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March 3, 2013 (Morning)

Exercise Type: Run

Comments:
Corey, one thing to keep in mind is that there is something of a difference between elements of moral law and religious practice. For example, as a Catholic I do some fasting on certain days and abstain from eating meat on certain days. Is it because I believe eating meat on a Friday in Lent is intrinsically evil? No; it's simply a religious practice. It would be wrong for a Catholic to eat meat on a Lenten Friday, but for anyone else who is in a denomination that doesn't have that rule it's perfectly fine for them to eat meat on those days. What Leviticus is containing here is primarily elements of Jewish Law that had a much longer and more complicated set of rules than any Christian denomination has for sure. A good bit of the Gospel describes Jesus explaining endlessly to various Jews that holding to the various fasts and rules of immense Jewish laws really wasn't the point. And most Christians are not at all Jewish, so you shouldn't really expect us to follow Jewish Laws. Homosexuality on the other hand is condemned again in Romans (the New Testament) so a reasonable interpretation probably would allow the things you described here and still condemn homosexuality. Interpretations do vary by denomination and theological background, though at least from the Catholic perspective saying homosexual acts are morally okay doesn't mesh at all with the general understanding of sexuality, which must be uniative and open to procreation. In addition, the moral law (unlike religious practices) is intrinsic and not relativistic. The various Protestant denominations mostly have other views on the issue so a cohesive and unified Christianity hasn't so much been divided as shredded on this sort of topic.

Legally, gay marriage is overwhelmingly likely to be legalized across the US in the coming decades regardless of my views and honestly at this point I think it's far more important for Christians to fight relentlessly for religious freedom so that we'll still have the legal ability to believe something other than Obama (or whoever is in his place by then) without being put into a legal bind of some sort in the way like what I already hear being suggested: revoking tax exempt statuses, hate crimes legislation, involving healthcare benefits somehow, etc. Catholics in this country have enjoyed a few decades of living as accepted members of society and I'd prefer that to continue although I see growing cause to believe that it will not. The political events and discourse of the last year or so haven't been "bad" but more like downright awful for the Church and its status in the US. Yet, there's little good in worrying endlessly about it. It is what it is.
Until the 40s or 50s many Protestants mistrusted Catholics (who were largely new immigrants) and often used employment to pressure Catholics to convert to Protestantism or maintain economic superiority. Hegemony between Christian denominations is a relatively recent phenomenon. As for homosexuals, you have a very valid point. I agree insomuchas housing, employment, and a list of other things that are basic rights are concerned. However, marriage is not a right. The government subsidizes marriage in the hopes that people will marry, have, and raise their own children. That's the root of it rather than to recognize some form of companionship. If it were the latter, then why would it even need to be linked to sexuality at all? For joint filing of tax returns, adult siblings living together very well could claim a reason to marry legally. Then you also have some libertarians who want the government out of marriage entirely, which isn't an antagonistic position in any way though I doubt it would be feasible. Regardless, gay marriage is coming whether I like it or not. Hence my main point was that Christians ought to be fighting more to maintain the ability to oppose gay marriage personally and within their religious institutions without facing consequences from the government than actually stopping gay marriage from being legally recognized.
Okay Corey. I'm glad you're at least being honest here that revoking religious institutions' tax exempt statuses if they don't practice gay marriage is part of your goal. I've got news for you though: non-profit organizations in general are tax exempt whether they are religious or not. You're trying to fight off a practice you view as discriminatory by enacting a new discriminatory practice of the government selectively choosing which religious organizations to grant tax exempt status. If the flying spaghetti monster religion wants to open up a church and apply for tax exempt status, if they are functioning as a valid nonprofit organization they're perfectly welcome to.

And yes I am encouraging churches to oppose gay marriage. That much I can't and won't deny as it is crucial to the point I'm making here that no matter what the government does I will personally be against gay marriage and if you make that a hate crime you can drive up here to Madison and lock me up, Corey. I do believe in loving sinners (though you may not believe me and I can't claim perfection by any means). But at the same time, that doesn't mean loving sin or encouraging people to engage in a sinful act.

That Catholics have suffered prejudice in this country wasn't a point I was really trying to make and I will agree that I have never suffered any prejudice myself, been enslaved, left a country, had children, nor have I attempted to marry anyone. Things have been quite good for me in this country as you well know. I want to keep it that way. My stressor is hardly disagreement between branches of Christianity, which is probably apparent by the fact that from the original post I made, no one has even bothered discussing the part of it that pertained to theology. No, Corey, my stressor is fear of people like you swooping in to take all that away in emotional revenge for the purpose of "equality". I'd like to be able to still live with and be friends with people who disagree with me on many, many issues. I've been able to do that reasonably well in the past (see alcohol use at Case) and hope that sort of thing can continue. I don't want a self-segregation of this country by ideology, by the type of violent-angry-all-caps response you just wrote shows how that very well may fail.