Recently in same sex marriage Category

There have been some real gems among the hundreds and hundreds of comments left on this blog in the past couple weeks.  Among those that bear repeating is this one from Edward Green:

To begin to understand the Bible's views (and they are various) on sexuality you need to get into the culture.

Sex was something that came with marriage. For women between the ages of 14 and 18. For men probably a little later. Scripture supports what we see in society and studies of sexual dysfunction show, that human beings are designed to be sexually active from late teenage years onwards.

When I read the Song of Solomon I find an erotic poem describing many different diverse acts of love, most of which happen before the couple are married. Once you key into the imagery there is not much that is not covered. Love is awakened? Perhaps she fell pregnant. It is almost implicit. And so they marry.

Pre-marital sex in Scripture means pre-adult sex. It also means the risks of pregnancy outside of the core economic and family unit. The Gospels are clear that Mary & Joseph did not marry for love after all (although I am sure they grew to love each other) and they story demonstrates the stigma of pre-marital sex. But Joseph's response was one of grace (to put her away not shame her), and grace doubled (to marry Mary). And yes I do hold to the Creedal statements on the Virgin Birth. But is is the appearance of the situation that should guide our response.

So the 'No Sex Before Marriage' argument doesn't wash. The 'Sex is part of the journey of two people towards life long covenant loving commitment' argument does. Contraception offers us more sexual freedom, but not the freedom to be irresponsible, recreational or promiscuous. Remember plenty of STI's are passed on by skin contact, that is by 'fooling around'. The ideal is one intimate sexual partner for life.

...since last week.

OK, I'm serious about this. I'm not even being snarky. Really.If you are one who thinks that homosexual sex is sinful, can you please explain to me WHY a gay or lesbian person who is in a long-term, monogamous relationship...

"It's a clean sweep for the liberal agenda in the Episcopal Church," said David Virtue, editor of VirtueOnline.org, a conservative Web site. "The orthodox are finished."So begins the NYTimes article on the annual cluster meeting known as the Episcopal Church...

An interview with me on the issue of gays and the church just went live on the new interfaith website, Patheos.Q: In a now famous post, you came to the conclusion that GLBTQ folks can "live lives in accord with...

Probably the most anticipated element of Cornerstone that I was involved with was a panel discussion entitled, "Gay Rights or Wrongs," which was a conversation about how the church should approach the issue of GLBT persons. (I wrote about other...

Do you think that Christian leaders who publicly support same sex marriage, gay rights, etc., should be pushed out of the closet?Last fall, I publicly affirmed gay marriage as a Christian and biblically virtuous lifestyle. Of course, not all Christians...

Last week, Doug Kmiec went on Colbert and became the next in a long line of people: Those who've gone on Colbert and said what I want to say on Colbert. Kmiec said what more and more of us are...

In one of my early posts on same sex marriage, I wrote that I used to be in the "natural law" camp of persons who said that, thought there's not an overwhelming amount of verses in the Bible about homosexuality...

It just turns out that he won't debate it with me.Last fall, Rod and I agreed, at the behest of our then-editor, Patton Dodd, to hold a friendly "blogalogue" on same sex marriage.  It was in the aftermath of California's...

In this week's edition of Newsweek, Richard Mouw, the president of Fuller Theological Seminary, penned an essay, "Less Shouting, More Talking," in which he addresses the issues around Prop 8.  It's clear that he wrote it, in part, as a...

Noah, a self-described conservative, makes a calm and helpful comment under Same Sex Marriage Blogalogue: Press Pause,To be really honest, the comment section makes me sad. It is sad to me that people become so ugly when discussions arise over...

Several of you have been dropping comments under other posts, asking why this much-pimped series petered out so quickly.  Well, here's the deal: Rod chose to stop the blogalogue very shortly after it started. Both of us were inundated by...

As usual, lots and lots of mean-spirited commentary around GLBT issues here yesterday, but a couple of poignant comments stuck out under yesterday's Comment of the Day and Sunday's Announcing Queermergent. First, Kristi:done talking? done listening? i don't understand what...

After his much debated post, The Bible & Homosexuality: Enough with the Bible Already, Adam Walker-Cleaveland is now tackling Jack Roger's book, Jesus, The Bible, and Homosexuality: Explode the Myths, Heal the Church chapter-by-chapter.(Rogers is a polarizing figure in the...

A fine dissent from Mike to my still-debated post, How I Went from There to Here: Same Sex Marriage Blogalogue:I think the conclusion from this is that you have "caved to the mushy inclusivity of pluralized nothingness" from the simple...

Rod, Happy New Year!  I'm glad that we've decided to get back into our blogalogue this month.  I know that lots and lots of readers want us to tackle the biblical evidence one way or another regarding same sex marriage. ...

Panthera, Larry, Celsus, and others continue to have at on yesterday's COTD, but it's Christmas Eve, so I'm going to refrain from re-posting one of theirs here -- they're not particularly gentle.However, here's a comment by Panthera on yesterday's post...

The Comment of the Weekend, continuing the conversation on homosexuality, has drawn a bit of response.  Larry and Panthera exchanged comments that hovered just on the border of civility and then, I'm afraid, crossed that border.  We join the conversation...

Methinks the biggest story this week is not BO's choice of Papa Rick to give the inaugural invocation.  The biggest story this week is how big this story is.  It won't go away.  I'm sure BO's people thought it might...

There's a bit of an in-house dust-up here at Bnet over Steve Waldman's extensive interview with Rick Warren (VIDEO / TRANSCRIPT). Steve's posted on it a few times, as have others around the blogosphere.But here in the friendly confines of...

From Basil, responding to Quote of the Weekend:I appreciate the civil tenor of all of these comments. I am a gay man, who is exploring my own religious beliefs, via Quakerism, and enjoy my worship greatly. I am very interested...

To the post, The Newsweek Same Sex Marriage Kerfuffle, Dr. O'Hanlan writes, Galileo (science) was right and the Catholic Church was wrong and we finally had to admit it 500 years later. Science has some weighty evidence for us and...

Newsweek editor Jon Meacham gambled this week, and he gambled big.  In what is, by any measure and extraordinary piece of journalism, Newsweek religion editor Lisa Miller wrote a cover story that basically says, the Bible does not define marriage...

From Harpers Magazine, 2005:...

Two in a row for Dr. Science!Wow, I just checked back to see if the old thread had died, and what do I find! Thank you, Tony. BTW, the pronoun used for me is "she", not "he"."A Walker" -- Who...

To my post regarding Zach Lind's support of SSM, over against the arguments Dan Kimball noted that it may lead to the legalization of polygamy, Dr. Science writes,Civil marriage is a legal contract between two persons. Same-sex marriage acknowledges that...

The conversation continues my most-read Beliefnet post to date: Same Sex Marriage Blogalogue: How I Went from There to Here.  Ben contributed this:Yes, The Holy Bible is very clear on a lot of things. Circumcision, for instance. And what about...

The next thing I hope tackle with Rod in our Same Sex Blogalogue is the "slippery slope," which keeps coming up in the comments.  The argument usually goes like this: if we allow gay marriage, the next thing we know,...

Several commenters have questioned my inclusion of the "B" in GLBTQ, suggesting that bisexual persons don't fit under the monogamy that I endorse.  But PSUdain clarifies on my behalf:There seems to be a running confusion here about the nature of...

I won't be blogging about same sex marriage this weekend, and I don't know if Rod will nor not.  But, in the meantime, I thought I'd point you to a couple other spots where I've found some good thoughts:Eugene Cho...