Indiana's governor signs bill allowing businesses to reject gay customers

[Kristian Joensen]

Who does that for different interpretations of your TWeb posts? For different interpretations of Shakespeare's plays? For different interpretations of Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address? For different interpretations of a news paper article?

[Bill the Cat]

...and here lies the problem. Who decides upon the "truthfulness of that interpretation" when competing denominations (or members within a specific denomination) hold to different interpretations which are mutually exclusive?

The one that is closest to the historical understanding of the early church. Deviating from their understandings in matters of faith and sin are wrong.

History has shown how even the same denomination can interpret scriptural support for say, slavery differently over the centuries.

Especially when the NATURE of slavery changed with the seeping in of greed and it replacing biblical mandates on it. The "slavery" that was instituted in the colonies was a far cry from what it morphed into after the Revolutionary War. Those that tried to justify their greed and sin with the Bible were violating its commands on the subject. As I said, just because an interpretation exists, doesn't make it true.

And the same process of reinterpretation is clearly happening regarding homosexuality today.

Exactly. The bible is being twisted and reinterpreted to condone sinful behavior the same way the original pair was deceived. "Did God REALLY say...?"

[Bill the Cat]

You are arrogantly claiming the right of your denomination to define marriage for an entire, diverse, multicultural nation...

Actually, the Supreme Court already defined it years ago.

Maynard v. Hill

"marriage, in the sense in which it is dealt with by a decree of divorce, is not a contract, but one of the domestic relations. In strictness, though formed by contract, it signifies the relation of husband and wife, deriving both its rights and duties from a source higher than any contract of which the parties are capable, and as to these uncontrollable by any contract which they can make. When formed, this relation is no more a contract than `fatherhood' or `sonship' is a contract."

Atherton v. Atherton

"A husband without a wife, or a wife without a husband, is unknown to the law."

[Starlight]

Actually, the Supreme Court already defined it years ago.

Good to know you're okay with the Supreme Court defining marriage. So when they define it this June, you'll be all good with their definition.

[Bill the Cat]

good to know you're okay with the supreme court defining marriage. So when they redefine it this june, you'll be all good with their definition.

fify.

[Starlight]

fify.

Dunno if you got the memo, but the Supreme Court is allowed to discard old decisions and make new ones. That's just how it works.

[Bill the Cat]

Dunno if you got the memo, but the Supreme Court is allowed to discard old decisions and make new ones. That's just how it works.

Exactly. Redefining. So glad you agree.

[robrecht]

You are arrogantly claiming the right of your denomination to define marriage for an entire, diverse, multicultural nation. But, demonstrably the law of the land does'nt recognize your parochial viewpoint. Wiki. So you can cling to your particular view of marriage if you wish, you have that right, but the law of the land does not recognize this view and defines marriage differently.

Forgive me if I have misunderstood Joel's position. I have not read this thread, but only the last few posts. In Joel's most recent post I did not get the impression that he was claiming the right of his denomination to define marriage for an entire, diverse, multicultural nation. I thought he was just claiming the right to define marriage for one's own denomination. They have an opinion on marriage and marriage law, but they are only defining it for themselves if I understood him correctly. Yes?

[Sparko]

The arrogance is breathtaking. You're assuming that Christians have some sort of right to define for everybody else what marriage is, when marriage is something that non-Christian people around the world have been doing for thousands of years.

Seems to me that is exactly what the homosexual crowd is doing. Telling us we need to change what Marriage is, despite it being between a man and a woman for thousands of years. Christians are not trying to change what marriage is, we are trying to keep it the way it traditionally has been.

[Epoetker]

Good to know you're okay with the Supreme Court defining marriage. So when they define it this June, you'll be all good with their definition.

Marriage was defined far longer ago. You're the only one to claim that the formalization of this definition is MAGIC WORDS THAT CHANGE REALITY.

[Teallaura]

Dunno if you got the memo, but the Supreme Court is allowed to discard old decisions and make new ones. That's just how it works.

No, it isn't. The Court may indeed change its position on a matter of law but ONLY WITH JUSTIFICATION. The Court never defines legal terms whole cloth or out of thin air.

