I am glad to hear of your strong faith. However, human beings are not islands. Our faith starts from the sharing of the truth between one person and another. If you are Christian then you are dependant upon the testimony of weak and fallible human beings for your faith. Ultimately, however, you know that it can be trusted because it is God by means of His Church that keeps it pure; it does not depend upon the goodness or wisdom of people. Nevertheless, it is mediated through people.

Especially since their current message is to pray to have an arm chopped off. It is the deformation of personality that your programs offer, not its restoration.

I recognize that something one has embraced as truth, as a part of themselves, can seem, and in some ways actually be, a death to self when one has to turn away from it in order to approach the truth. However, if one recognizes his fallen state, his proclivity to engage in activities that seem at the time to be what is good for him but end up being poison, then one must recognize that his feelings and personal experiences are not the arbiters of truth.

Jesus actually said that one must be ready to chop off one’s hand or pluck out one’s eye if that is what it takes to turn away from what is harmful in order to embrace His healing love. While that may have been hyperbole, it still is instructive. Even though it may seem that to turn away from temptations may be felt as a form of death, this is not beyond what Jesus asks of us. Temptations, as compelling and irresistable as the experience might be, have no automatic claim to ontological status. This can only be discerned through divine revelation with absolute certainity and metaphysical speculation (using an adequate metaphysical system) with lesser certainty. Medical science alone has no competence on its own, to make claims one way or another about the mystery human person.

In the end, one cannot judge what is true or false solely from personal experience. Using Plato’s allegory, until one emerges from the cave he does not have an adequate frame of reference from which to evaluate reality. Until one experiences the liberation from slavery to his passions he cannot appreciate that he was enslaved.

If you are not already, some day you will come to a crisis that eventually, God in His mercy, allows all of us sinners to experience. The crisis will be an opportunity to see life clearly and turn away from the things that have separated us from God and turn back toward Him. We are all in the same boat. Our brothers and sisters who are afflicted with SSA simply have a different cross to bear in life, but we all have our crosses. When you reach your point of crisis remember the apostolate called Courage.

Thanks, but I’ve already had that crisis many years ago. And my faith in God has been absolute since then. However, my faith in those who claim to speak for him on the other hand has never been at its lowest. Especially since their current message is to pray to have an arm chopped off. It is the deformation of personality that your programs offer, not its restoration.

No huffing and puffing here, you have done more than enough of it for the both of us. Just some observations:

I continuously find it interesting that those who claim that being gay is against the will of God always try to justify their prejudices toward gay and lesbian people by turning to science, psychology, studies of diseases, etc. Is your faith so weak that you cannot proceed on the Word alone?

I don’t know whether you are a believer or not, but this assertion seems to reflect a voluntarist view of God. The entire series was aimed at showing the theological anthropology of the human person. Since God made us this way, the meaning of sexual activity is not something arbitrary but part of who we are. God does not, cannot, arbitrarily deem somethings o.k. and some things not. Given this truth of creation with its inherent order that accords with the Truth of God Himself, we should expect to see negative ramifications for violations of this order. The empirical evidence I provided simply supports the anthropology. Sure empirical evidence is not necessary for faith, however, faith and reason are mutually supporting. To not engage reason with faith is to succumb to fideism.

The truth of that matter I think, is that it is most likely that you have never even made a conscious decision to be prejudiced toward gay and lesbian people. I suspect that you had never read the Bible, never read a single “study” of homosexuality before committing your heart on its current dark path.

It is of course, ironic that you condemn me for pre-judging and then go on and do exactly that yourself. It is also ironic that you have sunk to personal condemnations in falsely accusing me of the same. I have done nothing here but reveal the truth of the human person and provided evidence of the terrible personal and social consequences of ignoring this truth. My focus has been on decisions and actions, you will have to point me to any personal condemnatory statements you may think I have made. I suppose the problem is that you cannot separate your temptations toward disordered activites from your personal identity. However, one must realize we live in a fallen world. No one would think of justifying (as of yet any way) a liberation movement of alcoholics or kleptomaniacs simply because they have had, from an early age, these innate predispositions to what became almost irresistable temptations to disordered activities. One seriously errs when he equates temptations with his personal identity. On this basis we can justify just about any act.

So be it, believe what you wish to believe. But the cloak of sanctity you attempt to put around your words cannot hide their basic evil and underlying hatred.

I would not waste my time discussing the matter if I were motivated at all by personal hatred. I would simply leave those with this affliction to succumb to the ill fruits of their disorder. Rather, I am motivated solely by love of God and my fellow man that I devote time trying to promote the truth of the dignity and greatness of the human person.

And know this: no matter what you do, no matter how many little essays dehumanizing gay and lesbian people you write, no matter how many hate-filled laws you support, we will remain.

Interesting, my little essays have done nothing other than presented the truth of the dignity of the human person and by doing so attempted to “rehumanize” those who have fallen into “dehumanizing” practices and lifestyles. There are no “gay” or “lesbian” people. These people are only people, human beings, who suffer from various manifestations of SSA. And you are correct, the disorder will remain as with, as will all types of illness and also death until the eschton. However, we can and must do all we can to allieviate the suffering; e.g. in the case of SSA by helping those in the situation to recognize their plight and seek the help that is available.

If you are not already, some day you will come to a crisis that eventually, God in His mercy, allows all of us sinners to experience. The crisis will be an opportunity to see life clearly and turn away from the things that have separated us from God and turn back toward Him. We are all in the same boat. Our brothers and sisters who are afflicted with SSA simply have a different cross to bear in life, but we all have our crosses. When you reach your point of crisis remember the apostolate called Courage.

Is your faith so weak that you cannot proceed on the Word alone?

The truth of that matter I think, is that it is most likely that you have never even made a conscious decision to be prejudiced toward gay and lesbian people. I suspect that you had never read the Bible, never read a single “study” of homosexuality before committing your heart on its current dark path.

You have gone out and sought works by those that share and support your pre-existing prejudices, rather than look at anything with the eye of reason.

So be it, believe what you wish to believe. But the cloak of sanctity you attempt to put around your words cannot hide their basic evil and underlying hatred.

We see right through you.

And know this: no matter what you do, no matter how many little essays dehumanizing gay and lesbian people you write, no matter how many hate-filled laws you support, we will remain.

Gay and Lesbian people have endured and survived at least the last few thousand years of persecution by those such as yourself. Yet we are still here, we remain. We did not die out. If Hitler couldn’t accomplish our destruction with his ovens, surely you, a mere amateur bigot, cannot either.

We will continue to be a part of the fabric of this great country, and we will grow and prosper in it, because this is our home too, not just yours.

And there is not a single damn thing you can do about it.

Cheers!

PS: No doubt you will huff and puff and give a dramatic performance about being compared to Hitler. Too bad. Take comfort I didn’t equate you to something worse, like say, cannibalism.