I recently was a part of a rather lengthy blog comment discussion about same-sex marriage on the site of a liberal Christian. I noted that Genesis 2:24 was pretty clear what marriage was defined as, and that when the Bible mentioned marriage, it was always heterosexual. (Another commenter picked up on the idea that, even when polygamy is mentioned, it is one-man-many-women.; each of the women were married to the man, not to each other.) Every mention in history, in a parable, or even just talking about a particular married couple, it was heterosexual. There’s even a whole book (Song of Solomon) devoted to heterosexual marriage and the sexuality within it. But nothing–no press at all–on same-sex marriage.

And the mentions of homosexuality in general? Again, 100% negative. You can argue the contexts, I suppose, but every time homosexuality is mentioned, whatever the context, it is sin. I’m willing to listen to arguments as to where homosexuality is mentioned positively, or even neutrally, but I don’t recall ever hearing it.

I find this significant. The Bible talks about marriage quite a bit, and yet nothing at all about same-sex marriage. Now, the arguments against me included the idea that, while Genesis 2:24 says what marriage is, it doesn’t say what marriage isn’t. I found this laughable, and surprisingly legalistic for someone who, I’m pretty sure, did not appreciate legalists. In this particular case, it sounded like this person required that the commandment must include fine print and enough provisos worth of a car commercial. “This command should not be construed to permit situations such as, but not limited to, marriages of minors (under the age of 18), animals, toasters (including other mechanical and/or electrical objects), and/or siblings. Tax, tag, title and dealer prep extra.”

Another objection was that the Bible didn’t mention nuclear power, either, but we don’t take it as a handbook on that. Indeed,the Bible says nothing about all things nuclear, nor energy sources in general. But it does talk about marriage, a lot, and when it does, it’s all about the man and the woman.

I was also told that there were so very few verses at al that even talked about homosexuality that it wasn’t enough to really draw any concrete conclusions. This from guys who were literally ridiculing my point about 100% of the Bible talking exclusively about heterosexual marriage. Amounts only matter, it seems, in certain cases.

Anyway, that’s what the Bible has to say. Over the millennia, a lot of smart guys have looked at the issue and have come to the same conclusion.

Church history is crystal clear: Homosexual practice has been affirmed nowhere, never, by no one in the history of Christianity. . . .

Christianity is a tradition; it is a faith with a particular ethos, set of beliefs and practices handed on from generation to generation. The Christian tradition may be understood as the history of what God’s people have believed and how they have lived based upon the Word of God. This tradition is not only a collection of accepted doctrines but also a set of lifestyle expectations for a follower of Christ. One of the primary things handed down in the Christian church over the centuries is a consistent set of lifestyle ethics including specific directives about sexual behavior. The church of every generation from the time of the apostles has condemned sexual sin as unbecoming a disciple of Christ. At no point have any orthodox Christian teachers ever suggested that one’s sexual practices may deviate from biblical standards.

Concerning homosexuality there has been absolute unanimity in church history; sexual intimacy between persons of the same gender has never been recognized as legitimate behavior for a Christian. One finds no examples of orthodox teachers who suggested that homosexual activity could be acceptable in God’s sight under any circumstances. Revisionist biblical interpretations that purport to support homosexual practice are typically rooted in novel hermeneutical principles applied to Scripture, which produce bizarre interpretations of the Bible held nowhere, never, by no one.

This applies to a host of other churches and traditions, not just the orthodox ones. Ignore all of that collected wisdom at your peril. Indeed, sometimes there does need to be an overturning of established understanding (see: Martin Luther), but there had better be an extremely good Biblical foundation and argument accompanying it. The reasons I’ve seen so far trying to establish a Christian imperative for same-sex marriage could just as easily be applied to many other actions that the church considers sinful. Jesus loved the woman caught in adultery, and did not condemn here there, but told her to “go and sin no more”. He called it what it was and didn’t affirm her behavior just because it was forgiven.

