Obama/Biden versus Romney/Ryan?

[Jules]

I meant churches in Germany. They get appr. 70 or 80% of their income through church taxes.. From members who choose to be members of the church, which makes complete sense to me.

[GipsyQueen]

Germany is one of the only countries where there are church taxes. Now while I think it's fine, that if you don't pay taxes, you don't get to marry in the church ect ect. - I don't like the concept of the churches recieving taxes as a whole.

[OwnedByBCs]

Actually, the Mormon church requires you to give 10% of your income to stay a member in good standing with the church, and to get into the higher levels of heaven. Cause that's not at all crazy...

[sparks19]

Originally Posted by eddieq

100% untrue in every church I've been a member. All offerings and financial contributions are voluntary. Sure, we keep records, but for tax purposes (we provide a statement to all members so they can deduct the charitable contribution on their income taxes at the end of the year) and for expense budgeting for the coming year (even for churches, electricity, heating fuel, etc. isn't free). If a member wants to get married, hold a funeral, hold another event using our fellowship hall, it's permitted no matter what (if any) funds they have given in the past. Non-members of the church can certainly use the facility as well, but we charge a small fee (and are appropriately taxed on it) to cover our expenses (electricity, water, the custodial staff who has to open the building and clean up after, etc.).

And realistically, member contributions make up way more than 80% of our budget. There are some investments that yield a small amount of interest and some facility usage fees, but over 90% of the "income" our church receives is from voluntary member contributions.

In any church where I've been a member, we have never refused access to any member regardless of their donation status.

I hear people say, "The church is corrupt" and "the church does this" and "the church does that", but my personal experience is quite the opposite.

That is how our church is too but we are too small for others to want to rent our facility so we don't have that fee to add into our "income". It is all conpletely funded by our congregations charitable donations and since we are so small that money mostly goes to bills fOr the church and a "stash" of money in case of emergencies. We are too small to be corrupt and power hungry lol

[Barbara!]

Originally Posted by Puckstop31

Actually Barbara! its been addressed over and over. Please read this carefully.

Romans 1:22-27
"21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles.

24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error."

Fran's arguement does not get around that homosexual acts are described as 'shameful and unnatural'. The motivation for them does not matter.

It also describes lustful heterosexual relationships the same way...

Which is why I said that LOVING homosexual relationships are not condemned in the Bible.

[RBark]

The passage you posted doesn't even condemn homosexuality. It condemns "shameful acts" with other men. There are instances in the bible where a man can commit a "shameful act" with a woman. That does not make heterosexuality a sin, any more than it makes homosexulity a sin.

[Puckstop31]

Well... I guess we will just disagree then. The language used there tells me something different than it tells you.

"Unnatural and shameful" is pretty clear to me.

Also, i've read all your links and watched your videos. How about you return the favor? See the case from my point of view.

http://www.reformedonline.com/view/r...ne/homosex.htm

[Renee750il]

Something I always find interesting -- and telling -- in our political threads is how they always take a turn for the religious.

Since we're a pretty good cross-section of the public, I have to think that our politics are a whole lot more intertwined with religion than we want to believe.

[~Jessie~]

ETA: Carry on. lol.

[Linds]

I'm not going to try and convince someone who thinks their religion finds homosexuality a sin that they're wrong. As long as they understand that their belief stems from their religion and don't use that to try and push for laws based off that religious belief then I'm completely cool with them.

I would like to think that people who are religious would have enough respect for their religious freedom that they would fight for freedom from religion in the law.