Following on from the Cameron/Christian thread, Lilibet needs advice

[lilibet]

Ok here goes, I am very much in love with my (non christian) DP, we don't live together but he stays at my house with myself and my children usually about 4 nights a week. We are all very happy and the children really like him, all going very well. He knows how much my faith means to me, and would never dream of doing anything to take me away from it, in fact he is now a regular at church with me and finds some of the services really interesting, some prompting some very interesting discussions as he wants to know more about the topics that have been talked about. On Saturday night at a party, after quite a bit of drink all round, our Vicars wife mentioned to me the possibility of him attending the new Alpha that is coming up, I know that he would hate this sort of thing as I have mentioned it to him in the past and as he has never wanted to do it, I have left it. Told her this and also told her that from Sepetember he is doing accountancy exams in his own time after work so he will have very little spare time anyway, but I did point out to her that I was talking to him about Jesus and evangalising as best I could without becoming overbearing.
She then pointed out to me that as long as I was having sex with him, he would never make a commitment, as by going against all Christian teachings and 'fornicating' I was not doing Jesus any honour, and I was showing DP that I had no respect for my religion by picking and choosing which bits of the bible I was deciding to follow. Then came the worst bit, She was only asking me to do a little thing by stopping sleeping with him (how she knows that I am sleeping with him is another very long story!) its not like she was asking me to have nails driven into my hands. By this point I was in tears, DP came over, She started saying about the Alpha to him, he was a bit puzzled as to why I was crying and it developed into a stand up row between her and DP. I went to get the Vicar who is a wonderful gentle spirit led man, and asked him to intervene. He was a quiet calming influence, saying very little, his wife got upset and dp and I left. Following morning, it wsa very hard going to church and of course DP felt that he had to come with me, but all went well, we shared the peace with her and she hugged us both. I do know that she only has my and DP's best interests at heart and was doing what she thought was right but I was so upset and DP was absolutley furious. I didn't jump into bed with him immediatley, we were both certain that we loved one another before we had sex and he told them on Saturday that this is going to be a relationship that will last all our lives and how much he loves me, which did make me very proud of him. I know that she thinks that relationships where one person is born again adn one isn't are doomed to failure but I know that this will not be the case with us as he is so understanding and interested in my faith, but I admit that I have seen realtionships break up becasue of it.
So? Sorry If I have rambled, but would appreciate opinions. Thanks

Right non-christian hee, but didn't Jesus mix with the lowest of the low in his time (eg women). If he was alive today would he really be spouting off against homesexuals? No I don't think so. It is thes narrow mindedness and pettiness that puts so many people off the church (and lets face it numbers are decreasing rapidly). The last time I went to a church I had a very difficult time? Why? Because my autistic son does not behave appropriately. For who? Jesus? God? Now for the bigotry of the church. Would I go somewhere that couldn't accept my son a) if he was autistic and b) if he happened to be homesexual? NO absolutely not.

I don't see much in the church to welcome me to be honest, and whilst I read about a rabid congregation totally unable to accept someone becuase they happen to have same sex realtionships I see even less.

Tinker - no, I am in no way suggesting that a homosexual is the same as a paedophile - what I am saying is that some people would probably feel uncomfortable if they knew their son's teacher was gay, whereas they don't see a problem with a gay man being the leader of a church. The reason I say this is that young boys/men are quite impressionable and could perhaps be influenced by someone else's lifestyle, if it was in fact made to be public knowledge. People who attend churches can also be quite vulnerable and church leaders have a huge responsibility to the people who come under their care and influence.

Jimjams I'm sorry you were made to feel uncomfortable. It shouldn't be the case but unfortunately it happens... perhaps a different church would not have been so intolerant of your son's behaviour. Anyway yes Jesus did mix with the 'lowest of the low' - prostitutes, beggars, tax collectors, criminals, etc - and he was a wonderful example of how we should reach out to others. But the thing that gets confused somewhere along the line is that even though Jesus mixed with people from all walks of life, he did not condone sin - in fact he preached repentance and wanted people to change their ways and turn from their sins. He commanded us to follow his example and to obey his words. So it's not someone's past he cares about, it's what they do with their future once they have been made aware of their wrongdoing, that counts.

