whay has the Christian myth got such a magnetic pull on some people?

[Durango95]

Of course! In Uganda the most prominent gay activist David Kato was murdered. Uganda is Christian and is rabidly homophobic. They revently tried to pass a law to hang gay people, di you sign the petition against it? Jamaica is also extremely homophobic--checkout 'Two more gay men killed in Jamaica

In 2011, 30 fatally violent hate crimes were committed against lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender victims, 3 more than the previous year's total.

And then we have the children bullied to death for being gay, or being seen to be gay, in schools in the Christian west. This is just one very sad example BULLIED TO DEATH: Seth Walsh, 13, Dies After 10 Days On Life Support After Suicide Attempt

And as well as this is the violence and threat of violence for children, and adults, fearing what can happen if they are gay or targeted for being seen to be gay by bigoted people.

Listen to Christians even generally when the subject of gays is brought up, you will usually hear cherry picking from their fave book about 'it is abomination for man to lie with man', 'Sodom and Gomorrah' and that fuked up homophobic saying 'God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve' They like to think they have an all-good perfect male god in the sky backing them up, and paving their way to heaven for hatin on gay people---etc! So you speak out and question their myth and whatever fuels their fear and violence and ignorance which is what I have done and will continue doing.

Ok so these few in contrast to the thousands in Muslim countries. I just seems that you have more of a problem with Christianity specifically. I also seems like you don't have so much of a problem with how gays are treated by any other religious systems, namely Islam.

I suppose it stands to reason. You didn't reference it specifically, but I assume you were born here. Chances are you were reared in a home with some sort of Christian background. Even if you were reared in an atheist home, 99.9% of atheists come from Christian backgrounds as well. I did the atheist thing for a while. It just didn't do it for me. Funny thing is, in all those years, I never ever met an atheist that was once Buddhist or Muslim....weird, huh.

[Yuki Sohma]

I was surprised to learn that Jimmy Bakker is back in the christian televangelism business. Can't see myself donating any sum of money his way. By the way, while on the subject of televangelism, what's up with Houston Texas christian televangelist Joel Osteen's eyes? Kinda' creepy if you ask me. Wouldn't give a nickle to Joel either.

[TX-Beau]

Then why did you not say all patriarchal religions and not just Christianity. I haven't seen anyone being killed in the past few months in a Christian country for being gay or committing adultery.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History..._United_States

[ludolfo]

Of course I am against Islamic fear and violence which includes abuse of woman, children and gay peoples! I instigated a 50 page discussion titled 'Danger of Islam' at another forum--longest thread there--- because I was so concerned about it, and I received a lot of abuse for doing so from a few who thought I was being racist. I am against ANY myth which I consider toxic and creating fear and promoting violence, and will speak out against it. I do same with Eastern traditions, and secular myths like scientific materialism. I see all of these myths stemming from patriarchal mythology. The reason I focused on the christian myth here is because nearly most of the threads were to do with Christianity?

[Kulindahr]

MikeyLove has said that homosexulity is "objectively disordered" and caused by original sin aka inherited guilt when science shows it is caused by nature. He has also said that gays should be celibate and in order to be good Catholics must hate their sexuality and fight against it.

Those two are not mutually exclusive.

[Kulindahr]

Well errrm the Christian conquests of the 'New World' for example? And before that was the massive suppression of the Old European Goddess religion by the same kind of oppression fostered by Judeo-Christianity.

By the time Christianity came around there wasn't much goddess religion left -- it was mostly what I call "soap opera religion", with a wide selection of characters and a free choice of which to be fans of.

[Kulindahr]

I just don't understand why someone would actively be part of a religion that so stigmatizes their feelings towards men. Why pray to a deity who says that homosexuality is an abomination that has no place in the world to the point of being a death sentence?

The word "abomination" isn't a very good translation because it has emotional baggage on it that doesn't belong to the original term. That original is a technical term which doesn't indicate anything evil or wrong, just something placed off limits.

It's also a term subject to change, as God demonstrates when He tells Peter in Acts that he can eat anything he wants: among the list of things eaten by humans are foods listed in the Old Testament as "abomination", but here God is saying that designation is done with.

Given that later in the same book the Apostles tell the entire church, all believers, that Leviticus and all the rest don't apply (except perhaps to Jewish Christians at the time), it is reasonable to presume that male-male sex (if that was ever all-inclusive) is no longer listed as "abomination".

I respectfully submit that just as Jesus and Paul set forth that certain Old Testament rules were given for human reasons (as Jesus says it, "because of the hardness of your hearts"), we can reckon any prohibition against gay sex the same. It may thus now be considered null and void, and the only operative guide left is the admonition to be faithful, i.e. no promiscuity or cheating.


As for why the Christian message has such a pull, its because most people are aware that they are to a great extent fuck-ups, and thus in need of a repair job or rebuild.

[Kulindahr]

That reply of mine sounds muddled, and not clear so I am gonna try to be clearer. OK, The Christian belief is that nature is already sinful.

Nope -- just that nature is scarred. If you mean human nature, yes, the position is that human nature is sinful, which merely means that it's focused on self and does not live up to its full potential.

[Kulindahr]

As an atheist, I believe science has not explained our lives fully. Whether it can has yet to be claimed, never mind proven.

It is also apparent that religions have pretended to explain our lives fully, attributing, according to their imagination, purpose, origins, obligations, and any manner of other qualities which should properly be called "guesses" instead of "revelations" or "commandments" or "divine laws."

In reality, Christianity doesn't claim in the least to "explain our lives fully" -- only to supply some very critical information about our real situation.

[Kulindahr]

One of the earliest individuals to truly persecute gay people, in Christian Europe, was Theodosius I. That was the least of his crimes, but it did set a precedent that we are still untangling the consequences of today. Theodosius was not a nice man. St. Ambrose was generally appalled by him. However, Theodosius I ordered gay men to be sentenced to death by burning.

There's an pair of understatements!

[Kulindahr]

It was actually a philosophical movement that really led to gay people being persecuted so widely, though. Under the idea of individuals like Thomas Aquinas, many governments outlawed a number of things that were deemed "unnatural," and homosexuality was on the list. This was not a theological movement as much as it was a philosophical movement in the context of a culture that was largely dominated by Christianity.

History is not as cut-and-dried as it is often made out to be.

More and more I think of Aquinas as a heretic. He exalted Aristotle's philosophy and his own paths of reasoning over scripture, a route that led to the extreme condemnation of homosexuality.

He could have used a serious dose of ancient Eastern/near-eastern thinking, where things can be two things (or more) at once.