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 Faith-based activists in Minnesota helped defeat a proposed gay marriage ban there this month.
November 30th, 2012
06:00 AM ET
After gay marriage successes, activists look to build on new faith outreach techniquesBy Dan Merica, CNN (CNN) – It may not sound very powerful, but gay rights activist Debra Peevey said that a two-inch green button played a major role in convincing voters to legalize gay marriage this month in her home state of Washington. “Another Person of Faith Approves R. 74,” said the button, which refers to the ballot initiative that wound up legalizing gay marriage in Washington.
As faith director for the statewide pro-gay marriage campaign, Washington United for Marriage, Peevey and her team distributed 5,000 of the buttons. They were conversation starters, she said, ways of letting people know they could relate to one another on the intimate level of religion. And that being religious didn’t meant you had to oppose gay marriage. “We had people clamoring for the buttons,” Peevey said. “People of faith all over the state wore them. It amplified that perspective that people of faith do, in fact, support marriage equality.” This year, voters in Washington State were joined by those in Maryland, Maine and Minnesota in handing big victories to the gay rights movement. In the first three states, voters legalized gay marriage. In Minnesota, they rejected a measure that would have banned same-sex marriage. After watching dozens of states adopt gay marriage bans in recent years, gay rights activists hope this month’s victories mark a national turning point. And to help push other states to follow suit, they are holding up efforts like Peevey’s as a blueprint for how to successfully incorporate faith into future gay rights campaigns. Some same-sex marriage proponents think their fight may move to Colorado, Illinois, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Oregon or some combination of those states. Wherever the effort goes, gay rights activists say, faith will be a part of the mix. “Faith became part of the solution and not just the problem in all four states” where gay marriage was on the ballot this year, said Sharon Groves, director of the religion and faith program at the Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights group. “We will never do a campaign moving forward where engaging people of faith will not be central part of that work.” ‘Be who you are, not something you are not’ For Grant Stevensen, a Lutheran pastor in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the faith director for the campaign opposing a gay marriage ban in the state, engaging faith communities depended on framing the debate the right way. In past gay rights ballot fights, Stevensen said, the same-sex marriage movement put “a big emphasis on civil rights language and connection to the civil rights movement.” But the messaging didn’t work, he said, with many people rejecting the idea of a link between civil rights for minorities and marriage rights for gays. Instead, Stevensen and his team used words like “love,” “marriage” and “commitment,” in their messaging about opposing a gay marriage ban, words that he said strike at the heart of Christian beliefs about marriage. “Our goal for the whole campaign was to emphasize those themes and talk specifically about gay people,” he said, “as opposed to making this another civil rights movement.” Similar campaigns in other states took different approaches. For instance in Maryland, gay rights activists emphasized outreach to African-American churches and played up civil rights arguments. In Maine and Washington State, enormous effort went into mobilizing lay Catholics, even if their hierarchy actively opposed the gay marriage campaigns. Stevensen’s Minnesota campaign, meanwhile, targeted the state’s many Lutherans. “Be who you are, not something you are not,” the pastor said, encouraging other gay rights activists to combat the stereotype that all Christians “are opposed to gay people.” The right conversation In past ballot fights, which resulted in gay marriage bans in more than 30 states, forces opposed to same-sex marriage had dominated the faith conversation. A faithful same-sex marriage supporter was seen as an outlier. When Ross Murray, director of religion, faith and values at the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), was asked by his bosses to be one of the lead liaisons between the four state-based gay campaigns and the national gay rights organization, he knew more emphasis than ever was going to be put on religion. Murray advised the campaigns to ask “people to vote the value that they have been taught” and “make sure that you can reach within all religious groups and get those who have passion and have them reach their friends, neighbors and co-congregants.” That’s what Stevens tried to do in Minnesota: “We were going to either own this conversation about faith and if we can’t own it, no one is going to own it.” Stevensen and his eight-person faith staff trained 2,500 "conversationalists," religious people who were taught how to have conversations about gay marriage with other people of faith. They were instructed to discuss same-sex marriage in terms of their religious beliefs. The campaign offered similar training sessions to more than 500 clergy. The two-hour-long training sessions also focused on people telling their own faith stories. If someone had once been opposed to same-sex marriage because of their religious beliefs, they were encouraged to talk about that, too. More than anything, said Stevensen, the conversationalists were encouraged to listen. “People have their reasons to think what they do. [We taught how to] draw people out and make sure they are heard,” he said. “All of us like to be listened to.” The Human Rights Campaign’s Groves said she was impressed by the lengths these campaigns went to reach deep into faith communities. As a veteran of the same-sex marriage fight, Graves was there when the movement struggled with this sort of outreach. “It makes sense that we would have made some mistakes around that,” Groves said. “LGBT people have been harmed by the church.” Perhaps the biggest mistake was around the gay marriage ban in California, known as Proposition 8. Prop 8 mistakes Debra Peevey was faith-based field organizer in Southern California during the fight against the Proposition 8 ballot initiative in 2008. One reason she and her fellow gay rights activists lost that campaign was the way the religious conversation played out. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Mormons, along with the Roman Catholic Church actively campaigned for Prop 8. That framed the fight as one between secularists and believers. “There was a resistance in engaging faith community,” Groves said. “We kind of let the religious right define the space for us and that was a real learning that we got from that.” While religious organizations were pouring in money and manpower, said GLAAD’s Murray, anti-Prop. 8 opponents were apprehensive in reaching out to religious allies and ineffective at building enthusiasm from sympathetic religious communities and leaders. Both Murray and Groves describe the post-Prop 8 reflection period as a “turning point” for the gay-rights community that gave rise to this year’s intense faith-based organizing. Now, Peevey said, there’s no going back: “I can’t imagine that we will ever have a LGBT campaign where faith was not a part of the team.” Moving forward At pro-same-sex marriage organizations like GLAAD, Murray said conversations are turning to where the next gay marriage fights will happen. “It is really hard to tell where this is going to come up again,” said Murray, adding that the next attempts to block or legalize gay marriage may happen legislatively in some states, as opposed to via ballot initiative. He said gay rights groups want to tap into the Lutheran networks in Colorado, Illinois and Oregon early, to ensure that their LGBT outreach is well established by the time any ballot initiative or legislative efforts formally get under way. By the time that happens, the gay rights community has learned, it may already be too late to frame the faith conversation around gay marriage. |
  About this blog
The CNN Belief Blog covers the faith angles of the day's biggest stories, from breaking news to politics to entertainment, fostering a global conversation about the role of religion and belief in readers' lives. It's edited by CNN's Daniel Burke with contributions from Eric Marrapodi and CNN's worldwide news gathering team.  |
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Welcome One & All!
The Rocky Mount Pantry is now serving;
Tommy two toned oysters chiseled from the bulls who still remain alive!
KRHODES tongue of cows taken but not spoken for!
Answer hog jowls pickled in Pete's sauce!
the AnViL Pig's feet pickled as well in Pete's sauce!
Fridays are not for fish anymore folks!
Come by and sit a spell and do eat til your heart's full!
Our society is built on traditional marriage.
Our society is built on freedom, so go fuck yourself.
Is it? I think it's kinda built on continuing the species, which does not require any type of marriage.
Our society is built upon individual liberties and equal protection.
well apple bushi...if we are founded on freedom then why are liberals so bent on taking our freedom away and giving it to the government?
@KRHODES
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
So the whitewashing continues, eh?
Whitewashing the blackened soot from distanced afar off and deal not with those placards who do unsoundly divide the Word for their own betterments sakes! 2Timothy 2:15 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.
Many will thusly so do and find acquittals to give others unsound reasoning to no more dwell upon the righteousness Word!
Laughing at "placards." Do you even know what the word means, you Lumpy Load?
hindu Jewish filthy secular way, Kosher pig is ok for a hindu gentile, ignorant slave Christians.
Tom, Tom, the Piper's Son,
So TT Piglet Wiggler, I am calling those of your cheesiness "placards' a card of insurrection and ridiculing subjectivisms meant to offset the weak in mind and low in spirit to make them feel abused for your cunning's sakes!
This coming Christmas holiday.. give yourself a gift. For those of you who are firm believers give yourself the gift of becoming gay.
See if you can handle a c-o-c-k. XD
oh how cute, one religious organization isn't h.omophobic and is going to try to convince the rest of the religious organizations not to sow hatred and bigotry. the bible is the problem. the bible clearly says christians are to kill g.ays. also says to kill non-virgin brides - goodbye 98% of females... also says to kill disobedient children - goodbye 98% of children. also says to kill anyone working the weekend - goodbye anyone working at the mall this sunday. the bible is disgusting. the bible supports slavery, has rules for selling slaves, beating slaves - even gives rules for selling your own daughter into slavery. what a epulsive book.
Bootyfunk,
SOooo Boots oh Plenty? Unrighteous division of the Word of Truth is not a sin nor is it an unsound endeavor for the unleavened clans? 2Timothy 2:15 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.
lion, guess you agree with me - the bible is atrocious.
Friday Night Belief Blog Special Tasting! Two bites, $21.99.
Bite One: Basashi (Horse)
Very lean and tender, rare-prepared and garnished with freshly grated ginger and diced onions.
Bite Two: Tobiko (Flying Fish Ovaries)
Flying fish roe served Gunkan-maki or “Battleship Style.” Salty and crunchy, served with raw quail egg cracked directly on top of the battleship piece, with a shiso leaf, wasabi, squid ink, spicy seasoning and citrus flavors.
Nigori Sake $49.99 Kampai!
With all due respect, Toshi, I am not going to eat horse, and although I'm an adventurous type of gal, my last name isn't Zimmern.
Akira, horse is good! Why fear the unknown? Most of the world enjoys horse very much. Anyway, you no like? I make want you want ok! You VIP customer.
Lol, Toshi.
Don't worry, I'm partial to Sushi Kanji.
I'm loyal to you, just not to Mr. Ed.
Mr. Ed taste just like chicken.
Hello, I'm Mr. Ed.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_PZPpWTRTU
Sorry, couldn't help myself.
