I will endeavor to write that post shortly to keep you from waiting much longer. Until them, I apologize for the wait.

“Bring out the statistics, my friend. Find me studies that have been peer reviewed, published in scientific journals, and are readily accepted by mainsteam scientists.”

But I digress.

Musicguy, you say people have used the Bible to justify slavery. Well, people also used the secular constitution to justify slavery. Furthermore, people have used secular thought to justify genocide. National Socialism in Germany wasn’t a religious movement and neither was Stalin’s regime. In fact, the USSR was far more secular during it’s most oppresive era than the USA has ever been.

My point is simply that secularism is in no way morally superior to a religious system, and certainly is not superior to a faith in Christ.

Secondly, I’d also like to point out that just because the truth exists and is given to the world in no way suggests that the world cannot take the truth, distort it and use it for evil purposes. In fact, this is exactly the description of satan, AKA the ‘god’ of this world.

Satan does not just make up whole new lies, he takes a piece of the truth and presents it in a false way. This is far more effective than a black and white lie. Nobody likes a lie, but if the lie is so similar to the truth that one is able to bend their conscience to include it, then the enemy has won. This is the best way to deceive people.

That’s what satan has done. He’s taken the truth about love, that love is selfless, and has turned it into a meaning that says something like ‘true selflessness means not enforcing your own narrow-minded ideals upon others.’ While true love is not forceful, it does not compromise itself to appease another, which in the sense of virtues is an anti-virtue.

Statistics are wrong 100% of the time anyway. And as far as statistics about marriage, did you know that there is no difference in the divorce rate of couple within the ‘Church’ as there is without it? I say this to throw you a proverbial bone Musicguy, because Truth does not need statistics to back it up, neither is it founded on statistics. Rather, statistics, if true, reflect Truth.

Quoting MInTheGap:
“Why do you deserve the same exact rights and privileges of the traditionally married folk? Why does your behavior warrant the rights?”

I propose a more appropriate question here.

Why do married couples deserve the rights they are given by the government?

It seems to me that marriage has it’s own rewards, not the least of which is two incomes and one rent!

Do you have any idea how hard it is to be single in America? ESPECIALLY for those without a higher education! Seems to me the man-made help should go to the ones who need it the most not the ones who have the most natural help.

Afterall, what is a wife to a man but his help-mate(meet in the KJV)? If a wife is a help, then isn’t a single man without help?

Married men have their wife to encourage them. Single men have no such comfort.

Married men have their wife’s body to satisfy them. Single men have no such comfort.

Anyway, I’m half serious about that and half joking. I AM single, and so it’s easy for me to see the down sides of being single. However, I do realize that the rewards of marriage are hard earned.

But I think that this is the way homosexuals are feeling. They see the pie married couples are getting and they want a piece. That’s human nature, a nature given to us by God, whether it be mis-focused or not.

NEWSFLASH: America will never return to it’s ‘puritan past’. In fact, even the puritans weren’t so great once you research them to any extent! The end is coming because the enemy has dominion over this world, power ceded to him by … MAN! … the wretches! God Himself testifies that these things will come, so as Christians we should stop obsessing over them and start focusing on the truly important things: The work of GOD! Which is what? (I’ll never tire of quoting this!)

“The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.” John 6:29 baby! OH! You gotta love it!

Do you believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that He died on the cross to forgive you of your sins? Then you will be raised! Prepare yourself for your resurrection! But it is the Holy Spirit given to you which will convict you of sin.

Love,
Art

Bring out the statistics, my friend. Find me studies that have been peer reviewed, published in scientific journals, and are readily accepted by mainsteam scientists.

Why do you deserve the same exact rights and privileges of the traditionally married folk? Why does your behavior warrant the rights?

Part of the reason– whether looking back it was a good idea or not– that marriage was given to the states to license and to give benefits to was that there was a benefit to the state to have stable married monogamous heterosexual relationships. They produce children, they curb disease spread, they create good citizens.

What benefits do homosexual unions give the states? You could say that they adopt children, but statistically homosexual unions are less stable than heterosexual ones.

To me, all the benefits are for you, the individual, and not for the state. This is purely a secular argument, not a sacred.

And, by the way, if you’re saying my religious laws will stay in my church, does that mean that we can expect the law protecting those that kill in self defense to disappear? How about tort law? Death Penalty? Perjury? Rape? Incest?

All of this law comes from common law extending from the Bible. Certainly these will not disappear entirely.

At the end of the day, I don’t care if you call gay marriage gfeirnds93493nvvdsmnf3q9fdsds. As long as gfeirnds93493nvvdsmnf3q9fdsds involves me getting the same exact rights and priveldges of the traditionally married folk. Things change over time, whether you want them to or not. The fact of the matter is that tolerant, imclusive people (and churches for that matter) are winning this fight. You can bleat all you want, but your RELIGIOUS laws will stay in your church, while secular, rational law will govern this land.

