wow you really misunderstood what that means. The St. Paul teaching that it’s better to remain celibate than married is not the same as saying marriage is bad, or even unimportant. The Church did not disparage marriage, rather it taught that it was better to be celibate to emulate Christ and St. Mary. But the covenant of marriage was still respected and still defined as being between one man and one woman ordinated towards child rearing.

And we’re Christians, adherents of the one true faith.

The Roman Church's teaching are ridiculous, nonsensical, and unfaithful to the word of God. Christians often try to impose their ideas about marriage on everyone else and that's why I said that. I still maintain the "definition" is stupid and self serving.

Because as Christ said “ Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”


Or as St. Paul said, 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools; 23 and they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling a mortal human being or birds or four-footed animals or reptiles.

This isn’t even a Catholic proposition, all of Christendom is united in professing that Christianity is the one true faith, and all others are false. It’s a basic premise of the Faith man.

All those other religions, times, places, cultures and religions are completely irrelevant. They do not matter with regards to Christian Doctrine, their precepts have no bearing on our precepts. All that matters is our Doctrines and our Teachings. And here’s what our teachings are:

Christ referenced this when he said:
“ He said to them, “Have you not read that He Who made them in the first place made them man and woman? 5 It says, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and his mother and will live with his wife. The two will become one.’ 6 So they are no longer two but one. Let no man divide what God has put together.”

Matthew 19:4-6.

I will point out the creation story Jesus references is genesis 2. In genesis 2 Eve is created as a companion for Adam, unlike genesis 1 where she is created to reproduce children. This does not bolster a view that marriage is about reproduction.

But it does establish that it’s between Male and Female.

And what is this marriage covenant ordinated towards?

14 You ask, “Why does he not?” Because the Lord was a witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. 15 Did not one God make her?[d] Both flesh and spirit are his. And what does the one God desire? Godly offspring. So look to yourselves, and do not let anyone be faithless to the wife of his youth.
Malachi 2:14-15

You're quoting a latter prophet, a Jewish moralistic text to define marriage for you? This is reaching.

So we’re throwing out parts of the Bible now are we? We’ve decided that scripture is not God breathed, divinely inspired by the Holy Spirit, not to mention you’re discounting the words of a Prophet who by definition speaks for God? And you think i’m the one reaching here?

You know it doesn't say the covenant is "for" offspring, just that it's something God desires within marriage.

That’s a distinction with out a difference fam. When we say something is ordinated, it doesn’t mean only. Marriage is not only for child rearing but it is “pointed in that direction.”

I just demonstrated through biblical scripture that you’re wrong. The defining of marriage as a covenant made
before God between man and woman, ordinated towards child rearing, predates the birth of Christ

You really didn't and you contradicted the fathers so your church goes against tradition.

I invite you to demonstrate how I’ve contradicted the Church Fathers, but I’ll tell you I don’t have high expectations. Mainly because I, in fact, haven’t. Hell I barely even invoked them, because the Truth of this matter is practically self evident from scripture. I appealed to scripture, the foundation that unites us. You relied instead on supposition, and your own personal biases, and your hatred of the Roman Catholic Church. It’s amazing you accuse the Church of having a self serving definition of marriage, while your entire line of argumentation is self serving. You ignore all evidence to the contrary and grasp at straws to exonerate homosexual sex. You dismiss scripture, even editing it out of my post in your quotes so that you don’t have to address it, and you deny the singular Truth of the Christian Faith.


In the end your position is a house of cards, and is left wanting for a stronger foundation.


Look, all this aside. I feel for you, I really do. I can’t imagine what it must be like to be in your shoes. But that empathy, isn’t grounds for overthrowing doctrine. And I’m beholden to True doctrine, not doctrine I wish were so.

[Luminesa]

Vatican launches e-rosary: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-50081466

How do fellow kids do you wish to praise the lord electronically?

I use an electronic rosary on my Laudate app sometimes when I have my phone. I need to carry my actual rosary more often.

[Nioya]

Despite your ad hominem attacks, I’ve not let my mind be clouded by “homophobia,” I’m arguing for what the texts explicitly say.

If anyone is committing is an ad hominem, it's you becaysd you've accused me distorting scripture due to my "homosexuality". Obviously a form of heterosexism and homophobia, as if being gay makes you bad at interpreting scripture.

And the texts do not explicitly argue anything. They are written letters. You continually assert your own interpretation as the only possible one when I have shown it is tenuous at best.

I will say you tell me I'm distorting the texts, but when I actually tried explaining what the passages mean, you got offended and just blew me off.

