More than Sodomy?

Salon Magazine ^ | Dana Berliner and Steve Simpson

[Dimensio]

For some reason I don't believe that an old Hebrew myth alone is a good justification for any law.

[Dimensio]

The notion that you can't outlaw something if Christianity says its wrong

This is an inaccurate representation. The argument with respect to Christianity is that it is not right to outlaw something only because Christianity says that it is wrong. Otherwise you're creating a strawman to which you could use murder -- which Christianity opposes, but then so do many other religions -- as a counter.

[Michael.SF.]

Michael, I guess we are at the opposite poles on this and perhaps other issues.

I'm not so sure we are that far apart. I am not defending the actions of the homosexual community. I am only oppossed to the governments role in defining what behavior is or is not acceptable.

The battle begins at home, and it is up to parents to define morality for their children. It is not the governments role to do so.

[Iconoclast2]

I don't mean to be dense, but I don't see what the Fourteenth Amendment has to do with state laws concerning sodomy.

[carlo3b]

The battle begins at home, and it is up to parents to define morality for their children. It is not the governments role to do so.

In a perfect world that would be so, however, in our corrupted school system, pop culture, and filtered News sources, our enlightened society is emboldened by the lack of an organized resistance.. History is an early warning system, we never thought AIDS and Gay Scouts Leaders would ever happen in my lifetime.. but.. you get my point, I'm sure.

[KDD]

http://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft9611/opinion/walsh.html

[Hermann the Cherusker]

I'm sorry that you can't see the difference between the rape of a child and an expression of love between two people of the same sex.

You have a twisted notion of "love" to include homosexuality within it. Homosexuality is an expression of hate against God, Man, and Family.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

I'm against stores opening on Sunday.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

The outlawing of meatloaf is a matter of indifference since it is not a question of right and wrong. If a majority of people voted to outlawed it, you should abide by the law.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

You are confusing "legal" with "right". "Right" refers to chosing the good between two alternatives in a matter of morals and conscience. "Legal" refers to what human acts the state has chosen to append penal sanctions to. Just because it is presently "legal" to kill unborn children does not make it "right", or confer a moral right on anyone to do so. Ditto for any state not outlawing sodomy.

In a good society, laws most closely conform to the right in order to encourage the populace to upright behavior. The more that they do not, the worse the society becomes and the more vicious the people become.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

Here's an example of what we can now term "meatloaf laws": Georgia to require sweet tea in restaurants

[Robert Drobot]

"Homosexuality is an expression of hate against God, Man, and Family."

A Biblical direction blaspheming anointed actors and pretenders have been attempting to tear away.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

The world would be a better place if we did it.

[tahiti]

Amendment XIV granted the U.S. Constitution uncontested jurisdiction within sovereign state borders.

Subsequently, Amendment IX now has jurisdiction within state boundaries.

[GraniteStateConservative]

I like Scalia, but this comment from the arguments on this case is sort of disturbing.

"It's conceded by the state of Texas that married couples can't be regulated in their private sexual decisions," says [attorney] Smith. To which Scalia rejoins, "They may have conceded it, but I haven't."

Scalia for Mullah?

[Iconoclast2]

I still don't get it. Even though the Constitution applies to limit State powers, how does Amendment 14 or any other part of the Constitution prohibit a state from enacting sodomy laws?

[Hermann the Cherusker]

Any sinner is vicious. The worse the sin, the more vicious the person. Homosexual sodomy is one of the four sins that cries to heaven for vengance (murder, opressing the poor, and defrauding workers of their wages are the others). The sin tends to completely darken the mind of those engaged in it because it is so unnatural and perverse. The practices, life expectancy, diseases, and tendencies of this section of the population are natural confirmations of this truth.

[Stone Mountain]

Homosexual sodomy is one of the four sins that cries to heaven for vengance (murder, opressing the poor, and defrauding workers of their wages are the others).

Where did this list originate? Is it comprehensive?

[Hermann the Cherusker]

Where did this list originate?

The Bible.

Is it comprehensive?

Yes, according to the Catholic Church. I'm not aware of a diligent search of verses ever turning up other sins that "cry to heaven for vengence."

From the Diocese of LaCrosse website:

The Catholic tradition recognizes four sins that especially arouse God's justice, four sins "that cry to heaven for vengeance." The first sin is the murder of the innocent. After Cain murders Abel, the Lord addresses him saying, "What have you done? The voice of your brother's blood cries to me from the earth" (Gen, 4:10). The second is sodomy: "The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied, and their sin is become exceedingly grievous" (Gen, 18:20). The third is oppression of the poor, as we see in the oppression of the Jewish people in Egypt: "Now after a long time the king of Egypt died, and the children of Israel groaning, cried out because of their work, and their cry went up to God from their work" (Exod, 2:23). The fourth is the defrauding of the laborer his wages: "Behold the hire of the laborers, who have reaped down your fields, which by fraud has been kept back by you, cries; and their cry has entered the ears of the Lord of sabaoth" (Jam, 5:4).

Why do these four sins in particular "cry out to God"? These sins strike at the most basic commands of the moral law founded on our human nature. As a living thing, we act to perserve our own life. Hence, the murder of the innocent undermines the duty that we have to protect human life. Next, as animals, we are meant not only to preserve ourselves, but also to perpetuate the species. Hence, sodomy denies the fruitfulness of conjugal love and the intrinsic order of men to women. Finally, because of our rational nature, we are meant to live together in society. The bonds of society are the virtues of justice and mercy. Hence, defrauding the laborer of his wage goes against the virtue of justice, while oppressing the poor violates the works of mercy. All four sins implies a basic rejection of the moral law. ... our rejection of the most basic expression of the moral law invites chastisement in accord with divine justice.

"Vices against nature are also against God, as stated above (ad 1), and are so much more grievous than the depravity of sacrilege, as the order impressed on human nature is prior to and more firm than any subsequently established order." (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Pt. II-II, Q. 154, Art. 12, Reply 2)