You're still a bigot Lion, if that's all you can muster is drawing a parallel between gay marriage and other things you deem harmful that are so unrelated. For all that gibberish you really haven't given a decent answer to AnViL's challenge. If all you can allude to is "destructive tendencies" after all that, you may as well give up English and try another language.
oh that was for the doped-up Lion – I will relocate.
mama k,
I told the almighty anvil I had no discernments with gay marriages but he along with others seem to overlook such and decisively want their ridiculing behaviorisms to make out with me! Dumb fvckers haven't got anything really worth my mind's potency worthy of entrapment!
Yes, you are a legend in your own mind, ll.
gay, lesbians, goons, there are no two Gods for all three of them, But Is'lamb ism, misunderstanding of original words, Hebrew, Ellah, Aramaic, Ellohim, Arabic, Allah, Spanish holla, meaning the same, TRUTH ABSOLUTE THIN ALLAH, THE LORD OF THE RING, ROBERTO, AND THE GAWD, FOUNDATION OF AMERICAN CONSTI PATION.
Anyone hungry? Friday night, and Sushi very fresh!! I make special roll for you ok?
can I order goat curry with two naans to go? I am 25 cents short, can I bring tomorrow? You know me, skunk, I come here everyday!
hindu, no credit, no goat, no sushi.
no credit!! NO CREDIT!! NOT EVEN 25 CENTS!!! spit on my face. I am ashamed to be muslim.
Goddamn mongorien spitting everywhere serve a sushi it goddamn shitty walk goddamn hindi shitty wok!
Can I just say this? Homophobes are the stupidest people on the face of the Earth hands down.
Sure you can say it; I agree.
And, hi.
Howdy Akira. How was your day today? What is your day like if I may ask?
My day was fine...it was very pretty and sunny today.
It was generally groovy.
Got up to almost 60.
"Woke up, fell out of bed,
Dragged a comb across my head...
Made my way downstairs and had a cup,
And looking up, I noticed I was late..."
What do you want to know about my day, AB?
Well, I know you are a Beatles fan. But I already know you are a cool chick...
Gay marriage successes proves NOTHING but the increase of gays population in that particular state where it happens.
Delusional idiocy.
DUMBA, your posts prove nothing except that you have access to a computer and the internet.
No, the 'morals' of Americans are changing. (Just like they always do.)
As of 2011, the Pew Forum reported that in the US there is now a plurality in favor of gay marriage.
Gay Marriage?
......................... 2010 ... 2011
Favor ............... 42% ... 46%
Oppose ............ 48% ... 44%
Don't know ....... 10% ... 09%
Wow. Do you dress yourself?
*snerk* at mama k's post.
Duh.
@midwest trail et' al..Fact is like a huge PAK on your faces. You sound really hurt by it.
"You sound truly hurt." Do tell. You can hear what others say on these boards?
The only thing painful about your drivel is the lousy writing.
Oh, I hit some nerve. Sorry!
Yes, dear, you are sorry. Truly sorry.
I feel bad for your parents.
No, you just illustrated your bigotry and ignorance.
You give yourself way too much credit. Posting inane drivel with no basis in reality is merely annoying to rational humans. Next.
My heart bleed for you all. But it's your choice to make staring at your colon for the rest of your pathetic lives while depriving youselves from breathing fresh air.
Absurdity of troll-ism, hind, ignorant.
Goon.
Methinks DUMBA mistakes farts for "fresh air."
My fart is freshier than your breath.
This is my experience... Thank you.
MY personal testimony.
A thought to consider without an ego response
I Accepted Jesus christ as my lord and saviour. You never know how soon is too late. Transcend the worldly illusion of enslavement.
The world denounces truth....
Accepting Jesus Christ (for me) resulted in something like seeng a new colour. You will see it .....but will not be able to clearly explain it to anyone else..... Its meant to be that way to transend any selfism within you.
Also... much the world arranges "surrounding dark matter into something to be debated" in such a way that protects/inflates the ego.
The key is be present and transcend our own desire to physically see evidence. We don't know anyways by defending our own perception of dark matter.
Currently.... most of us are constructing our own path that suits our sin lifestyle. Were all sinners. Knowing that we are is often an issue. But both christians and non are sinners. Even once we are saved by christs merciful grace we will still experience adversity to mold us to adhering to the truth.
We will slip... But not fall of the ship ...carrying us onward to perfection in christs grace.
We don't like to Let go and let god. We want control to some degree. This is what Jesus asks us to do. "Follow me".
It's the hardest thing to do... but is done by letting the truth of scripture lead you (redemptive revelation)... as I said .
Try reading corinthians and see if it makes sense to you. Try it without a pre conceived notion of it being a fairy tale.
See the truth...
do we do what it says in todays society... is it relevant... so many have not recently read and only hinge their philosophy on what they have heard from some other person...which may have been full of arogance pride or vanity..
Look closely at the economy ponzi, look at how society idolizes Lust , greed , envy, sloth, pride of life, desire for knowledge, desire for power, desire for revencge,gluttony with food etc .
Trancsend the temporal world.
