Let's stop beating around the bush

[il Padrino Ute]

Originally Posted by non sequitur

It's not just about sex. If two guys are walking around BYU holding hands and being affectionate towards one another, they'll quickly find themselves in front of the honor code office. It's obviously not just sex act that is the problem.

Aren't the folks in the Honor Code office a bit more gung-ho about curbing behavior than the LDS church is itself?

For example, my hair length right now hasn't stopped me from recently renewing my temple recommend, but I'd be kicked out of the testing center at BYU for it and have to explain myself to those in the HC office why my hair is the same length as the Savior's in all the paintings I've ever seen of him, including, I'm assuming, paintings of him in buildings on the BYU campus.

[MikeWaters]

Originally Posted by TripletDaddy

You seem pretty worked up about this issue.

Being the activist that you are, why not write a letter to the FP and lay out your argument for them? That kind of courage would be exemplary.

Have you shared these concerns with any local or regional Church authorities?

It's a good idea. Maybe I will.

Of course we know how it goes. It gets read by a secretary and gets sent to the stake president. I like my stake president. He's the one that gave the seminal "big tent" impromptu speech in my ward. He also sent out on email explaining that the federal amendment from the FP was not a request to vote for it.

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

Yeah, my dad trotted out the argument that if gays are allowed to be married, gays will have to be allowed into the temple endowment ceremony because of the current wording of the temple ceremony concerning marriage.

There are a lot of church members who believe crap like this.

How did you get that from my argument?

Maybe in the hereafter, Heinlein's Stranger is more representative of how relations will be and our current cultural expectation for relations will be changed or done away with.

The real reason is for control and money. Perhaps societies merely created the artifice of marriage to control the delivery of offspring and its retention.

[MikeWaters]

Originally Posted by creekster

Is that true? I don't think so. Emotional attachment is not the same as physical comsummation. Holding hands may or may not be a probelm, but it is certainly not some Rubicon-esque trip wire for church discipline.

The way that a man can love a woman, and a woman can love a man--it is not possible per Mormonism, that a man can love a man in the same way.

Period. Because love is a gift from God. And the love of a man towards a man is evil.

It's really simple. And it explains how the church cannot budge an inch in recognizing any truth in the love of a man for a man.

Will specific examples convince you? I doubt it. So I won't go to the trouble of acquiring them.

[non sequitur]

This is an excerpt from BYU's honor code:

One's stated same-gender attraction is not an Honor Code issue. However, the Honor Code requires all members of the university community to manifest a strict commitment to the law of chastity. Homosexual behavior and/or advocacy of homosexual behavior are inappropriate and violate the Honor Code. Homosexual behavior includes not only sexual relations between members of the same sex, but all forms of physical intimacy that give expression to homosexual feelings. Advocacy includes seeking to influence others to engage in homosexual behavior or promoting homosexual relations as being morally acceptable.

Violations of the Honor Code may result in actions up to and including separation from the University.

Isn't that self-contradictory? It's okay to have same sex attraction, but it's not okay to have homosexual feelings?

[creekster]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

The way that a man can love a woman, and a woman can love a man--it is not possible per Mormonism, that a man can love a man in the same way.

Period. Because love is a gift from God. And the love of a man towards a man is evil.

It's really simple. And it explains how the church cannot budge an inch in recognizing any truth in the love of a man for a man.

Will specific examples convince you? I doubt it. So I won't go to the trouble of acquiring them.

I am confused (really, and more so than usually). Are you spekaing euphemistically about the love of a man for a woman? Or do you mean that the church literally will discipline a man for being emoitonally attached to another man regardless of any physical consumamtion of the attachemnt? I am not aware that this is true; do you believe it to be true?

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

To the church, saying SSA is not a sin, is like saying a passing thought of a naked beautiful woman is not a sin, if not dwelt upon by the thinker.

However, love, LOVE, LOVE is a very different thing. And for a man to love another man is horrifying, and means that SSA has gone too far, and is now devilish and evil.

Why is holding hands so offensive and worthy of priesthood intervention? Because it indicates love. And if a man can truly love a man, in the true sense of love, then there is no God.

It's really as simple as that.

No, if there is no explanation in religious doctrine for something that shouldn't exist, then perhaps there is no God.

The existence of a phenomenon not theologically explainable, especially one as significant as homosexuality, suggests that the entire scheme is man created, not inspired and we're all just base animals.

[CardiacCoug]

Originally Posted by non sequitur

This is an excerpt from BYU's honor code:

One's stated same-gender attraction is not an Honor Code issue. However, the Honor Code requires all members of the university community to manifest a strict commitment to the law of chastity. Homosexual behavior and/or advocacy of homosexual behavior are inappropriate and violate the Honor Code. Homosexual behavior includes not only sexual relations between members of the same sex, but all forms of physical intimacy that give expression to homosexual feelings. Advocacy includes seeking to influence others to engage in homosexual behavior or promoting homosexual relations as being morally acceptable.

Violations of the Honor Code may result in actions up to and including separation from the University.

Isn't that self-contradictory? It's okay to have same sex attraction, but it's not okay to have homosexual feelings?

I disagree with it, but it's not self-contradictory. You can HAVE homosexual feelings and admit to those feelings but you can't physically EXPRESS homosexual feelings, even with holding hands, kissing, etc.

[creekster]

Originally Posted by Archaea

No, if there is no explanation in religious doctrine for something that shouldn't exist, then perhaps there is no God.

The existence of a phenomenon not theologically explainable, especially one as significant as homosexuality, suggests that the entire scheme is man created, not inspired and we're all just base animals.

Base animal = natural man.

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by creekster

Base animal = natural man.

there is no higher man and perhaps no God. Gays disprove the existence of God.

God would not create something that serves no purpose, but as science proves the probability of a combination of mostly genetic, with in utero factors, determining sexuality, then the existence of something which serves no evolutionary purpose proves the non-existence of God.