Hey, where's that thing about polyester and football in Ephesians you mentioned earlier? Where are those explicitly in the text?

Homosexual sex is explicitly condemned in multiple instances in the scriptures,

Again, not true.

I will not dispute a few of the fathers condemn homosexuality. That's not so relevant to my argument though.

For all your accusations of eisegesis, you’re the one openly advocating for it. You’ve come to the conclusion independent of scripture that homosexuality is not sinful, and are trying to read that back on the text. I’m making an argument from scripture.

I've never advocated for eisegesis. I actually tried engaging with your historical critical interpretation but you took offense at it.

I've said the meaning of scripture must be determined by love of neighbor. It is not an act of love to exclude an entire class of people because of sexual desires they did not choose, deny them the rite of marriage, and condemn to celibacy or excommunication. I'm not going to stand down on this point. You do not get to define love for yourself to exclude anyone you want.

If a segregationist told you he thought the Bible said he had to exclude black people from his church and interracial couples from marriage, would you believe him? Would you let him get away with it? Just try to imagine this from someone else's perspective.

Now we can talk about the injustice that’s been wrought on communities, and for the most part I’ll even agree with you. But suffering that injustice does not change something that is sinful into something that is not.

Would you say the same thing about interracial marriage?

Wow you really misunderstood what that means. The St. Paul teaching that it’s better to remain celibate than married is not the same as saying marriage is bad, or even unimportant.

Actually it is. That's the most logical interpretation based off historical scholarship.

The Church did not disparage marriage, rather it taught that it was better to be celibate to emulate Christ and St. Mary.

The fathers did explicitly disparage marriage.

But the covenant of marriage was still respected and still defined as being between one man and one woman ordinated towards child rearing.

Neither of those things are true.

And I will say you entirely missed my point. I was saying marriage never called a "sacrament" in the early. There were no ceremonies to bless or celebrate it. That was an innovation. But now you made all these lies about the fathers to bolster your own church. How dare you lie like this.

So we’re throwing out parts of the Bible now are we? We’ve decided that scripture is not God breathed, divinely inspired by the Holy Spirit, not to mention you’re discounting the words of a Prophet who by definition speaks for God? And you think i’m the one reaching here?

There you go putting words into my mouth. Now who's the bigot?

I invite you to demonstrate how I’ve contradicted the Church Fathers, but I’ll tell you I don’t have high expectations.

Well you already took a jab at me being gay so I don't suppose anyone as bigoted as you sees good faith in anyone that disagrees with you. But I'll refer you to the articles I posted before about marriage not being a sacrament. That was my point.

Mainly because I, in fact, haven’t. Hell I barely even invoked them, because the Truth of this matter is practically self evident from scripture.

Again, made up nonsense about your opinion being "obvious"," self evident", et cetera. Even though I've shown when homosexuality was condemned the terms from these passages were not used, alternative translations were given, the historical context points the other way, the fathers contradict this in many ways, and so on. And you still accuse me of "reaching" and "eisegesis" and so on.

I appealed to scripture, the foundation that unites us.

You muddled the waters by confusing when I was talking about tradition for when I was talking about scripture and your church actually says its authority is more important scripture but whatever.

You relied instead on supposition, and your own personal biases, and your hatred of the Roman Catholic Church.

More ad hominems. I will point Augustine is a father of the church, degreed a "doctor of the church", the most influential theologian after St. Paul. His teachings are entirely approved by catholic dogma and my appeal to him is entirely according to tradition. It is far from a "supposition" or personal bias. I never said we should discard scripture, but someone like you makes all sorts of interpretative moves to justify all kinds of abuses of gay people. I offer historical arguments and you scoffed at me for challenging them. So whatever claim to reason or common sense you have is invalid.

It’s amazing you accuse the Church of having a self serving definition of marriage, while your entire line of argumentation is self serving. You ignore all evidence to the contrary and grasp at straws to exonerate homosexual sex. You dismiss scripture, even editing it out of my post in your quotes so that you don’t have to address it, and you deny the singular Truth of the Christian Faith.

I like how homophobia is "the singular Truth of the Christian Faith". Not the incarnation, the crucifixion, the atonement, or the Resurrection, but one minor detail about two or three verses used to condemn homosexuality. I think that says where you really come from on this issue.

[Luminesa]

I’m uhhh pretty sure that Tars does believe the singular truth of the Christian Faith is the Incarnation. He doesn’t believe interracial marriage is sinful either, he’s not a white supremacist. Also, the Church Fathers were not all against marriage, there was a spectrum of opinions on the matter. And those changed from the 3rd century onward.

