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Inclusiveness and Gay Children of God


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16 hours ago, USU78 said:

If the Book of Mormon teaches anything, it teaches that both individuals and peoples have the freedom to make lousy decisions and suffer the consequences of those decisions 

Not everyone has that freedom.  Some countries and peoples are far less tolerant of diversity.

ETA: Rick Phillips, “Saints in Zion, Saints in Babylon: Religious Pluralism and the Transformation of Mormon Culture,” doctoral dissertation (Rutgers Univ., 2001).  Online at https://www.academia.edu/9832129/Saints_in_Zion_Saints_in_Babylon_Religious_Pluralism_and_the_Transformation_of_Mormon_Culture?email_work_card=title  .

Edited by Robert F. Smith
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1 hour ago, Nofear said:

I don't imagine heaven as being full of clones, not at all. I personally and fully expect a great deal of diversity. So I think I didn't get my point across well enough.

1) our immortal bodies will in some tangible ways be different from our physical bodies
2) what we perceive as desirable in the eternities will in some tangible way be different than what we perceive as desirable in the eternities
3) the differences can range from trivial to profound, but what is trivial and what is profound is subjective to the individual

You are fine with being gay right now in mortality. When you die, your opinion won't suddenly change either. But that doesn't mean it won't as we come to further understand the economy and society of the heavens. It doesn't mean my ideas won't change either. Indeed, I'm absolutely confident that I don't have it figured out and that in many things I will change my ideas. The prophets of God have given their perspectives on a tiny portion of the issues. I weigh their views more than you do but I'm ultimately still just as ignorant.

My father used to say that the most arrogant position to take is "I don't know what the right answer is, but I know you're wrong."
That's my position. :)

Do you think your love for your spouse will go away?

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1 hour ago, let’s roll said:

I’d invite you to consider how Jesus answered the question “what lack I yet?”

If there is anything more important to any of us than Celestial life, we will be asked to give it up.  What you are asked to give up may be different than what I will be asked to give up because we may value different things.

If we’re unwilling to give it up, my belief is that we’ll keep it, and forsake what we might have had if we were willing to, figuratively, place it on the alter.

Honestly, I don’t even know if there is a place for someone who is gay in the Celestial Kingdom.  I am just trusting God that he has a plan for me.  It is hard to work towards something that might not be possible. I sometimes am envious of those who are straight.  Everything seems more clear. 

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3 minutes ago, california boy said:

Honestly, I don’t even know if there is a place for someone who is gay in the Celestial Kingdom.  I am just trusting God that he has a plan for me.  It is hard to work towards something that might not be possible. I sometimes am envious of those who are straight.  Everything seems more clear. 

california boy, God put you here for a reason, it's that clear! :) 

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6 minutes ago, Valentinus said:

This obsession with with perfection is a flaw that humans need to be cured of in order to be with God.

Why? What is wrong with perfection?

5 minutes ago, california boy said:

Honestly, I don’t even know if there is a place for someone who is gay in the Celestial Kingdom.  I am just trusting God that he has a plan for me.  It is hard to work towards something that might not be possible. I sometimes am envious of those who are straight.  Everything seems more clear. 

I hope you make it. It will be more fun if you are there.

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23 minutes ago, Robert F. Smith said:

Not everyone has that freedom.  Some countries and peoples are far less tolerant of diversity.

I'm having trouble following you here.  Diversity isn't the issue as I see it.  Morally turpidudinous decisions by nation-states and individuals is.

Abortion on demand is one such decision.

Preservation of nuclear family is another such decision.

Putting children and youth into risky situations without regard to risk because of political expedience.

IMNSHO homosexual marriage is another.  

One can be inviting of others, regardless of the moral turpitude of their personal decisions, without putting self, family, community, or nation-state at risk, so long as the others agree to abide by the moral strictures of one's home, family, community, or nation-state.  One must be free to enforce those strictures, however.  Impositions upon the individual, family, community, or nation-state from without are the stuff of Babylon.  Homosexual marriage is one such.  Abortion on demand is another.  Policies inimical to home and family yet another.  Putting children and youth into risky situations without regard to risk because of political expedience probably the worst of all.

