You were recommended to me by
an acquaintance familiar with your column and podcast. I am a
20-year-old male, and as such have certain desires that almost all
20-year-old males have (desires of a sexual nature). However, I am
deeply religious. Religion has been for me a source of strength in my
times of weakness, a rock in the times of storm, and above all a home
to return to when I have lost my path. In the teachings of my
particular religion, to indulge the particular desires I am
experiencing will condemn me to fates too grotesque to mention. I am
rational enough to realize that there is no way that I can “pray away”
these desires. My question is this: How does one prepare for a life of
celibacy and solitude (as that is what is required of me to remain a
member of this particular faith)? Based on what my friend has told me,
I know you have little respect for religious practices and beliefs.
However, these desires are not exactly something I can talk about with
other members of my spiritual community. And while I am currently
seeking counseling related to other issues, I was wondering what a
so-called expert on sex and sexuality would have to say.
Clever Acronyms Escape Me
Get over yourself, faggot.
If it’s possible for you to act on your
unnamed-but-easily-identified desires in an ethical manner—if you
desire to do whatever it is you desire to do with consenting adults who
desire to take their turn doing it to you—this so-called expert
on sexuality thinks you should crawl down off that cross and find
yourself a boyfriend already. (“Pray away” the gay? I’m guessing you’re
Christian, probably Catholic.) And if you experience a moment’s anxiety
the first time you stick your ass in the air—pull the Jesus stick
out first!—just remind yourself that things have been crawling on
top of each other and madly humping away for 850 million years.
Sex came first, then humanity (200,000ish years ago), then religion
came along tens of thousands of years after that. Which may explain why
religion, when pitted against sex (really old) and human nature (pretty
old), always loses. Always.
If you’re on the cross, CAEM, it’s because
you put yourself up there. Which means you’re not some poor mortal
trapped between a cosmic rock and an existential hard place; you’re
just another closeted cocksucker with a martyr complex.
Look, kiddo, you get one life, one chance at
happiness. If it gives you a spiritual semi to fantasize about a God
who created you gay but forbids you to act on your emotional and sexual
attraction to men, knock your damn self out. But you can have a
boyfriend and Jesus, too—look at the pope—you just have to
do what people have been doing since the first terrified idiot invented
the first bullshit religion: improvise. Find yourself a
brand-new religion or sect, or jettison the bits of your current faith
that don’t work for you. If you know anything about the history of
Christianity—and it sounds like you don’t—then you know
that the revisions began before the body was cold. No reason to stop
now.
And finally, CAEM, there is no God—you
do realize that, right? No hell below us, above us only sky, etc.
I’m an only child, male, born
to a single mom. I’m about to turn 21, and I’ve been with a great guy
for over a year. I may be in love. We both have steady jobs, and we
want to move in together. He came out to his parents after we started
dating, and now I think it’s my turn. Problem is, I don’t know how to
break it to my mother. She’s a tiny Mexican woman who isn’t afraid of
smacking me. I’m afraid to tell her. She always talks bad about the gay
lifestyle because she considers herself Christian, although not the
churchgoing kind. When and how do I break the news that she’s not
getting grandkids from me?
Her Only Male Offspring
Your mom is my favorite kind of “Christian.”
She’s not the “churchgoing kind,” as that would require some personal
sacrifice on her part (of her Sunday mornings, at least). And she
certainly didn’t let her faith interfere with her sex life (I’m
assuming your conception was something short of immaculate*). But when
it comes to other people’s lives, when it comes to your sexuality and mine, HOMO, then her Christian values kick into
high gear. How convenient.
Okay, HOMO, lots of us have come out to
hostile moms and dads and watched in awe as they morphed into the
loving, supportive parents we didn’t know they were capable of being.
For some parents the process is quick, for others it’s slow, but it
can’t start until you come out.
Now here’s when you come out: The sooner the
better—but don’t come out to your mother while she has the power
to harm you, i.e., if you’re dependent on her for a place to live or if
she’s paying for your education. And here’s how: by U.S. mail. Don’t
give your mother the chance to smack you. Write her a letter, include
the contact info for the PFLAG chapter in your area, and tell her
you’ll discuss this with her after she attends a meeting, not
before.
Finally, when I came out to my mother, the
first thing out of her mouth was, “I don’t ever want to meet any
boyfriends.” She said the word “boyfriend” like it had been
dipped in shit. On her deathbed, my mother told me to tell my boyfriend
that she loved him (“like a daughter”). My mom came around, HOMO, and
so can yours. But not until you tell her.
My husband and I got married
recently. His first pick for best man was his older brother, “St.
Paul,” a seminary student studying to become a priest. When my husband
asked, he started crying and said he had hoped my husband would return
to the church. We are both liberal ex-Catholics. For a wedding gift,
Paul gave us a book called Man and Woman He Created Them: A Theology of
the Body, 700 pages of dogma by JP2. In the five years I’ve known him,
he has rarely said more than one sentence to me, yet he speaks boldly
in favor of the church’s most conservative doctrines at family
gatherings. How much of his bullshit do I have to deal with? I’m a huge
fan of yours, and I know that you’ve had some issues reconciling your
own life with loved ones within the Catholic Church. Your advice would
be appreciated.
The Schismatic
Man… so intolerant.
I’m talking about you, TS, not your
brother-in-law. Don’t get me wrong: Your brother-in-law sounds like
total douchedrizzle. But he has a right to his opinions and a right to
express them. You have a right to your opinions, too, of course, and
just as much a right to express them. When St. Paul goes off on
premarital sex or the ordination of women or the gays and their Prada
loafers, smile and tell him he’s full of shit. You don’t see him too
often, right? Tolerate his bullshit—that’s what family
does—and count your blessings.
And don’t complain about every word that
comes out of his mouth and then gripe about how little he has to
say to you.
* Note to Bill Donohue: Yes, I’ve confused
the virgin birth with the Immaculate Conception. So sue me,
motherfucker.
i love when we get theme weeks! keep up the great work, dan.
First?
Great as always, Dan! Telling off Christians is just what I needed this week to vent some frustration — now I do it vicariously through you.
Man, you are on a tear today Savage! Love the advice, agree with so so much of it, but couldn’t help but notice the tone – cranky!
CAEM should go to seminary and kill two birds with one stone…
What’s the difference between virgin birth and the Immaculate Conception?
Virgin birth… I have to laugh.
Dan — yay for the Bill Donohue joke. It makes me consider forgiving you for all the space you waste encouraging dumbasses to ascribe stupid meanings to stupid people’s names.
Dan, thank you very much for your advice to CAEM. People have been making up their own religion since religions have existed. I love to reference the bible as the “Big book of pick and choose”. Gays are bad but you can’t sell your daughters? Why follow one of those and not the other?
Also, as a heads up to CAEM – your religion clearly isn’t a “rock in a time of storm” right now.
Dan, anyone as smart as you, who only PRETENDS to confuse the Virgin Birth with the Immaculate Conception (brought to you by Pius IX in 1854, btw) deserves every accolade possible. You go, Girl!!!!
ps As a half-convinced, (non-practicing) raised Protestant with seriously laissez-faire Hindu/Buddhist/futurist tendencies, it gives me great pleasure to inform you that I have made a part-time career of betting my Catholic* friends that they are wrong in thinking that the Immaculate conception refers to the virgin birth of Christ. It’s so satisfying to get hammered on cocktails bought for me by rueful catholic buddies…. try it you’ll like it!
* TRIVIA NOTE! Oxford Dictionary definition of small-c “catholic” (what the word meant BEFORE the Church of Rome did its thing): all-embracing; of wide sympathies or interests; of interest or use to all, universal.
hmmm….
Nice job on the religion smackdown, esp. re: CAEM’s letter! As a militant atheist with lots of deeply religious friends, I have always tried to be tolerant of belief systems. However, over the last few years I have become more tuned into all the harm that religion does to the world and think that the world would be better off without it. I’m glad there is a widely read advice columnist out there who is willing to tell it like it is: Religion is useless.
@ Brandon G.
Immaculate Conception: Most christians believe that Mary was conceived/born without sin — helps lend credibility to the Jesus’ mother thing. Remember that they believe that everyone, at birth, inherits Adam and Eve’s original sin that the committed by listening to the ‘talking snake’ as Bill Maher irreverently refers to it. The “immaculate conception” gives Mary a loophole so that Jeezus isn’t born with sin too. Make sense? Not really? Bingo.
Virgin birth: this is where JC is born to Mary without her having “known” a man. Don’t laugh, it happens. Look up the term parthenogeneis and the lizard genus Cnemidophorous as an example. It doesn’t happen in HUMANS, but it happens.
Better yet, semenary!
oops, typo: that’s “parthenogenesis”
Wow–I’m an anti-religious homophobophobe, yet I thought that first response was stupidly harsh. Maybe there’s missing info, or did Dan assume this guy is gay, simply because the guy wrote him specifically? There are actually religious groups that act like it’s a huge sin to even have sexual thoughts of a hetero nature. Or how do we know the guy isn’t fighting his desire to have sex with dogs? Dan needs to learn tricks from the sneaky christians; if the hell-bound heathen peeps in and says “Hi, I have a problem…” smile and welcome him and slowly brainwash him. They’re smart enough to know not to fling poo, why isn’t Dan?
Well telling CAEM there is no God isn’t going to help him beleive that he can have God and still be who he is. I think it might be better to give him some religious sources that are affirming of who he is. I’m ex-catholic, now a member of the United Church of Christ, and I think having a church family who supports you can be good for people who are religious. http://www.ucc.org/lgbt/.
What if CAEM is a pedophile? or something similarly disgusting? I find it hard to believe that he wouldn’t admit to being gay to DAN SAVAGE in an anonymous letter. I think he’s worried about something else.
Also, I’m sick of all this crap from religious folks for whom religion is therapy, or has use value – his religion is his rock in times of trouble? Whatever. How about believing out of conviction rather than need, rather than weakness, rather than desire for community? You can get similar help by joining a book club.
ok 1st of all CAEM is most definitely queer… I am big fat cunt munching dyke that was born a scared little catholic school girl who was voted most likely to become a nun… 10 years ago CAEM’s letter could have come from me… and at that time even if I had be GUARANTEED anonymity I would not EVER have typed or spoken or whispered the word lesbian… it makes no sense so don’t try to make sense of it… but let me tell you (especially CAEM if he reads this) my life has been 100% better since I jumped off the cross, and dove into my wife’s bed.
Actually, there HAVE been documented virgin births…but only if you define “virgin” as “no vaginal intercourse.”
The most hilarious one was reported in the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology and related the case of a young woman with congenital absence of the vagina who was stabbed in the stomach by a jealous suitor who caught her giving head to someone else…..and was delivered by C-section 9 months later. Apparently semen in a stomach with a stab wound can travel through the abdomen to the ovaries. Astonishing but true — you can look it up.
Another was documented in British law in an aristocratic divorce. Lady X accused her husband of impregnating her via “Hunnish practices” and produced a doctor to testfy that her hymen was intact at her delivery. Her marriage was annulled on grounds that it was never consummated.
Very funny this week on the column and the podcast!
I recommend if anyone wants to laugh until they cry/pee themselves/literally ROTFLtheirAO to listen to the call and response from this week’s podcast where the guy calls in about the dog licking the cum off his hand. That has to be the funniest thing I have ever heard.
Great advice. Special note to CAEM – assuming you are interested in lawful, consenting activities, (which I am sure you are), remember that feeling a little guilty and deviant, about your perversions are definitely part of the fun – part of what makes them hot. Come off the cross but don’t forget about it completely. I’m telling you, I wish I had a strict religious upbringing to contemplate while my wife puts me through my decidedly unholy paces.
I would reccomend the website http://www.gaychristian.net for anybody trying to reconcile conservative christianity with being gay. It’s not very liberal, but I think liberal gay christians have an easier time finding fellowship, because they can just go to the nearest unitarian church.
Thank you #17, I think we’ve all learned something there. That may be my all-time favorite post on this site.
I’m gonna go out on a limb and predict that one day in the future we see CAEM and TS’s brother-in-law on the youth pastor watch.
CAEM is almost certainly not gay, he identifies “certain desires that almost all 20-year-old males have.” There’s only one desire that almost all 20-year-old males have in common, and that’s to stick their junk into 20-year-old vaginas.
whoa
I enjoyed the theme as well, but that first response was a little on the harsh side. Not that I don’t think what was said needed to be said, but couldn’t it have been said in (at least in the start) a slightly more gentle fashion. Clearly Dan likes to vent, and just as clearly we all like to read/listen when he does, but I have to believe that helping the person asking for advice is a goal in there somewhere. I can’t see this advice bringing anything but despair. I’m willing to believe that CAEM (gay or not) is going to have to suffer some despair before he finds happiness (don’t we all?), but I think that fact could have been delivered with a little more empathy or at least sympathy. Sure, maybe he’s hurting because he’s being pigheaded, but it’s not entirely by choice, and anyway who cares? He’s hurting. Don’t people who are hurting and reach out for advice in such a polite and careful manner deserve a little compassion?
Right on, Dan, to the religion sufferer.
He says he is “rational enough…,” and that he will roast in hell or whatever “in the teachings of my particular religion….”
If you’re so rational, then you should realize that you won’t roast in hell BECAUSE your cult teaches that. You will either roast in hell or you will not roast in hell, whether or not you believe it and whether or not your cult teaches it.
Hint: the briefest reflection will make clear to you that no one is going to roast for anything, because no one is going anywhere. This is all there is!
P.S. Your priest knows this, too.
Great column. I appreciate (and share) your view on religion. Though I must say, I do have some problem with gays (or adulterers, or whoever) who insist on reconciling their Christianity with their lifestyle. The truth is, the bible is pretty explicitly against these things, so I think the honest thing to do is decide whether you want to believe the bible and forgo your lifestyle, or indulge in your natural desires and reject the faint consolation of organized religion. The religious gays I have met seem almost pathologically unhappy–like the Jew that’s desperately trying to parse Mein Kampf so he’s not left out of the Nazi community. Seems to me that Christianity + Homosexuality= Misery, though I feel for all those born into situations where they must make a choice.
