Federal judge overturns Utah's ban on gay marriage

[epan]

Chances are the 10th circuit will rule to approve a stay by the end of this week. And it won’t be too late.

According to the Salt Lake Tribune, hundreds of marriages have occurred since Friday. That might be an exaggeration, but it only takes one marriage to create the grounds for the equal protection claim, which will probably overturn any prohibition, even if the appeal is successful on the current grounds. I think that it is telling that the 10 Circuit found that it had not been shown there is a “significant likelihood” of prevailing in an appeal to the circuit court.

Further, Justice Sotomayor is assigned to the 10th circuit. So, an appeal for a stay goes to her first, and she decides either to rule on the appeal, or to refer the matter to the full court. Maybe Utah has some solid ground for appeal, but I doubt it.

As I have noted before, at length, this train pulled out of the station more than 100 years ago. There is no stopping it this far along the trip. Like it, or not.

 

[rossum]

Well… Christ was silent on the topic, as far as we know.

Indeed He was.

What Jesus said about homosexuality:

http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1529140/thumbs/o-BLANK-PAGE-570.jpg

rossum

 

[Monkey1976]

Well… Christ was silent on the topic, as far as we know.

In the Gospels, He is also “silent” on the issues of drunk driving, global warming, and the use of nuclear weapons. Does that make these all okay? Or maybe you could stop parroting gay lobbyist talking points and do some discernment by actually reading Scripture. For example:[BIBLEDRB]Matt 5:17-19[/BIBLEDRB]

 

[rossum]

In the Gospels, He is also “silent” on the issues of drunk driving, global warming, and the use of nuclear weapons. Does that make these all okay?

He was also silent on plane journeys, heart transplants and the Internet. Does that make those things wrong? You cannot argue that silence equates to wrongness(*), since there are a great many things Jesus did not talk about.

(*) Unless you are Amish, and refuse to use anything in modern life that is not “Biblical”.

rossum

 

[Monkey1976]

He was also silent on plane journeys, heart transplants and the Internet. Does that make those things wrong? You cannot argue that silence equates to wrongness(*), since there are a great many things Jesus did not talk about.

(*) Unless you are Amish, and refuse to use anything in modern life that is not “Biblical”.

rossum

I’m not saying that the lack of a direct quote from Our Lord makes something “wrong”, I’m pointing out the biggest hole in the “He never said…” argument. If you want to get into the religious arguments against same-sex “marriage” from a Christian standpoint, then we can go there. Honestly, I’m pretty curious how groups that claim to be Christian can celebrate it, but that’s a topic for another thread…

 

[InSearchofGrace]

Indeed He was.

What Jesus said about homosexuality:

http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1529140/thumbs/o-BLANK-PAGE-570.jpg

rossum

Attempting to win Christians over to their side, same-sex “marriage” proponents often assert that Jesus would approve of their agenda. They claim that Jesus never said anything at all about homosexuality. Not once do the gospels record him condemning homosexual acts as being sinful. Therefore, the activists claim, Jesus would approve of same-sex “marriage” and Christians should be supportive.

Although it is true that the gospels do not record Jesus directly condemning homosexual acts, to conclude on this basis that he in any way approved of them is faulty reasoning. It commits a logical fallacy known as argumentum a silentio (Latin for “argument from silence”). “Jesus is not on record against it so he must be for it.” Such an argument bases its conclusion on a supposed lack of evidence to the contrary rather than on the existence of any evidence one way or the other. In reality, lack of evidence does not prove anything.

…

In the New Testament, it is primarily in Paul’s letters that homosexual acts are directly condemned. In his letter to the Galatians, Paul reminds us where he got his teaching (Gal 1:11-12):

For I would have you know, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not man’s gospel. For I did not receive it from man, nor was I taught it, but it came through a revelation of Jesus Christ.

Paul was the last apostle to be sent by Jesus (cf. 1 Cor 15:8) and we should expect that he received the same assurances that Jesus provided to the other apostles. Jesus promised his apostles that the Holy Spirit would (among other things) “bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you” (John 14:26).

Paul certainly shared in this assurance. That being the case, his teaching on homosexuality may very well be what he remembered Jesus saying to him in a revelation.

Additionally, when Jesus sent out representatives he told them, “He who hears you hears me, and he who rejects you rejects me, and he who rejects me rejects him who sent me” (Luke 10:16). Thus, since Paul was sent by Jesus, when we “hear” him in his letters, we also hear Jesus.

