Letters to the Editor
No one is perfect, and only 1 will judge us
Posted on Nov 12, 2009 by Jeff Tecklenburg.
Andy Chevelt’s Oct. 27 letter said Glenn Chatfield’s Oct. 24 letter falsely claims that Jesus said homosexual behavior was an abomination, and he claims Jesus did not say one word about it. Chevelt also claims that the few references are in the Old Testament stating other sins plus the fact that it wasn’t important enough to mention in the Ten Commandments. Then he went on to tell Christians what it says they should be doing.
To all of this I say that God’s word says that we have all sinned and come short of the glory of God. That none are perfect. We shall only be like Him when we see Him face to face. However, because of this, Jesus came to shed his blood for the remission of our sins not that we would not have to worry about sinning again but that we would have the third person in the God head, The Holy Spirit, to nudge us when we do commit a sin to repent and ask God to forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
As we begin to recognize the devil’s tricks we are more able to sin less but we still won’t be perfect. So we all should be careful how we judge others. After all, the Bible does say God is our judge and He has the last say.
Oh, and Andy, I didn’t know Romans was in the Old Testament. Or how do you interpret Romans 1:26 and 27; it doesn’t say homosexual behavior in those two words, but it describes it very plainly or else I don’t know what homosexual behavior is.
Betty Allnutt
Cedar Rapids
Betty, unless you are homosexual, you DON'T know what homosexual behavior is. As to the rest of your letter, may I remind you again that religious beliefs do not entitle anyone to deny others their civil rights.
How do you feel about the State intruding into your religion by taxing your church?.
For pete's sake ctigar , everyone knows what homosexual behavior is. If they declare the untidy activity a civil right they better do a better job of hiding it. It is not healthy and everyone should be aware of it. Religion has nothing to do with it, only common sense is required which there seems to be a lack of.
Silace, people with common sense don't get their knickers in a twist about the sex life of others.
Why do you call untidy activity? Having some issues with residual Puritanism?
You know those were very emotionally repressed and dysfunctional people. Now we worry about our own lives and respect the rights of others, sadly, your personal opinion doesn't count at all.
Once again, if God is our judge then let Him do His job. What difference does it make to you if someone else is going to burn for eternity? If you have a solid self-image and are happy with your life style that's really all that should matter. Why so homophobic?
No one is denying anyone civil rights. It is not a civil right to redefine what marriage is. It is not a civil right to get special protections based on CHOSEN sexual behavior. It IS a violation of civil rights to punish someone for saying that homosexual behavior is wrong, which is what "hate crimes" legislation is all about: punishment for thoughts. If someone beats up a normal person while calling him all sorts of derogatory names, he goes to jail, but if someone beats up a gay person and calls him a derogatory name he goes to jail for longer. That is wrong, period. No one should suffer more penalty for their crime just because they didn't like the person they committed the crime against – all punishment for the same crime should be equal.
Oh, and it isn't my religious beliefs that say homosexual behavior is wrong – it's common sense.
Great thinking, there Glenn- I guess by your lights the Nazi mass murder of Jews, Gypsies, Jehova's Witnesses and, yes- gays- just deserves to be viewed as just an unfortunate state-sponsored killing spree: bury the dead, punish those responsible and move on, ho-hum. Well, most of us are able to take lessons from history and recognize violent acts of hate for what they are- they are acts which transcend mere physical violence and which strike at the souls of all civilized people, no matter who the hate is directed at. I truly pity you.
Every act of violence is based on some sort of hate. That doesn't mean we should punish people more for the same crime just because they said something mean. Whatever happened to "sticks and stones…"
Your tirade about Nazis, etc has no bearing on whether hate crimes are fair.
Sticks and stones killed Matthew Shepard. Because of people like you who tend to see murders like that as the will of god, this is now a federal crime.
Whatever happened to cold blooded murder?
I don't pity him. He's made his own choice.
I have told you before, it is a scientific fact that it's not a choice and you may not deny Gays their civil rights because of religious belief, that now has been shown to be superstition.
This is the evidence that the Iowa Supreme Court based their ruling on.
For some reason, all of my posts are being blocked on this subject. Just seeing if something gets posted?
I'd like to use some words myself, that would make Glenn see the light.
Then they wonder why young people drift away from the church.