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36 minutes ago, california boy said:

Do you think your love for your spouse will go away?

Ooh, trap question. Fun!

I personally don't distinguish between the types of love, though I haven't put deep pondering into the subject. Instead, I think of love roughly as "care for another's well-being". So, to answer your question, no, I won't stop loving her. It will only deepen.

The difference between me loving my wife, or children, or a stranger includes amount and appropriate expression. Some examples.

  • Sexual expression: appropriate wife.
  • Intimate but non-sexual contact: appropriate both wife and children.
  • Kind and uplifting words, Sacrifice, and Service: appropriate everybody.

My Heavenly Parents love me to an extent far greater than I currently possess for mere mortals, including my wife. But their expression is most certainly not sexual.
 

Edited by Nofear
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I cannot imagine getting to the other side in some opposite parallel universe and suddenly being attracted to a different gender than I am attracted to now.  I don’t imagine any of us can fathom such a thing. 

Can God do anything? Of course.  But if ^this^ were a thing, my whole life would be meaningless. IMO. 

Edited by MustardSeed
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8 hours ago, Robert F. Smith said:

I don't know that any of that is true, but those who demand groveling admissions of guilt and fault forget Jesus' admonition to forgive even your enemies, to be kind to those who despitefully use you and abuse you.  The prayer mode he taught was to ask for forgiveness based on first forgiving your enemies (those who have trespassed against you).  So why the always and ever one-sided demands?  Is it always going to be about vengeance and getting even?  I know that marriage and family relations cannot proceed on that basis, and most diplomats understand very well that constant scapegoating will not advance one's cause.

Moreover, the LDS Church has not changed its theology, but only sought a modus vivendi, an accommodation, if you will.  Just like Orthodox Judaism and evangelical Christianity, LDS theology still defines homosexual activity as wrong.  There is unlikely to be any sort of change in that fact.  So what are the demanded apologies for?  What purpose do they serve?

Never mind. The mental gymnastics of unpacking your response are too exhausting to qualify your post with a response of substance.

I'll just concede that the church has never sinned nor will it ever sin because it's perfect and the "kingdom of god" on earth and imply all other positive platitudes the church is due.

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6 minutes ago, MustardSeed said:

I cannot imagine getting to the other side in some opposite parallel universe and suddenly being attracted to a different gender than I am attracted to now.  I don’t imagine any of us can fathom such a thing. 

Can God do anything? Of course.  But if ^this^ were a thing, my whole life would be meaningless. IMO. 

And from what I've been taught, we take with us those personalities, addictions etc. This from LDS church lessons I've heard.

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22 minutes ago, USU78 said:

I'm having trouble following you here.  Diversity isn't the issue as I see it.  Morally turpidudinous decisions by nation-states and individuals is.

Abortion on demand is one such decision.

Preservation of nuclear family is another such decision.

Putting children and youth into risky situations without regard to risk because of political expedience.

IMNSHO homosexual marriage is another.  

One can be inviting of others, regardless of the moral turpitude of their personal decisions, without putting self, family, community, or nation-state at risk, so long as the others agree to abide by the moral strictures of one's home, family, community, or nation-state.  One must be free to enforce those strictures, however.  Impositions upon the individual, family, community, or nation-state from without are the stuff of Babylon.  Homosexual marriage is one such.  Abortion on demand is another.  Policies inimical to home and family yet another.  Putting children and youth into risky situations without regard to risk because of political expedience probably the worst of all.

Will you expand on the bold? I'm unsure whom you're talking about here. Thanks! :)

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I often wonder - given God's apparent ability to be OK with some sexual things that seem hard for me to accept - polygamy, concubines, etc. - if one of our big trials here is the emphasis we have on the appetite for sex. I wonder if the very fact that we are so worried about it here is not just one big obstacle to us becoming more god-like, and if, in the eternities, it won't be so much about who we are attracted to as much as who we choose to covenant with.  