Michael Carlos (10) – I don’t think “most Christians” believe in the Immaculate Conception of Mary. This is a recent dogma which the Vatican pulled out of its ass. Absurd, obviously, like all the other crap they extract from up there. Protestants recognize it for the nonsense that it is.
Mr Me (25), the Bible is not exactly clear on gays. There was no word for gay back then and the words used in the ancient Greek and Hebrew text have no equivalent word today, even if scholars all agreed on exactly what the word meant. Most of the anti-gay passsages are modified to suit the purposes of the translators, who had their own axe to grind. King James was more interested in pretty words than exact translations and it’s gotten worse since then.
Granted, most fundamentalists/Mormons/Catholics/JW/whoever I’m leaving out have to have someone to hate and vilify, but they’re not getting it from the Bible, just their own translation and hate-infused lens.
Oh, STFU, Deleanore @ #3. “Cranky”?? WTF?? When he’s dealing with the kind of shit that has oppressed men and women for thousands of years, don’t you think Dan has the right to adopt any kind of tone he wants? Besides, it’s his f*cking column. Got a problem with his tone? Then — duh! — don’t f*cking read his columns, dumbass!
Bill Hicks said it best.
Pissed-off redneck: Hey buddy we’re Christians and what you said offended us!
Bill: So? Forgive me then.
Why do some people assume that anyone who is religious is therefore also a weak, stupid, blind, narrowminded sheep? That’s an extremely intolerant and divisive generalization.
I am a Christian. I was born in NY, but live in the south. I go to a Baptist church down here that is filled with … gasp … liberals, homosexuals, environmentalists, and feminists. I know, right? Jesus is totally going to firebomb the place.
Dan, religious people ARE NOT ALL THE SAME. Yes, some of us are jerks. You know what? Some of us aren’t. Stop being so willfully ignorant. And you have no more proof that there is no God than I do that there is. It’s an opinion based on faith or the lack thereof.
CAEM – God made you and God loves you. God gave us these bodies and these hormones and these minds. Jesus never said one word about homosexuality and didn’t say much more about heteroseuxal sex. Jesus talks about love, compassion, unselfishness, and joy. You can enjoy sex. You can enjoy your body. Don’t use sex to hurt people or control people. Don’t use sex to forget God. Keep praying, but don’t pray for God to remove your desire … He won’t because He loves you.
Guess you had a choice to either go gently on him and read him the errors of his ways, in the hope he would draw his own conclusion, or give him the harsh truth! Still not sure how I would have responded, but loved the pope angle. I’d have mentioned how the Borgias used sex, adultery, nepotism, cunning, intrigue to get their family members promoted to bishop, cardinal and pope! Or mentioned Pope Julius III 17 yr old ‘Ganymede’… So much for “fates too grotesque to mention.”
On second thought, I’d have given plastered him as well!
Attitude Devant [sic]: please provide citations for your claim. I am unable to find a record of a woman with MRKH conceiving through a stomach wound. That seems extremely unlikely to me, since (a) I don’t think sperm would survive the extremely acidic stomach conditions, since only the hardiest bacteria can do so; (b) any wound extensive enough to provide a pathway between the stomach and ovaries would lead to such massive internal bleeding, infection and trauma that, even if the mother survived, it’s hard to see how she could possibly bring a child to term; (c) I fail to see how such a horrific event could possibly be considered “hilarious,” even if mother and child both survived it.
While conception resulting from anal sex (through an EXTERNAL pathway; semen can drip) is not unknown, it seems at least as likely that Lady X simply paid off the doctor, or fooled him with a false hymen, as women have been taking advantage of male ignorance of female sexual anatomy by doing for thousands of years.
Dan,
My mother is coming for a visit next week, I hope you don’t mind if I borrow your line:
“But when it comes to other people’s lives, when it comes to your sexuality and mine, HOMO, then her Christian values kick into high gear.”
Not that she reads Savage Love or anything, but I’ll change it to sound like it’s coming from me.
Thanks.
@CAEM If you believe in a personal God then there’s two possibilities.
1) God made you the you are and loves you that way. If you’re Christian, you’ll see that God doesn’t have much to say about who you love, only how you approach love. It’s his followers that have something to say about who. But, frankly they’re a bunch of judgmental, fearful, powermad humans and you don’t have any particular obligation to listen to them. If you’re not acting on your desires in a way that hurts others, if you’re doing so being mindful of a need to treat your partner as you would want to be treated, and if you are acting with love, you should be cool with God. It’s up to you to decide whether you have a religious obligation not to celibacy but to testifying to your fellow believers about the faultiness of their assumptions.
2) You and your religious authorities are right, and God made you and some other people in such a way that you desire love and intimacy but only in a way that you’re forbidden to express. If that’s true then…that’s incredibly, pointlessly cruel. I don’t think a being like that deserves my love and loyalty, or yours. And if you’re worried about torments too grotesque to mention…the other option is doing what the bully wants and then spending the rest of eternity at his side watching him throw a fit and punish anyone like you that didn’t cut themselves off from love. I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t sound like any paradise I’d want to be a part of.
@Shoshannah – false hymen?? Explain, please!
I find the alternative more likely, since I work at Planned Parenthood, where we’ve had girls with intact hymens come in pregnant through dry-humping, for lack of a better term. And in one case, where the girl’s religion made it important for her to have an intact hymen before marriage (I know, I know – tampons, horseback riding, but it was still her request) the doctor was able to perform the procedure without disturbing that sacred little flap-o’-skin. Not trying to say anything about the Virgin Mary now…
@octopodes: right on.
For the record – I’m your average liberal British girl. I don’t go to church, I haven’t made up my mind about my spiritual beliefs yet, I’m a big fan of all the science stuff. I’m not defending religion from a personal standpoint; my mother used to be Catholic and my dad is Jewish. I’ve seen the kind of intolerant dickweeds religion can spit out.
I just don’t see how an atheist who goes “what, you’re *religious*? Pfft, then there’s no point in talking to *you*, as you’re self-evidently stupid” is any different to the Christian who goes “what? *Not* religious? Well, there’s clearly no help for you; you’ll burn in hell”. It’s the same kind smug intolerant bullshit, no matter which side it’s coming from.
@15, if CAEM is a ped, that might not necessarily be at odds with his religion. Homosexuality, on the other hand…
Shoshannah (@32, and sic to you, too!) the case was published in the letters section of BJOG in the 80s and was required reading in my residency. The hilarity came from the details of the case which took place in rural South Africa, and appears to have been treated in a matter-of-fact way by all concerned. Indeed if memory serves the young woman ended up marrying one of the young men (in Africa childbearing cements a family union), and there was an exchange of livestock between the three families to settle any hard feelings. I’ll try and dig up the actual citation, but it’s going to be a hard slog, given their computerized data base is of recent origin.
Since you know the acronym of the mom’s condition, then surely your knowledge of anatomy will demonstrate you that one or two stab wounds to the belly, anterior to posterior, could perforate a full stomach without damaging an artery. As to whether or not sperm could survive stomach acid, that’s the wonder of the story—apparently they did (but then the author makes it clear that they weren’t in the stomach long before she was stabbed). BJOG at one time was a great source for weird and wonderful stories like this.
As for the British case, of COURSE she could have lied. That is, in fact, my point. What makes you think people aren’t lying about Mary too? On the other hand, I have treated a pregnant woman, a Saudi, with an imperforate hymen, not FGN, so there you are: life is truly stranger than our textbooks let on.
p.s What’s with the “sic?” Unfamiliar with ballet? Google it!
I’m not sure what in CAEM’s letter implied he was gay; I know quite a few people with such conservitive upbringings (I live in the bible belt) that ANY expression or feeling of sexuality brings on personal guilt and fear of damnation. After all, he did say they were “desires that almost all 20-year-old males have.” I presumed CAEM was assuming almsot all 20-year-olds have heterosexual desires rather the homosexual ones. Your advice still stands, though, its good advice for repressed, overreligious straight guys, too.
hey dan, loved the column this week… as a former/recovering all-consuming christian, your advice to caem is right on – get down off that cross and into someone’s bed! one of my great pleasures these days is hooking up with the hot 19-year-old who goes to the local bible college and posts everyday on his facebook site about how god is so good and how he wants to live his life for god… but when we’re in the sack, he LOVES getting his cock sucked, LOVES having me rim him hard and deep, and LOVES getting stuffed with my big ol’ cock over and over and over! and i didn’t even bring up his diaper fetish…
been there and done him in minneapolis
The British case is fairly famous:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/articl…
The South African case is elusive: because it is old, and because the Journal’s search engine relies on title words (there are not titles to the Letters).
Still working on it…
@37 – if he doesn’t act on his [insert horrible inclination], he’s ok in christianity, even as a pedophile. I’m no theologian, but I don’t think pedophilia is that different o a hardcore christian from homosexuality. Anecdotally, haven’t we heard plenty of “believers” say “gay marriage?! what next, marrying kids?”
@33 I’m going to have to borrow that one some day too! My mom’s religious views miraculously only kick into high gear when someone else (me) is doing the sinning. Her 20 year affair is no big deal, but apparently, being gay or bisexual is an affront to the almighty. Her religion is only really an issue when she can use it against someone else. It’s mostly all about controlling people and has very little to do with any of the things that are actually in the bible.
Yeah, a little harsh on CAEM there. If he wants to keep on believing (the nice parts) about what he’s believing, he should check out the United Church of Christ. I’m Unitarian, born and raised, and as much as I enjoy it I don’t know that someone with lots of God-faith will immediately take to it. UCC seems to be about as liberal as you can get before you transition into a congregation mostly comprised of practicing agnostics/atheists. Sky Papa love without centuries of bullshit.
@Octopodes, but mostly Rei:
Do you honestly think that upon learning of someone’s devotion to a violent, divisive, and largely intolerant cult-dogma that I should be welcome to their opinions about how I should be living my life? Have you considered that because of the endless persecution and accusations of immorality projected by christians and other religious devotees, people such as myself make snap-second decisions about emotional and social profiles? You can gasp in shock that I would not want to get into a discussion about morality with a christian all you want, but it’s a reaction to a lifetime of bearing witness you YOUR people’s self-righteous bigotry. I am just as happy to ignore you and your delusional D&D land of make-believe.
in re: the stabbing-virgin birth case, all I can offer is a passing reference to it in Morton Stenchever’s farewell editorial in Obstetrics & Gynecology (July 2003, Vol 102, p.5-6). He reports that the case study was submitted to him but rejected for publication, since he felt the case was of limited relevance to American readers but notes “The case report later appeared in another journal.”
I quote here (since you cannot access this journal without a subscription): “It was submitted from an African developing country and reported on a pregnancy that occurred in a young woman with agenesis of the vagina who was having oral sex with a man who was not her usual partner. As the man climaxed, her usual partner arrived and stabbed her in the abdomen. Her stomach was lacerated and its contents spilled into the peritoneal cavity. The author reported that a pregnancy ensued, several pigs and cattle were exchanged to secure a marriage, and a birth by cesarean delivery later occurred.”
Now Shoshannah, I will grant you that as a woman I find violence against women indefensible (Hell! I find violence against people of all genders indefensible)…but…can you think of this case without even the tiniest bit of mirth?
Virgin conception could also occur if the vagina or pubis comes into any contact with male ejaculate. A session of mutual masturbation or similar fun could create such a situation. Sperm a very determined and will find the way or die trying. Odds are against, but those are just odds.
Dan, I understand that this is not your strong point and you’ve never claimed it as such, but I still think that CAEM could maybe have used a gentler hand. Ridiculing somebody’s faith (particularly if it’s one you yourself have experience with) may feel good but I don’t think it helps the person that much. It’s too much to ask a 20-year-old kid to do a total instant 180 on something that’s been an important part of his short life and turn right into a godless flaming fag. Of course if he WANTS to eventually turn into a godless flaming fag, that’s perfectly fine, but I think it’s important to emphasize (as you hinted but did not elaborate upon) that gay and religious do not have to be at odds with each other. There are groups for gay Christians of all types. There are more accepting churches and versions of Christian ideology. There are people who believe that a loving God does not cast people into Hell for being who they are. He should explore these different ways of being Christian.
CAEM, I’m just one of many people that embraces both my religion and progressive values. If you want to, you can be another. There are plenty who will support you.
I think Dan was right in assuming that CAEM is gay. The reason CAEM couldn’t say what he wanted outright is because it’s too shameful for him to admit, even to himself. There’s no way he’s going to put it in black and white that he prefers a big, hard, throbbing cock over boobies and vajajay. He can barely think it, much less say it out loud or write about it.
Religious guilt can be really intense and overwhelming. If he’s anything like me, he’s had a lifetime of guilt and garbage put on him by his family (even those who are well-meaning) and church community. The church has shamed him into believing that homosexuality is dirty and wrong. That kind of guilt trip doesn’t go away overnight.
I”m mostly straight, but have bisexual tendencies. I’ve made out with a few women (years ago, though-no recent experimentation) and enjoy lesbian porn. I think women are beautiful, but it’s taken years for me to admit to myself that I even like the idea of sex with another woman. It’s taken an abundance of reading, meditating, therapy, visits to a UU church and Dan Savage columns for me to be ok with my sexuality. The head trip that my religious upbringing put on me was incredibly emotionally scarring (in more ways than just sexually). The guilt and shame made me so repressed that I was in denial about my attraction to women.
So, in short, I think Dan was right on the money. He has probably had enough letters like these to recognize a repressed gay guy with religious baggage when he sees one. There are probably plenty more people out there just like CAEM who not only have to deal with the societal taboo of being gay, but the religious implications as well.
Good luck CAEM! You’re not alone. There are others just like you.
