Bob, some people believe that everyone is born in sin. That is why the Christian missionaries went all over the world, converting indigenous peoples by force, and killing many of them in the process. The Christians believed it was their mission to baptize the pagan babies for Christ.
Other people believe that everyone is born innocent. I myself have never seen a sinful baby, and the children I have known who grow up to do evil are the ones whose parents mistreated them in some way, creating enormous rage in their psyches, so they then acted out in the same way they were mistreated, again on someone who was powerless, a victim, as they were when they were children.
To expect a homosexual person to abstain from sex their entire lives, or go against their basic nature and have heterosexual sex, which is what conservative Christians expect them to do, is as unfair to them as it would be to insist that you only have homosexual sex, when you are heterosexual.
When you say that it would not be threatening to you if homosexuality is genetic, you add that we could say that all SIN is genetic. What you don't seem to understand is that only certain people have a belief system that homosexuality is a sin. So for you to additionally say it would still be sinful if it is genetic simply makes the issue murky, at least for me. Perhaps I do not understand you.
Certainly, lumping homosexuality with alcoholism and violent crime is illogical if you are trying to look at it objectively. There is a genetic predisposition for alcoholism--particularly in the Irish and American Indians. Violent criminals may have chemical imbalances in the brain which are genetic in origin. Children with serious head injuries have a tendency to commit violent crimes more than the general populace does, statistically speaking.
But even if these things are true, alcoholism can be treated. There is an initial choice to drink or not to drink, based on an individual's knowledge that they may be predisposed to alcoholism. Children who exhibit the early signs of violent behavior, like lighting fires and torturing animals, can certainly be treated at that point, with varying success rates dependent upon how damaged the child is and how much love and stability he has experienced.
ALL of these things are different from homosexuality, however, which inherently hurts no one (except in a society which discriminates against homosexuals, thereby hurting them), is not an addiction, and is innate. |