For instance, I have a hard time thinking God would look at a woman (or man), and have the kind of thoughts we often have such as "wow!  what a sexually attractive/hot person".  I am not saying those thoughts are wrong for us as mortals, as long as we keep them in check - but I wonder if part of becoming exalted is losing them in favor of a more universal love and compassion.

 

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1 minute ago, Tacenda said:

Will you expand on the bold? I'm unsure whom you're talking about here. Thanks! :)

No, thank you.

Let your imagination run wild.  I could come up with a dozen or so myself.

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11 hours ago, Hamba Tuhan said:

Precisely. To argue that Christ can't or won't fix all faithful and repentant sinners is a distraction from the real disagreement: is the millennia-old standard of Christian sexual morality -- vigorously reinforced, for Latter-day Saints at least, by men claiming to be authorised prophets -- really of God or not?

I'd rather be gay in the deepest pit of hell than a gay turned straight man in heaven.

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7 minutes ago, Valentinus said:

I'd rather be gay in the deepest pit of hell than a gay turned straight man in heaven.

The doctrine's of the Gospel acklowledge this.

D&C 88:33 For what doth it profit a man if a gift is bestowed upon him, and he receive not the gift? Behold, he rejoices not in that which is given unto him, neither rejoices in him who is the giver of the gift.

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13 minutes ago, Valentinus said:

In temporal form it is unrealistic. Perfection assumes you have nothing more to learn or progress. Because of my faith in God I'm able to be grateful and be humbled by my inability to ever be omnipotent or omniscient like He is.

I intend to reach that point. I do believe perfection can be daunting specifically because people often ascribe the failings of fallen flesh to eternal inadequacies. Recognizing what problems we should work on in ourselves and what is just a temporary affliction to be endured but not repented of makes life a lot easier.

11 minutes ago, Valentinus said:

I'd rather be gay in the deepest pit of hell than a gay turned straight man in heaven.

But what if you just turn bi and double your options? Surely you could not object to that. ;) 

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13 minutes ago, Valentinus said:

I'd rather be gay in the deepest pit of hell than a gay turned straight man in heaven.

Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.

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21 minutes ago, Maestrophil said:

I often wonder - given God's apparent ability to be OK with some sexual things that seem hard for me to accept - polygamy, concubines, etc. - if one of our big trials here is the emphasis we have on the appetite for sex. I wonder if the very fact that we are so worried about it here is not just one big obstacle to us becoming more god-like, and if, in the eternities, it won't be so much about who we are attracted to as much as who we choose to covenant with.  

For instance, I have a hard time thinking God would look at a woman (or man), and have the kind of thoughts we often have such as "wow!  what a sexually attractive/hot person".  I am not saying those thoughts are wrong for us as mortals, as long as we keep them in check - but I wonder if part of becoming exalted is losing them in favor of a more universal love and compassion.

 

I would argue that our passions intensify in the resurrection. Hence the need to control them now while the training wheels are on. I would argue that God’s passion and attraction for his wife or wives (comprising spiritual, mental, emotional, physical, and sexual attributes) would dwarf the most lustful or in love fallen mortals.

Too often I think we ascribe to God being less then we are in terms of emotions and appetites when He is much much more. He/They controls them but better but his appreciation for beauty and sensation in all aspects dwarfs ours. He enjoys a hug, the ocean spray, the view from a mountain, and skydiving more then we ever could.

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18 minutes ago, Nofear said:

The doctrine's of the Gospel acklowledge this.

D&C 88:33 For what doth it profit a man if a gift is bestowed upon him, and he receive not the gift? Behold, he rejoices not in that which is given unto him, neither rejoices in him who is the giver of the gift.

The gift is is being created and born gay. To reject such a gift is precisely what D&C 88:33 is talking about.

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24 minutes ago, Valentinus said:

I'd rather be gay in the deepest pit of hell than a gay turned straight man in heaven.

Well, I have never been to hell to compare the two, but I can vouch that being straight is not all that bad 😁

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