Jeremy Irons on Gay Marriage. Could a father marry his own son?

I am not aware of Jeremy Irons views on many issues, and he seems to be on the fence regarding gay marriage.

However, this is one thing that came into my mind some time ago. If all are allowed to marry whom they please, and there's no pro-creation, what's there to stop mothers and daughters, or fathers and sons marrying one another?

Marriage equality, will never be equal, until all can marry whoever, and whatever they want.

The interviewer tried to calms things down by suggesting that incest law would kick in, and trying to poke fun that Irons had said he was going to marry his dog. Yet, he couldn't get away from the fact that Iron's logic, is the proper one, and one that I think I will see suggested in my lifetime.

This is a theme that has been present in gay porn time and time again, and as in the case of other sexual promiscuity, I don't doubt that it will reach, if it hasn't yet, real life.

Why the Christian view of marriage matters, and the real impulse of some gay activist regarding marriage

This discussion took place here, in my own country, Australia, where even our Prime Minister is not married, and does not look like she is going to in the long term, happily living with her "partner" The direct link is here for the audio.

What I will post, however, comes from the Stand to Reason (STR) Blog.

July 31, 2012
Same-Sex Marriage Won't Be Enough
Last month, at a Sydney Writers Festival panel discussion on the question, “Why get married when you could be happy?” Russian-American journalist Masha Gessen had this to say about same-sex marriage:

It’s a no-brainer that we should have the right to marry, but I also think equally that it’s a no-brainer that the institution of marriage should not exist [cheers from the audience].
That causes my brain some trouble. And part of why it causes me trouble is because fighting for gay marriage generally involves lying about what we are going to do with marriage when we get there—because we lie that the institution of marriage is not going to change, and that is a lie. The institution of marriage is going to change, and it should change. And again, I don’t think it should exist. And I don’t like taking part in creating fictions about my life. That’s sort of not what I had in mind when I came out thirty years ago. I have three kids who have five parents, more or less, and I don’t see why they shouldn’t have five parents legally….
[After my divorce,] I met my new partner, and she had just had a baby, and that baby’s biological father is my brother, and my daughter’s biological father is a man who lives in Russia, and my adopted son also considers him his father. So the five parents break down into two groups of three…. And really, I would like to live in a legal system that is capable of reflecting that reality. And I don’t think that’s compatible with the institution of marriage.

This just illustrates the fact that the institution of marriage is inextricably connected with children and reflects an unchangeable reality: One man + one woman = children. The reproductive system is divided in half—the man has one half, the woman has the other—and when they come together, the result is a whole, functioning system that creates children. Therefore, the state protects the union between a man and a woman. By doing this, the children are legally protected.
Gessen wants to fight for marriage to legally include different types of relationships because she wants the government to declare there is no difference between a heterosexual union and a homosexual one. But there is a difference. A very important difference based on the unchangeable realities of biology. A difference that’s relevant because it’s at the very heart of the institution of marriage. A difference that justifies the government treating the different unions differently.
So Gessen is conflicted. She wants the unions to be treated the same, but she recognizes that, by nature, they create fundamentally different situations. And since the institution of marriage can’t accommodate a union that has only one woman and one woman (because another person—a man—is needed somewhere in the picture in order for a family to be created), she understands that an entirely new legal system must be created in order for the government to be able to address her situation.
So here’s the thinking (a summary in my words, not hers): “I want all unions to be treated the same, but since we’re not the same, due to biological realities beyond our control, and since marriage can never work for the union and children I have, we need to drop marriage and come up with a new idea so we can all be the same under that new system.” Or even more succinctly stated, “You shouldn’t have marriage because we can’t have marriage.”
Marriage can’t be separated from biological realities. And that’s why this upheaval won’t end when same-sex marriage is accepted—why Gessen’s ultimate goal is the end of marriage.
I’m glad to hear her honesty about this.

[HT: John Sandeman (click to see more quotes from the panel)]

So, for all of those who so fiercely defend same sex marriage, would you like to move into this new type of understanding?? What if you get divorced, and then you find that your ex's new hubby or wife has full custody, just like you??

Better think again, since you don't seem to know what you are wishing for.

More on the hypocrisy by those who want to boycott Chick-Fil-A

Via Zwinliusredidivus

Finally taking a stand against the intolerant minority that wants us all to conform to their ways

This is a great opportunity to affirm the biblical view of marriage. What gives others the right to have a "pride day", and yet, we don't call them "heterophobes" (But I do indeed some are)?

It's a great American story [i.e., the founding and operation of the company] that is being smeared by vicious hate speech and intolerant bigotry from the left.The Chick Fil-A company refuses to open on Sundays so that their employees can go to church if they wish. Despite the pressure from malls, airports, and the business world to open on Sundays, they still don't. They treat customers and employees with respect and dignity. 

