Satan Really Is An Evil Genius

[CV75]

This is wrong on so many levels. What more can they share, with someone they haven't fallen in love with? They can still raise children, maybe adopt the many that need a family.

They can still do a ton of other things traditionally married people do, and even enjoy happiness on the terms they have defined it. However, there is always the opportunity to define happiness in the way that is defined by the “plan of happiness.”

 

When we speak of the plan of happiness, we speak of the way of the Lord, and believe the Church keeps us in this way.

 

As you’ve seen in this thread, the argument comes up from time to time that the Church will someday condone and perform same-sex temple marriages. The rationale is varied, namely that there is more to be revealed (Articles of Faith 9), the priesthood ban due to race was lifted (the leaders were wrong about a racist policy and so are likely wrong about same-sex unions), homosexual behavior would be legitimized in the marriage covenant, and that the scriptures doesn’t specifically prohibit same-sex marriage.

 

According to my understanding, these arguments are faulty in that the revelations would not contradict the Abrahamic covenant, which focuses on the priesthood and the continuation of the seeds (through marriage--Abraham 2:12, D&C 132:19, 30); that the blessings of priesthood and the temple are already fully available to people with same-sex attraction as long as they are worthy (according to our stake presidency, many do marry and raise families, even though the Church no longer necessarily advises gay members to marry someone of the opposite sex--there is no ban on same-sex marriage because there is no same-sex covenant to ban.); and the scriptures from Adam and Eve onward consistently hold up marriage as being between and man and a woman, even in the imagery used (bridegroom/bride, husband/wife) for God’s relationship with Israel and the Church. The Savior Himself required a Father and a mother. The scriptures lay out the true and faithful testimonies and covenants and prohibit anything that man might imagine that does not align with them (Mosiah 4:29; 12:26). This is aside from the various Biblical prohibitions against homosexual behavior, the fact that life cannot be generated through same-sex unions, and that other powers inherent in the complimentary natures of the respective genders are lacking in same-sex relationships. In addition, same-sex marriage as a fairly recent development wouldn’t be in the scriptures that predate the concept because it “perverts the ways of the Lord” (in this case, the original covenant of marriage)--the alteration was imagined after the established covenants were revealed.

 

I see the law of opposition also serving as a foundation of sorts for the marriage covenant. Without the male and female becoming one flesh and thus a compound in one, there can certainly be no temporal existence, which is a figure for spiritual existence. From 2 Nephi 2:11-13: “For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things. If not so, my first-born in the wilderness, righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad. Wherefore, all things must needs be a compound in one; wherefore, if it should be one body it must needs remain as dead, having no life neither death, nor corruption nor incorruption, happiness nor misery, neither sense nor insensibility [a same-sex union is not a compound of complementing things in one]. Wherefore, it must needs have been created for a thing of naught; wherefore there would have been no purpose in the end of its creation. Wherefore, this thing must needs destroy the wisdom of God and his eternal purposes [the immortality and eternal life of man, or the continuation of the seeds], and also the power, and the mercy, and the justice of God. …wherefore, all things must have vanished away.

Edited May 27, 2014 by CV75

[Gray]

Okay, Gray, maybe you'd like to help California boy out by explaining what, if anything, is good about people of the same sex having sexual relations with each other. He hasn't told me anything good about that and I am now challenging you for a good answer.

 

 

As a married guy, I can tell you that it's an essential part of any marriage, for bonding and closeness to your spouse. 

[Gray]

In terms of D&C 93, the compass points “north” because that is the direction from which the light shines, and we have the agency to follow the compass or ultimately corrupt the compass and in turn ourselves. Agency trumps the compass. Well-honed agency keeps it in good working order, and ignorance and rebellion ruin it, which is is how God’s laws and covenants are corrupted.

 

That fails to meet the CFR. There is no Church counsel to abstain from marriage and “the Church does not necessarily advise” those with SSA to marry today, meaning it can be advisable under the right circumstances.

 

 

if I can decipher what you're trying to say here, they are only counseled in the ways of righteousness and righteousness never was unhappiness once the blessings are fully understood, which is the purpose for spiritual counsel.

 

I don’t think you can demonstrate that LDS temple worship, particularly the covenants that are made, is an example of perverting the ways of the Lord. I've demonstrated how SS"M" does pervert His ways, and without resorting alone to the absence of its mention in scripture, which you seem to think is OK to use to justify it.

 

The mention of marriage alone as it is typically/traditional described in scripture is sufficient to show that any other alteration from the man-woman union was, is, or would be a deviation from it. “I cannot tell you all the things whereby ye may commit sin [or pervert the ways of the Lord]; for there are divers ways and means …observe the commandments of God [or] perish.” (Mosiah 4:29-30).

 

Re: paragraph 1. How can God's laws be corrupted? I don't think it's possible.

 

Re: paragraph 2. It more than met your CFR by any reasonable standard, sorry! It said the church used to advise them to do so in the past, and doesn't necessarily do so today. Either option is bad marry someone you're not attracted to or stay single forever. Both are disfunctional.

 

Re: paragraph 3. Right, which means that it is righteous for gay people to settle down with a spouse they are attracted to.

 

Re: paragraph 4: You missed my point. It's all dependent upon which subjective viewpoint you are looking at it from.

 

Re: paragraph 5. The scriptures mention wheeled vehicles, but this is not enough to demonstrate that the use of rockets is a "perversion"

 

Edit: sorry if the format is confusing.

Edited May 27, 2014 by Gray

[Gray]

Maybe you do. I don't.

 

God doesn't literally speak with a voice to us. We find the voice of God emerging from very human and imperfect speakers and texts written by humans. There is no booming voice from the sky, though. 

 

I would take it as a mixture of both and it is not limited to moral teachings. If it were it would be kind of sad.

 

I understand that you view things differently than I do.

 

I think we can travel far but I do not think it is primarily us doing it.

 

I think the point is we travel together, as a human family, and we help each other out.

[Gray]

I don't believe sexual relations between 2 people is only about having children together, but I do believe it should at least be a possibility. Even if 2 people can't have children together during mortality they should at least have the possibility of having children in heaven, aftet resurrection, otherwise they would never be able to have children together, and that just wouldn't be good or as good as being able to have children together.

 

 

It is speculative at best to say that people reproduce in heaven via sex