Just think if you can find any truth you can take with you ....in any of these things. When you die your riches go to someone who will spend away your life..... You will be forgotten.... history will repeat iteslf.... the greatest minds knowledge fade or are eventually plagerzed..... your good deeds will be forgotten and only give you a fleeting temporary reward . your learned teachings are forgotten or mutated..... your gold is transfered back to the rullers that rule you through deception. Your grave will grow over . This is truth .
Trancsend your egoism and free yourself from this dominion of satan. Understand you are a sinner and part of the collective problem of this worldly matrix... Repent.... Repent means knowing (to change) The Holy spirit (within) will convict you beyond what you think you can do by yourself. Grace is given to those who renounce the world. That are" in" the world but not "of " the world.
Evidence follows faith. Faith does not follow evidence..... Faith ....above reason in Jesus Christ.
Faith comes by Reading or Hearing the word of god from the bible . Ask Jesus in faith for dicernment and start reading the new testament... You will be shocked when you lay down your preconceived notions and ....see and hear truth ... see how christ sets an example ... feel the truth....
Read Ecclesiastes. Read romans or corinthians.
You cant trancend your own egoism by adapting a world philosophy to suit your needs. Seek the truth in Christ.
Sell all your cleverness and purchase true bewilderment. You don't get what you want ....you get what you are by faith above reason in christ.
I promise this has been the truth for me. In Jesus christ .
Think of what you really have to lose. ...your ego?
Break the Matrix of illusion that holds your senses captive.
once you do . you too will have the wisdom of God that comes only through the Holy Spirit. Saved By grace through Faith. Just like seeing a new colour.... can't explain it to a transient caught in the matrix of worldly deception.
You will also see how the world suppresses this information and distorts it
You're all smart people . I tell the truth. Its hard to think out of the box when earthly thinking is the box.
I'ts a personal free experience you can do it free anytime . Don't wait till you are about to die.. START PUTTING YOUR TREASURES WHERE THEY REALLY MATTER >
Its awsome and It's just between you and Jesus
my testimony
Romans 10:9
"If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved
Last eve I passed beside a blacksmith’s door,
And heard the anvil ring the vesper chime;
The, looking in, I saw upon the floor
Old hammers, worn with beating years of time.
“How many anvils have you had,” said I,
“To wear and batter all these hammers so?”
“Just one,” said he, and then with twinkling eye,
“The anvil wears the hammers out, you know.”
And so, thought I, the anvil of God’s Word,
For ages skeptic blows have beat upon;
Yet, though the noise of falling blows was heard,
The anvil is unharmed – the hammers gone.
Truth is..exclusive
It was very unkind of you to post that long pile of nonsense.
Please don't try to forbid marriage amongst those our Lord God created gay...
1 Timothy 4:1-5
Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart
from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings
of demons, through the insincerity of liars whose consciences are
seared, who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God
created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know
the truth. For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be
rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the
word of God and prayer.
Thanks for cut and pasting that sh1t again. We've all seen it, and didn't read it before, and didn't, and won't next time. Give it up.
there is not one single secular reason to deprive h o m o s e x u a l people the right to marry. there isn't one singular secular reason to deny equality to any american based on their s e x u a l preference.
those of you who would restrict the rights, freedoms, liberty, and equality of others based on your repugnant religious ideologies deserve no freedom, liberty, equality or rights.
There is no secular reasoning to deny those to partake of the drug trades. There is no secular reasoning to deny those to partake of the s e x trades either. There is no secular reasoning to deny those to partake in the gambling trades.
strawman arguments are a sure sign of an untenable position.
lionlylamb:
while i generally do not entertain schizophrenics – i'll give you an opportunity to explain how h o m o s e x u a l marriage is destructive – like gambling, drugs or p r o s t i t u t i o n.
ready – set – GO!
Loopy Lion: "There is no secular reasoning to deny those to partake of the drug trades"
Of course there is. Drug trades everywhere involve criminal activity and harm to others.
Idiot.
The AnVil:
I agree wholeheartedly with0 both of your posts.
There is not one reason, in the United States, that a whole segment of society isn't able to have the same rights that society as a whole enjoys.
If churches do not want to marry gays, that's one thing...but to prevent them from getting married at all is ridiculous.
Religion should not have a say in it.
The destructive tendencies you speak on are individualistic tenures and I do not frown upon the legalization of what I speculated as being secular ilk. Sure gay marriages should be allowed! Who the hell am I to be against such acts and/or actions of the socially insecure? I say allow all such acts to be so allowed and be done with it! let the chips fall wherever and whenever for whatever the causes may be!
Tom, Tom, the Piper's Son,
What you fail to fvcking rationalize is that all such TRADES that I declare to be secularized ilk are but big fvcking brother (Governments) own faults for there being drug wars and selling of declared illegal drugs in exchange for the drugs czars of today to then buy weapons in a never ending cycle! Free up the drug trades and get the money flowing into the big brother's wallets God Damn it! Same goes for the s e x trades and gambling trades you senile barbarian of womanly vestiges!
Lousy Lion, when you get out of rehab, alert the media. Your posts are nothing but an exercise in verbal mast urbation.