There really is no doubt that Jesus condemned homosexual acts as sinful so do not be fooled by the faulty reasoning of activists.
Read full piece here, CAF staff apologist Jim Blackburn’s argument that essentially kills the argument by rossum, epan, et al in this forum.

 

[_Abyssinia]

The opinion in an open letter from 200 scholars in the field says the following about the Osborne and Amato:

“While Cynthia Osborne and Paul Amato are certainly well-respected scholars, they are also both active participants in the Regnerus study. According to her curriculum vitae, Dr. Osborne is a Co-Principal Investigator of the New Family Structure Survey. Dr. Amato served as a paid consultant on the advisory group convened to provide insights into study design and methods. Perhaps more importantly, neither Osborne nor Amato have ever published work that considers LGBT family or parenting issues. A cursory examination of this body of literature would reveal a wide range of scholars who are much more qualified to evaluate the merits of this study and were neither directly involved in the study design nor compensated for that involvement.”

How sad that an author of a study is so afraid of peer review, that he relies on paid participants in his own study. If the methodology was that bad, then why did he ever publish it, other than as an editorial?

Regnerus’ study was peer reviewed. Tell me what study on the issue of outcomes for children raised by same sex parents is better in regards to methodology Regenerus’ study?

It appears to me that those opposed to homosexual couples raising children will find issues in studies claiming that children raised in homes with homosexual parents have good outcomes or as equal outcomes to children raised by their biological parents and those opposed to homosexual couples not being able to raise children will find fault in any study that claims to show that children raised by homosexual parents do not have as good outcomes or as equal outcomes as children raised by their biological parents, which is why I do not rest purely on studies. I have researched the issue of parenting in regards to children and there are differences in how a adult male parents and how adult female parents and and these differing roles are part of the balance that is needed ideally in raising children: fathers are more direct, mothers more descriptive and encouraging; girls who have good fathers in their lives are predisposed to have healthy relationships when they are adults because they understand how a man is supposed to act towards a woman. Boys who grow in a home with a mother and a father are predisposed to have healthy relationships with women as adults because they know how to act towards women from learning from their father and how women should act towards them that they learned from their mother. Mothers tend to avoid risk in their style as parenting whereas fathers tend to take more risks in their parenting style which balances out and provides children with expansion of understanding in the world in terms of the risk but protection from the adverse risk of too much risk. These are basic things and is why the ideal for children should be to have a mother and a father, and it is not that homosexual couples can’t love a child or children they bring up, but the differing roles in gender that a father and mother have are part of the balance that is ideally needed for children growing up.

I have also read some of the stories of those brought up in homes with same sex parents. Take this example written by Robert Oscar Lopez. He doesn’t that those that his mother and her female partner didn’t love him or didn’t bring up as best as they could necessarily, but he speaks of the confusion that rose from not having traditional roles, from not having a father.

Growing Up With Two Moms: The Untold Children’s View

Frank Ligtvoet and his male partner are raising children, and the story is tragic when you read his daughter doesn’t have a mother around and calls him ‘mommy.’

By FRANK LIGTVOET
Published: June 22, 2013

SOMETIMES when my daughter, who is 7, is nicely cuddled up in her bed and I snuggle her, she calls me Mommy. I am a stay-at-home dad. My male partner and I adopted both of our children at birth in open domestic adoptions. We could fill our home with nannies, sisters, grandmothers, female friends, but no mothers.

My daughter says “Mommy” in a funny way, in a high-pitched voice. Although I refer the honors immediately to her birth mom, I am flattered. But saddened as well, because she expresses herself in a voice that is not her own. It is her stuffed-animal voice. She expresses not only love; she also expresses alienation. She can role-play the mother-daughter relationship, but she cannot use her real voice, nor have the real thing.

nytimes.com/2013/06/23/opinion/sunday/the-misnomer-of-motherless-parenting.html

 

[_Abyssinia]

Indeed He was.

What Jesus said about homosexuality:

http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1529140/thumbs/o-BLANK-PAGE-570.jpg

rossum

Well… Christ was silent on the topic, as far as we know.

Jesus as quoted in John 5:46-47

If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. But since you do not believe what he wrote, how are you going to believe what I say?

There are multiple condemnations of homosexual behaviour in Mosoaic law.

Why would Jesus Christ whom is God, choose Paul to be an apostle, and the apostle Paul preached against homosexual behavior, if Jesus Christ, whom is God, was not also against homosexual behavior?

