Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For July 22, 2015

July 17

To Steve Hays' angry July 16 comment responding to my comment where he leveled a number of accusations against me. This was part of the discussion in the blogpost about the Wheaton staffer who changed her position on same-sex marriage. This appeared in Denny Burk's blog.

Steve,
It seems that you are venting more than making grounded statements. The personal accusations against me regarding how I pray or my preference for having the homosexual lobby bully people or saying that I thank God I am not like Denny because I belong to the Socialist Party USA are totally without grounds. Find the quotes that support those accusations. Also, just a technical note, I actually belong to the Socialist Workers Party, not the Socialist USA Party.

Second, there is nothing wrong with how I have referred to that parable. That parable provides an equal opportunity warning. And I use that parable to disagree with Marx's solution of relying on a proletariat dictatorship to usher in the classless society as much as I use it on Christians who want to feel superior to those from the LGBT community. BTW, I disagree with Marx there because such is an externalization of sin where Marx seems to be saying that only the Bourgeoisie sin. I prefer Kautsky who recognized that any group can be oppressive.

As for the issue you identified, you present a similar case as was presented in the defense of Jim Crow. This is where we disagree. I believe that the state has a right to defend the equality of all its members.  And so the question becomes this: Can we use religious beliefs as a grounds for not treating people from certain groups as equals? That was one of the questions asked by some defending Jim Crow only their target was nonWhites? Note that freedom of speech isn't the issue. And freedom of association does not mean that businesses can discriminate otherwise you have defended parts of Jim Crow.

In addition, what some seem to be missing is the impact that denying business services to a group can cause in a Capitalist society. When you have a business, you have agreed to an implied social contract of serving all who legally ask for your services.  Why is that a contract in a Capitalist economy? Because the majority of goods and services can only be provided by businesses in such an economy. And if a business could deny a group services for the reasons you cited, then all could and such leads to the marginalization and even the experience of the deprivation of goods and services.

BTW, I wasn't changing the subject with Romans 7. You talked about sins occurring when there are lapses, that isn't the only time. And I understand those who are advocating the acceptance of homosexuality. What I am saying here is that we have to find new ways of calling homosexuality sin that do not include denying the equality of those from the LGBT community.

And no, I don't have a single test for those who are Christian. I don't regard those who disagree with me on same-sex marriage for religious reasons as nonChristians. I believe they are wrong on this issue as much as they believe I am wrong. But never have I doubted their Christianity. What I have doubted is their consistency just as I see inconsistency in myself when I sin.

And no, I don't agree with any group calling what the Bible says hate speech. I fully disagree with the court decision in England against a street preach who  was convicted of causing emotional harm to members of the LGBT community simply by reading Leviticus.

Finally, when we say such and such a lifestyle is very destructive or self-destructive and cite the destructive actions that have followed. It is our responsibility to examine why such people committed such self-destructive actions. For I see those same self-destructive actions in heterosexuals while I don't see those self-destructive actions in most, if not all, of the people I know from the LGBT community.
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To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost quote asserting that opposing same-sex marriage is not the same as opposing interracial marriage. This appeared in Heidelblog.

Same-sex marriage does not have to be identical to interracial marriage for comparing the opposition to both. There can be significant differences between the two. And yet, opposing same-sex marriage can be comparable to opposing interracial marriage.

That opposing both have been based on the Scriptures makes opposing both comparable. And while the scriptural defense for justifying same-sex marriage is completely inadequate while the scriptural defense for practicing interracial marriage is more than adequate, opposing both can still be similar enough. In either case, opposing both seems to have a personal basis in bigotry. That same-sex marriage is not justified by the Scriptures does not imply that it cannot be practiced in society, especially a society that is based on religious freedom.

And using the natural law argument for prohibiting same-sex marriage fails for two reasons. First, there is no mandate for enforcing every part of natural law otherwise Christians would still demand that homosexuality itself be a criminal offense. Second, though in terms of truth there is only one natural law, there is more than one version of natural law in society. As I have mentioned here before, homosexuality exists with benefits in 1,500 species. So when a nonChristian looks at natural law, he/she might be using the example of what occurs in nature as the rule for natural law.

Using common law and tradition to forever rule out same-sex marriage fails because we first have broken with tradition before and to allow for common law and tradition to forever rule out same-sex marriage is more authoritarian than democratic and promotes and a tyranny of tradition. In addition, much of common law and tradition assumes a particular set of religious beliefs.

Yes, opposition to interracial marriage was insidious. But what do you call it when you unnecessarily force unbelievers to abide by your religious code?

The problem here is that our opposition to same-sex marriage in society fails on multiple levels. First, it attempts to exact a measure of discrimination against and marginalization of those from the LGBT community. Second, because other Christians sense the unfairness of our discrimination, it forces them to think that homosexuality must be biblically supported in order to escape the consequence of practicing discrimination. And finally, while nonChristians witness our discrimination against those in the LGBT community and our silence over sins of economic exploitation, destruction to the environment, and our penchant for war and militarism, we give them stumbling blocks to listening to the Gospel in the first place.

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July 20

To Stephen Hale and his July 20 comment describing my previous comment as a 'sort of geopolitical socialization engineering' and that I told Christians they ought to 'consider contemporary political views when reading the Bible.' This was part of the discussion attached to the blogpost on what Christians can do about same-sex marriage. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.

Stephen,
No, but they should consider societal issues of equality and fairness as well as economic issues before advocating legislation or promoting/opposing Supreme Court decisions both of which determine the rules for our society. We should preach the Scriptures, not make them the law of the land.

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To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost quote on fetal tissue. This appeared in Heidelblog.

We live in a society in which people are regarded as disposable objects. So how can we expect society to treat the unborn, whose humanity is hidden by its location, with the human dignity they deserve? 

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 To Joseph Sunde and his blogpost about Jeb Bush's call for American workers to work longer hours. This appeared in the Acton blog.

The message of both Jeb Bush and Joseph Sunde, the writer of this blogpost, is that Americans should submit themselves as slaves to the competitive needs of business. After all, according to Joseph Sunde, our ancestors worked longer and harder hours than we currently work. But if our ancestors are setting the standard for our work ethic, we would also employ abusive child labor and slavery. We should also be willing to accept the labor standards that caused people to die on the job such as when the transcontinental railroad was built. And while Sunde complains that we are not making workers like we use to as evidenced by how today's workers complain, realize that our ancestors eventually got fed up with the poverty wages, the health threatening working environments, and the long hours so they organized and went on strike. Now how is it that Sunde can conclude that yesteryear's workers' would not complain like today's

Why does Jeb want us to work longer hours when, according to Forbes, Americans ranked 12th in 2013 and 10th in 2014 in the average number of hours worked per worker? We could answer that question with a famous movie quote: 'Follow the money.' After all, who would benefit more from the the sacrifices workers would have to make by increasing their hours? Would it be the workers or the top x%? A possible clue to the answer to that question can be found in asking this: Who benefited the most from the recovery of the 2008 economic collapse?