Hells Bells
In what is sure to be an event of historical prevelance (I love that word, prevelance, such a good word), the angelican american and canadian churches are facing expulsion- after being suspended- for their tolerant stance on gay marriage. The american delegation appealed to the Bible, to charity, to openness and inclusiveness, while the nigerian delegation pushed for their expulsion from the fellowship. I found that interesting because it's something that i am starting to notice about christianity and its rapidly changing face. Christianity historically, more or less, has mostly been a predominantely white religion, with the majority of their memebrs based in western countries. This is no longer the case. Faced with the declining participation and faith in the western countries (again the US is the exception here), more and more churches-regardless of denominations- seem to be focusing their efforts on Latin and African countries, as if giving up on their old markets and seeking new ones. This is casuing the powerbase of christianity to shift away from the hands of the white patriarchs towards those of other ethnicities (remember the calls for a black or latin pope?) in order to appeal more to those new religious recruits. Not that there is anything wrong with that. It's just a random observation. On a more disturbing note, a polygamous sect in Utah threw out almost 1000 of its young male members in order to make more young women available for older men. Those who got casted out - some as young as 13- were simply dumped on the side of the road and told by the other church members that they will never see their families again or go to Heaven. This makes sense according to their rules, because the sect believes that a member has to marry at least 3 women or they won't get to go to heaven. I am not quite sure what the point behind this belief is, but it's almost like saying that the act of marrying women is some sort of trial of faith or a necessary evil that must be endured in order to purify one's soul from its sins and go to heaven. If that is truly the case, then marrying at least 3 women seems like a cruel and unnecessary punishment. I mean, sharing a bathroom with 3 women for a year in itself enough to test anyone's faith (I know from experience, trust me), let alone for the rest of your life. Also keep in mind that 3 is the minimum and not the maximum number of wives that you should have, so the extra faithfull might really chalk up 5 or 6 wives in order to really gurantee going to heaven. I can see how that could be a punishment and a way to atone for your sins; Hell, the nagging alone would probably do the trick( Just kidding. I am, Really!)! The women probably go to Heaven by being obedient to their husbands and not mind participating when he likes to play "the Sultan and his nymphomaniac bisexual harem" in the bedroom. Now that's my kind of religion! In other news, the Southern Baptists have ended their eight year boycott to Disney, which was news to me because i wasn't even aware that such a boycott was in effect or that southern Baptists actually adhered to it(the ones i knew sure didn't!). The article is unclear on the reasons of the boycott, but i have always felt that disney was evil and i am positive that the movies The little Mermaid and Aladdin had something to do with it, you know, with the former's Phallic shaped Palace Speres and Princess Jasmine being a big Harlot. We live in a fun fun world!
posted by The Sandmonkey @ 6/23/2005 12:01:00 AM
10 Comments:
You know we need some Christian missionaries to come and minister to America. There was a time when missionaries came from America, hence your reference to the white man's religion. But now I think we've gotten so liberal that we need to be reminded of our original values.
As for the cults, I can't believe that is even news. It sounds like its from one of those tabloids. But the thing is it is news and it does happen.
We have such dysfunctional families as it is. Imagine 40 kids and 3 moms and one dad. Thats beyond dysfunction. Not to mention the full on cult mentality to top it all off. No wonder our society is falling apart. One family is like a small community.
Uh, question for you though, don't Muslims have more than one wife and like 40 kids?
Kelli,
"don't Muslims have more than one wife and like 40 kids?"
LOL
Is that like each?
The short answer to your question is NO.
Muslims can technically marry up to 4 women, but according to the rules it has to be under certain conditions. This is what's supposed to happen: A man marries a woman, she doesn;t bear him children, he then asks her consent to marry a second wife in order to have children. If she consents, he then proceeds to marry the second wife. If the second wife doesn;t bear him children, he asks both of their permission to marry a third wife. If they consent he married the third. If they still can;t have kids he can ask their permission to marry a 4th wife. If they consent he can marry the 4th wife. If the 4th wife doesn;t bear him children, then the problem isn't with the women, it's in the man himself. Consider it a tribal fertility test of sorts. Unfortunately the muslim men abuse the right to marry more then one wife, especially since the religion didn;t set strict controls that would stop the second/third/4th marriage without the wife's approval(Gee, i wonder why. That's why you have some Saudi sheikhs who marry like 4 women at a time and then keep divorcing and rotating them and have like 50 kids. But that's about the only people who do that. 99.999999% of muslims can not possibly afford to do that in any way. So again it's the saudis who are giving everyone else a bad name here.
