What IS good, and how do we determine it?

[Nope]

Please ignore this

[Nope]

I have written this reply to CL at least five times. Everytime I try to isolate one quote from her and answer, I end up with the entire quote without my answer being published. It is probably something I did wrong but it is very annoying

Catholic Lady, I used to feel similar to you on the issue of same sex marriage. For reasons that my puny human intellect could not understand, god did not want same sex couples to express their love in the same manner that my husband and I did. That didn't make sense to me but, as a Christian, I accepted it. It wasn't until I lost faith that I realized the mental gymnastics that I had to use in order to retain both my faith and my sense of fairness to same sex couples. Like you, I didn't want the state to forbid same sex couples from marrying but I thought homosexuality was a sin.

[abaris]

I have written this reply to CL at least five times. Everytime I try to isolate one quote from her and answer, I end up with the entire quote without my answer being published. It is probably something I did wrong but it is very annoying

Happened to me yesterday. Typed for about ten minutes, only to get the quote without my reply. Couldn't be arsed to type again.

[Nope]

I have written this reply to CL at least five times. Everytime I try to isolate one quote from her and answer, I end up with the entire quote without my answer being published. It is probably something I did wrong but it is very annoying

Happened to me yesterday. Typed for about ten minutes, only to get the quote without my reply. Couldn't be arsed to type again.

Hopefully, it is  only a temporary glitch

[Whateverist]

How about "she knows what God wants for .. (pregnant pause) .. IT IS WRITTEN."

What does that matter if she ignores half of what is written and makes up her own ideology anyway?

Tbh it's making shit up as you go either way, but if you claim to follow a religion and ignore its dogmas in favor of your own ideas, are you really following that religion? Incidentally I know dozens of religious people who do that....sorta defeats the purpose of associating yourself with the faith

This bothers me much less.  How should one read a text?  I'm all for allegorical reading of some texts.  The trick is not forgetting how one has read it.  Every insight gleaned is of an "as if" variety, meaning for personal consumption only.

[pocaracas]

Guys, if you're having troubles with your replies, please use the source mode editor.
Go into your control panel (http://atheistforums.org/usercp.php?action=options) and activate the option to always use the source editor. It's at the bottom right.

This enhanced editor isn't working as it should all the time... sadly, it is the default editor now.

[Longhorn]

I don't think any sex outside of husband and wife is moral, whether it is between 2 people of the opposite sex or 2 people of the same sex. And I know it is hard for you to understand why I believe this. I don't blame you! It is one of those things that doesn't mean anything unless you believe in God, since I use God in my explanation of it.

And I can tell you why it doesn't mean anything unless you believe in god: because there is nothing morally wrong with sex outside a heterosexual marriage. Endorsing the opposite idea is a source of sexual repression and misery. It's baseless, harmful and immoral.

Aside the notion that some sky daddy intends this or that (which brings us to the question.....how do you know that?), no case can be made for why premarital/homosexual sex is wrong. Only religion insists on keeping us in this unhealthy hatred towards everything 'other'. Marriages are man-made, and so are gods. We've been fucking everyone left and right for thousands of years before god finally decided to bat an eye. The only reason religion takes interest in sex is to control people, and frankly, it makes me sick.

[Aoi Magi]

What the heck do you mean by "moral truth"? Define the term please...

1) If murder or any such action is morally wrong in one situation but not wrong in another, and if the same morality isn't universally applicable then morality is NOT a universal truth, but a subjective truth.
2) If it is subjective, then suggesting it is universally defined by a supreme being is false.
3) Thus simply presuming a supreme being, and jumping from that to christianity or any particular god is a huge leap in logic.

It means that it IS immoral regardless of what some people believe. So, going around butchring infidel men, women, and children for the sole reason that they are not radical Islamists, is immoral, period. This is a moral truth.

I keep using Isis as an example because it's the big thing going on right now. But it's just an example and is not limited to them.

I agree with your point #3.

Has this situation been precisely written down in the religious moral-handbook or on the contrary does it actually advise to do the same thing as what ISIS is doing? Even in NT the threat is there albeit in a softer tone

Matthew
10:14 And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.
10:15 Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrha in the day of judgment, than for that city.

But leaving that aside, I am glad you agreed to my #3, but I'd also like to hear your thoughts on #1 and #2. If morality doesn't exist in nature why do you believe it to be universal?

Even if it is objective why does it need to come from a supreme being but not from within our societal norms or as you say, our "instincts", as there is clear evidence of morality changing throughout time as our society evolved?

If you only explain your morality only from your particular religious text, then what about situations that are not covered in that text? Like say killing fish and animals for food....

[robvalue]

When someone says someing I can't possibly fathom like "same gender/extra marital sex is immoral" then I can only think of two explanations:

1) The person already thinks there's something wrong with it, for whatever reason, or has been taught there is something wrong with it. They then use religion as a way to avoid having to give reasons why it is actually immoral.

2) They don't think it is immoral, but the religion they have chosen tells them that it is, so they convince themselves that it is.

To demonstrate I'm wrong would be a simple matter of giving an actual reason why same sex or extra marital sex necessarily causes any more harm than marital, straight sex. It's all the same thing. Pregnancy is the same (except not even a problem for same sex, bonus!), spread of STDs is the same... things don't become magically right and "moral" because of an abstract agreement like marriage.

That's just my analysis and opinions. I'm not trying to single out Catholic Lady here or expecting her to respond, this is my general thoughts for everyone who holds such views.

A god that would actually forbid or get upset about two consenting adults doing what they want together and not hurting anyone else is not what I'd call "good". Instead I'd call it a sexually obsessed control freak. This is a use of the term "immoral" which deviates entirely from what it actually should mean, which is harmful. This is the problem when you have words meaning two things at once.

[pocaracas]

Come on, Rob...
Sex is for procreation, only.

Why would homosexuals do it, then? No reason, they can't breed, hence it's immoral! QED