Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

My niece is 15. She has asburgurs but is high functioning, pretty normal.

She has no religion (but is Christian), both parents are dead. She is living with a relative.

Before her dad died he taught her a lot of stuff. Get rich quick, no respect for money. He taught her its ok to hate people based soley on color/etc.

One of the things we as a family are struggling to explain is why if you are gay, black, Hispanic why its not ok to hate someone.

we are getting through on the black/Hispanic stuff, but not on gay. In fact she said today "well the bible says so".

As a Jewish woman I am trying and struggling to make her realize "to each his own" but MORE importantly "don't hate" based on this teaching coming from the bible I am not familiar with. (and in this case I TRULY believe its about keeping the father alive and doing what dad did rather than her OWN Christian beliefs)

Don't like gays because a book says so, but don't HATE.

She is entitled to her opinion but I don't want her to grow up HATING gay people JUST because they are gay, JUST because the bible says so.

Does anyone have any advice on this?

And to be CLEAR: I am not trying to change a belief, I am trying to make her realize not to hate and the bible does not teach hate. And I am NOT against Christianity. That's not the purpose of this post.

Edited to change VERY poor wording.

Message edited 10/30/2014 3:17:31 PM.

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

I would approach it as the Bible is not meant to be taken literally.

In fact, in the new testament, Jesus himself uses parables not to say, "hey guys, he's an awesome true story I read in the Bible" but rather, "now, using the people/things in this story as a symbol, how can you apply that to your life?"

Like, Bible aside, if we look at the Lion King. Is this really a story meant to be taken literally? Is the point that we learn "wow lions talk and sing and fight each other!" or is it something between the lines that we should learn? Not be greedy, powerhungry, etc?

As far as I know, and I'm not Christian scholar, the only sorta sorta reference in the Bible says something about a man lying with another man. I think that we can really interpret this a variety of ways, not all of which have to be sexual. As a practicing Catholic, and also a support of gay rights, I have a hard time believing that Jesus himself, were he here, would be like, "hey, everyone is good...except gays. You'll all burn." I can't imagine he'd exclude or condemn them. I think of the church as a living, breathing, evolving (ohhhhh no I didnttttt) organism. Its not perfect. It changes. It makes mistakes, just like people make mistakes. Because its created by, kept up by, and interpreted by humans - and we all make mistakes.

So, I guess, I'd tell her to read the exact passages that she's using as a scapegoat and maybe discuss other non-literal meanings for it. Hell, there are bible passages that suggest women have to keep their heads covered and you KNOW we don't take those literally anymore.

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

This might help, also:

Bible Info

This is a great line from that webpage:

The Bible isn’t a rulebook, and Christians cannot lift out of its context any passage from it, and still hope to gain a clear understanding of that passage.

Message edited 10/29/2014 4:22:41 PM.

Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

Toughie

There are plenty of passages in the bible that relate to love and not hate. such as: If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.

The fine line is judging. (you can point to Matthew 7:1 for that)
or Luke 6:37 which could be interpreted to say we are all sinners and before we pass judgment so quickly on others we need to see our own sins

All Christianity is rooted in love. For love is god's way. To be closer to him or be resentful is to forgive and to love. Turn the other cheek. (or that's what they teach)

You can use to read the bible as a way to direct YOUR actions. If you believe the bible says something is 'wrong' then you can believe that and act YOUR life that way but still the bible says to love your neighbor. So although she can say being gay is wrong (which to be clear I utterly disagree with) then she can choose to not be gay (because yeah its a choice?) but if she chooses to be a Christian then her mission is love the children of god and to help them see the way. To hate would be the devil's work to keep her at arm's distance from doing what god wants and be utterly against what god would want.

I'd take her to a church honestly and sit with a priest (or clergy) but first vet them out and discuss what it is you are trying to clarify.

The bible is a book of morals. You use it to live your life by. But if you choose to only read half the story you are doing it a injustice.

- Signed the lady whose read the bible a few times (in 3 versions) still doesn't believe a single word in it and yes I'm Agnostic Atheist but still respect ANYONE who chooses to live a good life with good acts without judgment, regardless of who they worship.

Just my $0.02

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

I would turn the question to her. Is it ok to hate her just because she has a disability? If someone blindly hated her because of something she cannot change about herself, why is it ok to hate anyone for something that they are unable to change in themselves? I don't think it is ok to hate anyone.

