Category Archives: Homosexuality
When will bigots quit bullying Margaret Court?
(Pastor Margaret Court AO, MBE, OAM: Court at the net in 1970, courtesy Wikipedia)
This article was first published in the Australian e-journal, On Line Opinion, When will bigots quit bullying Margaret Court? 27 January 2021.
It has hit the fan again in pronouncing Australian grand slam singles' tennis champion, Margaret Court, "a bigot" for her views on homosexuality and gay marriage. The yelling has come because she has received the highest civilian honour of the level of the Order of Australia, "The Companion of the Order of Australia," on Australia Day, 26 January 2021.
I'm using bigot according to the customary English definition, as referring to "a person who is utterly intolerant of any differing creed, belief, or opinion" (dictionary.com 2021. s.v. "bigot"). The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) gives a more detailed definition as referring to "a person who is obstinately or unreasonably attached to a belief, opinion, or faction, especially one who is prejudiced against or antagonistic towards a person or people on the basis of their membership of a particular group" (lexico.com 2021. s.v. "bigot").
How is Margaret Court a bigot?
Victorian Premier, Daniel Andrews, slammed "the decision to honour Mrs Margaret Court, saying he didn't want to give her "disgraceful, bigoted views any oxygen. "I think calling out bigotry is always important," he said. He then later reiterated his disapproval of the honour on Twitter: "Grand Slam wins don't give you some right to spew hatred and create division. Nothing does," he wrote.
He spoke of the proposed granting of the Order of Australia (OAM) to Margaret Court on 26 January 2021. Why is the winner of 24 grand slam, singles, tennis championships a bigot according to Daniel Andrews? His claim is her stand on the Bible's view of homosexuality and marriage is the practice of bigotry. He wouldn't use the language of the Bible's view but the media are happy to label her a fundamentalist Christian.
Let's get it straight Premier Daniel Andrews.
Who is being the bigot? Is it Margaret Court who promotes the Bible's view on sex and the marriage relationship or is it Daniel Andrews who is so enamored with the LGBTQ agenda that he can't see the trees for the mulga? Does he need their views for votes at the next election?
Let's get something straight. From the mouth of Margaret Court: She does not discriminate against homosexuals. She 'loves' them: "She insists although the bible stands against homosexuality she 'loves' and supports gay people through her church."
The media and Premier Andrews regularly have a vendetta against Margaret, forgetting to tell the people that this was Jesus' view of the marriage relationship: "God said, 'That is why a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife. And the two people will become one'" (Matthew 19:5, citing Genesis 2:24).
Jesus did not need to say: "Homosexuals should not marry." That was contained by inference in his statement that "a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife." Wives were female in the time of Jesus. Jesus did not support the view that "a man will leave his father and mother and be joined (in sex) with another male."
Was Jesus also being a bigot against homosexuals like Margaret Court is being accused of? Surely the media and Daniel Andrews would place Jesus also in the category of a bigot!
Bigotry is a serious Australian issue.
Daniel Andrews' believes "calling out bigotry is always important. I don't seek to quarrel with people but I'm asked a question and I've answered it." This is one point on which I agree with Mr Andrews. It's important to identify bigotry. Why can't Mr Andrews see that his calling Margaret Court a bigot has caused much harm to her personally and the evangelical Christian community – those who take the Bible seriously?
The Honourable Daniel Andrews in 2018
48th Premier of Victoria
Elections: 2014, 2018 (Image courtesy Wikipedia)
Mr Andrews can't get a handle on his own bigotry of being "utterly intolerant of any differing creed, belief, or opinion." His bigotry opposes an eminent Australian sportswoman who promotes a biblical world view on marriage and sexuality. It has been endorsed by the Christian Church for two millennia. But Mr Andrews considers it's suitable for him to label Margaret Court the bigot and not call himself out as a bigoted, left-wing Labor Premier.
Mr Premier, it's time for you to own up to your own opposition to Margaret Court's world view and call your opposition for what it is – bigotry.
I'm a bigot when it comes to going to the doctor when blood is seeping through my urine. I discriminate at elections. I vote for the party whose values most consistently harmonise with my Christian world view. I will not support a party that murders unborn children and calls it a mother's choice and does not make this a criminal offense.
In Australia, it is now illegal to kill, trap, poison or interfere with wedge-tailed eagles in any way. "In Queensland waters all whales, dolphins, dugong, seals, sea lions, marine turtles and threatened sharks are protected under the provisions of the Nature Conservation Act 1992 (Qld) and relevant subordinate legislation."
Aren't these bigoted, discriminatory actions against this wildlife? Of course it is in order to protect these animals. However, it's not a criminal offence to slaughter unborn children in the womb. When will Australian governments grapple with the legalised murder they endorse?
Since a bigot is one who "is utterly intolerant of any differing creed, belief, or opinion," by definition that makes Dan Andrews a bigot towards someone who is an outspoken supporter of the Bible's view. For 2,000 years this has been taught by the Christian church but when Margaret Court dares to be faithful to her God-given commission, she is called out as a bigot by Daniel Andrews.
When will Dan Andrews also get a handle on how discriminatory his words are towards Margaret Court that should be considered persecution or bullying of Mrs Court? 7Sport (23 Jan 2021) had the headline, "Margaret Court says she's being 'bullied' and it's time for critics to stop."
"Bullying" refers to a "person who habitually seeks to harm or intimidate those whom they perceive as vulnerable" (OED 2021. s.v. "bully"). The OED gives synonyms of bully as persecutor, oppressor, tyrant, tormentor, browbeater, intimidator, coercer, and subjugator. Margaret Court considers she is being bullied and persecuted. By these definitions, that's the truth. The media, some tennis players, and a Premier such as Daniel Andrews have bullied, persecuted and browbeaten Margaret Court. It is time for these people to own up to their bullying and persecution tactics and quit doing them immediately.
Let's black mail Margaret Court!
Two factors need to be noted before I comment on this example. "She" is a transgender person and "she" is an activist who could not tolerate a person who supported a biblical Christian's view of sexuality and marriage. "She" did not use the language of anything to do with a Christian world view.
How would you react to the title of this article? "Canberra doctor hands back OAM in protest against Margaret Court's Australia Day honour" (SBS News, 24 January 2021)?
The essence of the story relates to Dr Clara Tuck Meng Soo AO, who was recognised in 2016 for her work as a medical practitioner with LGBTIQ+ and HIV positive communities. The issue that is causing the furore in 2021 is that Dr Soo is handing back her AO because the decision to award Australia's highest honour to Margaret Court is made to a person who has made comments that are "disparaging of same-sex relationships and transgender people" and that has been "very distressing." For a photograph of Dr Soo, see: https://www.news.com.au/sport/tennis/australian-open/doctor-hands-back-oam-amid-margaret-court-controversy/news-story/17b1183ec9e0f3ce4cf698b13bdf61f6
Dr Soo continued:
If the honour awards people like Margaret Court, it is sending a message to the community that is okay to make hateful, derogatory comments about disadvantaged segments of the community…. And I felt that if I actually retained my award, I would be condoning that system.
It must be noted that Dr Soo is discriminatory towards Margaret Court's Christian world view. Dr Soo let us peer into her agenda. She told SBS News, "I may also add that I have spent most of my adult life as a gay man before my gender transition to a woman in 2018. Therefore, have both professional experience as well as lived experience of the communities that Mrs Margaret Court makes these derogatory and hurtful remarks about."
Leading ABC commentator, Kerry O'Brien, has done the same thing. He has refused to accept the AO medal on Australia Day 2021.
Mr O'Brien had earlier agreed to accept his appointment as an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) in Tuesday's official honours [26 Jan 2021]. But on Saturday, he wrote to reverse his decision in protest against Mrs Court's elevation in an awards system that had already recognised her achievements as the winner of 24 Grand Slam singles tennis titles, and her charity work, with an Order of Australia in 2007 (The Sydney Morning Herald, Kerry O'Brien refuses Order of Australia after Margaret Court honour, 25 January 2021).
Getting honest definitions
There are some queer statements made by those who are anti- the homosexual agenda and those who are pro- the Christian perspective. I'm using "queer" in the sense of strange or odd (OED 2021. s.v. "queer").
This queer definition places homosexuality outside the purview of being able to criticise it and present a different view. That makes the pro-homosexual position one of bigotry or discriminatory.
This queer definition makes Christianity's biblical views of homosexuality into bigotry when compared with the politically correct perspectives promoting gays as a viable lifestyle supported by the general populace.
ABC News (21 Jan 2021) reported Margaret Court's views of her statements about homosexuality and marriage:
I am a minister of the Gospel, I have been a pastor for 30 years," she said.
I teach the bible, what God says in the Bible and I think that is my right and my privilege to be able to bring that forth.
I'm not going to change my opinions and views, and I think it's very important for freedom of speech that we can say our beliefs….
I think it's very sad people hold on to that and still want to bully, and I think it's time to move on.
Pastor Margaret Court said she was "honoured" to learn of her new award for tennis on the court and her work off the court.
I still represent my nation, I pray for my nation, I pray for the LGBT, I pray for the premiers in this nation and the Prime Minister," she said.
When asked about the hurt her views on homosexuality may cause to LGBT people, Ms Court said she never turned people away.
"I have them come in here, I have them into community services from every different background, I never turn them away," she said.
"And I was never really pointing the finger at them as an individual. I love all people, I have nothing against people, but I'm just saying what the bible says."
The 78-year-old said she was disappointed about how her views had been portrayed in the media and feels she was singled out due to her "high profile" (ABC News, 23 January 2021).
The facts are:
(1) The Christian world view and its view on sex, including homosexuality, will always be a country mile from the secular (godless) view. It will be labelled as bigotry or discrimination, without bothering to check that the secular, pro-LGBTIQ view is just as bigoted and discriminatory.
(2) Those who call Margaret Court's Christian view on marriage to be bigoted and discriminatory are blind to the fact that their opposition to Court's view presents another – but different – bigoted approach to reality.
(3) Margaret Court promotes Jesus' vies that marriage is between a man and his female wife in first century culture, customs and biblical Christianity.
How can this be resolved?
Get journalists, Premiers, doctors and other people in the media to be more careful with their words. I can't see that happening.
Examine the presuppositions underlying a person's statements. The likelihood of Daniel Andrews agreeing with Margaret Court's world view is zero. He needs to admit that up front: "I have an agenda and it is not Christian. In fact, it is anti-Christian and I won't change my mind."
Margaret Court has already admitted, "I should always be able to say my views biblically, being a pastor and helping people with marriages and family. And I'll never change those views."
Remember the safety against religious bigotry in the Australian Constitution:
The starting point in any discussion about religious freedom in Australia is section 116 of the Australian Constitution:
The Commonwealth shall not make any law for establishing any religion, or for imposing any religious observance, or for prohibiting the free exercise of any religion, and no religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth.
There are four prohibitions on the Commonwealth in this section:
establishing any religion
imposing any religious observation
prohibiting the free exercise of any religion
requiring a religious test as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth.
Therefore, for Daniel Andrews to prevent Margaret Court from the free exercise of the teachings on Christianity, he violates one of the prohibitions, "the free exercise of any religion," guaranteed by the Australian Constitution.
Copyright © 2021 Spencer D. Gear. This document last updated at Date: 27 January 2021.
This entry was posted in Cultural Apologetics, Freedom of Religion, Homosexuality, Mass media and tagged bigotry, Daniel Andrews, discrimination, Grand Slam tennis, Homosexuality, Margaret Court on 27 January 2021 by spencer.
Have politics changed ScoMo's Christianity?
'I'm not running for Pope'
The Honourable Scott Morrison MP
30th Prime Minister of Australia
This article was first published by On Line Opinion, 6 November 2019.
What is Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, telling us about his Christianity with these statements?
Before becoming PM, he did not support same-sex marriage. What about now?
When interviewed by Leigh Sales, he had an opportunity to tell those watching what his views were on the existence and nature of God. He pushed that one aside with a 'love' view.
He's a Christian who doesn't mix religion and politics.
Which God is he serving? He and his family attend Horizon Church, Sutherland Shire, NSW, Australia. This is a Pentecostal congregation associated with the Australian Christian Churches, affiliated with the Assemblies of God worldwide.
He allowed the mass media into the worship service to see him with his wife at Easter Sunday service 2019. ScoMo was praising God with hand raised. This is a common practice in Pentecostal and other evangelical church worship, supported by Bible passages such as Psalm 63:4.
This article will examine how Morrison's Christianity integrates in public with his politics.