[Nioya]

I’m uhhh pretty sure that Tars does believe the singular truth of the Christian Faith is the Incarnation. He doesn’t believe interracial marriage is sinful either, he’s not a white supremacist. Also, the Church Fathers were not all against marriage, there was a spectrum of opinions on the matter. And those changed from the 3rd century onward.

I want to add I don't disagree with this.

[Northern Davincia]

I’m uhhh pretty sure that Tars does believe the singular truth of the Christian Faith is the Incarnation. He doesn’t believe interracial marriage is sinful either, he’s not a white supremacist. Also, the Church Fathers were not all against marriage, there was a spectrum of opinions on the matter. And those changed from the 3rd century onward.

I want to add I don't disagree with this.

We are aware that you don't agree with things that are true.

If a segregationist told you he thought the Bible said he had to exclude black people from his church and interracial couples from marriage, would you believe him? Would you let him get away with it? Just try to imagine this from someone else's perspective.

The Church, of which Tar claims loyalty to, would never accept the segregationist's view because it is false. We believe as the church does.
You interpret love as permissiveness, when in reality our bodies are temples for the Holy Spirit, and thus we should deny ourselves mortal pleasures for immortal grace.

[Luminesa]

I’m uhhh pretty sure that Tars does believe the singular truth of the Christian Faith is the Incarnation. He doesn’t believe interracial marriage is sinful either, he’s not a white supremacist. Also, the Church Fathers were not all against marriage, there was a spectrum of opinions on the matter. And those changed from the 3rd century onward.

I want to add I don't disagree with this.

Well, good! It's technically historical fact anyway. But like, St. Jerome went to the extreme and said that marriage was basically a distraction from celibate life (if I am quoting the right Church Father). Knowing St. Jerome's temperament, this is not all that...out-of-left-field for him.

[Hakons]

This is a relevant debate in most of the Christian world, so thanks for bringing it up. It's certainly nice to have a Christian theological discussion, rather than the ever-present atheism vs Christianity posts.

When we have questions about what is sinful and what is not, it's clear we need to have an authority to rely on. This is found in the Magisterium of the Church, or the sacred deposit of tradition, scripture, revelation, and the examples of the saints. While I understand the viewpoint you're coming from, our faith is abundantly clear on sexual morality.

A Christian receives his understanding of morality from God. This simple point can be difficult to follow, and it is difficult for me, since our morality is affected by the society around us. Still, in our faith, in our true religion, our morality comes from the true God, not the worldly powers around us. As Tarsonis has extensively demonstrated, scripture clearly condemns homosexual sex. Homosexual acts are condemned because they do not follow the ordered purpose of the sexual act, which is for procreation and the unity of Holy Matrimony. For whatever reason you disagree with the accepted and historical interpretation of scripture. That's not exactly a defensible position. You're opinion on scripture doesn't automatically trump the centuries-old truth maintained by the devoted.

This leaves us with the question I began with, on what authority are you relying on? Our flesh is weak. Our rationality is slow, finite, and prone to error. Our perspective is tragically small, and our life is short. It would be altogether mad to interpret scripture based off of our own reading, off our own opinion. We must rely on the Source of rationality, on the Infinite, on the one Omnipresent God. Only by His direction through His holy Church can we come to an understanding of His will for us. If our personal views are contrary to His will, contrary to His scripture and His Church, then we must submit our will to His. Only by submitting our fallen rationality to the will and power of the perfect God can we hope to to obtain direction and conviction to holiness.

[Hakons]

I've said the meaning of scripture must be determined by love of neighbor. It is not an act of love to exclude an entire class of people because of sexual desires they did not choose, deny them the rite of marriage, and condemn to celibacy or excommunication. I'm not going to stand down on this point. You do not get to define love for yourself to exclude anyone you want.

This proposition, that the meaning of scripture is "determined by love of neighbor" is entirely unworkable. What do we mean by love? We obviously disagree on that. Now what? Love isn't just what makes people happy. We don't bend our sacraments to fit the needs of people. It is not an act of love to say what is sinful is for whatever reason suddenly not. That leads to people staying in mortal sin, thus damnation, and would cause us to be judged as well for leading those people to Hell. Changing the unchangeable and divine institution of marriage is not something we will do. Such a pronouncement would be suspiciously removed from the overwhelming consensus of Christianity and rather close to a certain culture's sexual views developed in only the last century. There is honestly no limit on your proposed definition for interpretation of scripture and the application of the sacraments. Do not adulterers think they love each other? Would it then not be wrong to exclude them from being "married"? What about "open relationships"? Would you dare exclude them from the sacrament? What about polygamous relationships? The list goes on for eternity, because anyone can say they love anything and thus must have their desire, no matter how far it strays from the truth of God, affirmed by the Church. This is why the Church maintains what has been given to her by God, despite the pressure from secularists and modernizing Christians. I agree that we can't define love ourselves, that is why we rely on God, not our personal views on sexuality.

