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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13796
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It was really Deej that prompted this thread. Non gay friendly religions are many. The real issue is how to handle being gay in that environment. How does one handle an inflexible religion in, for example, Saudi Arabia, where I understand the penalty for homosexual relations is death?
Suddenly Southern Baptists look like an open and accepting sect! LDS looks positively liberal!
When does a religion become intrusive instead of offering guidance?
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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marc
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Needs to get a life! |
Registered: March 2003
Messages: 4729
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timmy wrote:
> It was really Deej that prompted this thread. Non gay friendly religions are many. The real issue is how to handle being gay in that environment. How does one handle an inflexible religion in, for example, Saudi Arabia, where I understand the penalty for homosexual relations is death?
Don't mince your way to the bizzare wearing a pink dress and spiked heels.......
>
> Suddenly Southern Baptists look like an open and accepting sect! LDS looks positively liberal!
>
> When does a religion become intrusive instead of offering guidance?
Always....
Life is great for me... Most of the time... But then I meet people online... Very few are real friends... Many say they are but know nothing of what it means... Some say they are, but are so shallow...
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saben
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On fire! |
Registered: May 2003
Messages: 1537
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You don't handle it. Eventually it comes down to a choice of celebacy versus leaving the religion. You do what you can to survive while in it. Whether that means descrete encounters while pretending you are a perfect church-goer. Or whatever. While you HAVE to be in it coping is hard enough. But eventually it comes down to your church or your lovelife. Some people can reconcile both, but I don't know how personally. I guess if you can force yourself to think of your church as "not-divine, but still with elements of divinity" you can come to a compromise between the two. And some people do. But for me, it was a choice. I followed my heart, my head and my god-given inspiration.
Look at this tree. I cannot make it blossom when it suits me nor make it bear fruit before its time [...] No matter what you do, that seed will grow to be a peach tree. You may wish for an apple or an orange, but you will get a peach.
Master Oogway
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Timmy:
>When does a religion become intrusive instead of offering guidance?
On a personal level:
- When you stop accepting its word as take-it-or-leave-it guidance, and start to assume that it is infallible.
- When you use it as a substitute for intelligent and logical thought (the mob mentality).
- When you start to feel it is your duty to force your beliefs on others.
On a religious level (the same points, from the other direction):
- When the religion expects or forces you to bend to its will without question.
- When its doctrine condemns original thought.
- When it expects you to evangelise to others, and, worse, condemn people who have chosen not to be part of it.
(Come to think of it, that could be a description of the British tabloid newspaper industry as well.)
This ignores completely whether or not the message of each religion itself is 'good'. People should be able to choose which messages are relevant to them. If they can't, or won't, it's a sign something is very wrong.
David
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cossie
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On fire! |
Location: Exiled in North East Engl...
Registered: July 2003
Messages: 1699
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... but I do think we tend - unjustifably - to tar all religions with the same brush.
If we are indeed God's children, then we are ALL God's children. Some religions have a conspicuous record of tolerance, not least the Muslims, who for centuries recognised and accepted the importance of Jerusalem to both Jews and Christians.
I don't subscribe to any sort of fundamentalism, in particular a fundamentalism which expects me to repress my intellect and deny logic in favour of belief. But I do believe that religion has a part to play in our lives, as has been the case since intelligent life first evolved. There may, or may not, be a God. I am a mere mortal; I don't have the answers. But mere mortals have the potential for intelligent and logical thought, and over the ages man has sought to explain that which he does not understand by invoking some kind of religious structure. But God did not chose the Jews - the Jews chose God! There are elements of validity in all religions, and I would not seek to deny anyone the comfort of believing in resurrection or reincarnation. Religion can bring comfort in a war-torn world. It is, for example, difficult to justify criticism of the pacifism which characterises the followers of Buddha; surely they were closer to God than the extremist Taliban who destroyed their monuments? But, personally, I suspect that when I die I am gone forever; the most that I can hope to achieve in life is to leave ideas implanted in the minds of others.
All of the above should make clear that I have no time whatsoever for any group which condemns homosexuality as a matter of faith rather than on any logical basis. Such groups are simply tools in the quest for power and influence by their leaders, and a very basic tool in generating emotional support is to encourage hatred of others.
The precise causes of homosexuality have not yet been determined, but it does appear to involve both genetic and non-genetic factors. But it IS clear that it is not in any sense a conscious choice, and those who condemn homosexuality do so with an absolute lack of logic; they might as well condemn all those with ginger hair as servants of the devil - the logical justification is neither stronger nor weaker!
For a' that an' a' that,
It's comin' yet for a' that,
That man tae man, the worrld o'er
Shall brithers be, for a' that.
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Hey cossie, all I can say is Amen to that!
Now you really didn't think it was all I would say did you?
I go a bit further than you do in beliving that God exists, which I do believe in my own logical way. Now you may not accept all my premises for my belief but I do not demand that; all I ask is respect for the view and you have shown that. To me, belief in God is perfectly logical; more logical to me than a belief that we all just sort of sprang into existance some how. The logic being that it is self-evident that we exist and came out of somewhere (were created) and that to me demands some one or something to create us. A very simple view I know, so don't chastise me for being so simple minded. I look at all around me and conclude logically I think, that it could not all be an accident of some kind of evolution.