@32–BTW what in the world do you mean “even if both mother and child survived?” It’s how she got pregnant—there was no baby at the time. As I’m sure you must know the peritoneal cavity is one big spaghetti bowl. Whatever gets in there (in this case via a stab wound to the stomach) floats around like marinara sauce. Of course sperm swim, so this is marinara sauce with a propulsion device….
A life of celibacy does not mean solitude. It’s troubling that CAEM can’t talk about this with the other members of his spiritual community. What kind of spiritual community is that?
He says he gets solace from his religion, it’s a rock, a home, and a source of strength. Dan, don’t be so quick to dissmiss this side of it. But if this strength comes at the cost of his inner being, then it’s not religion, it’s an addictive drug, offering the same old anxiety/relief cycle as any other addiction.
Perhaps he could separate the religion from the community? Maybe it’s the community that’s his rock, not the belief system itself. Even if he’s Catholic, there are many diverse groups within Catholicism which may be more accepting of his feelings – even if they might guide him not to act on them fully. He needs a way to meaningfully participate in this great spiritual community of his.
The Catholic notion that even thoughts are “sinful” is so pernicious I can’t even begin. We don’t have much control over the thoughts that bubble to the surface of our consciousness, although we do have control over how much we choose to consciously entertain those thoughts once they’re recognized. Most of the thoughts I fight against are tendencies towards harboring excessive resentment – not sexual fantasies.
A better spiritual practice is one that accepts one’s inner thoughts but which encourages “right action” – whatever that may be. Right action for me would include honesty, courtesy, responsibility, etc. So I can think inside my head “You are a bitch” but as long as I don’t say it, I haven’t done anything to regret. If I go home and brood about it all evening, that’s not so great. And this can be done by atheists who only believe in psychology, just as well as by deeply devout religious believers.
You misspelled judgmental in your art. I make that mistake all the time and I’m studying for the bar.
I LOVE the acronym that 2nd letter used.
And on the first letter Dan – how did you know? 😉
You’re preaching tolerance to TS but showing CAEM nothing but intolerance. While yes, CAEM does seem terribly unhappy, there are those who’s religion makes them happier than fulfilling the desires that go against it.
IIRC, “Theology of the Body” is actually a pretty sex-positive work and an appropriate wedding gift for a Catholic to give due to its emphasis on the importance of a husband’s prioritizing his wife’s sexual fulfillment.
@54: Dan called TS intolerant, but he also told her to tell her brother-in-law that he’s full of shit. So clearly his definition of “tolerance” doesn’t require agreeing with people, supporting them, or even being polite to them. It requires allowing that people have a right to their opinions and not throwing a shit fit about the very idea of having to share the planet with them. Dan didn’t tell CAEM that he wishes he were dead, or that the world would be better off without him– he offered advice. Highly bitchy advice, yes, but then that’s kind of what Dan is known for.
@#15 “Also, I’m sick of all this crap from religious folks for whom religion is therapy, or has use value – his religion is his rock in times of trouble? Whatever. How about believing out of conviction rather than need, rather than weakness, rather than desire for community? You can get similar help by joining a book club.”
The post was complete and utter b.s. First, belief based on *conviction* (defined as “fixed or firm belief”) is exactly why there’s religious bigotry. Someone makes something up then tells others that what they think doesn’t matter because the truth has been written down in a prophesy, treatise or catechism. It is in the *need* that the true God exists. Those who seek fulfillment for their personal *needs*; those who have the wherewithal to question, are often those who are wisest about faith and religion. Those who spoon up the dogmatic *convictions* of their elders are the belt-wielding, Bible-spouting bastards.
Second, after that nonsense was addressed, there are people out there for whom religion (i.e. faith in a supernatural benevolent being) is valuable, is a rock and a foundation. How in the world can believing in a God of Creation, who made you and *loves* you, not be valuable? There have been times in my life where I’ve thought that *only* God loves me. This is the rock of which CAEM speaks… that our Creator is not flawed and since He made us in His image, we are not flawed. Reconciling this *extremely* valuable message of love with his community’s assertion that his sexual urges are fundamentally evil is what CAEM is trying to do.
CAEM, you were made in the image of you God. You were created out of His love for you. I spent years teaching Catholic Catechism and here are a few messages I’ve took from that on my journey of faith. First, nothing you hear and nothing you think is sinful; we may be surrounded by epitaphs of sin, but until you act, no sin has been committed. So, cut yourself a huge amount of slack for what you’re thinking. Second, the only thing Christ ever asked of us where to keep the commandments holy and to remember his commandment of love: “Love one another, as I have loved you.” Not “keep your dick in your pants,” not “follow my purported messengers blindly,” not “self-flagellate until you’re black and blue.” Simply, love. So, when you finally accept that what you’re thinking is not sinful and you make a decision about how to act, the only thing God asks of you is that *what* you do is filled with respect for *yourself* and for your fellow man. Please note that first love has to come from yourself *to* yourself. If this ingredient is missing, you’ll never be reconciled to who you really are. If this ingredient is missing, you’ll behave like a bulimic coming off a starvation streak: gobble everything in sight and not come up for air until your self-loathing outweighs your temptation.
@56 FTW!
@57. Look, my position is simple: there is no God. And I despise conviction when it comes to religious matters. And CAEM and you agree with me, because you both admit that religion is about fulfilling a NEED. All the NEEDS fulfilled by religion are BETTER fulfilled by more supportive and understanding communities, such as: friends, book clubs, cooking groups, therapy etc etc etc etc etc. These ALL fulfill needs without resorting to the idea of a god that’s so loving it will strike you for desiring people of the same sex.
Hey CAEM,
God gifted you with a brain, use it and start studying. You’ll find that their is an incredible difference of opinion amongst denominations, theologians, and scholars. Your faith, your devotion, is to God, not to religious text, place of worship, or tradition. Your salvation is found in the relationship you have with God, it will always be deeply personal, unique, and tailored to the relationship you share. I’m going to assume that Savage is correct about your situation, as he has your actual letter and could confirm with you. While, I disagree with Savage, I believe God is real and there is both heaven and hell, I agree with him that you have this one life here and now. You must come to peace with yourself and live it with integrity. So, start reading. Here is two places you can start:
http://www.religioustolerance.org/hom_bi…
http://www.soulforce.org/
You can read about Rev. Mel White (at Soul Force), his life story can offer you comfort.
Best wishes.
Re: my post 59. In case anyone should accuse me that my statement “there is no God” is equivalent to having religious convictions, I call BS on that. It’s YOUR duty as religious people to prove to me that there’s a basis for your affirmative convictions. It’s not my job to prove that there’s no Apollo or Yahweh or Allah. In the absence of any proof whatsoever, it’s inevitable that I will be convinced, until proven otherwise, that the gods you invoke do not exist. But I’m willing to change my mind when you show my some, some, some fucking proof of your affirmative convictions.
So… CAEM, wake up and choose to be free, because you only have a few years left to live. Then there’s a big nothingness.
Hey CAEM
Pick another God. There’s plenty of them out there.
Post #2
Quit saying “first” like it’s an accomplishment. You sound like an idiot, no matter what comes after.
Dan seems think he has all the answers, but he comes across as hateful and prejudice, which is ironic since that’s what he rallies against…He seems to hate religion and women to such a degree that he can’t even reasonably answer their mail. I think the only people who should write to Dan should be gay guys, because Dan can lovingly feed them the answers they so crave. Everyone else, he’ll basically spit on. I’m not religious or a woman, by the way, but I notice blatant spite and snide comments towards writers who are relgious or women. I remember one column where a woman had a tiny bit of toilet paper stuck to her snatch from peeing, and Dan blasted her as disgusting and untouchable. Yet a dude leaves a big stinkin’ streak of shit and it’s supposedly normal…but if not normal, then somehow the woman’s fault he didn’t clean his ass (???). Dan’s retarded.
Skeptika,
Thou dost protest too much. Sounds to me like you’ve run into one kind of religion and decided they’re all like that. To so easily dismiss a belief that something out there is bigger than you, that you (even YOU) don’t know absolutely everything, well, you just stay with your beloved book club. Enjoy the challenge of reading something someone else says and then attacking it because you know better. Me, I’m going to allow myself to believe, even if I don’t understand it and it doesn’t match up to rational thought. Much more interesting.
*standing ovation*
Oh, just to be clear–that standing ovation was for Dan’s excellent column.
Thanks for stickin’ it to the hypocritical religious types, Dan.
“The truth is, the bible is pretty explicitly against these things…” Hardly. The Bible says these things are unnatural, but the word used meant “not in the custom of” not the way we mean it today. It was also in the context of when gay sex was punishment meted out to losing armies, not love, and when a tribe needed to push reproduction. It’s hardly a full condemnation and besides, do you really think people should adopt it’s antibaconcheeseburger / cottonpoly blend rules with equal vigor? No one does. Agreed in that the most rational thing is to laugh at the Bible.
While that might help in the short term, in the long term everyone would be better off not believing in God, gods, or other superstitions.
Skeptika-you’re responding as if someone is trying to proselytize you. No one here cares if you’re an believer of atheism or a believer of God. And you adamant and fervent statements are a conviction: “All NEEDS are BETTER fulfilled…” Well, I’ll lay the BS card on that one. Book Clubs, Cooking Groups and Friends are human people. Rich and fulfilling their company may be, but they are flawed as humans are. An argument, a disagreement, a misunderstanding with even one person can alienate you from the whole group. No argument is too heated, no disagreement too wide, no misunderstanding too torrid to separate God’s love for us. Even disbelieving in Him, denouncing Him and rejecting Him causes not His love to flee and He mourns the loss of a soul if one dies before reconciliation. (Nota bene: Catholics and other organized Christian religions do acknowledge that if one dies in this spiritual state then they can never be connected with God.)
Anyway, though, I’m not trying to convert or convince you of MY truth; my main goal is to show you that people of faith are not wasting their time; that a relationship with God is one of the most important relationships a person can have. I can see how atheists would reject that idea, but look at the rate of divorce, and how often you’ve ever broken up with your “best friend”, and how often parents alienate their children for some perceived slight and tell me that believing in unconditional love from any quarter isn’t BETTER.
PS and a therapist is paid to be sympathetic… not really better than someone (anyone!) who truly feels empathy for you.
The whole Old Testament anti-gay theme. People, it was two passages out of the whole 2,000 pages. Soddom and Gomorrah were blasted because the people were wicked and seditious (def. as rebelling against God). (Remember, out of two towns Abraham couldn’t find even 10 good people to save the villages.) It wasn’t until the Middle Ages that their evils turned into sodomy and *that* was a political statement against by the Church to keep a French prince in line. Are we to believe that every man, woman and child in those villages practiced sodomy? No, a reasonable person could see that the charges against the villages were changed, mid-stream historically. The second passage was in Deuteronomy along with how to properly stone your adulterous wife and how many goats a rapist had to give the girl’s father for his crimes. These passages were written by the Hebrews after God had spoken to Moses in an attempt to clarify only ten rules and impose their culture on these rules. Deuteronomy is not divinely given, so I say… are you Jewish? Then forget about Old Testament’s statements on homosexuality, and listen to Jesus’ command to LOVE!
@65. Sorry, snowbird, spending my morning defending the right of gay people and atheists to EXIST, on several non-English language forums filled with “believers”, makes me rather shrill. If they were like you, I wouldn’t bother. But I’m afraid you are part of a tiny minority.
@30: “And you have no more proof that there is no God than I do that there is. It’s an opinion…”
Um, it may be “opinion” if you’re talking about a God that watches and takes no part in the events of the universe. Don’t imply that the “exist” / “doesn’t exist” opinions are equally probable, however, just because the improbable hypothesis cannot be tested.
As for a God that intervenes, well, we’ve seen plenty of evidence that miracles, Zeus’ lightning, etc are in fact easily explainable. There’s no good evidence for any miracles, really… or the Bible stories… and if one wants to believe God directed the big band and evolution and the bible is just made up, well, one wonders why God took so many billions years and extinctions and false starts to get to humans, then waited hundreds of thousands of years to let them in on the secret, then could only redeem them by torturing and executing his “only child” (he should see a fertility specialist!)… well, I guess then its an opinion that I’m not made of antimatter.
Face facts: everyone is an atheist about ALL religions or about all but the one they favor–and if they came around and finished off that last 1% or so we’d all be happier.
@69: what long term are you talking about? Like, in the hospital about to die, that’s the best time to realize that your simply going to decay, rot and dissolve into the lining of your hermetically sealed coffin and concrete crypt?
How about, instead, thinking of faith as a way of life; as a way to respect others and respect yourself. A way to love your spouse (whichever sex either one of you may be) and raise your children to respect other people.
People seem to have this messed-up idea about God, that he’s some parent on high ready to come down and give us the spanking of our lives if we don’t toe the line. Maybe that’s how the Hebrews wrote about God, but Christ had a different message. Since *plenty* of my atheist friends can argue morality outside of the religious box and secular humanism until they’re blue in the face, atheism shouldn’t be an excuse to live an immoral life. I can only think that the fervently religious and atheists alike seem to only be concerned about what, if any, is that “final reward” as if living a good life isn’t reward enough.
Are you worried that you’ll believe your whole life in a God, then die and say WTF!?! where’s my harp and cloud? First, do you really think there’s some magical dimension that houses simpering and insipid people in a state of spiritual bliss? Do you think that you get to keep your consciousness after you die? The answer is, no. Our souls are borrowed for the extension of our life and return to God at the end of it. There isn’t any sort of embodiment of who you are after death (the first big divorce from my faith in Catholicism here). Second, don’t worry, because whether I’m right or the atheists are right, you’ll never think a thing and you lived a good and valuable life.
jab2009, it sounds like you speak to God (how else would you know his thoughts?). May I have His #? I am a doctor and would like to find a cure for cancer.
Beyond that–you are right that relationships wax and wane all the time including those people have with God. And you seem to believe he tosses you in the garbage if you happen to get hit by one of his lightning bolts on an off day, but you fly to loving heaven if you choose a movie over golf because of the threatening weather, and reconcile the next day? What of the millions that died before the God of the jews revealed himself? Children who die at birth and can’t know him? Hmm? They get pardons?