The legal reasoning for redefining marriage is pure whimsy. Yeah, they CAN do it but it will eventually be overturned. Plessy was a stupid decision, legally speaking, that did the EXACT SAME THING. (Hey, let's redefine public policy so that we can create an underclass totally absent in Constitutional law and call it constitutional because though separate, the facilities are 'equal'. Separate but equal was the same sort of legal fiction you propose.)

[Cerealman]

She brought it up.

Her first post to me in this discussion:


To which I again repeat my response:
No other culture in the history of the world is documented as ever having the death penalty for gay sex.

Africa

[Starlight]

Telling us we need to change what Marriage is, despite it being between a man and a woman for thousands of years. Christians are not trying to change what marriage is, we are trying to keep it the way it traditionally has been.

Do you think that if you repeat this claim enough that it will somehow become true?

All sorts of different views of marriage have operated in different cultures throughout history. In the bible alone you can see substantial changes in how the Israelites viewed marriage, with polygamy, and forced-marriage for rape victims occurring in the early parts of the bible, and with shifting teachings on divorce occurring throughout the bible.

In your own country there was same-sex marriage traditionally practiced among the native peoples prior to European colonization.

No other culture in the history of the world is documented as ever having the death penalty for gay sex.

Africa

If you mean modern Africa, then the nations there that have had a death penalty or suggested introducing one have done so under the influence of Christianity and/or Islam.

The historical attitudes of African cultures pre-colonialism were pretty LGBT friendly. These anthropologists have documented 21 historical African cultures that had pro-LGBT practices. 11 of them were documented to have allowed same-sex marriages. (It's worth noting that just because the others don't have surviving documentation indicating that they allowed same-sex marriage, the lack of evidence either way shouldn't be necessarily taken as implying they didn't. The more we learn about native cultures around the world, the more we generally find extremely tolerant attitudes toward LGBT people, and so if there happened to be two people of the same sex wanting to get married, most cultures seem to have seen no obvious reason not to perform such a ceremony. Unless you have a religious text saying "thou shalt not be nice to gay people or let them marry", then the attitude of most people is generally to not care about who other people are having sex with or marrying.)


Coincidentally though, I am going to walk back my earlier claim, because I just came across an article today to the effect that researchers recently managed to reconstruct the law code that Genghis Khan applied to his own people, and in that there was a death penalty for gay sex because he was seriously concerned about their total population and worried that his people were so heavily outnumbered by their enemies. (Obviously when he conquered other peoples to form the Mongol Empire, this reasoning wasn't relevant to the conquered peoples) As always, the Mongols seem to be the one exception to every rule...

[lilpixieofterror]

She brought it up.

Her first post to me in this discussion:


To which I again repeat my response:
No other culture in the history of the world is documented as ever having the death penalty for gay sex.

Idiot, you tried to blame Christians for all the ills of the world and I simply pointed out your argument was wrong. Instead of admitting that your stupid claim was false, you changed up the goal post to something else because you're incapable of ever admitting you were wrong. I know you're very stupid and full of pride, by anybody can go and read the thread for themselves and see how big of a moron you truly are. Bottom line, the Islamic world is not Christian, neither are the Chinese nor the Russians (their demographics say they are mostly non religious), but you ignore that because it tells you stuff you don't like hearing. Besides, you changed up the goal post, yet again. From 'gay marriage' to 'homosexuality' in general. Keep digging Starlight because anything is better than admitting you're wrong, right?

[lilpixieofterror]

Seems to me that is exactly what the homosexual crowd is doing. Telling us we need to change what Marriage is, despite it being between a man and a woman for thousands of years. Christians are not trying to change what marriage is, we are trying to keep it the way it traditionally has been.

What is amusing is watching Starlight change up the goal post. Notice his examples of homosexuality are examples of homosexual acts and not marriage. An important difference, in accordance to his argument that Christians are the one 'redefining marriage'. Getting Starlight to admit he's wrong though is pointless though. He is incapable of admitting to error and prefers to double up on being wrong than just admit to his stupid mistakes.