King Solomon, wisest of all men according to the Bible:
But remember: letting two men get married should be as offensive to Christians as letting a man have two wives.
]]>The problem is less with this as a practice and more with the denial of it.
Also I'm truly skeptical of mega church pastors. I don't questions anyone claim of spirituality but you would be a fool to think that Warren, Osteen, Meyer, Jakkes, Long and their ilk don't have a financial stake in pleasing their constituency...a fool.
k1
ryanculver.blogspot.com
I honestly thought it was simply to rescind marriage rights from gays, and define any state-granted marriage rights as belonging exclusively to couples consisting of one man and one woman. Is it a total fabrication? If so, does Warren know that? Call me naive but I still find it difficult to believe that a 'man of God' would allow himself to be a demagogue. ("One who lies to the people.") That's a sin.
]]>Warren either knows this is a lie or one ignorant preacher.
He's also lying that all religious groups define marriage as one man-one woman. There are rabbis and ministers who marry all couples.
Furthermore, there is still polygamy in parts of the world, such as Afghanistan. And Mormons practiced polygamy in the US less than two centuries ago.
]]>However, while I'm shamefully ignorant of the ins and outs of the Civil Rights movement (and thus may be talking out of my ass), I would think there were a large portion of people that had extremely bigoted views of African Americans but yet were co-opted into supporting the movement. People who were dead certain that black people were inferior and wouldn't want to be in the same neighborhood or on the same bus... but still thought it was bad to have the Government enforcing such discrimination.
If we can use Warren to break off "moderate" evangelicals who are more friendly to legal protections of Gay Rights, then that's what you do. We can kick them out of the tent after the laws get passed.
]]>The answer is "no part of Prop 8 said that." But to people like Warren, i.e. right wing evangelicals, telling lies is okay as long as it serves a larger purpose. Don't remember Jesus saying anything like that, but hey, their form of Christianity is about as related to what Jesus is recorded as saying as the belief in transubstantiation is--which is to say, not at all.
]]>It is truly a conservative talking point and one they used several times to help pass Prop 8 in California. They also said that churches could get sued if they didn't marry gay couples which was also a lie, and they said gay marriage would then automatically translate into gay adoption and if a faith based adoption group denied gay parents the ability to adopt they would be sued and that was also a lie.
This is what pissed me off yesterday about the response to him being picked to pray at the invocation. I personally understand the politics of it and it didn't surprise me because Obama had spoken highly of him many times during the campaign. But the people who were upset and were featured on all the cable news shows never spent ANY time pushing back on the stuff Rick Warren was saying. They spent all of their time attacking Obama for slapping them in the face. And thats why today the right wing shows like Morning Joe are now saying the left are just as bigoted and divisive as Rick Warren because they are attacking his free speech. Because nobody actually exposed all of the lies in his rhetoric the wingers are now able to frame it as just sour grapes. I knew it would happen and Scarborough definitely did not dissappoint. I am sure FoxNews is having a field day with it as will a lot of the top newspapers and the problem is a lot of people are going to believe Rick Warren's bullsh!t because nobody has disproven what he is saying and maybe only KO and Maddow will correct the record But who will be paying attention?
]]>As a wise person once said, "If YOU don’t believe in gay marriage, don’t get into a gay marriage."
I don't know the original Greek, but every English translation I've seen of Mark 14:22-24 has Jesus saying, "This is my body." There's definitely room to argue over whether or not he meant that as a metaphor, but the quote is there.
About homosexuality, though... Mark 7:5-22 (though it was speaking about food rather than sex) would probably apply to the whole homosexuality debate in general.
As far as Jesus' teachings on divorce, Mark 10:2-12 pretty much covers it. Here, at least, Warren's matching up with Jesus' teaching.