TT babbler,
Keep your lowed vivaciousness issues in your own house with your own family members if you please!
11/25 marco rubiotard ignites debate on stuff he shouldn't mess with.
lionlylamb posted: "FYI, I am seeing a psychiatrist 8 years now with the same lady doctor. Moby and I am taking my meds unconditionally and without question. I take 15mgs of generic Zyprexa an anti-psychotic."
schizophrenic..... told ya so.
"Drug trades everywhere involve criminal activity"
Please define "criminal activity"
"and harm to others."
My 9-year old grand daughter and I MUTUALLY want to marry and will not harm others in doing so, then, there is not one single secular reason to deprive us the right to marry, right, TOMI?
@TOOL
informed consent is required.
How can a nine year old have informed consent?
There is not one single secular reason to deprive h o m o s e x u a l people the right to form civil unions distinct from marriage. You can find any number of secular reasons to deprive them of marriage.
TOOL, what part of "informed consent" are you too retarded to grasp?
Let me guess: you were repeatedly and purposely dropped on your head as an infant.
the AnViL,
At least my psychosis is being dealt with! As for the rest of society's smitten, I dare suggest they see a doctor lady like mine! She is one in a million!
TOOLtom
9-year old girls do not possess the maturity or experience to consent to anything – let alone incestuous relationships with mentally ill people who think it's OK.
your argument is rejected – dismissed.
Loopy Lion, last time I checked, you didn't have a pot to p!ss in. I doubt you own CNN. You have no say over what I post.
You're still a bigot Lion, if that's all you can muster is drawing a parallel between gay marriage and other things you deem harmful that are so unrelated. For all that gibberish you really haven't given a decent answer to AnViL's challenge. If all you can allude to is "destructive tendencies" after all that, you may as well give up English and try another language.
i don't attempt to reason with people who simply do not have the faculties to do so,
schizophrenic people, like lionlylamb, are obviously beyond reason.
everything you post is summarily dismissed.
TT Beechnut,
What say you? Got a problem you do? Maybe I should introduce you to Mrs. wonderful, my doctor who has been faithfully servicing my best interests! It seems your syllogisms is leveraged unbecoming a maid of such fancy for you to tout so glaringly about!
AnViL has you pegged, LL. You're nuttier than a fruitcake. Have a good night, nutter.
I tell you what, I'd LOVE to have LL as a patient. I'd be driving a Mercedes and parking it a gold-plated garage.
mama k,
It seems Tommy Hilfinger lady has a swooned person of interest! better watch out TT for she has an eyeing for your piglet namesakes!
Arvoasitis: "You can find any number of secular reasons to deprive them of marriage."
kindly provide these secular reasons.
Yes, please do. I'd love to know what those "reasons" are.
the AnViL,
You seem to be troubled young one? Are you having issues! Tell me please! I will not tell others of your ilk!
"informed consent"
Ah, okay, how about her 27-year old mother who is my second to the youngest daughter whom husband died in the line of duty in Afghanistan and unarguably better than her in bed. There must be no secular reason to deprive us to marry, right?
It seems that h o m o s e x u al relatioship is ok for you but incestous is not, when they're both and mutual, healthy and loving relationship, and most of all doesn't harm others, why is that?
TOOL, do you brush that single tooth every night?
Idiots like the TOOL always have to resort to citing pedophilia, incest, or polygamy to make their points about gay marriage.
What a shame their desperation makes them look even more stupid than they first appear.
TOOLtom:
addressing your strawman arguments – because it's so easy:
actually i could not care less about incestuous relationships... i just don't think people in them should breed – for fear of birth defects or producing more mentally challenged people. a very real result of combining familial dna.
pedophilia on the other hand is defined as a mental illness.
ignoring your strawman arguments... i would still challenge you or anyone to provide a single secular reason to deprive h o m o s e x u a l couples to marry.
cha cha cha
Of course, anyone who can figure out TOOL's alternate identi ty won't be surprised that he's so impotent.
@TTTPS,
don't forget goats and sheep!
Never would I do so! 🙂
Yeah – that Chardonian argument is old as the hills now. But I agree with AnViL, and people will always push the envelope on rights. You have to, or you wouldn't know which ones your lacking. It's ridiculous that the U.S. is so far behind on this issue, but then again, considering that large percentage of people still thinking Creationism is reasonable, I guess we shouldn't be surprised. It's just stupidity. These days we just live in a horribly uneducated country.
So from "informed consent" to birth defects and DNA..blaah blaah blah!
Okay, let's talk about health and science.
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2009/aug/09082609.html
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/...aids/...aids/new-hiv-infections-rising-among
and tons of sites who could...
" provide a single secular reason to deprive h o m o s e x u a l couples to marry."
Just google "aids in relation to h o m o s e x u a l i t y". Go beyond your comfort zones and do it!
truly a tool:
1. The first link is this kind of site: "LifeSiteNews.com emphasizes the social worth of traditional Judeo-Christian principles"
get the religious junkout of my sight. it's worthless
2. You didn't copy the second link properly and therefore worthless to anyone here.
3. I would expect that HIV infection should be expected to be less for married couples than for promiscuous singles, so it would seem that gay marriage would work against the problem of HIV in gay men.
