Posted on 12/04/2004 5:17:59 PM PST by Mr. Silverback
Note: The following commentary includes graphic descriptions. This is not suitable for children.
“I’m at my wits’ end,” the young woman wrote. “I’ve asked pastors, friends, parents, God, and message boards this question and still haven’t received an intelligent answer that I can live with. Why are homosexual acts wrong? I’m a Christian and believe in the Bible, but this part always stumps me.”
According to my friend, Dr. J. Budziszewski, author of the excellent new book, Ask Me Anything: Provocative Answers for College Students, disturbing questions like this show that church leaders aren’t providing young people with the whole picture about sexuality. They may be faithfully teaching God’s rules, but when asked why God made these rules, too often they say, “Take two aspirin, and wait for the questions to go away.”
The good news, says Budziszewski, is that we can answer disturbing questions. Where are the answers found? In our creational design.
“People say homosexuality isn’t natural,” the young woman complained in her letter, “but that can’t be true because it’s found among animals.” Budziszewski answers, “But our nature is how God designed us. What’s natural for human beings isn’t whatever you can find some animal doing; it’s whatever fulfills our design. Men and women were plainly designed for each other—not men for men, nor women for women.” Children can be born in no other way.
“But homosexual acts don’t harm anyone,” said the young woman. Budziszewski answers, “The idea that homosexual acts don’t harm anyone isn’t even close to being true; they harm those who perform them at every level. To begin with the most obvious level—the physical—how could it not harm a man to suffer physical trauma because body parts are repeatedly forced into bodily openings that were designed for a radically different function?” And the rates of a long, long list of diseases are also much higher among practicing homosexuals, and contrary to popular belief, this is true for lesbians as well as for “gay” men.
At the emotional level, Budziszewski explains, the damage of homosexual acts is just as grave. God designed the male-female pair to balance each other; by contrast, same-sex mating drives them out of balance. If you want an example, think of the anonymous, no-brakes promiscuity of men who have sex with hundreds, even thousands, of other men.
“And what about spiritual harm?” asks Budziszewski. “In homosexual acts, you’re seeking union with someone who is only your own mirror image, so in a way, you’re still trapped inside yourself. You haven’t experienced the power of marital sexuality to take you beyond the Self; you’re rejecting the challenge of union with someone who is really other. In that way, homosexual acts are less like marital intercourse than like masturbation with another body.”
That’s frank, even startling language, but what’s happened to our culture is startling too. When young people confused by the culture ask questions, they need clear, unvarnished answers to set their thinking straight. That’s why I recommend this great new book Ask Me Anything: Provocative Answers for College Students.
God’s rules for sex are never arbitrary; they are based on how He made us. As Budziszewski rightly says, it’s all in the design.
Not only have you made understanding dawn, but I now wonder how I missed your point the first time through. Thanks!
Budziszewski bump!
Read his other stuff, too, esp. "What We Can't Not Know: A Guide", and his web site, http://www.boundless.org
-- Joe
Here is the text to which I referred:
John 8
1But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. 2At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. 3The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group 4and said to Jesus, "Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. 5In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?" 6They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.
7But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her." 8Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.
9At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. 10Jesus straightened up and asked her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?"
11"No one, sir," she said.
"Then neither do I condemn you," Jesus declared. "Go now and leave your life of sin."
I don't see anything in there that conflicts with what I wrote.
Also, you might want to see post 117.
Agreed. I forgot to include that the spiritual and reward/punishment consequences of some sins are greater than others, and you stated it eloquently.
Well, the average gay person is not "dangerous," nor do they have any agenda other than wanting to live their lives as they choose. But the ones who are trying to reform our society to their tastes do have an agenda and are dangerous.
It's sort of like the difference between your average Vietnam draft dodger and Bill Clinton...
Good idea. People often forget that this technique was used by Paul with the Athenians, when he reasoned with them on their level and convinced them that the "Unknown God" they'd been honoring was really Yahweh.
Add in to the mix eating their own feces, cannibalism and incest...
Oh, I wouldn't say that. Reproduction is more of a surface drive with them than with us. They may not do it for pure pleasure, but when some female dog is in heat, they male dogs sniffing around her house aren't thinking, "I can't wait to show my dominance!"
Not by this boy. I know the Bible is true because of many proofs, the Resurrection being the most important. The Resurrection is a real historical event, and the rest of the Bible hangs on it.
Back during that wave of gay marriages in San fran and other locations...did you notice how there were a bunch of senior citizen lesbian couples and no senior citizen male couples?
Here's another todbit for you:
AIDS rate for homosexuals climbs; data called 'astonishing'
Baptist Press ^ | Dec 2, 2004 | Michael Foust
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1295013/posts
AIDS rate for homosexuals climbs; data called 'astonishing'
Dec 2, 2004
By Michael Foust
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP)--New statistics showing that homosexual men make up 44 percent of all new HIV and AIDS cases underscore the fact that homosexuality itself is unnatural, a prominent leader in the ex-homosexual community says.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released data Dec. 2 showing that the number of newly diagnosed HIV and AIDS cases has increased 11 percent among homosexual men. The data spanned a four-year period ending in 2003.
Despite the fact that homosexual men make up only 1 to 2 percent of the population, they nonetheless made up more than 40 percent of the new cases, the data showed.
