Fridae

Finally a good religious figure who has a good sense on his shoulders. I wish more religious leaders were like him.

As an Anglican priest, I am proud of this Archbishop who has the courage to stand up to those in our church who seem to expouse bigotry. This Archbishop stands in contrast to the disappointing Archbishop of Canterbury who would go at great ends to appease the "homophobes" to maintain Church unity.

Noel+

Yo let them hear you Desmond! You're my hero!

Well said Desmond.

And, if being gay is a choice or born, so what. We are allowed choices. Its a non-argument.

Finally the sun is shining.

Great to here one of the God Squad critiscise their own team.

I agree with Archbishop that the world has more pressing problems like HIV, Poverty, Other Pandemics, Rampant Pornographies on media/internet as well as molest/sexual abuse of young boys/girls by Catholic priests which are happening any other day in any other country in the west.

As such, whether a person is gay or not, the church should not be deciding whether he is going to hell or not. They should be more concern of their own catholic priests who made a promise for celibacy and yet take advantage of young boys/girls quietly while pretending themselves to be the Spokesmen for God. In Singapore recently, we have a case of a catholic priest who abused his power to accumulate wealth through donations in kind from his church-goers while at the same time he also built close relationships with 2 other women.

Bishop Tutu is a true humanitarian, Christian, and servant of God. As a Jesuit priest told me some years when I was struggling with issues of sexual identity et al,

"Jesus taught us to "love thy neighbor". That was an unconditional love, not choosing some people but not others, but all people, all neighbors. God loves everyone, unconditionally. It does not matter if they are gay or whatever. The message is love and that God is love and love is God."

Thank you so much Bishop Tuto for your wisdom and courage. and thanks to BBC too.

Outstanding, mr. Tutu. After all these years, you still remain a symbol of decency,humility, and social awareness. May they learn from you. When you say "if God were homophobic, i wouldn't worship that God", you are saying everything. Religion, when inciting any form of prejudice or discrimination, is against the own values it proclaims to convey. Nonetheless, most people look in religion for an identity, and not for coherence or true improvement. And so, hypocrisy is born.

Wasn't one of the teachings "Judge not yet ye be judged". Which means the church should not discriminate else all it's failings shall bring them undone. Tutu is right - there is far too much focus on sexuality by the church administrators. Perhaps they are titilated by it or maybe the church is really not the all embracing loving and accepting nirvana that their dogma purports it to be.

Well said, Archbishop Tutu :-) ! You are right about homosexuality NOT being a choice. I am sure I would have chosen to be part of mainstream society, to be a father and husband and, generally, to be accepted by the prevailing majority, had I been given such a choice. I certainly did not choose to be homosexual, to be among the hated and reviled. His Grace's analogy speaks volumes : who would choose to be black in a country governed by bigotry and racial hatred??? Amen.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu should come to Singapore and give a talk to all the churches here in Singapore... Especially to the conservative Christians... The world DESPARATELY needs more people like Tutu...

People are called Saints not becos they hate... They are called Saints becos they LOVE... The churches in Singapore need to remember that...

A real messenger of God. Churches focus on homosexuality because of two small lines in the bible that consists of 66 books. Aren't the 10 commandments more important? Is it to take the focus away from all the robbing done by governments, the focus off of devorse, the focus off of financial institutes that ask too much interest and keep poor countries in their power (same chapter of Leviticus). But isn't it at the same time clear that Leviticus was NOT written by God, but by a straight heterosexual male? Two guys making love are a horror? Two girls making love are not? If a straight heterosexual female would have written it, it would probably be the other way round. As a gay guy I don't like to watch a straight couple having sex.

The church is indeed obsessed with homosexuality but another thing for sure, Fridae is obsessed about the church ! The number of religion-related articles here is amazing. What's with you guys ? Come on, there is a life outside of churches, priests, commands, exegeses and anathems and all forms of tight-assed bigotted attitudes. I sure like what Tutu says but much as i appreciate him as a man, I don't give a damn about him as a representive of his church.
Let's keep in mind that people, ideas and moralistic attitudes may only have the importance we give them. If the Fridae team secretly hopes that one day gays will be loved by the church they might as well give up right now, because it's just not going to happen. Water and oil don't mix, and droids don't love, they just act according to their programming.

yveserwan (Post 12),

Wter and oil don't mix, but this is in the past. Now, there is oil that mix with water. Go and find out the cosmetics.

The main criticisms are from the people of this faith, thus we need to engage them. We need to face the problem, and don't escape form it.

Fridae editors, well done.

andy370 (Post 8),

It is expected that many of the people of this faith is not that all embracing, loving and accepting. Fleshly people of this faith served the evil's spirit's will. Otherwise all people will be saved long time ago. It is the evil spirit's will to chase all the LGBT away from the church but actually in fact God is just beside the LGBT and loved them in His heart.

So don't be stupid and get bitter by the religious people. We need to forgive them just as God forgives us. Don't forfeit your chance of getting saved just because of their criticisms. Fast and pray for them, and let God vindicate us.

The views of religious figures are important, because many religions attempt to create laws based on their views of morality.

The 'obsession' of christianity with homosexuality is interesting because whereas extra-marital hetrosexual sex is considered immoral in christian society (see the commandment 7 and 10) , it has been legal in most western societies for many years now. Do archaic laws about the illegality of anal sex exist only today only because gays are a minority with a weak political voice?

Quote: "Our world is facing problems - poverty, HIV and AIDS - a devastating pandemic, and conflict. God must be weeping looking at some of the atrocities that we commit against one another. In the face of all of that, our Church, especially the Anglican Church, at this time is almost obsessed with questions of human sexuality."
Exactly, Bishop Tutu- if only there are more people with yr soundness of mind, the world wouln't be in such a troubled state.

