WHAT HARM DOES IT TO TODAY TO HOLD THAT GOD INSPIRED AND COMMANDED THE STONING TO DEATH OF CERTAIN SINNERS CENTURIES AGO?

The Bible believer today usually does not stone homosexuals (in some parts of the world he does!) but he approves of the fact that it was done in the past at God's behest in the Bible. Jesus upheld the Old Testament doctrine that its laws are infallible and from God. Jesus never apologised for the killings. He even said that killing the adulteress by stoning her is fine if you are without sin (John 8). That is a very strong endorsement. If you praise violent scriptures as God's word, you take responsibility for the contents and the consequences. If somebody thinks the rules about stoning are in force today you need to take responsibility for that and the results.

When you praise the Bible as being unerring in its teaching and doctrine, you are saying it is right to say that God commanded that homosexuals be stoned to death. That is to mention one evil out of many that it commands. This is extreme evil. Respecting and approving of it makes you no better than those who picked up the stones. To praise the Bible is to indirectly respect and approve the evil. To praise the God of the Bible is to implicitly respect and approve the evil. The evil being implicit or indirect does not make it any less bad. It is still as reprehensible and intolerable. In one way, you are worse than the killers for they had more chance of feeling bad about it than you!

In Nazi Germany, the Church used Jewish reverence for violent scriptures against the Jews and to fuel antisemitist propaganda.  Its own reverence for such texts was downplayed.

We must not forget that in Catholic doctrine, God formed a religion under Moses and the prophets that murdered gay people by stoning at divine command. This religion was fulfilled and added to and updated by Christ. The new Testament claims to be in continuity with the Old and denies that Christ formed a new religion but says he completed genuine Judaism. Many of the Jewish people did not accept the updates or Christ's right to administer them and so are considered breakaways. The Catholic Church then implicitly claims it had its own holocaust. A religion honouring evil brutal books as something to be read by all and taken by all as being God's revelation and God's writings through men needs to be firmly opposed. It is an outrage for violence should be abhorred outright. There are better books than the Bible out there!

Romans 2:11 says that God will give the Jews special treatment when he is saving the universe at the end. If you think he meant spiritual Jews - which he claimed saved believers were though they were not Jewish by race - Christians have to be Jewish in a sense. That demands respect for the law.

The texts are intrinsically dangerous.  Respecting them is like supporting arsenic being gifted to all the houses in your village.  Your attitude is as dangerous as they are.

God according to the book of Leviticus ordered that the people must stone gay men to death. Bishops cite that verse to oppose gay sexuality. We must remember that God threatened the people with horrendous disasters including plague if they did not comply with his laws. That shows how much "God" wanted gay men murdered.

Case study-

A bishop, Huonder, cited the bloodstained Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 with approval. He said, “These two parts would be sufficient to give us the right direction with regard to homosexuality, in the light of our Faith.” He will not take responsibility if somebody goes out and kills gay people because of the quotes from the Bible. If the bishop says he does not believe in killing gays today and that it was a law for the past that does not get him off the hook for he is saying, "It is only my opinion". That opens the door to people to disagree and think the killings would be endorsed by God at best or understandable at worst.

If somebody hears the bishop quote the Bible and approve of the murders that were carried out, that he may not advocate murder now, the Bible is not going to discourage that person much if the person wants to kill gay people.

While it is good that decent people oppose the Church saying that gay sex is a serious sin, the problem is that Jesus said it - that is the main one.

If Jesus really set up Roman Catholicism to teach the "truth and be the only right religion" (as the Church claims) then he is to blame for the bishop and the pope's anti-gay teaching.

Pink Cross perceived the bishop to be calling for a restoration of the death penalty for gays. This is the reason why it is suing him for hate speech. They are right to say that if he wanted gays executed that this would be hate even if it were legalised again. But problems will arise. What if people argue, he is still not arguing for anything illegal. He wants them dead if the law allows it. It would be odd if anybody reasoned, "It is not hate to approve of the people being murdered by the Leviticus law. He does not hate today's gays if he does not want this law applied today." If a person said they wanted black people killed but only if it is legal that would be obeisance to law but still murderous.

The bishop is a disgrace. And those who applauded at his sermon are no better.

Cherry-pickers are hypocrites not allies!

Christians who cherry-pick the Bible are giving the message: "My opinions are as good as God's. If I don't honour the whole Bible why do I honour any of it? Because it is sacred and I am just too stubborn, inconsistent and naughty to obey it all". Cherry-picking is paying homage to the Bible and the Bible should get no homage at all. It is bad advertising for the goodness of the Bible but still advertising. The message to obey the thing properly is still there underneath all the cherry-picking. A bad Catholic is not an advert for bad Catholicism but good obedient Catholicism. From a humanitarian point of view, no Catholicism is good but that is not the point.