The only people who drift away from the church are those who don't want to hear the truth. You keep bringing church & religion into the subject but I've never mentioned it here. I keep talking about common sense, biology and the natural order of things. But if you want to bring religion into it, then you have to decide if Scripture is true. If it is true, then it means what it says and cannot be twisted to make it more palatable.
He will eventually see the light, in all it's burning glory…
What I see here is that if you are a liberal you get a big green number for you comments, but if you are against the liberal and perverted agenda, then you get big red negative numbers voted. It appears that mostly the liberal, perverted mindset is at operation on these opinion comments. So when you have the majority, you can shout down the opposition rather than actually be objective about what is being said.
The existence of a discernable liberal bias among the users of this board doesn't explain how most conservative posters and yes, even the half-dozen hardcore wingnuts, somehow manage to "stay out of the red zone". As far as I know, you are one of just two posters who have achieved that dubious distinction. The simple explanation for this is that NO ONE agrees with your goofy opinions and bizarre worldview.
I think Silace would be offended if you called him a liberal.
The only thing perverted here, is the concept of "Christianity" being pushed at others.
Most of us recognize the flaws in the dogma and it turns us off.
The jury is still out on your "choice" thingy ctigar , so give it a rest.
It doesn't matter whether it is a choice or not. The fact is, it is NOT YOUR choice. This untidy business of people imposing their superstitions on others needs to end.
OK c, again, let's see your genetic scientific proof. Who you trying to fool, your grandma?
Come on Glenn. We don't punish people for their thoughts. We punish them when their actions injure another individual. Is someone injuring you by what they do in their own bedroom?
Depends on the size of his imagination, I guess…
Let's see, in Canada and Europe people are fined and/or go to jail for saying homosexual behavior is wrong. They don't hurt anyone, just express an opinion and they are charged with hate speech. It all started with hate crime and before you knew it the laws included speech. That's exactly what is taking place here. People are being punished for refusing to photograph same-sex weddings because of their personal beliefs and yet the gays are intolerant and refuse to find someone who agree with same-sex marriage and then sue and force others to do their bidding. This is just the beginning. We already have had cases where gays attacked a normal person and it wasn't hate crime. It's only hate crime if a gay is attacked. The sexual orientation shouldn't matter. If someone beats up a person, he is already punished to the full extent of the law, but you want them to have additional punishment because it was a gay who was attacked. That is punishment for thought.
If you wish to embrace Bronze Age superstitions, that certainly is your right as an American. But just remember that the same Constitution that gives you that right, gives others the right to reject superstition in favor of a belief in the wonders of the natural world, science and the fact that man can define a just morality without having to be threatened with eternal damnation by some supervisory being.
Feel free to believe whatever you like in your home, your church or other place of worship, just leave me out of it and stop imposing your ideas on me through the government.
Again, you are claiming it is my religion, church, etc on which I base my statements. No, it is common sense, biology – i.e. science – nature, and just plain sense of decency that says homosexual behavior is wrong and not to be sanctioned by government forcing us to accept what perhaps 2% -3% of the population desires.
Glenn, you're a religious fanatic, the likes of which are incapable of understanding reason and logic.
You hide behind your version of the bible to act out your bigotry and intolerance with your sermons. The fact that you refuse to pay attention to scientific findings bears out the truth of my statement, because you seem to accept any other scientific discoveries when that suits you.
You can call me names to attempt to marginalize my argument in order to justify the unjustifiable same-sex behavior. Your claim of "scientific" findings ring hollow because the findings have never been repeated by legitmate researchers – the only "science" supporting your theory is propaganda by those supporting homosexuality. Same with your interpretation of the Bible – only recent twisting of scripture by pro-homosexual so-called scholars have suddenly found the Bible to say what it hadn't said for thousands of years. It is you who are bigoted against true Christianity and what the Bible really says – it is you who are intolerant of other views.
Talk to the wall, your audience has left the room.
Just because you cannot understand something, does not mean it is against commone sense, biology or nature. Your opinion has no bearing on what anyone else finds decent, right or wrong.
Given the low numbers of Gay men and women in the it should be no problem for people like you to accept that others have the right to chose who they want to share their life with. Unless you do not have enough to occupy yourself in your own life.