1. Prime Minister's moral views
When he was treasurer in 2016, he did not support change from traditional to same-sex marriage. This is in agreement with Jesus' endorsement of heterosexual relationships:
'''Haven't you read,' he replied, 'that at the beginning the Creator "made them male and female," and said, "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh"? So they are no longer two, but one flesh' (Matthew 19:4-6).
What about abortion?
The context of the recent abortion debate in NSW was when the PM acknowledged it was a State issue where the MPs and MLCs were granted a conscience vote. He would not make it a Commonwealth issue but acknowledged
"I have what I would describe as conservative views on this issue as people know I have on other issues. That's really all I think I need to say".
That statement was made after he became PM.
2. When new moral views become law
Now that homosexual marriage has been legalised in Australia, what is Morrison's view? Notice how he dodges the journalist's questions:
When pressed on whether his opinions have changed, he told reporters in Perth: "I always support the law of the country".
So, he supports Australian law but won't own up to his current personal beliefs about homosexuality. I wonder, as a Pentecostal Christian, whether he accepts the Bible's view on the topic.
OUTinPerth, an LGBTIQ+ news source, observed ScoMo's views on homosexuality when a journalist interviewed him in Perth. Now he was supportive of same-sex couples being allowed to 'get on with their lives' because he 'always supports the law of the country'.
ScoMo would not be drawn into a discussion on whether he believed 'gay people would be sent to hell' – referring to the Israel Folau controversy.
3. His views on God
Leigh Sales of ABC's 7.30 grilled him on this topic: 'I'm not running for Pope,' Mr Morrison shot back. "I'm running for Prime Minister. And the theological questions are not ones that are actually, I think, germane to the political debate in this country'.
Then he defined faith as loving others, 'which is what I've always believed'. His parents taught by example, serving in local youth organisations, boys and girls brigade for the youth in their community. 'They taught me a life of faith and service and that's what my faith means to me. It means service and caring for others'.
He had an ideal public opportunity to declare his belief in the Lord God Almighty and Jesus the Saviour who offers salvation to the world. He turned to the 'loving others' definition of who God is. In my view he dodged the issues regarding attributes of God for a Christian PM.
When will ScoMo have the courage to lead the country in repentance and prayer for rain? He stated when it rained in Albury: 'I do pray for that rain. And I'd encourage others who believe in the power of prayer to pray for that rain and to pray for our farmers. Please do that'.
We heard former PM, Malcolm Turnbull, state, 'We can't make it rain'. Step up to the mark ScoMo. You know the One who sends and withholds rain: God the Father 'lets the sun rise for all people, whether they are good or bad. He sends rain to those who do right and to those who do wrong'.
I'm waiting on Morrison's call to the nation to flood into churches, public halls and local parks to pray earnestly for rain. We can't force God to send the rain but he has told us to 'never stop praying' and wait for his sovereign action in sending the liquid gold to the parched regions of the nation.
It is time for this Christian PM to tell us who sends the rain. This view espoused by many that 'we can't make it rain' is true but it avoids announcing who sends rain and how we should respond to the drought.
4. Religion does not mix with politics
Morrison told a journalist, 'he doesn't "mix [his] religion with politics"'.
Regarding homosexuals and hell, he clarified his view before the 2019 election: 'No, I do not believe that', he told SBS News.
However, only a year prior he supported Israel Folau's 'strength of character in standing up for what he believes in and I think that's what this country is all about'. Folau believes sinners go to hell. Does he support Folau's 'strength of character' without affirming Folau's moral and theological beliefs?
Does he believe all sinners go to hell? I have not found his making a clear public statement about this.
However, The Horizon Church where he and his family attend, stated in its Doctrinal Basis (for Australian Christian Churches), 'We believe in the everlasting punishment of the wicked (in the sense of eternal torment) who wilfully reject and despise the love of God manifested in the great sacrifice of his only Son on the cross for their salvation' (Bible references provided).
If ScoMo is a member of that Church he would have to accept this teaching.
5. Which Bible does ScoMo read?
Twelve months ago when he was treasurer, Morrison's views on morality and a Christian world view do not match his philosophy with biblical teaching today. From what I've written above, alarm bells should be ringing of conflicts between his beliefs and actions.
The first alarm concerns how a person's world view affects life in the real world, including politics. All of us have a world view, a lens through which we look and interpret all of life.
The global warming world view uses a certain set of lenses. Left wing and right wing agitators also use different lenses. The Christian and atheistic world views see life through the theistic God's existence (Christian) and the lack of evidence for God (atheism).
For ScoMo to state he doesn't 'mix religion with politics', he violates a Christian fundamental belief: 'And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him' (Colossians 3:17).
So, ScoMo, as a biblical Christian, should live by the teaching: 'I must mix my Christianity with political thinking and actions. By this I give thanks to God the Father through Jesus'.
A second alarm deals with ScoMo's acceptance of moral issues after they become law, e.g. homosexual marriage and abortion. The biblical view is that promoted by Peter and the apostles when confronted with the Jewish high council (the Sanhedrin).
The high priest stated: 'We gave you strict orders not to teach in this name. Look, you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching, and you intend to bring this man's blood on us! But Peter and the apostles replied, "We must obey God rather than people" (Acts 5:28-29).
Should that be ScoMo's approach to legislation that clashes with Scripture?
6. Bible, homosexuality and abortion
First Corinthians 6:9-11 is clear. Wrong doers or the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God. These include those who indulge in sexual sin, worship idols, commit adultery, are male prostitutes, practise homosexuality, are thieves, greedy, drunkards, abusive, or cheat people.
If they don't inherit the kingdom of God, where do they go at death? Jesus said regarding the last judgment: 'They [the unrighteous] will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous will go into eternal life' (Matthew 25:46).
Therefore, Izzy scored the try across the biblical line while ScoMo fumbled the biblical material and presented a view that is foreign to the text.
(aborted 22 weeks, Campaign Life Coalition)
As for God's view on abortion, is it more than ScoMo's 'conservative' view? Is the unborn a living human being (from God's perspective) whose right to live should be preserved? Or is the unborn child a lump of cells of no more value than a chicken fillet?
Scripture teaches that human life exists in the womb: 'You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother's womb' (Psalm 139:13).
In the New Testament (NT), when Mary and Elizabeth met, both being pregnant, Elizabeth's baby (John the Baptist) 'leaped in her womb' in salutation of Mary's baby, Jesus. Of special significance in Luke's account is that he used the same word brephos (NT Greek) for an unborn child (1:41, 44), the new-born baby (2:12, 16) and the little ones brought to Jesus to bless (18:15).
Medical science agrees. Every human life begins at conception. The approximately 65,000 murdered in Australian abortions every year are pre-born children – human beings.
In 1970, in the midst of the United States' abortion debate (it was legalised in 1973), the editors of the journal California Medicine (the official journal of the California Medical Association), noticed 'a curious avoidance of thescientific fact, which everyone really knows, that human life begins at conception and is continuous whether intra or extrauterine until death'.
Therefore, to kill an unborn infant is to murder a human being.
ScoMo's world view is not driven by biblical Christianity's, 'We must obey God rather than human beings'. When he reneges on what the Bible says about the destiny of all evil doers, including homosexuals, he has made a trade off to weaken what the Bible states.
To affirm that he is not running for Pope and serves a God of love avoids fuller explanation of who God is: All-powerful, one who knows all things, has wrath as well as love; he offers salvation to all who believe; we can know him truly, and he is eternal.
Could you imagine ScoMo taking a stand on the 7.30 program like this? 'As a Christian who believes in the inspiration of the Bible, I endorse the content of Israel Folau's Instagram post. As a Christian PM, everything I say and do will be under the scrutiny of the Bible'.
I appreciate that that kind of comment would lose some votes at the next election – while gaining others – and could be used by the opposition to denigrate his beliefs in a multicultural Australia. Nevertheless, the Australian Constitution has its foundation in the five states that joined together, 'humbly relying on the blessing of Almighty God'.
All Christians are faced with the ScoMo challenge: 'Everything you say and everything you do should be done for Jesus your Lord'. Imagine the PM saying it like that to Leigh Sales!
In my view, the public life of politics has weakened ScoMo's overt Christianity.
ScoMo what will it be? Spiritual correctness or political correctness? Your future will depend on it.
This entry was posted in Attributes, Cultural Apologetics, Government, Hell and Eternal Punishment, Homosexuality, Presuppositions and tagged abortion, compromise, God sends rain, Prime Minister Scott Morrison on 2 November 2019 by spencer.
Intolerant Intolerance
(Wintour photograph courtesy Wikimedia Commons)
This article was first published (without the graphics and subject headings) in On Line Opinion, 21 Febrary 2019.
During the January 2019 Australian Open Tennis Grand Slam, Anna Wintour, long time fashion editor with Vogue, spoke publicly about her disagreement with champion tennis player, Margaret Court, over homosexual marriage.
Dame Anna Wintour DBE dived into the 'intolerance' issue against homosexuals. Her target was tennis champion, Margaret Court.
(Margaret Court Arena, photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons)
The Age reported that Wintour 'has thrown her support behind the push to rename Margaret Court Arena over the tennis champion's opposition to same-sex marriage'.
Wintour stated, 'I find that it is inconsistent with the sport for Margaret Court's name to be on a stadium that does so much to bring all people together across their differences"', in a speech delivered at the Australian Open Inspirational Series in Melbourne on Thursday [24 January 2019] , to applause.
She continued: 'This much I think is clear to anyone who understands the spirit and the joy of the game.Intolerance has no place in tennis" emphasis added).
Wintour continued her broadside against those who support traditional family values:
"I have been alarmed by your prime minister's record on LGBTQ rights, which seems backward in all senses," she said.
"That no one can be expelled from school for their orientation, should not require clarification. A government should protect its people, not make it unclear whether they will be accepted."
Not once in that article did the journalist mention Anna Wintour's intolerance towards Margaret Court and Scott Morrison.
I find it disconcerting when a person opposes the 'intolerance' of Margaret Court on the subject of homosexuality and doesn't see her own intolerance towards Margaret Court's values.
It is a self-contradictory statement to accuse another person of intolerance while perpetrating the same oneself.
Other media joined the Wintour refrain
(image courtesy longfordpc.com)
There were a considerable number of mass media examples that promoted the Wintour homosexual chorus. Three instances were from:
ABC News Brisbane, Qld reported that 'Wintour said when Australia passed same-sex marriage in 2017, "the world sang in celebration" with it'. Wintour continued:
"Intolerance has no place in tennis. What we love [is] watching these remarkable men and women exceed themselves while being themselves in many different forms.
"Margaret Court was a champion on the court but a meeting point for players of all nations, preferences, and backgrounds should celebrate somebody who was a champion off the court as well."
Do you hear Wintour's 'off the court' intolerance towards Margaret Court's sexual values as a Christian?
This article quoted Margaret Court's views about the approach of her opponents who call for the renaming of the Margaret Court Arena at Melbourne Park. Court called this 'another example of freedom of religion under threat…. I should be able to have my say as a minister of the Gospel…. I believe I shouldn't be bullied for what I did in my past'.
Not a word was stated in this article about Wintour's intolerance towards Margaret Court's views.
Channel 9:
MSN Channel 9 explained the Wintour event with similar quotes to those by The Age and ABC News Brisbane about Primer Minister Scott Morrison and tennis champion and now Christian minister, Margaret Court.
Wintour didn't hold back about her views on the proposed amendments to the Sex Discrimination Act:
"That no-one can be expelled from school for their orientation should not require clarification," Wintour added, referring to previous proposals for the Sex Discrimination Act to be amended in a way to allow religious schools to do so.
"A government should protect its people, not make it unclear whether they will be accepted and we are struggling with these issues in the United States as well."
This article failed to expose Wintour's own intolerance in her speech.
News.com.au provided similar details on the Wintour speech, with a sub-heading, 'Fashion legend Anna Wintour has taken a swipe at Australia's Prime Minister and one of our greatest tennis stars in a scathing speech'.
This news report and others were pleased to use Wintour's statement in her speech: 'This much I think is clear to anyone who understands the spirit and the joy of the game. Intolerance has no place in tennis'.
Again there was no effort to demonstrate Wintour's own intolerance.
In this article I point to an apparent lack of discernment by journalists into the nature of intolerance that Wintour actively perpetrated. She practised the very thing she complained about with Margaret Court and Scott Morrison.
This is one of the main issues:
Dr Jeremy Sherman exposed the nature of Wintour's intolerant intolerance with examples from other situations that can be applied specifically to Wintour's proclamation at the speech delivered at the Australian Open Inspirational Series in Melbourne on 24 January 2019.
"It's true. We shouldn't tolerate intolerance. We should nip it in the bud, set clear boundaries."