The Truth of God is hard to follow. The Gospel is unpopular. It can be hard to confess our sins to God and try to correct our ways. Still, we must abandon our previous conceptions and follow Christ with all our soul. If it takes feeling as though we are crucified as He was, then so be it. His mercy and graces are effective and will lead us through our sorrow.

[Tarsonis]

Despite your ad hominem attacks, I’ve not let my mind be clouded by “homophobia,” I’m arguing for what the texts explicitly say.

If anyone is committing is an ad hominem, it's you becaysd you've accused me distorting scripture due to my "homosexuality". Obviously a form of heterosexism and homophobia, as if being gay makes you bad at interpreting scripture.

Sigh. No, that's not what I said at all. I accused you of being biased.

I said

On the contrary you’re the one allowing bias to influence your interpretation of scripture. You’re allowing your homosexuality to determine how you interpret the passages regarding homosexuality.

In retrospect, I realize I did not articulate my self well, and for that I apologize (it was 3. AM, not the best wordsmith at that hour.) but that statement, in no way was meant to say what you are accusing me of. What it was meant to suggest is that you have confirmation bias. By my observation You are starting with the conclusion that homosexual sex is not considered immoral and deriving your premises from that conclusion, picking only the evidence that supports your position, no matter how flimsy. I don't think it is an illogical, bigoted, or even an unfair the proposition to conclude that bias is rooted in the fact that you are gay. Being gay would naturally influence your opinion on this matter.

And the texts do not explicitly argue anything. They are written letters.

Yes, they are written letters, meaning were written by an author who had something to say. That author had an intended meaning with what they said. It's not uncommon to say "the text says/states/argues" when referring to this intention of the author.

You continually assert your own interpretation as the only possible one when I have shown it is tenuous at best.

But you haven't. You really haven't man. I've provided multiple lines of reasoning, and you either waved them away with out sufficient support to your refutation. Or you simply cropped them out of my posts and ignored them. Case in point:

Hey, where's that thing about polyester and football in Ephesians you mentioned earlier? Where are those explicitly in the text?

I already addressed this here:

First let’s start with what does Ephesians 2 say?

[spoiler]11 So then, remember that at one time you Gentiles by birth, called “the uncircumcision” by those who are called “the circumcision”—a physical circumcision made in the flesh by human hands— 12 remember that you were at that time without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14 For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us. 15 He has abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace, 16 and might reconcile both groups to God in one body[c] through the cross, thus putting to death that hostility through it.[d]

Right the whole passage is about joining Jews and Gentiles into one people. But what does that mean?


Deuteronomy 7:6-7
6 For you are a people holy to the Lord your God; the Lord your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on earth to be his people, his treasured possession.

7 It was not because you were more numerous than any other people that the Lord set his heart on you and chose you—for you were the fewest of all peoples.



The Jews were the chosen people of God. “ I will also make you a light for the Gentiles, that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth.“ Isaiah 49:6 They made covenant with God and we’re separate from the Gentiles who did not. The Jews had the Mosaic Law, the Gentiles did not.

Now under the Mosaic Law you had two types of law mishpatim and hukkim. Mishpatim are moral laws, things like “don’t kill. Don’t steal. Don’t commit adultery” right? They’re things that are considered moral issue. Homosexual sex falls under this category, as stated in Leviticus: “ You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.“ It declares something to be unequivocally wrong. These are mishpatim.

Hukkim however are “customs of the nations”. These are laws that are not considered moral infractions but rather establish the customs of the people. For example “And the pig, though it has a divided hoof, does not chew the cud; it is unclean for you. these clothing and dietary restrictions weren’t moral they were customary for the Jews in opposition to Gentiles.

But now circling back to Ephesians 2:15 Christ abolished in his flesh these ordinances to make the two people one flesh. He abolished the hukkim, the dividing custom laws that created the enmity between Jew and Gentile so that the division would dissolve and two peoples would be come one people. This is further emphasized to Peter in Acts 10: 13-15

13 Then a voice told him, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.”

14 “Surely not, Lord!” Peter replied. “I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.”

