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StAnastasia
Guest
A friend of mine was able to get an annulment even with kids as products of the marriage. I figured the diocese needed the money.
A silly simple question on sexual orientation (re gay marriage)
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jmcrae
Guest
First, she didn’t get an “annulment” - she got a Declaration of Nullity.
And secondly, lack of sex on the wedding night is not the only possible impediment to marriage.
Alcoholism, and a wrong understanding of what marriage is are also possible impediments, along with lack of form, and lack of permission to marry outside the faith, in the case of a mixed marriage.
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StAnastasia
Guest
None of those were at issue in this case.First, she didn’t get an “annulment” - she got a Declaration of Nullity. And secondly, lack of sex on the wedding night is not the only possible impediment to marriage. Alcoholism, and a wrong understanding of what marriage is are also possible impediments, along with lack of form, and lack of permission to marry outside the faith, in the case of a mixed marriage.
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jmcrae
Guest
Unless it was your Declaration of Nullity, how could you possibly know?
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StAnastasia
Guest
Because I have known both parties for thirty years. They were not happy in their marriage, and the wife was in another relationship already. An annulment made it easier for both parties to get on with their lives.Unless it was your Declaration of Nullity, how could you possibly know?
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jmcrae
Guest
That seems to signify pretty clearly that at least one of them (if not both) didn’t understand what the phrase “'til death us do part” means, at the time of the wedding, nor the phrase “forsaking all others.” That’s grounds for a Declaration of Nullity, right there.
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StAnastasia
Guest
That’s amazingly convenient. What a useful tool for anyone wanting to get out of a sacramental marriage!That seems to signify pretty clearly that at least one of them (if not both) didn’t understand what the phrase “'til death us do part” means, at the time of the wedding, nor the phrase “forsaking all others.” That’s grounds for a Declaration of Nullity, right there.
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larkin31
Guest
Ignorance IS an excuse for the “law”!
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mflorence
Guest
“Jesus is the God of the Old Testament, and speaks quite frequently there against homosexual behavior.”
WELL SHIVER ME TIMBERS, if it ain’t the Old Testament again! I find this intriguing every time the Old Testament comes up in these discussions about homosexuality. It is a commonly used connection to say that Jesus is the God of the Old Testament, and the Old Testament speaks against homosexual behavior. Yes, the Old Testament says that it is an abomination. It also says that eating shellfish and making graven images are abominations, along with a whole host of other things that are now common practices among Christians. There is also the story of Lot in Genesis that points out the evils of homosexuality, but the hero in that story, the one who was righteous in the eyes of God, the one who was spared God’s wrath, offered up his daughters to be gang raped and then later in the story he got drunk and slept with one of them himself. He repeated the same behavior with the other daughter soon after. I will be so bold as to make my own moral proclamation here: offering up your daughters to be gang raped and getting drunk and sleeping with your daughters is an abomination to modern humans, and therefore the story of Lot holds no moral ground to anyone who can think for themselves, unless you apply some very tortured logic.
So, basically, you have the Jewish laws that lump homosexuality with eating shellfish along with naming some other mundane things in the same vein, and then you also have the story of the most righteous Lot of course. Admittedly some other biblical texts prescribe the death penalty for homosexuality, but those same texts prescribe death by stoning for disobedient children. I assert that these have can no moral authority either, unless you want to start stoning your children and shutting down the shellfish industry along the Gulf Coast. You would be surprised at what else you would have to do to abide by the hundreds of laws of the Old Testament. These same laws were used by southerners to support the moral soundness of the slave trade, because of course slavery was fine in the Old Testament, and it was perfectly okay to sell your daughters into slavery according to Jewish laws as prescribed therein. Specifically, all Old Testament references I can find to homosexuality are in some of the five books of the Torah. Tradition says these were written by Moses, but most bible scholars agree that they were written at least three hundred years after the death of Moses starting during the Babylonian Exile by a group of “priestly writers.” They are a code of living and the story of the Jewish people established to help them maintain their autonomy as a group during exile. It contains some history and some myth. Anyway, to cite these texts as God inspired authority to condemn homosexuality is to open the field up to the denigration of women, children handicapped people and homosexuals. All are subjugated to lesser status as humans in these books. You can’t use these to stick it to homosexuals without applying them across all the demographic groups and social behaviors prescribed in them. In other words, you can’t pick and chose. Either all of the laws are applicable or they are not. If they are, things start to get a bit uncomfortable in modern society.
Now, if you don’t want to marry homosexuals in your church, then your church has a right not to do so, however, it is not license to make condemning moral proclamations about them from books that prescribe death penalties for disobedient children, openly approve of slavery for young women, and bar sick and handicapped or deformed people from the temple, unless you feel these laws are right on those counts too. If you do feel they are right, then I would say there’s another one of those abominations!
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jmcrae
Guest
You will have noticed, while reading the Book of Acts, that in the vision to St. Peter, God made all foods clean. He did not make all sexual activities clean, however, and St. Paul emphasizes that those laws did not change.
God found “no righteous person in Sodom” - which would seem to include Lot - so, where are you getting the idea that God thought Lot was righteous?
And again, these laws were quite clearly changed by God through Pope St. Peter in the New Testament.
It’s not about “sticking it to the homosexuals” - there is nothing about orientation in the Bible. If a homosexual person remains chaste throughout his life, he has no sins against chastity, and probably has a better chance of getting to Heaven than a great many heterosexuals.
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mflorence
Guest
You will have noticed, while reading the Book of Acts, that in the vision to St. Peter, God made all foods clean. He did not make all sexual activities clean, however, and St. Paul emphasizes that those laws did not change.
God found “no righteous person in Sodom” - which would seem to include Lot - so, where are you getting the idea that God thought Lot was righteous?
