Atlanta Fire Chief - fired for being Christian.

[One Bad Pig]

One of the things I have come to realize over the years is that translation plays an absolutely huge role in people's biblical interpretation. I think the vast majority of Christians don't realize how many of the beliefs they hold about what the bible 'obviously' says are actually fairly sketchy when you really consider the evidence for the translations they are taking for granted.

Homosexuality, in particular, is not a core issue that the bible repeats dozens of times. Rather it is (allegedly) referred to in a mere handful of places, and hence translation and interpretation play a huge role.

I've spent years studying the subject of what the bible says about homosexuality. I am totally unconvinced that either testament condemns homosexuality.

A brief run-through:
1 Cor 6:9 + 1 Tim 1:10
In these passages, Paul uses a very very obscure Greek word (arsenokoites) whose meaning we don't know. For bad historical reasons it often gets mistranslated as 'homosexuality'. However there are over 500 pages of surviving Greek and Roman primary sources that talk about homosexuality, and none of them use that word ever. So we can be reasonably sure that whatever Paul's word means, it isn't a Greek synonym for homosexuality. From what little evidence there is regarding the meaning of the word Paul uses, my educated guess would be that it refers to a sub-category of rape, but there is so little evidence as to it's meaning that I would agree with Dale Martin of Yale University's comment: “I am not claiming to know what arsenokoites meant, I am claiming that no one knows what it meant.”

Have you considered how other ancient translations looked at the word? On the surface, it's difficult IMO to explain away the literal meaning of anal sex.

Romans 1:18-32
A lot of Christians today assume this passage mentions both gay and lesbian sex, however the interpretation of it as having to do with lesbianism is highly dubious (the early church fathers were unanimous in reading that bit as referring to men having sex with their wives in the 'wrong' way, not to lesbian sex). I agree with their reading as being the most accurate one. Notably that then means that the bible nowhere condemns lesbianism.
My field of particular expertise is the interpretation of Romans, so my exegesis of Romans gets quite complicated because Paul is not the most straight-forward writer and reasons for interpreting his words in certain ways get very complicated, but keeping things very simple: I would say that Paul sets up Romans 1:18-32 as a devil's advocate kind of position, only to knock it down with what follows it. In 2:1 he says "you have no excuse, whoever you are, when you judge others; for in passing judgement on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, are doing the very same things", thus condemning the person who took it upon themselves to condemn others in Rom 1:18-32. So I would say that Paul himself does not hold the views expounded in Romans 1:18-32, but rather is condemning people who do. And fair enough too, because everything Rom 1:18-32 says is wrong at face value: the wrath of God is not actually being revealed from heaven, worshiping animals is not actually the cause of gay sex, and gentiles are not actually terrible horrible awful evil people in every way possible, nor do Jews actually behave orders of magnitude morally better as a result of worshiping the right God.

Er, Paul does not say that they are wrong in judging such things; they are wrong for hypocritically doing so. And I think you're willfully misinterpreting hyperbole here.