15 The voice spoke to him a second time, “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.”

So the Hukkim have been abolished.


Hence my example that I have made sense. We can throw the pigskin around (footballs were originally made with pigskin hence the name), wearing polyester shorts (polyester is a is not pure cloth cloth but a fabric woven of multipleFibers) and eat a dinner of shellfish and bacon after wards (unclean animals), but I Cannot kill
Anyone to get more bacon.

You simply ignored this entirely, cropping it out of your response to that post. And here you are acting like I never addressed it.

Now if you want the specific verses where those are prohibited,

"Leviticus 11:7 The pig, for even though it has divided hoofs and is cleft-footed, it does not chew the cud; it is unclean for you. 8 Of their flesh you shall not eat, and their carcasses you shall not touch; they are unclean for you."


"Leviticus 19:19 You shall keep my statutes. You shall not let your animals breed with a different kind; you shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed; nor shall you put on a garment made of two different materials."

I will say you tell me I'm distorting the texts, but when I actually tried explaining what the passages mean, you got offended and just blew me off.

But you didn't. That's not what what you did. You stormed into the thread and aggressively made a claim without substantiation (that the texts have been mistranslated and distorted) and then proceeded to essentially call me and the Catholic Church bigoted, intolerant bastards. My response to this was to dismiss it with the same level of substantiation (none) and tell you to calm down, and present your point with actual supporting evidence, so that I had something to engage with beyond "your translations are wrong and you're being homophobic." To which your response was to attack me further.

Homosexual sex is explicitly condemned in multiple instances in the scriptures,

Again, not true.

I'll skip the ones in question, as well as Genesis/Jude as I don't agree with most interpretations of the "Sin of Sodom"

Leviticus 18:22 "You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination."
Leviticus 20:13 "If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall be put to death; their blood is upon them. "
Romans 1:24-27 "24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the degrading of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever! Amen.

26 For this reason God gave them up to degrading passions. Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, 27 and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error."

These are explicit. LGBT apologists have tried to argue they mean something else, but such a feat is only accomplished by inserting words that aren't in the text.

I will not dispute a few of the fathers condemn homosexuality. That's not so relevant to my argument though.

Of course it isn't. Why would evidence that directly contradicts your argument be relevant? See what I mean about confirmation bias? You're picking and choosing.

For all your accusations of eisegesis, you’re the one openly advocating for it. You’ve come to the conclusion independent of scripture that homosexuality is not sinful, and are trying to read that back on the text. I’m making an argument from scripture.

I've never advocated for eisegesis. I actually tried engaging with your historical critical interpretation but you took offense at it.

But you didn't. You engaged me with unsubstantiated claims, unearned dismissals, and personal attacks. As for eisegesis, no you never advocated for eisegesis as a good thing, but eisegesis is what you are doing. You are reading into the text. You're allowing your experience to shape your interpretation of scripture.

I've said the meaning of scripture must be determined by love of neighbor. It is not an act of love to exclude an entire class of people because of sexual desires they did not choose, deny them the rite of marriage, and condemn to celibacy or excommunication. I'm not going to stand down on this point. You do not get to define love for yourself to exclude anyone you want.

Yes. That's called eisegesis, reading into the text to make it mean what you want it to mean, but lets set that aside for a moment.

You quoted St. Augustine to support his premise: "whoever… thinks that he understands the Holy Scriptures, or any part of them, but puts such an interpretation on them that does not tend to build up [the] twofold love of God and our neighbor, does not yet understand them as he ought." (Christian Doctrine, 1.36.40)

However you should have kept reading, for in the very next paragraph he states":
"Whoever takes another meaning out of Scripture than the writer intended, goes astray, but not through any falsehood in Scripture. Nevertheless, as I was going to say, if his mistaken interpretation tends to build up love, which is the end of the commandment, he goes astray in much the same way as a man who by mistake quits the high road, but yet reaches through the fields the same place to which the road leads. He is to be corrected, however, and to be shown how much better it is not to quit the straight road, lest, if he get into a habit of going astray, he may sometimes take cross roads, or even go in the wrong direction altogether."

Scripture has one meaning, what the author intended. His quote about interpreting it from love of neighbor does not actually support your premise that we should interpret the scriptures in whatever way makes your neighbor happy. Rather the statement was to argue the other way, that we should not interpret the text maliciously or deceitfully. If you read the rest of that particular paragraph you quoted from he gives a short lecture about how being wrong in your interpretation is okay so much as it your intention is to love and not to deceive.

