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Megachurch Pastor Comes Out Of Closet

Blackdog said:
You can take it how you wish. You are not a Christian, so why should your inaccurate and wrong interpretation matter?
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Christian? It depends upon which Christian's interpretatoin you wish to take. According to some I am forever a Christian even if I reject it, and according to others I am destined to burn in hell. It's funny, you would think your God would be a little more careful in laying out hs wording so that it couldn't be interpreted an infinite number of ways.
 
Johnny DooWop said:
You just said "Everything in the Bible is God's law, period".
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Figuratively yes, everything is. Not everything in the Bible is as literal as people would like it to be like CriticalThought's "math" comment. One thing is clear though. Immorality in all it's form is a sin. This includes acts of homosexuality.
 
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CriticalThought said:
Did he say that before or after he was ressurected?
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Irrelevant. John Chapters 13 and 14 were christ's teachings to his disciples, which were not nullified(and no commandment was) either before or after ressurection.
 
CriticalThought said:
Christian? It depends upon which Christian's interpretatoin you wish to take. According to some I am forever a Christian even if I reject it, and according to others I am destined to burn in hell. It's funny, you would think your God would be a little more careful in laying out hs wording so that it couldn't be interpreted an infinite number of ways.
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As I said, it is not biblical so it is not relevant. Continue to play your silly semantics game, it makes you look uninformed at best.

And no it can't. Only people like yourself who want to twist it into something that it's not. So why even bother to try so hard? So you can escape hellfire? So you can make yourself feel better somehow?
 
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Blackdog said:
Figuratively yes, everything is. Not everything in the Bible is as literal as people would like it to be like your "math" comment. One thing is clear though. Immorality in all it's form is a sin. his includes acts of homosexuality.
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Another funny thing is that all important word "sin" which can translate to mean simply "off mark". Although I do love your interpreation of God as some authoritarian father figure who seems to have created all his little children to be robots living in accordacne to an imperfect world. Anyone who does not obey or fails his expectations is apparantly defective and worthy of being discarded. Quite the parental figure to be proud of I would say.
 
CriticalThought said:
Christian? It depends upon which Christian's interpretatoin you wish to take. According to some I am forever a Christian even if I reject it, and according to others I am destined to burn in hell. It's funny, you would think your God would be a little more careful in laying out hs wording so that it couldn't be interpreted an infinite number of ways.
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i think he did, human thought just manages to ruin it anyway. In ancient times, for a someone to become a member of the sanhedrien, the "applicant" had to prove to the sanhedrian that he was a master of logic, and would have make an arguement for the torah/bible allowing jews to eat red meat, even thought it is clearly forbidden, word for word in the commandments.

And obviously, some were successful. So, i think it has nothing to do with how "well" my God wrote his bible and more to due with people who don't like to be told that they are wrong.

Which is fair, no one likes to be told they're doing something wrong...
 
CriticalThought said:
Another funny thing is that all important word "sin" which can translate to mean simply "off mark". Although I do love your interpreation of God as some authoritarian father figure who seems to have created all his little children to be robots living in accordacne to an imperfect world. Anyone who does not obey or fails his expectations is apparantly defective and worthy of being discarded. Quite the parental figure to be proud of I would say.
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I don't know which god you are thinking of. Are you done being fascetious yet?
 
Blackdog said:
As I said, it is not biblical so it is not relevant. Continue to play your silly semantics game, it makes you look uninformed at best.
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Informed? As in, pretending a certain interpretation that I have been indoctrinated into is the absolute correct one and anyone who strays from it is not truly a Christian? That is quite the thing to be informed in! How does that work out for you? It must be maddening living in a world where you are one of the few people who have it right. I'm sure you feel quite powerful and knowledgeable.

And no it can't. Only people like yourself who want to twist it into something that it's not even bother to try.
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Twisting? Funny thing about books that were based on oral traditoins is that they were likely twisted many times over by the time they were written down. And even when they are written, it is so easy to distort them when you take them out of historical context. But I'm sure you and your God are well aware of such a trival thing. Why not just assume that book is perfect and for added fun, lets emply the ciruclar logic that it is perfect because it says it is.
 
CriticalThought said:
Another funny thing is that all important word "sin" which can translate to mean simply "off mark". Although I do love your interpreation of God as some authoritarian father figure who seems to have created all his little children to be robots living in accordacne to an imperfect world. Anyone who does not obey or fails his expectations is apparantly defective and worthy of being discarded. Quite the parental figure to be proud of I would say.
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And this has what to do with my post? In fact you are completely wrong. You did not bother to read my posts in the beginning did you? If you had you would have seen that you are just spouting nonsense at this point because in actuality, you really have no argument.
 
