Demonstrator calls for death of homosexuals
One sign says the penalty for homosexual acts is death (CLICK TO ENLARGE ALL PHOTOS)
(CNS): A very small and apparently peaceful demonstration against the ruling by Chief Justice Anthony Smellie legalising same-sex marriage took place outside the Legislative Assembly Wednesday, as politicians inside debated a motion calling for an appeal and voiced their grievances. Despite calls from the premier for the community to be respectful to each other, one demonstrator was proudly holding a sign calling for death to homosexuals. While last Friday’s ruling was welcomed by many people in Cayman, there are some who, largely based on religious beliefs, are vowing to continue the fight against it.
While most of the handful of demonstrators confined their billboards to moderate and much less offensive positions about marriage, one poster referred to Leviticus, calling for the “death of homosexuals” because “they have brought it on themselves”, and another demonstrator had a poster saying that “sexual perversions do not merit legal status”.
A protest sign denounces homosexuality
Around 40 people sat in the gallery of the Legislative Assembly Wednesday morning to support the debate on the appeal and the call for government to amend the Constitution to stop judges making laws in future. The government opted to hold this debate ahead of what would have been a packed list of business in the House on its opening day, including amendments to the Builders Bill and new legislation on healthcare decisions.
The premier confirmed ahead of the debate that government would be appealing the chief justice’s ruling, which was the essence of the motion. Several members pressed their support for the appeal on the basis that the chief justice, in amending the Marriage Law to make it comply with the Bill of Rights, had overridden their authority as legislators.
People protest the legalising of same-sex marriage
Many MLAs also admitted that their objection stemmed from their belief that same-sex couples should be discriminated against and openly expressed their homophobia. Some even suggested that the community should attend any gay wedding that took place in Cayman and object to the union.
The governor was criticised because of his enthusiastic welcome for the chief justice’s decision. Arden McLean (East End), who brought the motion that triggered the debate, had included those criticisms in the motion, accusing Martyn Roper of prejudicing the appeal.
While there is still a loud and politically powerful lobby against marriage equality, with the online petition against it having received more than 4,000 signatures, there is also much evidence of a more tolerant and welcoming section of Cayman society, especially among the younger generation, as the premier himself noted.
A small group of protestors gathers outside the Cayman Islands Legislative Assembly
Following the announcement by the premier, CNS was inundated with comments from many people calling on government not to appeal because they believe it will be a waste of public funds.
The chief justice has already ruled that Chantelle Day and Vickie Bodden should receive their costs. That means government, in addition to picking up the tab for Sir Jeffery Jowell’s time and efforts in his failed response to the petition, will be paying for the defence team of attorneys, led by the award-winning human rights advocate, Edward Fitzgerald QC.
Category: Local News
Hatred in the name of Christianity, and mostly aimed at “foreigners” for bringing their sinful ways to Cayman. Have the “real” Caymanians forgotten that Christianity was forced on your ancestors against their will? Try acting with love and tolerance instead, you’ll probably be happier and lower your blood pressure.
Go to jail, go directly to jail, do not pass Go, do not collect $200. You CALL yourselves Christians but there is nothing Christ-like about you.
Love begets love. Hate begets hate. See it? #turnedoffbychristianity
If you are going to argue with the bible to condemn homosexuality then please also bring back stoning for adulterers, human sacrifice, incest and all the other good stuff mentioned in the old and new testaments. No cherry-picking please…….
If it we’re Nazi’s out there protesting and quoting Hitler I bet freedom of speech wouldn’t matter. This is another example of the double standard of this society.
Everyone has rights. No doubt. But the law of God trumps any law of man.
Every Nation has their rules. Wonder what we think of Brunei’s decision to enact anti LGBT laws this week?3
Does the law of the Tooth Fairy trump the law of the dentist? Same principle I’m afraid..
Can’t wait for the international media to get a hold of this! The general public will be outraged at the hatred and medievil thinking in what noe looks like a backwards/3rd word country full of hate. Brunei will applaud. The rest will shun you Cayman. Sad to see my fellow Caymanians to ignorant. I would love to encourage them to write a 500 word essay to e plain their fear/ reasons for being to against this law. 500 words. I bet the pages would be blank, as would the expressions on their faces. Blank.
if you down voted this and claim to be Christ like you need to take a long look at yourself. Check that log in your eye.
