Homosexuality and religious.

[Trailblazer]

Your view is absurdly prejudiced though

You are the pot calling the kettle black since you have your own prejudices, just in the opposite direction.

 

[Sheldon]

The way society looks at sexuality has nothing to do with what is moral since society does not determine what is moral, God does.

Yet another circular reasoning fallacy, you are being relentlessly irrational.

Your religion's claims are from a man, not a deity.

 

[Trailblazer]

Your religion's claims are from a man, not a deity.

My religion's claims are from a Messenger of God who speaks for the deity.

 

[Aupmanyav]

The way society looks at sexuality has nothing to do with what is moral since society does not determine what is moral, God does.

Well, as you know I am a strong atheist. I do not believe in existence of God or soul. For me, it is society which decides morals.

 

[loverofhumanity]

Manifestly untrue.



Promoting hate speech and homophobia is demonstrably not in humanity's best interest.



Nonsense, you already know this isnt6true. Two mothers, or two fathers works just as well, as long a child is loved and nurtured, and not fed dangerous prejudice, they'll likely grow into well adjusted adults.


Your view is absurdly prejudiced though, as you're forcing it through the nasty doctrine of homophobia your religion promotes. That's what is dangerous, and does real harm.

The Manifestation of God says otherwise and I trust His Knowledge above human error prone minds.

 

[loverofhumanity]

But how about then. Were they accepted and able to participate fully in the Baha'i community?

I was just new and not in the same community as them but they were Baha’is in good standing as I saw their identity card. You want a good story? I’ll tell it to you.

When I had moved on and accepted the Faith, years later I saw John walking down the Main Street. I knew he was a Baha’i but he did not know I had joined. Anyway I said hello then asked him if he could lend me a few $$ as I was hoping to spot his Baha’i identity card.

So he took out his wallet and I said “What’s that?” and he said it was his Baha’i identity card. At that moment I shouted allowed “Allah’u’Abha and embraced him. He was overwhelmed with joy. He had taken me in and showed me love and fed me and referred me to other Baha’is. And we became best friends. I didn’t even think about Gay. He was my friend. The Baha’i teachings tell us to love everyone so that has always been my attitude.

Nice story and true.

 

[Dawnofhope]

Bahaism maintains that god created everything.
"As the Supreme Being through which the existence of all other things is realized" -
"The process of His creation hath had no beginning, and can have no end."

That doesn't mean that every human behaviour is attributable to the supernatural.

In this particular thread, I simply can't watch people attempt defend and justify homophobia without responding. If it was Christians or Muslims doing it, I would do the same. Perhaps the reason it has gone on so long is that Bahais seem to be more entrenched in their adherence to dogma than other faith.

It depends on what religious group we're discussing. The Baha'is are not alone in being clear homosexuality is against the laws of their faith. Nor do we agree with the label 'homophobic'. We've covered this ad nauseum and we simply don't agree. That's fine by me, but if you want to keep arguing go ahead.

BTW, nice to see you are keeping an eye on my stats. Could you provide a monthly summary, just for comparison? Ideally ranked by topic. Thanks.

Mate. Take a few seconds to check out the function 'Top Posters' near the top of this page and you'll get a breakdown of who has participated in this thread and how many posts we've all contributed. If you feel creating all these posts to put us 'homophobic' Baha'is in our place, that's your prerogative.

 

[loverofhumanity]

Or in the case of me and countless others who have suffered tremendously in this life, renouncing faith and belief in the Abrahamic God is what leads to happiness (and emotional healing). As a survivor of abuse and a former devout Christian, I can say with absolute certainty that happiness was not a result of obeying and believing in God. Would you mind answering the questions I asked you in my previous reply to you? The previous posts we had in this thread from early on in relation to the questions I posed are posted below. I replied to your other post, but up until now it seems that you either ignored my reply and chose not to respond or you didn't see it.

Im glad I suffered and all my tests and difficulties eventually led me to find Baha’u’llah. I suffered child sex abuse, was rejected employment because I had epilepsy and have never been able to drive a car because of my disability. Also, at an early age my father rejected and abandoned me saying I was not his son.

All these sufferings became so unbearable I tried to commit suicide 6 times, the last taking 50 sleeping pills. I decided that I didn’t want to live in such a cruel world. Then I found Baha’u’llah. My suffering led me to the Blessed Beauty and for the last 45 years I have been living in joy, happiness and inner peace that none can find.

Now I look back and thank God for that suffering and would welcome it a thousand times again to find Baha’u’llah. I was on death’s door and God raised me up from the dead to a station of such certitude that my faith is unshakeable by any and all and my inner contentment and inner peace what all the treasures in the universe cannot buy.

I could never amply show my gratitude even though it were every second of everyday for centuries, aeons or eternity for the blessing of knowing Baha’u’llah.

And if it took suffering to wake me up from my deep sleep of ignorance then it was worth every atom of pain. Don’t forget birth is suffering to and so is the dying of self and being born in God. Both are very painful but immensely rewarding.

 

[Dawnofhope]

When you say it makes sense, do you mean that it is an objective and rational conclusion, or that for you personally there's a reason that might not make sense to a critical mind?

A Baha'i world view embraces science, reason and critical evaluation.

This is often true for theists, as their religious beliefs offers them order, structure, and meaning for them. These needs and expriences is a common social behavior for humans. It's an evolved trait both biologically, and socially. Humans have learned to adopt social norms and rituals, and they find comfort mimicking these norms. It offsets natural anxieties we humans have.

It must be great being so enlightened and to rise above the insecurities and anxieties of Abrahamics and theists.

