there's no argument there. when you hold mistakes over people's heads and condemn and judge, you can not expect any less than that when you're seeking mercy and/or forgiveness.
I thought I wanted to stay away from this... Taking his sins public and humbly getting help is a great gift to this man. He might have escaped this humiliation and ended up a hypocrite. You know the hypocrite is one who denies his sins, will not admit a wrong, and thinks one is better for it. I pray this minister will live a transparent life and will be set free from hypocrisy and deception- something that must happen in all of our lives if we are to see Heaven.
but is it a sin to be gay? the whole issue is compounded by the fact that this is a person who under the guise of preaching the word of jesus, promoted an idea that being gay is a sin. im no preacher, but if jesus was about anything, it was about compassion, love and tolerance for your fellow humans (dirty hippie!) and this guy preached a divisive message of hate. instead of his experience softening his anti-gay position, i am going to bet that he becomes even more anti-gay. he will be able to talk from the pulpit about how the devil made him a sinner and how he was able to "redeem" himself.
rhester is talking about the man cheating on his wife, using illegal drugs, and being an all around hypocrite. homosexuality is the least of his problems.
come on..that's not what he means and you know it. the guy was married. he was cheating on his wife with a man and taking drugs. he's a pastor of a church. He was "caught" in the sense that more is expected of him...as a pastor and as a husband. this doesn't have to be a homosexual issue at all. it's no different if he's caught with another woman. just ask jim bakker.
Does a guy who have 4 kids at home and has to work 3 jobs get a pass if he starts embezzling money from a company? Do you give a pass to the woman who, because her husband has Erectile Dysfunction, goes out and cheats on him? Do you give a pass to the 30 year old guy who sexually abuses little kids because he was similarly abused as a child? We need to stop making excuses for actions. If you are repressing a major part of yourself and need to go act things out, fine go ahead, but if they cause pain and suffering to others, then you are not being a responsible adult and should suffer the consequences of your actions.
And maybe the religious oppresors should also suffer the consequences of their actions. They are responisble for trying to make homosexuals live a lie. It hurts a lot of people.
much like Haggard's attraction to drug enhanced man-on-man sex romps. Ya know male sheep can be gay and they certainly lack "free will", as defined by Christian Theology. Why would God make gay sheep, yet condemn men of similar behaviour? More evidence of God's sense of humor.
This reminds me of a Law & Order episode where one guy and his friends would have "poker" nights that would really be butt sex nights. The guy tried to deny that he was a homosexual saying that just because he has sex with men doesn't make him a homosexual. Ice-T told him "naw dog, you're gay," and he said, "yeah, I'm gay, damn."
But his sexual addiction was sex with other males not sex with females and he did it repeatedly. If this was a one time occurence maybe then it could be considered experimenting or just testing taboos but that he repeatedly had homosexual sex tells me that he has fairly strong homosexual tendencies that he was going to go to great lengths to satisfy. What I don't understand is why you want to downplay that?
