Christian Leaders Scapegoat Gays

I am a Christian (Southern Baptist) with 2 gay cousins that I love (and support) dearly. I'm a Christian without an agenda, as far as that goes. My point is, you can't paint Christians with a broad brush.

So this is another christian bashing thread. I posted a thread about christian bashing vs islam bashing a few months ago and everyone here said oh we do not bash chrisitans anymore than islam but this thread is one of many of them. I am so tired of it. In islam there is no gay scapegoating, they just kill gays so there is no problem for them. At least christians do not kill them.

"I've always been a bit dismayed of the fundamentalist conservative Christian agenda. The three top things that threaten them are gay marriage, religious freedom (huh?) and abortion." by Tweety

So ... all christians are fundamentalist conservatives? Like all muslims are fundamentalist conservatives?

Not even all fundamentalist conservatives of any religion think or worship alike ... Tweety made it pretty clear about whom he was talking, I think.

If, as a Christian, you share the agenda mentioned by Tweety, try addressing the question he asked about it.

If you don't, quit whining about "bashing" and using it as an excuse to rant about your own issues with what you think is Islam. For one thing, muslim countries have no corner on anti-gay violence. It wasn't so long ago that "homosexual panic" was a valid defense for murder in our own courts ... still is in some places.

I think it's interesting and perhaps important to look at how fundamentalist christian theology is used to explain/justify these positions.

I, too, am interested in the for the rationale for the assertion that gays are "destroying" marriage. Or the idea that, somehow, conservative christian theology gets to control how non-christians live.

Islam has nothing to do with it ... they have their own issues to work out.

I do think many fundamentalist Christians are disproportionally focused on gay people. Remember the Ted Haggard situation? So many Christians seemed horrified by the gay sex aspect, and rarely mentioned the fact that he was doing crystal meth with a prostitute.

Tweety, instead of looking at this document through the warped interpretative lens of a very liberal writer with an agenda and an ax to grind, why not go to the original source to examine the document?

The Manhattan Declaration

Manhattan Declaration: A Call to Christian Righteousness

Sign the Declaration

The document is only stating that people of conservative Christian values will not "bow" to the latest troubling edicts from the Obama administration. I know I will get flamed for this, but I believe we are witnessing the twilight of religious freedom in America.

The Obama Administration is quickly removing the "conscience clause" protection for health care workers. This would force prolife nurses to participate in acts of abortion or active euthanasia or face being fired or losing their licenses. Churches and other houses of worship face losing their tax exempt status if they do not allow gays and lesbians to marry within their facilities. ENDA, if passed, would require conservative religious organizations to hire people whose values are in diametric opposition to the organization's beliefs and mission statement. Conservative photographers have been sued for refusing to take pictures for a gay wedding event. Their right to conscience has not been upheld in a court of law. The "Hate Crimes" legislation is such that the average Southern Baptist preacher might be imprisoned for quoting certain Scriptures concerning homosexuality from the pulpit or airwaves. Even parts of the Bible could be outlawed as "hate speech." The Obama Administration, with its Orwellian "Nanny State" socialist agenda ("Big Brother knows best"), also wants to resurrect the "fairness" doctrine that would silence conservatives such as Rush Limbaugh, Glen Beck, Sean Hannity, and Bill O'Reilly from the airwaves. It also seeks to control information disseminated on the Internet through its "net neutrality" initiative. I find these trends very disturbing indeed.

Vicky ... I disagree wholeheartedly but thank you for addressing the OP.

I'd like to address the question of forcing churches to perform sacramental marriages or face losing their tax exemption. Do you happen to have an analysis of how that would work legally? To me, it's a clear violation of the separation of church and state.

Sacramental marriage ... marriage within a particular religious denomination or tradition ... is a strictly spiritual/religious ritual that happens to be also legally valid as a civil marriage. Forcing a christian congregation to perform gay marriages makes about as much sense as forcing a Baptist minister to perform Jewish rituals, or forcing a Roman Catholic priest to marry divorcees in a Catholic ritual.