So I have to wonder tool, what's your angle on this?
TOOLTOM – you ignorant dolt.
if you're going to attempt to claim "aids" is a secular reason to deny equality to americans – you're going to fail. while gay males are definitely in a much higher risk group... monogamous couples aren't.
thank you for demonstrating your ignorance of pedophilia on a national public forum....
also – thank you for displaying your ignorance in regards to higher occurrence of birth defects inherent in incestuous couplings.
and finally – thank you for your strawman arguments.
dismissed
NEXT!
mama k "So I have to wonder tool, what's your angle on this?"
there's very strong evidence to support the concept that most often – individuals who speak out against same-s e x marriage (like tooltom) are latent/repressed h o m o s e x u a l s.
The only reason why incest, pedophilia & polygamy are not legalized is...those types of people have reserved few drops of civility and honor inside their system to blatantly displaying their infirmities and shoving it down to everybody's throat.
interesting to note – so many individuals who speak out against same-s e x relationships illustrate their oral fixations in their written matter... they will often refer to the subject being "forced down their throat"....
repressed.... latent.....
*chortle*
"TOOLTOM – you ignorant dolt."
It's a lil bit insulting to me, personally but...giving too much compliment on my post. You're really make me soo flattered. THANK YOU!
TOOL, the only smart thing you've ever done is choose an apt name. You really are a tool.
TOOLTom...
"It's a lil bit insulting to me, personally but...giving too much compliment on my post. You're really make me soo flattered. THANK YOU!"
i rather enjoy it when individuals like yourself demonstrate your ignorance on national public forums... but you should not be flattered... you should literally be ashamed – it is a shame you're too stupid to understand this.
by all means – carry on, son.
"The only reason why incest, pedophilia & polygamy are not legalized is...those types of people have reserved few drops of civility and honor inside their system to blatantly displaying their infirmities and shoving it down to everybody's throat."
Lol – oh my. The sad thing is that I have a funny feeling that English is supposed to be your native language.
DUMBAtheiStS,
Do nor forlorn yourself with such people of malicious contentment. Most are here to lay waste to those religious who come here for a look-see. I am part of tis blog's furniture and even though I do sometimes dawdle in my religious clemencies, I do ever turn back to God Almighty whose great seas of nothingness is God's Holy Spirit and those disbelievers will one day be back in the arms of their nothingness while those who have found even a little bit of Christ's teaching to be Truth, they will be granted another Life deeply within the Kingdom Domains of God!
Mathew 6:33 "But seek ye first the kingdom of God!"
Luke 17:21, "The kingdom of God is inside you!"
John 18:36 Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not of this world!"
1Corinthians 3:9 "For we are labourers together with God: ye are God's husbandry, [ye are] God's building!"
Keep in safety within your mind's sake these four holy verses of scripture and spread their Truth among others of one's Faiths.
Somehow I get the feeling the Lion wants the DUMB one to go play dungeons and dragons somewhere else.
@mama
Hey now, don't disrespect D&D. 🙂
Sorry Damo. 🙂 I just think of of that because Lion & some of these other seem *stuck* in the middle ages. For some reason, that comes to mind.
Thusly does righteousness abbreviate upon long forgotten issues of fatherly intensions meant to be applauded then and forgotten of nowadays! We are living amid a day and age of once bitten frugally rent harborages of long ago lavishness. Alas do we ever tender to forget our elder generations once gleamed garnished essences! We live therefore to die an aloneness ever to be content in our mind’s eyes that the great seas of nothingness will be our ever unending rewards for a journey of abrupt lividness living was to be our only rewards! Are individual rights based on societal righteousness within the parameters of cultural soundness being the kindled line drawn and distanced by religious austerities? How far away from religious agendas will the leveraging hierarchies be twined and marked in being and becoming mere factors of the mythological?
Have the vesper pottages of amassed humanisms become complacently illiterate nowadays? Where then do the root-commodities of religious socialisms truly matter and 'riotous' materialization make scalar upon spattering of regarding irrational causations? I do shudder in the crowds' 'revolting' laments, for of crowned sarcasms does lay the tutors of indemnifications' coverings leaving no more the generosities of the lividness' racial trees of multi-faceted generalists.
Monotheisms do nowadays abound, for many variations of 'mono-isms' are but fetters, the bonds that do bind up and weigh shackled inward, towards errant subjugations upon the propensities of root cause worthiness. The godless need the ungodly and vice versa and although goodly does prevail upon and thru all aberrancy, many are plated and some are filtrations while many are mere silhouettes. No one person should be upon another's backsides but raised by the shoulders of another to such heights as deemed wise, needed and cautiously sublimated. Goodness knows no boundaries yet many do not heed the goodly in others who share unendingly their deeded austerities.