Do you WANT to believe in this kind of a system? But hey, at least you have a positive attitude.
Totally liberal, sex-positive, atheistic people go to celibacy all the time. (A friend of mine did it for a year after a bad break up, for instance. He was a bit of a womanizer and could have thrown himself into bed with anyone, but he decided to go that route so he could work on himself post-relationship. I’ve thought about it too.) You could have had the decency to tell CAEM how he might go about that instead of being as intolerant as you accuse Schismatic of being. I happen to agree with you that he’s a martyr who makes silly life decisions based on the imaginary old man in the sky of a 3000 year old book written by desert wanderers but the fact is that he asked you a legitimate question.
@76: “And you seem to believe he tosses you in the garbage if you happen to get hit by one of his lightning bolts on an off day, but you fly to loving heaven if you choose a movie over golf because of the threatening weather, and reconcile the next day?”
Did I say this? No, I said: “Even disbelieving in Him, denouncing Him and rejecting Him causes not His love to flee and He mourns the loss of a soul if one dies before reconciliation. (Nota bene: Catholics and other organized Christian religions do acknowledge that if one dies in this spiritual state then they can never be connected with God.)”
What I said was He continues to love even those who disbelieve (or even hate) Him, not that He tosses them in the garbage. What I said was a lifetime of rejection will be forgiven in even a moment of reconciliation.
*GOD* never turns his back on us; *We* turn our back on Him. The reasoning behind the dogmatic belief that those who chose to disbelieve God don’t go to “heaven” is that they’ve never turned toward the God that will give it to them before they died. (We were given free will, remember?)
But I never said I believed in heaven either, did I? I said, “Our souls are borrowed for the extension of our life and return to God at the end of it. There isn’t any sort of embodiment of who you are after death (the first big divorce from my faith in Catholicism here).” Which is clearly derisive of that dogmatic belief there’s clouds, harps and halos or fire, brimstone and torture soon after we die.
Criminy, read my posts before flaming me. I was raised Catholic and even taught Catholic Catechism. I went to a Catholic College and took extensive religious studies classes. I’m a devote believer in the God Christ describes and it makes me a better person. I have absolutely no issue with atheism or atheists. That’s between you and your (non)God. It doesn’t hurt me any if you disbelieve. What I take issue with is you virulently disagreeing with me without proper facts of the issues (i.e. a basic knowledge of Christianity outside of the fundementalist hoo-ha you were fed since birth) and without proper reading comprehension.
octopodes @30 and Rei @36, there’s a lot of confusion about atheists just as there is a lot of confusion about Christians (separate denominations of which number in the thousands). One of the complaints that is frequently expressed by the more liberal sects is the amount of voice that’s been given to the conservative faiths. For this we have, amongst other things, the Clinton and Bush administrations to thank, but one of the consequences is, as krf demonstrates (one of many), the amount of prejudice in the populace that all Christians are intolerant, literalist, dominionist and hypocritical.
The fact that we have a tendency to remember the finger pointers who threaten us with Hellfire doesn’t help. Similarly the fact that we remember atheists who decree that God is impossible, doesn’t help the tendency to presume that atheists are as unreasonable (or rather dependent on faith) as the religious. Regarding this later issue, let me clarify the common atheist position:
Firstly, there’s no such thing in the physical world as proof, or rather prove beyond doubt, which are reserved for abstract sciences such as logic or mathematics. But even gravity which seems certain, or the solidity of electromagnetism, are proven only beyond reasonable doubt. These are theories that are honored as laws since the evidence of their certainty is overwhelming, the models of them we use to predict outcomes work with unerring accuracy. So proof of God’s existance or non-existence is impossible; evidence of God’s existence, while possible, remains fruitless to this day.
That said, Atheism is really about skepticism, though interestingly, this is the one unforgivable sin in Christianity, which is why they tend to be at odds. Rape, mass murder, torture, unjust warfare, all are forgiven by the Christ, but doubt is not. That said, atheism is about not accepting any explanation of events or phenomena without some evidence to support it; it’s the principle of Occam’s Razor; we associate events with causes already seen unless those too defy explanation.
And we’re not afraid to say we don’t know.
Concerning the appearance of artifice in the universe, As Richard Dawkins put it, cranes, not skyhooks; we look for how they could have developed within this manifold before we seek explanations outside of it.
This is why I clarify my own position as that of naturalism, not the belief that God does not exist, but that God does not exert influence upon this world. To date, no evidence has challenged this hypothesis. And upon new evidence that cannot be reasonably justified any other way, I’d rethink my position. In actuality is the way of atheism.
Uriel-238- :-*
One of the best-written and intelligent posts yet to explain, define and defend atheism.
I’m not going to proselytize or defend my position; I just wanted to say that respectful, intelligent discussion where neither tries to change the other’s mind but instead tries to explain and convey their position to achieve mutual understanding should always be goal when two people of a dissimilar mind should meet.
Thank you.
Hey, Dan, “Get over yourself, faggot” (to quote yourself). You jumped to conclusions and displayed intolerance and abusiveness to CAEM based on your dubious assumptions. If your response reflects the opposite of religious piety, it failed to present an attractive alternative. It was a huge turn-off.
It’s not clear that CAEM is gay. As others have commented, he says he has “certain desires that almost all 20-year-old males have”. I assumed he was referring to masturbation. Your jaded self is bombarded with letters describing arcane and bizarre sexual practices, so you may not have considered how normal masturbatory urges could torment CAEM. Masturbation and enjoying sexual fantasies are considered sins by the Catholic church.
I don’t think anyone would dispute that most men, especially young ones, are “tempted” by masturbatory impulses, fantasies and desires for sex regardless of marital status.
CAEM asks, “How does one prepare for a life of celibacy and solitude?” Why do you assume his “shameful” secret is homosexuality? He refers to you as a ” so-called expert on sex and sexuality,” not homosexuality.
Since he hasn’t discussed his sexual desires with any clergy or co-religionists, he may have a very distorted view of healthy sexual impulses (“healthy” not implying either sexual preference).
What a hypocrite you are! You exhibit the black-and-white thinking you condemn. Religion and sexual enjoyment are not mutually exclusive. God’s first commandment to Adam & Eve is “Be fruitful and multiply”. Hello! And contrary to the inferences made by some pious folk, I don’t recall a wedding ceremony in the Garden of Eden.
I’m not particularly religious, but I found your response offensive on many levels. Insulting others’ religions – unless they pose a direct threat to me or others – is rude and unnecessary. To quote you again, Dan, “Get over yourself, faggot”.
Hey, Dan, “Get over yourself, faggot” (to quote yourself). You jumped to conclusions and displayed intolerance and abusiveness to CAEM based on your dubious assumptions. If your response reflects the opposite of religious piety, it failed to present an attractive alternative. It was a huge turn-off.
It’s not clear that CAEM is gay. As others have commented, he says he has “certain desires that almost all 20-year-old males have”. I assumed he was referring to masturbation. Your jaded self is bombarded with letters describing arcane and bizarre sexual practices, so you may not have considered how normal masturbatory urges could torment CAEM. Masturbation and enjoying sexual fantasies are considered sins by the Catholic church.
I don’t think anyone would dispute that most men, especially young ones, are “tempted” by masturbatory impulses, fantasies and desires for sex regardless of marital status.
CAEM asks, “How does one prepare for a life of celibacy and solitude?” Why do you assume his “shameful” secret is homosexuality? He refers to you as a ” so-called expert on sex and sexuality,” not homosexuality. Since he hasn’t discussed his sexual desires with any clergy or co-religionists, he may have a very distorted view of healthy sexual impulses (“healthy” not implying either sexual preference).
What a hypocrite you are! You exhibit the black-and-white thinking you condemn. Religion and sexual enjoyment are not mutually exclusive. God’s first commandment to Adam & Eve is “Be fruitful and multiply”. Hello! And contrary to the inferences made by some pious folk, I don’t recall any wedding ceremony in the Garden of Eden.
I’m not particularly religious, but I found your response offensive on many levels. Insulting others’ religions – unless they pose a direct threat to me or others – is rude and unnecessary. To quote you again, Dan, “Get over yourself, faggot”.
Hey, Dan, “Get over yourself, faggot” (to quote yourself). You jumped to conclusions and displayed intolerance and abusiveness to CAEM based on your dubious assumptions. If your response reflects the opposite of religious piety, it failed to present an attractive alternative. It was a huge turn-off.
It’s not clear that CAEM is gay. As others have commented, he says he has “certain desires that almost all 20-year-old males have”. I assumed he was referring to masturbation. Your jaded self is bombarded with letters describing arcane and bizarre sexual practices, so you may not have considered how normal masturbatory urges could torment CAEM. Masturbation and enjoying sexual fantasies are considered sins by the Catholic church.
I don’t think anyone would dispute that most men, especially young ones, are “tempted” by masturbatory impulses, fantasies and desires for sex regardless of marital status.
CAEM asks, “How does one prepare for a life of celibacy and solitude?” Why do you assume his “shameful” secret is homosexuality? He refers to you as a ” so-called expert on sex and sexuality,” not homosexuality.
What a hypocrite you are! You exhibit the black-and-white thinking you condemn. Religion and sexual enjoyment are not mutually exclusive. God’s first commandment to Adam & Eve is “Be fruitful and multiply”. Hello! And contrary to the inferences made by some pious folk, I don’t recall any wedding ceremony in the Garden of Eden.
I’m not particularly religious, but I found your response offensive on many levels. Insulting others’ religions – unless they pose a direct threat to me or others – is rude and unnecessary. To quote you again, Dan, “Get over yourself, faggot”.
Hey, Dan, “Get over yourself, faggot” (to quote yourself). You jumped to conclusions and displayed intolerance and abusiveness to CAEM based on your dubious assumptions. If your response reflects the opposite of religious piety, it failed to present an attractive alternative.
It’s not clear that CAEM is gay. As others have commented, he says he has “certain desires that almost all 20-year-old males have”. I assumed he was referring to masturbation. Your jaded self is bombarded with letters describing arcane and bizarre sexual practices, so you may not have considered how normal masturbatory urges could torment CAEM. Masturbation and enjoying sexual fantasies are considered sins by the Catholic church.
I don’t think anyone would dispute that most men, especially young ones, are “tempted” by masturbatory impulses, fantasies and desires for sex regardless of marital status.
CAEM asks, “How does one prepare for a life of celibacy and solitude?” Why do you assume his “shameful” secret is homosexuality? He refers to you as a ” so-called expert on sex and sexuality,” not homosexuality.
What a hypocrite you are! You exhibit the black-and-white thinking you condemn. Religion and sexual enjoyment are not mutually exclusive. God’s first commandment to Adam & Eve is “Be fruitful and multiply”. Hello! And contrary to the inferences made by some pious folk, I don’t recall any wedding ceremony in the Garden of Eden.
I’m not particularly religious, but I found your response offensive on many levels. Insulting others’ religions – unless they pose a direct threat to me or others – is rude and unnecessary. To quote you again, Dan, “Get over yourself, faggot”.
I commend Uriel, Kim in Portland, and Jab2009 for their wonderful posts. Just like not every Muslim is a terrorist, very few Christians are actually against homosexuality… just the bigoted uber ones that give the rest of us a bad name, the ones who never actually READ the Bible or use their God-given brains. (CAEM, I really suggest you read the Song of Psalms and see that sexuality and sexual impulses are not in and of themselves sinful. They are beautiful, natural, and given to man by God.)
Uriel, your post was beautiful and intelligent. We may not agree on issues of spiritual belief (and frankly, I was raised in my church to believe that my faith is between me and God alone, and the same goes for everyone else… only God can read a man’s heart, the rest of us should STFU), but I respect and applaud you. Thank you.
I know a guy who went to seminary – an ultra-Catholic seminary in Germany where they conduct all the services in full high-church Latin – instead of coming out.
He’s still in his mid-20’s, but my guess is that by 35 he’ll have realized that what he really wants to do is poke his brethren, and then leave the church. I dunno. We’ll see.
Hi Uriel-238,
That was well said.
I have only one thing to add, and that is from my personal up bringing in the church and personal study. So, there are likely many who disagree with me. Doubt isn’t the unforgivable sin, it’s blasphemy against the Holy Spirit (Matthew 12:31). Jesus, is gentle with his disciples, especially Thomas, when they doubt and takes pain to help them overcome their doubt. The question then becomes, for me, when I doubt can I humble myself to ask for the faith to believe. Perhaps, this is what jab2009 is referring to when he speaks about turning our backs and there is a burden upon upon us to ask for help with our doubt.
Anyway, I enjoy your posts, and am grateful for the way they stretch me.
Good Lord, Urleen, you must not be a regular reader or listener of Dan.
Good lord, Urleen, you must not be a regular listener/reader of Dan’s.
I think Dan’s assumption/conclusion that CAEM is gay is a good one – assuming he’s not in some extreme asexual cult, or into little kids or something he wouldn’t be talking about “praying away” his desires, living a life of “celibacy and solitude”, or not being able to “talk about (it) with other members of my spiritual community” if he was just talking about wanting to jerk off or have regular straight sex.
I think Dan’s assumption/conclusion that CAEM is gay is a good one – assuming he’s not in some extreme asexual cult, or into little kids or something – he wouldn’t be talking about “praying away” his desires, living a life of “celibacy and solitude”, or not being able to “talk about (it) with other members of my spiritual community” if he was just talking about wanting to jerk off or have regular straight sex.
I have to say, Dan: you’ve got some hypocritical, intolerant nerve to rip CAEM a new one over his faith and accuse The Schismatic of intolerance *in the same column*.