"If we tolerate intolerance it spreads: Racism, sexism, prejudices of all sorts, judgmentalism, negativity, bigotry, factions squaring off and fighting: right vs. left, this fundamentalism vs. that."
"An eye for an eye just leaves the whole world blind."
"To bring about greater harmony we must all of us be tolerant. No exceptions. Loving, listening, caring for each other, respecting each other's opinions whatever they may be."
Sherman exposed our hypocrisy when we try to tolerate certain behaviours yet name others as being intolerant. He said the 'truest practical question' is 'not whether to be tolerant or intolerant but when to be which'.
So far, I have not noticed the mass media I read expose Wintour's intolerance of her own views – against Margaret Court's and Scott Morrison's views.
Sherman rightly exposed the dilemma:
'Folks who don't notice the hypocrisy don't appreciate the bind we're all in and they cut themselves unconscionable slack. They manage the bind ineptly at best, self-servingly at worst, telling people not to be judgmental when they're being criticized, and not noticing they're being judgmental when criticizing others'.
In applying this to Wintour's speech content, Wintour didn't seem to be aware that she herself was intolerant towards Margaret Court's and Scott Morrison's values. It would been startling to hear Wintour admit: 'I oppose Court's views on homosexuality, but in saying that, I'm making an admission this is an intolerant statement I'm making'.
It would have been even more remarkable to hear Wintour admit: 'We live in a free society where freedom of religion and thought are allowed. It shouldn't be surprising that a modern society like ours accepts homosexual behaviour, but I should not lambast Margaret Court's worldview as that would demonstrate my intolerance'.
Michael Mendis calls it 'the paradox of tolerance' because tolerance is a 'self-contradictory principle' as it is reflexive. The phrase is not original with him:
He stated that the principle of tolerance 'dictates that we must be tolerant of everything. We cannot pick and choose what we will tolerate and what we will not. If this is so, then tolerance requires us to tolerate even intolerance'.
Thus, if somebody is proclaiming or practising intolerance, Mendis rightly observes that 'the tolerant person cannot, in principle, speak out against what the intolerant person is doing, since speaking out against intolerance would itself be an act of intolerance".
Therefore, his assessment was that 'tolerance as a principle, then, is clearly illogical, and therefore irrational. It is much more logical and rational to espouse intolerance, for then one does not get entangled in any contradictions-self or otherwise.
Intolerance as a principle does not require us to be consistently and universally intolerant'.
Who raised this paradox?
Enter Sir Karl Popper, Austrian-British philosopher of science and political philosopher:
"Less well known is the paradox of tolerance: Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them".
In my view, it shows the lack of logical precision by the Australian mass media that they don't expose the intolerant intolerance by Dame Anna Wintour's statements against Margaret Court's Christian beliefs about homosexuality and the Prime Minister's views on amendments to the Sex Discrimination Act.
Intolerant tolerance of Court's & Morrison's values
(image courtesy 123RF.com)
The Collins' Dictionary (online) defines 'intolerance' as an 'unwillingness to let other people act in a different way or hold different opinions from you' (2019. s.v. intolerance).
Therefore, for Wintour to accuse Margaret Court of intolerance because she didn't support same-sex marriage is to engage in an act of intolerance towards Court's values. When will the supporters of certain values wake up to the fact that to accuse opponents of being intolerant is to engage in an act of intolerance perpetrated by themselves?
Other media join the Wintour spin
1. Sporting News, Australian Open: Anna Wintour slams Margaret Court over gay marriage stance (24 January 2019).
2. Perth Now, Wintour of discontent gets a serve from WA tennis legend Margaret Court (25 January 2019).
3. Daily Mail Australia, Fashion icon Anna Wintour slams Scott Morrison's gay rights record and calls for the Margaret Court Arena to be renamed in a fiery speech – but she's not Snow White when it comes to the #MeToo era (24 January 2019).
4. Women's Agenda, Thank you Anna Wintour for highlighting what should be key to sport: 'Intolerance has no place' (February 2019).
5. Vogue Australia, Anna Wintour on inclusivity and the power of tennis (24 January 2019).
6. Fox Sports, Australian Open 2019: Anna Wintour calls for Margaret Court Arena to be renamed (24 January 2019).
7. SBS News, Vogue editor Anna Wintour slams Scott Morrison on LGBTQ rights (24 January 2019).
8. WWD, Anna Wintour Slams Margaret Court and Australian PM Over LGBT Issues (24 January 2019).
9. 3AW News Talk, Tom Elliott takes "hypocritical" Anna Wintour to task over Margaret Court comments (24 January 2019).
10. CNN, Anna Wintour slams Margaret Court, Scott Morrison over LGBTQ rights (25 January 2019).
See: Be Intolerant Of Intolerance! At: https://www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/ambigamy/201501/be-intolerant-intolerance
Also, The Paradox of Tolerance: https://bigthink.com/the-paradox-of-tolerance
Enter Karl Popper: Paradox of tolerance, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance
Singer, M 2019. 'Intolerance has no place in tennis': Wintour criticises Margaret Court. The Age (online), 24 January 2019. Available at: https://www.theage.com.au/lifestyle/fashion/intolerance-has-no-place-in-tennis-wintour-criticises-margaret-court-20190124-p50tcs.html (Accessed 8 February 2019).
(image courtesy Brotherhood News:
Facebook censors biblical posts against homosexuality)
This entry was posted in Apologetics, Homosexuality, Intolerance, Thoughtful Christianity and tagged Anna Wintour, Homosexuality, Intolerance, Margaret Court, tennis on 5 March 2019 by spencer.
(courtesy dreamstime)
(courtesy PublicDomainPictures.net)
In 2014-2015, Senator David Leyonhjelm in the Australian federal Senate has been promoting a Bill to legalise same-sex marriage (with support from other politicians). It was reported: 'Liberal Democrat David Leyonhjelm introduces same-sex marriage bill' (The Sydney Morning Herald, November 26, 2014). The Sydney Morning Herald also provided information on 'the surprise visitor [Senator Cory Bernardi] at David Leyonhjelm's gay marriage press conference' (SMH March 19, 2015). What has happened to the Bill? Leyonhjelm told Sky News that he expected the Bill to be debated in federal parliament in 2016. See, 'Gay marriage vote in 2016 says Leyonhjelm' (Sky News, 2 June 2015).
I wrote to the Queensland Senators to provide evidence why they should not support homosexual marriage. I wrote as a Queensland elector, one who has been a counsellor and/or counselling manager for 34 years, and someone who is not a homophobe.
Reasons not to support homosexual marriage
I urged the Senators not to support or promote this legislation for these reasons:
1. While there have been widows and single parents since the beginning of time, the marriage of a man and woman has been the norm to have the potential to produce children naturally. To change this is to change a necessary fundamental of society.
2. To go down the road of same-sex marriage would be a potentially dangerous social experiment in Australia for the following reasons:
One of those is the impact on children born to surrogates and then parented by a same-sex couple. Too often, the man who donated the sperm or the woman who donated the ovum is not known to the child. Article 7 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child states: 'The child shall be registered immediately after birth and shall have the right from birth to a name, the right to acquire a nationality and. as far as possible, the right to know and be cared for by his or her parents'. All children, wherever possible, have the right to know and they need both mother and father. Such is not possible with many homosexual couples where there are children.
3. All is not well with children from some homosexual parents. On 19 March 2015, The Courier-Mail published the article, 'Heather Barwick, the daughter of lesbians, against gay marriage, defends Dolce & Gabbana'. Part of what she wrote was:
"I'm writing to you because I'm letting myself out of the closet: I don't support gay marriage. But it might not be for the reasons that you think. It's not because you're gay. I love you, so much. It's because of the nature of the same-sex relationship itself," she said. "Same-sex marriage and parenting withholds either a mother or father from a child while telling him or her that it doesn't matter. That it's all the same. But it's not. A lot of us, a lot of your kids, are hurting. My father's absence created a huge hole in me, and I ached every day for a dad. I loved my mum's partner, but another mum could never have replaced the father I lost."
'Growing up, and even into my 20s, I supported and advocated for gay marriage. It's only with some time and distance from my childhood that I'm able to reflect on my experiences and recognise the long-term consequences that same-sex parenting had on me," she said. "It's only now, as I watch my children loving and being loved by their father each day, that I can see the beauty and wisdom in traditional marriage and parenting".
(Male same-sex couple with a child, courtesy Wikipedia)
A new study of children raised by homosexual parents by sociologist Mark Regnerus of the University of Texas at Austin reverses the conventional academic understanding that such children are not at a disadvantage when compared to children raised by a married mother and father. The article in the journal, Social Science Research, has found that 'the children of homosexuals did worse (or, in the case of their own sexual orientation, were more likely to deviate from the societal norm) on 77 out of 80 outcome measures. (The only exceptions: children of "gay fathers" were more likely to vote; children of lesbians used alcohol less frequently; and children of "gay fathers" used alcohol at the same rate as those in intact biological families)'.[1]
This newer study contradicts earlier research which was reported in, 'Children of same-sex couples thriving: study' (The Sydney Morning Herald, April 6, 2013).
Therefore, the same-sex relationship, even in marriage, does not have the same dynamics as those for the man-woman relationship and may have detrimental consequences on children and our society as the following points illustrate.
4. The rectum is not designed for sexual penetration; the vagina is. Anal sex is a high risk sexual activity. One of the many hazards is the vulnerability of the tissues to tearing and bleeding. Damage can be done to the sphincter muscles that may lead to incontinence and rectal prolapse. There is a high level of organisms that may cause disease in the rectum. Do you want these medical issues to be added to the already overloaded Medicare system?
5. Some research has shown that the risk for transmission of HIV is higher for anal sex than for vaginal sex. This report from 2008, "Inequitable Impact: The HIV/AIDS epidemic among gay and bisexual men and other men who have sex with men in Massachusetts", demonstrates the increased HIV rate among MSM (men having sex with men) in Massachusetts
6. Please read this assessment by Brian Camenker in 2008 of "What same-sex marriage has done to Massachusetts: It's far worse than most people realize". Examine the impact in Massachusetts on education in schools right down to the primary school level. Observe how it influences public health, increased domestic violence, business, the legal profession, adoption of children, Government mandates, the public square and the mass media.
(diagram anal cancer, stage 1, courtesy Wikipedia)
7. The anal cancer problem. 'For HIV-positive Gay Men, the risk is even further elevated. In a recent meta-analysis of all studies describing anal cancer incidence in Gay Men living with HIV, it was reported that anal cancer incidence increased to 78-100 per 100,000 per year in reports published after 1996. These data demonstrate that the incidence of anal cancer is increasing in HIV-positive men, despite the improved general health associated with effective HIV therapies.
The incidence of anal cancer in men and women who identify as heterosexual and have HIV is about 20 per 100,000' (Submission, June 2014, 'Anal Cancer-Diagnosis, Monitoring and Management in Sydney and South East Sydney Local Health Districts', Positive Life NSW).
So, the occurrence in anal cancer for homosexual men is 4-5 times higher than for heterosexual men and women. Marriage is not likely to stop this incidence in the homosexual population, but Senators should be promoting the message in Parliament and to the mass media that the homosexual lifestyle has some deleterious medical consequences.
Another report on anal cancer indicated that 'in the general population, anal cancer is a rare disease…. Among men who have sex with men (MSM), the incidence of anal cancer is significantly more prevalent and increasing annually' (National lgbt Cancer Network, 'Anal Cancer, HIV and Gay/Bisexual Men', 2013).
8. The foundation of Australia's healthy democracy and laws has been built on a Christian world view that promotes heterosexual marriage for the health of the nation, which states that 'a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh' (Genesis 2:24). Jesus Christ affirmed heterosexuality for the norm of society when he repeated the Genesis mandate, 'For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh' (Matthew 19:5). Paul promoted it in Ephesians 5:31. If Australia moves away from this foundational law for a just and fair family, it will be violating a fundamental of Australia's national cultural health.
In light of these details, I urge all politicians not to vote for any Bill that legalises homosexual marriage.
[1] Mark Regnerus 2012, 'How different are the adult children of parents who have same-sex relationships? Findings from the New Family Structures Study', Social Science Research Vol 41, Issue 4, July, pp. 752-770. Available at: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0049089X12000610 (Accessed 21 March 2015, emphasis in original).
Copyright © 2015 Spencer D. Gear. This document last updated at Date: 2 December 2015.
This entry was posted in Government, Homosexual marriage, Homosexuality, Marriage & the Family on 2 December 2015 by spencer.
What did Jesus say about homosexuality?
Courtesy Salt Shakers (Christian ministry)
Those who oppose a Christian view of homosexuality often come up with some interesting provocative resistance. Here is one I encountered on an online Christian forum:
There is no justification for a proscription against homosexuality as a "moral" law, although as a practical matter, it may have been forbidden as a violation of the stricture to "be fruitful and multiply".