Monotheistic self is what the gestations of ungodly and godless unwittingly portend they themself to be in their hindsight’s. They are their own gods so to profess and in their cu-mulative efforts they due themselves conjoin and gather their piecemeal subjugates forsaking all goodly 'proprietaries' relatively based in self-godly characterizations. "I will not give in!" are the ungodly and godless stands even though they tend to belittle and make small their talking spheres of jubilation's acquittals. A pig knows only how to root and make ruts searching the grounds for it’s' nourishments. Are we all not but rooting for our source codes?
Do let Mommy have her keyboard and thesuarus back.
Russ, Thanks for the clarification, I will admit I don't understand Religion, the three major Religions Judaism, Christianity, and Islam seems to believe in one God and Believe that the other two Believe one God but the God that the other two believes in is a different God then the one that they believe in. (I hope I made myself clear).
John, You also see that play out between the different sects of the three religions. Everyone else is going to hell and only we have it right. yada, yada, yada
No there are no two Gods for all three of them, But hinduism, misunderstanding of original words, Hebrew, Ellah, Aramaic, Ellohim, Arabic, Allah, meaning the same, TRUTH ABSOLUTE, THE LORD AND THE GOD, FOUNDATION OF AMERICAN CONSTI TUTION.
...and this "one god" thing is actually 3 or more all conveniently cheated into 1 with the dishonest concept of "the Trinity" – and Catholics worship even more like Mary, etc. but they call those "saints" to avoid being called Polytheistic. So funny. Lying is one of the big 10 sins even though it is the bread and butter of religion.
What many people seem to be misplacing in regards to the gods and goddesses is that they all are the sons and daughters of God Almighty! God’s Holy Spirit is the vast Seas of the Nothingness regions that reach ever so far away in the celestial domains and spirals ever inward towards the inner domains! We all live in a semi-lucid state of constant fluctuations in ever diminishing states of rationed containments in randomized soulless fulgurations ever pulsating and really never at a true resting mode due to particle physics law of thermal dynamics regarding sub-quantum flexing. Can you fathom this angular sublimated dichotomy or?
Do I call you idiotic just because one feels a sensation to call you so? My godliness perceptions lay upon my worded pragmatisms. Anyone’s godlessness comes about by ungodliness hammerings of societal bitterness. Forsake you not in ungodly mannerisms for these are your causality in these celestially anthropic morphs regarding godlessness and ungodliness. Your crying out against God gives me reasons for God to be and even become and also as once was in the schematic morphologies within cosmologic paradigms’ leavening ways regardless what one does so clamor on being one’s own gods and/or goddesses.
RELIGIOUS HINDUISM, BS.
teavangelist, I think you are missing a few facts. 1) The US is not a democracy (we are a Federal Republic), even if we were a democracy, Basic human rights should never be up for a vote (the bigoted nature in us we deny rights to others). 2) All rights and responsibilities should be equal for all citizens, the laws covering pedophilia are (should be) enforced equally, as well as the laws covering polygamy, incest and any other relationship.
You can convince of the merits of your point if you can give me just ONE reason to deny same se-x marriage other than Religion or personal, we don't base our laws on either?
Yes.. remember that having a gay person just touching you makes "YOU" gay also. XD
I might also include that even if the gay couple who are making love to each other in the privacy of their own home – without you knowing of this very act- makes "YOU" gay also. 😛
Rights means limits, limits are wages earned of duties discharged, limits are responsibilities, responsibilities are liabilities subject to accountability by the limit of truth absolute, constant, no accountability, no rights, plain and simple. hindu filthy gay ism is not a right, limit, but hinduism, violation of limit of truth absolute GOD, rack of America. SUBJECT TO PROSECUTION.
Because John you are not redifining marriage as much as undefing marriage.
*undefining*
Nonsense, KRHODES. Undefining might be something attributed to the religious aspect of the definition, but this issue involves rights and advantages afforded one type of civic couple verses another type of civic couple. So as long as states are in the business of handing out rights and advantages as a civic function, and defining the classification of that function that affords such rights and advantages marrriage, then, they should be doing so fairly across the board. No one is trying to dictate what churches can do.
Human have no authority over truth absolute, but subordinated to truth absolute, matters out side limit of truth absolute are hinduism, illegality. Civility is core of civil societies, and hindu Gay ism, hind love ism is not of civility but of Jungle in following of hindu, filthy animals justified by atheism, self center ism, having no place in civil societies.
mama k
"Nonsense, KRHODES. Undefining might be something attributed to the religious aspect of the definition, but this issue involves rights and advantages afforded one type of civic couple verses another type of civic couple. "
Nonsense yourself. Does a particular religion define marriage or has human society always defined it as a man and woman. If we allow marriage between two women or two men then you have changed the definition and in fact undefined it. What would a "marriage consist of if we throw out the traditional? If we are changing it then how would we define it and what are the conditions?
Khruddy, marriage has been redefined many times throughout human history.
Just for sh!ts and giggles, do explain how your marriage or anyone else's will be harmed or devalued if gay marriage is legal?
@KHRODES – It's a redefining, not undefining. I don't think you'll find the language being changed to say any two people in a state can get certain benefits if you just fill out this paperwork. It's still marriage – but society is starting to allow just those particular combinations of consenting adults in the same manner with the same restrictions they currently do, just without the restriction of gender.