For those (like CAEM, perhaps) who are actually interested in exploring how Christian faith and healthy homosexuality can coexist, I highly recommend the documentary “For the Bible Tells Me So.” (Website here: http://www.forthebibletellsmeso.org/inde…)
As others have mentioned, for those LGTBQ seeking a religious community, it’s worth checking out the Unitarian Universalists. They’re one of the few denominations out there that happily accepts all folks into their fold regardless of who they rub body parts with. In fact, that support is a part of what caused one very messed-up guy to walk into a UU church in Knoxville and start shooting.
Re Mr Me’s comment that it’s ridiculous for gay believers to try to reconcile their sexuality to their Christianity:
It’s not so hard, I don’t think, *if* the attitude you take toward the Bible is that it is a historical text created by imperfect and culturally situated human beings in an effort to reach out to and comprehend the divine, which is impossible to do perfectly since the divine is so very different from the human. Even in texts written with divine inspiration, there’s inevitably going to be some human elements creeping in there. Taking that attitude toward the Bible (or any other religious text) means you can shift through it with an eye to what might be an artifact of historical human composition and what might not be, and keep the stuff that’s of value while dropping the stuff that made it in there because of prejudice or dated cultural norms. Whether they would articulate it in this way or not, most moderate Christians probably take this sort of approach, I suspect. Where you get into trouble is in insisting that every part of such a text is true on a literal level. If you take that attitude, then there is no way to reconcile any number of accepted modern attitudes and practices with scripture in most religions out there. (I’d say there’s also no way to reconcile complex texts like the Bible with themselves, when reading literally, though people do seem to be champs at rationalizing away the evident contradictions.)
I think this is worth pointing out because, whatever the New Atheists would like to see happen, religion is not going away for the majority of humans in the world any time soon. Not for centuries at the earliest, I’d say, if at all. So encouraging moderate forms of religion is more productive in the long run, I think, than insisting that people have to throw the whole thing out entirely. If that’s the choice you give people, most people will choose not to throw it out because they need it. They are simply not going to look into the void, no matter what.
I’m Catholic, and I don’t believe in every little thing written in old scriptures. (i.e. the idea of hell for anyone not baptized, or being gay as a sin–give me a break). Thank you for telling the last reader to tolerate the religious best man–he probably has good intentions and just wants them to have a healthy marriage, shown by giving them a loving book. (He didn’t throw it in their faces…)
Also, I have a friend with a little Mexican single mother who didn’t come out to her until he was 29–instead, he moved to Seattle, hours away from his mom, and lead his life. Unfortunately, it made them grow painfully apart and by the time he told her, she admitted she “always knew”, and accepted him in love. So TELL her, I agree Dan.
Great Column as usual.. loved the first one the best.
i never realized so many doctors read this column – how cute.
also, why do some people’s comments come out in tiny type?
doctor my eyes
shit MY message came out in tiny type!
shit MY message came out in tiny type!
shit my message came out TWICE in tiny type!
Always a delight to read your column.”Closeted cocksucker with a martyr complex”. Well said, Dan -I’m going to be quoting you on that one!
CAEM — I don’t know if you’re going to read the letters, or read this far, but my advice would be to write to Cary Tennis at Salon.com. I think you might find a more thoughtful, reasoned answer to your dilemma.
I also suspect Cary Tennis will ultimately come to the same conclusion — that as long as what you want to do involves consenting adults, you’re probably in the wrong religion. And I think maybe you have that suspicion too, which is why you’re writing to advice columnists.
I don’t think Dan’s advice is bad, just lacking in sympathy.
Well, holy effin’ wow. jab2009, Martychan and kim in portland thank you for the accolades.
kim in portland, you’re absolutely correct. Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is stated to be the one unforgivable sin, which is only commonly interpreted to be doubt or denial of Jesus as the son of God. Personally, I find the nature of such blasphemy to be terribly obtuse, not necessarily being denial or doubt of the Christ, certainly not necessarily meaning Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus.
Interestingly, when I was a young adult I (at recommendation by religious friends) prayed and begged the Christ to enter my soul and bring me understanding. The epiphany I gained that night was, rather, there are an infinite number of points between fundamental Christianity and hard atheism (thought it might also have been there are an infinite number of possible beliefs other than fundamental Christianity and hard atheism). While I did not find Jesus in the evangelical sense, it did put me on my present spiritual path, and as far as I’m concerned have God’s blessing to walk it.
Martychan I’ve also noticed the personal nature of the relationship between God and the individual, at least in Protestant denominations of Christianity. This implies a personal responsibility to understand and interpret scripture, contrast to blindly allowing a given minister or church to tell you what to think. (Doing so is the traditional definition of sloth, incidentally.) Hence those who choose to justify their bigoted viewpoints by the bible are personally responsible for their intolerance. Catholicism sidesteps this issue by re-institutionalizing prayer as a tradition of the Church, so they get to place blame of their intolerance on the head of the Pope.
jab2009, I agree, and try to live by the same precept that the best we do is to convey comprehension of our positions; it’s then respectful to let those you’ve done so decide for themselves. I don’t always succeed (in my efforts to adhere).
@ #26. Ok, so I agree there are more Protestants than Catholics. But my irony meter just red-lined at your claim that Protestants are somehow above the absurdity of the immaculate conception. Aren’t most fundamentalists who believe a literal interpretation of Genesis identified as Protestant????
Uriel-238,
I’m glad you found your path. We have much in common, faith wise.
Martychan,
Thank for your kind words of encouragment.
Eh, there’s a difference between disagreeing with a person’s views, and disagreeing like a smug asshole. I understand that part of your charm is from your blunt nature, but you don’t need to be so blatantly offensive and disrespectful to the people who are COMING TO YOU FOR HELP. All you’ve done here is, frankly, make an ass of yourself and entertain the readers who found your relentless belittling funny. Sure, the advice is there, but who the hell would listen to it after being reamed into like that? Especially the first letter! And again, I get the whole tough love thing, hell, I even agree with half of what you said that wasn’t terribly nice, but some of it was just too over the top (Insulting a guy’s mother? I’m sure he not so stupid as to notice some of his mother’s hypocrisies, she was still the woman to nurture and raise him. The last response was by far my favorite though, true to yourself, but the advice was there without completely belittling the person or their life/lifestyle). The first kid especially was, I’m sure, hoping for some remotely consoling advice from someone who’s been through similar things, hell, the first line and overall tone was very appropriate. However, I don’t think he expected the shock of reality to be followed by an anti religious rant from an angry man who’s clearly not in the mood to help. Reassuring him that his whole upbringing is a lie was not necessary.
Hey #54 (and others)….
Tolerance of religion means not shutting down the churches in the neighborhood and letting them go about their inane business.
Criticizing them for mental terrorism is not intolerance. Its a predictable form of discourse coming from those who find the religious message nonsense.
If the religious folks kept their views out of public discourse, then railing against them publicly would be impolite.
However, since religions want both freedom and a public face, what they also must accept is people calling them on their bullshit.
that is all
I don’t know what Dan means by “the revisions began before the body was cold”, but then I don’t know what the fuck a podcast is either, so I guess I’m just an ignorant top who craves mouth & ass.
And, isn’t False Hymen a Joan Jett song?
Ah, it’s so refreshing to hear a voice boldly encouraging people to overcome the guilt/manipulation religion uses on people to control their sex lives.
awesome column dan!
i love the first response… though I have to disagree – there DEFINITELY is no god (as in, i agree but more vociferously)
I too originally thought Dan might have too quickly jumped to the conclusion that CAEM is gay. However, after rereading his letter I’m in total agreement that he is gay. He never references his desire is for a female, actually he avoids acknowledgment of the sex he desires he simply and accurately states that most 20 year old have desires of a sexual nature. Furthermore he indicates that he cannot discuss this with members of his faith – if his desires are of a hetrosexual nature than he most certainly could discuss it with any of his peers. He also asks “How does one prepare for a life of celibacy and solitude?” which, unless he was to become a priest or similar, would be totally unnecessary unless he was speaking of avoiding homosexual activity. And, even if the desires are hetrosexual then why in the world would he ever consider a celibate life when every religion I’ve ever heard of accept, condons and encourages marriage between a man and a woman.
I too think Dan was a bit harsh (but when isn’t Dan a bit harsh?) but I do think he was totally correct in assuming the guy is gay and his advice was right on!
I’m CAEM’s gay friend. Yes, this closet religious 20 yo male has a very close openly gay friend. We met when I was in College and he was a freshman. As a senior, I picked him up because he was a sexy, young kid I thought I could have fun with… and I have, more than once. He just doesn’t talk about it, forgets for 3 months and then comes back to me.
Having read through all the previous comments from Christian and Athiest alike, I felt that I should commend both sides for presenting themselves so eloquently.
I was born into the Christian faith and followed it until roughly the age of eight, when my pastor retired from his duties. When he left, I found that the spark of my faith had severely diminished, and over the following years, I moved further and further away from God in the Christian sense and began to explore other faiths and belief systems, searching for that spark again.
Now, seventeen years later, I proudly call myself Christian once more, but I’ve come back to my faith armed with insight that I would never have gained had I not turned my back on God for so many years and gone off to learn on my own. While I may be quite unconventional in my beliefs, I will agree with every other Christian that has posted here and say that God’s message is about love for both yourself and your fellow man – if you show those around you love, acceptance and understanding and you keep the Lord in your heart with all that you do, then I seriously doubt He has any issues with your particular methods. After all, it’s the message that matters.
That said – Great column as always, Dan. Can’t wait for next week! 🙂
Great column, Dan! And I just listened to your newest podcast this week and I have to say, it was the best one in ages! I was laughing for hours!
@30
” And you have no more proof that there is no God than I do that there is. It’s an opinion based on faith or the lack thereof.”
The inability to see, hear, smell, detect using instrumentation, or mathematically extrapolate any gods is actually quite a lot of evidence that there is no such thing. Proof? No, it’s impossible to prove that something doesn’t exist, because new evidence could always come to light. But until you can provide that evidence, it is ONLY rational to not believe in the undetectable thing.
The only evidence that we have of gods is via the people who “just know in their hearts”, and, funny thing, all of these people who have access to Ultimate Truth via their deeply personal faith. . . well. . . they believe different things. Different gods, different “truths”. So, at least most of these people with their deeply-held and conflicting convictions have to be wrong. You’re sure about Jesus, some other guy on the other side of the planet is sure about Mohammed, and I am laughing at you both.
Let me say, I don’t think that rational is the only way to be. Religious people like to claim that atheism is my religion, or that science is my religion. No, that’s not true. I’m an atheist and a scientist because rationality leads you there. Rationality is my religion. My only justification for it is via more rationality, which is circular reasoning.
If people are happily irrational, I’m cool with that. Whatever peanut butters your jelly, man. If you think 2+2 might be 6 tomorrow and 38 the day after that, I don’t fucking care. I just want religious people to stop CLAIMING that they are as rational as the rest of us. You can’t have it both ways.
We have one person’s assertion he’s slept with CAEM and that he’s gay–and CAEM speaks about indulging himself in the future tense, not the past. If he were worried sex doomed him he’d feel doomed eternally not doomed to loneliness. Other than that, I fail to see why he couldn’t like only kids or dogs. He’s most probably gay, but no smoking gun, right?
Jab2009, you wrote, “He mourns the loss of a soul if one dies before reconciliation.” Seems to imply a chance was missed, and permanent harm done. Soul was LOST. So if you are “unlucky” enough to die on an off day, disfavoring God, you’re LOST. If you were reconciled that day, you get eternal bliss. Would not a human who failed to forgive a loved spouse who died before an apology could be made be viewed as rather nasty? And I say “unlucky” because God could intervene in your fortunes until the day you were going to reconcile.
Over and over, the issue is this: why believe in something supernatural when there are so many better explanations, no evidence, and the counter position that the certainty of faith, experienced currently and throughout time, has been stupendously wrong over and over even in the opinion of the devout? What does the born again think of the certainty of the 911 bombers? They were wrong, so why trust their own unsupported faith? The one that say they’ll be saved because they belong to the right faith–lucky that they were born somewhere it was taught, right?
dan- 850 million years is wrong. as a geologist i know that the beginning of cellular life (with a fossilizable, traceable cell wall or exoskeleton) marks the beginning of the Cambrian period, which began 542.2 Ma (million years ago). While there was certainly life before this time, it was rudimentary and did not posses the mechanisms for sexual reproduction. The odds are against sexual reproduction until later into middle and upper Cambrian.
that being said, that fag needs to get the jesus stick out of his ass.
dan- 850 million years is wrong. as a geologist i know that the beginning of cellular life (with a fossilizable, traceable cell wall or exoskeleton) marks the beginning of the Cambrian period, which began 542.2 Ma (million years ago). While there was certainly life before this time, it was rudimentary and did not posses the mechanisms for sexual reproduction. The odds are against sexual reproduction until later into middle and upper Cambrian.
that being said, that fag needs to get the jesus stick out of his ass.
@70:
Yeah, IMAGINARY unconditional love.
For the dickwad who hyperventiled, “What if CAEM is a pedophile?”
Dan clearly stated that CAEM should act on his desires ONLY if they’re ethical and with someone who also desires the same thing.
But nice homophobic slur, throwing in the “dog” and “disgusting” to boot.
I agree that Dan’s response to CAEM’s letter was a bit harsh, but then that’s the risk you take asking Dan for his opinion.
Yes, CAEM is gay (straights don’t require a life of celibacy). His “certain desires that almost all 20-year-old males have” sentence was just not clearly written, and refers to sexual urges.
That letter could have come from me 20 years ago. I was a tight-ass christian boy who secretly prided himself in being better than everyone else. But once I admitted to myself that I was gay (at age 28) I went thru a rough spell of everything I believed being questioned, and came out the other side only a little worse for wear. I still question my religious beliefs but haven’t thrown it all out.
To anyone who thinks Dan’s comments are harsh, I have to ask, have you been hiding under a rock for 17 years, or is this just the first time you’ve read his column? He’s always harsh, acerbic, and more often than not, downright nasty and vicious. But mostly right. What’s weird is, if you meet him in person, as I did at a book signing, he’s the exact opposite: warm, apologetic, self-effacing. I barely recognized him! The perpetual Libra, always striving for balance; that’s our dude Dan!
