Thank you Voice of Reason. You've successfully put down, quite eloquently, my thoughts on this topic. If people don'tmind, I'd like to see the passages that arecommonly used to condemn homosexuality. Because the ones I've seen so far simply say not to defile your body, because it is the God's temple. How is homosexual sex considered defiling the body if it's an expresion of love? This passage could be interpreted as condemning any introduction of a foreign substances into the body. Should people stop taking medicine? They're not a natural part of the human body. What about alcohol? Alcohol is quite literally, a poison. Yet Jesus drank wine for ceremonious purposes just as very other Jewish person did. And the passage from the story of Sodom and Gomorah "bring [the men] out so that we may have sex with them" could simply condemn rape, not homosexuality. What other passages are there that plainly express homosexuality as being a sin?
I think emphasis absolutely must be placed on Reason's statement that interpretation is necessary to use the Bible at all. I read the Bible passages and sometimes don't understand a thing. Does that mean they're "wrong"? No, of course not. But neither does it mean that I should depend on the interpretation of another human being who, like me, is flawed, even if they've studied the text for years. Why is there even such thing as Bible study if the text is so simple? Many here have claimed that I, as well as others, choose to take what we want from the Bible to satisfy our own ideas. But so do they. There is not one solitary interpretation of the Bible and thus anyone reading it at all, is "taking what they want" and disregarding other possible interpretations. So, as I've asked numerous times before, why is that interpretion correct and others incorrect? Becausew you made it? Because someone told you it was right? We must start relying on GOD and not other human beings for the truth. The Bible was written (although you may say inspired by God) and translated and interpreted by humans. All we can do is read the texts as a guidline and look into ourselves - our temple where God resides - for how to interpret it. And my heart tells me that homosexuality is a wonderful expression of love, a gift from God.