]]>i for one (and i think most others here) do not believe warren to be an ogre, and agree that he's done important work and advocacy on behalf of the poor and sick, which is a hallmark of christianity as i understand it. we're merely calling him out for falsehoods he has told with regard to this particular issue. i personally dont have a big problem with his giving the invocation or not giving it; i understand why obama picked him and i dont think it's very important one way or the other, but then i'm not a gay person who feels slapped in the face right after the whole prop 8 thing. While I agree that there are areas of agreement across the board where we as Americans need to make a lot of headway, I do feel that this whole gay marriage thing is more important than you make it out to be - these people, though a small minority, are human beings and American citizens and they have rights. marginalization simply won't work in any way. they're not gonna stop being gay, so why can't the govt simply encourage the same level of stability they do with straight people? as a straight man who plans to get married and have kids one day, i dont see how it really affects me.
Anyway, as far as all the criticism about Obama picking this one or that one and the second-order symbolism of every little part of his inauguration - there's so much speculation at this turning point in american politics! let's let the man be president for at least a few months or so before we start deeming his presidency a betrayal or a boon.
]]>That said, viewing the clip I can see why Warren would come off as more appealing than most such preachers (perhaps a low standard). After all he begins by acknowledging that divorce is a bigger threat to heterosexual marriage than is gay marriage. And he even recognizes that the focus on gay marriage is one of people looking to focus on the sins that they are not themselves tempted by. He then, somewhat hestitantly, but still in the end fully claims to support equal institutions.
And ultimately he just compares gay marriage to those other things as being (incorrectly of course) changes to the definition of marriage. Of the people who are wrong on this issue, he seems to be less offensively wrong than many.
Warren did Obama a big service by having him speak at his church. The left talks about him being ambushed, and the right attacks what Obama had to say. But both sides are wrong to ignore that a significant number of less partisan evangelicals were impressed that Obama went and probably liked much of what they heard him say.
It is not surprising that Obama would want to repeat this link, and this is a pretty purely ceremonial role, the best kind for people who don't have anything worth saying on the issues.
]]>Stonetools,
Please quote where I called Warren "the biggest anti-gay bigot since Hitler." You made the claim. Now prove it.
]]>sgwhiteinfla: We can't be constantly silent fearing what the right wing will say. Didn't they say BO was a Muslin? A terrorist sympathizer? An anti-Semitic? I also don't understand very well what you are saying about attacking Obama and not Warren. We are upset about Warren because he is a big-time bigot that has said horrible things about gay people -and women, by the way. What are we suppose to say: I think the President-elect's choice is great because Warren is a big time bigot, etc?
]]>
Don't you think that part of this reason is because Warren's views were already known and were sort of a given for the conversation. I didn't see any of the cable news shows, but I would imagine those complaining are activist types, not party hacks.
A DNC type would want to take the discussion off of Obama and maybe refocus it on Warren and how Obama and Warren differ. The activist is trying to pull Obama from the center to the left on this issue so they want the focus on Obama. They are more interested in the issue rather than in protecting their leader.
I did listened to a bit of talk radio and Thom Hartmann was calling the choice of Warren "brilliant" (and not sarcastically).
]]>http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/1208/Warren_and_Obama.html?showall
]]>No what I expected them to say was WHY they oppose Rick Warren with out using generalites. There are many preachers who oppose gay marriage on religious grounds but not many of them lie about it and say it would curtail their free speech.
DougEMI
The whole point is a whole lotta folks who like Rick Warren DON'T know about his reasoning behind why he pushed prop 8. Most people in this country aren't face painters who follow this kind of stuff all that closely. Notice how nobody talked about his rhetoric on abortion during the Saddleback forum. NOBODY. Most of his supporters and people who bought his books probably assumed that he opposed gay marriage on religious grounds but had no clue that he saw it as being analagous to incest or polygamy. And believe it or not there are still people who are walking around California truly believing that if Prop 8 didn't pass it would have curtailed the free speech of preachers.
]]>So, basically, you're against gay marriage, so you're sympathetic to Warren.
Well, Warren is certainly wrong to claim that marriage has always, everywhere, been one man, one woman. But so what?
Well, he's a Christian minister, who's telling baldfaced lies about something that he claims is a central to his world-view. I think that matters. Don't you?