Leviticus 18:22, 20:13
The primary motivation for the Levitical prohibitions are likely a historical cultic practice popular among the Babylonians in which transgender priests (originally male), called 'kadesh', had ritual sex with male worshipers to honor a Babylonian god. Deuteronomy bans this practice in Deut 23:17-18, and various other OT books get very upset about the 'high places' in Israel where this type of worship is practiced. Most modern translations now render these terms "male temple prostitutes" or something similar whenever they appear. The Levitical prohibition was very likely primarily motivated by a desire to ban this same practice. An interesting question to ask is what exactly is Leviticus intending to ban: Is it solely intending to ban male sex with a transgender-male (a "man-as-woman" as a very literal translation of the Hebrew in Leviticus might suggest), or is it intended as a more general ban on male homosexual sex (of a specific kind?). Philo, a Jewish contemporary of Jesus, seemingly reads it as the former, thinking it refers to shrine prostitution (The Special Laws, III, VII, 40-42). Certain streams of modern Judaism think it is a ban on male anal sex only, and hence are happy with homosexual non-anal sex, and happy with heterosexual anal sex.
Most Christians today would divide Levitical laws into 3 general kinds of category (insofar as they pay any attention to them at all): Ritual/ceremonial, medical, and social/moral, with only the social laws being still considered relevant to today, whereas the ritual laws are considered irrelevant, and anything medically motivated is considered superseded by modern medicine and generally cleaner standards of living. So to conclusively decide that the law is there for social reasons that still apply today, we would want to be able to enumerate some of those reasons, and we would also want to rigorously exclude ritual or medical motivations. Neither of those things is the case. There are obvious ritual motivations for the ban - a ban on Babylonian worship, and obvious medical motivations for the ban (before condoms and antibiotics there was little way to prevent the spread of STD nor treat them; plus prior to the days of toilet-paper and enemas, anal hygiene was probably far less than ideal). However decades of modern research has failed to produce any social reason for a ban on homosexuality, but have produced plenty of good social reasons for endorsing it - and for that reason all major scientific organisations have been testifying in court over the past decade that gay sex and gay marriage should be legalized, and on the basis of their evidence the courts have almost unanimously agreed (something now along the lines of 50/52 of the last US court decisions on the subject have concluded that there is “no rational basis” for a ban on same-sex marriage). So there doesn't seem to be a good reason for applying this Levitical law today.

1&2 Samuel
I agree with many recent interpreters in believing that the author(s) of the stories about David, Saul and Jonathan in 1&2 Samuel intended to depict David having sexual relationships with Saul and with Jonathan. The details of this interpretation require knowing quite a lot about how same-sex relationships are depicted in other ancient literatures, so it is relatively pointless arguing this beyond observing that almost everyone now who is familiar with other ancient sources that depict same-sex relationships also believes that 1&2 Samuel are depicting them.

I think a lot of people are reading into the story their own predilections here. Even in 19th century America, men could sleep in the same bed and express love for one another without anything sexual in mind whatsoever.

Matthew 19:12
Jesus' positive but cryptic comment about people who are “born eunuchs” may well have been referring to gay men, as it is talking about men who do not have wives, and thus may well be referring to both men who are born asexual and men who are born gay.

Doubtful. Again, you're reading into the text.

Matthew 8:5-13; Luke 7:1-10
When Jesus is asked to heal the centurion's “beloved” servant, there is every possibility that there is a same-sex sexual relationship involved, because these were very common in Roman society and the phrasing used hints at the possibility. Jesus doesn't ask. Instead he extols the centurion as an exemplar of faith.

And God talks about "My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." Was God in a same-sex sexual relationship with His Son?

Mark 12:31 - “You shall love your neighbour as yourself”
That is a command I would say is 'unambiguous' and 'clear'. Phrased in different ways, the command to help others is clear throughout the NT, from the Good Samaritan which tells us to do good to the enemies of our culture and religion, to the Sheep and the Goats which tells us that we will be judged on how we helped those who were suffering. We are to heal the brokenhearted, help the persecuted, care for those who are suffering, all in Christ's name. That is the “Royal Law”, the “commandment we have had from the very beginning”, the way to tell if we are sons of God and not sons of the devil.
Gay people are an oppressed minority who has suffered discrimination and persecution for centuries, so Christians should be the first to be standing up and speaking out for them. Scientific and medical organisations around the world have concluded that gay people have suffered MASSIVE harm from discrimination and prejudice, with social rejection of gay people driving them to suicide, alcohol, and drugs, in massive numbers. The only Christians response to seeing such harm done on such a massive scale to such a persecuted minority must be compassion, empathy and love.