Well, this is the big change beginning. Regular christians voting for gay marriage, using the 'Talibangelical" word, Pat Robertson saying creationism is bullspit. Hope this results in the complete elimination of religious influence in our government. If people take this garbage out of government, and wait until kids are older before they start brainwashing them, I might find religious people tolerable, (at least the great majority that admit that the earth is billions of years old and that evolution is indisputable fact and the foundation of ALL Biology..
hinduism, absurdity of religions yes, but hindu atheism, filthy self center ism has no place in America, America founded on rock of truth absolute GOD.
please throw your shoes at me, I deserve it. I am ashamed to be muslim.
born that way, the Choice you made was yours to make (you have the Right to make it). Are you willing to take that same right from others?
choice in truth absolute is the right choice, rest of it is hinduism, violation of truth absolute, deserving of punishment, as is applied to every one in jail today for making wrong choice.
spit on my face, spit on my name Dar, spit on my country Daristan, I am ashamed to be Daristani muslim.
A friend of mine told me this real story. His wife's sister in a midwestern city was married with 2 kids to a guy who "thought he was g-ay" and wanted a divorce. that dude had 2 brothers.
the dude's family swung into action. parents threatened to disinherit him. brothers and close family threatened to ostracize him. wife told him he can have his divorce but he can kiss the house and any contact with kids buh bye. parents told said so called gay person they will support the wife in the divorce suite and make sure she wins everything.
alternative offered was to get some decent chritian counselling and come back to his senses. wife forgave his gay affiar. Of course he was tested for all kinds of diseases that his filthy habit would have gotten him into.
his closetted gay lover who tried to break up the family was tracked down, lost his job, and all kinds of things bad happened to him. thats another story.
all is well now.
question is – how could he have 2 kids and think he was gay? this proves its a choice. a tendency. that one can and should suppress for the good of society.
So, he was bullied back into the closet? And you tout that as a good thing?
A gay man can have intercourse with a woman. The fact of the matter is, he is attracted to men.
There is also a chance he is actually bi-sexual, and fell in love with a man, even though he also loved his wife. We are not, by and large, monogamous creatures.
Congratulations, your friend and his fellow christards bullied a man back into the closet. This will not end well.
What a horrific story. A man relaizes who he is, tries to make peace with it, and is threatened and abused until he denies it? And the poor other man's life is destroyed. I'm not saying it's ever acceptable to cheat on a spouse, but this is a far worse crime. Those poor children and the therapy they will need after growing up in such an awful family. I dearly hope, for their own sakes, that none of them turn out to be gay.
Teavang... So you think that vigilantism, threats, intimidation and coercion are a way to keep a family together? The husband is still gay, the family has only succeeded in shoving him deep into a closet.
It sounds as if the man was bi, and was trying to do the right thing and leave a marriage he no longer had any inclination to continue.
That he was browbeaten into staying by his own family, and another person's life was totally ruined by this man's family in a vigilante manner is totally repugnant and not at all 'Christian'.
What a sad story.
I can almost guarantee one thing: all will not remain "well" for long.
@tevangelist,
this sort of thing happens all the time and it's not a new thing. It is the classic story of the closeted gay man.
I can relate a personal story too – with a closer connection that yours. More than 20 years ago my aunt and her husband divorced. They had three children together and had been married for many years. This can be very traumatic for everyone.
There is no question that my uncle was then and remains a gay man to this day. I suspect the same is true in your story.
It happens with women too. I know several stories of women, who having had their children, divorce in their middle age and form a couple with a woman. It happens all the time.
I think the difference with tea's story is that they blackmailed him, forced him to get 'Christian' counseling, and ruined another man's life; I think this is wholly unacceptable.
I wonder if he knew his two brothers were h0m0phobes?
@Akira,
no doubt. My aunt wasn't raised by fundies. It was difficult for all concerned, but there was no denying the man was and is gay.
People try to do what is expected of them – as was the case with my uncle. He was trying to be someone he wasn't.
Holy crap. I was reading your story Teavangelist and I thought you were going in a whole other direction. Your moral of the story sucks bad. Gay people are gay, that's it. They can pretend all they want but the feelings are probably always going to be there. What makes it worse is that these people feel the need to fit into the "norm" of civilization and that's where you get the problems. They need to just be who they are and the rest of the world has to get over it....focus on your own lifestyle and keep your nose out of others.
Thank y'all for your opinions. I refuse to believe that being g@y was his 'nature'. If so he would have never married. The family did what it had to. Ya see, civilized man can have impulses like this – have g@y affair, assault some neighborhood kid, graffiti a wall, whatever. the point is a good family raises a boy who can resist them.
See "hate the sin, love the sinner"
His lover wasnt the only other victim. They forced him to out 2 other g@y people who were helping them, and outed that couple to the whole community. Parents turned one of the other 2 to the street when he refised christian counselling, Tough love. they weer sure he would return and give up his hedonistic lifestyle.
@teavangelist, nice try, but this is definitely a made up story. I'm not sure who you're trying to put one over on. The first part had me going...I really did think you might be that dumb. But you went over the line in part B.