As someone with a strong believe in moral relativism…

Here is your solution and your greatest problem. As a person that believes in moral relativism, anything can be good at any point in time, as well as it could be bad. For example, it can be good to steal– if you’re stealing to provide for your family.

This works in that you can define yourself and anyone else is good simply by shifting the standard of where good is or redefining a bad thing good.

However, government must act under a set of rules and laws. Though these laws are flexible, in that they can change or be redefined, they must be descriptive at any point in time.

And that’s why we’re discussing the founding fathers. If they did base the laws of this country on Christianity– specifically on Biblical precept– then what the Bible has to say on any moral law is in play.

And this is also why the denominations that you mentioned are superfluous to this discussion. If a given denomination does not believe that the Bible is the authority on moral law, and the Founders did, what the former has to say is irrelevant.

God defined marriage originally (first documented understanding), but I would ask you this, Musicguy, could you find for me the first dated instance of marriage being used to define a homosexual couple? In fact, I would surmise that marriage up until the most recent times was exclusively defined as man and woman (albeit I’m sure you could find multiple wives). Point being, you’re attempting to change the definition.

You are trying to change the definition of a word that means man and woman. You have a right to get married– to a woman– just like every other guy. We’re not trying to force government to infringe your rights, we’re trying to uphold the moral values we believe in– the same as you are. Except yours may be up for grabs depending on the situation.

As someone with a strong believe in moral relativism, I can’t help but laugh at your attempt to push the “absolute truth” idea around as if it were the only school of thought regarding such things.

That’s right– God defines marriage for all you church folk. The rest of us rely on our government to do so, which does not espouse any one religion or belief system. No one is telling you to change your beliefs or definitions. However, when you’re beliefs infect government and infringe on my rights, we have a problem.

I grow tired of this argument here, especially now since the “absolute truth” garbage got thrown in. As if we should all just shut up and go home because, “Your “”absolute truth” said so.”

I don’t want to pick on you, but you’re missing the entire foundation of Christianity here and replacing it with a system of legalistic dogma and condemnation.

However, you also touched on the topic of absolute truth. This is a philosohpical question that everyone has to come to terms with eventually and although I’m not about to get into a great discourse on the topic, I can assure you that there is one Truth which is objective and self-existant. Truth does not rely upon the beholder, neither does it change between cultures. Truth is not democratic in nature, it is autocratic. In other words, even if everyone in the world chooses to believe that the sun does not exist, it still exists.

I just wanted to say that to address your arguments that other denominations and religions accept homosexuality as a gift from God. Wherever there are two opposing virtues, one thing is sure: they are not both correct. (That leaves room for the both being wrong of course.)

You are right, you CAN be a GOOD person without following a specific religion. In fact, you can’t follow a religion and be a GOOD person at all! Religion is a construction of man. It is a set of rules and ordinances that claims absolute authority in people’s lives. God is not found in a religion. God is found by His Word that is Christ Jesus, the Risen One.

The law is not given to men to tell them what they must do to be GOOD, it’s given to men to tell them that they are NOT good! If God is perfect, how can that which is imperfect come into union with God? For imperfection to unite with perfection would cause perfection to become imperfect. Perfection however is a stronger virtue than imperfection and therefore it’s impossible for the two to unite.

Man is imperfect, something some belief systems deny. But it’s true even if the whole world believes it is not true. God understands this and created us knowing we would sin and make ourselves incapable of uniting with God. But part of perfection is also Love, and so He Loves us and that Love means that God desires unity with us. So God sent His Son to take on sin though He is perfect. When sin is taken onto a spirit it causes the spirit to die. Therefore the Son died spiritually as well as physically. But because the Son is perfect and blameless, without sin, He was resurrected. All that God requires of us is to put our faith in His Son whom He sent to redeem our spirits. But to do that we have to first admit to God and to ourselves that we are not GOOD. Then we put our faith in Christ and His work on the cross for our redemtion from sin. At that time the Holy Spirit enters into us, which is God living inside us, and causes our souls to heal, grow and live more abundantly than we are otherwise capable.

Yes Musicguy, we’ve all done those things… That’s the whole point of Christianity! The idea is to stop acting like we’re all ‘OK’ or ‘GOOD’ and come to terms with our flaws and to seek out the solution to those flaws. The solution is Christ, Chrisitans are those who’ve come to terms with their flawed nature and found the answer to the problem of sin. It doesn’t make us sinless, just forgiven.

As for homosexual marriage? It doesn’t exist. I say let the government ‘marry’ two men or two women because the government does not define marriage, God does.

In fact, I think it’s folly for Christians to look to the government as the moral and ethical authority or vanguard. I believe that many have taken their eyes off Christ as the vanguard of their faith and have turned to the government and it’s laws.

Who afterall will be brought to Christ because they were turned away from homosexual ‘marriage’ by a secular government? As if a guy’s going to go to the courthouse to get married to his lover and upon being turned away he’s going to say, “The government won’t marry us! This must be wrong! I need Jesus!”

If the Word of God and the Commandments and the Law are not enough to convict a man of his sin then the United States Government is not going to do any better.