Finally it is worth noting that any specific laws of the Bible must always be interpreted in line with the overarching message of the bible to love God and love one another. Paul writes that what is important is the spirit of the law, not the letter. When we consider the topics of slavery, genocide, or racism, it is clear that there are many literal statements in the bible that could, when taken literally on their own, be easily interpreted as supporting slavery or supporting racism or supporting genocide, and unfortunately it has historically been the case that some 'Christians' have indeed used those verses to support those things. However, today we do not consider the endorsement of slavery acceptable as Christian position – it is incompatible with love for one's neighbour. In our theology we need to not be legalists like the Pharisees who solely focus on the letter of the law, but instead let the Bible's overall teaching of love inform our worldview, and interpret the letter of the law in the wider context of the spirit of the law, love.

Should we love an alcoholic by giving him booze? Love does not mean "validate whatever gives a person pleasure."

In the overall context of the Bible, sexual relations (marriage) are for procreation. The only instance I recall in the Bible mentioning sex that avoids procreation got Onan killed on the spot. Homosexual sex cannot result in procreation.

ETA: Didn't quite get as in depth as I intended (was trying to get a post in between football games).

[Starlight]

Have you considered how other ancient translations looked at the word? On the surface, it's difficult IMO to explain away the literal meaning of anal sex.

The Peshitta and Vulgate both give an extremely literal translation of the parts of the word ("man" + "bed"), which I suspect probably suggests that the translators weren't sure what the word meant and just opted for translating the pieces of it. Unfortunately this is generally an incorrect approach - you can't simply break words into pieces and assume the meaning of the word is the meaning of it's pieces, eg "understanding" doesn't have anything to do with being "under" anything or "standing" on anything. Biblical scholars have learned this lesson repeatedly, because in the 19th century there weren't many surviving koine Greek manuscripts and so a lot of guessing had to be done in NT translation about what the words 'might' have meant based on the parts they were made up of. When lots of koine manuscripts were discovered in the 20th century and it became clear what the words actually meant, it became obvious that the vast majority of the guesses had been wrong. Anyway a translation of "man-bedder" interpreted as "man who has sex with a man" isn't consistent with the very few other historical examples of the word arsenokoites being used in surviving Greek fragments, and it isn't consistent with the fact that the huge amounts of surviving greek literature discussing homosexuality don't use this word. A meaning of 'rape of males' looks like it might be the meaning most consistent with the surviving examples of usage, or possibly 'anal rape', but that is fairly speculative, and it is quite possible the meaning changed over the centuries, and it appears the word shifted also from describing the perpetrator to describing the victim of the attack.

I'm confused by your statement that it's difficult to "to explain away the literal meaning of anal sex". What literal meaning of anal sex? And are you implying that it's a ban on male-female anal sex or only male-male anal sex? (I would note that male-female anal sex is vastly more common in the present day than is male-male anal sex, since the number of male-female couples is so much higher that only a small proportion of them need engage in it to vastly outnumber all gay couples) The literal meaning of the parts of the word are "man" and "bed"... how is that anal sex? There are plenty of ways for 2 men to have sex (if that is what is being referred to) that don't involve anal sex. (The prevalence of anal sex among gay couples seems to have climbed from 8% to 60% in the last hundred years)

Er, Paul does not say that they are wrong in judging such things; they are wrong for hypocritically doing so.

I think it was obvious to the original audience that the gentiles were not as a whole guilty of the serious moral failings that Rom 1:18-32 alleges. Romans society highly valued the virtue of 'fides' (faithfulness, loyalty), and the Roman legions were known around the world for their faithfulness, and Jesus notes that the Roman Centurion knows all about faithfulness, so for Rom 1:18-32 to accuse the gentiles of lacking faithfulness would have had comedy value to the original audience but would not have been taken seriously - likewise with many of the other 'crimes' the gentiles are accused of in the passage. It's like saying "Americans are horribly unpatriotic, the French are terrible cooks, and the Germans are so disorganized", you know it's meant as comedy because it's saying people who are renowned for being good at a thing are terrible at that thing.

