An odd question by someone in the class sent today’s Sunday School lesson off the rails. Thank goodness, since I get bored at church really easily. The question was, “what do we do when law makers establish laws that don’t agree with our religion, like abortion and gay marriage?” Of course, I was the first to raise my hand to pounce on that carrot.
My response was, I have no problem with any of those things. While I think it would be nice if everyone was the same and we all had traditional families, that just isn’t possible. So, I don’t think it’s our place to govern that behavior. I’m obviously not for abortion, but I don’t think you can tell someone what to do either. People need the freedom to make the wrong choices. And, who cares if two gay people get married? How does that affect me? It poses no threat to my life. I’m of the opinion that people are most often born with those tendencies, making their desire to be strait about as compelling as mine to be queer. For the record, I have none.
Of course my comments prompted several other comments, all from older members who disagreed with me. The consensus was, our laws should reflect God’s laws. We cannot be persuaded to approve of things that are clearly spoken against in the Bible. They were also concerned with the influence such allowance would have on children and society. I can see why people feel that way (Christian’s are basically programmed to say those things), but it doesn’t make it any less ridiculous.
How do two dudes getting married pose a threat to our society? You know what poses a real threat, especially to the youth? Premarital sex. Why don’t we play morality police on that and make it illegal to act on your horniness? I hate to break it to you, but if your child is attracted to the same gender, there isn’t much you can do about it. What you should be more afraid of are the urges running around in their pants. That’s going to get your kid in a lot more trouble.
Or what about alcohol? The effects of alcohol cause more damage to people’s lives in America than cancer. If we really wanted to pick up a cause that might change our culture for the better, we should be campaigning for another prohibition. Yet we don’t, because we’ve resigned ourselves to a live-and-let-live stance on alcohol. Amazing, since there are SO few issues where we are that passive. Christians pick the weirdest battles.
Just cut with all that pious BS. Raise your kids right, be the example you’re supposed to be, and leave it at that. Rage against the issues that truly stand to threaten your way of life. You’ll find it isn’t this ticky-tack stuff.
My response was, I have no problem with any of those things. While I think it would be nice if everyone was the same and we all had traditional families, that just isn’t possible. So, I don’t think it’s our place to govern that behavior. I’m obviously not for abortion, but I don’t think you can tell someone what to do either. People need the freedom to make the wrong choices. And, who cares if two gay people get married? How does that affect me? It poses no threat to my life. I’m of the opinion that people are most often born with those tendencies, making their desire to be strait about as compelling as mine to be queer. For the record, I have none.
Of course my comments prompted several other comments, all from older members who disagreed with me. The consensus was, our laws should reflect God’s laws. We cannot be persuaded to approve of things that are clearly spoken against in the Bible. They were also concerned with the influence such allowance would have on children and society. I can see why people feel that way (Christian’s are basically programmed to say those things), but it doesn’t make it any less ridiculous.
How do two dudes getting married pose a threat to our society? You know what poses a real threat, especially to the youth? Premarital sex. Why don’t we play morality police on that and make it illegal to act on your horniness? I hate to break it to you, but if your child is attracted to the same gender, there isn’t much you can do about it. What you should be more afraid of are the urges running around in their pants. That’s going to get your kid in a lot more trouble.
Or what about alcohol? The effects of alcohol cause more damage to people’s lives in America than cancer. If we really wanted to pick up a cause that might change our culture for the better, we should be campaigning for another prohibition. Yet we don’t, because we’ve resigned ourselves to a live-and-let-live stance on alcohol. Amazing, since there are SO few issues where we are that passive. Christians pick the weirdest battles.
Just cut with all that pious BS. Raise your kids right, be the example you’re supposed to be, and leave it at that. Rage against the issues that truly stand to threaten your way of life. You’ll find it isn’t this ticky-tack stuff.
2 comments:
Jon, this is Farrah's friend Rebecca and I just have to say that I LOVE this post and completely agree with everything you've said. I also loved your post on prayer from a few months back. You and I should definitely talk religion next time I see you and Farrah because it sounds like we have very similar views on many of the issues!
I second what Rebecca said... I've had many similar discussions and I couldn't agree with you more.
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