All these divorces and men fathering countless children only to abandon them to be dragged up. But these gays who love each other and contribute to Caymanian society. Let’s give them sh*t. Pathetic Cayman
Where would these haters like to have a public stoning of gays? Camana Bay or downtown George Town on the docks.
BOYCOTT THE CAYMAN ISLANDS
Maybe as a church fund raiser during Pirates Week. May this type of Christian (CI-ISIS) burn in their own version of hell! Now wonder as your congregations decrease.
Men father countless children because the women encourage it. Many divorces because people marry for the wrong reasons in the first place i.e convenience
funny how that doesn’t demean the traditional values of marriage in Cayman though
why are we letting adulterous people marry, or allowing couples to divorce, marriage is for life.
Lets all protest every wedding in Cayman in response
boo hoo
how much these people are getting paid? must be warm out there
They need to be arrested for a hate crime. This is a british overseas territory and by rights they should follow the law. Hateful people who have nothing better to do than ignorant protests. They are certainly not christians, for sure.
09:02 not Christian? Have you heard of the crusades in the between the 11th and 15th Century? They were demanded/confined/encouraged by the Papacy as a way to secure the holy land, I.e. Jerusalem.
The current Pope is trying to allow Homosexual unions.
Christianity changes with the ebb and flow of society.
A democratic society allows protest and even encourages it (within reason, i. e no slander), just look at the french, they are always protesting and demonstrating!
At least 20 people in Cayman think it’s ok to arrest a person for voicing their opinion. Talk about sad.
Take it easy, guys. I support gay marriage, but I also support the rights of those protesting against it to say what they like as long as no crime is committed.
None is here: there is no actual incitement to death or injury. Freedom of speech and all that.
Get use to it, its from your hate mongering crew against family and the Most High!
she should be arrested for making threats.
Calling for, or supporting, the killing of humans on the basis of religion is akin to terrorism is it not?
How are these people different from Bin Laden or other terrorists?
RCIPS what are you going to do about these threats to human lives? Not just from the demonstrators calling for the deaths, but also the people who support these severe kinds of demonstrators.
As Australia faces a postal survey on same-sex marriage, we are seeing a steady stream of articles arguing the Yes or No case.
Many on the No side are prone to citing the Bible or appealing to “biblical values”. But what does the Bible actually say about human sexuality and homosexuality in particular?
What follows represents a summary of critical biblical scholarship on the issue.
Critical biblical scholarship draws on a range academic disciplines including literary criticism, archaeology, history, philology, and social science to offer the most plausible, historically grounded interpretation of the Bible. It is not simply a matter of personal belief or citing official church doctrine.
Australian scholars are among leaders in the field when it comes to sexuality and the Bible. William Loader has written several books on the matter and this Anglican collection of essays is also excellent.
When it comes to homosexuality there are, at most, six passages of the Bible that are relevant. So what do these passages say?
Genesis 19 and Leviticus
The story of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 19 is well known. This is where the terms “sodomite” and “sodomy” originate, and it has long been associated with biblical condemnation of male homosexual sex. It is, however, actually about gang-rape.
In this story, the men of Sodom seek to rape two visitors (who are actually angels). Their host, Lot, defends them and offers them protection in his house, but offers his virgin daughters to be raped in their place.
Note to Margaret Court
Margaret Court is wrong to claim marriage is “a union between a man and a woman as stated in the Bible,” writes Robyn Whitaker.
It is a deeply problematic and complex story that warrants an article of its own, but what is clear is that sexual violence and rape is harshly condemned, and so God destroys the town with sulphur and fire.
Despite the linguistic history of the word “sodomite”, Genesis 19 has nothing to say about homosexuality or mutually consenting adults of the same gender expressing their desire and love.
Two of the laws of Leviticus (18:22 and 20:13) seem more pertinent. They call a man lying with another man instead of his wife an “abomination”.
We should note first that the imagined scenario is a married man committing adultery with another male. It is not describing what we would understand to be a sexual orientation.
We might also note the inherent sexism here: women apparently don’t have the same desire or their sexuality is deemed too insignificant to be worthy of comment.
Again, we need some context. Yes, this verse clearly condemns adulterous homosexual sex in calling it an “abomination” (to’ebah), but here are all the other things also called an “abomination” in the Bible:
Egyptians eating with Hebrews;having an image of another god in your house;sacrificing your child to the god Molech;having sex with your wife when she is menstruating;taking your wife’s sister as a second wife; andeating pork.