What did Jesus have to say about homosexuality?[1]
There was no need for Jesus to make a direct statement against homosexuality because He had established the boundaries of sexuality. What He spoke clearly about was sexuality in general. Of marriage, Jesus stated, 'At the beginning the Creator "made them male and female," and said, "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate' (Matthew 19:4–6).
Jesus here cited from Genesis and the relationship of Adam and Eve and affirmed God's design for marriage and sexuality. It was heterosexual and not homosexual as Genesis 2:24 states, 'That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh' (NIV).
Thus, Jesus did not make a direct statement such as, 'Thou shalt not commit a homosexual act', for Jesus to confirm he was against homosexuality. The affirmation in Matthew 19:4-6 was all that was needed to provide God's parameters for sexual relationships.
Homosexual behaviour as sin
I wrote to Jim: You don't seem to grasp that in the New Testament, Jesus' words have no more authority than other NT Scripture (2 Tim 3:16). What Paul wrote about homosexuality is just as inspired (breathed out by God) as that by Jesus. Paul wrote:
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[3] nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 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 (1 Corinthians 6:9-11 NIV).
Paul is clear that homosexuality is among the sins that will cause a person not to inherit the kingdom of God. There are other sins that are included in this group.
Homosexuals can be changed
But the fantastic news is, 'That is what some of you were' (1 Cor 6:11). Like the sins of sexual immorality, idolatry, adultery, theft, greed, drunkenness, slander and swindling, homosexual sins can be forgiven. Thus, Paul places homosexual sin among sinful behaviour that can be forgiven and not as a sexual orientation. Sexual orientation is a secular, contemporary labelling. 'Such were some of you' is a clear indication that all these sins can be changed by the living God – including homosexuality.
Without faith in the buried and resurrected Christ of Golgotha, Jim and other sinful rebels are not likely to understand the biblical view on homosexuality. They need a heart change that involves, 'that is what some of your were' – an encounter with the living Christ – before their views of homosexuality will change. If that happens, hardening of the heart will continue.
What is a hard heart?
A hard heart is an obstinate and calloused heart that fails to respond to God or obey him. A hard heart is blind to the precious value of the gospel and refuses to embrace Christ (Rom. 11:8). Most precariously, a hard heart is synonymous with spiritual ignorance and alienation from God (Eph. 4:18) (Reinke 2014).
That's what I encountered with Jim, the atheist.
Reinke, T 2014. You Asked: Does God Harden a Believer's Heart? The Gospel Coalition (online), March 18. Available at: http://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/you-asked-does-god-harden-a-believers-heart (Accessed 21 November 2015).
[1] JimOdom#106, Christian Fellowship Forum, 'Five things I wish Christians would admit about the Bible'. Available at: http://forums.compuserve.com/discussions/Christian_Fellowship_Forum/_/_/ws-fellowship/123829.106?scrollTo=os_message_106&nav=messages (Accessed 2 March 2015).
[3] At this point in the NIV (New International Version), the footnote was: '1 Corinthians 6:9: The words men who have sex with men translate two Greek words that refer to the passive and active participants in homosexual acts'.
This entry was posted in Homosexuality, Jesus Christ on 21 November 2015 by spencer.
Traditional marriage = anti-marriage equality
I was alerted to what SBS television had done with censoring heterosexual marriage by an item on news.com.au. The heading of the article was, 'Anti-marriage equality ad pulled from SBS TV' (March 09, 2015).
AN ADVERTISEMENT critical of same-sex marriage was pulled by SBS management ahead of their telecast of the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras on Sunday night, the ad's sponsors say.
The Australian Marriage Forum said in a statement that the ad was booked and scheduled for broadcast during a Sunday night Mardi Gras special.
Dr van Gend says the ad was booked and paid for before he received an email on Friday to inform him it had been pulled from the Sunday night schedule. "I've unfortunately been instructed to advise you that we choose not to run this TVC for the Marriage Forum during the Mardi Gras telecast," the email from SBS sales manager for Queensland, Nick Belof, said….
Dr van Gend said: "It is outrageous for a taxpayer funded broadcaster like SBS to apply censorship to one side of the debate on same-sex marriage."
"SBS is funded by taxpayers on both sides of the same-sex 'marriage' debate", Dr van Gend said.
Dr van Gend called the cancellation of the ad a "suppression of free speech on a matter of public importance".
An SBS spokesperson told Fairfax Media that it reserved the right "to determine what advertisements it broadcasts" (emphasis in original).
My complaint about this censorship
(courtesy clker)
SBS TV is an Australian public broadcaster. It receives government funds to the tune of approximately $275,000 a year (see below) from the Australian taxpayer. So, on 11 March 2015, I sent this email:
SBS television comments@sbs.com.au
Dear manager,
I object strongly to what SBS, a publicly funded broadcaster, did to an advertisement by the Australian Marriage Forum (AMF) on SBS on Saturday evening, 7 March, when SBS was telecasting the Gay Mardi Gras.
Here is a link to the advertisement that your network censored: youtu.be/s80wL5al5NA.
The AMF advertisement was booked and paid for to be shown on Saturday night, 7 March, during the SBS delayed broadcast of the Parade – but only on Friday 6 March did the AMF agent receive this message from SBS management: 'We choose not to run this TVC for the Marriage Forum during the Mardi Gras telecast'.[1]
No explanation was given. This is disgusting discrimination against the heterosexual community and traditional marriage. It is censorship to be condemned.
Please advise me why your publicly funded network engaged in this kind of discriminatory censorship of an advt that had been paid for and scheduled to be telecast?
Mr S Gear
SBS reply
On 11 March 2015, SBS replied:
Dear Spencer,
Thank you for contacting SBS.
SBS reserves the right to determine what advertisements it broadcasts.
Regardless, I have passed on your comments to our relevant departments as viewer feedback.
SBS Audience Relations
In other words, SBS continues to promote its censorship with 'SBS reserves the right to determine what advertisements it broadcasts'. That's not how Sam McLean of The Drum saw it.
'SBS should have run this offensive ad'
Sam McLean of ABC's, The Drum, even though he objected to the content of the advertisement, complained that SBS should have telecast the ad:
I was offended by the Australian Marriage Forum's new anti marriage equality TV ad, but we shouldn't censor any one side of a political debate, writes Sam McLean.
A lot of people have been in uproar over the Australian Marriage Forum's new anti marriage equality TV advertisement – chief among them, my fellow progressives.
The ad, which the AMF pitched for a provocative first run on the night of Sydney Mardi Gras, implies same-sex marriage poses a danger to children. I was offended by the ad, but frankly, so too by SBS refusing to run it.
Yes, the ad is incendiary. Yes, it is wrong. But yes, the AMF has absolutely every right to run it – and no broadcaster should be able to deny them that. An email from SBS sales manager for Queensland, Nick Belof, reads:
Our review board has instructed that SBS has the right to choose what ads we run, and I've unfortunately been instructed to advise you that we choose not to run this TVC for the Marriage Forum during the Mardi Gras telecast (Mclean 2015, emphasis in original).
The following represents a summary of the ABC and SBS funding from the Australian government over the next 5 years (Turnbull 2014):
Therefore, for the 2014-2015 financial year, $287,023 was funded from government proceeds to run this operation. The conclusion is that '80 per cent of funding for the SBS Corporation is derived from the Australian Government through triennial funding arrangements. Funding is legislated annually through the Budget Appropriation Bills…. The remainder of SBS revenue is derived from independent sources. These include advertising and sponsorship, production services and sale of programs and merchandise' (Jolly 2007).
ringsview.com
Several issues are playing out in our Australian culture and the promotion of homosexual marriage:
The promotion of heterosexual marriage in the language of anti-marriage equality, is deconstructing language to make heterosexual marriage mean something else.
SBS has censored one side of the debate, the discussion that supports traditional marriage. That is abhorrent for a public broadcaster that receives 80% of its funding from the Australian government. It is supposed to represent ALL Australians and not just the homosexual community and its supporters.
Those who support 'marriage equality' are 'fellow progressives' (Sam McLean). This again is deconstructing language. In an era of political correctness, to be conservative and supporting traditional marriage is to be radical in a mass media environment that wants to silence the traditional marriage voice.
Sam McLean rightly concluded, 'The anti marriage equality lobbyists said it was unfair for SBS to apply censorship to one side of the debate on same-sex marriage, and I agree' (McLean 2015). I would have stated it this way: Those promoting traditional marriage consider the censorship of their advertisement was unfair for SBS to withdraw the advertising.
It's impossible or extremely difficult to get through to public mass media with an alternate message to their allegedly progressive, anti-conservative views. Penetrating the barrier is like pounding a brick wall with a foam hammer.
hanglogic
Jolly, R 2007. Special Broadcasting Service (SBS): Operations and funding. Parliament of Australia: House of Representatives, 28 March. Available at: http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/Publications_Archive/archive/SBS (Accessed 10 August 2015).
McLean, S 2015. SBS should have run this offensive ad. The Drum (ABC), 13 March. Available at: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-03-13/mclean-sbs-shouldnt-censor-anti-gay-marriage-ad/6314748 (Accessed 10 August 2015).
Turnbull, M 2014. Communications and Broadband: FAQs on the ABC and SBS, How much do the national broadcasters receive from taxpayers in the budget each year? (online) Malcolm Turnbull MP, Minister for Communications, 19 December. Available at: http://www.malcolmturnbull.com.au/communications-broadband/faqs-on-the-abc-and-sbs#budget (Accessed 10 August 2015).
[1] Included in McLean (2015).
This entry was posted in Homosexual marriage, Homosexuality, Marriage & the Family, Mass media on 10 August 2015 by spencer.
A Christian discussion of homosexuality and sexuality
(image in public domain)
I have spent many years in counselling individuals and families and sometimes dealing with their sexual expressions. I retired in 2011 after 17-years full time as a counselling manager and counsellor of youth, families, relationships and marriages – most of it in a secular environment.
To raise the topic of homosexuality and sexuality from a Christian perspective, automatically raises suspicion in some quarters, especially with secularists in the mass media and in online forums. There is quite a bit of confusion in this area today because of the increasing promotion of homosexuality and homosexual marriage as an acceptable lifestyle choice.
How should evangelical Christians (including myself) respond to this kind of explanation of homosexual behaviour? On alleged Christian wrote:
For many years of my life, I also believed that all homosexual behavior was wrong — whether it consisted of anonymous hookups or committed relationships. I believed, based on what I had read in the Bible, that even the most loving and monogamous of same-sex relationships was evil in God's eyes. But as I studied the Bible, my view on that subject changed. I now believe that homosexual behavior is appropriate within the confines of a committed, loving, monogamous, lifelong, Christ-centered relationship. Essentially, I'm arguing that a Christ-centered marriage is a good thing, regardless of the gender of the people involved….
But a growing number of Christians believes the church has made a mistake and that the church's position ought to be reformed. In this essay, I'm going to refer to these differing Christian viewpoints as "the Traditional View" and "the Reformed View" respectively. I support the Reformed View.[1]
That was promoted by Justin Lee, executive director of the Gay Christian Network. This paragraph includes his basic understanding of homosexuality:
He used to believe that all homosexual behaviour was wrong;
He gained that view from the Bible and believed that even monogamous, same-sex relationships were evil before God;
He changed his view after further study from the Bible and now believes that,
It is appropriate to have a Christ-centred homosexual relationship that is committed, loving, monogamous and lifelong. So,
Christ-centred marriage is a good thing whether homosexual or heterosexual.
The traditional view of the church needs to be reformed.
If your children and youth are exposed to that kind of approach, how will they view homosexuality? It will send them a positive message that it is possible to have a Christ-centred homosexual marriage.
That is not the assessment that will be reached in what follows. Let's look at some definitions.
A. Sexuality
How would you describe your sexuality and the expression of sex in your relationship?
Students from the University of Western Australia in 2012 provided this definition: 'Sexuality: Is about sexual feelings (who we are emotionally and sexually attracted to), sexual behaviour (how we express our sexual feelings) and sexual identify (who we say we are to ourselves and others based on our internal beliefs)'.[2]
Andrew Comiskey, a former homosexual who has been redeemed by Jesus,[3] gave this explanation:
Sexuality involves a lot more than mere behavior. It includes a heartfelt yearning for connection with another. At the core it's not a lustful seductive exercise. It grows from that God-inspired desire within each of us [unless you have the gift of celibacy] to break out of the walls of the lone self and merge with another human being. [Sexual] intercourse is only one expression of this merging, albeit the most obvious (Comiskey 1989:37).