I ask you to join me in speaking out on Wednesday, August 1 "Chick Fil-A Appreciation Day.” No one is being asked to make signs, speeches, or openly demonstrate. The goal is simple: Let's affirm a business that operates on Christian principles and whose executives are willing to take a stand for the Godly values we espouse by simply showing up and eating at Chick Fil-A on Wednesday, August 1. Too often, those on the left make corporate statements to show support for same sex marriage, abortion, or profanity, but if Christians affirm traditional values, we're considered homophobic, fundamentalists, hate-mongers, and intolerant. This effort is not being launched by the Chick Fil-A company and no one from the company or family is involved in proposing or promoting it.

 I don't live in the USA anymore, well, for more than 20 yrs now. But if you live over there, I encourage you to support for the right to think differently, and to hold on to values different than those of the intolerant minority.

Homosexuality, yet again!

I have a friend that tells me that talking about gays and homosexuality is my favorite subject. Well, it's not my favourite subject, is actually Jesus. But there is no place or time where I am at, that the homosexuality issue raises its head.

On this subject, Albert Mohler, the president of the Southern Baptist Seminary, has written for CNN, and I would like to share with you this piece. This will help to to answer the objections and also point a way forward when this issue comes up in conversations and places that you visit.

Without further delay, here it's the article.

My Take: The Bible condemns a lot, but here's why we focus on homosexuality 

Editor's Note: R. Albert Mohler Jr. is president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, the flagship school of the Southern Baptist Convention and one of the largest seminaries in the world.

By R. Albert Mohler Jr., Special to CNN
Are conservative Christians hypocritical and selective when it comes to the Bible’s condemnation of homosexuality? With all that the Bible condemns, why the focus on gay sex and same-sex marriage? 

Given the heated nature of our current debates, it’s a question conservative Christians have learned to expect. “Look,” we are told, “the Bible condemns eating shellfish, wearing mixed fabrics and any number of other things. Why do you ignore those things and insist that the Bible must be obeyed when it comes to sex?” 

On its face, it’s a fair question. But it can be posed in two very different ways.
First, the question can be asked to suggest that the Bible’s clear condemnation of sexual sins can simply be set aside. The other way of posing the question represents a genuine attempt to understand how the Bible is to be rightly applied to life today. 

In truth, those asking the question the first way really don’t want an answer.
An honest consideration of the Bible reveals that most of the biblical laws people point to in asking this question, such as laws against eating shellfish or wearing mixed fabrics, are part of the holiness code assigned to Israel in the Old Testament. That code was to set Israel, God’s covenant people, apart from all other nations on everything from morality to diet. 

As the Book of Acts makes clear, Christians are not obligated to follow this holiness code. This is made clear in Peter’s vision in Acts 10:15. Peter is told, “What God has made clean, do not call common.” 

In other words, there is no kosher code for Christians. Christians are not concerned with eating kosher foods and avoiding all others. That part of the law is no longer binding, and Christians can enjoy shrimp and pork with no injury to conscience. 

The Bible’s commands on sexual behavior, on the other hand, are continued in the New Testament. When it comes to homosexuality, the Bible’s teaching is consistent, pervasive, uniform and set within a larger context of law and Gospel. 

The Old Testament clearly condemns male homosexuality along with adultery, bestiality, incest and any sex outside the covenant of marriage. The New Testament does not lessen this concern but amplifies it. 

The New Testament condemns both male and female homosexual behavior. The Apostle Paul, for example, points specifically to homosexuality as evidence of human sinfulness. His point is not merely that homosexuals are sinners but that all humanity has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. 

The New Testament condemns a full range of sexual sins, and homosexuality is specified among these sins. In Romans, Paul refers to homosexuality in terms of “dishonorable passions,” “contrary to nature” and “shameless.” As New Testament scholar Robert Gagnon has stated, the Bible’s indictment “encompasses every and any form of homosexual behaviour.” 

Some people then ask, “What about slavery and polygamy?” In the first place, the New Testament never commands slavery, and it prizes freedom and human dignity. For this reason, the abolitionist movement was largely led by Christians, armed with Christian conviction. 

The Old Testament did allow for polygamy, though it normalizes heterosexual monogamy. In the New Testament, Jesus made clear that marriage was always meant to be one man and one woman. 

“Have you not read that He who created them made them male and female?” Jesus asked in Matthew. "Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” For this reason, Christians have opposed polygamy on biblical grounds. 

Why are Christians so concerned with homosexuality? In the first place, that question is answered by the simple fact that it is the most pressing moral question of our times. Christians must be concerned about adultery, pornography, injustice, dishonesty and everything the Bible names as sin. But when my phone rings with a call from a reporter these days, the question I am asked is never adultery or pornography. It is about homosexuality. 

Christians who are seriously committed to the authority of the Bible have no choice but to affirm all that the Bible teaches, including its condemnation of homosexuality. At the same time, our confidence is that God condemns those things that will bring his human creatures harm and commands those things that will lead to true human happiness and flourishing. 