Because you seem genuinely incapable of making the connection, let me lay it out for you: moral implications aside, society MUST punish hate crimes because of their corrosive effect on society itself. In the first half of the 20th century, lynchings of random black men were regular events in the southern USA. They were seldom punished for what they were- murder- because they were motivated by racial hate, and the very hate that fostered the killings permeated the local justice system to the point where it was all too often impossible to obtain indictments or convictions. It took action at the federal level, finally, to bring this era of lawlessness to an end. Exactly the same thing has been perpetrated on gays: for many decades, violence against them has been excused and NOT punished as it should have been because of the idea among the haters (apparently, you included) that the victims somehow deserved the violence that was inflicted on them. The objective of hate crime legislation is not to just provide "extra punishment" for the perpetrators- it is a corrective action aimed at correcting a bigger societal fault, a fault to which you are so richly contributing.
No, hate crime legislation is for one thing only – increased punishment. They are already punished for the crime. Only "hate" crime gets extra punishment.
Get someone to read and explain my previous post to you, Glenn. You are clearly this opinion board's equivalent of Br'er Rabbit's Tar Baby.
I don't need someone to explain it. This isn't 20-30 years ago- we punish the crimes no matter who they are committed against. What hate crimes does is ADD punishment for crimes against protected segments of society. We don't need hate crime legislation for ANYTHING except for extra punishment for those who dare assault some protected class.
Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also RESIST THE TRUTH: men of CORRUPT MINDS, reprobate concerning the faith. 2Tim 3:8
I just signed a petition demanding that churches should be taxed when they try to influence laws.
Oh, I get it, you don't want laws that reflect Christian morals, but if they reflect your morals that's great. Your public outcry here could well fall in the catagory of a "hate" petition. Where's the ACLU when you need 'em?
A Church doesn't try to influence laws – the people do. Christians have the same rights as you do.
They don't have the right to insert their dogma into politics. Would you really like it if the government started to interfere with your religions?
The gov't interfere's with my religion every day. Do you know how difficult it is to home school? In some states it is virtually impossible. The gov't tells me I have to hire people who violate my belief systems in jobs where the belief system is important. The gov't also punishes Christians who don't want to give sanction to same-sex weddings (like not wanting to photograph them), or not wanting same-sex ceremonies on their property. The gov't is always interfering with religion. Oh but that's okay because you want Christians to be forced to accept what you believe.
If God is all-powerful, why would He create a gay man? He wouldn't, so maybe it is something that is developed in an individual. Therefore I'm going to blame the combination of a domineering mother and passive father for turning a child gay. If we want to get rid of gays let's go back to Ephesians 5:22-23 where it says, "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husband, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife…" I'm all for a law which will ban strong women from getting married. And ladies, remember not to henpeck your husbands about yard work. It might turn your son gay.
Got to go and do some work on my John Deere now.
again.. leave your Christian dogma in your churches, since it doesn't apply to non-Christians.
again…leave your sexual practices in your bedrooms, since it doesn't apply to anyone else.
Nonsense.
Buick, quit "peering" into others bedrooms, nobody wants you watching.
It's the gays who force everyone to know they are gay! How am I supposed to know if you don't tell me????? And the only reason you tell us is to demand our approval. Keep your perversion to yourself and we don't care. It's only when you force acceptance that we object.
You force everyone to know that you're not gay. How do you think people can stand up for their rights, when they're not allowed to tell us how those rights are being violated by people like you?
Yours is the method of any Dictator who wants to deny people freedom of speech first, then all other freedoms.
I've never, ever discussed my sexua preference – I've never gone up to people and said, "Hey, I'm not gay!" Nor do I challenge an employer to know that I'm not gay. People who are not gay don't go around saying that.
You have no rights violated. What you want are rights not belonging to you – you want social sanction for your lifestyle, you want same-sex marriage – which isn't a right!- you want people to kowtow to your demands for special rights. There is not one thing a non-gay has as a right which gays do not have exept marriage, which by definition cannot be between gays.
It is the gays who deny free speech. They want all speech against their behavior silenced. It is the gays who are the dictators. IT is the gays who attack people involved in voting against same-sex unions. Who is denying who rights here? We have the right to keep marriage as it has been historically defined. If you want to redefine it, then you can't justify not allowing incest or polygamy or polyandry.
Glenn, you have an unnatural fear going on here. Believe me, there are many gays out there who would not think of forcing anyone to know they are gay. They just want to be left alone to live their lives. And most of them keep their "perversion" to themselves. So why do you continue to act like you do care?