Banned likewise is wearing mixed-fabric clothing, interbreeding animals of different species, tattoos, mocking the blind by putting obstacles in their way, and trimming your beard.
As you can see, there is quite an assortment of ancient laws, some of which seem to make good sense (such as no child sacrifice) and others of which the majority of Christians no longer keep (such as eating pork and wearing a wool-silk blend).
To claim one set as timeless truths while ignoring the others is patently hypocritical and goes against the grain of the text itself.
These two verses in Leviticus are the sum total of what the Old Testament (Hebrew Bible) says about same-sex activities.
The New Testament
The remainder of the biblical references occur in the New Testament, written between approximately 50 and 110 CE in the context of the Roman Empire. The attitudes and norms of Graeco-Roman culture are critical in understanding these texts.
In Graeco-Roman society, there was an acceptance that men might be attracted to other men. Even if married (to a woman) and often prior to marriage, a wealthy man might have a young male lover or male partner.
In educational settings, several ancient authors comment on the male-male mentoring that often included pederasty (sex with boys).
The main ancient objection to male-male sexual activity was that one partner had to take the “woman’s role” of being penetrated. In a patriarchal society, to be masculine was to be the active partner, whereas to be passive was deemed feminine and shameful.
These attitudes find their way into the New Testament in various forms. 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, and 1 Timothy 1:10 list a wide group of people who will not “inherit the Kingdom” without changing.
Why some are boycotting the postal vote
While many same-sex marriage campaigners are calling for young people in particular to get their names on the electoral rolls, others are boycotting the vote altogether.
Paul is using a standard list of vices here to make a wider rhetorical point.
Where some English translations might include “homosexuality” on this list, the translation is not that simple, which is why various English words are used (adulterer, immoral persons, prostitutes).
The Greek word malakoi in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 means “soft” or “effeminate” and captures the Graeco-Roman distaste at a man taking a “female” role. In the Bible it is commonly used to describe fancy clothing, and outside the Bible was a term for cult prostitutes.
The word arsenokoites is rarer. Scholars have debated whether it refers to male prostitution or pederasty or something else. To translate it as “homosexual” is problematic for two reasons: it is unlikely Paul had any concept of sexual orientation and he was certainly not describing a committed adult relationship.
In Romans 1:26-27, Paul condemns people swapping out their usual partner for one of the same gender. He claims this is a result of idolatry and uses it as part of his argument for why one should only follow (his) God.
It is typical of the strong “them and us” rhetoric of the ancient world, serving a larger argument and is not a statement on sexuality per se.
As New Testament scholar Sean Winter summarises:
“Paul shares a stereotypical Jewish distrust of Graeco-Roman same sex activity, but is simply not talking about loving partnerships between people with same sex orientation.”
Considering the context
We need to put all this in perspective. These are six verses out of more than 31,000 verses or roughly 0.016 per cent of the text.
In contrast, the Bible contains more than 2,000 verses about money (and related issues of greed, wealth, loans, and property), and more than 100 specifically on one’s obligation to care for widows.
In other words, monitoring and proscribing human (homo)sexual activity is not a particular concern of the Bible when compared to the overarching demand for justice, economic equality, and the fair treatment of foreigners and strangers.
For certain Christian groups to make this the decisive Christian issue is simply a misreading of biblical values.
Lest readers think the Bible is against sexuality generally, there is an entire biblical book devoted to celebrating human sexual desire. Written in the style of a Mesopotamian love poem, the Song of Songs(sometimes called Song of Solomon), speaks positively of both female and male sexual yearning.
Serious Christians cannot ignore the Bible. They can, however, make sure that they interpret it with all the tools available to them, that they examine their own biases, and stop over-simplifying the issues.
The Bible offers a wide variety of marriage arrangements, many of which we no longer condone. It never condemns same-sex marriage, partly because it simply does not address the issue directly.
It does, however, give us an ethic to guide how we treat one another: an ethic based upon God’s generous love and a profound concern for justice.
Robyn J Whitaker is Bromby Lecturer in Biblical Studies at Trinity College and a lecturer at the University of Divinity.