It is an insult to the people murdered as a result of the Leviticus law to say, "We don't do that now so it is okay". That is saying killing gay people isn't wrong - it's just not done any more. Talking like that is really saying, "They deserve to be killed but I am too good and too superior to slaughter them." It is a smug boast. It is using death to glorify yourself.

When the state persecuted it depended on religious citizens to do it and sure enough no firm action against persecution was ever taken by religious leaders.

Why did Catholic countries that took their rules from bishops such as Ireland put gay men in jail until relatively recently? Because of the influence of the Bible and Jesus. And it is a fact that the Church regards God as the author of the Bible not in spite of the fact that it demands in God's name that gays be stoned to death but because of it. The Church still teaches that homosexuality is bad for society - that implies support for the law banning it. A vote for Jesus who claimed responsibility for writing the murderous laws of the Bible through men is a vote for homophobia.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church uses words as weapons of hate.  Words can be weapons and only religion gets away with using them that way. Words are the coward’s weapon.

The Catholic catechism that you Catholics so adore refers to Old Testament texts that condemn homosexuality. To use texts from violent scriptures, even the non-violent texts, implies that you are not very upset about the violence. You are treating the text as a source of authority - of a supernatural authority that supposedly knows better than we do. You are still honouring that text - if you were disgusted by the violence you would be looking elsewhere for an authority to condemn homosexuality.

It is alarming how somebody can quote a murderous law as having been given by God and half the world says it is fine for God doesn't ask for gays to be stoned any more. It is a callous insult against the gay men who died. If you would be okay with such a law and such a God what will you be okay with next?

What if Jesus is shown to have stoned?

Jesus did not apologise for those laws and indeed stated they were correct. If it is true he does not require stoning any more it could be a matter of seeing the laws as out of date rather than wrong. He did not apologise for the murders which would have taken place in his own day. For all we know Jesus could have stoned gay men to death before he decided the law had had its day. Christianity is man made which is why man's flawed and bloody handprints are all over it. What happens if evidence turns up that he commanded stoning and participated in it?

Don’t be taken in by the complacent.  It is an insult to the people murdered as a result of the Leviticus law to say, "We don't do that now so it is okay".

"Christian so and so is such a nice person despite his belief in the Bible." Don't even think that. Human nature is notorious for enabling evil with a smile. A truly decent person does not even contemplate honouring an evil book as the word of God. He throws it away. The good bits are a reason for rejecting it not accepting it. Something that advocates good and teaches good and then teaches its opposite is worse than something that means well but does little else but damage. Evil needs to be softened by having lots of good put into the mix. That way it does more harm than shamelessly blatant and undiluted evil.

Some look at Christian good deeds and practically ignore the diabolical aspects of Christian doctrine. They say, "Actions speak louder than words". But the Christian adoration of a God who is not intrinsically anti-cruelty or anti-violence is an action. And a bigger one than any good deed they do. They put their devotion to him at their very core.
Christians justify the murders

The bible Jesus upheld scriptures as from God that endorsed the stoning of gay people to death. That seems to be fairly common knowledge. Read http://www.equip.org/articles/killing-the-canaanites/ which shows that Christianity today condones all the murdering done and commanded by God in the past. The religion might be non-violent in some nations, but it is not non-violent in how it approves fanaticism. I would prefer to be taught atheism in school than that sick tripe.

A corrupt faith can corrode your integrity.  Don't open the door one chink.

The Bible of Jesus, the Torah, is full of God sanctioned violence and has very little love. Surprise surprise! And what does it say about Jesus that he had to honour a book like that as sacred and his foundation? Those who say that religion is always good are talking a pile of nonsense. If one religion says Jesus is God and other says he is not one of them is not in tune with the truth and corruption always starts with failing to give priority to truth and to follow where it leads. And corruption leads to violence in one form or another.

Love the sinner?

And what is loving about some religions saying we have the power to be bad for all eternity? What about innocent until proven guilty? Even the worst of us is more good than bad inside. And Jesus even if he did (he didn't!) stop stoning of adulteresses to death did not apologise for or repudiate the stoning of adulteresses prior to that. In fact he said the Law of Moses was indeed written by God like it claims meaning the cruel command to stone came from the God he put forward as a sign of perfection to be emulated and worshipped. He supposedly claimed to be that God! Jesus used the expression bad people. It shows that Christianity's foundational doctrine that he regards actions as bad not the people is hypocrisy.

The untapped potential?

I think a devout Christian who has converted to Islam and who knows of the violence in the Bible that was commanded by God and for which Jesus never apologised and was okay with could easily turn into an ISIS convert given the right chance. The openness to violence is already there. That person does not hate violence and evil enough.