And I think you're willfully misinterpreting hyperbole here.

It's worth noting that my reasons for interpreting Rom 1:18-32 this way have to do with how I interpret Paul's argument as a dialogue, and I reached this interpretation long before I was at all interested in looking at what the bible said about homosexuality.

almost everyone now who is familiar with other ancient sources that depict same-sex relationships also believes that 1&2 Samuel are depicting them.

I think a lot of people are reading into the story their own predilections here. Even in 19th century America, men could sleep in the same bed and express love for one another without anything sexual in mind whatsoever.

I think that people who haven't done much study of other cultures, and how ancient writers depicted same-sex relationship, do indeed read the story however they want, and do some sort of hand-waving justification if they feel the need to. However, people with experience studying how ancient cultures depict same-sex sexual relationships seem to pretty consistently immediately identify a same-sex sexual relationship in the biblical accounts of David. It's a case of it looking and quacking like a duck I guess, and you can't identify it for sure unless you're a duck expert. As someone who's read quite a lot about homosexuality in other cultures and in the ancient world, I can only say that it's blindingly obvious to me when I read the accounts of David that the authors are meaning to convey a same-sex sexual relationship.

Was God in a same-sex sexual relationship with His Son?

Your question reminds me of various sermons I've heard over the years about how sex is the ultimate expression of love and connection, and about how human love between spouses is a pale reflection of the love between the members of the trinity from which such love originates. Such theology would ultimately seem to imply a polygamous same-sex marriage between the members of the Trinity, so I've always found it ironic that most of the people I've heard giving such sermons opposed same-sex marriage.

Should we love an alcoholic by giving him booze? Love does not mean "validate whatever gives a person pleasure."

Love certainly doesn't mean "be nasty to them until they kill themselves", which unfortunately has been all too often the response toward gay people. As I linked in my post, negative attitudes towards gay people result in an estimated over 2000 pre-mature deaths in Canada alone per year. The major scientific medical and psychological organisations in England and the US have been testifying to governments and courts that discrimination and prejudice has the effect of killing massive numbers of gay people, but that gay marriage is, by contrast, beneficial. So your comparison with alcoholism is wrong, because being gay doesn't hurt people the way drinking alcohol does. Instead it's being anti-gay that hurts people: The 'cure' is a thousand times worse than the 'disease'.

In the overall context of the Bible, sexual relations (marriage) are for procreation. The only instance I recall in the Bible mentioning sex that avoids procreation got Onan killed on the spot. Homosexual sex cannot result in procreation.

I'm afraid I can't take the Catholic arguments against condom usage seriously and think their biblical justification is ridiculously tenuous - I think non-procreative sex is fine and a part of a healthy relationship. According to Paul in 1 Cor 7, the ideal state for everyone is celibacy, however since most people have lusts, Paul grants them the concession of marriage. So it would seem from 1 Cor 7 that the biblical paradigm of marriage is as a concession to lusts, and thus presumably gay people should be granted the same concession for the same reason.

[Epoetker]

You misunderstand me. Mountain Man said that homosexuality is clearly a sin because the Bible calls it an abomination. There are other things which the Bible calls an abomination, such as eating bacon, which Christians do not consider sinful. Therefore, the fact that the Bible calls something an abomination does not necessarily equate to that thing being sinful.

My offhand remembrance on the exact wording is mainly going back to the NIV, but there's a pretty wide gulf between "you will be held ceremonially unclean" and "that is detestable". Looking at the original set of strictures has a whole lot of 'for you,' 'till evening,' and suchlike.

I am fully aware that some more sophisticated Christian theology attempts to separate the ritual laws which no longer apply from the moral laws which still apply. I was commenting specifically on Mountain Man's poor logic, and did not intend my statement to be an indictment upon all Christians who find homosexuality to be immoral.

