Pope speaking to nuns on gays
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A recent political cartoon in one of the Cities’ newspapers shows a severely-cartooned pope saying to favorably-cartooned “U.S. Nuns”: “I’m very upset with you for not speaking out against homosexuality!” The kicker is in the next frame, which pictures a cartooned Jesus and the pope adding, “Same goes for your friend.” The intended point — blatantly political and religiously irrelevant — is that Jesus never spoke out against homosexuality and, therefore, homosexuality is affirmed by God as a Christian virtue and part of God’s plan for marriage.
That it so happened Jesus himself never spoke out against homosexuality is irrelevant to the total biblical teaching on marriage and not an affirmation of homosexuality or same-sex “marriage.”
It is a fact there is no (recorded) statement attributed to Jesus as directly opposing homosexuality, and it is unlikely he ever mentioned it privately. But silence is no argument.
John, the disciple who listened most closely and understood Jesus best, closed his Gospel by insisting he did “many other things not recorded in this book.” Jesus understood his audiences and knew homosexuality was not an issue. He did, however, strongly affirm the Jewish standard of one-man, one-woman marriage as sacred.
(Even the polygamy of the pre-Jewish patriarchal era of the Hebrews that had been tentatively tolerated as primitive pending full understanding of the Mosaic Law was same-sex.)
We must read the whole Bible to see the whole picture. God’s Word is a good deal more than what he said through Jesus during the few years of his ministry. The Bible is not a book that is against homosexuality, and it certainly is not against homosexuals. It is for marriage as that which the Creator established for human relationships.
Yes, there are secondary direct sanctions against homosexuality, and they appear in many passages within the text. The tortuous attempts to explain them away succeed in nothing more than to be an acknowledgement of rejecting the Bible as the divinely inspired Word of God. If one feels self-identification as GLBTQ is a matter of honesty, one must be honest about this.
Neither Jesus nor any other voice in the Bible condemns either homosexuality or homosexuals. As so with all other human failings (and it is this), it seeks lovingly and graciously to redeem the latter persons from the former condition. The biblical writers and all who preach and teach it truly earnestly wish for human wholeness.
(Any who do otherwise — and some today do — also fall short of apprehending the scriptures of the faith. I have other words for them.) [More]
SOURCE
Wallace Alcorn/Austin Daily Herald
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7 Comments
Homophobia is just wrong
So much projection goes on in this argument. People who are very much afraid of sexual variation–in themselves, in society–look for some crystal clear statement, here by Jesus, to point the way. Jesus tells his disciples there is only one commandment: love. He doesn’t talk about homosexual or heterosexual love. He commands love. The word ‘homosexuality,’ of course, appears *nowhere* in the Scriptures because the perception was the everyone was created to be attracted to the opposite sex. We know that that doesn’t happen all the time; the Church accepts that homosexuality is not a choice. Why are we so frightened at the prospect of same-sex attracted people living a good, Catholic, ethical life? Who will show them the way?
I find it interesting that some Catholics would claim that because our Lord never made any reference to homosexuality, He therefore approved of it or was neutral! We seem to have forgotten that Christ is the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. This means that He is GOD the Son, co-equal and co-eternal with the Father. The Father made Himself perfectly clear in the Old Testament that He does not favor sodomy!! As God the Son, Christ would be of the same opinion as His Heavenly Father. Since sodomy was considered a sin by the Jews in Christ’s time, He did not make an issue of it. Why would He???
I believe that it is sinful to denigrate people because of their belief. Jesus really didn’t do that.
I don’t want to denigrate persons either, no matter how they believe. God is judge. Let’s let god do the judging job and love the persons themselvea.
William you said:
“He does not favor sodomy!!”
Where did you find this in the Bible?
How does God feel about oral sex?
The new testament in my opinion builds on the old testament. When Jesus was on earth I never saw him throw out bath water with the baby still splashing around. I support the teachings of the old testament and it is certainly written there that homosexuality is a sin. Jesus did not teach hate against others but his dislike of sin is in his every word.
There is no bullying here only the reaction of the vatican to heresey and a slandering of catholic values. If any nun doesn’t like the current state of affairs let her go her own way and see how her vast intellect stacks up against the real world economy.