Showing posts with label relationships. Show all posts
Showing posts with label relationships. Show all posts

Wednesday, February 09, 2011

Living together: What various denominations say

My wife cut out this article and drew my attention to it: Living together: What various denominations say.

One Baptist pastor says:

"We believe that if people are living together, they should be married," Brooks said. "But we welcome everyone. We don't judge them (those who are not married) or make them feel bad. We simply teach the Bible and what we believe to be true.

Another pastor says:

"Some pastors may avoid this topic, but not me," Evans said. "You can't talk candidly about this if you are afraid. Some pastors are afraid that by telling people their position, the people will start looking at them.

"But people have to know that nothing can separate you from the love of God, and God can change you and fix whatever it is."

Evans said fornication is a sin, and, "We hate the sin, not the sinner. We should not condone their lifestyle, but not condemn the people."

People do like to quote Romans 8:39 divorced of its context.

I especially laugh/cry whenever I hear: “we hate the sin, not the sinner.” This is usually stated as what people impose upon God as saying. I guess sins exist apart from those who do them and lifestyles just sneak up on people and drag them into them. People apparently do not actually choose their sinful lifestyles. People who have sex apart from marriage must be unaware of what they are doing.

I wonder, do these non-judgmental pastors hold the same tolerant views concerning domestic violence? How about rape? How about failure to pay alimony or child support?