Appealing to the Bible is something that actually works, given that the Book of Leviticus makes a very operational distinction between unclean animals, and detestable and dishonorable acts:

“‘Do not defile yourselves in any of these ways, because this is how the nations that I am going to drive out before you became defiled. 25 Even the land was defiled; so I punished it for its sin, and the land vomited out its inhabitants. 26 But you must keep my decrees and my laws. The native-born and the foreigners residing among you must not do any of these detestable things, 27 for all these things were done by the people who lived in the land before you, and the land became defiled. 28 And if you defile the land, it will vomit you out as it vomited out the nations that were before you.

Basically, one of the markers of the difference in moral tone within Leviticus was the universality of the laws against the acts and their consequences.

So again, you have some weird vendetta thing going against Mountain Man that causes you to overreact to what are essentially neutral statements, and again, it seems I have to correct you.

[lilpixieofterror]

It just depends on how you define "Christian".

Yeah, silly me for defining 'Christian' as the way it has been defined for the past 2,000 years. Not even Marcion attempted to throw Paul's works out the window, but rewrite them to 'remove' them of their Jewish influence. You might want to stop talking, at this point PM because you're just making yourself look more and more foolish because I can't think of a single group of Christians that have attempted to throw Paul's letters out the window. Even the heretics, seemed to have accepted at least some of what he said.

If you think Christians must believe that Paul's writings are exactly in line with the will of God, I think you're putting too much emphasis on a tertiary issue, not to mention excluding many early Christians who were born before the Bible was compiled.

Sorry PM, but Paul's letters appear in the earliest accounts of the cannon and seem to have been universal accepted as being canon, back in at least the 2nd century (and likely further back, even to Paul's time). If you want to keep saying stupid things, you're welcome to it PM, but wanting to throw Paul's works out the window kind of shows how ignorant you truly are. Paul is among the most inflectional people of the Christianity (with the exception of Jesus himself, of course). Over half of the NT, contains his words. Luke (who was one of his traveling companions) wrote the Gospel of Luke and Acts. He is quoted by almost every church father that I've ever read. His writing is universally accepted, in about every Christian denomination on the planet. Sorry PM, but you're speaking nonsense, but keep digging if you really want to...

[fm93]

Love certainly doesn't mean "be nasty to them until they kill themselves", which unfortunately has been all too often the response toward gay people. As I linked in my post, negative attitudes towards gay people result in an estimated over 2000 pre-mature deaths in Canada alone per year. The major scientific medical and psychological organisations in England and the US have been testifying to governments and courts that discrimination and prejudice has the effect of killing massive numbers of gay people, but that gay marriage is, by contrast, beneficial. So your comparison with alcoholism is wrong, because being gay doesn't hurt people the way drinking alcohol does. Instead it's being anti-gay that hurts people: The 'cure' is a thousand times worse than the 'disease'.

Bingo. Boom. Five stars. Two thumbs up. Would amen again if I could.

[firstfloor]

Bingo. Boom. Five stars. Two thumbs up. Would amen again If I could.

I agree. What a star. Maybe the godless should have a ‘Bravo’ button.

The underlying SIN is the entitlement that people feel they have to tell others how to behave. In an attempt to avoid the sin they appeal to a higher authority. If that higher authority is a god, the counter is either, my god is more powerful than yours or your god is imaginary. This error of appealing upwards to authority is a compounding sin – a shirking of personal responsibility.

[Boxing Pythagoras]

My offhand remembrance on the exact wording is mainly going back to the NIV, but there's a pretty wide gulf between "you will be held ceremonially unclean" and "that is detestable". Looking at the original set of strictures has a whole lot of 'for you,' 'till evening,' and suchlike.

Once again, you have missed the point. Mountain Man specifically claimed that the fact that the Bible calls the act an "abomination" is the reason it is sinful. He did not appeal to the difference between ceremonial law and moral law. He focused on the word "abomination." I merely pointed out that there are other things which are listed as "abominations" only a few verses after the Bible lists homosexuality as such which are no longer considered sinful.