We should do the same. The  Christian Left will complain, but while they can come up with their own arguments, they have little (if anything) to stand on, biblically speaking. When the Bible speak of homosexuality, it is always negative, and when the Bible speaks of marriage is it always heterosexual. This is significant.

When the minimum wage goes up, low-wage jobs are lost. This isn’t a prediction, it’s an observation. The Wall St. Journal notes it’s happening again, at the worst time for it, and mostly for minorities.

Syria pulled out of the running for a seat on the UN Human Rights Council. The problem is that they pulled out rather than being pushed. Given the number of human rights violators on that council, they could have easily been approved.

"I am a scientist who was on the carbon gravy train, understands the evidence, was once an alarmist, but am now a skeptic." Read why here.

The headline says it all: "WikiLeaks Threatens Its Own Leakers With $20 Million Penalty If They Leak Elsewhere". Transparency for thee but not for me.

Green energy losing green: A solar farm in Texas is losing money because the property taxes are so high.

High-speed rail losing speed: "California’s much-vaunted high-speed rail project is, to put it bluntly, a train wreck." Of course, the solution, according to the LA Times, is do it over, throwing good money after bad ($43 billion of bad money).

What a shock! "Autotrader survey shows most motorists go green to ‘save money, not the environment’." Make green energy affordable, and the world will beat a path to your door.

A big reason health care costs are rising so fast is because of central planning (aka Medicare, Medicaid). The Democrats solution? More central planning.

Civility Watch: Wisconsin Attorney General releases 100 pages of threats against lawmakers during the budget battle.

The White House shut out a reporter from the Boston Herald because of a critical editorial that the Herald put on their front page. The issue with Obama is not Fox News; it’s anyone who disagrees with him. But if you didn’t know about this, it’s not your fault. The rest of the media, who you’d think would be all over this treatment of colleagues, were virtually silent on the matter.

The anti-war crowd has seemingly melted away into the woodwork with the election of President Obama. I mean, if George W. Bush had violated federal law by invading a country without, within 60 days, getting congressional approval, how loud would the outcry have been, from the Left and the Media? Instead, a collective yawn.

(Sorry, no cartoon this week.)

There is an agenda, and it does involve indoctrination, at least according to one writer.

As the same-sex “marriage” battle heats up again in New York, one writer at a prominent gay news source is questioning why his lobby refuses to admit that the gay agenda involves “indoctrinating” schoolchildren to accept homosexuality.

Queerty contributor Daniel Villarreal criticized the homosexual movement’s knee-jerk reaction against accusations of meddling in public schools. Villarreal pointed to a recent National Organization for Marriage (NOM) ad launched in New York that points out how homosexual indoctrination has been introduced in Massachusetts and California schools.

While gay activists usually deny that they want to indoctrinate children, said Villarreal, “let’s face it—that’s a lie.” “We want educators to teach future generations of children to accept queer sexuality. In fact, our very future depends on it,” he wrote.

Villarreal pointed to the tactics of a gay activist group FCKH8, which fought a recent Tennessee bill prohibiting classroom discussion of homosexuality in grade school by “hir[ing]some little girls to drop F-bombs” in their controversial online ad campaign, and handing out gay paraphernalia to schoolchildren. “Recruiting children? You bet we are,” he said.

I mean, what else would you call it? But this is a rare bit of honesty amongst the flood of those who seek to soft-pedal what they’re doing. Just be honest about it.

And then see how much the public approves of the indoctrination.

Socialism works as long as you have plenty of it. But when you run out of other people’s money to pay for it, look out.

Social Security will run a permanent yearly deficit when looking at the program’s tax revenues compared to what it must pay out in benefits, the program’s trustees said Friday in a report that found both the outlook for Social Security and Medicare, the two major federal social safety-net programs, have worsened over the last year.

Medicare’s hospital insurance trust fund is now slated to run out of money in 2024, or five years earlier than last year’s projection, while Social Security’s trust fund will be exhausted by 2036, a year earlier than the prior projection.