Apostle Paul says the Lord gave the apostles authority

{10:8} And if I were even to glory somewhat more about our authority, which the Lord has given to us for your edification, and not for your destruction, I should not be ashamed.

sacredbible.org/catholic/NT-08_2-Corinthians.htm

1 Corinthians 6:11

{6:11} And some of you were like this. But you have been absolved, but you have been sanctified, but you have been justified: all in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.

sacredbible.org/catholic/NT-07_1-Corinthians.htm

 

[LisaA]

Jesus as quoted in John 5:46-47

There are multiple condemnations of homosexual behaviour in Mosoaic law.

Why would Jesus Christ whom is God, choose Paul to be an apostle, and the apostle Paul preached against homosexual behavior, if Jesus Christ, whom is God, was not also against homosexual behavior?

Apostle Paul says the Lord gave the apostles authority

sacredbible.org/catholic/NT-08_2-Corinthians.htm

1 Corinthians 6:11

sacredbible.org/catholic/NT-07_1-Corinthians.htm

Don’t you just love those who ignore the authority of the Bible, try to trot out some specious argument to prop up their agenda? To claim Christ was silent on homosexual activity because there was no specific reference is, as was noted, using silence to document agreement. Doesn’t work does it?

Does anyone dispute that Jesus was a devout Jew? That as a child he recited the Word of God in “my Father’s house?” Do you think he was acquainted with Mosaic Law? There are very clear prohibitions against homosexual acts as with a number of sexual sins. But now that homosexualists want to gain traction with those of us who’ve actually read the Bible and understand basic biology, they pull out the very authority that is disdained when it doesn’t comport with their preconceived notions.

The beauty of our Catholic faith is that it doesn’t gyrate itself into a pretzel of inconsistency and specious arguments to support the teachings of the Church. Traditional marriage is the backbone of every civilization from before the time of recorded history. Marriage is the source of not only stable society but the traditional form provides the best environment for raising children.

The only thing homosexualists have going for them is the childish "it’s not fair!’ or “I want what she’s having…” Their activity is unhealthy, unnatural, and results in a demonstrated higher incidence of mental, physical and emotional damage. Whether or not you believe in God, you should acknowledge Natural Law. All species are ordered to survive, at least long enough to reproduce. Homosexuality makes the first objective more difficult and the second impossible. No baby was conceived within the framework of a same sex relationship. Instead homosexual couples use the same tactics I used in breeding livestock to produce a child. That not only dehumanizes the child but makes him or her a commodity to be purchased.

This doesn’t mean all homosexuals are evil people but the activists’ agenda creates chaos, discord and supports unhealthy behavior. Honestly I really don’t care what you do in bed and that’s between you and God at your death. But don’t think anyone is fooled by the kind of convoluted “logic” that attempts to equate homosexual activity with traditional man woman marriage.

Lisa

 

[rossum]

There are multiple condemnations of homosexual behaviour in Mosoaic law.

There are condemnations of all sorts of things in Mosaic Law: shaving, eating clams,wearing polyester-cotton blends and a lot of others. You will need something better than such a general support for Mosaic Law. Do we have to start stoning disobedient children to death now? That is in there as well.

Why would Jesus Christ whom is God, choose Paul to be an apostle, and the apostle Paul preached against homosexual behavior, if Jesus Christ, whom is God, was not also against homosexual behavior?

Last time I looked, Paul was not Jesus. I gave a list of what Jesus said, not of what Paul said.

rossum

 

[JamesTheJust]

There are condemnations of all sorts of things in Mosaic Law: shaving, eating clams,wearing polyester-cotton blends and a lot of others. You will need something better than such a general support for Mosaic Law. Do we have to start stoning disobedient children to death now? That is in there as well.

Last time I looked, Paul was not Jesus. I gave a list of what Jesus said, not of what Paul said.

rossum

1. That was ceremonial law, which ceased to apply (Acts 15). The moral law is still binding.
2. But his words carry the same authority, when he is inspired by the Holy Spirit.

 

[Shia_Muslim]

1.** So, because an idea came from a religious person’s mouth, it is immediately a religious idea and is unfit for consideration by any democratic government.** Pope Francis supported peace in Syria. Does that mean peace in Syria is a religious idea and should be thrown out as US policy? You might do well to attempt to refute more than three words of an argument.

1. If said marriages are between two women or two men, then yes, it is a bad thing. The fact that said couples would otherwise be cohabiting is irrelevant and has no bearing on the truth value of either side of the argument.

Well that’s what Western society thinks unfortunately…

 

[gilliam]

Utah marriage case on way to the Court (US Supreme Court that is)

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, finding that the state of Utah has not made its case for delaying same-sex marriages, refused on Tuesday night to block a federal judge’s order striking down a voter-approved ban on those marriages. State officials then told news organizations in the state that they would now ask the Supreme Court to issue a delay, with a filing there likely on Thursday.