To me religious texts are meant t help people guide and explain situations using examples. It is not meant to be taken literally.

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

There is not much in the New Testament about hating or condemning gays. Most of the time when people quote the bible to related to gay issues it is the Old Testament they are quoting, specifically Leviticus. Do a few google searches on this part of the bible and you should come up with some of the other extreme verses written in this text. For example: If a man commits adultery with another man's wife--with the wife of his neighbor--both the adulterer and the adulteress must be put to death.
Maybe show her how we wouldn't follow that verbatim so why would we follow the part about gays.

Message edited 10/29/2014 5:45:25 PM.

Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

You need to explain to her that the Bible, especially the Old Testament, says a lot of things that most educated people don't agree with nowadays, and we don't take it literally. Unless you are my son's middle school principal who does, as do some fundamentalists in the area :(

Explain to her that the same section, Liviticus, that says men should not lie with men also says women are unclean when they have their periods and goes into great detail about the need for them to confine themselves during their periods and what needs to be done to make them "clean" again once their periods are over, so that they can rejoin the rest of the household.

It also says that if a woman with her period sits on something it is considered unclean and must be cleansed before a man can sit on it, a chair, a saddle, by blood sacrifice. The cleansing process involves the local rabbi and donating animals. It specifically says that bulls and rams have to have completely descended testicles. Apparently, people must have tried to donate less than perfect animals so it was thought necessary to write down in the Bible what was not acceptable.

There is a hilarious passage about how to cleanse a home that sounds like straight out witchcraft, if not something from a horror movie - Take a red string, put it in a bowl, put in a rock, kill a dove, add its blood to the bowl, then holding a live dove dip its wings into the blood and sprinkle the blood from the poor thing's wings all over your house, then let it fly away. Ugh, what a mess!

Message edited 10/29/2014 10:55:19 PM.

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

That's tough.

I know someone with Aspergers and while I think he can "get" other POVs, he becomes obsessed and "stuck" on things needing to be a certain way because that's how he sees it in his head.

I don't see the need to continue to challenge him though....not worth the "argument" I guess.

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

I was just coming on here to say exactly what the previous two posters said. I don't think you will be able to reason with your niece if she is on the spectrum.
The approach you might want to try is: Yes, the Bible says that being gay is wrong, but it also says hate is wrong. Therefore, while they may be doing something wrong, it is wrong for you to hate them.
Above all, at least it would get the point across that hate is wrong. And I think that is your ultimate lesson?

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

I think a good angle on this would be to let her know that the main thing Jesus would want is for us to act like Jesus, to be loving and kind, Jesus wouldn't hate anyone. Yes, the bible guides us in our daily lives but most importantly, we should love one another as Jesus would. Jesus accepted everyone and loved everyone, we are ALL God's children (Black/White/Gay/Straight/Bisexual, etc.) and all deserve our love/respect.

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

PS - it is certainly not a "Christian belief" to hate gays. Just an FYI.

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

I am a buffet Catholic so I may be stepping on Christian toes here.

I would explain it as the bible was written by PEOPLE & by many different authors, recounting what they believed was the word of God.

Sometimes PEOPLE have ideas that are wrong - or that at the time seemed like it was ok to believe but really it wasn't (for example, slavery).

It is a holy text, a guideline that we follow but there are flaws in it (because sometimes people are flawed). We need to determine based on what God would want us to do in our heart & act that way.

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

I also think with maturity she may get it more.

I know someone else with Aspergers who was very aware of his issues and had a better time coping with age and just the support of others who didn't focus so much on trying to change him and focus so much on HIS trigger topics.

Is she mentioning it constantly? Is it upsetting anyone?

If not I would probably leave it alone because then you are just calling more attention to it and triggering them IMO.

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related

"I think a good angle on this would be to let her know that the main thing Jesus would want is for us to act like Jesus, to be loving and kind, Jesus wouldn't hate anyone. Yes, the bible guides us in our daily lives but most importantly, we should love one another as Jesus would. Jesus accepted everyone and loved everyone, we are ALL God's children (Black/White/Gay/Straight/Bisexual, etc.) and all deserve our love/respect."

Message edited 10/30/2014 4:11:07 PM.

Re: Need advice- Explain why being gay isnt wrong- Bible related