The trustees stressed that exhaustion of the trust funds doesn’t mean the programs will stop paying all benefits. Social Security could fund about three-fourths of benefits past 2036, and Medicare could pay 90 percent of benefits past 2024 under current trends.

And assuming no other financial surprises in the meantime. We could keep raising taxes in a down economy, but raising taxes has always been the way out of the problem of the day, but with no thought for the impact down the road. Well, here we are, down the road, with the same problem.

I remember watching quite a bit of the Labor Day telethon when I was a kid.

LAS VEGAS (AP) — After 45 years, Jerry Lewis is retiring as host of the Muscular Dystrophy Association’s Labor Day telethon.

The 85-year-old comedian and Las Vegas resident issued a statement Monday through the Tucson, Ariz.-based Muscular Dystrophy Association calling it time for a "new telethon era."

He says he’ll make his final appearance on the six-hour primetime telethon Sept. 4 by performing his song "You’ll Never Walk Alone."

Lewis says he’ll continue as the association’s national chairman, a role he’s held since the early 1950s.

The first one was in 1966, and Lewis has really hung in there, long after I even forgot that it was still an annual event. Good on you, Jerry Lewis.

Wait times to see a doctor are getting longer. Fewer new doctors are being added. New regulations make insurance payments slower. This is what ObamaCare will bring us.

No, it’s not a wacky prediction or wild guess. It’s exactly what’s happening in Massachusetts under RomneyCare, of which ObamaCare is a carbon copy. It’s not a prediction; it’s an observation.

In addition to the doctor shortage the US is going to have when us Baby-Boomers hit retirement, Obamacare is going to make the problem even worse, based on current trends, how socialized medicine "works" elsewhere, and the government’s own numbers.

In 2005, when the press was enamored with Cindy Sheehan, Chris Matthews suggested she run for Congress. Yeah, how about now? Cue the crickets chirping.

Seal Team Six was an evil, secret, assassination squad manipulated by Dick Cheney. At least, that’s what it was when a Republican was President. Today, under a Democrat, they’re heroes, and not associated with Obama or Biden in the slightest. What a difference a "D" makes.

And speaking of contrasts, we have Nancy Pelosi on bin Laden, then and now.

Michael Barone notes that, to get bin Laden, Obama relied on policies he decried.

You know that kids that had George W. Bush in their classroom on 9/11? This is a good TIME magazine article on what they were thinking at the time when Bush was given the news, and what their reaction is now.

Over half of the country pays no income tax. But "the rich" still don’t pay "their fair share", eh?

While the bin Laden story stole the front page, the Conservatives in Canada won historic victories. Later, the Liberal Democrats in England suffered their worst losses in 30 years.

The conventional wisdom on salt intake may not be right after all.

Civility Watch: "So when does Seal Unit 6, or whatever it’s called, drop in on George Bush?"

"Democrats blame Bush for high gas prices"? No, not now; back in 2006. And in 2008, Nancy Pelosi blamed the "oil men" in the White House. They’re much quieter now.

A reform to watch: Indiana lawmakers OK broadest voucher plan in US.

It’s so very sci-fi-sounding, but some physicists believe that something from emanating from the sun is now causing radioactive decay to occur faster.

Worst of all, if the decay rates of matter are being mutated then all matter on Earth is being affected including the matter that makes up life.

The mutation may go so far as to change the underlying reality of the quantum universe—and by extrapolation-the nature of life, the principles of physics, perhaps even the uniform flow of time.

In fact, some evidence of time dilation has been gleaned from close observation of the decay rate. If particles interacting with the matter are not the cause—and matter is being affected by a new force of nature-then time itself may be speeding up and there’s no way to stop it.

And finally, a history lesson from Tom McMahon. (Click for the blog entry.)

With all the talk about the bin Laden story yesterday, it would be understandable that Americans might have missed this story. If you felt the ground lurch to the right yesterday, it’s because Conservatives in Canada were handed a huge victory.