B. Homosexuality
Here are some biblical explanations of what is involved from Romans 1:20-30,
Romans 1:24, calls them "the lusts of their hearts to impurity" (ESV);
Romans 1:26 as engaging in "dishonorable passions" and "exchanging natural [sexual] relations";
Romans 1: 27, Women were "consumed with passion for one another." "Men [were] committing shameless acts with men."
II. A biblical view of homosexuality (based on a biblical worldview of sexuality).
A. Sexuality involves a longing and desire for unity/union
The body longs for human touch;
The human soul longs for companionship to ease our aloneness [unless you have the gift of celibacy].
BEFORE the fall into sin, God said: "It is not good for the man to be alone; 'I will make a helper suitable for him.'" (Gen. 2:18).
This intimate desire for another happened in the pristine state of a human being, prior to the fall into sin.
What was God's answer? [Please understand that man had access to God, but that was not enough.]
B. God's plan is male and female
Background understanding comes from these two passages:
Genesis 1:26-28 (NIV),
26 Then God said, "Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals,[4] and over all the creatures that move along the ground."
27 So God created mankind in his own image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.
28 God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground."
Gen. 2:22-25 (ESV) states:
22 And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made[5] into a woman and brought her to the man. 23 Then the man said,
"This at last is bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called Woman,
because she was taken out of Man."
24 Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. 25 And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.
C. The origin of all depravity (incl. heterosexual & homosexual depravity)
(image courtesy ChristArt)
1. Genesis 3: the fall into sin
No matter what the sin, whether it be theft, adultery, rape, homosexual acts or genocide, the origin happened at the beginning of the human race.
Romans 5:12 explains how sin and all of its dimensions entered the human race: 'When Adam sinned, sin entered the world. Adam's sin brought death, so death spread to everyone, for everyone sinned' (NLT). Read the full fuller story of how it happened in Genesis 2 and 3.
How could a sinless human being whom God declared to be 'very good' (Gen 1:31) commit sin and condemn the whole human race, as our head, to depraved sinful actions? While admitting that Adam's sin was the original sin of the human race, theologian, Henry Thiessen stated that
it still does not show how the sinful disposition found a place in Adam's nature. We can be sure that God did not put motives before man that led him to sin. That would make God responsible and absolve man from guilt. Nor did God remove from him His sustaining grace, in which case He would likewise bear the responsibility. Nor is it sufficient to say that the power of choice with which God had endowed Adam was bound to lead to this result, for as [Augustus] Strong says, 'The mere power of choice does not explain the fact of an unholy choice'[6]…. We cannot tell how the first unholy emotion arose in the soul of a holy being, but we know the fact that it did. The only satisfactory explanation is that man fell by a free act of revolt from God (Thiessen 1949:247-248).
All sin entered the world as a result of this disobedient action by Adam and Eve. That's when the sin of homosexuality entered the world. Please note what I wrote. It is the sin of homosexuality and not the genetics of homosexuality that led to its being a sin that prevents one from entering the kingdom of God. But I'm jumping ahead of myself.
Here is an extended example from the Book of Romans that shows how homosexuality is one of the sinful desires that issues in sinful acts and God's wrath is revealed against this godlessness and wickedness of human beings. Let's take a read:
2. Romans 1:18-32 (NIV),
18The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
21For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
24Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator–who is forever praised. Amen.
26Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. 27In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.
28Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. 29They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
3. The male-female relationship fell from innocence.[7]
When sin entered the human race, our sexuality was cast into disorder. Comiskey explained: "Every one of us is in turn is sexually vulnerable to some degree. People with a heterosexual orientation are no less fallen than those with homosexual tendencies."[8]
Therefore, for anyone to experience homosexual healing, there needs to be, at the very base,
A clear understanding that brokenness comes from the fall into sin;
A humble recognition that "God never intended for man or woman to seek completion in the same sex. Thus, homosexual pursuit of erotic and emotional bonding [with a person of the same sex] violates something basic in our humanity."[9]
The homosexual MUST accept that "homosexual pursuit of erotic and emotional bonding violates something basic to our humanity."[10]
PLEASE also recognise that homosexuality is only one of the sinful sexual behaviours that is woven into our sinful humanity – the others include, any kind of sex outside of marriage, including pre-marital sex as singles, defacto sex as singles, prostitution (male and female), bestiality,
"The Genesis account underscores the futility of trying to become whole through a member of the same sex."[11]
D. That is what some of you were
Who are the people who will not enter the kingdom of God? What are the possibilities of change? These verses put these issues in context and provide answers.
I Corinthians 6:9-11 (ESV) reads:
Or do you not know that the unrighteous[12] will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practise homosexuality,[13] nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 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 our God.
Please note that one of the kinds of unrighteous deeds preventing a person from entering God's kingdom is the sin of practising homosexuality. It is important to emphasise that it in only one among a number of other kinds of unrighteous actions that will prevent people from entering the kingdom of God. Those who practise homosexuality are included with idolaters, adulterers, thieves and drunkards. ALL UNFORGIVEN SINNERS will be prevented from entering God's kingdom and that includes those who practise homosexuality. Too often the homosexuals have been singled out by Christians without emphasis on the other kinds of sinners in this passage.
However, God's view of sinners from 1 Cor. 6:9-11 is, 'Such were some of you'. It is not, 'Such ARE some of you'. It is in the past tense which means that these sinners have changed and that includes homosexuals – thanks to God's redemption through Christ. Jesus changes all sinners if they confess their sins, repent and receive Christ alone for salvation. And that includes homosexual sinners. Yes, homosexual SINNERS. God's assessment is that homosexuality is a sin that can be changed through Christ.
E. Accept/Receive one another
There is an important verse to help the church deal with recovering homosexuals in the church. Romans 15:7: "Accept [or receive] one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God."
When I preached this message at a local church, I said: I could have brought a redeemed homosexual along to share his testimony, but I resisted UNTIL we know the truth of Rom. 15:7 in the Christian fellowship. I know of redeemed homosexuals who have been so hurt by Christians in the church that they may never return to the church – and that is tragic.
When I shared this verse in a devotional at a ministers' association meeting with a group of pastors, one pastor shouted me down before I finished the devotional – objecting strongly to the biblical view that I was sharing that we ought to accept ALL believers, including redeemed homosexuals, redeemed paedophiles, redeemed prostitutes, etc. Please understand that I am talking about redeemed sinners who are being discipled and growing in grace. We are seeing the fruit of change in their lives. It is always wise to have others supervising redeemed sinners who have come from a dangerous, reprobate lifestyle. However, we need to remember that 'there but for the grace of God, go I'.[14]
III. The genetic hypothesis for homosexuality has some holes in it.
The basic root is sin, as has been explained above.
A. Hasn't it been proven that people are born homosexual?
There have been a number of examples of those who try to prove homosexuality has a biological cause. These are only two examples.
1. Simon LeVay[15]
This neuroscientist, Simon LeVay, has admitted he is gay.[16] He published research in 1991 (see LeVay 1991), indicating that there was an area of the hypothalamus in the brain that allegedly governs sexual activity and this is supposed to be smaller in homosexual men than heterosexual men.
LeVay has admitted that his findings do not prove "cause and effect," but the media have reported it differently.
Zetlan's assessment of LeVay's research was:
'as far as I can tell, LeVay has not found a biological substrate for sexual orientation. All LeVay has reported is that in groups of people
with unknown medical and sexual histories there is a significant difference in the size of a structure whose function is not known'
(Zetlan n d).
For a pro-homosexual expose, see Richard Horton's article from Frontline, 'Is homosexuality inherited?' (1995)
2. Bailey and Pillard
Shortly after LeVay's research, Michael Bailey, a gay-rights' activist, together with psychiatrist, Richard Pillard, who is a homosexual, showed research on identical twins versus fraternal twins. They suggest there is a link between homosexuality and genetics. However, this research has many questions needing answers. We need to ask:
Was the research conducted in an unbiased and fair way?
What are the true implications?
Are they accepted universally by the scientific and medical community?
Are they compatible with biblical truth?
We do know this: The media were quick to jump on this bandwagon and promote homosexuality's supposed biological cause, when the research did not prove that. There are too many questions about this research. Don't let anybody convince you the biological cause of homosexuality is proven. Not so!
Even if at some point in the future it is proven that there is a biological association with homosexuality, we need to conclude as the Bible concludes: genetic origins do not justify sinful behaviour.
The Bible praises sexuality and sexual enjoyment within the boundaries of marriage. Homosexual behaviour is consistently condemned in both Old and New Testaments and there is no exception in this condemnation.
[I recommend the article, "Born Gay?", by a redeemed homosexual, Joe Dallas, in Christianity Today, June 22, 1992, in which he assesses this research and comes to some thoughtful conclusions.][17]
3. Frank Worthen's view
A lot of money has been spent on research to try to link genetics with homosexuality, but Frank Worthen stated in 1991 that "no concrete proof has been found" (Worthen 1991:6). In their book, Human Sexuality, Masters and Johnson say, "The genetic theory of homosexuality has generally been discarded today."[18] However, as indicated below, more research has been done on this topic since Masters and Johnson.
Elsewhere they say, "Despite the interest in possible hormone mechanisms in the origin of homosexuality, no serious scientist today suggests that a simple cause-effect relationship applies."[19]
Why are homosexuals so determined to believe they are born gay? Frank Worthen, a redeemed homosexual, gives two reasons:
a. "The idea that a choice exists as to whether or not they remain homosexual is both frightening and threatening. The gay person has a real investment in his/her identity."[20]
b. "Most gay people cannot remember a time when they did not have homosexual feelings. They actually believe they were born gay. What research has proven is that the paths we take in life are laid down at a very early age."[21]
4. A 2012 study put the cat among the pigeons
A new study (published in 2012) by William R. Rice, Urban Friberg, and Sergey Gavrilets of the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Marine Biology, University of California Santa Barbara, California, has an interesting twist to this genetic view. The abstract of their article states:
Male and female homosexuality have substantial prevalence in humans. Pedigree and twin studies indicate that homosexuality has substantial heritability in both sexes, yet concordance between identical twins is low and molecular studies have failed to find associated DNA markers. This paradoxical pattern calls for an explanation. We use published data on fetal androgen signaling and gene regulation via nongenetic changes in DNA packaging (epigenetics) to develop a new model for homosexuality…. Our model predicts that homosexuality is part of a wider phenomenon in which recently evolved androgen-influenced traits commonly display gonad-trait discordances at substantial frequency, and that the molecular feature underlying most homosexuality is not DNA polymorphism(s), but epi-marks that evolved to canalize sexual dimorphic development that sometimes carryover across generations and contribute to gonad-trait discordances in opposite-sex descendants (Rice et al 2012).
This research concludes that
A major strength of our epigenetic model of homosexuality is that it makes two unambiguous predictions that are testable with current technology. Therefore, if our model is wrong, it can be rapidly falsified and discarded.
First, future, larger-scale genetic association studies will fail to identify genetic markers associated with most homosexuality.
Second, future genome-wide epigenetic profiles will find differences between homosexuals and nonhomosexuals, but only at genes associated with androgen signaling in the later parts of the pathway (e.g., AR cofactors or miRNAs that regulate them) or be restricted to brain regions controlling sexual orientation, i.e., not affecting sexually dimorphic traits like genitalia or sexual identity (Rice et al 2012).
While this is not a definitive study, it does progress the scientific evaluation of the origin of homosexuality beyond concluding that genetics is the cause of homosexuality.
5. What about the identical twin studies?
I highly recommend that you read Dr N E Whitehead's research, MY GENES MADE ME DO IT! Homosexuality and the Scientific Evidence (2013). Neil Whitehead (PhD biochemistry) has worked for 40 years as a research scientist in New Zealand and around the world. The book is written in association with his son, Briar Whitehead, who is a journalist, writer and editor.
Dr Whitehead wrote:
'Over the last decade, studies of twins have provided some of the strongest numerical evidence that "Our genes do not make us do it"…. Results from twin studies are quantitative, so they greatly focus and sharpen the results of many other studies we've mentioned so far. In a nutshell, if you take pairs of identical twins in which one twin is homosexual, the identical co-twin (a monozygotic (MZ) twin) is usually not homosexual. That means, given that identical twins are always genetically identical, homosexuality cannot be genetically dictated. No-one is born gay. The predominant things that create homosexuality in one identical twin and not in the other have to be post-birth factors' (Whitehead 2013:175).