And again, these laws were quite clearly changed by God through Pope St. Peter in the New Testament.
It’s not about “sticking it to the homosexuals” - there is nothing about orientation in the Bible. If a homosexual person remains chaste throughout his life, he has no sins against chastity, and probably has a better chance of getting to Heaven than a great many heterosexuals./QUOT
Did I not clearly say that I was addressing the Old Testament? Let me say again that Lot was considered by God to be the one righteous man in Sodom and this is why he and his daughters were spared. Read it again and get back with me. Also, I will write you a chapter on Paul one day (interesting character), but I was referring to the Old Testament. The argument was that homosexuality is prescribed as a grave crime in the Old Testament. Also Jesus said not one aspect of the of the laws was to be dropped, so when did Peter outweigh Jesus?
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jmcrae
Guest
Jesus gave Peter charge of the Church; see John 21:15-19, and also Matthew 16:18-19. Keep in mind that Peter never changed anything that wasn’t given to him by God to change.
What is it that you are arguing for, though?
Are you proposing that we lobby for a death penalty for practicing homosexuals?
Are you trying to say that Jesus couldn’t possibly be God because the New Testament supersedes the Old?
Do you want to say that because some things were superseded in the New Testament we no longer have to care what the Old Testament says at all including about things that were never changed?
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mflorence
Guest
To say that I am advocating death penalty for homosexuals gets close to slander. I love them as much as I do you, and I have no problem whatsoever with homosexuality. My only wish in that regard is to see them treated with the same respect as anyone else. The point is that there is much conflict between even the gospels in the New Testament, much less between the New and the Old Testaments. Jesus indeed left Peter in charge, but I would say that he didn’t give him carte blanche to reverse what He said, He said that not one aspect of the Jewish laws was to be dropped. He did so in the famous discourse where he added His own commandments. So this is a contradiction, and there are lots of contradictions in both the New and Old Testaments. They were written by people. One can go on all day twisting logic to reconcile all of them, but it just never works. Now at the end I did say that your church has the right not to marry homosexuals. You don’t have to explain it to anyone. It’s your thing - your church’s thing. That’s fine. I just get crossed eyed when I see all the twisted biblical logic, and being quite familiar with these scriptures I can tell you that they’re all over the place, because they are human accounts. I am always puzzled by the Christian preoccupation with homosexuality and the need to throw scripture around to prove that it is wrong as well as the desperate need for certainty in all things. I think a lot of that came from Paul, and he seems to have had certain issues with sexuality. The way I see it, once I get my heterosexuality under control, then maybe I could worry about someone’s homosexuality. But even then, I should really focus on working on the next thing in my spiritual journey. So my point? Firstly to answer the original post. My answer to that is no - your church shouldn’t marry homosexuals. My other point to the person answering the post with Old Testament references was to stop throwing scripture around and bending it every which way to justify the fact that you don’t marry homosexuals.It’s your club and you don’t. Simple.Jesus gave Peter charge of the Church; see John 21:15-19, and also Matthew 16:18-19. Keep in mind that Peter never changed anything that wasn’t given to him by God to change.
What is it that you are arguing for, though?
Are you proposing that we lobby for a death penalty for practicing homosexuals?
Are you trying to say that Jesus couldn’t possibly be God because the New Testament supersedes the Old?
Do you want to say that because some things were superseded in the New Testament we no longer have to care what the Old Testament says at all including about things that were never changed?
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larkin31
Guest
I could not agree more. That “Paul”'s writing comprises nearly 50% of the NT ends up, IMO, unfortunate for women in the church and for sexual beings in general. He was a zealot both before and after his conversion, a torch, both light and fire. A remarkably curious figure to me!
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Chochy
Guest
I agree. Just because we “can” do something, it doesn’t make that something right. I too, believe there is great conflict between the spirit and the flesh. We have indeed become slaves to our fleshly lusts. Where will it end?
Do we not want to lead productive lives? Let us not ignore the simple fact that the sexual act between a male and a female still produces a child. In that case, the sexual act is productive since it produces the gift of life. If I am in a committed marriage, the sexual act becomes an act of great responsibility, since a child that is conceived, is cared for and nurtured by it’s biological parents. Who are we to decide that a child can have two mothers or two fathers?
Whatever happened to doing what comes naturally. The way I see it, more and more people are becoming sexually confused because there are so many choices. Whatever happened to deciding to do what’s right, instead of deciding to do what’s right for me!! “To be more like Christ is to be more authentically human.” Sometimes I think we are looking for love in all the wrong places. Blessings
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Chochy
Guest
I beg to differ. I know of many homosexual relationships where there has been one partner for life. I don’t believe you are giving credit where credit is due. Blessings
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mflorence
Guest
You’re right - and zealot is a good word for him. You always have a way of finding accurate descriptions that are kinder than mine. I would have said sociopath, but I like zealot better. I have to learn to do that better. Anyway, he did indeed cause a lot of suffering for people through the ages.
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SteveVH
Guest
I’m a little confused here. Do you accept Paul’s writings as the word of God or not? You seem to be implying that the truth of Scripture is interspersed with Paul’s human weaknesses and errors, leaving each of us then, to sort out what is true and what is not. Could it possibly be that you don’t understand the true meaning of his words, or do you believe that God’s word contains human error?
The Church teaches us that Paul’s words came under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and therefore are protected from error. While the words of Sacred Scripture are colored by the personality and perspective of the human writer, we are assured, nevertheless, that what is written is truth. Without this assurance, we can be sure of nothing contained in Scripture. The fact that it may not square with what you wish to believe does not diminish its truth.
Stephen168
New member
That might be true in Protestantism but not necessarily Catholicism.
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larkin31
Guest
That is not a universal belief, not even among Catholics, let alone all Christians. But yes, it is the doctrine of the RCC.
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