Furthermore, it's perfectly clear that the Judeo-Christian civilization they moan about all the time was founded on a completely different definition of marriage than the one Warren claims has existed for 5,000 years, and in fact went on happily existing and thriving before arriving at the "one man one woman" definition so close to Warren's heart.
All of which leads me to believe that Warren is simply a homophobic bigot who's decided to justify his hatred by cherry-picking Bible excerpts and ignoring history. If Warren were telling the truth about the history of marriage, I wouldn't change my mind about homophobic bigotry. But I wouldn't necessarily think that Warren is a dishonest, hypocritical bullshit artist.
That's "so what".
As to the slippery slope stuff: the quick answer is (a) sexual orientation is more innate than wanting to be married to more than one person at a time; (b) the legal framework of marriage as it exists is designed for 2 people, and while it's no problem at all legally to change Husband and Wife to Spouse A and Spouse B, changing it to some larger number of people would be very, very complicated; and (c) the definition of "incest" has obviously been incredibly fluid historically, and will continue to be (which cousins count? are you legally required to marry your dead brother's widow?).
]]>And if I'm not mistaken, the judge in California who wanted to overturn Proposition 8 said that "any two people who love each other should be allowed to get married." Should that not also include two brothers, or two sisters? A father and his son or daughter? And if not, who are you to discriminate? On what legal basis would you stop the marriage of two consenting adults who aren't hurting each other?
If you think this is far-fetched, read Savage Love sometime. How can you say same-sex marriage laws won't be used to defend incest when clearly tolerance is relative?
]]>Got your point and it is a really important one because, see, in this very thread how many people still insist that this is all about gay marriage and ideological litmus tests, etc. But that wasn't my impression, really. I watched the video of Warren comparing gays to pedophiles, incestuous, polygamous many times in several programs and networks. Plus all the Holocaust crap. I saw the guy from HRC and Hillary Rosen from Huffington Post and an elegant lady from the People for the American Way and some other articulate WHY they didn't like the pick. Some people weren't that good making the point and I get all anxious when I see it (like you did) but that's always the way it is. Some people suck at being interviewed on the TV. And the right wing machine will do what they do for a living no matter what.
]]>So, in Corinthians, Paul only gives a backhand endorsement of marriage. "Better to marry than to burn," but better still to get your shit together in anticipation of the end days. More than that, Paul seems openly skeptical about procreation. What's the point in making babies when the world is about to end?
The Christian focus on spiritual union in marriage grows out of an early guilt that physical love/sex was a waste of time when time was running short. If marriage was primarily spiritual, however, it could be in keeping with Christ's teachings on love, etc. But there's no reason I can see that this kind of theological position requires different genders, especially given Paul's skepticism towards the value of procreation.
Basically this whole idea that marriage is good and should be between a man and a woman for the purposes of making babies is hugely controversial in the Bible and hardly an obvious theological tradition.
]]>AS to his position that gay marriage is like polygamy and incest, well, he may be not argued his point well, but it remarkably difficult to argue against the position that if you allow gay marriage, why not allow polygamy and incest?]]>Actually it CAN be done. Polygamy should not be allowed for a couple of different reasons
1. Benefits, how do you handle health benefits with a company when you have several wives or several wives has one husband. Who gets the settlement should the man dies?
2. Most of the polygamy laws deal with men who SECRETLY marry more than one woman. The truth is a man can marry more than one woman in this country now as long as they never get caught and or the wives are in agreement. Google "polygamy in America" and see what you find. The problem comes in when a woman finds out her husband has a whole other family somewhere else and thats both fraud and a breach of contract.
3. Similarly if a woman doesn't know her husband has other wives he may be subjecting her to undo risk of STDs. So there is a health care aspect to it.
As for incest, for one that is a situation where the child does not have the ability to choose to engage in the act itself because of their age. I have yet to see (thought I could in theory be wrong) a man prosecuted for having an incestual relationship with his grown up daughter that was initiated after after she was grown and out on her own. Also if a child should be a product of an incestual relationship its is many times more likely to have birth defects.
That you think gay marriage is comparable to incest or polygamy says a lot....about you.