This has nothing to do with whether or not the Bible actually holds homosexuality to be sinful (for what it's worth, I believe that it does). This has to do with the logic behind demonstrating that fact. If one of my geometry students wrote on a quiz that the Pythagorean Theorem is true because a circle has a radius, his answer would be wrong regardless of the fact that the Pythagorean Theorem actually is true. Similarly, even if the Bible does say that homosexuality is sinful, that proscription is not due to the fact that the Bible refers to it as an abomination.

So again, you have some weird vendetta thing going against Mountain Man that causes you to overreact to what are essentially neutral statements, and again, it seems I have to correct you.

Project much? Mountain Man and I sometimes disagree, sure. But we sometimes agree, as well. And I similarly have issues upon which I agree and disagree with many other members of this message board.

I have no "vendetta" against Mountain Man; and while you seem to think him incapable of doing so, I have complete faith that the gentleman can defend his own statements without need of your help.

[lilpixieofterror]

Bingo. Boom. Five stars. Two thumbs up. Would amen again If I could.

Too bad it is just a pile of burning straw.

[Sparko]

I agree. What a star. Maybe the godless should have a ‘Bravo’ button.

The underlying SIN is the entitlement that people feel they have to tell others how to behave. In an attempt to avoid the sin they appeal to a higher authority. If that higher authority is a god, the counter is either, my god is more powerful than yours or your god is imaginary. This error of appealing upwards to authority is a compounding sin – a shirking of personal responsibility.

all sin hurts people directly. It keeps them from having eternal life with God. That is what Jesus came and died for, so we could be forgiven because we all have sinned.

and since you are telling us how we should behave and believe (or NOT believe) -- you fail your own criteria, you entitled twit.

[Sparko]

Too bad it is just a pile of burning straw.

Don't worry, I am sure he will deny his agreement later.

[fm93]

Too bad it is just a pile of burning straw.

No it's not, unless you want to argue that love DOES mean being nasty to people until they kill themselves, that being gay DOES hurt people in the same way alcohol does, and that being anti-gay does NOT hurt people.

[Darth Executor]

No it's not, unless you want to argue that love DOES mean being nasty to people until they kill themselves

They kill themselves because they're mentally ill. And being gay hurts them more than alcohol.

[Starlight]

And being gay hurts them more than alcohol.

The actual fact of being gay doesn't appear to hurt them at all. I know several gay couples who seem entirely happy with their lives, who don't seem to be hurt by their gayness in the least, not one iota.

But prejudice and discrimination definitely does hurt people. Every gay person I have ever talked to has had stories to tell of the stress, anxiety, and sufferings they've endured as a result of their families, friends, or society being anti-gay. Anti-gay prejudice is almost always cited by gay people who have attempted suicide or had suicidal thoughts as being the primary motivation for that. It should be obvious, but society being repeatedly and constantly nasty towards people harms them. Being nasty towards gay people very very definitely hurts them, as scientific and medical organisations around the Western world have been testifying to for more than a decade now. And while it is hard to pin an exact number on the damage done by prejudice, because the subtle effects of anti-gay sentiment are quite insidious and often difficult to quantify, it is reasonably clear that the kinds of numbers of people were are talking about is on the order of 2000 premature deaths per year in Canada alone (that was prior to marriage equality there - marriage equality significantly reduces the death rate). That is what comes of telling a minority group that they are bad people, sinners, undeserving of the same status for their relationships that other people have, that who they love and who they are is wrong, that God disapproves of their lives, that their families and society don't approve of them and their choices. That causes chronic stress and chronic anxiety, it drives people to alcohol, drugs, and smoking for stress relief, the chronic stress cause and exacerbates other latent medical or psychological problems, and the feeling of rejection and lack of self-worth leads to depression, despair and suicide... in massive numbers. We're not talking about a small amount of harm here: We're talking about the attitudes of anti-gay Christians killing more people in the US per year than the Muslims did in 9/11. And even worse is that anti-gay discrimination doesn't just kill people, it makes their lives so miserable that they want to die.