OTTAWA (Reuters) – Canada’s Conservatives stormed to a decisive victory in Monday’s federal election, winning 54 percent of the seats in Parliament and securing a stable four-year term in power after vowing to focus on the economy.

The Conservatives grabbed 167 seats in Canada’s Parliament, well above the 155 they needed to transform their minority government into a majority, according to provisional results. They won about 40 percent of the vote, beating expectations.

The victory, a relief for Canadian financial markets, left support for the separatist Bloc Quebecois in tatters and the party’s leader without a seat. Bloc Quebecois advocates independence for the province of Quebec.

The Liberals, who have ruled Canada for more years than any other party, were reduced to a dismal third place showing with their worst ever seat haul.

The global financial crisis has apparently made Canadians very tired of liberal solutions. The financial markets echoed this new-found optimism.

The market’s nightmare scenario of an unstable minority government headed by the pro-labor New Democratic Party never came to pass. Harper now has free rein to keep corporate taxes low in the nation of more than 34 million people and bring in a string of tax breaks once he balances the budget, projected within four years.

"It’s going to reinforce quite a bit of stability and confidence, and Canada is going to continue to be very attractive for foreign investors," said Youssef Zohny, portfolio manager at Van Arbor Asset Management in Vancouver.

"With a Conservative majority, you’re essentially assured a fairly business-friendly platform, low taxes, continued investment in energy and potential future energy projects. In terms of investment it’s definitely got a bullish bias."

Pro-business is pro-worker, because pro-business is pro-jobs. The liberal "solutions" have only made the problems worse by taxing the job-creators or pushing them out to look for greener pastures. Canadians have had enough of this, and it’s very possible they will beat the US out of the recession.

If they do, will Americans learn that lesson?

From "Stand for Israel", the blog of the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (where our contributor Jim now works):

Palestinians rioted in East Jerusalem Monday after hearing news of Osama bin Laden’s death. The rioters threw stones at police and attempted to block roads in the Silwan neighborhood, right outside the Old City of Jerusalem.

Hamas, which has recently announced that it is finalizing a reconciliation agreement with the Palestinian Authority, denounced the assassination of bin Laden, hailing him as an ”Arab holy warrior.” Hams leader Ismail Haniyeh condemned the U.S. for killing bin Laden and claimed that this is an example of “American policy based on the oppression and bloodshed in the Muslim and Arab world.”

So then, what do you think are the prospect for peace with a group that simultaneously hails the late bin Laden as a holy warrior, will not recognize Israel’s right to exist, and has been welcomed into a pact with Fatah? Hmm?

Some thoughts on the death of Osama bin Laden.

OBL’s death was a targeted killing. Cheers are going up all over the world for the targeted killing of a terrorist. Now can we stop condemning Israel for doing the same thing?

Hamas condemned the killing of bin Laden, whom they called a "holy warrior". This is the same Hamas that has just  signed a reconciliation agreement with the Palestinian Authority and that was hailed by Jimmy Carter. Great timing, Fatah. Do we really think honest negotiation will come out of this?

This all happened within a stones throw (well, a really good throw) of Pakistan’s military academy. Lots of questions should be asked about this.

OBL has been at that location since 2005. Thanks to George W. Bush for finding that out, and thanks to Barack Obama for making the gutsy call to go in with Navy Seals and confirming the kill rather than bombing the place and not being sure. This is not the end of the war on terror, but it is a huge psychological blow.

Question: What government program costs us 7 times what NASA does?
Answer: The department of Improper Payments.

Question: In a study looking at data from over 50 years, towards which political party does the NY Times lean? 
Answer: Well, do you really have to ask? And it’s more about what stories are covered than about bias within stories.

Question: Why do movements like pro-democracy or the Tea Party seem to balloon overnight?
Answer: The "Preference Cascade".

