[B-Chan]

Don't tell me, let me guess -- you're one of those "once saved, always saved" heretics?

It is no sin to have a homosexual orientation. Sin requires an act of deliberate will. Homosexual acts are objectively sinful -- just like being a hypocrite is -- but no worse than other sinful acts that people (even you) commit on a daily basis. We are all "children of the devil" by that standard. Unless you live in a constant state of perfection you, too, are one of the "walking dead".

You whitewashed tomb. Spend more time comtemplating the sins that you commit -- and the mercy shown to you by God and your fellow believers -- before you go condemning other people as "children of the devil".

[Antoninus]

We are all "children of the devil" by that standard. Unless you live in a constant state of perfection you, too, are one of the "walking dead".

If I remember correctly, when the unrepentant public heretic Marcion met St. Polycarp, he called out to him, "Polycarp, do you not know me?"

In response, St. Polycarp called out, "I know you to be the first-born of Satan."

So it's not like such pronouncements are without precedent. And yes, unrepentant sinners of all varieties are by definition 'children of the devil' as by their willful sinning, they reject God. Praise be to Jesus that he has given us the sacrament of Confession--without which, many of us would be quite doomed.

[Mad Dawg]

You whitewashed tomb.

Oh. Well. Thank goodness we're not being judgemental!

"Children of the Devil" isn't a condemnation or an abuse. It's more like a diagnosis, or maybe a "term of art". It means something like: they are in a state of mortal sin and are currently rejecting God's offer of grace, and distancing themselves further and further from grace (whether they mean to or not) by their behavior.

Just as Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress suggests there is a way to Hell even at the gates of Heaven, I think there is a way to Heaven even at the gates of Hell. So, for me, saying someone is a child of the devil (not language I use much, but it doesn't make me get all jittery to hear it either) isn't as much about their ultimate destination as it is about their current heading and situation.

[farmer18th]

Sin requires an act of deliberate will.

Would that include forming a "gay straight" alliance, demanding that traditionally heterosexual cultural traditions include sodomites? Hmmm?

You are the viper, the white-washed tomb. The blood of this generation will be on your head for refusing to call sin what it is. Paul and Jesus and Peter never showed the sort of self-serving, hypocritical "mercy" that you show, because they were not cowards. Remember when the disciples were wringing their hands over perceived slights the Lord showed the Pharisees? That is your present state. Consider it.