continue...
, how can you really tell ps Matt Prater is only care about the same sex marriage matter, or he just use his community to play this voting game,

We need to know what is his really purpose and intention behind it, I'm also a Christian but I'm not a fool, we need to discern and understand his true purpose behind and there are people using the leadership role to misuse his power. that just a shock to me unbelievable!. Thank you for watching

longweekend58 wrote on Sep 5^th, 2013 at 3:19pm:


So you are consistent then? Since its leviticus that says the stuff about gays you follow all the laws in leviticus?

SOB

Sprintcyclist wrote on Sep 5^th, 2013 at 10:43pm:


And rudd answered it

SOB

longweekend58 wrote on Sep 5^th, 2013 at 3:19pm:


Maybe my views just seem "wishy-washy" to you. If Quantum has a dispute with me, you should let him speak for himself. You are obviously a believer in sola scriptura. I reject sola scriptura because it has many problems. It's not just because it leads to an inaccurate interpretation, but because it's just impossible to not allow external information to influence interpretation. This leads to many different opinions and is why Protestant Christianity has so many denominations. It's inevitable that people will make assumptions and possess biases when reading the Bible. That's why I say if you want to get the most accurate interpretation, you must know the historical context. It's one of the best ways to narrow down the number of opinions.

Sola scriptura (your view) is a more wishy-washy approach to the Bible than what I am proposing here.

longweekend58 wrote on Sep 5^th, 2013 at 3:19pm:


I find it weird that you would talk about "inerrancy" when I don't recall even talking about the Bible's credibility. You sound like one of those American Bible Belt Christians who has a knee-jerk reaction whenever someone expresses beliefs different to his own, regurgitating the same ingrained slogans you learnt from others who attend the same church. I wonder if there was any thought process at all about what I actually said. This is weird coming from a "biblical scholar," someone who is supposed to have thoughtful views on the Bible. Unlike Quantum, you sound like a layperson, not a biblical scholar.

What I was actually talking about was the inadequacy of the Bible. This is not the same thing as discrediting the Bible. Jews and Catholics would be familiar with this view because it is part of their respective traditions. Jews have an "oral tradition." Catholics have a "holy tradition." The written tradition isn't considered to be a stand-alone collection, but must be supplemented by something else. Of course, a Protestant bible scholar like yourself wouldn't understand this.

longweekend58 wrote on Sep 5^th, 2013 at 3:19pm:


Speaking of "alternatives" to your "sola scriptura" viewpoint, Christians haven't succeeded in converting all of the world's Jews even after 1,900 years. You also have Catholics being the largest group of Christians in the world. There are plenty of people who believe in an alternative to your "sola scriptura" beliefs and your group is outnumbered by them.

longweekend58 wrote on Sep 5^th, 2013 at 3:19pm:


I don't think Kevin was attacking the Bible. I think he was just being realistic. Like I said, Jews and Catholics don't follow the Bible directly. They have an oral/holy tradition. A lot of the laws that used to apply to Jews in the OT don't apply to them today.

longweekend58 wrote on Sep 4^th, 2013 at 11:19pm:


Longweekend, I am glad you care about the homeless and mentally ill. I am glad that in this instance, you are not behaving like one of those American Bible Belt Christians who respond with knee-jerk reactions and try to impose their religion on others, but this isn't about who's the most disadvantaged here. If we took your argument to its logical conclusion, women would never have equal rights and we would never have abolished the White Australia Policy. This is about a group of people who want their relationship to be treated the same as for straight couples. They want the same government benefits as straight couples.

If you were gay and you were in a relationship and you saw a straight couple receiving government benefits, wouldn't you be thinking, why can't I get the same thing? People can receive government benefits without involving religion or churches, which is why I consider it silly that so many people include the Bible in the dispute.

It is not my business to decide whether a relationship is worthy of being called a "marriage." That is up to the people in question to decide. If I want to have a say in that, I am infringing on someone's "private rights," just like forcing churches to accept gay marriages would be an infringement of a religious organisation's "private rights."

I think both the pro-gay and anti-gay marriage camps are locked in a battle over a pointless technicality. To me, it's just a name and the concept of "marriage" in our secular society is only useful for the purposes of taxation and economic management. It is possible for gay couples to receive the same government benefits as straight couples without it being called "gay marriage." It is also possible for "gay marriage" to be recognised by secular society and for churches to not be forced to recognise them.

If Christians are just worried about churches losing their "private rights" over the issue, then they are making a fuss over nothing.