We debate for the intellectual fun just like some will play chess or do crossword puzzles. This is an adversarial and social activity. It's actually good for minds to be stimulated like this.

It sounds like your having a blast.

 

[Dawnofhope]

I'm an amateur student of human psychology, and both faith-based thought and religious apologetics are endlessly fascinating phenomena to behold for me. This is what critical thinkers enjoy doing. They enjoy crafting sound arguments and evaluating the arguments of others for soundness, identifying and naming fallacies along the way. Many of us ask you to examine you beliefs, but I don't think that happens much. Faith pretty much triumphs in those willing to believe by faith.

Why do people keep coming back to Wordle (or sudoku)? Same thing, if one is a critical thinker and skilled at language and deduction. He enjoys putting those skills to the test just for the pleasure of applying reason to evidence and arriving at sound conclusions. And he kicks himself for making a careless error, because doing it efficiently is just as important as arriving at a correct solution.

Thanks for explaining your interest in this thread and discussions with the Baha'is.

This is how you convince yourselves that this is not homophobia. The laws are homophobic.

It is true that Baha'is at the very least aspire not to be 'homophobic'. The laws against certain sexual practices certainly do include some homosexual behaviors. Laws can't be homophobic of course as homophobia is human quality.

Is God homophobic? For you he can't possibly be, as He doesn't exist. For Baha'is God is exalted and transcendent above all human characteristics.

Baha'is aspire to be loving and kind to all, including those who identify with being gay.

What became of the gay couple in the video? Weren't they rejected. That's may not be shunning in the Mormon or Jehovah's Witness sense of the word, but it is rejection.

The video in post #1518 I watched was a guy who ultimately felt rejected by the Baha'is. However Baha'is would be free to associate with him. We would not shun someone under such circumstances as the JWs do.

That's what you are being accused of with deflection - unwillingness to engage in responsive discussion, that is, an unwillingness to answer uncomfortable questions by criticizing analogies, for example, and not with valid criticism, either. What you did can be done with any analogy, and it doesn't make the analogy less apt. The very essence of an analogy is that it has some features that map mutatis mutandis onto something else, and some features that are different but irrelevant to the analogy. Thus, "he's as blind as a bat" is a valid analogy when limited to sight, but not much else, and replying that man is not a bat is a self-evidently true yet irrelevant objection.

I simply won't respond further to comparisons between the Baha'i Faith and the KKK and consider such comparisons born of religious phobia and aversion.

 

[KWED]

Just in case anyone thinks I am ignoring them or whatever, I will no longer be discussing this particular issue. Seems my "passion" is not conducive.

 

[Dawnofhope]

Just in case anyone thinks I am ignoring them or whatever, I will no longer be discussing this particular issue. Seems my "passion" is not conducive.

Thanks for letting us know. You have put a great deal of energy into this thread devoted to what you believe is right. Sometimes having a break is the best thing.

 

[samtonga43]

A lot of theists imply it's a strong motivator, pleasant myths are easier to digest that unpleasant truths.

I was an atheist who discovered that these 'pleasant myths' turned out to hold disturbing truth. It is not so pleasant for an atheist to be slowly convinced that Myth became Fact (C.S. Lewis)
"Pagan myths are not to be regarded as a nemesis. They are the whispers and Jesus is the voice; they are rumors and Jesus is the news; they are suspicions and Jesus is the truth; they are wishes and Jesus is the reality; they are hope expressed and Jesus is the grand fulfillment".

 

[samtonga43]

You continually propagate your personal opinions as if they are facts

Oh, the irony!

 

[Sheldon]

The way society looks at sexuality has nothing to do with what is moral since society does not determine what is moral, God does.

This is manifestly untrue, as religions and their adherents have found out to their cost, when they break society's laws by openly discriminating against people who happen to be gay.

 

[Sheldon]

I was an atheist who discovered that these 'pleasant myths' turned out to hold disturbing truth. It is not so pleasant for an atheist to be slowly convinced that Myth became Fact (C.S. Lewis)
"Pagan myths are not to be regarded as a nemesis. They are the whispers and Jesus is the voice; they are rumors and Jesus is the news; they are suspicions and Jesus is the truth; they are wishes and Jesus is the reality; they are hope expressed and Jesus is the grand fulfillment".

We have no objective evidence that Jesus said any of the things assigned him, even if we did it wouldn't objectively evidence the claims of course.

 

[Sheldon]

You are the pot calling the kettle black since you have your own prejudices, just in the opposite direction.

Nonsense, I am happy for straight people to be treated equally with gay, the prejudice is yours, I'm simply opposing it.

 

[Sheldon]

My religion's claims are from a Messenger of God who speaks for the deity.

Nope, that's just a subjective belief you hold. Whereas many decent societies base their laws on what those societies deem moral, not on archaic religious doctrine, like the pernicious homophobia your religion is trying to peddle.

Thus your claim was manifestly untrue, as societies decide what is moral, and pass laws accordingly. Your religion's prejudiced homophobia may land it in trouble with society's laws at some point, as have other religious homophobes

 

[Sheldon]

The Manifestation of God says otherwise and I trust His Knowledge above human error prone minds.

Your subjective beliefs are irrelevant since we have objective evidence that gay people are excellent parents on the whole, and children thrive at least as well with two fathers or two mothers as they do with heterosexual parents. Your claim was and is manifestly untrue.

 

[Sheldon]

Laws can't be homophobic of course as homophobia is human quality.

I'm sorry maybe I've misunderstood. Humans pass laws, those laws can reflect and practice homophobic prejudices, as well as many others of course.