30 December 2006

Neither honesty nor religious tolerance needed

What America's religious right has lately got up to, on the matter of gay couples raising children and Congressmen of a different faith. Full essay.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Let's be real here. You have to agree that there are major differences between a man and a woman. And it is not just physical differences, but also characteristic differences. It is the yin and yang if you may like to call it. So a child growing under the influence of a yin and yang parentage will enjoy the benefits of nature's contrasting energies. However, a child raised in a gay or single parent family may not necessarily lead to psycho-paralysis, but it will definitely lose out on the contrasting influences.
I suppose, it is an optimum outcome best suited to homo sapiens in its natural or original state that these leaders are accentuating. In this regard, it is diffiicult to alternate let alone alter.

Anonymous said...

More than 20 years ago, on the notice board of the faculty of medicine at sepoy lines, was a poster put up by the Navigator with these words in large bold prints "Towards a Christian Nation".

galven said...

"who declare to their congregations their intention to change Singapore from a secular state and a multi-religious society into "a nation of righteous Christians"

Asking Christians to do otherwise would be asking them to be hypocrites. I am a Christian. I believe that Jesus died for your sins and loves you. I believe that Jesus is the only way to eternal salvation. Asking me to, instead, pray for or hope for the maintenance of the status quo is asking me to be hypocritical. As my agnostic friend said, given what I believe in, he would be expecting me to evangelise at every opportunity. Yes, I pray that not only Singapore, but the whole world, will be transformed into a nation of righteous Christians. The Muslims, I believe, are also similar to us, in such an aim. I think the person you quoted made no mention of supporting a theocracy or infringing upon the civil rights of non-Christians. This aspect of your attack, thus, resembles a cheap potshot at Christians.

Yawning Bread Sampler said...

To anonymous 31 Dec 12:19

Basically, you are reasserting a certain assumption that male and female parents are needed for their "contrasting" natures. The point is, once again, that this assertion is simply not supported by the facts, neither in terms of contemporary studies nor historical experience.

I can also assert any number of models about the essentiality of this and that, e.g. that having siblings is critical to psychosocial development of children (they learn to fight and share), living in a village of different ethnic groups and religions is essential (they learn about respect and tolerance) and so on, but however seductive these theories are, ultimately we have to ask for evidence and secondly to balance this "optimum" that we so demand (often demanding the coercion of law as well), with the freedom of parents to raise their children in their own way.

Yawning Bread Sampler said...

To Galven Lee -

You may think that prayer is sufficient to fulfill your evangelical obligation, but many others of your same religion go further than that. They campaign actively to impose your religious values onto others. As do people of different religions who equally believe that theirs is the One True God.

This is a recipe for continuous conflict and an endless quest for social fascism. It is also not merely a matter of private religious faith, but is in fact politics under the banner of religion.

Also, as Richard Dawkins pointed out in his book The God Delusion, it isn't only the religion-motivated political Christians or Muslims or Hindus (etc) who are at fault. The greater numbers of tacit co-believers who quietly support the conflict they brew (thinking it is merely evangelism) are equally responsible.