Originally published in The Conversation
While your analysis is impressive, I have to humbly remind you that the Word of God is divine and if you are not enlightened by the Holy Spirit when reading it, you are just NOT going to get the message, understand the Truth, or be set free. You will regretfully miss it. Those of us who have experienced a divine and celestial intervention in our personal lives can speak to this truth. The message is received based on your predisposed views and beliefs. The Bible is not like any other book or to even be compared. The Bible is God’s Word. The Bible condemns sexually immorality, fornication, homosexuality, and all sins of a sexual nature. Sexual immorality, from the Greek por·neiʹa, a general term for all unlawful sexual intercourse. It includes adultery, prostitution, sexual relations between unmarried individuals, homosexuality, and bestiality.
Not written till 400 years AFTER his death so there could be some misunderstandings you must agree about what he did actually say?
Awesome and Amazing read. Thank you very much for sharing.
Stay Blessed Chet.
An interesting read, and I agree with the author, who is a Pastor.
homosexuality?
By Sam Allberry
It is a surprise to many people to discover that there are only a handful of passages in the Bible that directly mention homosexuality. Yet despite its infrequent mention, where the subject does come up, the Bible has some very important things to say about it. We need to understand them if we’re to avoid the twin mistakes of homophobia and thinking God is indifferent about how we use our sexuality.
The first two passages that directly mention homosexuality come from the Old Testament, the other three are from the New Testament.
1. Genesis 19
Sodom has become so associated with homosexual conduct that its name was for many ears a byword for it. But is ‘sodomy’ really what Sodom is about?
The account describes the men of the city attempting to forcibly have sex with two angelic visitors to the city, who have appeared in the form of men. Later parts of the Old Testament accuse Sodom of a range of sins: oppression, adultery, lying, abetting criminals, arrogance, complacency and indifference to the poor. None of these even mentions homosexual conduct. This has led some people to wonder if we have read homosexuality into the Genesis narrative, when in fact the real issue was social oppression and injustice. But a close look at the text makes it clear that homosexuality was in fact involved.
Although the Hebrew word for “know” (yada) can just mean to “get to know” someone (rather than to “know” them sexually), it is clear from the crowd’s aggression (and Lot’s dreadful attempt at offering them his daughters as an alternative) that they are looking for much more than social acquaintance. Hence what happens next: the angels warn Lot that judgment is imminent (v.13).
In the New Testament, Jude adds an important insight:
…just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire. (Jude 7)
What happened at Sodom is clearly meant to be something of a cautionary tale. Jude makes it clear that their ungodliness involved sexual immorality. They were punished for sexual sin along with the other sins of which they were guilty.
Jude also highlights the nature of their sexual desires: they pursued “unnatural desire” (literally, unnatural “flesh”). Some have suggested that this relates to the fact that the visitors to the city were angelic; Jude references angelic sin earlier in his letter. But these angels appeared as men, and the baying crowd outside Lot’s house showed no evidence of knowing they were angelic. Their desire was to have sex with the men staying with Lot. In other words, it was the homosexual nature of their desires, and not just the violent expression of them, that is highlighted in the New Testament.
2. Leviticus 18 & 20
Leviticus contains two well known statements about homosexual activity:
You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination. (Leviticus 18:22)
If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them. (Leviticus 20:13)
“An abomination” is often used to describe idolatry, and some suggest these verses are not condemning homosexual behaviour in general, but only the cultic prostitution connected to pagan temples. It is also often claimed that the fact that these prohibitions appear in a book full of other laws which no Christians think they are expected to follow today suggests that they should not be taken as having abiding moral relevance. But to take the first objection, the language used is not that specific; it refers to lying with a man “as with a woman,” – that is, in very general terms. Secondly, the surrounding verses in each instance describe other forms of sexual sin (such as incest, adultery and bestiality), none of which is anything to do with pagan temples or idolatry, and which we would take as being applicable to Christians today. It is moral, rather than just pagan religious behaviour that’s in view. Furthermore, Leviticus 20:13 highlights both male parties equally, again suggesting general, consensual homosexual activity (as opposed to gay rape or a forced relationship).
3. Romans 1:18-32
Turning to the New Testament, Romans 1 has much to say about the nature and character of homosexual behaviour.
Paul’s aim in these early chapters is to demonstrate that the whole world is unrighteous in God’s sight, and therefore in need of salvation. In Romans 1:18-32 he zeroes in on the Gentile world, describing the way it has turned away from God and embraced idolatry. The particular details in the passage may indicate that Paul is using the Greco-Roman culture surrounding his readers as a case in point.