If a segregationist told you he thought the Bible said he had to exclude black people from his church and interracial couples from marriage, would you believe him? Would you let him get away with it? Just try to imagine this from someone else's perspective.

I fully understand your motivations. However, I would not fly off the handle and call him and his Church bigoted ass clowns, which is what you did. I would engage them on the merits of their claims and attempt to show them where they got it wrong.

Now we can talk about the injustice that’s been wrought on communities, and for the most part I’ll even agree with you. But suffering that injustice does not change something that is sinful into something that is not.

Would you say the same thing about interracial marriage?

Would I say that suffering injustice does not make something that is sinful into something that is not sinful? Yes, because that is true no matter the case. What the Lord hath declared to be sinful is sinful, and no amount of human suffering will change that, what ever it may be.

Now would I say interracial marriage is sinful? No, because there's not much to support that conclusion. If anything, quite the opposite.

Wow you really misunderstood what that means. The St. Paul teaching that it’s better to remain celibate than married is not the same as saying marriage is bad, or even unimportant.

Actually it is. That's the most logical interpretation based off historical scholarship.

No it isn't. What does the text say?

"7 Now, about what you wrote: “It’s good for a man not to have sex with a woman.” 2 Each man should have his own wife, and each woman should have her own husband because of sexual immorality. 3 The husband should meet his wife’s sexual needs, and the wife should do the same for her husband. 4 The wife doesn’t have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise, the husband doesn’t have authority over his own body, but the wife does. 5 Don’t refuse to meet each other’s needs unless you both agree for a short period of time to devote yourselves to prayer. Then come back together again so that Satan might not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. 6 I’m saying this to give you permission; it’s not a command. 7 I wish all people were like me, [b]but each has a particular gift from God: one has this gift, and another has that one."


St. Paul says marriage is a gift from God. It was not his Gift, and he makes no bones about it that he thinks his gift is superior. But he does not disparage marriage, understanding fully that marriage is a gift from God.

And while were on it, look what else he says, not only does he define Marriage as Between a Man and Woman. (Verse 2) but also defines the marriage covenant as being the moral way for which to partake in sex. So we've come across another passage that supports my position and not yours.

The Church did not disparage marriage, rather it taught that it was better to be celibate to emulate Christ and St. Mary.

The fathers did explicitly disparage marriage.

But the covenant of marriage was still respected and still defined as being between one man and one woman ordinated towards child rearing.

Neither of those things are true.

And I will say you entirely missed my point. I was saying marriage never called a "sacrament" in the early. There were no ceremonies to bless or celebrate it. That was an innovation. But now you made all these lies about the fathers to bolster your own church. How dare you lie like this.

I took these three quotes together because this next bit pertains to all three. You said you like St. Augustine right? You should really read his work "On the Good of Marriage." It has some great quotes:

"Therefore the good of marriage throughout all nations and all men stands in the occasion of begetting, and faith of chastity: but, so far as pertains unto the People of God, also in the sanctity of the Sacrament, by reason of which it is unlawful for one who leaves her husband, even when she has been put away, to be married to another, so long as her husband lives, no not even for the sake of bearing children:"


"The Good of Marriage stands in the occasion of begetting," i.e Child Bearing. (further supported by another quote from the same work "If, therefore, even they who are united in marriage only for the purpose of begetting, for which purpose marriage was instituted,"

"and in the Sanctity of the Sacrament." St. Augustine, an early Church father, Doctor of the Church even, calling marriage a sacrament.

How dare I? No, sir. How. dare. you.


Now yes, I will concede that some Fathers took a negative view of marriage viewing it as distraction from God, and a source of misery. However, I'm quite certain that even in their works where they state this, you will also find them begrudgingly acknowledging its importance.

So we’re throwing out parts of the Bible now are we? We’ve decided that scripture is not God breathed, divinely inspired by the Holy Spirit, not to mention you’re discounting the words of a Prophet who by definition speaks for God? And you think i’m the one reaching here?

There you go putting words into my mouth. Now who's the bigot?

Um bigot doesn't apply here, but I'm not putting words into your mouth. Throwing out scripture is essentially what you did. I quoted Malachi, as evidence of my position. Now did you challenge my interpretation? No. What did you do? You said:"You're quoting a latter prophet, a Jewish moralistic text to define marriage for you? Your reaching" You dismissed the scripture as unimportant, and not relevant. You effectively threw out a piece of scripture you didn't like.

I invite you to demonstrate how I’ve contradicted the Church Fathers, but I’ll tell you I don’t have high expectations.

Well you already took a jab at me being gay so I don't suppose anyone as bigoted as you sees good faith in anyone that disagrees with you.