Warren might be wrong about it being biblically one-man one-woman all the way through the Bible, but every time there is mention polygamy, it never ends well (major family drama from Abraham onward).
It's implied that Solomon's appetite for women was his downfall, wisdom notwithstanding, and Paul in the New Testament says that leaders in the church must "be the husband of one wife," which is probably where Warren is getting it from.
Just my two cents.
]]>As for slavery, I'd offer the minor quibble that slavery being something appropriate to apply to one race is of more recent vintage--slavery as the sucky thing that happens when you lose a war or have too many debts, or have a relative in those situations, is indeed really old, but it could happen to anyone.
Traditional marriage is an exchange of property guaranteed by the exchange of some family members; I don't see such re-arising here.
]]>You're right about slavery. I stand corrected.
]]>Duh. The same way you divy it up when a man has several children. What do you think Brad Pitt will do? Do you think a man who can afford that many wives can't afford to have health insurance or a will made?
]]>Um. Polygamy is currently not legal and some men are liars. If polygamy becomes legal there will still be men who are liars. What's your point?
]]>Anyone can subject anyone else to STDs by not practicing safe sex, so what? Hmm...let's say the polygamist man has just 2 wives, but only has sex with those two. But then there's a married man who has sex with 15 women outside of his marriage to one wife. Is sexually promiscuity miraculously cured by straight marriage? I didn't know it could do that!
]]>Honestly, I can see some definitely pro's to having more than one wife (aside from the obligatory male reason). Having served in Saudi and having got to know a number of Saudi officers and their families, I also know the huge con of being nagged to death. Hell, there's three of them scheming against just one of you...who's going to come out on top? Saudi men are just as apt as American men to say, "fine, whatever", if for no other reason than to bring some peace and quiet back into their lives.
Marriage, one way or the other, should have zero mention in civil law. It's a problem that needs to be addressed and getting gay people added to straight people getting "married" under the law just compounds the error. Marriages are religious...period. The legal aspects of what we call marriage are civil and should be named as such. Thus, ALL such agreements between whoever should be called civil partnerships or whatever.
It seems to be like pulling teeth, though, to get a gay-marriage proponent to admit that legislating the ability for Fred to marry Ted discriminates against Bob who wants to marry John and Eric. If one-man/one-woman is now oppressive, why should one-person/one-person be any less oppressive to those embracing what, as TNC rightly states, is an ancient and universally practiced arrangement?
]]>The Bible, of course, has polygamy all over its pages. So did the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in the 19th century. So, I'm sure, have assorted other cultures in the past 5000 years: women have often enough been treated as chattel so that occasionally one rich man would have the culturally-endorsed opportunity to buy up a slew of them.
Marrying off girls while still children? Hell, they were doing that among European nobility during the Middle Ages. I bet it still happens in some Third World cultures.
Sibling marriage? The Pharoahs of Egypt practiced brother-sister marriage.
What bothers me about Warren's giving the invocation isn't that he holds a belief about homosexuality that's contrary to mine. What bothers me is that he's an idiot, a buffoon, someone who says things without having any idea at all whether or not they're true.
People like that shouldn't be taken seriously. By giving him such a prominent platform, Obama is treating this buffoon as someone worthy of playing a role in our civic dialogue, rather than dismissing him as the buffoon he is. That's my problem with Obama choosing Warren to give the invocation.
]]> You have yet to see it because it's a relatively rare phenomenon, and still considered too taboo in society for most to mention it even it if were happening. Which just proves the point that it's not like you're going to have to worry about an explosion of incest marriages once you open the gates for gays. Not that incest between two consenting adults would be wrong- it's icky perhaps to most of us on a taste level but whatever. Doesn't hurt anyone, then fine.
Please, I am not even that bright and I'm able to swat down these arguments as if they were one-eyed flies.
You're not even disagreeing with the person. Your responses have been very bizaree. He was making an argument that the incest comparison is bogus. So are you.
]]>You mean like Biden's FDR-on-TV comments? Or knowing its false and saying it anyway like Hillary (too many to list)?