In other words, we understand that the Bible condemns all forms of sin because our Creator knows what is best for us. The Bible names sins specifically so that each of us will recognize our own sinfulness and look to Christ for salvation and the forgiveness of our sins. 

Christian love requires that we believe and teach what the Bible teaches and that we do so with both strong conviction and humble hearts. The Church must repent of our failures in both of these tasks, but we must not be silent where the Bible speaks. 

Are Christians hypocrites in insisting that homosexual behavior is sin? We, too, are sinners, and hypocrisy and inconsistency are perpetual dangers. 

The church failed miserably in the face of the challenge of divorce. This requires an honest admission and strong corrective. 

At the same time, this painful failure must remind us that we must not fail to answer rightly when asked what the Bible teaches about homosexuality. Love requires us to tell the truth. 

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of R. Albert Mohler Jr.

Make me a bishop, or I will sue. Gay priest wants to be a bishop, no matter how

When people see ordination more as a right, and not like a privilege, there must be something wrong with them. But even worst when there's a person who is living or promoting a sinful lifestyle, and yet, demands to be ordained. This is exactly the case of The Very (I)Reverend Jeffrey John, Dean of St Albans. The Daily Mail reports:

A controversial gay dean has threatened to take the Church of  England to court after he was blocked from becoming a bishop.The Very Rev Jeffrey John, Dean of St Albans, has instructed an eminent employment lawyer to complain to Church officials after being rejected for the role of Bishop of Southwark.Sources say the dean, one of the most contentious figures in the Church, believes he could sue officials under the Equality Act 2010, which bans discrimination on the grounds of sexuality. Such a case could create a damaging new rift within the CoE.

See how this works. We all remember how Gene Robinson was elected the first practicing homosexual priest by the Episcopal Church USA (ECUSA). The leaders in that "church" say that they were led by the Holy Spirit to take such a decision (I wonder how the Holy Spirit will contradict himself so blatantly, but then again, the ECUSA are like the Mormons, they believe in a different Holy Spirit as it seems). Now, it seems that they don't need the guidance of an spirit, these people want to get ordained, because it is, apparently, their right!

Dr John was at the centre of a storm in 2003 when forced to step down as Bishop of Reading by Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams after it became known that he was in a gay, though celibate, relationship. The furore fuelled a bitter civil war within the Anglican Church that has dominated Dr Williams’s decade in office.The dean was again a cause of infighting in 2010 when he was a candidate for Bishop of Southwark. A respected theologian and former canon at Southwark Cathedral, he had strong backing from senior Church liberals and it was said even David Cameron was supportive.

David Cameron? Isn't he supposed to be from the Conservative Party? Anyway, he is a politician, therefore, no real moral position. But Dr. John, has already being a bishop before, but needed to step down because of his gay celibate relationship. Ok, let's say he was truly celibate, it seems that he was seeking affirmation, and didn't get it, so he was diposed.

But this time around, he is not taking things sitting down, he is taking action:

Dr John has instructed Alison Downie, partner and head of employment at London lawyers Goodman Derrick, to write to the Commission to suggest it risks breaching gay equality laws if it is blocking the dean over his homosexuality

Well, I wonder if he is in a homosexual relationship today. The issue with this man is that he doesn't care if the Bible bars him, if he is practicing homosexual, from practicing ministry, period.

I Corinthians 6:⁹ Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men ¹⁰ nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. ¹¹ And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. 

We have a lot of other sins, but in this post, I want to single out the sin of homosexuality, and how this man is so blind, that he wants the position of bishop, and he has actually cut himself from the body of Christ, but promoting such a lifestyle in the church.

So there you have it, somebody demanding to be ordained, or else, he will go to the courts. He is so blind that he can't see that God is not going to call him, unless the Church of England follows this new spirit that ECUSA is following.

Totally shocking, and amazing how blind people have become!!

If the gay Lobby is right (which is not), there were no heterosexual before 1869

At my seminary, and all other places, I always hear that the word "homosexual" is a recent term coined in the 19 century, therefore, we cannot read into the bible the meaning that we understand it today.

Well, a bit of history first. The man who coined the term, "homosexual" was Karl-Maria Kertbeny, an Austrian born Hungarian writer and human rights promoter.

What you never hear from those who propose gay marriage, or the gay lifestyle, that on the same year he coined the term, "homosexual", he also coined the word "heterosexual".

My question is, can we also apply the gay's argument, that heterosexuality is not the same in biblical times as with the meaning that Kertbeny gave it in the 19 century?

For 19 centuries there was no concept of heterosexuality?

Mind you, Kertbeny was just giving labels to practices that were known, accepted (heterosexuality) or repudiated (homosexuality).

Poor Kertbeny is today a gay icon, although he was married. Shows you how some people misrepresent history, just to prove that their view is the right one.