I certainly don't have the answer either, but to say one view is any more correct than another, when nothing can be proven, is to become somewhat arrogant.
I do belong to a church, yes, but if I were pushed much I would say that I didn't take everything literally either. I think if you take something like the ten commandments and just seperate them from all the other rhetoric of religion, they make a lot of sense as a way to live with others. I bet that most religions can be found to have similar guidelines for life, but the leaders tend to pervert things. Yeah, like someone once said, "Why can't we all just be friends?"
The reason I wrote all this was to try to show some of you that I am not an intolerant idiot. I respect that you have your views and I have mine. I have shared my views of God and religion with several people who are very intelligent in my view (PHD electronics and physics says the guy is not dumb) and they tend to agree with my views, so it is not a fair thing to say that any belief in God is from a point of not being intelligent enough to see the real truth of science.
Ken
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new_new_guy
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Getting started |
Registered: July 2006
Messages: 11
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Hi cossie,
You write:
"The precise causes of homosexuality have not yet been determined, but it does appear to involve both genetic and non-genetic factors. But it IS clear that it is not in any sense a conscious choice, and those who condemn homosexuality do so with an absolute lack of logic;.......".
I would be grateful if you could post some references (web addresses, articles etc.) discussing the fators affecting sexual preferences. Anyone who has similar links or pointers, please post here.
Thank you!
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Hi New Guy,
I'm just off to bed, so I'm too tired to go out and look for stuff myself, but, as a rule of thumb, when looking for things on the internet, especially things that have been addressed on this board, the best places to begin are:
i. this board -- you can use the search function. It's been around for years and there are virtually no topics that haven't been discussed in depth at some time or another. I know for a fact that other people have asked exactly the same thing as you.
ii. Wikipedia. Not, I might add, because it's always right, but because it gives a basic idea of what to look for. And often links to other sites that are (more) authoritative.
e.g.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_orientation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biology_and_sexual_orientation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choice_and_sexual_orientation
etc.
Then, of course, there is Google, written encyclopaedias, your local university library (if you can get access to one), Cossie, etc.
Sorry for not answering the question directly; I don't think I can do that in my current state of exhaustion. Maybe tomorrow.
David
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cossie
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On fire! |
Location: Exiled in North East Engl...
Registered: July 2003
Messages: 1699
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Hi, Not-so-new-any-more Guy!
I'm afraid that I can't really add to the advice Deeej has already given. I've read widely on the subject, and as my contributions to the board are not academic dissertations (though some have suggested that several of my posts are almost long enough to be so regarded!) I have rarely quoted sources. What I have aimed for is a readable distillation of current thinking.
In response to your specific enquiry, it's essential to remember when reading academic reports on the subject that research to date is woefully inadequate and much of it is hopelessly skewed. Some of the research is suspect because it was wholly or partially funded from either religious sources or gay-friendly sources. Above all, it is predominantly USA-based, and among English-speaking Western nations the USA has far the highest incidence of religious homophobia.
In my previous post on this thread I was effectively repeating views I last refreshed a few months ago when contributing to several previous threads. In all honesty, I can't recollect the specific sources, but most of my research was internet-based, and it shouldn't be too difficult to replicate it. Subject to the reservation above, a clear majority of recent studies endorses the view that sexual orientation is NOT a conscious choice; in addition, the general consensus is that orientation cannot be changed by therapy and attempts to do so may be psychologically damaging. My suggestion that both nature and nurture had a part to play was based on the results of two studies comparing the incidence of homosexuality in identical twins (ideally, those raised apart) with the incidence among fraternal twins, other siblings and the general population. Both studies concluded that between identical twins the probability that if one twin was gay, the other would also be gay, was very much higher than the correlation between fratenal twins, other siblings and a random population sample - but it was still well below 100%. The logical implication must therefore be that genetic factors play a significant part - but, as identical twins have the precisely the same genetic inheritance, the fact that the correlation fall short of 100% must imply that non-genetic factors also have a part to play. 'Nurture' is perhaps a slightly misleading term; I use it simply to cover all non-genetic influences, but there is as yet no significant consensus as to whether these influences are pre-natal or post-natal, or indeed a mixture of both.
It's a fascinating subject, and I hope you find your researches as interesting and enjoyable as my own!
For a' that an' a' that,
It's comin' yet for a' that,
That man tae man, the worrld o'er
Shall brithers be, for a' that.
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new_new_guy
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Getting started |
Registered: July 2006
Messages: 11
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Thanx Deej! The wiki search returns enough terms to start google-ing with...
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You don't need to change the screen name. Just change the "Full name" in the profile.
My username is /david (for some reason I have now forgotten) but since my Full name is Deeej, that's what everyone sees.
I would recommend settling on a slightly less generic name. Though you can of course stick with "new guy" if you would prefer.
David
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Religions that are not gay friendly 
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