Atheism vs. Religion Dead Horse Beating Round 473!

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For the ads.... a "Coalition of Reason" may imply that those who don't support the coalition or its beliefs aren't reasonable? It depends on if you look at the title as exclusive or not.

Cnn, other than the photo of one of the posters, showed a picture of someone wearing a shirt that included the phrase "Debaptize Now". Thus there is apparently a ceremony for some atheist group out there that focuses on people declaring themselves non-religious.

If some atheists come up with a ceremony it isn't impossible some would come up with some sort of anti-religious meeting that happens at scheduled times. I wouldn't expect to see most atheists attending one on a weekly basis anytime soon but it isn't an impossibility for some group of atheists out there-especially if it initially happens less often than weekly.








About priests and legal marriage. Removing the power of a priest to legally marry a couple decreases the number of authorized clerks capable of doing carrying out a service. Thus it makes marriage harder to attain by removing a group that does it essentially for free for the government.

When talking about removing priests' civil authority to marry this would decrease the amount of a service provided to a community for no benefit in return and also undo a traditional power given by the civil government to priests in some places.

Rather than promoting general freedom (in this case the ability for citizens to choose to be married by a priest and the ability of priests to choose who they will marry) it would decrease it.

There are reasons the idea questionable in both practicality and principle.

 

I agree NOG. I also find it absurd to think that any significant number of people would want to be married by a person of faith (be he a minister, priest, rabbi, imam, whatever) if they did not agree with or follow the edicts of that faith. If you don't want anything to do with a particular faith, why would you want someone of that faith to preside over one of the most important occassions of your life?

I'm nominally Catholic, and I was married in a catholic church, but I would never consider being married by a rabbi for example (not that I have anything against Judaism - I wouldn't want to be married by an imam either).

 

Tradition? Social conditioning? I've heard far too many people with the opinion that if you're not married in a church it's not a proper wedding.

 

They don't have the right to break the law. While I suppose that for some bigotry may be a matter of "conscience," (frankly I find that hard to understand) discrimination by a government official is illegal, at least in this country.

I think it's fair to say that people of the same faith may disagree, even those who attend the same church. For instance, there was that preacher who didn't want anyone who voted for Obama to attend his church (I can't remember where it was). I'm sure in the Catholic Church one is not supposed to use birth control but many Catholics do anyway and still receive the sacraments.

 

Ah, but do they flaunt it? I'm sorry, but you can't have a gay wedding in a church and not be said to be flaunting your relationship (at least in front of the Church). If you have a personal understanding with your priest and he doesn't object to your relationship... then there's no controversy to begin with (well, except for a Catholic Priest approving of gay marriages). If you know that the general standing of your church is disaproval of your relationship, and you still want to attend, odds are you're keeping the relationship rather discreet.

 

But if you think that the only proper weddings are the ones held in churches, then chances are that religion holds are least some value in your life. You may not be a weekly church goer, but you would have some knowledge of some faith, and chances are you would be married in the religion you're familiar with. People who strongly disagree with religion - or those who are simply ambivalent about it - probably don't think that the only proper weddings are the ones performed in churches, because chances are religion plays little to no role in their lives.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but actually the Catholic Church bans all forms of contraception, so even something like a condom is against the rules. However, it is one thing to disagree with a point on a religion, rather than disagree with a basic principle of a religion. The reason I don't think that your example is a particularly good one is because the Catholic Church prohibits contraception, but does not prohibit heterosexual sex. That would be the equivalent comparison. (And technically the Catholic Church's stance on homosexuality is it's OK to be homosexual, it's just not OK to engage in any homosexual behavior - which is kind of like saying it's OK to be a fish, but not OK to swim.)

Anyway, my larger point was simply this: If you want separation of church and state, then that has to cut both ways. That means that if you are a public official you have to marry anyone who wants to get married and who also meet the marriage laws of the state. On the other hand, churches are free to impose rules above and beyond the state regarding who they will and will not marry. If a particular person has a problem with that, then perhaps that person should seek out a church more in line with their views.

 

NOG - Now you are saying something completely different than the issue I addressed in my post. If you go back, you will see that the issue I commented on was "attending" the church, not if a priest should perform the ceremony. Like you, I believe it should be up to the individual church whether or not to perform the ceremony of a gay marriage. The priest can work it out with the Pope later, or expain to the couple why he would not perform a marriage.

 

Because gay people who are religious and want a regular old marriage don't exist?

 

No, it's because from the church's perspective regular old marriage doesn't exist for homosexual couples.

 

While this may be true, it still doesn't mean that having a gay marriage in a church is equivalent to flaunting your relationship. A gay couple married in a church no more flaunts their relationship than a heterosexual couple married in a church.

 

Ummm... most religions view homosexual intercourse as a sin, even an abonimation. Having a gay couple married in the church would be akin to having a prostitute working in the rectory.

 

It is flaunting the relationship to the Church. And yes, I agree it's just as much a flaunting as a heterosexual couple doing the same, but the Church has no objection to a heterosexual couple.

Basically, it's about akin to you 'flaunting' your existence to Tal by posting here. Since Tal has no objection to your existence, it's meaningless. On the other hand, if Tal strongly objected to your very existence, your posting here may be somewhat troublesome.

Looking back, I think our problem may be a disagreement on the definition of "flaunting". To avoid further confusion, I'd define "flaunting" here as making something blatantly obvious, not necessarily doing it in a way intended to cause objection.

 

It depends on the Church. Not every church is like the Southern Baptist Church.

Now what do you have against prostitutes? IMO, prostitutes should be able to attend church just like anyone else.

There are some religions that view ANY kind of sexual intercourse as a "sin." Look at the example of the Shakers. How many are left today? 4. That's what happens in a sexually repressive religion. But the Catholics are smart in that that they don't allow birth control. They know how to build a church membership. If you were to say that in a mostly gay church it's hard to build the base (for obvious reasons), it would be easy to see why it would be discouraged.

 

I didn't say "attending" Chandos -- I said "working." Now, granted, the number of young males attending church may go up and, if the church gets a cut, the revenues may improve for the church.

... this reminds me of the Fosterites in Stranger in a Strange Land.

 

...especially Congressmen and Senators. Governors probably hang out in eHarmony, looking for "soul mates" instead.

 

I'm not sure what you mean here. How is it less flaunting in a northern Protestant church? Either way, you're asking the Church to host and officiate a ceremony entirely dedicated to the recognition of the relationship. That's just about as flaunting as you can get and avoid criminal charges.

 

What I meant was, it depends on the church (I meant exactly that):

 

Maybe you missed the sentence after the one you quoted:

My point with that is that the act flaunts the relationship whether it's approved of or not. It's just that approved of relationships don't cause any controversy when they're flaunted.

 

Now, I'm not sure what you are saying. Maybe neither of us are sober.

 

To flaunt something is to show it proudly in order (usually) to contradict something... so a heterosexual couple would not flaunt their marriage if it were an accepted thing.

(from dictionary.com)

Unless the heterosexuals are waving each other in the air when getting married, they are not flaunting their marriage.