Question: What are 5 truths about Planned Parenthood that you’re not likely to hear in the media?
Answer: Read them here.

Question: How could you defend the use of sola Scriptura, "Scripture alone", to someone who objects on the basis that humans are fallible, so you just can’t be sure what is Scripture?
Answer: C. Michael Patton has a good response.

Question: Has Paul Krugman ever flip-flopped on an issue for politics’ sake? Not a little quibble, but on really substantial stuff?
Answer: Oh yeah, he has.

Question: Has Nancy Pelosi ever flip-flopped on an issue for politics’ sake?
Answer: Well, she blamed high gas prices on "two oil men in the White House" before. Wonder who she’s blaming now.

Question: Is Syria, a country that is killing its own citizens for protesting the government, really being considered for a seat on the UN Human Rights Council?
Answer: Oh yeah, it is. And the UN is divided on whether it should even investigate their recent human rights abuses.

Question: Was Stanley Ann Dunham punished with a baby.
Answer: No, the baby (Barack Obama) was not a punishment, even though Barack’s campaign rhetoric would tend to suggest otherwise.

Question: Has Hamas moderated, since it had to take on political leadership and run the Palestinians?
Answer: Oh no, it hasn’t.

Question: Did Fox News push the whole "birther" issue the most?
Answer: Oh no, they didn’t.

Question: Does Europe want us Yanks, with our neo-con aggression, out of their backyard?
Answer: According to this Norwegian liberal, oh no, they don’t.

Question: Shouldn’t the federal government be a limited one?
Answer: Click for a larger image.

From CBN News:

Rev. David Wilkerson, founding pastor of the Times Square Church in New York City, was killed Wednesday in a car crash in Texas, according to a source close to CBN News.  He was 79.

Wilkerson’s wife Gwen was also involved in the crash and rushed to the hospital.  Details of the crash are still developing. Stay with CBNNews.com for an update.

Wilkerson posted a blog dated April 27 — the day of his death. In the post, titled "When All Means Fail," he encouraged those facing difficulty to "hold fast" and stand strong in faith.

"To those going through the valley and shadow of death, hear this word: Weeping will last through some dark, awful nights, and in that darkness you will soon hear the Father whisper, "I am with you,’" Wilkerson wrote. "Beloved, God has never failed to act but in goodness and love. When all means fail-his love prevails. Hold fast to your faith. Stand fast in his Word. There is no other hope in this world."

Read all of Wilkerson’s final blog here.

I recall reading the comic book adaptation of the book "The Cross and the Switchblade" at a Salvation Army summer camp where my parents worked. The comic came out in 1972. If you look at the front page of the comic book, between Nicky Cruz’s feet you’ll see the name of the illustrator; Al Hartley. He also drew some other Christian comics using the Archie gang, all under the Spire Christian Comics label.

Seventeen or so years later, and since then, I’ve been hearing sermons preached by Al’s son, Fred Hartley. Talk about a small world.

Proving that he indeed was born in Hawaii, President Barack Obama finally released his long-form birth certificate today, taking one huge bit of ammunition away from the so-called “birthers”, sabotaging Donald Trump’s main campaign issue, killing sales of a forthcoming book on the subject even before its release, and probably doing absolutely nothing to keep someone somewhere from continuing to drum up controversy over this. I imagine now we’ll need a photograph of President Obama’s parents standing in front of Kapiolani hospital with a copy of the August 4, 1961 edition of the Honolulu Star Advertiser in one hand and a complete genome in the other. Personally, I’m still waiting for authentication from Dan Rather.

However, we also now know what he’s been spending all that money on lawyers trying to hide. Under “Favorite Band”, he listed “Backstreet Boys”. So now that this thorny issue is behind him, he can concentrate on not doing anything about Syria.

Social benefits, long thought untouchable there, are now getting a second look. The combination of huge taxes with a financial crisis, makes that sort of spending unsustainable.

