Letters to the Editor
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connecting the final dot
possibly someone has already mentioned this; as I haven't read all (270 plus) letters at this point, naturally I don't know.
you (seem to)come achingly close to saying it mr greenwald, and to be fair, I can't blame you for your reluctance-- as I am also clearly reluctant, and won't say it with my own name.
But who controls the mass media in the US? It sure ain't the Episcopalians!
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Jimmy Taliban
there is no significant difference between you and the Taliban. You are so certain of your myopic belief system, which reduces God to the pages of a book, that you are utterly incapable of thought. The bible is not God; it is a window through which we might see God, if we come to it clear-eyed and free of self-interest. Your agenda is the same tired xenophobic, homophobic, mysogynistic, nationalistic reich wing blather that we've heard for decades. The true gospel is simple and loving and selfless. the republikan agenda is diametrically opposed to all of those things. The test of any poliy is this: does it make people more free or less free. You are so certain of your fundy froth that any question makes you cringe. Love is fearless, and does not ask for anything in return. You and the goosesteppers you associate yourself with deny free will by making moral judgements for the rest of us. You have no such right. the bible is true, and you're in it unde Pharisee. Sad.
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JimC's proclivities
The point was that if you think it's a choice whether you have sex with men or women, then it seems you must think we all feel an equal attraction for both and we all simply choose which we'll have sex with. Those who choose the opposite sex are good, those that don't are bad.
Maybe that's how it is for you, but I doubt it. People feel an unconscious attraction for one or the other, which they have no choice in. If The Act is what matters, then those unlucky enough to be born with an attraction for the same sex are at a huge disadvantage morally. We tend to discount things from our moral agenda that people don't have control over. Unless it's something that causes actual harm to others, in which case we hold people to not act on their predilections, but sexuality just doesn't fall in such a category. It hurts nobody, as long as sex is consensual and between adults. It seems strange to have to explain this, but since i was the one who posted your quote i'll take the responsibility to explain what rational people think about sex.
You've decided to be hurt by other people's sexual practices that don't have anything to do with you. This makes you a weird kind of busybody, who stands outside someone else's bedroom anmd decides to be hurt by what's going on behind that door.
Assuming your actually heterosexual, what if god said you had to have sex exclusively with other men. You'd have to give up forever whatever enjoyment heterosexual sex brings you. You think God cares and you'd suffer your whole life to make him happy. I wouldn't ever let anyone force you to give up sex with your wife and force you to make love with a man. That's just the kinda guy I am. It's nobody's business. Not even God's, if he's going to be so arbitrarily cruel about it.
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tom payne
You're right. The Bible is kind of a Rorschach test for people. Whatever is inside them seems to come out when they tell you what they think the bible means. Interpretations crystallize what's inside a person. JimC is a fairly common frightened modern human wanting to be on the right side of Eternal Judgment. What we see in his take on things is what the world would be like if JimC ran the universe.
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Jim C
Yeah, yeah, you got me....but you are correct, the sin is the act, the act is a choice, we can chose to act or not, sin or not....it's your choice....
"I have sinned in my heart" -Jimmy Carter
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Armagednoutahere
I took a class a few years back from a guy named Marcus Borg on the Historical Jesus. Man that guy knows the bible--every single verse--and the meanings of important words in all pertinent languages. I always wish I could have him there when these people start quoting. Like the Woody Allen movie where they're arguing in a waiting line about what Buckminster Fuller (I think) meant when he said something or other, and Bucky magically appears and tells the other guy he's full of shit and Woody's right. Wouldn't it be great if that could happen in real life is the point as I recall. Anyhoo, I always think of Borg when they get out the scriptures.
It was Marshall McLuhan. And why stop with Borg? Why Jesus himself?
Oh yeah. We already know what would happen. It's in the Bible: Jesus wept.
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Tom Payne
Are you Christian? "The bible is not God" I refer you the the book of John.
John 1:1
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:14 And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.
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God is God
Judging again, Jimmy Boy. Shame. You lockstep literalists miss the forest for the trees. If the word is God, why so many conflicting translations? Churchs doen't even agee on which Books should be included. Lame. The bible is divinely inspired, but it ain't God. That's like saying a map is the earth. Foolish on its face, you retreat into your little trailer park theology, which is a mile wide and an inch deep. If you read St. John of the Cross or Summa Theologica, your tiny head would explode. Scant loss.
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Tommy
Judging, no, just asking since it appears Jonathan came out as a "weak" atheist agnostic, I want to make sure who I'm talking to is a believer.