Tim Wilkins, head of Cross Ministry, Inc. -- a Christian outreach to homosexuals -- called the data "astonishing."
"If homosexuality was normal and natural, you would not have a disease that spreads as ravenously as this does," said Wilkins, who is married now but once was involved in homosexuality.
Homosexual activists responded to the news by calling for better education and prevention -- for instance, the promotion of condom usage. But Wilkins said the problem can be found in homosexual sex itself. Men were not made to have sex with men, he said.
"All of mankind is physiologically heterosexual -- that's just a fact," Wilkins said. "One hundred percent of the homosexual community is physiologically heterosexual.
"We can throw more and more money, bigger budgets, bigger programs, more education [at the problem]. And we see that education is not correcting the problem at all."
For years, studies have shown that homosexual men are prone to promiscuity. A University of Chicago study released in 2003 found that 61 percent of homosexuals in Chicago’s Shoreland area had more than 30 sexual partners. Perhaps just as telling, some two-thirds of same-sex "marriages" in Massachusetts have involved lesbians -- underscoring, pro-family leaders say, the notion that homosexual men are less prone to commitment.
"[The CDC] statistic obviously shows a pathology that indicates an abnormality," Wilkins said. "From a Christian perspective we would call it sin."
Such statistics should result in the scientific community re-evaluating its position on homosexuality, Wilkins said.
The Christian church, though, should not respond by saying, "I told you so," Wilkins said. Instead, the church should respond with compassion.
"We can't allow sin in any form to repulse us from reaching out to people who are hurting," he said. "As horrible as AIDS is, it can be -- and I believe it is -- an opportunity for the church to reach people who are broken."
--30--
For information about the national debate over same-sex "marriage," visit http://www.bpnews.net/samesexmarriage
====
It's not as though THIS is a mystery. The fact is there is tons and tons of information that even from a secular view tell a person with a brain who is willing to use it that homsexuality is ABNORMAL. You don't even have to rely on the Bible for that OBVIOUS FACT.
He's not wrong at all. Neither God, nor the Faith, nor our relationship with God are too fragile to stand up to some curiousity. There is a very large gap between Questioning God and asking questions about God. You are confusing one with the other.
Jeez-o-bleedin'-pete. Some people's kids.
"Don't need no stinkin collage book.... just explain to the kids that homo's are like two headed toads and something went wrong with them. Just leave them alone and don't torment them."
If you want to bury your head in the sand and pretend that those kinds of answers will be enough, that's fine for your own kids. But if we're confident in our own opinions, we should respect our kids enough to tell them the full, complicated truth.
"Any moral reasoning must be anchored in the Bible first...then possible reasons can be reasonably figured"
That's precisely what Budziszewski did. He came to the conclusion first -- not second -- then used moral reasoning to determine why that conclusion must be true. I'm not sure what this guy has done wrong.
Me?
The author of the weekly Useful Idiot Caption-A-Rama?
The coordinator of the KerryTrack protest ping lists?
The daily attendee at the DUmmie FUnnies?
An apologist for the Left?
Sure, and the Pope's Japanese. Is it a mark of christianity in your view to accuse people without evidence?
Understanding WHY homosexuality is wrong isn't hard to do in secular terms let alone in Biblical terms.
So the Bud-man explained it to her. What's the big deal, especially when what she wrote in the article makes it clear she was halfway there already and just needed a little course correction? You act as if it's a major crisis of the Faith that somebody asked these questions.
You don't know if this is a "young Christian" or not.
Ahem. It's in the first line of the article: "I’m at my wits’ end,” the young woman wrote. Note that the author of the book being discussed works with college students. Even if she was saved at a very young age, she was probably wrestling with these issues for the first time; a kid saved at 3 doesn't run into sexual issues any earlier than a kid saved at 8.
Regardless either common sense should kick in or you simply have faith that what is written is true.
Do you know of any credible philosophy that looks poorly on questions about it's tenets? Christianity isn't one, no matter how much you believe it is. What you're advocating reminds me more of the Jehovah's Witnesses than anyone like Aquinas, Augustine or Paul.
You don't have to read the entire Bible to realize that stealing and lying and homosexuality are wrong. Your excuses aren't cutting it.
She didn't ask whether it was wrong, but why it was wrong. And "excuses"? Aren't you getting a little worked up here?
If I was approached by her, I'd show it to her in the Bible where it was denounced. If she chose to disbelieve that then yes, I would think to myself that her will over God's will and word is what prevails with her.
Showing her those passages would be a good idea, but the problem is that she wouldn't have been asking the questions she was asking if she were doubting that God's word is true. So you would show her stuff she already believes, not deal with her questions and pat yourself on the back like a good Jehovah's Witness overseer Christian who sees questions as a threat and sign of unbelief. When someone is the victim of secular propaganda as this young woman was, part of our duty is to counteract that propaganda, and you would leave that duty by the wayside in an effort to avoid compromising the Faith, even though the propaganda was attacking the Faith in the first place.
Part of "having an answer for the hope that we have" is accepting the question in the first place. Part of seasoning our conversation with salt so we know how to answer everyone is to accept the question.
I would add that I'm not aware of a single credible philosophy that says "Don't ask those questions!"
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