...couldn't resist.
And just so I don't get the enfuego for hijacking, legislated marriage anything = bad.
]]>You can try to read into it what you like, but the Bible is fairly unambiguous when it comes to homosexual behavior. It's also unambiguous when it comes to divorce and polygamy. Jesus even goes so far as to say that God hates divorce, a claim that is certainly never made about homosexual behavior or polygamy.
The rub is this, and it's why Warren and his ilk are so very wrong: Jesus isn't in the business of telling his followers, "X is bad, so you should try to pass a law preventing X." He's in the business of telling them, "X is bad, so if you're doing it, stop. Then follow me."
There's a large category of behavior the Bible seems to recognize as sinful but not worth making illegal. Divorce is there. Polygamy is there. Homosexual marriage isn't mentioned (because the idea didn't really exist) but I'd argue that's where it should be. Christians just aren't called, anywhere, to a position of legislating behavior on the part of anyone else. We are meant to live holy lives and embody the love of Christ to our neighbors, not attempt to force them to live as we do via governmental intervention.
I believe that homosexual behavior is sinful, but it's no more sinful than behavior I engage in every day anyway: lust, hatred, laziness, greed, envy...I could go on. I wouldn't necessarily actively support adding laws to create homosexual marriage, but I would certainly not support laws making an existing institution illegal (I'm looking at you, California.) I definitely and actively support full benefits/legal protections/etc for homosexual couples.
Does all that make me a bigot? It comes down to a religious belief for me, but I'm not willing to extend that belief to harm or prevent others from behaving as they will. It's not my job to sort out sin from sin; it's no Christian's job.
]]>What Stacy said. I just miss tagged the part of Stonetools post that I wanted to highlight. If you notice the only thing that isn't highlighted is "stonetools says"
He said nobody could argue against polygamy or incest and for that reason Rick Warren was right. I was refuting him. Sorry for the confusion.
Damm my html skills!
]]>And another philosophical point: no stable society equates homosexual marriage with heteresexual marriage. If there is any precedent for this in history, please let me know. But as far as I can determine, even in cultures where same-sex unions are tolerated (in Europe, specifically) and not discriminated against, hetero-marriages are considered the norm, the standard. Same-sex marriage has been prevalent in societies before but (correct if wrong) could not be sustained as a viable lifestyle choice.
]]>Why should we honestly care though? You and I may think it's wrong, but what reason does the government have for forbidding it? Sure, we need laws protecting minor, but who is the government protecting in the case of non-minor siblings?
"And another philosophical point: no stable society equates homosexual marriage with heteresexual marriage. If there is any precedent for this in history, please let me know."
That's not a valid argument. Just because something has never worked before doesn't mean it can't work now. And a society that accepts homosexual marriage on equal footing with heterosexual marriage has never been tried. No one is proposing that all people everywhere are forced into homosexual marriage thereby spelling (presumably) the end of procreation.
]]>Does all that make me a bigot?
I'm not sure that it matters. I don't actually care whether someone approves of me or likes me, as long as they agree that I deserve the same rights under the law as everyone else.
I admit that I don't get the idea that because your god says it's wrong, it's wrong for people who don't follow your god. My goddess is just fine with me boffing whoever I want, provided it's consensual and no one is harmed.
I do have to ask, though, if, since you say you read the Bible literally, you follow all 600-odd Levitican rules. The only place that homosexuality (between men; as usual, lesbians don't count) is specifically mentioned is in Leviticus, along with the parts about not stewing a calf in its mother's milk and not wearing clothing of mixed fibers.
Oddly enough, most Christians seem to feel that the New Testament overrides the dietary and clothing laws set down in the Old Testament. Which is fine...except most of those people also seem to think that there's a footnote that says, "Does not apply to Christians because Christ is the New Covenant--except for the part about NO BUTTSEX!!"