Blackdog said:
And this has what to do with my post? In fact you are completely wrong. You did not bother to read my posts in the beginning did you? If you had you would have seen that you are just spouting nonsense at this point because in actuality, you really have no argument.
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Did I ever have an argument? I'm simply enjoying your posts. They are quite amusing. Who am I but a lowly nonbeliever, and why should you cast pearls before such swine? Truly, it is much more important to preach the gospel and save your fellow man from the plight of his own humanity and a world that is as inherently absurd as he is.
 
Blackdog said:
Figuratively yes, everything is. Not everything in the Bible is as literal as people would like it to be like CriticalThought's "math" comment. One thing is clear though. Immorality in all it's form is a sin. This includes acts of homosexuality.
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I have strong religious beliefs and I believe the Bible is one of the greatest spiritual guides ever written. However I won't agree with your statement nor will I disagree with it. I think everything in the Bible needs to be examined in the context it was written, and with proper translation. For instance, the word "fornication" was a very improper translation of the Greek word Pornea. While fornication means sex outside of marriage, Pornea is a general term simply meaning sexual immorality, or "playing the harlot" without giving any specifics as to exactly what forms of sex are in this category.

Also, one thing Christians like to ignore, is that even Biblical laws change overtime to fit with their society.
 
CriticalThought said:
Informed? As in, pretending a certain interpretation that I have been indoctrinated into is the absolute correct one and anyone who strays from it is not truly a Christian? That is quite the thing to be informed in! How does that work out for you? It must be maddening living in a world where you are one of the few people who have it right. I'm sure you feel quite powerful and knowledgeable.

Twisting? Funny thing about books that were based on oral traditoins is that they were likely twisted many times over by the time they were written down. And even when they are written, it is so easy to distort them when you take them out of historical context. But I'm sure you and your God are well aware of such a trival thing. Why not just assume that book is perfect and for added fun, lets emply the ciruclar logic that it is perfect because it says it is.
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At this point you are not even addressing anything worth responding to. It has become nothing but yet another in a LONG line of your anti religion rants.

I have to go help a friend move. So God bless and sleep tight man. :peace
 
CriticalThought said:
I'm certainly no fan of it. I like to believe I have a choice in rejecting Christianty for the vile and corrupted relgion that it is.
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Moderator's Warning:
This is very close to baiting/trolling: the use of needlessly inflammatory language likely to cause other posters to lose their temper and respond with flaming. I advise caution in making such pronouncements in future. One can express oneself without being needlessly offensive to an entire religion.
 
If it's between him and God, it's none of your business if he's a sinner or not. We are all sinners, and I think that is pretty established in in the Bible. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.

Christianity has always been a refuge for homosexuals because if you are willing to play the traditional role of a man, it's easy. Producing a child is not hard. I'm gay and I could do it. From a Christian perspective, are you really willing to write off 30 some odd years of this guy's work just because he is now coming out? He has probably done a lot of good. It's hypocrisy to gloss over the good in his life over something like this.

Your job is not to judge. Your job is to love. It is God's job to judge. I'm not even Christian and I understand that better than you do.
 
Johnny DooWop said:
I have strong religious beliefs and I believe the Bible is one of the greatest spiritual guides ever written. However I won't agree with your statement nor will I disagree with it. I think everything in the Bible needs to be examined in the context it was written, and with proper translation. For instance, the word "fornication" was a very improper translation of the Greek word Pornea. While fornication means sex outside of marriage, Pornea is a general term simply meaning sexual immorality, or "playing the harlot" without giving any specifics as to exactly what forms of sex are in this category.
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I know this and absolutly agree.

Johnny DooWop said:
Also, one thing Christians like to ignore, is that even Biblical laws change overtime to fit with their society.
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Here I will disagree. The laws put down by Jesus and Paul have not changed, society did. We are just looking at it from far away.

God bless brother.
 
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My apologies to anyone I may have offended. I'll choose my words more carefully.
 
Orion said:
If it's between him and God, it's none of your business if he's a sinner or not. We are all sinners, and I think that is pretty established in in the Bible. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.

Christianity has always been a refuge for homosexuals because if you are willing to play the traditional role of a man, it's easy. Producing a child is not hard. I'm gay and I could do it. From a Christian perspective, are you really willing to write off 30 some odd years of this guy's work just because he is now coming out? He has probably done a lot of good. It's hypocrisy to gloss over the good in his life over something like this.

Your job is not to judge. Your job is to love. It is God's job to judge. I'm not even Christian and I understand that better than you do.
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Is anyone even bothering to read our initial thoughts on this thread? That is what we said Orion. Then the anti Christian brigade decide they did not like religion sounding reasonable.

They also got fired up about the sin thing, lol.

Anyway no offense taken and my apology critical if I sounded harsh.

Peace, God bless, and good night all.
 
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Blackdog said:
Here I will disagree. he laws put down by Jesus and Paul have not changed, society did. We are just looking at it from far away.