His continued assessment was:
'These very complex comparisons of identical twins and non-identical twins definitively rule out genetic determinism. Identical twins with identical genes are about 11-14% concordant for SSA [same-sex attraction]. If homosexuality were "genetic," identical co-twins of homosexual men and women would also be homosexual 100% of the time. In classic twin studies the genetic fraction is less than 22% for men and 37% for women, and may be as low as 10%. Twin studies continue to find steadily lower genetic fractions for homosexuality as methodology improves and samples become larger' (Whitehead 2013:267).
IV. What causes gender confusion?[22]
How secure we feel in our maleness and femaleness can significantly affect how we relate to those of the opposite sex. A major study in 1981 (Bell, Weinberg & Hammersmith) found that one consistent theme among homosexuals studied was gender confusion. Looking back as adults, homosexuals have sensed a number of factors that influenced them to have a sense of being different from their same-sex peers in childhood. This confusion seems to be linked later in life with an erotic preference for the same sex.
What factors contributed to this gender confusion?
A follow-up study was conducted by Blanchard & Zucker with these results:
The authors compared parental age, birth order, and sex ratio of siblings for 575 homosexual men and 284 heterosexual men, matched on age and education. They were originally part of Bell, Weinberg, and Hammersmith's large-scale study of male and female homosexuality. The results confirmed the previous findings that homosexual men have older fathers and later births than do heterosexual men but not the finding that homosexual men have larger proportions of brothers. The collective findings suggest that birth order is perhaps the single most reliable demographic difference between homosexual and heterosexual men (Blanchard & Zucker 1994).
A. The role of parents
Parents have a powerful influence on a child's acquisition of gender identity. This is natural, since Mum and Dad are our first and most influential models in life of a man and a woman.
1. Perhaps the most powerful influence on our gender identity comes from our relationship with the same-sex parent. The nature of the relationship is very important (see George Rekers, Shaping Your Child's Sexual Identity). That parent will influence your views of intimacy and how you identify with the same sex positively or negatively. If it was an affirming relationship, you will be approved in your gender role.
a. If that relationship is broken (e.g. physical or sexual abuse, personal victimisation, emotional detachment, death, illness, neglect, etc.) it can block the lifeline of intimacy and identification. Secure gender development may be obstructed.
b. The child responds to this breach by moving away from (detachment) the same-sex parent, the need for healthy same-sex love is repressed.
c. This detachment may limit the child's ability to take on the characteristics of the same-sex parent. More than that, the child may develop a tendency to shy away from a person of the same sex.
d. But in adolescence, when one is aroused erotically, this repressed need for same-sex love may be expressed homosexually.
2. The parent of the opposite sex may play a vital role in affirming or hindering your sexual identity. If you do not see the parent of the opposite sex as a caring individual with whom you want to identify, you may be repulsed by that parent. How you relate to your opposite-sex parent will convey your `adequacy' with the opposite sex.
a. Male example:
A dominant mother who is usually intense and emotionally smothering, may breed a fear of women. Gender confusion may develop along with perfectionism and contempt. A young man who detaches from his mother may generalise this contempt to other women.
b. Female example:
An abusive, erratic father fosters fears of the possibility of being violated. In future relationships with men, the woman may close down emotionally. Because the mother is most often the main nurturer in the family, the female child may develop a neurotic tie to mother's love with no bonding with the masculine.
3. What impact does marriage have? How parents relate as a heterosexual couple will impact children. The children will be either attracted to how they see Mum and Dad interact or they may be repelled by it. Will the children want to repeat what they see in the parents' response to each other, or will they be attracted to a same-sex model? This may be influenced by:
a. Evidence of abuse in marriage.
Does one partner seem to be victimised by the other? With which one does the child identify? This becomes somewhat complicated when there is a separation and/or divorce.
b. Siding with one parent against the other.
c. Inner vows that a child makes —
swearing never to be like him/her/them. This vow may handicap prospects for marital intimacy.
The child's relationship with his/her family will determine many of the attitudes to life later. It is the seedbed in which attitudes grow: co-operation, competition, perception of self and one's body, submission or domination. It is in the family that we nurture our hopes, fears and feelings about sex.
B. Some other contributors to gender confusion
1. Early sexual experiences.
By whom have you been erotically stimulated?
a. Heterosexual:
For young girls and women, sexual abuse by men can easily create a fear of, hostility and a repulsion towards men.
b. Homosexual:
Especially for boys, if there have been sexual advances by men and these have affirmed the boys, this can create a perversion of same-sex intimacy.
2. Peer rejection because of gender confusion.
a. This may alienate one from the peer group.
There is ambivalence—a yearning to be accepted, but there may be rejection by both the peer group and the same-sex parent.
b. There may be an over-identification with opposite-sex peer group.
c. You sense there is a difference about you, the peer group rejects you, you are labelled as 'homosexual.'
So you experience a profound sense of inadequacy.
d. High anxiety linked with gender identity in your peer relationships.
So gender identity becomes a point of conflict (Satan the accuser).
3. Gender alienation:
a. If you are secure in your gender identity and it is being positively affirmed,
You relate reasonably well with males and females. However, insecurity leads to your being rigid and maybe fearful. So, in such circumstances one feels a need to work on trying to be 'normal.' One feels cramped and anxious.
b. The alienation leads one to suppress opposite-sex attraction.
c. A self-fulfilling prophecy, especially in adolescence.
4. What gets lost?
a. A clear and realistic picture of the opposite sex.
b. Legitimate needs for same-sex intimacy and identification.
c. The realisation that our need to have same-sex associations without being erotic.
d. The grace to allow God to separate sinful lust from legitimate desire.
The result of this gender confusion is often loneliness and fear. We have a fear of our sexuality—gender, bodies, ourselves—so we launch into homosexual expression in spite of the guilt that we experience.
IV. The steps that lead to healing for the homosexual.
Books by redeemed homosexuals:
Andrew Comiskey, Pursuing Sexual Wholeness: How Jesus Heals the Homosexual (1989).
Jeanette Howard, Out of Egypt: Leaving Lesbianism Behind (1991).
Frank Worthen, Helping People Step Out of Homosexuality (1991).
A. Summary of Steps out of Homosexuality[23]
1. Making the decision
This is not a decision to be made lightly. Weigh the costs. Note Luke 14:25-35.
2. Brokenness
Change comes out of brokenness. Homosexuality is sin and you have grieved God. Deep sorrow is needed for your actions. Please take seriously this Scripture:
James 4:7-10, "Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will lift you up" (NIV).
Before you find peace, there may be a time of grief.
3. Your need of a Saviour
"Brokenness must be so complete, that we no longer have any desire to regain control of our lives, but allow the Holy Spirit to lead. Victory is dependence on Jesus."[24] (John 3:16)
4. Doing the ordinary with other believers
Join with a group of Christian believers. You need the love and support of God's people.
There may be difficulties in fitting in with a church.
Need to spur one another on to love & good deeds.
Intercessory prayer is vital for victorious Christian living (with Christians). (Heb. 10:23-25)
5. Spiritual Warfare
Every step out of homosexuality will be challenged. (Eph. 6:10-20). Do not expect the secular world to be favourable towards the steps you are taking to be healed of the sexual sin of homosexuality. The mass media will be hostile towards your change if journalists hear about it.
6. Holding a correct view of God
His majesty, His unlimited power and His everlasting love. (Jer. 29:12-14: 'Call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,' declares the Lord" and will bring you back from captivity")
7. Hold a correct view of others
Part of brokenness is that you realise how selfishly you have used others for your own gratification. They may have hurt us; we may have hurt them, but we need to respond to them as people made in the image of God.
8. You must have God's view of you
You are made in the image of God;
You are fallen;
In spite of your sinful, wicked condition, God loves you enough to die for you.
God loves you too much to leave you that way; he wants you to change.
9. The belief principle
Walk by faith. Christ lives within you. He is alive in you. This is not blind faith, but faith build on the evidence of Jesus revealed in Scripture.
10. Submission
For the person seeking salvation and healing from homosexuality, accountability is part of the healing process. You need to submit to God, but you must also submit to one another. "Submission is death to self-interest and birth to God's interests."[25]
11. Fruitfulness
You must bear fruit consistent with repentance. Your old life, its attitudes,
associations, the ties that held you to that sinful lifestyle must be broken. Growing in grace (sanctification) is clearly God and us working together. (James. 1:5, "If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him.")
12. Walking in the light
I John 1:5-7, walk in the light;
I Thess 5:17, pray continually;
1 John 4:4, Live daily in the light of God's presence; "the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world".
I agree with Frank Worthen's assessment: "In our ministry, we are frequently asked: 'Do you make homosexuals into heterosexuals?' Our answer is, 'No, we only point the way to wholeness in Christ"' (Worthen 1991:137). Why take this approach? It is because God's design for heterosexuality has been so distorted by this worldly system in which we live.
V. God's design
A. There is a deep spiritual factor involved in the sexual relationship – worship.
First Corinthians 6:16-17 says: "Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, 'The two will become one flesh.' But he who unites himself with the Lord is one with him in spirit" (NIV).
Young people, if you forget everything else I have written here, please remember this: sex is a spiritual issue. It is impossible for you to commit sexual immorality and still be one with God. Sex has a strong spiritual dimension, as I Cor. 6:13 says: "The body is not for immorality, but for the Lord; and the Lord is for the body."
The infamous Jim Bakker of PTL Television Network fame, USA, commented as his ministry lay in tatters: "It's amazing how fifteen minutes can ruin your life" (Comiskey 1988:31). What he didn't say was: Not just any fifteen minutes, but fifteen minutes of sexual immorality.
While Paul, the apostle, speaks of becoming one with a prostitute in I Cor 6:16, he expands it to general immorality in I Cor 6:18, "Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a man commits are outside his body but he who sins sexually sins against his own body."
B. DO YOU WANT SEX AT ITS BEST?
Surrender your rights to Jesus Christ. You must choose with your actions (not just words) to follow Jesus as Lord. This means refusing to yield to sexual temptation and fleeing sexual immorality. Does your walk match your talk? You will find it impossible to "flee sexual immorality" if you are in the back seat of a car at midnight in Queens Park.
God says through Paul, "They profess to know God, but they deny him by their works. They are detestable, disobedient, unfit for any good work" (Titus 1:16).
But, you might ask:
C. ISN'T A FAITHFUL SEXUAL RELATIONSHIP OUTSIDE OF MARRIAGE OK?
A little while ago, a man in his seventies said to me: "The young ones these days have sure cottoned onto a great idea. They are very progressive. It makes sense to try her out before you marry her." He was thinking of living with her first and sampling each other sexually.
But is living together before you marry very smart? Back in November 1977 the American edition of Seventeen magazine included an article, "The Case Against Living Together" (in Remsberg 1977). It included an interview with Dr Nancy Moore Clatworthy, a sociologist at Ohio State University.
For about 10 years, she had been studying unmarried couples who had been living together. When she began, she was like the elderly man with whom I spoke. She thought it was a good idea. The young had told her it was wonderful and she believed them. It seemed a sensible, practical arrangement. Then, as now, it seemed to have a reasonable ring to it.
But her research led to a change of mind. She said, "The things people say living together is doing for them, it's not doing." She found that this was especially so for girls who were uptight, fearful and looking past the talk 'to the possible pain and agony.'
She stressed two points. First, "In the areas of adjustment, happiness and respect," couples who lived together before marriage had more problems than those who had married first. They argued more about money, friends and sex.
"In every area the couples who had lived together before marriage disagreed more often than the couples who had not." It was evident to this researcher that living together first did not solve problems. In fact it created difficulties.
Second, Dr Clatworthy discovered that defacto relationships had an impact on commitment. She believed that "commitment is what makes marriage, living together or any human relationship work."
But "knowing that something is temporary affects the degree of commitment to it."
So, unmarried couples living together are not wholehearted in working at and protecting the relationship. She found that 75% of them break up. And girls are badly hurt.
Nancy Clatworthy concluded: "Statistically, you're much better off marrying than living together. For people who are in love, anything less than a full commitment is a cop-out."
More recent studies have similar results. Newsweek magazine (1983) reported that 16% of college students thought that it was harmful "for a man and woman to live together before marriage" while 61% said it would be "helpful."
But a study in the same year (1983) by the National Council on Family Relations (USA) found that those who lived defacto first were less happy in marriage. Women complained about the quality of communication after the wedding.
Yale University sociologist, Neil Bennett, discovered that defacto women were 80% more likely to separate or divorce than women who had not lived with their spouses before marriage.[26]
It is startling to realise that one study discovered that those who shacked up before marriage were almost twice as likely to dissolve within 10 years compared to all first marriages.
What does all of this say? Marriage is one shoe you cannot try on before you wear it. When it comes to marriage, try before you buy is not a smart idea.
This confirms what the Author of marriage commanded: "Marriage should be honoured by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral" (Hebrews 13:4).