]]>As to the multiple comments about "slippery slope" and why there's an argument against sibling marriages if gay marriage is legal, why isn't there a slippery slope now? Marriage between a man and a woman is already legal, so why is THAT not a slippery slope to marriage between a brother and sister? Or to a man and multiple wives? I'm not sure how gay marriage comes closer to those things than a man and a woman. The argument that because one thing is legal everything is does not make sense. We make new laws all the time; drinking age is 21, if we change it to 20, do we have to change it to 19?
If the idea of marriage is making someone a partner for life, than it makes no difference what sex that partner is.
]]>This is really just a necessary disagreement following on radically different ideas about the nature of God/god/gods.
I certainly don't follow the Levitical purity code, seeing as how it was intended for a very specific people at a very specific time and the condemnation of homosexual behavior there isn't terribly relevant today. If a Christian quotes Leviticus to you, feel free to ask if they ever disobeyed their parents while growing up, and if so, why they weren't stoned.
But homosexual behavior (and women are even specified!) is mentioned several times in the New Testament.
You're right that many many people who call themselves Christians have no earthly idea what the Bible says or teaches and have probably read no section of Leviticus not about buttsex. They are ignorant but they are not a totality.
]]>Oh, I could argue that each marriage was between one man and one woman. It is just that one man could be in several marriages simultaneously, instead of sequentially.
If his marriage to Wife 1 were to end, the marriage to Wife 2 would continue.
Pedentry aside, to disprove his argument, you really should try to find societies that have had gay marriage for a long time - several centuaries, perhaps. Then you could show that nothing terrible happened.
]]>I just posted this over at the culture11 article that Sullivan linked to. I don't know if they will allow it to stay but its the truth.
I have a question about the premise of the “preaching/teaching” against gay marriage having an effect on tax exempt status. Bob Jones University didn’t lose their tax exempt status because of free speech. They weren’t SAYING that interracial dating was wrong, they were FORBIDDING interracial dating. The same thing goes for the property tax exemption case in NJ. They weren’t SAYING that gay marriage was wrong, they were actively discriminating against those gays who wanted to use their facilities for a wedding. If you are actually charging money for the use of your facilities then should you be granted tax exempt status if you discriminate against anybody for any reason? And I would love for someone to argue how Bob Jones University was right for banning interracial dating.No matter how you feel about gay marriage, I don’t believe those two particular cases have anything whatsoever to do with restrictions on “preaching and teaching”. If you could point out a case where a church lost their tax exempt status because the Pastor/Priest preached a sermon denouncing gay marriage then perhaps you would have a leg to stand on. As it is, judging from what is displayed your argument does not IMHO.
The best arguments I see against incest and polygamy today are that the latter typically involves subjugation of women and the former typically involves rape of a minor by a parent, which seems like it should be an additional crime (not just rape of a minor).
Equal civil rights for gay and straight couples is a no-brainer and should be called the same thing, whether marriage or civil union. It's all about going to town hall and getting a piece of paper that indicates you've chosen your next of kin.
]]>There were a few cultures in West Africa where a woman could gain a harem of wives as a show of her wealth and power. Although these relationships were quite possibly more like "united servitude" and tended to be Platonic. Even in societies where two males married it was almost always the case that one of the males was deemed to be womanly or third-gender. Or the marriage was intentionally temporary and the younger man would eventually get himself a wife. (A female wife)
The marriage of a post-op transsexual to a man is allowed in states that do not allow same-sex marriage. I believe Oregon allows it. Same-gender marriage, the marriage of two males as men or two females as women, is a relatively new idea. It does go against the idea that gender matters and marriage is a union of elements, ideas which are almost universal so far as I know. (Slavery is not universal) However my idea that one of those men in a same-sex marriage better be wearing a dress has not really taken off among the Religious Right.
]]>Modern love match marriage, no dwry, no background checks, no nothing, on the other hand 1) doesn't have much of a track record and 2) what reocord it has is pretty sorry - a 50% failure rate is pretty sad.
]]>Maybe Warren has told Obama his plan is to rip off his mask at the podium and declare himself a repressed homosexual who has found his true self and now wants to fight for gay marriage rights alongside his partner.