PARIS — From blanket health insurance to long vacations and early retirement, the cozy social benefits that have been a way of life in Western Europe since World War II increasingly appear to be luxuries the continent can no longer afford.

Particularly since the global economic crisis erupted in 2008, benefits have begun to stagnate or shrink in the face of exploding government deficits. In effect, the continent has reversed a half-century history of continual improvements that made Western Europe the envy of many and attracted millions of immigrants from less fortunate societies.

The envy of many only because it was made to look better than it was by borrowing from the next generation. Well, the next generation’s here, and it’s time to finally pay the bills.

In the new reality, workers have been forced to accept salary freezes, decreased hours, postponed retirements and health-care reductions. Employees at Fiat’s historic Mirafiori plant in Turin, rolling back a tradition of union privileges, even pledged to cut back on the number of workers who call in sick when the local soccer team has a match.

Unions have been a party to this deal with the devil, no doubt under the guise of "worker’s rights", including the right to watch soccer on company time.

Unlike in the United States, where conservatives are so resolved to cut spending that they threatened a government shutdown, Western Europe’s generous welfare programs had generally been embraced by the right as well as the left. Against that background, the new wave of cutbacks seems to signal a dramatic shift in attitude toward benefits that many Europeans had come to see as a birthright and that politicians of any stripe could challenge only at the risk of their careers.

Apparently, "conservatives" over there found, too, how easy it was to buy votes with promises of wealth redistribution. The politician who robs Peter to pay Paul can count on Paul’s vote.

The social welfare system no longer plays its role, said Claude Bernard, a union organizer at Renault’s struggling car factory in Sandouville, a suburb of Le Havre in western France. The very system of redistributing wealth through taxes and welfare programs has been called into question.

In a measure of the shift, Manuel Valls, a presidential hopeful in France’s Socialist Party, challenged party doctrine recently by declaring that it should not make an issue of preserving the 35-hour workweek if French factories have to compete with Chinese factories where the workweek starts at 60 hours and goes up from there. In Denmark, Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen rattled many in that icon of Scandinavian cradle-to-grave welfare by suggesting Danes should work longer before retiring, to peel back the deficit by $2.8 billion.

Britain’s Conservative-led government decided in the fall to attack deficits by cutting more than $130 billion over the next five years, hitting welfare benefits hard and setting off protests by raising university fees.

But deficit pressures have forced leftist governments to seek savings as well. Some of the most painful cuts — pensions reduced, wages stalled and retirements pushed back — have been imposed by two Socialist prime ministers, George Papandreou in Greece and Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero in Spain.

If even socialists are calling their founding principles into question, why, then, are we trying to run off the same cliff, and at one of the worst possible financial moments in our history? Let’s learn from their mistakes instead of repeating their failed history.

For perspective, as budget issues continue to take center stage in Washington, and welfare programs are considered sacrosanct by Democrats, here is information from a US Census Bureau report in 1990:

* 38 percent of the persons whom the Census Bureau identifies as "poor" own their own homes with a median value of $39,200.

* 62 percent of "poor" households own a car; 14 percent own two or more cars.

* Nearly half of all "poor" households have air-conditioning; 31 percent have microwave ovens.

* Nationwide, some 22,000 "poor" households have heated swimming pools or Jacuzzis.

"Poor" Americans today are better housed, better fed, and own more property than did the average U.S. citizen throughout much of the 20th Century. In 1988, the per capita expenditures of the lowest income fifth of the U.S. population exceeded the per capita expenditures of the median American household in 1955, after adjusting for inflation.

Emphasis mine.  Now, 14% isn’t a whole lot, and 22,000 even less so, but when Democrats talk about not paying for tax cuts or programs "on the backs of the poor", just realize what "poor" means in the US. I’m sorry, but if you have a swimming pool or Jacuzzi, you aren’t poor, and money can be saved on these programs. This was 20 years ago, and spending has only risen.

As an aside, I’ll bet that people getting assistance from, say, The Salvation Army, don’t get hot tubs from them.