Gay Clergy-About time or moral oxymoron?

It doesn't matter to me
I do feel though that a religion either believes the bible or doesn't. I feel that it is a bit silly for any religion to go around saying "we believe the bible except for this issue or that issue" either believe it or throw it away.

Or accept it for what it really is!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I beg to differ with the opinion, Frank's and perhaps others', that Christians who do not accept statements literally in either the Old or New Testaments must, to be true to themselves, form a new church. I observe many believers staying with their churches and picking and choosing. Not unlike ordering at a deli, saying hold the mustard, but still keeping clearcut belief in the sandwich concept (can't stop with the sexual imagery...)

At the time I wound my way slowly out of my own religion, even as I immersed myself in theological study, I remained practicing as I agreed with less and less; then I grew weary of thinking about it all. Sometime later I realized I saw my religion and others as constructs, and let it all go.

Other people can and do stay in their religions, holding on to the main tenets and discounting old texts that are dated as
not to be taken at face value today. I don't think this is hypocritical; rather I think that they see the religion as a whole as representing their faith, but that they are not tied to each and every detail of it. Some of the people that have stayed are actively gay, and decide to stay because they value the church as a whole.

As to a church openly ordaining gay or lesbian folks as clergy, fine with me.

The gay Metropolitan Community Church which is nationwide doesn't dwell at all on the Old Testament.

Good analysis, osso. My feeling is that people stay with their churches or faiths because they find a feeling of community. If there are a few issues on which they do not agree -- these could be major issues -- the pull of belonging is greater than the pull of righteous disagreement.

The faith community that I belonged to for thirty years does a great deal of good, especially outreach to poor and immigrant communities, and I support the faith in that effort. I have no belief in that church's dogma and religious services, but they have my support in their outreach and other programs that help the needy.

I too agree with Osso's comments (above) "I beg to differ with the opinion, Frank's and perhaps others', that Christians who do not accept statements literally in either the Old or New Testaments must, to be true to themselves, form a new church".

There appears to be an underlying assumption in many of the other posts here that the bible is an all-or-nothing thing.

The bible is a book put together by fallible men (some of whom had a definite and obvious agenda). That said, however, it would not be impossible for believers to feel that there is at least some "truth" within its chapters.

If someone believes in "god", and further believes that this god may have sent representatives to reach out to and teach human beings, they will believe in the truth of those teachings, but not necessarily as conveyed in the recorded documents of flawed human beings.

Compassion, Charity, Love, Honesty, etc. are ideals that seem to run through many organized "religions", including christianity. The man Jesus may have been teaching these basic ideals, and not all the rest of the "stuff" in the bible. This would make it entirely valid to call oneself a "christian" and, at the same time, not buy into the whole package of biblical diatribe.

(BTW, I do neither.)

Absolutely. The problem with Frank's view is that he doesn't explain why the literal interpretation should be considered the only acceptable interpretation (especially considering the variety of literary styles, authors, and periods that make up the Bible). It is not so in poetry, novel, etc. Why should it be in the Scriptures?



Literalists have already gone their way thousands of times (especially during the 19th century in the U.S.). Go and see all those fundamentalist churches, Jehovah's Witnesses, etc. Interesting: Not even the literalists agree on how to interpret the Bible, and what teachings we should take from it. There are wild differences among them. The reason is clear: The Bible is a collection of different books, written by different authors, over a long period of time, using different ways of conveying their messages. The Bible is NOT logically consistent, systematic, unified, homogeneous, plain type of book. It is not a legal code to be taken at face value. Those who try to read it as a legal code (1) don't know the diverse library they have in their hands, (2) will never agree on anything--for they'll try to interpret verse X in light of verse Y, while the others do the opposite. The literal approach is, therefore, IMPOSSIBLE, self-destructive.



To pick and choose is at the ESSENCE of interpretation. And in Christianity, it is a constant dialogue between our own personal path, and the path proposed by the Church.



Agree. And this perception shifts over time, especially when a person takes seriously their own path, their own development, in the faith--and when they accept that they have something to learn. Things that didn't make any sense when we were teen-agers all of a sudden make all the sense in the world when we marry and/or start having children.



True. I even know gay people who AGREE with the teaching of the Church about homosexuality. Out of their own experience.

:wink:

Can you provide a pie chart for that?

Sure I can.

:wink:

A humble pie chart, maybe?

Sure. For you, a humble pie will do.

Just tell me what cream you like...

:wink:

Careful there, you're getting vaguely obscene and if there's anything I can't stand, it's vagueness.

I have a feeling that you guys know each other from another time and place.

Yeah, well, I met GWLight on a thread about Richard Meier's plan for the new Ara Pacis building in Rome... that was a while ago now, in another place. Also met another good friend on that thread, Paola L. Small thread, but memorable.

Haven't met Maliagar before this last couple of weeks.

(I know, Kara, you weren't talking about Osso, but I am speaking up anyway...)

You go right ahead and speak up, Osso, and see if mebbe you can get Paola here too ... dunno if you recall, but I met the two of you on a different thread over on "that other forum", a long, long time ago. Now, maliagar and I are old freinds, though apart from here we've never met and this acquaintance is barely a month old; our archetypes have been having at one another for a few millenia. We've sorta come to depend on one another. I figure it'd be pretty dull overall if either side conceded defeat.

Osso, speaking as a nun gone bad, I agree with your post. There are very few people I know who believe the bible is the literal truth. Actually, the few people I know who do believe in the literal truth of the bible are some of my cousins. Sigh.

No, no, I'm the nun gone bad...

Timber, I don't remember that, I hope I wasn't rude...

I have tried to drag Paola here, but the topic I got her to post in pretty much cemented her un-interest. It was the one about the photo of italian men looking at an american girl passing by... She thought it was a horribly long thread, and that makes sense now that I remember, she does like short threads.

Ok, back to listening..

B'Gawd. We've got two defrocked nuns and a tête-à-tête between LW and Maliagar. Paola would surely enjoy this one, Osso.

One way to make a long thread short, make a post and post no more -

Sounds like "The Black Narcissus," one of my favorite films and about a nun gone bad. I haven't seen maliagar's humble pie chart he offered but I bet it has a cherry on top. Now there I go with that vagueness...I guess I should practice what I preach.