She's a girl

/Please continue....

Well, I really cannot understand how anyone would view opposition to gay marriage as "hatred." I imagine there are those on my side of the debate that in fact do hate gays, and I imagine there are gays who hold prejudices against straight people. I do find it disconcerting, however, that a minister would be not only in favor of gay marriage, but willing to support it by using their place as a minister. Unfortunately I am not very informed regarding your specific church, nor would I make it my place to question your faith or loyalty to it. However, as a Christian, I find the prospect of gay marriage troubling. I certainly could not support a religious ceremony under the premise that God has brought two gay people together to be joined in marriage.

No one HERE is talking about forcing or requiring religions to perform gay marriages. They are ONLY talking about the state and civil marriages. Ones that are performed by a Justice of the Peace and not a pastor of any sort. This would not affect your church unless your church decides to allow it. An entirely seperate discussion.

That said, there are some denominations that allow gay marriage.

I didn't misunderstand the post. My comments were not out of fear for such ceremonies, they were simply questioning the church who would be willing to perform such.

From a Catholic perspective, the only REAL problem the Church has with practicing homosexuals is the SAME problem that they have with those who have straight sex outside of marriage/with birth control. That's it. It's not the gayness, it's the marriageless, childless, sex.

Hard to play high and mighty when the average Catholic 20 year old who is straight is just as poorly thought of as the average gay Catholic 20 year old.

/basically assuming that most college kids have sex
//Most do.

I'd rather see a church like that than a church which views it as their "duty" to convert Jews, or a church which stands on soapboxes on a Catholic campus and tells everybody to repent, or a church which litters the basilica I attend with anti-papist literature, or a church that knocks on your door, or a church that thinks a kindergartener can accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior, etc....

FYI, not all churches who oppose gay marriage go to campuses and tell you you're going to hell. Most don't, actually. However, I see nothing wrong with people who care so much about others that they strive to convert them to a faith that they think will save the person. Sure, some evangelicals take it over the top, but otherwise it doesnt bother me at all. Similarly, it doesn't bother me when Mormons or other people do it. They feel it is their duty, you can simply reject them if you don't wish to hear about their faith.

Actually the Church views homosexual sex as worse than Fornication (sex between unmarried people)...

My major issue with the Church when it comes to homosexuality is the seemingly entrenched view that homosexaulity is solely a choice... which is what fuels the view on the sinful nature of homosexual behaviour...

No, they came to my campus and told me I was going to Hell for being Catholic. If you want me to ignore that, then why don't you just ignore churches that ARE performing gay marriage?

shinerblock -- this is purely a hypothetical question, but:

if one of your children turned out to be a homosexual -- would your feelings on this issue differ? what would you do about it?

In my opinion in this debate Shinerbock's arguments have been basically emotion/religion driven without a lot of real factual backup. From that standpoint, I find his arguments frustrating.

To be fair, though, at least in this thread, I haven't seen a lot of seemingly random name calling and personal attacks on his part.

Neither side, nor any third party (not necessarily political party in this case) enjoys opposition.

This might be what students of propaganda techniques would call a "glittering generality." While there may be some basis in fact, it is far from the total story.

That's funny, because my post didn't say that my point was specific to THIS THREAD only, so your point isn't all that relevant or necessary.

Well, they didn't get to this debate yesterday. It's been added to the agenda for the meeting in November.

You're the one who brought it up. Don't bring it up if you don't want it broughten up. You up-bringer.