Gentile society faces God’s wrath because it has suppressed the truth that God has revealed about himself in creation (verses 18-20). In the verses that follow, Paul illustrates how this has happened, giving three examples of how what has been known about God has been exchanged for something else: they exchange the glory of God for images of creatures (verse 23); the truth of God for a lie, leading to full-blown idolatry, worshipping created things (verse 25); and reject the knowledge of God (verse 28), exchanging “natural” relations for “unnatural” ones:
For this reason God gave them up to dishonourable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. (Romans 1:26-27)
Two important and sobering truths are apparent from these verses:
1. Homosexual desire is not what God originally intended. This is not to say that homosexual desire is the only thing that God did not originally intend. All of our desires have been distorted by sin. But Paul does describe both lesbian and male homosexual behaviour as “unnatural.” Some have argued this refers to what is natural to the people themselves, so that what is in view is heterosexual people engaging in homosexual activity and thereby going against their “natural” orientation. According to this view, Paul is not condemning all homosexual behaviour, but only that which goes against the person’s own sexual inclinations. But this view cannot be supported by the passage itself. The words for “natural” and “against nature” refer not to our subjective experience of what feels natural to us, but to the fixed way of things in creation. The nature that Paul says homosexual behaviour contradicts is God’s purpose for us, revealed in creation and reiterated throughout Scripture.
Paul’s reference to lesbianism as well as male homosexual conduct also supports the idea that he is condemning all homosexual activity, and not just the man-boy relationships that occurred in Roman culture.
The strength of Paul’s language here should not make us think that homosexual conduct is the worst or only form of sinful behaviour. Paul may be highlighting it because it is a particularly vivid example, and may have been especially pertinent for his readers in Rome given their cultural context. Either way it is illustrative of something that is the case for all of us: as we reject God we find ourselves craving what we are not naturally designed to do. This is as true of a heterosexual person as of a homosexual person. There are no grounds in this passage for singling out homosexual people for any kind of special condemnation. The same passage indicts all of us.
2. Our distorted desires are a sign that we have turned away from God. It is important to recognize that Paul is talking here in social rather than individual terms. He is describing what happens to culture as a whole, rather than particular people. The presence of same-sex desire in some of us is not an indication that we’ve turned from God more than others, but a sign that humanity as a whole has done so. It is not the only sign, and in everyone there is no doubt more than one sign or another – but it is a sign nevertheless.
Paul writes that alongside the gospel, “The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men” (Romans 1:19). Though there will one day be a “day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed” (Romans 2:5), there is already a present-day expression of God’s anger against sin. We see God’s wrath in this: he gives us what we want.
In response to the exchanges Paul has described, we see three instances of God giving us over to live in the outcome of our sinful desires. This is his present-day judgment against sin. We ask for a reality without him and he gives us a taster of it.
In each case the “giving over” results in an intensification of the sin and the further breakdown of human behaviour. God gives humanity over to impure lusts and dishonourable bodily conduct (verse 24), and to “dishonourable passions” (verse 26). The exchanging of natural relations for unnatural leads to being given over to a “debased mind” and the flourishing of “all manner of unrighteousness” which Paul unpacks in a long list of antisocial behaviours (verse 28-31). Sin leads to judgment, but judgment also leads to further sin.
The presence of all these sinful acts is a reminder that we live in a world which has deliberately turned away from God in all sorts of ways, and is therefore experiencing a foretaste of God’s anger and courting its final outpouring on the day of judgment. Again, homosexual activity is certainly not the only sinful act. All of us are guilty. But it listed among them as one of the ways in which human nature as a whole has been changed from what God originally intended.
4. 1 Corinthians 6:9-10
Paul writes:
Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. (1 Corinthians 6:9-10)
In these verses Paul is describing different kinds of people who (unless they repent) will be excluded from the kingdom of God. Four kinds relate to sexual sin, and two of those specifically to homosexual behaviour. The ESV takes the latter and puts them together as “men who practice homosexuality”, while the NIV translates them as “male prostitutes and homosexual offenders”.
The first of the two terms relating to homosexuality is malakoi, which translated literally means “soft ones.” In classical literature it could be used as a pejorative term for men who were effeminate; for the younger, passive partner in a pederastic (man-boy) relationship; and to refer to male prostitutes (hence the NIV’s translation). In 1 Corinthians 6 malakoi comes in a list describing general forms of sexual sin, and the context suggests Paul is most likely using it in a broad way to refer to the passive partners in homosexual intercourse, as we are about to see.
