Biblical instructions not always relevant to modern times
Christine Kraly
class of 2001
This letter is in response to Becket Gremmels' Sept. 27 letter.
So, Becket — you don't hate gay people? That's great. You have gay relatives? Terrific. Wait — you even talk to them, too? Well, Hallelujah. (Pun entirely intended.) Please stop shining your medal for a second and read this.
Something tells me — gut instinct — that you count your gay friends on your hands. And by that, I don't mean that you only choose to have this many or that many gay friends. I say you count them on your hands so that you can say you have gay friends. ("Well, there's Tommy, he's one. And Amy, yeah, Amy's two. And, well, no one knows about Mark, but I'm totally counting him.")
The best defense to any argument — especially one you have such thin evidence to back up, like yours — is to use your own life as an example. But please, don't use your friends and family as backup and then throw out a Bible quote that equates them with "theft, kidnapping, murder, greed, fratricide, lying and lawlessness." I know Tommy, Amy and Mark would be so proud.
So since I'm assuming we're taking the Bible so literally these days, you would tell me to shut my big yap (or stop my fingers from typing) and marry a man I don't know and start making him babies, right? Or that I should start building a tent now, in which I can take solace once my period comes because a menstruating woman is unclean and unfit to be in society. (Shh, I'll let you in on a little secret: this is what the Bible says, too. Not just that gay people are wrong, wrong, wrong.)
I won't directly quote from the Bible because there are so many different versions and so many different interpretations of the book o' rules. And maybe a word you should start researching, Becket, is this: interpretation.
Just because it's written down, in a big, fat book o' rules, doesn't mean it's a. Meant to be taken literally; or b. meant to be taken literally in the 21st century. Countless events, laws and changes have passed since the Bible's inception, for example, the Civil Rights Movement, the Women's Movement, Vatican II. Catholic doctrine has been interpreted over the years to adapt to modern society. In 2002, should sinners or law-breakers be made to wear a crown of thorns? I think not. But, of course, that's just how I interpret it.
But I must say that your final, most moving point was when you note, "God didn't drop the ball on this one; He took it to the basket." That's funny you say that, because I swear I don't remember reading anywhere in the Bible that God played basketball.
Christine Kraly
class of 2001
Washington, D.C.
Sept. 28
All Viewpoint Stories for Monday, September 30, 2002