]]>Some emperors did have concubine relationships of both genders. In fact I believe in the Han dynasty it wasn't uncommon for Emperors to have an official male concubine along with his female concubines and wife. Some Confucians were perfectly okay with that so long as he still produced the necessary heir. A few though seemed to have disapproved, at least silently, and the devotion of one Emperor to his male concubine was seen as killing the dynasty. (He had a weird relationship with this concubine. After the young man got married, to a woman, he still would drop over to do the "I'm the Emperor, you can have a wife but I must still be your lover." It's hard to tell with ancient histories, but I got the sense the young man was probably straight and a little creeped out this old guy was reminding his wife of what he had to do to make a living)
]]>"Why should we honestly care though? You and I may think it's wrong, but what reason does the government have for forbidding it? Sure, we need laws protecting minor, but who is the government protecting in the case of non-minor siblings?"
Well, both science and history has shown that unions between closely-related relatives have a high tendency to produce offspring with severe mental and physical handicaps. (Google The Hapsburgs.) Then again, going down this road would likely break open a eugenics argument. Either way, there doesn’t seem to be a significant number of brother/sister parings demanding full marriage equality. You can't always fix every problem of today in a satisfactory manner and foresee every problem in the future as well.
But of course the mentioning of incestual marriages and marriages between adults and children in this context is not by accident. It's meant to provoke a sense of shock or bewilderment in the minds of those who might support same-sex marriage. It's the essence of the slippery-slope argument, dirty up something acceptable with something non-acceptable via tenuous links.
Andrew didn't say this outright, so let me explain:
You are assuming that Andrew either believes in many gods and chooses to follow one (and you another) or that he doesn't really believe in God or gods and He/they are a fictional construct used to represent his moral philosophy.
The fact of the matter is, Christianity is monotheistic, meaning that we believe that our God is the only God, and all other gods and goddesses are false (either they are fictional or they are something else rather than god(esse)s). Therefore, we believe that not following our God is in and of itself wrong.
(This is a separate issue from the legal issue of whether or not to recognize same-sex marriage - I am against it, but not based on a simplistic "the state should ban everything that God says is morally wrong" ideology).
]]>
Not moral, but rather practical: if practiced on a wide scale both polygamy and incest destabilize society. Polygamy (even voluntary) degrades women's status and creates a frustrated horde of low status, unamrried men. Incest ciorrodes exogamy (marrying outside one's family lineage) which is one of the key building blocks of a strong, coherent society. The Middle East has both (cousin marriages in the case of incest) and I would not see those societies as something we should hope to copy.
Re: Marrying off girls while still children? Hell, they were doing that among European nobility during the Middle Ages.
Pre-purberty children could be betrothed but marriage (and its consummation) had to wait until they were, biologically, adult. In India marriages are still arranged for children, but they don't happen until the couple is grown up.
]]>TR: Although accurate this sounds judgmental in a way I don't feel for myself.
Other gods are either unreal or are some kind of guardian angel, but I tend to feel a bit nervous boldly phrasing it as "they're false." To me most other gods are sincere efforts to understand something transcendent or to understand human nature or to understand nature in general. (I'm excluding gods that are intentionally fictional or ironic like the Spaghetti Monster or something.) They are false more in the way phlogiston or phrenology is false.
Granted they are morally false too in a way, but this is not equally true in all cases. It gets more true the further they get from the true God and the love of others. Gods based on nature are at least based in things created by God and are therefore, by analogy, connected. Therefore they are less immoral. (Granted I'm getting this from the deuterocanonical books) The worship of things created by people, like cars or money, is about as false a God as you can get. When "gods" demand things that go against the love of neighbor, like child sacrifice or rape, they also become false in the judgmental way as well.
BTW: Yes I know this is heavily and specifically Catholic, but I think there is a logic to it. A person who's Sun-God inspires them to be good to others is clearly in something better than a person who worships a skyscraper that orders him to kill innocent people.
]]>It is interesting that Warren says he is for equal rights for everyone. Ok Rick Warren, I'm calling your bluff. Can YOU come up with a vision of equal rights that protects GLBT families? Can YOU join the fight for civil unions?
]]>