This is a puzzle many people grapple with–not just the young. Why should sex with a permanent partner outside of marriage (in a defacto relationship) be any different than marriage to one woman for life? Many think the essential elements of both are identical.
The government thinks so and has given legal status to this kind of immorality (according to the Bible). The government treats the defacto couple like marriage.
The difference is this: God designed marriage; human beings designed the live-in, look-alike, defacto relationship.
I am indebted to Al Haffner for this illustration:
"Consider this: `It is possible to analyze an apple and ascertain its chemical constituents; but all the chemists in the world cannot make an apple, nor anything that can substitute for it.' Neither can the world make any relationship do what marriage does, not even a monogamous love affair" (Haffner 1989:34).
In our way of thinking, there is a vast separation between a faithful lover and one who sleeps around. From God's point of view, He lumps all sex outside of marriage into the same heap because sex makes a spiritual statement.
In Al Haffner's words: "Inside marriage it is the melodious beauty of spiritual serenity; outside of marriage, even in a monogamous relationship, sex cries out a cacophony of spiritual chaos."[27]
When you indulge in "sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed" this amounts to idolatry, according to Col 3:5-6 because it is self-serving selfishness, opposed to serving God and "because of these, the wrath of God is coming."
I refer you to these links for further details:
5 (Secular) Reasons Not to Live Together Before Marriage (Jennifer Fulwiler 2013);
Seven Reasons Why Living Together Before Marriage is not a Good Idea (Pastor Arron Chambers 2009);
5 Great Reasons to Live Together Before Marriage & 1 Better One Not To (Pastor James Hein 2010);
20 good reasons not to cohabit before marriage (Don Weston 1998).
D. WHAT ARE GOD'S REASONS FOR INSTRUCTIONS ABOUT SEX?
We must begin by understanding the character of God.
He is not a killjoy wanting to ruin your fun.
He didn't make us to enjoy sex and then frustrate us.
God made and designed us.
He knows everything.
Only God knows what is best for us. Deuteronomy 10:13 says, "Observe the Lord's commands and decrees that I am giving you today for your own good."
Those last four words are critical: for your own good. All of God's commands to us, all of his requirements are not to break us and kill our joy, but they are for our own good.
Psalm 84:11, "For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord bestows favor and honor; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless.
James 1:17, "Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows."
God knows how you are wired–body, mind and spirit. God knows how human relationships function most fully and joyfully. God is not trying to stop us from having a wonderful sex life. He is giving us the positive instruction to have the most wonderful sex life possible.
I have found many Christians ignorant of this perspective.
If you look on God's commands, such as, "You shall not commit adultery, flee sexual immorality, etc.," as negative and designed to frustrate your enjoyment, you will miss what God wants for your sexual enjoyment. Remember, these negatives are given for positive reasons.
When my children were young, I warned them: do not touch a hot plate on the stove. That was very negative and it looked like I might have been stopping them from having fun. But it was really a positive command. If my Paul, Wendy and Jeff had burned themselves, it would have prevented them from enjoying life for a while–maybe permanently.
That's how it is with God: Whenever he gives a command, there are at least two positive reasons behind it:
1. He's trying to protect us from some harm, and
2. He's trying to provide something good for us.
If you abstain from sex now, it is because God wants you to experience greater intimacy later–in marriage. But God is also calling you before marriage to greater intimacy with Himself.
There are many valid reasons for you to say "NO" to premarital sex. God really is acting in love when He commands that sex be enjoyed in the bonds of marriage only.
This is a message of prevention for those who are virgins. God loves you and wants to protect you from entering into the damaging consequences of illicit sex.
On the other hand, I know there may be some for whom this message is too late–you have lost your virginity, you are loaded down with guilt, you know what I have been saying is true. What can you do? You do as I had to do because the message I'm sharing with you was too late for me also.
Run to Jesus! You cannot undo what you have done, but you can be forgiven. God will lay down all charges against you if you repent and seek his forgiveness. The biblical message for all Christians who sin is I John 1:9, "If we confess our sin, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness".
You can be forgiven today. If the Lord has convicted you about sexual sin in your life, respond to him.
1. Do you want sex at its best?
Wait for the sexual relationship until marriage.
If that is too late, confess your sin and abstain from sexual relationships until marriage.
Be faithful in marriage.
Homosexual thoughts and practice are not consistent with biblical revelation of sex in Scripture.
The story is told of Alexander the Great who was reviewing his troops after a fierce battle. He encountered one of his captains disciplining a soldier for being a coward. Alexander approached.
"What is your name, soldier?" he asked.
"Alexander," replied the soldier.
"What?" exclaimed Alexander the Great.
"Sir, my name is Alexander!" said the soldier.
Trembling with rage, Alexander the Great yelled, "Soldier, either change your ways, or change your name" (Haffner 1989:91).
As soldiers in Christ's army, we must stop acting cowardly in the face of sexual temptation, or we should change our name—which will have eternal consequences. In this sexually perverted generation, the words of I Corinthians 4:20: come thundering through: "For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power." Change your ways or change your name.
As noted in this article, there is a radical difference between a secular approach to the research of homosexuality and the biblical diagnosis of the condition and its treatment.
See also: Why is the Mass Media Promoting 'Gay Rights'? – YouTube
Bell, A P, Weinberg M S & Hammersmith, S K 1981. Sexual preference: Its development in men and women. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press.
Blanchard, R & Zucker K J 1994. Reanalysis of Bell, Weinberg, and Hammersmith's data on birth order, sibling sex ratio, and parental age in homosexual men. American Journal of Psychiatry, September 15(9), 1375-1376. Available at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8067496 (Accessed 10 July 2015).[28]
Comiskey, A 1988. Pursuing sexual wholeness (Guide). Santa Monica, California: Desert Stream Ministries. [You can read Andrew Comiskey's blog at: http://andrewcomiskey.com/].
Comiskey, A 1989. Pursuing sexual wholeness: How Jesus heals the homosexual. Lake Mary, Florida: Creation House.
Haffner, A 1989. The high cost of free love. San Bernardino, CA: Here's Life Publishers.
Howard, J 1991. Out of Egypt: Leaving lesbianism behind. Eastbourne: Monarch.
LeVay, S 1991. A difference in hypothalamic structure between heterosexual and homosexual men. Science 253, August 30: 1034-1037.
Malcohn, E 2014. Review of Gay, straight, and the reason why: The science of sexual orientation by Simon LeVay (online). PsychCentral, available at: http://psychcentral.com/lib/gay-straight-and-the-reason-why-the-science-of-sexual-orientation/0005404 (Accessed 17 April 2014).
Remsberg, C & B 1977. The case against living together. Seventeen, November, 132-3, 162-3.[29]
Rice, W R, Friberg, U, & Gavrilets, S 2012. Homosexuality as a consequence of epigenetically canalized sexual development. The Quarterly Review of Biology (online) , 87(4), December, 343-368.[30] The University of Chicago Press. Available at: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/668167 (Accessed 10 July 2015).
Whitehead, N E & B K 2013. My genes made me do it! Homosexuality and the scientific evidence (online), 3rd ed. New Zealand: Whitehead Associates. Available at: http://www.mygenes.co.nz/ (Accessed 10 July 2015)
Worthen, F 1991. Helping people step out of homosexuality. Manila, Philippines: OMF Literature Inc.
Zetlan, S n d. LeVay critique: Neuroscience or nonsense (online). Women's Studies Program. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin. Available at: http://mith.umd.edu/WomensStudies/ReadingRoom/AcademicPapers/levay-critique (Accessed 17 April 2014).
[1] Justin Lee 2014. Justin's view, Homosexuality & Christianity, The Gay Christian Network (online). Available at: https://www.gaychristian.net/justins_view.php (Accessed 17 April 2014, emphasis in original).
[2] Current students, University of Western Australia 2012. Sexuality definitions (online), 15 May. Available at: http://www.student.uwa.edu.au/life/health/fit/share/sexuality/definitions (Accessed 17 April 2014).
[3] See The 700 Club 2014. Ex-gay encourages the church to welcome the sexually broken, The Christian Broadcasting Network (online), Available at: http://www.cbn.com/700club/guests/bios/andrew_comiskey_082504.aspx (Accessed 17 April 2014).
[4] The NIV footnote here was, 'Probable reading of the original Hebrew text (see Syriac); Masoretic Text the earth'.
[5] The ESV footnote here was, 'Hebrew built'.
[6] This citation is from Strong (1907:585).
[7] The following is based on Comiskey (1989:43).
[12] Or 'wrongdoers' (ESV footnote).
[13] 'The two Greek terms translated by this phrase refer to the passive and active partners in consensual homosexual acts' (ESV footnote).
[14] For discussion on the origin of this phrase, see The Phrase Finder, available at: http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/there-but-for-the-grace-of-god.html (Accessed 16 April 2014).
[15] For an assessment of the research, see Zetlan (n.d.)
[16] Malcohn stated, 'LeVay, who is gay himself' (Malcohn 2014).
[17] I was not able to locate the article online on 16 April 2014.
[18] p. 319, in Worthen (1991:7).
[19] Ibid. p. 320, in Worthen (1991:7).
[20] Worthen (1991:8).
[22] This section is based on Comiskey (1988).
[23] This is based on Worthen (1991:142-147).
[24] Worthen (1991:143).
[26] Psychology Today, July/August 1988. Also available at, 'Sociological reasons not to live together ', from All About Cohabiting Before Marriage. Available at: http://www.leaderu.com/critical/cohabitation-socio.html (Accessed 16 April 2014).
[27]Ibid., 34.
[28] This online reference only provides an abstract of this research.
[29] Some of this material is available online at the University of Alberta, in Paul Flaman's 'Chapter 7: Some contemporary arguments for premarital sexual intercourse and responses', 1999. Available at: http://www.ualberta.ca/~pflaman/PSAL/Ch7.pdf (Accessed 16 April 2014).
[30] The online edition of the article had no pages indicated.
Copyright © 2015 Spencer D. Gear. This document last updated at Date: 6 August 2019.
This entry was posted in Homosexuality, Sexuality on 10 July 2015 by spencer.
Cakes, lesbians and Christianity
(courtesy public domain)
This article has nothing to do with the constitutional rights of USA citizens but is to address whether the 'Sweet Cakes' case presents the only Christian response.
The battle over cakes for lesbian weddings
There has been a long running battle in Gresham, Oregon (with implications across the USA) over a cake shop that refused to make a wedding cake for a lesbian wedding. The couple who own 'Sweet Cakes by Melissa', Aaron & Melissa Klein, are Christians and cited their Christian convictions to support what they did in refusing to make thecake.
This is the outcome, as reported in The Oregonian, July 02, 2015:
The owners of a shuttered Gresham bakery must pay $135,000 in damages to a lesbian couple for refusing to make them a wedding cake, the state's top labor official said Thursday.
State Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian ordered Aaron and Melissa Klein to pay the women for emotional and mental suffering that resulted from the denial of service. The Kleins had cited their Christian beliefs against same-sex marriage in refusing to make the cake.
Avakian's ruling upheld a preliminary finding earlier this year that the Kleins, owners of Sweet Cakes by Melissa, had discriminated against the Portland couple on the basis of their sexual orientation.
The case ignited a long-running skirmish in the nation's culture wars, pitting civil rights advocates against religious freedom proponents who argued business owners should have the right to refuse services for gay and lesbian weddings.
Avakian's final order makes clear that serving potential customers equally trumps the Kleins' religious beliefs. Under Oregon law, businesses cannot discriminate or refuse service based on sexual orientation, just as they cannot turn customers away because of race, sex, disability, age or religion, the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries said in a news release.
"This case is not about a wedding cake or a marriage," Avakian wrote. "It is about a business's refusal to serve someone because of their sexual orientation. Under Oregon law, that is illegal.
"Within Oregon's public accommodations law is the basic principle of human decency that every person, regardless of their sexual orientation, has the freedom to fully participate in society. The ability to enter public places, to shop, to dine, to move about unfettered by bigotry" (Rede 2015).
This article, 'Sweet Cakes owners respond to firestorm over wedding cake decision' (Kopta 2013), indicated that the Klein's business, 'Sweet cakes by Melissa', has closed its shop in Gresham OR and is operating from the couple's house. The website indicates it is now called, 'Sweet Cakes'.
(public domain)
A different Christian approach
I am sympathetic to the stand that the Kleins have taken, based on the media evidence available to me. I think I understand why they did it (even though I'm an Aussie, my family and I have lived for 7 years in the USA and Canada). I take a different perspective to that of the Kleins of 'Sweet Cakes' in my response. Here is my thinking.