In a two-page order, a two-judge motions panel of the Tenth Circuit found that a stay was not warranted, expressing some uncertainty that the state’s position against same-sex marriage would ultimately prevail in court. The judges set the case (Kitchen v. Herbert (Circuit docket 13-4178)) for expedited review, with a briefing schedule to be issued shortly.

A request to the Supreme Court for a delay of the ruling by U.S. District Judge Robert J. Shelby of Salt Lake City would go first to Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who is the Circuit Justice for the geographic area that includes Utah. She would have the option to act alone or to refer the issue to her colleagues.

The state’s planned plea to the Supreme Court would be the first time the issue of same-sex marriage had returned to the Justices since their rulings in late June — one of which, United States v. Windsor, provided the basic constitutional reasoning that Judge Shelby applied in nullifying Utah’s state constitutional amendment against same-sex marriages — even though the *Windsor *decision was not a ruling on state authority to bar such unions.

It could be a significant test of whether the Court is ready to confront the power of states to ban same-sex marriages — an issue they explicitly did not resolve in those June decisions.

scotusblog.com/2013/12/utah-marriage-case-on-way-to-the-court/#more-202638

This does not look good for the State of Utah’s case

 

[_Abyssinia]

Trust me, if militant gays think not getting the wedding cake they want or the photographer they want or the venue they want is worth engaging in lawsuits, protests, and hateful communications on social media, they are salivating at the thought of taking on the Church. One chip at a time against the freedoms our country was founded upon. And all so they can claim equivalency with heterosexual relationships, not because there aren’t alternatives…like the baker down the street or another photographer…

It amazes me the lengths they will go to, to promote the ability to publicly declare what sexual activities they prefer. Sexuality has gone from what (some) people do, into a primary identifier. An interesting set of priorities and peculiar source of pride

Lisa

A homosexual couple is suing the Church of England because the Church of England has an opt out from having to conduct homosexual marrige ceremonies. They are members of the Church of England

catholicnewsagency.com/news/gay-couple-to-sue-church-of-england-for-marriage-rights

Church of England is a state Church like the Lutheran Church in Denmark, but why should a state Church be forced to marry two people of the same gender? Church of England is not forced to marry a man and woman or a polgamous marry so why should they, or the Luthern Church in Denmark be forced to mrry two people of the same gender?

 

[Robert_Bay]

MODERATOR NOTICE

This thread is wandering. Please return to the topic in the original post. That being the case in Utah.

Stay with that topic. This thread is not intended to be an open discussion on the the history of moral theology.

 

[_Abyssinia]

There are condemnations of all sorts of things in Mosaic Law: shaving, eating clams,wearing polyester-cotton blends and a lot of others. You will need something better than such a general support for Mosaic Law. Do we have to start stoning disobedient children to death now? That is in there as well.

Last time I looked, Paul was not Jesus. I gave a list of what Jesus said, not of what Paul said.

rossum

JamesTheJust is correct. Also, condemnation of homosexual bvehviour continues from the Old Testament to the New Testament.

Jesus was not silent on the issue of homosexual behavior, not when you take into consideration the fact that Jesus is God. Leviticus 18:22 was given to Moses as an instruction for Mosaic law, by God.

Edit: Sorry mod, saw your post after posting this. Won’t post any further on this issue.

 

[latin_rite]

So one man over rules the majority? So how is america the land of the free again?

 

[rossum]

1. That was ceremonial law, which ceased to apply (Acts 15). The moral law is still binding.

Please supply the Bible verses listing exactly what is, and what is not, “ceremonial law”. I hope that you are not applying a non-Bibllical classification here.

Does the verse about stoning homosexuals to death still apply? If not, then why not?

1. But his words carry the same authority, when he is inspired by the Holy Spirit.

Not relevant. I limited my post to what Jesus said. What Paul said is not relevant to what Jesus said.

rossum

 

[rossum]

So one man over rules the majority? So how is america the land of the free again?

America is the land of the Constitution. If a law is against the Constitution, then that law has no power. Judges are empowered to decide questions of law.

rossum

 

[Farsight001]

America is the land of the Constitution. If a law is against the Constitution, then that law has no power. Judges are empowered to decide questions of law.

rossum

Right. And in regards to individual’s rights such as abortion, drug use, gay marriage, etc., the constitution is clear - each state has individual control over those issues. People don’t realize that most of the constitution applies only to the federal government. Hence it is perfectly constitutional for gay marriage to remain illegal, as long as the people in that state want it to be.