The second term he Paul uses. is arsenokoitai. This is a compound of “male” (arsen) and “intercourse” (koites, literally “bed”). These are the two words used in the Greek translation of Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13, suggesting that Paul is linking back to those two passages. (Paul has already just made a connection with Leviticus in 1 Corinthians 5, where he condemns the church’s acceptance of a man living with his father’s wife using language that echoes Leviticus 18:7-8. For Paul, the sexual sins which Leviticus prohibits remain forbidden for New Testament Christians.) Arsenokoitai, then, is a general term for male same-sex sex, and its pairing with malakoiindicates that Paul is addressing both the active and passive partners in homosexual sex.
So what does all this mean for our understanding of homosexuality?
1. Homosexual sin is serious. Paul says the active and unrepentant homosexual, as with all active, unrepentant sinners, will not enter God’s kingdom. Paul urges his readers not to be deceived on this point. He assumes there will be those who deny this teaching, and argue that some forms of homosexual conduct are acceptable to God. But Paul is clear: homosexual conduct leads people to destruction. This is a serious issue.
2. Homosexual sin is not unique. Paul’s list includes other forms of sexual sin (sexual immorality and adultery), and it includes non-sexual forms of sin (drunkenness and theft, for example). Homosexual sin is incredibly serious, but it is not alone in being so. It is wicked, but so is, say, greed. We must not imply that homosexual sex is the sin of our age. If we are to be faithful to Scripture, we must also preach against theft, greed, drunkenness, reviling, and defrauding others, many of which are also trivialised in our society, and all of which also characterize the unrighteous.
3. Homosexual sin is not inescapable. Paul continues in verse 11: “And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of God” (1 Corinthians 6:11).
These forms of behaviour are not appropriate for the Corinthian church precisely because it is not who they are any more. Some of them clearly had been active homosexuals. They did once live in these ways. But no more. They have been washed, sanctified and justified; forgiven, cleansed from their sins, and set apart for God. They have a new standing and identity before him.
However ingrained it may be in someone’s behaviour, homosexual conduct is not inescapable. It is possible for someone living a practicing gay lifestyle to be made new by God. Temptations and feelings may well linger. That Paul is warning his readers not to revert to their former way of life suggests there is still some desire to do so. But in Christ we are no longer who we were. Those who have come out of an active gay lifestyle need to understand how to see themselves. What defined us then no longer defines us now.
5. 1 Timothy 1:8-10
Here Paul writes:
The law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers, for the sexually immoral, men who practise homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine. (1 Timothy. 1:9-10)
He again uses the term arsenokoitai (translated by the ESV as “men who practice homosexuality” as a catch-all term for all forms of homosexual conduct. Also in common with 1 Corinthians, same-sex sex is mentioned among other wide-ranging sins, non-sexual as well as sexual.
These forms of behaviour characterize those who are not “just” and for whom the law was given, in order to bring conviction of sin and the need for mercy. All these practices contradict “sound doctrine” and the gospel. They do not conform to the life Christians are now to lead. They go against the grain of the new identity we have in Christ.
Conclusion
Attempts to read these texts as anything other than prohibitions of homosexual behaviour do not ultimately work. The plain reading of each passage is the right one. It is homosexual practice in general, rather than only certain expressions of it, which are forbidden in Scripture. To attempt to demonstrate otherwise is to violate the passages themselves. Yet these very same texts list homosexuality alongside many other forms of behaviour that are also against God’s will. The very passages that show us that homosexual activity is a sin, make it very clear that it is not a unique sin. It is one example of what is wrong with all of us.
So weak…your convenient interpretation reminds me of President Trump’s ramblings or that of a snake oil salesman…the bible does condemn homosexual behavior plain and simple…the bible condemns a lot of things but isn’t it just a book used to control and placate the masses?
Repent. There is still time. I pray that you come to know Christ and seek his forgiveness. You are speaking against God. The true and only God.
Even more impressive! Thank you so very much for this. May God bless you.
@ Another prospective
I am an LGBYQRDTUBWCYXZ where are my rights.
In addition I am also a committed naturist, why do the RCIPS officers warn me to put on my clothes when I am enjoying nature in my natural as born nudity?
This is a violation of my natural Human Rights and my lifestyle is environmentally friendly by reducing waste going into the landfill – I do not have any old clothes to dump.
I will now also get Legal Aid to fight for my natural naturist rights.
Good job!! Excellent argument!! I will come out and support you, as you make a very valid point.