Posting by V. Rev. Mark Hodges at Monomakhos.com
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V. Rev. Mark Hodges says:
June 1, 2011 at 11:13 pm
ditto. Thank you, George. How true your comments are.
None of us are innocent of self-justification, but this is what is behind homosexuals’ diversionary accusations. It’s all about avoiding repentance, which is basically living in denial and rejecting the fear of God.
Jesus said sodomites should have repented (Mt 11:23-24), and in mentioning Sodom in the Gospel of Luke (10:12f), He taught that those sodomites who admitted their sin and repented would receive forgiveness of their sin. The clear Christian teaching is that sodomy is a sin to be repented of. (St Symeon the New Theologian is a great example of this.) Jesus later reiterated this judgment (Luke 17), but the people were more concerned with their business, with their financial position, than they were with the immorality around them, as are corporate leaders today. So in the end, homosexuality destroyed the city of Sodom.
Have your critics no compassion for hurting people who are deluded or enticed or forced into sodomy? (There is no other way to enter into this perversion — NO child is born desiring a male to force his penis into his anus. A 1998 study revealed that of the homosexuals surveyed, 62% had been threatened with a weapon and 85% had experienced significant property or financial loss from an angry partner. In addition, 39% had been forcibly sodomized, either orally or anally, against their will by a homosexual “partner.”) Many of the falsely-termed “gays” (they are nothing close to this) became such because they had been sexually abused.
We are to love everyone, without exception and without condition, but we are simultaneously to speak the truth about the harmful sins being called “good.” It is love to speak these truths about the harmfulness of sodomy, of abortion, of euthanasia, of pornography, of the ridiculous idea that all religions are equal (“Islam is peaceful”), etc.
Love warns when danger is near. Christian love speaks, even if it means being rejected or misunderstood. If my neighbor’s house is on fire, I would warn him; likewise, when my neighbor’s soul is being destroyed, I warn him out of the same personal concern for his life and the lives of those around him. And in the case of moral evils such as sodomy, my neighbor is harmed not just spiritually and in eternity, but is harmed in this life physically, emotionally, rationally, and psychologically. And not just my neighbor, but all in the accepting society are harmed by such collective sin.
Far too many Christians –even Orthodox leaders– have compromised on moral issues, looking the other way, because they have confused pastoral care for people suffering from same-sex attraction with acceptance of homosexual behavior (or because they themselves are morally compromised, or because they’ve simply bought into the world more than into the truth).
My only advice to your critics is to admit and repent of your sin. And pray for me, that I may repent of mine!
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