Keep in mind, folks, it’s completely possible to have sex without destroying or rupturing the hymen. I knew a girl whose hymen didn’t rupture until her third lover. Hymen does not equal virginity, although nutso religious freakwads will insist so.
To the person who thinks Dan hates women:
I don’t see that. I’m a woman and I’ve been reading his column religiously for 11 years.
He yells at everyone – men, women, intersex, black, white, gay, straight, bi, poly, mono, married, single, divorced.
I’ve also never seen him miss the mark. I’ve seen him stumped, but he always admits this and asks others for help in advising his querent.
>> My husband and I got married recently. <<
at first i thought this statement was needlessly obvious. then i quickly remembered it was dan’s column, and not dr. laura’s.
* TRIVIA NOTE! Oxford Dictionary definition of small-c “catholic” (what the word meant BEFORE the Church of Rome did its thing): all-embracing; of wide sympathies or interests; of interest or use to all, universal.
hmmm….
Yes, and after having learned this a few years ago I found it quite amusing to use the phrase “catholic community of Catholics” in a final exam essay in my freshman year Intro to Religion class, when speaking of “all the Catholics in the world.”
I’m with @2—-Dan, you made my week, too!!!
Go, Dan, go!!!!
I think Dan went way to easy on this moron.
Look, CAEM, your god and everything you think is holy results from an effective marketing scheme made by a bunch of perverted old men who want to take your money, control your life, and rape your children. Literally.
Stupid beliefs like yours are why God made hashish and psilocybin and instructed us to use them in Genesis. Personally, I recommend going camping, getting up before the sun, and taking a bunch of mushrooms. Then sit by a river smoking hashish hashish while the sun rise and talk directly with god about your problem.
I think Dan went way to easy on this moron.
Look, CAEM, your god and everything you think is holy results from an effective marketing scheme made by a bunch of perverted old men who want to take your money, control your life, and rape your children. Literally.
Stupid beliefs like yours are why God made hashish and psilocybin and instructed us to use them in Genesis. Personally, I recommend going camping, getting up before the sun, and taking a bunch of mushrooms. Then sit by a river smoking hashish while the sun comes into view as the earth spins around it. As each second stretches into a blissful infinity filled with colors and light that look like music sounds, you can talk directly with God about your problem. It’s that easy.
CAEM: look into More Light churches (that may just be a Presbyterian thing, but other denominations may have similar organizations/labels/groupings)…
And to everyone who seems to have a hate-on about religious people? Yes, I know some Christians are self-righteous assholes who try to shove things down your throat (and not in a fun way), but others (like, say, my mom, who’s been a deacon at her church) actually are reasonable, sane, intelligent people who do their best to do good in the world and quite frankly couldn’t care *less* about what one consenting adult does with another consenting adult (barring cheating)…
And while, yes, I cannot prove that there is a higher power… you also can’t prove that there *isn’t* one, and it is not unreasonable to surmise that the various somewhat improbable events that led to us being here were nudged along by some kind of mind… and you also cannot prove that there is nothing of ourselves that continues after death. Perfectly reasonable of you to live your life under the assumption that there isn’t, but it’s also perfectly reasonable (provided you’re not a fanatic about it) to live under the assumption that there *is* something that will Go On.
CAEM doesn’t claim specifically to have a god-centered religion ( iread it and thought of non-christian religions only), so Dan’s anti-catholic/anti-evangeticals rant complete with ‘god doesn’t exists’? I call BS. Bad form, old man.
I was tempted to also call BS on assuming CAEM is gay, but the ‘celibacy/solitude’ line lends you cred.
CAEM: you’re an asshat; you can’t discuss spiritual salvation with anyone, ANYONE, from your spiritual community?
Time to look for a new spiritual community for one thing: if they can’t counsel something this, and yet hundreds of other churches can, you are in the wrong org for your soul’s needs. Jump ship and find the one that matches your needs better.
There is no God?? I think you are an idiot to state something you could not and do not know. I believe there most certainly is a God. Your the type who if you cant see it you dont believe it. Your an arrogant, arrogant man. You cant see air, but you know it’s there right? Stick to the witty comments on sex, thats your forte. Dont go beyond your mental capacity.
I think Dan sometimes edits letters to give us the gist in less space, which sometimes results in an appearance that he’s assumed something (CAEM is gay) that we don’t see in the letter.
If CAEM’s relgion is such a “rock” etc. then why is he writing to Dan for advice?
#132 – turn your words around. You cannot and do not know for sure there’s a God. If you can have your opinion, then don’t call others “idiots” for holding other opinions. Please do not confuse “believe” (faith) with “know” (have evidence). Those of us who find rationality to be evidence of mental capacity question YOUR beliefs, trust me.
Dan I heard you on “This American Life” speaking about your occasional Catholic Relapses. That being said, you could have been a little less harsh and expressed your opinion without being quite so harsh. I read your column because you give interesting and insightful advice. You might be 100% correct, but you came off as mean spirited and arrogant.
# 133 I called him an idiot for a specific reason. He stated as if his view is based in fact there is no God. In my humble opinion, that is an idiotic statement to make being that he cannot prove the statement. I find it irrational aka idiotic to state something as fact that cannot be proved one way or the other. Faith is the belief in things unseen. Have a blessed day!
I believe that CAEM is gay, and here are my reasons. First, he writes to Dan of all people. He knows Dan is gay and he knows Dan is anti-religious. If he were straight, I’m assuming he would right to someone else. There would have to be something they have in common in order for him to seek advice from him. I don’t go asking my straight guy friends for advice on sexuality or lesbian friends, it will be my gay or straight girl friends, and vice versa.
Secondly, just because he says he’s thinking thoughts 20 year old men usually think, does not necessarily mean what it’s meant to mean. He could be going off the fact that most people have homosexual thoughts or fantasies whether they mean to or not. We know that if it was regarding sleeping with women, he would have been more likely than not to find a tactful way to say it, as with masturbation (besides, I don’t think there is eternal damnation for jacking off, you’re just not supposed to, nor premartial sex). This is something this guy is ashamed and embarassed of, being gay is something a lot of religious people believe is a sin that will lead to burning in hell.
Or, he could have made that statement to justify his own thoughts by saying it’s common for guys to think, or he could have purposefully added that to confuse readers.
I do feel the advice was a bit harsh, but sometimes you have to be harsh to get the point across. It can shock someone into waking the hell up and learning to live their life while they have the chance instead of sitting around being miserable.
But that’s just my thoughts.
Person who was freaked out by those who think CAEM may have kid or animal urges: it’s not homophobic to think that. Those are just three things people are conflicted about / socially censured. It doesn’t equate them to hypothesize he might have 1 of the 3. Dan fields questions on all of them.
ROTFL at: “There is no God?? I think you are an idiot to state something you could not and do not know. I believe there most certainly is a God. Your the type who if you cant see it you dont believe it… You cant see air, but you know it’s there right?”
Listen, it’s possible that God is just silent and watching, but its possible Papa Smurf is a spirit as well. Thoughtful hardcore atheists like Dawkins will admit they can’t rule out God, but emphasize the the evidence is FAR on the “no God” side. The ONLY stuff (I know of–educate me?) on the “yes God” side is the convenient hospitality of earth and characteristics of the universe–but if it were any other way, we wouldn’t be here wondering. And to compare God to air? Seriously? You are aware that air can be felt, weighed, analyzed, partly combusted, liquified, vaporized, humidified, etc, right? Whereas for God, we just have the “everyone is wrong but me” attitude of hundreds of religions. C’mon.
In brief, we may not be able to know “for sure” but we certainly can be confidant that the weight of evidence is far to the “no God” side, just like I’m reasonably sure if I drop my keys they will accelerate toward the center of the earth. Don’t imply “We’re not sure” is a coin toss.
Wow, I see I got the Dan Anti-God squad in a lather LOL. Look, you can pontificate all your theories on why there is no God til your blue in the face. So Anti-God squad member(s) we will just have to agree to disagree. For me to argue with ones who are set in thought is pointless for me to do. I know God is real to me based on where I am in life and the things that have happened for me to be at this point (Good Place). If you think when you die you just become worm food OK! But the soul of you moves on is what I believe. There are many different paths to the same destination. Maybe your non-belief is the path your supposed to travel, I have no clue that is far above my pay grade. As I stated, Faith is the belief in things unseen! You can logic God out of your life all you want, but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord….Peace & Blessings!!
“For me to argue with ones who are set in thought is pointless for me to do.”
1) And yet, here you are. Arguing. Or shall we discuss?
2) We’re not set in thought. I’ve changed my mind on bunches of important issues; all it takes is evidence or at least some logic. If there is no evidence or logic, and we are talking about faith/certainty in things for which everything knowable points the other direction… well, there isn’t much to argue or discuss if that’s the case, right? Not because I’m closed minded but because I’m open minded, and you have nothing to add to my open mind.
I stopped taking people’s word in fantastic, unseen, unknowable creatures and events long ago but what drove it home recently was hearing a rape victim describe how she identified the wrong guy despite being face to face with him the whole time. She admits she sees the innocent guy (released after DNA evidence) raping her when she imagines the assault.
Experience misled; science iluminated. And liberated. And then it caught the actual perp. But we can agree on peace and bles–er, well wishes.
What a dick. I used to like reading this column, but this guy wrote a decent letter asking for your help and you CRUCIFIED him. Aren’t we all supposed to be ‘open-minded’ and ‘respectful’ of peoples beliefs and lifestyles Dan? ESPECIALLY if they’re gay? I think so. In fact, it’s rammed down our throats not to be so judgemental now-a-days. Maybe you should exercise the same open-mindedness and respect for religious people that you expect out of others toward your sexuality. If you didn’t want to respond to this you could’ve put ‘No Comment’, instead of getting your panties in a knot.
What’s with the juvenile, narrow-minded approach toward what Christians and Catholics are? They come in a large array- and I’m not sure, for example, how many soup kitchens and shelters exist among non-religious groups who meet on a regular basis and volunteer their time. Sure, it happens, but not on the same scale. You’re anti-religion views sound like they’re coming from a close-minded, melodramatic teen filled with apathy trying to shock everyone around him with personal “knowledge”. This shit may drive up readership, for the shock value– is that all this is? I don’t think so. You want positive change for everyone- so let’s see it, instead of this griping, huh?
138 is your typical xtian…when a hole is poked in their argument, they avoid discussing the point made and instead fall back on their brainwashing. Total avoidance.
Shomondo…it’s call the Scientific Method. Go to college (though actually, I think they teach this in middle and high school these days). Study. Learn. Test. Verify!
Hey if you are christian, and you are mad at what Dan wrote: FORGIVE HIM HE KNOWS NOT WHAT HE DOES. And then read that part about not flaunting your prayers in public.
Can we all agree that whether or not there is a God, most of the people who claim to be christian in public are complete fucking hypocrites? Can we agree that teaching kids they will go to hell for sexual urges is child abuse, even though it’s socially tolerated? Can we agree that most people who condemn others to hell are using the same circuits as people rooting for their sports team? Can we agree that any God that is so petty s/he cares about CAEM’s sex life is a psychopathic tyrant who is not worth worshipping, no matter how hot a hell s/he will send you to? Can we agree that children absorb religion the same way they absorb the tooth fairy (regardless of the truth of the religion)?
It seems to me there should be lots of points of agreement for everyone regardless of what we all think about the existence of God.
I’m disappointed in your answer to CAEM, Dan. Your analysis of sex vs. humanity vs. religion was right on (may I use it in the future?), but you blew it by stating your opinion on the existence of a Supreme Being as if it were settled fact. It certainly is not. It’s clear he’s a Christian of some sort, so why didn’t you suggest he attend a MCC service in his area? Or even a Unitarian or Quaker congregation, for crap’s sake. (I attended a lesbian Quaker wedding in June, and it was a joyous event.) There’s no reason to belittle him just because you think believers in a god are beneath you. Jeez.
“Gods” are a human construct and were imagined tens of thousands of years ago to likely assign value and meaning to life. And surely tenets, dogma, et cetera, were appended thereafter to appease and control the masses. Atheism, the belief in the absence of “God,” is really just an opinion because we as humans have no proof that there is or isn’t a “God.” That’s why I’m an agnostic – I don’t know. But what I do know is that I encourage anyone wanting to broaden their paradigm to study history, which gives all important context – it explains why things are the way they are. The sciences are also important fields to study because they look at the who, when, what, why and how of our environs. Seek “truths” by asking questions, observing, and experimenting with typical or atypical ideologies. And know that others’ opinions are just that, and that they are no “greater” than your own. Living in the question is an excellent start.
anyone who believes that god is anything other than a myth born of human superstition is an idiot.
If he is gay and wants an accepting church, he should try looking at some Episcopal ones. Sometimes I think we have more gay members than straight at ours.
If he is gay and wants an accepting church, he should try looking at some Episcopal ones. Sometimes I think we have more gay members than straight at ours.
Good advice from Octopodes, plus I forgot to mention to CAEM one easy-to-read book that clarifies things well: What The Bible Really Says About Homosexuality, by Fr. Daniel Helminiak, Ph.D. Don’t listen to Mr Me, who echoes the popular but very wrong stance, and take it from folks like Helminiak and yonush18. Helminiak actually has two Ph.D’s, one in Bible and one in clinical psychology, and unlike many of the fire-and-brimstone Pat Robertson clones of the day, reads both Testaments in their original languages to analyze what’s being said in the context of their times. I promise you you will come away from the book feeling better about yourself, the Bible, and your faith.
I think the advice to Schismatic was a bit too judgemental. There is a proper forum for her brother in law’s ranting, and it’s not at intimate family gatherings.
@49 – so, by that logic, closeted gays are more shy about expressing themselves than other sexuality minorities? WTF? / Inaccurate. Couldn’t he be talking about screwing the pastor’s wife, too?
