Posted on 07/01/2008 7:23:43 PM PDT by Coleus
Despite denials from some, it is pretty obvious that premarital hetero sex has become tolerated if not expected among most "Christians." Certainly "fornication" is not denounced with anything even vague resembling the brimstone pitched at homosexuals.
Adultery is still frowned on in many churches. However, divorce when scriptural grounds do not exist is generally accepted. Few (Protestant) churches of which I am aware take any action at all when a member abandons his/her family.
I believe a major differential factor is that it is much more fun to denounce sins you are very unlikely to engage in personally because you find them repugnant.
I would suspect a sermon denouncing all sexual sins as the Bible does would wind up hitting a majority of the average congregation where it hurts most. Easier to denounce bizarre and unpopular sins. It helps the congregation feel good about themselves.
The idea of homosexuality as a lifestyle alternative to heterosexuality is not a sexual idea, but a political idea — part of the broad spectrum of Revolutionary thought, and, as such, merely one more front in the Revolution's war against Christian civilization. This is a war of ideas; the idea of a person as "a homosexual" (i.e. a being defined by their sexual attraction) rather than as a human being suffering from homosexual urges is an ideological weapon. Its purpose is to destroy the natural order of human relations by redefining the human person as a creature of its sexual desires. The best way to confront the homosexual lifestyle movement is, therefore, to destroy the artificial construct of a person as a homosexual. By treating persons with homsexual desires as persons — i.e. by refusing to concede that such a thing as "a homosexual" exists — we deny the Revolution a major weapon in its ideological arsenal.
How should we do this? Once again, the Church provides the answer.
Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that "homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered." They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.Here we see the means of defeating the gay movement: love. We must love those suffering from disordered sexual attractions — on an individual basis, as human beings, not as members of a political movement. We do this by refusing to accept the Revolutionary lie that any such thing as "a homosexual person" exists; instead, we should return to the traditional Western idea of sodomy as an individual vice. Western society has always dealt with sodomy in the context of vice, and has dealt with the damage caused by sodomy in a manner similar to that caused by alcohol and drug abuse — as a matter of individual suffering. The Church still treats it in this fashion. By refusing to accept the Revolution's redefinition of the human person, and by refusing play the Revolution's political game, we can blunt and ultimately destroy the Revolution's use of human sexuaity as a weapon against Christian civilization.The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God's will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.
Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection. [Catechism, Part 3, Section 2, Chapter 2, Article 6, SubSection 2, Heading 5]
You are precisely correct. It’s easy and fun for us as Christians to cast stones at those with a homosexual orientation, but let someone damn us for our own sexual sins — from masturbation to remarriage to “shacking up” — and watch the sparks fly. Perverts? Oh, no, not us! We’re Pharisees!
Being a Christian is not meant to be easy or fun. Human nature is fundamentally twisted due to the Fall; just as homosexuals have the disordered urge to have intercourse with those of the same sex, the rest of us suffer from the disordered urges to have sex before marriage, outside of marriage, or for the purpose of entertainment. Contraception, fornication, adultery, and masturbation are every bit as wrong as is b-—f-——g — but no one likes the feeling of their own ox being gored.
(Please note that I am no better than the rest of my fellow hypocrites in this regard; I am all too ready to damn the homos to hell while justifying my own heterosexual perversions.)
In the eyes of God, a person who remarries after divorce, or who plays the field, or who steps out on his or her spouse, or who yanks their crank, is every bit as much of a pervert as the most effeminate poof in Sodom. We would all do well to acknowledge our own perversions before we attack others for theirs.
With the exception of the crank-yanking, for which I know of no specific scriptural prohibition, I agree with you.
I guess what irritates me most is the often self-righteous nature of the denunciation of homosexuals, when everybody knows full well that many if not most of the denunciators have practiced or are practicing various sexual sins themselves.
I forget who said it, but when you start to feel self-righteous, you’re not.
To be perfectly fair, some of the other things the OT describes as “abomination” are eating pork or shellfish, wearing garments made with blended fibers, and trimming your beard.
I suspect a significant majority of Americans are guilty of abominations per the OT. Personally, I’m guilty of every one of these.
Historically speaking, it would be more accurate to say western society has generally dealt with sodomy by executing the sodomite.
The idea that homosexuality defines a person rather than a sin or dysfunction is indeed very modern. I wish I had more information about the history of this definition, but it is certainly less than 100 years old.
It was an assault button.
I don’t specifically disagree that; a person who has true homosexual urges, realizes it’s a sin and struggles with it from that aspect, deserves the Church’s (our) support. The current PC thinking is; it is a normal part of our person. Which IMO, is an assault on decency and society. Compassion, again IMO, does not work on this level. This is hedonism and I think we all know how that works out for civilizations.
In defense of the self-righteous. No self-righteous person is out there claiming that adultery, pre-marital sex, “crank-yanking” etc. is good and needs to be taught to children.
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