Thoughts on the Supreme Court Ruling? -Lots of people
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Ok. It's time to stop beating around the bush. Moderate to Liberal Christians do that far too often, trying to play nice in hopes that some of that will rub off on our more conservative leaning brothers and sisters, but too often this happens at the expense of those being hurt by abuses of the Scriptures. You do not promote equality by pandering to those oppose it. You name what they are doing as sin.
If you are actively fighting equality for homosexuals on Christian grounds, then you are sinning. If you are making arguments so that OTHERS will actively fight equality for homosexuals, then you are leading them to sin, which is, you guessed it, sinning. And if you stand by, silent, while others do such and by your silence lead them to believe that you are with them, that is also a sin, at least of omission.
I will put this as clearly as I know how. USING THE BIBLE AND THE SCRIPTURES AS A TOOL OF OPPRESSION IS SIN. This has nothing to do with the sinful nature of their relationships, and everything to do with the sinful nature of your own. You are using scriptures to deny them a tool explicitly created to aid sexual relationships that had been destroyed by sin. That is what marriage is.
Here are things that have been accomplished by those who campaign against equal rights for homosexuals. Children have been torn away from loving parents, or denied them entirely. Sick or injured people have been denied access to their loved ones during times of crisis, and loved ones barred from ICU's and funerals. Life partners have been denied health benefits, treated as less than people.
These. Are. Sinful. Acts.
To DO any of things, or to condone them, is just about as sinful as it gets. And to use the scriptures as rationale, to use the gift of the Holy Spirit to somehow argue that your own petty bigotry is in the right? That goes beyond sin, to sin of the Holy Spirit, which according to at least one scripture is the ONLY unforgivable sin.
This isn't about all those people who are finally able to marry. Are their sexual relationships sinful? Yeah. So are yours. Humans who have sex will sin. Humans will sin. Marriage is one (flawed) tool to help us navigate that, and now they have the same tools you have. That's a good thing. I'm not worried about them. I am worried about you.
YOU, by fighting their right to marry, are sinning. And you are doing so in the name of God. The fact that you think you are doing so at the will of God just makes it worse. That you could look at the joy people found in each others arms and be offended, that you could watch people denied this right for decades cry in raw happiness at finally being acknowledged to be people and feel anger, that you could deny the love they have for each other and somehow think that such an act is itself loving is... well, it's appalling.
Completely appalling.
I believe in the forgiveness of Christ, and that nothing can separate us from the love of God. So I believe you will find forgiveness. But when your time comes, and you are called on to answer for the sins of your life and find the real NEED for that forgiveness, I have no doubt that among those sins will be the way you looked at a victory of LOVE, WHEN GOD IS LOVE, and saw it as a defeat.
Stop worrying about their sins, and START worrying about your own.
Thank you so much for this post. As a liberal now-Californian raised in a very conservative, religious town in Tennessee, I've struggled with how to deal with some of the downright hateful "Christian" responses to the SCOTUS decision (as well as some pretty vile "Christian" posts about Caitlyn Jenner, but that's another type of sin all together, I suppose), and this helps a lot. I love following your blog and your insights on Adults Nerdfighters; it gives me a little more faith in Christianity as a whole (play on words absolutely intended)
ReplyDeleteFunny. When I read the Bible, homosexual encounters are routinely included in the list of sexual perversions including adultery. So I don't see how people who choose to indulge in their homosexual temptations are doing anything other than sinning. Oppression is not the answer - I agree there - but attempting to legally legitimize sinful behavior? And you're in favor of this? And you call those of us who aren't, sinners? Seems like we're not reading the same Bible. Folks with homosexual temptations need love, yes, just as the rest of us do, but telling them that their actions are not sinful, but in fact to be celebrated, seems terribly, terribly wrong.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous the Second, you seem to be under the misapprehension that my article had anything to do with the sinfulness of the homosexuals in question. I addressed their sinfulness once... ("Are their sexual relationships sinful? Yeah.") THEIR actions are not the point. YOURS are. Their actions, sinful or no, do not change the sinfulness of yours.
ReplyDeleteYou say that we seem to be reading different Bibles. You'll have to show me the verses in your Bible that say that the sins of others mean that your own sins don't count.
I do sin, as humans we sin everyday, but as Christians saved by Jesus Christ we have one thing unsaved people don't, grace, God's grace. I would never presume to tell someone they are sinning without telling them that I do to. Romans 1: 16-32 explains perfectly how God feels. This doesn't just relate to homosexuals, but all evil moral sins. Again, those that are of human nature. The fact that as Christians we should always try to stay in His word, doesn't mean that we do, but it does mean we have the Holy Spirit to convict our hearts. Trust me, I've fallen before, and gone through seasons I know God wasn't proud of, but He brought me back. I guess my main concern is that nothing you said in your blog was backed by Scripture. I will simply close with Ephesians 3:8-12, " To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things, so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. This was according to the eternal purpose that he has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence through our faith in Him."
ReplyDeleteMost of what I say in the Blog is backed by scripture. I can understand the confusion, though, because I rarely quote directly, or even leave scripture passages, as you find in a lot of religious blogs. This is because in general, endless Bible quoting is a pain to read, and misrepresenting the Word of God through scripture quotation is easy. The first thing that Satan said to anybody was a misrepresentation of God's word, and in his temptation of Christ, he quoted scripture directly. And even if I did dig out direct quotes, I am sure you would have yours, and here we would be again, two people trying to do God's work, having to talk to each other.
ReplyDeleteBack to our conversation, I am glad you are aware of your general sinfulness, kudos. But that still is not what I am talking about here. I am talking about the specific sinfulness that has been employed and perpetuated against LGBTQ people in the name of "defense of marriage" and our Savior. I'm talking about loved ones separated in times of need, Children denied loving homes, dehumanization (a sin against the image of God), violence, misinformation, and outright horribleness directed by those who claim to do so in the name of Christ, not to mention the outrageous expenditure of billions upon billions of dollars in political leverage money that could have been infinitely better spent nearly anywhere else.
This isn't about "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone," though that is always good to remember. This is about willful sinning, or the support their of, by an entire movement within the church that supposedly does so to fight sin.