Promiscuity can also hurt people, through STDs and emotionally, which is yet another reason why anti-gay Christians are so wrong to try and deny to gay people the possibility of the commitment of marriage. I have seen many Christians hypocritically berate gay people for promiscuity while at the same time insisting that they be denied the right to commit to each other in marriage.

all sin hurts people directly. It keeps them from having eternal life with God. That is what Jesus came and died for, so we could be forgiven because we all have sinned.

Exactly: Because of Jesus, sin doesn't actually prevent people from having eternal life with God. That's why legalism is wrong as a path to salvation: We don't need to all try to assiduously and Pharsetically avoid all sin, because trying to avoid all sin is not what saves us. Christ is what saves us: The sins in our lives no longer are a source of damnation due to Christ. So there seems little point in trying to make gay people's lives miserable by insisting on them remaining celibate, since them having or not having a partner is not what saves them, Jesus does. It's inconsistent to be legalistic out one side of your mouth while preaching Jesus' finished work as the means to salvation out the other.

[JonathanL]

Exactly: Because of Jesus, sin doesn't actually prevent people from having eternal life with God. That's why legalism is wrong as a path to salvation: We don't need to all try to assiduously and Pharsetically avoid all sin, because trying to avoid all sin is not what saves us. Christ is what saves us: The sins in our lives no longer are a source of damnation due to Christ. So there seems little point in trying to make gay people's lives miserable by insisting on them remaining celibate, since them having or not having a partner is not what saves them, Jesus does. It's inconsistent to be legalistic out one side of your mouth while preaching Jesus' finished work as the means to salvation out the other.

"Christ is what saves us: The sins in our lives no longer are a source of damnation due to Christ. So there seems little point in trying to make murderers lives miserable by insisting on them keeping from killing people, since them murdering or not murdering people is not what saves them, Jesus does."

"Christ is what saves us: The sins in our lives no longer are a source of damnation due to Christ. So there seems little point in trying to make child molester's lives miserable by insisting on them keeping from molesting children, since them molesting or not molesting children is not what saves them, Jesus does."

You see how I can use your insane logic to justify any kind of atrocious behaviour?

[Starlight]

Chrawnus,
Murder and child molestation harm others in obvious ways. Therefore there is every reason for society to want to dissuade people from doing those things.

I am unaware of any protestant Christian denominations who hold to theology that says that if a saved Christian commits a murder or molests a child then that person is going to hell. Rather Christians strongly encourage others not to murder or molest children because those are not a loving, Christ-like things to do, and Christians should strive to be loving and Christ-like. However, such acts are not salvation issues - doing more good works / doing less bad works are the 'fruits' of salvation, they are not the cause of it, which is Christ alone. (According to standard evangelical theology anyway. Your theology may vary of course. And being an atheist myself, I don't actually believe this, but it's what standard evangelical doctrine teaches. (I used to be a theologian, and still dabble))

The reformer Martin Luther was subjected to a lot of criticism for his theology on exactly this issue - his bold new claim that human works were not a route to salvation and that in fact it is Christ's finished work alone saves people, was subjected to criticism by Catholics who responded that if you take away good works from being a cause of salvation then it incentivizes people not to bother so much with doing good. Protestants have since had to grapple with the issue because they view good works as "fruits" but not the "cause" of salvation. Luther (in)famously wrote "sin boldly", emphasizing to his followers that their faith in Christ was what ultimately saved them, not their sinlessness: "let your sins be strong (sin boldly), but let your trust in Christ be stronger". In protestant theology, neither murder nor gay sex, nor any other sin real or imagined can be an ultimate issue of salvation, only faith in Christ, for without Christ no sinless life can save, and the blood of Christ covers all sin. So just as being straight doesn't save anyone, being gay doesn't damn them.