@136: ” If he were straight, I’m assuming he would right to someone else. “
So only gay people can be assumed to write to Dan? What, are you NEW here??
“There would have to be something they have in common in order for him to seek advice from him.”
See above, AND: advice columnists are NOT defined that way: so then ann landers must have everything in common with the )people she helped? Miss manners must be as rude/crass/gauche as the ignorant masses that write to her? )
You are a circular logic troll. Go back to your loop-de-loop bridge.
@145 – you need to look up atheism and get the definition straight.
@146 – so you don’t believe/know that some religions are businesses, and in those cases, god would be invented not to create a myth but to fleece people)? Now who’s the idiot…?
@111: I’m still not seeing the full proof, in the letter as published, that CAEM’s issue is homosexuality nor that his religion is christian. The issue could still be some taboo kink, or freaky style, adultery, pedaphilia, necrophilia, or swinger culture – many that would land them in hot water with their minister/flock.
– it’s just not statedIf there’s more to the letter, or if it arrived with pink triangles all over the envelope, then we’d have a little more to work with – – but as is, Dan comes off not smelling great to some readers.
@137 You get +10 Internet Religion Argument Points for mentioning Dawkins. WTG
Seriously hatin’ up the religion today. I’m not very religious – I wouldn’t call myself atheist or agnostic or “spiritual” because I honestly don’t think about it too much – but I think that telling an obviously religiously-conflicted gay person that they have to choose one or the other creates inevitable doom. Not everyone has to shed the entirety of their former persona in order to accept themselves.
Ah, the phase of hating yourself, wanting to know how it could be so wonderful yet so wrong… brings back memories.
I had a very frank discussion with God, with my sexual partner (who was even more conservatively raised than I). Guess what? God gave us the urges, so he wouldn’t have done that to one and let the other consent if it would lead to this Mythical Roasting Place. I agree, get over yourself; we had to.
AS to coming out, that’s always interesting to look at the relationship over time:
My mom at first: Oh, well, Okay I still love you but don’t tell people about it. (WTF?!)
Her mom at first: *Falls to ground and starts praying* You can’t see her anymore!
My mom a little later: It’s just a phase! You’re going to hell and I’m just worried about your well-being! You can’t see her anymore! Why should you talk on the phone so much? I don’t talk to you father that much! (Well, mom, you and dad married to appease God for your pre-marital children and hate each other’s guts and cheat and near divorce every chance you get, but whatever….)
Her Mom a little later: We should get you to wear girl’s clothes like that girl. (Hee, I’m “that girl?” Sounds like a super hero.)
My mom seven years later (yeah, we’re actually still together…): I love her like a daughter now, I’m so happy you have someone who takes care of you. *Sends anniversary cards*
Her Mom seven years later: I’m going to go shopping with her (oh, she uses my name now!). And buy her clothes. Because I can dress HER up like a girl. And I’m okay with it, just don’t talk about it around certain ones of my friends….
Progress, slow but works. Hurts sometimes, but you deal with it.
THough I do wish somebody had introduced me to Pflag before I cam out. Would have made things much easier.
@151: “I’m still not seeing the full proof, in the letter as published, that CAEM’s issue is homosexuality nor that his religion is christian. The issue could still be some taboo kink, or freaky style, adultery, pedaphilia, necrophilia, or swinger culture – many that would land them in hot water with their minister/flock.”
I fail to see how an urge toward adultery, swinger culture, or even kink would doom him to a life alone. It’s not “adultery or nothing” for anyone I’ve ever heard of. He might want guys, kids, dogs, dead people or nothing, and that would make more sense. And where do I spend IRAP points?
“God gave us the urges, so he wouldn’t have done that to one and let the other consent if it would lead to this Mythical Roasting Place.”
I’m totally with you on the wonderfulness of your lesbian urges. BUT, the God of the Bible is a quirky, vindictive, and frequently nasty character. He demands blood sacrifice; he could very well give you an urge you’re meant to resist (or, it’s your sinful nature / somehow he didn’t determine your urges despite being omnipotent). I agree that would make him an unsavory guy to worship, but I know you don’t think people with unacceptable, say, violent, urges have God’s blessing to follow them. What you realized, instead, was that religion is wrong headed and internally inconsistent–take the final step and toss out the idea of a God watching you and your lover in bed along with all the other nonsense the religion taught you.
Last I checked, there were multiple religions that condemn homosexuality. In fact, most of them do. Religion is kind of evil…
I used to be a hooker (I’m a dude), and this one time I had a client who confided he was a seminary student, and confused, and didn’t know what to do about being gay. So I “lent” him my copy of ‘Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality’ by John Boswell [btw: will EVERYONE please go read this book – it’s packed with all the ammunition you will ever need against the Christian homophobia machine and it’s a fun read]. He was so out of touch with his body that he actually came back from the bathroom with toilet paper stuck to his butt. No lie. Anyway I tried to be gentle regarding the religion thing. I didn’t really expect to ever see my book again, but it would have been nice if he had called to thank me for it.
Anyone who says the bible is clear on homosexuality hasn’t actually read it, or else is lying. Because in the book of Samuel you will find one of the most beautiful gay love stories ever written: David and Jonathan. This is the same David who goes on to become king of Israel. If you follow his story, during his secret affair with Jonathan, God always has David’s back, protecting him from peril, and elevating him in political power. But David falls out of grace with God later in life when he has an affair with a married woman, and sends the husband to his death to cover it up. Moral of the story: God is cool with boys sleeping together, but God is not cool with the killing of an innocent person.
It’s sort of interesting to juxtapose this story with the position of the Christian right in relation to homosexuals and the Iraq war…
I am a new subcriber so be gentle. I just finished listening to a lovecast where the subject was a tg whose family wouldn’t support their needs; financially or emotionally. I am a straight, married thirty-six year old who buys make-up, heels, dresses, and all the usual accoutrements every time I have to show up for “family circus”. I never use any of this more than once. Is there someplace I can send it where a tg in this situation could use it? I also have two perfectly working cell phones that have been replaced by “updates” by my parents. Could these be sent anywhere beneficial to the the glbtg community?
wayne @108, while the revisions began before the body was cold may be an exaggeration, it’s only a slight one. One of the reasons the Resurrection of Christ is so significant an issue (most denominations of Christianity require acceptance of the Resurrection as truth) is because it marks the clearest crux of revisionism. In the original tale, when Christ’s empty tomb is discovered, the story ends; religion was supposed to be the domain of the individual and God, which drastically contrasted with the complex hierarchy that was accepted in early Judaism. Hence the story of the resurrection was made after the fact, in which the Church was established.
Shomondo @132, jeffsd @146 et. al. One of the problems of trying to prove the existence of God (beyond the issue of the nature of proof, that I discussed above) is the difficulty in getting everyone to agree on the God’s qualities. If we define God as one and the same as the universe (or, as speculated in string theory the multiverse, for which we haven’t a solidly defined name), then no proof is necessary, since cogito ergo sum equates to cogito ergo Deo. (please forgive my poor Latin.) Similarly, if we define a personal higher power (in the 12-step sense) as one’s wise mind (the psychological construct), again we can presume it is there, since evidence of it is manifest. Once we start assigning properties to God to fit the biblical deities, however — consciousness, omniscience, omnipotence, anthropomorphism, masculinity, interest in human affairs, etc. — the likelihood of such a construct actually existing as described starts to rapidly decline. In fact, the degree of anthropomorphism described in the old testament counts as evidence that the biblical god is a construct of men, not the other way around. Human qualities emerge from the the nature of human existance. A god without the same needs we have would demonstrate an entirely different set of interpersonal qualities.
This idea, that God may be completely different to Its decription in religious texts is seldom address by the religious activists that seek to demonstrate God’s existence. This is a noteworthy oversight, since it’s not addressed by some of the strongest Christian-based fronts against science. The Discovery Institute, for example in the promotion of Intelligent Design Theory seeks to prove we couldn’t have evolved through random mutations filtered by of a lot of time. They hope to, by doing so, prove the Judeo-Christian dogma. At very best, though, if they could find the signatures of our creators in our DNA, for example, they would only prove our exospermic origins, not that we were divinely created at all.
I would add, Shomondo, faith is less about belief and more about fealty, that is, loyalty to the divine despite how ridiculous it may seem. An Arabian adage illustrates it well, If at noon the caliph says it is midnight, behold the stars!
A relevant adage of a more recent time: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. — Voltaire
As for your declared knowledge of the divine I would paraphrase Dawkins in noting the human mind has a great capacity for interpretation.
Rev.Smith @151, why does yonush18 get Internet Religion Argument Points for mentioning Dawkins, but I do not? I mentioned him first.
presently out @155 the Abrahamic faiths, Judaism, Christianity and Islam have provisions against sex outside authorized unions, and to differentiate social and worship practices from those of other deities, which have been reinterpreted in contemporary times to proscribe gay relationships. But other than those, are there others? I’m not up on my Hindu dogma, but does it hold anti-gay commandments? Buddhism is notably flexible with their provisions and restrictions. How about Confucianism? Anyone?
Dan;
How about some rightous anger towards Islam?
The psycho bastard president of Iran, has said “That they do not have gays!” .when laughed at, he asked for “The addresses of these People” . It aint just the catholics that have that market open.
about the only “religion” that has no hang ups about Queer seems to be Buddhism.
Dan;
How about some rightous anger towards Islam?
The psycho bastard president of Iran, has said “That they do not have gays!” .when laughed at, he asked for “The addresses of these People” . It aint just the catholics that have that market open.
about the only “religion” that has no hang ups about Queer seems to be Buddhism.
hey im a 24yr old lesbianmother of 3, living in cincinnati,i recently meet a 24yr old woman of the seattle area she’s soooo dam beautiful,sweet,short,honest, shit ill drink her bath water….. it was like love a first sight!! we’ve been talking n its getting pretty dam serious!!serious to the point were talking me move to seattle serious!! i love everything about this woman everything!!! what should i do LESBILOVERS
I LOVE the acronym that 2nd letter used.
I would have told CAEM this:
Celibacy isn’t going to work. All you have to do is google “priest scandal,” read “Youth Pastor Watch,” or just watch TV to learn that people who try and bottle up a sexual urge lose that fight over and over. ESPECIALLY people who are trying to be celibate (unless you get castrated. That works). Much like judo, if you don’t use the momentum of your attacker (your sex drive) to your advantage, you will be crushed. In other words, if you don’t find yourself in a mature relationship with another adult, you’ll find yourself raping children or at the very least furiously jerking off to hardcore porn all alone in a basement, probably more than a little lonely and committing a sin anyway.
Since you’re going to end up apologizing to God for sexual indiscretions one way or another, you might as well pick the ones that do the least harm to others and the most good for yourself.
“…if you don’t find yourself in a mature relationship with another adult, you’ll find yourself raping children…”
Repressed homosexuality (or heterosexuality) does not lead to pedophilia. Pedophilia is a pathological compulsion in its own right that starts at a young age. Youth pastor positions and priest positions don’t turn people into pedophiles, pedophiles go into these areas because it gives them an opportunity.
Dan,
While you allude to the changes/revisions in doctrine, and the various resulting sects, it may be helpful to specifically instruct the faithful on the history of their own religions that is all too often a inconvenient lesson. For example the First Council of Nicaea where Christians agreed upon what would become canon, which gospels to include, and which dates to party. Hell, anyone who made the mistake of reading or watching The DaVinci Code should know this.
In the realm of sects, there are plenty of gay friendly churches that do not preach or attempt to convert gays into straights. Even if it’s controversial, it’s there.
Also, this cat might not be Christian. I know it’s easy to get a hard on for Christians in America, especially as an atheist or other group commonly demonized by the Christians in America such as you deliciously dirty homos.
Maybe the kid is Sikh, or Muslim or a Jew. I suppose it doesn’t matter, but I think we should not be jumping to conclusions as to his religion.
As someone personally abused and currently embittered by psycho-sexual ritualistic child “discipline,” brought to my parents and institutions by the bible and church “authorities,” I applaud any criticism anyone can haul at Christianity.
To “Christians” who whine at criticism: bite me.
Dan, please don’t tell me Santa Claus isn’t real either, that would really ruin my day.
The comment to the religious closet-case was the most perfect advice in the history of this column! Genuinely, how DARE this young man talk about the strength he gets from his religious beliefs, and then ask a mere mortal like Dan Savage for sexual advice…honestly. Hey Closet-Case, why don’t you ask the God who got you through so much already? If your faith is that strong, you have no business asking Dan Savage, you just keep on praying for Strength from the abusive slavemaster you called “God” who you believe insists on your celibacy and refraining from sexual indulgence anyway.
And before anyone freaks out on ME and says I’m not “respecting” religions, I’m happy to inform you that I’m an ordained minister with the United Church of Canada. You can have a happy, fulfilling and exploratory sexual life and still have a spiritual/religious connection in life. You just have to be smart and discerning enough to not blindly follow some hypocritical nonsense cult like it sounds CAEM is a member of.
Rock On, Dan!
“Get over yourself, faggot.”
Sometimes the best advice really is the shortest. Much like:
“Don’t eat that.”
“Compliment her shoes.”
“Send a thank-you note.”
“Repressed homosexuality (or heterosexuality) does not lead to pedophilia. Pedophilia is a pathological compulsion in its own right that starts at a young age. Youth pastor positions and priest positions don’t turn people into pedophiles, pedophiles go into these areas because it gives them an opportunity.”
The inconvenient truth is that you’re right and partly wrong. Repressed homosexuality doesn’t make pedophiles, but most of those priests weren’t pedophiles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ephebophili…
Lots of male adults lust after adolescents, whether male or female ones, whether they are straight or gay. I DO believe that being gay and tortured may make you choose priesthood and then the position and opportunity might predispose you to young, physically mature males. If you’re a wreck a childlike but physically mature person is easier to relate to. Going into the priesthood just to bang some kids seems an awful lot of work and annoyance!