A man who joined our church several months ago is a convicted drug user/dealer and is soon going to be sentenced to jail. He was at church yesterday and the pastors asked him if they could pray for him before he receives his sentence next week. They then told the congregation what a wonderful man this was, how much he had changed over the last few months and what a great contribution he is now making to the church. Everyone was so warm and welcoming to him, even though his past is not the best but because he has been able to change his lifestyle and is now doing what he can to help others.

Jimjams once again, people have a choice about how they live. Your son does not have a choice about being autistic, but a grown man does have a choice about whether he sleeps with another man or with a thousand women. Everyone has desires, but it is up to the individual what they do with those desires. The bible gives us teachings and guidelines to follow, and people can choose to accept them or not - but we cannot change them just because they don't happen to fit in with our preferred lifestyle. People can either accept the bible as God's word and follow it as best they can, or just walk away from it altogether - it's their choice.

This whole big church think IMO is just legitimised judgement of others.

I think it very niave and a bit of a cop out to base your views on a book that was written hundreds of years ago.

What actually matters in this life is peoples happiness and comfort - not castigating people because of their sexual orientation or because they are of another religeon or chose to get divprced or sleep around.

And as for saying that gay people's way of life is wrong and there are not lots of commited relationships - what a narrow minded load of tosh - the amount of hetrosexual teenagers sleeping around today (STD's on the rise in young girls (straight)) is huge, it is not gay people that are doing this it is just people singling them out because they are a minority.

Nocompromise, whilst I agree that young boys/men may be influenced by the lifestyle of someone who has authority over them, I don't think that would make them gay, make them fancy men and want to sleep with them, surely their hormones would see to that?. All teenagers experiment, all teenagers rebel to a certain extent, surely, if they see their gay teacher as "alternative" something racy, or frowned upon by their parents, that would make them more likely to investigate? If gay people are accepted by society as a whole, nothing said to draw undue attrention to their lifestyle (which would be the attitude to most straight teachers), then they will be seen as "teacher" rather than "interesting exciting person".

My sister investigated the Mormon Church for a while, to the horror of the congrgation of the Cathedral that we attended at the time. My parents sensibly made no big thing of it, even discussed the book of Mormon with her after reading a few chapters, and she soon became bored with the whole thing.

I have zero problem with gay teachers. I know a lesbian couple who are both teachers actually. If my son had to spend time, with say, Ian McKellen or the Rev Ian Paisley, well I know who I'd choose for him (and for myself too, thank you very much).

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lisalisa, somewhere (? on the other thread) miranda explains that a "myth" can impart a far greater truth than an account. She does not appear to be belittling the OT, far from it.

There are things in the OT that are difficult to comprehend if taken factually. For example- how do you explain the "fact" that people were stated to be hundreds of years old? Do you think that that really happened through the grace of God, or through some kind of since forgotten behaviour or food? Does this "fact" actually matter? If these people lived to an advanced age through God's grace, why has He not done it since? Has no-one deserved it? A genuine question!

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Hi - I've been busy on the other thread, but thought I'd pop back here to have a look!

Lisalisa - sorry if I offended you, and of course anything I say here is my opinion and anyone is free to disagree with it. As Tissy said, I certainly did not intend to belittle the OT or Orthodox Judaism, I was using 'myth' or 'fable' in a fairly technical sense (explained on the other thread), but I guess I shouldn't have used jargon without explaining it! The view I expressed is fairly mainstream amongst OT scholars, though for some reason many in the church are scared of expressing theology to 'the people in the pews' (I think they think most people won't understand it or be interested - I think mumsnetters have proved the contrary very effectively!!), so probably not very well known. Two key texts if you were interested to read up more on why I think this (I've just gone and got my theology degree notes off the shelf!) are J.van Seters, 'ABraham in History and Tradition', and T.L.Thompson, 'The Historicity of the Patriarchal Narratives'.

Someone wanted to know where I trained (checking out my credentials??!!) - I did a theology degree at Durham University and my ordination training at Cranmer Hall, also in Durham. Before that I was a historian, hence my interest in the historicity of the texts (both in terms of whether they are or were intended as historical accounts, and in terms of using the texts as historical documents in their own right which tell us something about the people/society in which they were written, read and preserved).