I did not. That is perhaps your 20th personal attack you've thrown at me however.

But I'll refer you to the articles I posted before about marriage not being a sacrament. That was my point.

And I'll refer you to Augustine on why your point is bollocks.

Mainly because I, in fact, haven’t. Hell I barely even invoked them, because the Truth of this matter is practically self evident from scripture.

Again, made up nonsense about your opinion being "obvious"," self evident", et cetera. Even though I've shown when homosexuality was condemned the terms from these passages were not used, alternative translations were given, the historical context points the other way, the fathers contradict this in many ways, and so on. And you still accuse me of "reaching" and "eisegesis" and so on.

Because your argument there is self defeating. You're conceding to my point that homosexuality was indeed condemned, establishing that yes indeed homosexuality has been condemned throughout church history. But then point to their usage of other words, as if that technicality means you've won. (As an aside I posted an article which explicitly addresses the multiple word usage by the fathers, which you ignored. So criticizing me for ignoring your sources, well hypocrisy abounds doesn't it.)

I appealed to scripture, the foundation that unites us.

You muddled the waters by confusing when I was talking about tradition for when I was talking about scripture

Sounds like you need to be more clear then.

and your church actually says its authority is more important scripture but whatever.

It doesn't actually, it says the Magestirium, must be in perfect harmony with Scripture and Tradition.

You relied instead on supposition, and your own personal biases, and your hatred of the Roman Catholic Church.

More ad hominems. I will point Augustine is a father of the church, degreed a "doctor of the church", the most influential theologian after St. Paul. His teachings are entirely approved by catholic dogma and my appeal to him is entirely according to tradition. It is far from a "supposition" or personal bias.

But As I've pointed out, your appeals to Augustine were wrong, and Augustine's writings actually work against your hermeneutical philosophy, as well as confirm my positions as being accurate.

I never said we should discard scripture,

You didn't say it, but you did it. I presented scripture to you, and you dismissed it.

but someone like you makes all sorts of interpretative moves to justify all kinds of abuses of gay people.

No. I didn't. And this I take personal offense to. I never made an argument justifying any kind of abuse, violence, persecution, etc. You are projecting a thought paradigm on me that I do not possess, nor have I advocated. The only thing I’ve defended is the excommunication of unrepentant sinners, which applies to allunrepentant sinners, regardless of the sin in question.


I am not your whipping boy, nor a stand in for the asshats in your life who attacked you for being gay.

I offer historical arguments and you scoffed at me for challenging them. So whatever claim to reason or common sense you have is invalid.

No, I "Scoffed" at your appeal to cultural universalism. The other cultures can get bent for all I care, their presuppositions are irrelevant. All that matters is Christian Doctrine.

It’s amazing you accuse the Church of having a self serving definition of marriage, while your entire line of argumentation is self serving. You ignore all evidence to the contrary and grasp at straws to exonerate homosexual sex. You dismiss scripture, even editing it out of my post in your quotes so that you don’t have to address it, and you deny the singular Truth of the Christian Faith.

I like how homophobia is "the singular Truth of the Christian Faith". Not the incarnation, the crucifixion, the atonement, or the Resurrection, but one minor detail about two or three verses used to condemn homosexuality. I think that says where you really come from on this issue.

That's not what mean by Singular Truth. By singular truth, I meant that the Christian Faith, is singularly true, other faiths are not. And you denied this, when you asked this question "Where's the Sumerian dictionary affirming this definition of marriage? Or the Buddhist one? Or the Muslim one? " You made the implication that those religions are also true, and Christian teachings are only true if they correlate with those. Christianity is the one true religion, all others are false. Their suppositions have no prescriptive value in Christian discourse,

[Nioya]

I've said the meaning of scripture must be determined by love of neighbor. It is not an act of love to exclude an entire class of people because of sexual desires they did not choose, deny them the rite of marriage, and condemn to celibacy or excommunication. I'm not going to stand down on this point. You do not get to define love for yourself to exclude anyone you want.

This proposition, that the meaning of scripture is "determined by love of neighbor" is entirely unworkable.

From the start, I want to tell you you're rejecting the words of the Lord Jesus and a doctor of the church.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Com ... t_accounts

“[w]hoever… thinks that he understands the Holy Scriptures, or any part of them, but puts such an interpretation on them that does not tend to build up [the] twofold love of God and our neighbor, does not yet understand them as he ought.“ (Christian Doctrine, 1.26.40)

What do we mean by love? We obviously disagree on that. Now what? Love isn't just what makes people happy.