I'm eternally grateful to him for giving those amongst us who do not choose to be gay a voice too. Though it's interesting to note that here in Singapore religious scene, there's been a deafening silence over Bishop Tutu's substantial insights.

B R A V O !

THERE'S THE RUB
Saint
By Conrado de Quiros
Inquirer
Last updated 02:59am (Mla time) 08/30/2007
A friend of mine from almost a lifetime ago, a poet and a priest, showed me the dilemma of priesthood, or indeed of religion in general, in a poem he wrote. The setting was the holiest moment at Mass when the priest holds up the host and chalice and proclaims to believers they are the body and blood of Jesus Christ. Except that in this case, the priest who does so is suddenly seized with doubt as to whether the miracle he is proclaiming is true or not. The moment stretches to eternity and takes on the aspect of an age-old battle between angels and demons.
I asked my friend if that had really happened to him or to someone he knew. He laughed and said it happened all the time, to priests and nuns above all because they're the ones who are forced to confront their faith as an occupational hazard. He merely chose the moment of the transubstantiation in his poem for dramatic effect, but most priests, like most faithful, are seized by doubt at some point in their lives. They have their dark nights of the soul. Priests go on to wonder whether they did right to give up everything -- or at least vowed to, the part pertaining to celibacy and poverty not always being fulfilled -- for nothing.
Faith, said my friend rather wisely, is the tension between doubt and certainty. You will never be completely certain there is a God, and you will never be completely convinced there isn't one. You truly make a leap or plunge in faith. Past doubt and short of certainty, you believe. Or choose to believe.
I remembered this rumination after reading that truly breathtaking, or awe-inspiring, news report about Mother Teresa, contrary to her image as walking with God on her side all her life, pretty much feeling his absence for most of it. In letters that she wrote to friends, she emitted the most agonized cries, like the shrieking of the wind in the desert: "Where is my Faith -- even deep down right in there is nothing, but emptiness and darkness -- My God -- how painful is this unknown pain. I have no Faith -- I dare not utter the words & thoughts that crowd in my heart -- & make me suffer untold agony�."
And again: "When I try to raise my thoughts to Heaven�there is such convicting emptiness. I call, I cling, I want�and there is no One to answer�no One on Whom I can cling�no, no One. Alone."
That is incredible writing, pain and despair pouring out of every jagged line. Kind of reminds you of the characters of Graham Greene, the burnt-out cases who have lost faith, direction, meaning, but who by struggling to do the decent thing in a world grown indecent, by persevering to do the right thing in a world grown impervious to right and wrong, end up becoming the very arguments, the very embodiments, of faith, direction and meaning.
I don't know that Mother Teresa isn't all the more marvelous, or miraculous, for it. I agree completely with Rev. Richard McBrien who says, "This can only enhance her reputation as a saintly person with people who aren't easily impressed with pious stories." Certainly, this "new" Mother Teresa has infinitely better lessons to impart to us, Filipinos, a presumably deeply religious people whose religiousness has always been a little suspect. It says at the very least that people who do not suffer a crisis of faith do not really have much faith to suffer from.
Are we really deeply religious or are we merely resolutely escapist? Are we really full of belief or are we really full of bull? One can easily make a case for our religiosity being largely ritualistic: You go to Mass, you take the sacraments, you flagellate yourself on Good Friday, you visit the Vatican and kiss the Pope's ring, and you are saved. Notwithstanding that you rape, pillage and murder in-between. It is a religiosity that has to do with appeasing a vengeful God, not doing well by your fellow man.
Mother Teresa's saintliness had little to do with spending endless hours on the pews of a church searching for God, it had to do with spending endless hours in the streets of Calcutta searching for those God presumably created in His image and likeness but forgot about soon afterward, or so it would seem. Mother Teresa's saintliness had little to do with embracing the rosary and tending to the calluses on her worn knees, it had to do with embracing the skeletal frames of famished orphans and tending to the leprous, the dying, the damned occupants of earth's version of Dante's Inferno. Mother Teresa's saintliness had little to do with sighing, ah, but all this misery is God's will let's just accept it and move on, it had to do with trying as best one could to push it back however daunting the task, and crying out to heaven in moments of anguish and despair, as Christ himself cried out at the Cross: "Where are You, God? Why have You forsaken me?"
In Latin America, many of the priests who experienced the same dark night of the soul sought light in, or lit it with, the Theology of Liberation. Far from surrendering to Marx's cause, they merely surrendered to Christ's who said: "What you do for the least of your brethren, you do for me." Or far from upholding Lenin, they merely upheld Aesop who said: "Zeus helps those who help themselves." The priests of Latin America found their salvation in Medellin, Mother Teresa found her salvation in Calcutta. The priests of Latin America lost their faith in the smithy of struggle, Mother Teresa lost her faith in the bowels of wretchedness. The priests of Latin America found their God again in their struggle to transform their world and themselves, Mother Teresa found her God again in her striving to fill the famished bodies around her with food and the even more famished soul inside of her with laughter.
In my book, or any book worth reading, that makes her a certifiable saint.
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my rationale: there's another side of christianity :)
again-I, too, am a theist

Three CHEERS for Archbishop Tutu!

The God I know and respect will make final judgement on me based on my actions and deeds as a human being not based on my sexual orientation. Fortunately God (and followers such as the bishop) have a greater vision and acceptance of all, than many of their colleagues here on earth do. They too will be judged.

wonderful words by Archbishop Tuto about time somebody from the church had the courage to speak the truth
jared