Get over yourself, Urleen!!!
Great column, Dan! You ROCK!!
actually, I assume the guy from “Clever Acronyms Escape Me” is Mormon, not Catholic. While Catholicism hasn’t totally embraced homosexuality, the focus on the “horrible fates too awful to mention” seems to be coming from a non-Catholic, Mormon-y source. If he were Catholic, he’d mainly be focusing on feeling guilty. . .
-Catholic, so I can say this
I’m hoping that HOMO doesn’t always think that being gay means not having any grandkids – especially as he’s writing in to a column by a writer who has written so candidly about being a gay parent.
If it’s just controlling his hormonal urges, why not recommend Vitex (aka chaste berry)? Investigate it first, consult your physician first, etc… but maybe not being so pent up all the time could help the guy make more objective and rational choices.
And to answer the inevitable question, I do not support the propagation of ridiculous religious dogma. Religion is still just what it has always been…. a tool to provide order and structure for the masses. It scares the hell out of me to think what the world would be like if all of a sudden people everywhere realized that there were no cosmic consequences for their decisions and subsequent actions. I also don’t want to destroy religion because human nature makes that impossible… just look at how well that worked in Communist Russia. I would rather change their views to incorporate more compassionate and rational values.
I don’t mean to go off on a rant here… oh wait..
Pray Away,
You are doing the right thing!- Anyone intelligent will realize that everyone and everything has to come from some kind of creator! This is First place common sense. Wisdom (Basically the good fear of God) is a gift from God-not given to everyone-which prones you to seek that higher advice for a life lived to the fullest- a life well-lived..not just getting by, but with all God’s protection(provision), blessing and True prosperity (The kind that doesn’t end suddenly-for some unknown reason).You seem to be seeking so if you have Wisdom -be Proud of it. We know that sooner or later all scorners will be cowering for direction-from God-and that there’s always that moment in their life when they all secretly pray —God—Help ME!!!!!!–The good thing is that he does….So be Encouraged, Be strong and of a Good Courage-as the Bible says—For in Due season you Will have your reward!!!! A Good Reward!!!!! Lose the Bad Fear, Keep the Fear of God (Wisdom), Exhert yourself in Excellence (not perfection!) in the good things you love and are good at –GO after your dreams-including celebrating God in Church on Sunday!- Show him –You are the man who wants to get his approval!!!–and guess what?–You will—“He will chase you to bless you ” !!!! “He will order his angels to take charge of you” He will keep you! Sometimes you will feel that you are getting near the perfect girl– and that will fizz out–but don’t be frustrated!–Remember, You’re only getting nearer!–Keep pressing on ” toward the mark” just like everything else in your life, –and while you are so busy enjoying yourself — in Doing all the right things–all that Good energy will have to attract Good and The Designated one WIll APPEAR!!!!! Don’t forget that awesome undertakings in history are the ones that made history–Such as King James–the man who opposed all –had the courage and strength by God to order that a version of the Bible (closer to the original Hebrew/Aramaic) be made in English from the Geneva translation (before the time Rome translated it into Latin-and some of its plain and simple meaning be lost in complicated translation… )He wanted every common man to be able to have his own Bible to study for himself… Because of this Rome chased him around, trying to kill him and any others who would separate from their religion. Thus, he sent the pilgrims on the Mayflower to colonize America so that simple, uncomplex Christianity would not be persecuted, but so that it could move on–And this is why our country was, in the beginning, the most blessed nation the world has ever known–BUt by the very liberty that we extended to the world, sadly, our own “American Christianity has become overshadowed by new religions practiced” even allowing Roman religions to be practiced-the very religion we as Americans once ran from in England…(read the Mayflower Compact) So if you fall on your way–take a moment–then get back up again!— Straighten yourself up–“lift up your head”–and get back at it again!–WHo knows what Awesome things God has in store for you!!–WHen you have a great attitude like the one you have!–Praying for you and signing off for now!
@158: Uriel – I intended no slight, please excuse me: Same Internet Religion Argument points awarded to Uriel, plus 1 bonus point of Internet Whining Proficiency. Done. Also Kudos for the comment about the nature of the sin of Sloth; well done.
and pcelise : There are a few crumbs of wisdom in yer post, but the moldy bread surrounding it is toxic;
you are bragging about/lovin on King James? And his UK-politics-of-the-time-centric PR publishing scam? Seriously?
King ‘I’m such a huge fan of the occult I hired Bill fawking Shakespeare to write about witches, Hecate, ghosts and fortune telling and then once the people were glassyeyed over the famous Scottish play, went on to sponsor his entire sex/violence-heavy theatre career with my taxing of the poor peasantry’ James? King ‘I claim two thrones, Scotland AND england, nay THREE: add ireland, because that’s how I roll – big-balled and not trying to make up for any size issues elsewhere, yup, yessiree, trust me.’ James? King ‘the translators I hired put in little word games and jokes into the bible- like the 42nd psalm just as one example in a thousand- and I was okay with that because I play both sides if you know what I mean’ James? King ‘Inbred? what’s inbred?’ James? King ‘I wrote the book titled DAEMONOLOGIE, – on how to burn innocent people at the stake for witchcraft ‘, James? King ‘ I inspired GUY FAWKING FAWKES & (the terrorism known as the gunpowder plot) because I was hated SO’ James?
Yeah, ok.
If you want to revere the Paris Hilton of monarchs, the Carrot-Top of Theology literature, The Joan Rivers of duplicity, then go right ahead and have fun with that.
But methinks your theology needs some QC, Elise. Start by looking up the Hampton Court Conference and the Popish Recusants Act.
And yes, I’m a real reverend, an actual ordained minister, and not one of those mere cheap online knockoffs: I live good, I bring good works to the world, and my conversations with the Great Divine have yielded no evidence that King Jimmie the 6th of Scotland nor the HCC had any business touching the revelations in the Hebrew Bible. Their translation was foremost designed to show off English as a language, promote the pope-hating Church of England and -to a reduced extent- the Puritans (who primarily made up the HCC), and re-inforce the divine right of kings (Jimmie especially) to rule : not to bring more good to the world.
No thanks. Find god in your heart, not in a book.
132 said: “There is no God?? I think you are an idiot to state something you could not and do not know. I believe there most certainly is a God.”
==============================
Holy Toledo Shomondo! Do you know how ridiculous you sound when you put those two sentences back to back? You call Dan an idiot for stating an opinion about something that is not provable, then you proclaim with certainty there is a God, which you could not possibly know for sure.
In my book that’s being a hypocrite. I’ll take back my harsh words if you admit you are an idiot, or you admit Dan is not an idiot. Either one is fine by me.
@122 & @124: Right on, wayne and Sunshine! I’m a longtime Dan-fan, too!
And THANK YOU, solid15, for calling the long-winded Shomondo on his / her hypocritical bullshit.
King James was still human, but this just proves that even in all our imperfect humanity-if we at least try to lean towards God’s higher understanding-and have the right attitude–God Still Used King James== Word!God can use anyone or anything he wants to.. NO one is imperfect to God.
Dear Pray Away
This will set you free:
Matthew 23:9
1 Timothy 4:2-3
Psalms 115:4-8–GOd loves you -his ultimate creation-Man. He has a wonderful mate for you to enjoy all your life with-as seen in all the pattern of life and creation..(A woman!) He thinks you smarter than for you to believe you can talk to wood or metal and think that it will hear you, and yes you can enjoy a wonderful carne asada with your Girl too!
Whats the difference between Faith and Religion???
Faith is beliving in God, Religion is man made bullshit!
As someone who is extremely catholic with a gay godfather and who worked to try to keep ref 71 off our ballots I’m a little offended that you just assume the closeted gay kid is catholic. Its much more probable that the kid is mormon or crazy evangelical.
personally, I believe that the campaign against inequality in the sex battles of gay rights and sloggers the world over starts somewhere in the intollerance of slang useage and VERY HIGH ADVERTISING BILLS AND DISPROPORTIOATE WAGE PACKAGING!!!
you see schismatics…. houston has been calling and the Weekly has the answer.
p.s., don’t forget to change your name savage.
CAEM: I was raised in a strict religious household, and given only two options: 1) “EXACTLY THIS, ALL THE TIME” (i.e., fundamentalist Christian idea of perfection), or 2) “ETERNAL DAMNATION.”
Around 16, I realized that I could never live up to every last doctrine preached to me (esp the ones I had issues with, for ethical reasons) – Much less expect to get up early every Sunday and go to church 3 times a week, every week, rain or shine, unless I had an actual fever, til the day I died.
So I walked away, and became a serious brat: selfish, hedonistic, thoughtless, even a bit cruel when I felt like it…And why not? I was going to Hell anyway, right?
It took me years to decide that it’s possible to be a Good person (in my case still a hedonist, and a nightowl;) — without being Religious.
Am I going to hell? Who knows? I’m sure my family thinks so (I avoid the topic, to avoid upsetting them.) And personally, I don’t worry about it anymore – I no longer believe in a physical Hell. (Honestly: given enough time, logic/reason DO win out over childhood conditioning…and the guilt WILL go away.)
I’m not gay, for what it’s worth…I’m a straight girl. Tho the religion/cult I was raised in doesn’t allow for homosexuality, either.
I’m just saying that if it’s important – truly important – to you to be a Good Person…then maybe spend some time thinking about what makes a person “Good?”
You’re already aware you won’t be able to be yourself, while sticking to the party line you’re being fed…otherwise you wouldn’t be seriously considering an unnatural life of celibacy and deprivation. (Which almost no one can maintain for life.)
Please. You’ll spare yourself years of being a bitter jerk, and all the guilt that comes from that.
It’s not easy. I know. I wish you the best of luck in finding yourself.
(ps – while I agree with Dan, here, YOU don’t have to. Why must there only be ONE way? Find your own way…Surely a benevolent Creator, who gave you a mind of your own, would expect nothing less?)
Sorry to y’all for breaking the cozy little consensus, but I think Dan completely dropped the ball and let his own issues get in the way of responding to someone who came to him for help.
To Dan: Congratulations on coming out of the closet. I had wondered on and off whether you were “this way” for a while, but had not seen you show your true colors until now. At last, you have proudly shown yourself to be a bitter, bigoted anti-religionist hypocrite.
Your “God = the Blue Fairy” remark in last week’s column was a big confirmation, but your real coming-out party happened about a month ago when you replied to a young man who is struggling with his deeply-held desire to live chastely for religious reasons.
Dan, this kid came to you warily but with hope, looking for the help he was told only you could give him, on how to live his sexuality in the way he chooses to. He is making a countercultural choice not to let his sexual desire run his life and define his character, and instead to live without genital contact. His choice is different (wayyyyyy different) from your own conventional viewpoint, that one’s sexual proclivities define him and that life cannot be happy without indulging them. You might have noted your differences and still given him support, access to resources, the names of groups who affirm their sexual orientation but try to live it out chastely. You might have tapped into your vast knowledge about having sex, and looked for some tips on what to do if a person chooses not to. You might have at least treated the kid with respect and dignity.
Instead you slammed into him with all the vindictive vitriol you feel towards religion, and let him be your whipping boy in place of all those horrible people who dare to disagree with you about what constitutes immorality. You mocked his choices and ridiculed his beliefs. You feigned an openness to pro-gay Christianity, then insultingly declared God dead (on the authority of John Lennon). You were anything BUT “GGG” when it came to responding to his situation; instead you insisted on reframing his problem to suit your values.
God doesn’t hate fags, Dan. But Jesus got pretty pissed-off at bigots and hypocrites. Congrats on having the courage to show yourself to be one. Sign me
Sick of Hearing Anti-Religious Propaganda.
PS When sex and religion are pitted against each other, “Religion always loses,” you said. “Always.” Oh really? So, when religion tells a husband or wife not to fuck the neighbor, religion loses? When religion tells someone to reign in that mix of lust and rage that can end in rape and violence, religion loses? When religion tells a person to save their sexual expression as the ultimate form of intimately giving oneself to another, to be given only to the man or woman to whom they give their whole selves for the rest of their life in marriage, religion loses? Always? There have been no priests, nuns, monks, brothers, or consecrated lay people – no single people trying to live chastely in accordance with God’s desire as they understand it, who have lived full and happy lives? No one has ever managed to avoid fucking their brains out before being married? Ever?
Or could it be that you are limiting your frame of reference to your own experience, among your own circle of friends, in your own tiny uber-hedonistic subculture, with your like-minded colleagues who all have made the same decision to drink the Freudian-Flavored Kool-Aid that says no life has meaning without genital sex, and they (if you’ll pardon the Biblical reference) “seek to justify themselves”?
@186, you might want to actually try reading the comment you respond to before launching into a multi-paragraph tirade.
First, your suggestion that this kid is expected to be celibate for no other reason than he was born into a bigoted, homophobic cult is beyond idiotic. By that logic a Muslim woman is expected to just bend over and take it if her husband decides, without her consent, to take on more wives? This kid didn’t say he can’t have “genital contact”, he said he has to have no romantic contact with anyone, ever, just because of an accident of being born into the wrong religion. He isn’t choosing to “live his sexuality”, he’s choosing to reject it.
Dan wasn’t making this kid a “whipping boy”, he was telling CAEM to try and have it all, religion and sex, instead of having to settle for one for no good reason at all. As for “insultingly declaring God dead”, you do understand the concept of a joke, right? I mean, you clearly have no sense of humor, but you do know what it is.
As for sex vs. religion. Dan was referring to it in the context of self-denial of all sexual urges (including auto-erotic), not just “genital contact”. For the record, people make the decisions regarding rape, infidelity and abstinence based on personal feelings, beliefs and fear of potentially adverse consequences. Not solely based on petrifying fear of the invisible kid in the sky with a magnifying glass burning them into a cinder.
The only person seeking to “justify themselves” her is you. If you want someone to tell you you’re right, seek a less open minded, audience. I hear Anne Coulter is always listening.
Pandorum is everywhere!
Santorum is everywhere!