It's certainly not what makes people miserable, which is what you think it means.

I'll quote one source I learned this from.

"Admittedly love as a matter of principle or "abstract concept" is not "sufficient" as a foundation for reliable knowledge about ethics. But nothing is. That realization not lead to a rejection of the claim that Christian interpreters defend their interpretation by demonstrating they render loving practices. The appeal to love will not solve all our problems or settle our disagreements. But demanding interpreters demonstrate their condemnations of lesbian gay Christians are "the loving thing to do" is at least preferable to the simple statement that something is true just because "the Bible says so" or because "it is the will of God". A debate about love and his demands of referable to simplistic and deceptive claims out "what the Bible says." And again "at least the idea that all interpretations must submit to the tribunal of love has compelling precedent in the Christian tradition."

We don't bend our sacraments to fit the needs of people.

Was the sabbath made for man or man for the sabbath?

I will point out the massive hypocrisy here in that the Roman church created "annulments" and doles them out on a regular basis for essentially humanitarian reasons.

Changing the unchangeable and divine institution of marriage is not something we will do.

The Catholic Church has done it a thousand times lol.

Such a pronouncement would be suspiciously removed from the overwhelming consensus of Christianity and rather close to a certain culture's sexual views developed in only the last century.

I will point out there is no "overwhelming consensus" and the modern catholic position is a product of modern culture, seeing as it contradicts many of the fathers and is often dressed in psychology.

There is honestly no limit on your proposed definition for interpretation of scripture and the application of the sacraments. Do not adulterers think they love each other? Would it then not be wrong to exclude them from being "married"? What about "open relationships"? Would you dare exclude them from the sacrament? What about polygamous relationships?

In some sense I'd say all of those things are harmful on the grounds that they undermine healthy human relationships. It would be the loving thing to do to condemn someone for having an affair, as it is an unloving betrayal of one's spouse. The issue is far different for homosexuals, because it is an innate attraction they are born with, or at least cannot choose, and they have a need for human companionship as much as anyone else. And as I have said, tenuous leaps of logic are made to justify this bizarre doctrine. It reeks of prejudice and hypocrisy.

The Truth of God is hard to follow. The Gospel is unpopular. It can be hard to confess our sins to God and try to correct our ways. Still, we must abandon our previous conceptions and follow Christ with all our soul. If it takes feeling as though we are crucified as He was, then so be it. His mercy and graces are effective and will lead us through our sorrow.

As an Anglican, I will refer to Robert Farrar as to what callousness to human suffering dressed up in mysticism leads to.

https://imgur.com/a/ruSw79A

[Lost Memories]

Do not adulterers think they love each other? Would it then not be wrong to exclude them from being "married"? What about "open relationships"? Would you dare exclude them from the sacrament? What about polygamous relationships? The list goes on for eternity, because anyone can say they love anything and thus must have their desire, no matter how far it strays from the truth of God, affirmed by the Church.

An other example about the misuse of "love" could be:

A drug addict "loves" their drugs, but it's not an act of love to let them continue to ruin their body and mind, and overall their life, or to even encourage them in it.


Going back to homosexual acts, if it's understood to be a sin, it's because it's understood to bring ruin and misery.

[Philjia]

Do not adulterers think they love each other? Would it then not be wrong to exclude them from being "married"? What about "open relationships"? Would you dare exclude them from the sacrament? What about polygamous relationships? The list goes on for eternity, because anyone can say they love anything and thus must have their desire, no matter how far it strays from the truth of God, affirmed by the Church.

An other example about the misuse of "love" could be:

A drug addict "loves" their drugs, but it's not an act of love to let them continue to ruin their body and mind, and overall their life, or to even encourage them in it.


Going back to homosexual acts, if it's understood to be a sin, it's because it's understood to bring ruin and misery.

Drug addicts suffer. Gay people do not, except when homophobes cause them to do so.

[Jean-Paul Sartre]

An other example about the misuse of "love" could be:

A drug addict "loves" their drugs, but it's not an act of love to let them continue to ruin their body and mind, and overall their life, or to even encourage them in it.


Going back to homosexual acts, if it's understood to be a sin, it's because it's understood to bring ruin and misery.

Drug addicts suffer. Gay people do not, except when homophobes cause them to do so.

Idk man, I think God just created people to be tortured to make good memes. How else can you explain gay people existing and yet God punishing them for something they can’t control except by vehement self-denial that creates psychological damage (oh wait, maybe God doesn’t exist and long-term psychological damage is the point of the virus that is religion)?