Southern Baptist Church, and Democrats Options

[Jaq]

A Southern Baptist church in East Waynesville, North Carolina has expelled all of its Democrats

Well, actually 9 of them have been expelled and another additional 40 left as protest.

From another message board:

She (posters mother) said WLOS tv just broke in to report that the East Waynesville Baptist church has officially excommunicated all its democratic members.

She said that before the election, the preacher told the congregation from the pulpit that if they didn't vote for * they had to come to the altar to confess their sins and repent. they could'nt be members. (My Mom doesn't attend that church--she's United Methodist, but I know of lots who do attend).

From Mom's email: "One of the local women who got excommunicated said on TV that it was like a cult. Another man who got excommunicated said that the rest of the congregation stood up and applauded as the Democrats were told to leave."

This seems to signal to me another step towards not just the gradual blurring of the boundary between church and state, but a full blown theocracy.

Ten Commandments in public places, debating homosexual marriage in the context of religion (when it's a secular government policy and wouldn't have any impact on churches as they wouldn't be required to perform homosexual marriage ceremonies), prayer in schools... the list goes on..


What think you? The States heading towards a theocracy, or am I just blowing things out of proportion? Would a theocracy be such a bad thing? Why? Why not? Please submit your essays by 5:00 p.m. 500 words or less.

[believe]

Sorry I misunderstood what you meant. By marriage I don't mean marriage in a church or the religeous ceremony, I mean the civil rights, registry office and paperwork, which as far as I know is what people are campaigning for politically.

Well, while I'm sure definitions of religious signifigance vary, there's more to this than just the rights of involved people even if thats what on the paperwork. Even with all the changes going on in our society, marriage is still a legitimancy stamp for relationships and has culture connotations. Which is why this issue is so much more inflammatory to some people, than hate crime laws or whatnot. I don't think that going after marriage first is an accident, as its what I'd do if I was planning to change public perception.

My point was that the marriage of individuals, (regardless of sexuality), when not in the form of a religeous ceremony will not affect believers; thus by preventing them from marrying their rights to happinness and financial security are being infringed (is that the right word?).

Er. I have to disagree with the not affecting people part. Cultural changes and shift affect people that live in that culture. Unless all believers get teleported to mars, changes like this affect them and everyone else. If marijuana was made legal tomorrow for example, this would make several changes. It would be legal, at least somewhat more acceptable and the people that believe its a legit choice would have a lot more solid backing.

This isn't quite the same category, but judging from possibilities and history, I'd say the aftermath would be somewhere in that category. If you could something a not acceptable option for whatever reason, generally, you wouldn't want the federal government proclaiming it legal, right, necessary and equal. Or at least not acceptable. That does encourage people to see it as all right and to do it if they want. Some people obviously believe its acceptable and that the rights of those involved outweight whatever else, but thats not my point. I just consider cultural changes an affect and one that people could well take into consideration.

Many religeous people are opposed to it because they feel more young people will be "persuaded" to be gay if they can marry. No one is persuaded to be gay, your sexuality is something you are born with.

I have to disagree here. I don't think sexuality is always the firm, ingrained people make it out to be. Certainly, some people display same sex attractions at ages that still boggle my mind. Some studies suggest that for some people, there's differences in the brain as well. I read one of those a while back and I'm not going to pretend they don't exist. That also doesn't apply to every gay man and women, every bi one or every straight one, for that matter.

There's a lot of people that display... flexibility. Some girls and more rarely (in my personal experience) boys, that have flings with the other sex and eventually return to mostly straightness. Some are bi, but may or may not practice it and all the grey areas in between. You could argue that they weren't gay in the first place and that might be true, but sexuality seems to have some malleability for a decent share of the population if studies, stories and the rest are anything to go by.

The scary sexual abuse numbers in the US also likely deserve some consideration. I don't believe abuse alone necessarily makes someone gay or not, or that its the only reason. As numbers are frighteningly high and as profound as the affect is on children, I don't see how we can rule it out as something that can affect either orientation. My own experience wasn't a dramatic one, but it threw my sexuality and views of off-kilter for several years. For people that have more traumatic ones, well.. its something that does affect people's urges, beliefs and sometimes inclinations. That some of the inclinations could involve orientation for people with more flexibility would seem reasonable.

By allowing religeous people to prevent another group of people from an action that doesn't actually harm anyone is to give them unfair dominance; if one religeon was given dominance over another there would be outcry (I don't mean a state religeon like C of E by the way, I mean a theocracy).

There is a messy issue, even for me. I've heard arguments (some good) that it shouldn't it even go to the ballot like it has. As long as it does though, the point becomes moot. While religion is the reasoning for a lot of the opposing argument, the bottom line is that people put measures to the ballot, had them voted for and won in the majority of cases. I consider unfair dominance the necessary evil of democracy, including when it applies to me. Religion holding that place in this issue doesn't seem more evil to me than the republicans or democrats doing the same thing about gun control, the death penalty or some other issue I might have strong feelings about.

[Museum Girl]

Er. I have to disagree with the not affecting people part. Cultural changes and shift affect people that live in that culture. Unless all believers get teleported to mars, changes like this affect them and everyone else. If marijuana was made legal tomorrow for example, this would make several changes. It would be legal, at least somewhat more acceptable and the people that believe its a legit choice would have a lot more solid backing.

This isn't quite the same category, but judging from possibilities and history, I'd say the aftermath would be somewhere in that category. If you could something a not acceptable option for whatever reason, generally, you wouldn't want the federal government proclaiming it legal, right, necessary and equal. Or at least not acceptable. That does encourage people to see it as all right and to do it if they want. Some people obviously believe its acceptable and that the rights of those involved outweight whatever else, but thats not my point. I just consider cultural changes an affect and one that people could well take into consideration.

Here's an example; at my school girls cannot wear trousers before 6th form. We asked to be allowed to wear trousers and were told we could not unless everybody in the entire school signed the list, including the boys. Girls wearing trousers does not affect the boys but many still refused to sign the form and we weren't allowed trousers. Ridiculous isn't it? That people who were unaffected by something we considered an ordinairy right should be allowed to deny us that. By straight people being allowed to prevent gay people from marrying they are doing much the same thing that those boys did to us; a group of people are denied something they want and that other people consider an ordairy right simply because those people denying them this feel they shouldn't have that right.

Drugs, if they became legalised, are something that would be open to all people. Gay marriage is only open to gays. The culture will change, and in that sense there will be an affect on believers; but if believers wish to go on believing homosexuality is a sin no one will stop them. It's not like legalising gay marriage will make believers marry people of the same gender, nor will churches be forced to preach it's acceptability. The gay marriage will be there, and believers may not like it but they do not have to participate, and in that sense it won't affect them. Also just because some people consider something not to be acceptable doesn't mean that it shouldn't be acceptable.

Also how will those changes affect them? You say that a change in culture will affect them, but what will those affects be?