When we talk about gay marriage we are talking about civil marriage, not a sacrament or religious ritual. Nothing to do with religion at all. I believe gay marriage is righteous as an issue of equal protection under the law. I have no doubt that some idiot might try to file a lawsuit to hassle a particular congregation but I don't think it would get anywhere.

As for the fairness doctrine silencing anyone ... how does allowing equal time for liberals silence conservatives? I take pretty much equal time here, when I want, and I don't see any conservatives shutting up ...

I skimmed through the declaration cited in your post. (The history cited is a little iffy in terms of accuracy, BTW.) What I didn't find is a rationale for civil law being totally in line with your religious laws ... to insist that it be so, again, makes about as much sense as making eating lobster or working on Saturday illegal because it violates Jewish religious law.

And any member of any religion can preach whatever he/she wants, but if they use their religious writings to promote or justify violence against gays, or anyone else, then it's hate speech, I don't care whose holy book is being used to shield it. Context is everything.

Respectfully, then, I just don't buy the analysis you presented ... IMHO, you've fallen into the common assumption that my freedom must necessarily destroy yours.

Interesting read - but the author makes some errors regarding how Christians see things but then, as we've said on many threads, from his perspective it sure looks like what he thinks it looks like.

I don't have time to address all the things I think he misses . . . but to start with I'd like to mention Tweety's statement: "What about things that hurt families like divorce, economics, chemical dependency, abuse, alienation.......guess those don't happen to good Christian families."

I realize that this specific document doesn't address those things specifically but the Christian community as a whole does. I became a Christian at 28 after leaving my husband who was cheating on me. The reason I left was a book called "Love Must Be Tough" which showed me that I was being treated like a doormat by allowing my husband to come home to me and our boys and then leave again to be with his mistress and then come home again. I needed to stand up and say "No". And I did. And he left for good. Which was one of the consequences the book showed me. It was the right thing to do, to realize my value as a human being and not allow myself to be treated so shabbily. I learned that from a Christian. Three things that are deal breakers in a marriage - abuse, adultery, addiction.

There are many Christian organizations that address divorce, economics, chemical dependency, abuse, alienation, and many other issues.

As to the article - I understand why he is focusing on the part where sex = making babies ONLY. Maybe the focus has been shifted due to the gay marriage issue. But I've ALWAYS been taught that God made sex for human beings not only to procreate but to HAVE FUN! And He is absolutely in favor of infertile couples having fun, people who are finished having children having fun, etc.

As to his remark about Chuck Colson - yes he did a bad thing but he repented and has been doing an amazing prison ministry since then. Now if Chuck was still trying to obstruct justice I'd say he was a hypocrite. But he admitted he was wrong, did his prison time, saw how badly the prisons needed reform (not just religion stuff either by the way but true rehabilitation so folks could get out of prison and make something good out of their lives with a job, etc).

There are many things the Obama administration is doing that makes me concerned about religious liberty (well, liberty in general too). Vicky posted some of those.

There are many Christians who are questioning the focus on abortion and gay rights. I mentioned this book in a thread about a year ago with Stan - "The Great Awakening" by Jim Wallis which criticizes that focus and changes it to what he sees as bigger issues for the Christian to latch onto more social justice issues. Of course for me all I heard was it doesn't matter what we Christian focus on - the problem is we Christians want to solve the problems with Christianity.

So, I'll bet if we backed off on the abortion and gay rights issues . . . .people would be just as p.o.'d with us for whatever we focused on.

Jim Wallis also wrote "God's Politics - Why The Right Gets It Wrong and The Left Doesn't Get it".

steph

p.s. Jimmy Carter wrote the forward to "Great Awakening" and Bono wrote something on the back cover too.

Steph ... I still maintain that disagreement does not equal being po'd, bashing or any other synonym for persecution.

Using a theological argument to persuade fellow believers is reasonable. Using it as the only justification for civil action that affects my non-christian life is not.

I was thinking of a certain group of folks who simply don't want Christians to have any power whatsoever.

Not you.

And I actually agree that there are some things we Christians believe in and do that should not ever be mandated. Besides - God wants us to come to Him freely . . not coerced, not forced, not like robots. Otherwise - it wouldn't be love, would it?

steph