Rick Warren and my take on his statement

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Comment by tubejay on January 5, 2009 at 10:43am

I have to disagree with Tubejay's comment, but it won't let me reply directly. the LGBQT community doesn't need a religion of its own.

while you're certainly entitled, i don't ultimately think we disagree on this. i don't want religion to be "separate but equal," but just as there are black churches (which anyone may go to, and technically, relatively boring old white churches are generally open to everyone else as well... with the occasional exception i'm sure) i think we could do well with some gay churches. why gay churches? to make way for more gay pastors. once gay pastors are proportionally welcome and present in "non-gay" churches, the need for gay churches goes away.

What needs to happen is that the rights of churches to affect state law need to be removed. They have been protected from the law for far too long, and they have effectively abused their privilege by pushing for gays to have fewer rights than they have. It's disgusting, but I'm comforted by some of the logic. Most of the people who voted against the gay marriage legislatures down in the states are old, and soon they will be dead. It's harsh, but it's comforting.

i hate to agree with that, but yeah, i do. however, as fellow strong believer in the separation of church and state, i think how we manage that separation is delicate. we certainly agree that the separation has to be greater than it is, and i would not mind if the separation proved more complete than i thought possible, only that some proposals i've heard from fellow believers in that separation would seem to further destroy it in the long run, while creating actual regulations for churches.

so i think people that rightfully believe in that separation have to be sure their ideas ultimately serve the cause they believe they are serving.

Comment by ksawyer on January 5, 2009 at 9:08am

I have to disagree with Tubejay's comment, but it won't let me reply directly. the LGBQT community doesn't need a religion of its own. What needs to happen is that the rights of churches to affect state law need to be removed. They have been protected from the law for far too long, and they have effectively abused their privilege by pushing for gays to have fewer rights than they have. It's disgusting, but I'm comforted by some of the logic. Most of the people who voted against the gay marriage legislatures down in the states are old, and soon they will be dead. It's harsh, but it's comforting.

BTW, there's a movement to turn Saddleback into a somewhat disgusting sexual move, much like the Santorum.

Comment by tubejay on January 3, 2009 at 10:24pm

amen to that.

personally the only solution to this in my opinion is more openly gay religion. for one, i'm fascinated that you're christian. i mean, don't take it personally, i've dated plenty of christians, many of whom were as reasonable as interesting as people at epic fu. but i always think i'm surrounded by atheists. my view of the world and of religion takes a long time to explain, but if there's anything i'm not much of, it's atheist. (but i am a little.)

religion isn't going to go away. it's like saying "art will go away." art and religion are natural expressions of human thought and human feeling. neither will go away any sooner than homosexuality will. so while it would be nice for a lot of people (many homosexuals included) if religion just completely left us alone, it wouldn't do much for openly gay priests, and openly gay christians, who would lose something as important to them as art is to a gay artist.

i believe that when tribes with a history of not getting along well wanted to find peace, they performed marriages. obviously the marriage of homosexuality with christianity is nothing new, it is time for a revival. gays have the same rights to worship as everyone else, but as a society we still try to take it away. so people are allowed to be gay, and allowed to be christian, but if not enough are allowed to be both, then we'll simply need to do the same things we did to bring human rights into the 21st century.

we need more gay churches. more gay ministers, and like all people who deny others the right to simply be who god made them (whites, christians, men, heterosexuals) <- (but certainly not all of them) they will come to allow people their freedom when they see there is no other way. we cannot afford to allow fanatics who are anti-science and inhumane towards other genders (heteromale, heterofemale, homomale, homofemale, bimale, bifemale, i count six genders, unless everyone is really bi) to have a monopoly on christ or on god. http://www.tamfs.org/ ("that all may freely serve")