You guys are ridiculous. So now I have an "unnatural fear." Just because I say homosexual behavior is wrong and that we shouldn't give it social sanction, I therefore have an unnatural fear. Give me a break! I don't care what you do with your sex lives (except I feel sorry for you); what I care about is being forced to accept it as a legitimate use of human sexuality; what I do care about is forcing us to accept the perversion of same-sex "marriage." What I do care about is being being told it is hate speech when I say homosexual behavior is wrong (as happens in Europe and Canada, and will happen here); what I do care about is hate crime legislation punishing people more for crimes against gays than the same crime against me. What I do care about is the government punishing people for not photographing same-sex "weddings" or giving artificial insemination to lesbians. Unnatural fear – you are absurd.
Glenn, you make too much sense and because your comments on this subject are logical and based on the eternal truths of God's word, yours is an opinion the activist crowd fears because it interfers with their pet sin. The sin may differ, but the attempt to justify our sin is common to every sinner – I know from first hand experience!
When God says, "For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God" and "… all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags…" that tells me we're all in a heap of trouble. God's remedy requires us to express faith in , "…the blood of Jesus Christ his Son (because it) cleanseth us from all sin." 1 Jn 1:7
I don't understand one thing. If we started out with Adam and Eve, and they had Cain and Abel, how did those two guys create everyone else? Even if A and E created a few daughters then we must be talking incest.
He surely will.
I've never "pushed" Christianity on anyone, and I don't know any who do. Telling what true Christianity teaches isn't "pushing" it – you can take it or leave it. However, it is you people who are indeed pushing on society your whole idea of same-sex "marriage" and forcing us to accept it by using legal means. Your are the intolerant ones who allow for no opinion but your own.
My opinions are "goofy" and "bizarre" because they are that homosexual behavior is wrong, and that when the Bible is used it should be used as written and not twisted to suit the liberal agenda. Truth is truth whether you call it goofy or bizarre – it is still truth. So the whole object of the thumbs up or thumbs down is whether you agree with the person, not whether the person has a legitimate argument. You don't like what is said you you try to silence it. Typical liberal.
Adam and Eve had many, many children (Gen. 5:4). And yes, what is now known as incest was how the world was propagated. Adam & Eve's children married each other. Which wasn't a problem until genetic defects began entering the system due to the Fall. That is why by the time of Moses God gave the command to no longer marry brother/sister.
It seems people who are abhored by the idea of brothers and sisters marrying have no problem with same-sex marriage. Curious.
It is pushing it when you advocate discrimination against people because they don't adhere to your biblical script.
Marriage is a civil right that should not be forbidden between consenting adults, unless of course you won't mind if they get the same right to tell you whom you can marry.
I also advocate discrimination against a brother and sister who want to marry, and they are also consenting adults (but at least they are biologically compatible!). I also discriminate against a father and adult daughter or mother and adult son who want to marry and they are consenting adults.
Marriage is a civil right between members of the opposite sex who qualify for the union. It is not a civil right to redefine a word to mean anything you want it to mean. That doesn't have to come from religion – it comes from thousands of years of history where societies have said the proper marriage is between members of the opposite sex.
Besides, it isn't "MY" biblical script – the Bible isn't something I wrote. And the Bible is true, God is a fact and you will truly end up knowing it for sure whether you deny it or or not. But quit claiming it is about my religion when I say homosexual behavior is wrong. I had the same beliefs about homosexual behavior for the 22 years I lived prior to becoming a Christian – you know, when I was a pagan!
Home schooling goes beyond religion, so it is NOT gov't interferring with your religion. There are plenty of religous schools out there…You do NOT have to "hire people who violate my belief systems", And how does gov't punish you for not sanctioning same sex weddings?
Home schooler. Explains a lot.
Most home-schooling is done by Christians for the religous reason of not wanting their kids' heads filled with the revisionist histories, amoral sex education, evolutionism, etc. When the gov't says they can't homeschool, that is interfering with their religion. There have been lawsuits by gays who didn't get hired at Chrisitan institutions. The judges always find for the gays. A photographer in AZ (or NM – I forgot) refused to sanction a same-sex wedding by refusing to do the job and gave them someone else – didn't matter, they sued the photographer who was fined big time and had to attend classes where they were taught about diversity the government way.
scary innit?