Now, i can almost hear someone saying "well why can;t women marry 4 men at the same time as well?" Well, mrs femenist, the mullahs had the answer to that too. Their answer is this: If you put one man and 4 women in a room and lock the door for a year and when they come out a year later the 4 women are pregnant, u know who the father is. On the otehr hand, If you lock 4 men and 1 woman in a room and a year later she comes out pregnant, you have no idea who the father is.
Naturally, those rules were set 1500 years ago and did not count for things like fertility tests, praternity tests and DNA. So in modern day terms the rule that allowes men to marry 4 wives should be null and void and no longer be used in the religion. However, removing that rule would be removing one of the main and few perks of being a muslim male and muslim men will probably not stand for it, cause like their mormon counetrparts, they want to have a variety of "godly" options when they are feeling kinda frisky.
Hope i cleared that out for ya!
Sam
Little clarification Sam, while DNA testing can prove patertinity in most cases it is not 100% fullproof, however mitichondrial DNA from the woman can prove beyond doubt who your female great grandmother was up almost up to Eve. Maybe that's the wisdom of polygamy versus polyandry. So yes in the old days they had no DNA to prove paternity and hence being monogamous to one man was the only alternative, but even today's science can 'fail' at times (even though rarely), unless you're trying to prove who the female ancestors are ;)
Highlander,
but surely, if it's a case of proving paternity bgetween 4 male candidates who are not related to each other the DNA test should be able to prove who the baby daddy is. Right?
And i am wondering, if today's science provides foolproof dna paternity testing, would you agree that the whole "marrying 4 women" thing should become obselete?
Actually...There is a church in America called the African Methodist Episcopal Church...that sort of was the equivalent of the Anglican Church in America in early America since most churches were not integrated.. It was founded very early in American history.
Polygamy is illegal in Utah I'm pretty sure. Some of the rural Mormans ignore that.
Thanks SM,
I was thinking it was more Saudi, but then had heard mention of the no more than 4 wives thing.
Still 4 wives is crazy. I mean one spouse is hard enough to manage and stay married to in the US. I think the divorce rate is like 50%.
Anon,
Polygamy is not really illegal in the US. People don't go to jail for it if they're all adults. A guy can live with as many women as he wants and call them all his wives, but the state will only recognize one as official.
Aliandra
Kelli,
I'd say the polygamy idea is better than what's gotten too common in the American underclass . Guys who have 5 kids with 4 different women and no interest in supporting any of them.
Aliandra
Sam, we call the Anglican church Episcoplean here in the US. It's Anglican in Canada and most other places in the world. Except England, where it is the state church headed by Queen Elizabeth - the Church of England!
It's amazing to me that a denomination that is by definition "Anglo" has become so popular in non-English speaking countries! Really amazing. And yet, this Churhc has been losing popularity in the US for decades! Even me, I used to be Episcopalean.
Gay bishops. Hmmmph. I'm all for reforming and liberalizing Christian doctrine, but that's just crazy. What's wrong with gay people joing the Catholic Church like they've always done before? And I won't mention the gay priests molesting little boys. Really, I won't!
Polygamy. Sounds good on paper, eh? I dunno, I kinda feel sorry for those moslem martyrs if they really do get their 72 virgins. Being henpecked for all eternity by 72 former virgins doesn't sound much like heaven to me!
In Utah, there is a law that makes polygamy a crime, but it's difficult to prosecute. Why? Because the law says polygamy is being married to more than one spouse, and that can't happen because, by law, if you are already legally married, the marriage to a second wife is automatically null and void. Therefore, polygamy cannot legally even exist. When a case of a man with several "wives" does go to court, the prosecutor's charge is usually for bigamy, not polygamy. A fine example of Catch-22.
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