God bless brother.
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Christ, I agree, but he never said anything about homosexuality. What about the apostles though? Can any of their edicts be relevant to only their time period? What about women having to have their heads covered when they are in church?
 
Orion said:
If it's between him and God, it's none of your business if he's a sinner or not. We are all sinners, and I think that is pretty established in in the Bible. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.

Christianity has always been a refuge for homosexuals because if you are willing to play the traditional role of a man, it's easy. Producing a child is not hard. I'm gay and I could do it. From a Christian perspective, are you really willing to write off 30 some odd years of this guy's work just because he is now coming out? He has probably done a lot of good. It's hypocrisy to gloss over the good in his life over something like this.

Your job is not to judge. Your job is to love. It is God's job to judge. I'm not even Christian and I understand that better than you do.
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Look closely Orion, there is no judging here. I could care less if someone is a gay christian, or a straight atheist, or anything in between. But when it comes to my religion, I demand some intellectual honesty. Homosexuality is a sin in the book. I don't ask that believe that homosexuality is a sin, there are many religions where homosexuality isn't a sin at all, but if your going to argue from a christian perspective that homosexuality isn't a sin...then yea, be prepared for people to clearly prove you wrong.
 
Blackdog said:
At this point you are not even addressing anything worth responding to. It has become nothing but yet another in a LONG line of your anti religion rants.

I have to go help a friend move. So God bless and sleep tight man. :peace
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People are free to commit philosophical suicide and I am free to enjoy the absurdity of it.

I've never been one who enjoys being told what to do by people who know less than me but I recognize that for some strange reason it is important to modern day Christians that they adhere to the words of ancient nomads, so who am I to judge?
 
DarkWizard12 said:
Look closely Orion, there is no judging here. I could care less if someone is a gay christian, or a straight atheist, or anything in between. But when it comes to my religion, I demand some intellectual honesty. Homosexuality is a sin in the book. I don't ask that believe that homosexuality is a sin, there are many religions where homosexuality isn't a sin at all, but if your going to argue from a christian perspective that homosexuality isn't a sin...then yea, be prepared for people to clearly prove you wrong.
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Let us assume that I were a Jeffersonian Christian. In other words, if I followed the Jefferson Bible. How likely would I be to percieve homosexuality as a sin? Furthermore, why would his Bible be any less valid than the one that was crafted by ancient religious leaders who were motivated by their own political ambitions?
 
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DarkWizard12 said:
Look closely Orion, there is no judging here. I could care less if someone is a gay christian, or a straight atheist, or anything in between. But when it comes to my religion, I demand some intellectual honesty. Homosexuality is a sin in the book. I don't ask that believe that homosexuality is a sin, there are many religions where homosexuality isn't a sin at all, but if your going to argue from a christian perspective that homosexuality isn't a sin...then yea, be prepared for people to clearly prove you wrong.
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Homosexuality is a sin. I think that is quite clear in the Bible. On the other hand, everyone is a sinner so it doesn't really serve us to come down on someone for sinning. In an ideal world it should be possible to be a gay Christian for this reason, or even a pastor. He showed some humility when he came out of the closet and it took a lot of guts to do that. I don't particularly like megachurches and half of the stuff they talk about, but I still know what it means to come out... and I'm not even someone who had to come out to my world wide network of peers. My family was hard enough.

I realize we are talking about Christians here, but this still goes back to the idea of homosexuality as being a choice. If Christians could get past that, they would see that the pastor can't control who or what he is, and it shouldn't have a bearing on his good work. But... the whole reason why hate of gays exists is because of religion, and pretty much only religion.
 
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CriticalThought said:
People are free to commit philosophical suicide and I am free to enjoy the absurdity of it.

I've never been one who enjoys being told what to do by people who know less than me but I recognize that for some strange reason it is important to modern day Christians that they adhere to the words of ancient nomads, so who am I to judge?
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I think its the way people have used the Bible in negative ways, the controversial history of the Catholic church, and they way modern right wing Christians come off as discriminatory, closed minded and dogmatic, that has turned many people off from the Christianity. The Bible, even with its many contradictions and Old Testament wrath, is a great spiritual book and I think it is filled with some profound truths. Ghandi said it the best "I'd probably be a Christian if I ever met one".
 
Orion said:
... the whole reason why hate of gays exists is because of religion, and pretty much only religion.
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Orion, I'd have to disagree with you on that. For one thing, considering homosexuality to be a sin is not the same as hating gays. Hate is an emotional repugnance that carries connotations of a desire to do harm to the hated subject.

I know people who hate gays and who are utterly non-religious.

Hatred is rarely rational; it usually comes into being out of some sort of xenophobia, or a bad experience with a class of people, or similar things that result in a strongly negative emotional reaction being established as a habitual response. Justifications (rationalizations) then follow, based on whatever the hater thinks is a legitimate excuse.

Hating people for being different is hardly a new thing, and far from exclusive to the religious.
 
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