If I were running an automotive and industrial spare parts' business and a lesbian couple came in and wanted parts for their motor vehicle, I would be faced with a normal sales pitch. I would sell them the parts. Before I sold them, I would not ask about their sexual relationship because helping with the fixing of the vehicle is not an endorsement of the homosexual relationship. To be honest, my asking about the sexuality of the relationship is irrelevant when selling car parts to them. I would not be checking if the car was being used for their lesbian wedding. Even if I knew that were the case, I would still sell them the spare parts because that would be a business decision that had nothing to do with sexual behaviour.
The cake shop, just like a florist business, that sells all kinds of items to all kinds of people for a wedding should not be dealing with the sexual relationship. The cake shop is selling cakes to whomever – all people in the community – including homosexuals, adulterers, promiscuous sex addicts, murderers, thieves, good living people, etc. The cake shop's business is to sell cakes, without asking about their morality. That's a non-issue when selling cakes, is my view.
Marrying them is another issue
When it comes to marrying the couple, we are in a different league as homosexual marriage is clearly endorsing homosexuality if the celebrant marries such people. It then does become a moral issue. As a marriage celebrant, I would refuse to marry them because of my being convinced from Scripture that homosexuality is wrong and I should not be sanctioning it through celebrating a homosexual marriage.
I see a difference between doing business with homosexuals – which all businesses should want to do – and advocating for homosexuality through a church minister or civil celebrant conducting a homosexual marriage.
Biblical reasons against homosexual marriage
These are the biblical reasons against homosexuality that flow on to homosexual marriage:
Take a read of Leviticus 18:22 (NLT): 'Do not practice homosexuality, having sex with another man as with a woman. It is a detestable sin'. So the Old Testament law identifies the practice of homosexuality as committing a detestable sin. No genuine Christian should want to promote such a view.
Romans 1:26-27 (NLT) puts homosexual actions into the category of shameful desires and those who practised them suffered the penalty before God that they deserved. They were the actions of men and women who burned with lustful desires: 'That is why God abandoned them to their shameful desires. Even the women turned against the natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex with each other. 27 And the men, instead of having normal sexual relations with women, burned with lust for each other. Men did shameful things with other men, and as a result of this sin, they suffered within themselves the penalty they deserved'.
Where will these unrighteous sinners be with God at death? The sin of homosexuality is among a list of other sins. First Corinthians 6:9-10 (NLT) is very clear: 'Don't you realize that those who do wrong will not inherit the Kingdom of God? Don't fool yourselves. Those who indulge in sexual sin, or who worship idols, or commit adultery, or are male prostitutes, or practice homosexuality, or are thieves, or greedy people, or drunkards, or are abusive, or cheat people—none of these will inherit the Kingdom of God'. Those who practice homosexuality and these other sins will not inherit God's kingdom. By inference, they will go to the other kingdom – of darkness and of Satan.
So the Bible is crystal clear that those who have homosexual, lustful desires and who practise homosexual acts, practise detestable sin, have shameful desires, and will not inherit God's kingdom. There does not have to be a statement in the Bible, 'Thou shalt not practise homosexual marriage', because Scripture is clear that homosexual desires and practice involve practising sin that, if not forgiven, prevent one from entering God's kingdom. Thus, homosexual marriage is always against God's will because it involves sinful thoughts and actions of homosexual sin.
There's a further reason: God's view of marriage
God's view is in support of heterosexual relationships that lead to marriage. This is seen in the 'one flesh' heterosexual relationship that is stated in the Old and New Testaments:
Genesis 2:24 (NLT): 'This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one'. Thus, the one flesh relationship (probably referring to sexual intercourse) is between a man and his wife, i.e. between a man and a woman. Heterosexuality is God's order and not homosexuality or bisexuality.
Jesus repeated the same teaching in Matthew 19:5 (NLT), 'And he said, "This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one"'.
The apostle Paul affirmed the same message in Ephesians 5:31 (NLT, 'As the Scriptures say, "A man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one"'.
I recommend the article from the Got Questions? site, What is a Christian definition of when marriage begins?
See my articles:
Governments may promote gay marriage. Should we as evangelical Christians?
Reasons to oppose homosexual marriage.
These are just some thoughts from a Christian who is in the process of growing in Christ and who does not endorse the Christian view taken by the 'Sweet Cakes' owners.
The view adopted here is that Christians in business sell to whoever wants to purchase their products. No business that seeks to make a profit from sales needs to ask questions such as: Are you an adulterer, paedophile, homosexual, prostitute or promiscuous sexual addict? That question does not relate to selling car parts, burgers, furniture or cakes.
However, it does become an issue when a marriage celebrant or Christian minister is required to perform weddings of homosexuals. That would be endorsing sinful homosexual behaviour (from a biblical perspective) and should not be promoted – as I, a Christian, understand the Christian view from Scripture and conscience. It would be a matter of conscience and Christian conviction at that point and I would refuse to conduct a marriage ceremony for homosexual marriage.
Kopta, C 2013. Sweet Cakes owners respond to firestorm over wedding cake decision. Investigators 2, KATU News, September 2. Available at: http://www.katu.com/news/investigators/Sweet-Cakes-responds-to–222094901.html (Accessed 9 July 2015).
Rede, G 2015. Sweet Cakes: State orders Oregon bakery owners to pay $135,000 for denying service to same-sex couple. The Oregonian (OregonLive), 02 July. Available at: http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2015/07/sweet_cakes_state_orders_orego.html#comments (Accessed 9 July 2015).
This entry was posted in Cultural Apologetics, Homosexuality, Marriage & the Family on 9 July 2015 by spencer.
The bashing of Fred Nile's views on ABC TV (Australia)
The Reverend and Honourable
Fred Nile
Member of the Legislative Council of New South Wales
(courtesy Wikipedia)
Statutory corporationAvailability
WorldwideHeadquarters
ABC Ultimo Centre
700 Harris Street
Ultimo 2007, SydneyBroadcast area: Australia
Government of Australia
If you want to see the mass media bias against Christians, watch what secular journalists do to a politician who is an evangelical Christian operating from a biblical worldview in his or her policies. That's what I saw on Thursday, 16 April 2015 in the Australian ABC TV programme, 7.30. See, 'Fred Nile: Controversial Christian Democrat MP poised to hold balance of power in New South Wales parliament'.
Here the ABC proceeded to expose Fred Nile MP (Upper House, New South Wales parliament), who is 'renowned for campaigning on social issues. He opposes gay marriage, gay adoption, Islamic face coverings, and wants limits on halal food in Australian supermarkets'. The ABC's bagging of him continued, 'But despite his long history of activism, he does not understand why some people call him controversial'.
Fred's response was:
"It always surprises me, because I'm the most non-controversial person you could get," he said.
"Everything I believe is just so – in my opinion – mainstream and ordinary.
"The only controversy comes because there are groups of people who oppose what I'm saying."
Then 7.30 proceeded to expose Nile's approach to Muslim immigration:
Rev Nile once called for a halt to Muslim immigration, and now he fears that a larger Islamic community will try to impose sharia law.
"There are some dangers that Australians should appreciate," he said.
"Once [the Muslim population] gets to 5 per cent or 10 per cent, it's not that the Australians change [but] the Muslims change and become more militant and more demanding."
The opponents on ABC TV
So who does the ABC call on to oppose Fred Nile?
Islamic Friendship Association Spokesman Keysar Trad condemned Mr Nile's statement.
"I'm very disappointed with Fred Nile's contribution to New South Wales," he said.
"As a man of God, as a Reverend, you'd expect him to be inclusive, you'd expect him to reach out with love and compassion and peace towards others.
"But what we've seen from him over the last couple of decades is vitriol, divisiveness and fear mongering about Islam and Muslims."
Then there was Greens MP, John Kaye, who spruiked his opposition to Nile's policies:
"Fred has always been the pilot fish of the lunar Right," Greens MP John Kaye said.
"When homophobia was the cause of the day, Fred was right there as their man in parliament.
"Now it's hatred of Muslims, and fear of Muslims, whether it's mosques or halal food, Fred is their voice in parliament."
Mr Kaye said he expected Rev Nile to vote with the Government on most issues.
"He is the Government's patsy," he said.
Enter illogical thinking
By calling Fred Nile 'the pilot fish of the lunar Right', John Kaye is using an ad hominem logical fallacy to put down Nile. What is a logical fallacy? It is illogic in action. But the journalist who did the interviewing of John Kaye did not call him for using such fallacious reasoning. If he called him to task, he could have said something like, 'Why are you labelling Fred Nile's character and actions when you should be dealing with the truth or falsity of his claims about homosexuality, Muslim immigration, halal food and mosques? That's false reasoning that you are using'. Hearing that from an ABC journalist would send this viewer into an unnatural tizzy fit. The ABC, based on my past listening and viewing, is not in the habit of giving favourable coverage to Christians who are engaged in the public culture.
Does this contemporary journalist not have the common sense to know what John Kaye did in that kind of response? Kaye did not deal with the issues Nile is raising and their impact on Australian society.
The supporters on ABC TV?
Who would you think that ABC TV's 7.30 would bring in support of Fred Nile so that there would be 'balance' in the programme? Outside of his wife, there was
Not a soul. Not one!
The ABC receives approximately $6.61 billion (over 5 years) in Australian government funding to run its broadcast operations. There are many Christians who live in Australia, so who would any journalist worth his salt choose to engage positively with Fred Nile's views? There was not a single person. So, I sent
A complaint
This is the online bellyache I had against the ABC and its bias:[1]
I've just watched your 7.30 programme featuring Fred Nile and his wife in which you proceed to bag Fred Nile for the things he stands for. This was a classic example of ABC bigotry towards this Christian parliamentarian. Who did you choose to oppose him? A Greens MP who proceeded to slam him for what he wants to do about Islamic migration and Fred's support for the James Packer casino.
If the ABC was to present a balanced programme I'd just about have a heart attack. For every one who opposed Fred on 7.30, you should be presenting one in favour of Fred's views. That would at least be fair. But Leigh Sales had only the bag in hand to bash Fred Nile's views.
I'm tired of the bigotry that the ABC presents against those who don't support the ABC's agenda. If you did to a Muslim, what you did to Fred, you'd have a Jihad on your hands. But you think that it's perfectly OK to bash Fred Nile, a Christian, while you receive $2 billion[2] in funding from the Federal Govt. It's time that the ABC learned what fairness and justice are about.
You slammed Fred Nile with your dose of injustice. What will 7.30 do to change its approach to people who have views with which it disagrees?
P.S. I don't live in NSW so I can't vote for Fred Nile but as a Christian, I found what you did to be utterly offensive.
I omitted to mention that one other opponent was featured on 7.30, Islamic Friendship Association Spokesman, Keysar Trad.
The ABC's reply
How do you think that ABC would reply to what I emailed to them? Well, I'm not allowed to tell you. But I can say, from my perspective, it was not favourable towards the content of my complaint to it about Fred Nile's views.
But it did make sure that I couldn't tell you exactly what it said, by making this claim at the end of the email received from a person at ABC's 'Audience and Consumer Affairs' on 20 April 2015. It stated:
The information contained in this email and any attachment is confidential and may contain legally privileged or copyright material. It is intended only for the use of the addressee(s). If you are not the intended recipient of this email, you are not permitted to disseminate, distribute or copy this email or any attachments. If you have received this message in error, please notify the sender immediately and delete this email from your system. The ABC does not represent or warrant that this transmission is secure or virus free. Before opening any attachment you should check for viruses. The ABC's liability is limited to resupplying any email and attachments.
I can't even give you my response to this reply because I included some quotes from the ABCs reply.
The overall emphasis of the 7.30 story on Fred Nile was to paint this politician who could hold the balance of power as an extremist who doesn't represent what the Greens MP or the Islamic association promotes.
There's a lesson here for all Christians who want to engage in public issues through cultural apologetics. Be prepared for antagonistic bashing from mass media journalists and their producers.
New South Wales Legislative Council (55th Parliament)
Upper house (since 1856) of the Parliament of New South Wales
[1] I sent this via an online complaints form to the ABC on Thursday, 16 April 2015, and at my request I received a copy of my complaint by email reply. I await a response from the ABC, but I'm not holding my breath expecting them to do anything by way of change of editorial policy. However, they need to hear my protests and reasons for it.
[2] Malcolm Turnbull MP, Minister for Communications, on his website stated, 'the Government's continued investment in national broadcasting of more than $6.61 billion over the same five year period' (FAQs on ABC and SBS, 19 December 2014, Malcolm Turnbull MP).
This entry was posted in Government, Homosexuality, Hot Topics, Islam, Mass media, Worldview on 17 April 2015 by spencer.