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lisalisa, HOW do I believe that someone lived for hundreds of years? Do your Born Again Christian friends believe that as fact, or do they take it with a "pinch of salt" and say "well it doesn't actually matter how old he was - he was very old indeed ( and therefore worthy of great respect)".

I think that there is archaeological confirmation of some of the accounts given in the OT (my hazy memory recalls a TV series fairly recently). Is there archaeological confirmation that King David was 9 feet tall? Have they any skeletons from that period to confirm , was David a one-off? I'm not trying to be sceptical, but asking if it is confirmed in terms that we would understand today.

No, not checking out your credentials at all, just wondered if I knew you!

Did know someone training at Durham but he died a year or two ago, very young. We were at Nottingham.

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I'd never accept a medicine/treatment without having some idea/explanation of how it works and, ideally, not until I'd looked it up on the internet. I certainly wouldn't take something just because someone told me to! Maybe this is why I can't be religious.

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Mog and nocompromise (btw nc are you a regular who has changed names?), how do you know this isn't the view of most Christians? My vicar believes it is and my mother believes it is (she sits on PCC in a different parish). They both talk to a lot of people.

"I can assure you that God is not a practising homsexual" ?????????

I've heard it all now. How can this thread continue as a logical and reasoned discussion with comments like this being bandied about.

Forget it.

lisalisa, I really respect you for your depth of faith without what I would call proof

BUT for most medicines there is a chain of evidence, at the very least a doctor can say, "I know it works because I gave it to X last week and it cured him". For many treatments there is research, often very good research, that it works. Yes, we rely on our doctor to interpret that research on our behalf, but if pushed, the doctor could explain why he or she had chosen one treatment over another.

I don't believe that somne of the people in the OT were hundreds of years old, just like I am rather sceptical of King David being 9ft tall, but does it really matter? If they did find King David's grave and he was found to be 8, 7 or 6 feet tall, would you question your faith, because one detail was found to be innaccurate? Or would you say that it couldn't be David's grave because he was 9 ft tall? You clearly have a deep unshakeable faith, but the "validity" of the OT doesn't convince me, however much I believe that it does have a lot to teach us.

I know we maybe shouldn't sweat the small stuff but I'm afraid that precisely because I find minor points like David being 950 y.o. and 9ft tall so incredibly difficult to accept, it makes me all the less likely to embrace the bigger picture. I'm really sorry because I'm afraid I sound very disrespectful, lisalisa, but to be absolutely honest I just find it so, so odd that anyone would argue these sorts of things as fact. I agree with Aloha, I think I can't be religious because I'm too stubborn and cynical probably.

Very much agree with Tinker and others that I can't see any problem whatsoever with gay male teachers teaching boys. I can't believe that anyone thinks that "gay teacher= paedophile" or "gay teacher= wants to/will turn children gay" in this day and age.

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It isn't necessary to be a fundamentalist in order to accept Christianity no matter what Bloss and nc say. It's not a competition and who are they to judge whether someone else's faith is less valid than theirs? Tolerance is the key word. Scummymummy, you may not have faith but I think you are religious because you believe in the goodness of people and you try to help people so much yourself.

lisalisa, I like your explaination of a fable. I am not religious, so I guess the bible is a fable to me. But can you define a myth and a legend?

lisalisa, I'm finding this very interesting! I'm surprised that you say that your faith would be shaken by finding that some of the minor facts of the OT aren't true... I was expecting you to say the reverse, though you do qualify it by saying that you don't believe that will happen. I myself don't worry at all that some of it may not be factually correct- I think the message as a whole is far more important than how it is imparted. I also think that questioning can help to deepen faith... if something I don't understand is explained to me in a way that makes perfect sense, I am far more likely to believe wholeheartedly than if someone tells me to believe what is written even if it doesn't make sense.

You say, "Once we find a religion we believe in we trust that what it teaches is correct and don't need to question every assertion." I know that people are mostly born into judaism, but you sound as if you have found this path...did you move from another branch of judaism? If so, what made you change?

I don't mean to sound disrespectful, but I'm laughing out loud at the King David thing