In the game analogy I gave ("people want to play by the rules, so that they can actually win"), there is not enough room for people, since everyone is reduced to a "winner" or a "loser." But it's not about that. It's about living, within boundries, to experience life in a better form than it is naturally inclined to occur.
As I said to Cody, since natural law is immutable, order is a requirement for existence. This calls for a code of ethics in people, because it gives them framework for their reality and existence. Everyone has a code of ethics, although sometimes it is reduced to a subjective code which makes anything they do good in their eyes.
But we're getting hung up on rules.
Christianity can be summed up in the first call Jesus gave: "Follow me." (John 1:43). This is again affirmed: "I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father except through me." (John 14:6). Later, Jesus explains that to follow him is to: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself." (Luke 10:27).
All of the rules that flow from that are supposed to be extensions of these commandments. Don't bring up the rules about the Jewish law peculiarities, because 1) they made sense for the time, and 2) we're not Jewish [unless anyone out there is a Jew, then this statement is invalid, but as far as Kaleigh and I are concerned, we're not Jews.]
To address the abstinence issue, look at it this way. Have you ever fasted? Or gone without something, or put it off until you were a certain age? I know that I've gone without TV for over a month. The purpose was to strengthen my well. TV is not the best example, because when I saw TV afterwards, I thought it to be pretty pointless. But I have fasted, and afterwards, I appreciated food much more. I've also starved (when I was 13-14, because we were real short on $), and that is rather unpleasant. So abstinence is a concept that puts high emphasis on sex as the ultimate expression of love, short of dying for another, and reserves it to the marriage bed for the purposes of safety (since divorce is a long and messy process, and getting married is another grueling process that usually makes people ready to handle sex in a mature fashion), and for the purpose of maintining the idealist value of the intimacy of this act.
actually, it emphasized some of my concerns. Agreed that sex should wait until love, but not until marriage. Abstinence seems to rush people into marriage, often causing them to be unhappy for much of their lives because they were too fast to marry someone and never allowed themselves to become fully matured. And I suppose the bigger problem I have with abstinent people arguing their values, is that they've never had sex. You don't understand- that is truly understand it- until you've done it. I guess my other problem is that when you speak of love you speak like it's one person- but from what I've heard/experienced you can love more than one person in a lifetime...so why not share the expression of love when it is felt?
I love many people, but that doesn't mean I'm going to have sex with them. Romantically love? Yes, it is possible to love more than one person in a lifetime, but the thing is the emotional vulnerability and the openness to be left broken. I know that I would be totally enraptured with whoever I had sex with first, and if she left me, I would be totally crushed.
In the game analogy I gave ("people want to play by the rules, so that they can actually win"), there is not enough room for people, since everyone is reduced to a "winner" or a "loser." But it's not about that. It's about living, within boundries, to experience life in a better form than it is naturally inclined to occur.
As I said to Cody, since natural law is immutable, order is a requirement for existence. This calls for a code of ethics in people, because it gives them framework for their reality and existence. Everyone has a code of ethics, although sometimes it is reduced to a subjective code which makes anything they do good in their eyes.
But we're getting hung up on rules.
Christianity can be summed up in the first call Jesus gave: "Follow me." (John 1:43). This is again affirmed: "I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father except through me." (John 14:6). Later, Jesus explains that to follow him is to: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself." (Luke 10:27).
All of the rules that flow from that are supposed to be extensions of these commandments. Don't bring up the rules about the Jewish law peculiarities, because 1) they made sense for the time, and 2) we're not Jewish [unless anyone out there is a Jew, then this statement is invalid, but as far as Kaleigh and I are concerned, we're not Jews.]
To address the abstinence issue, look at it this way. Have you ever fasted? Or gone without something, or put it off until you were a certain age? I know that I've gone without TV for over a month. The purpose was to strengthen my well. TV is not the best example, because when I saw TV afterwards, I thought it to be pretty pointless. But I have fasted, and afterwards, I appreciated food much more. I've also starved (when I was 13-14, because we were real short on $), and that is rather unpleasant. So abstinence is a concept that puts high emphasis on sex as the ultimate expression of love, short of dying for another, and reserves it to the marriage bed for the purposes of safety (since divorce is a long and messy process, and getting married is another grueling process that usually makes people ready to handle sex in a mature fashion), and for the purpose of maintining the idealist value of the intimacy of this act.
I hope this addressed some of your concerns.
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Agreed that sex should wait until love, but not until marriage.
Abstinence seems to rush people into marriage, often causing them to be unhappy for much of their lives because they were too fast to marry someone and never allowed themselves to become fully matured.
And I suppose the bigger problem I have with abstinent people arguing their values, is that they've never had sex. You don't understand- that is truly understand it- until you've done it.
I guess my other problem is that when you speak of love you speak like it's one person- but from what I've heard/experienced you can love more than one person in a lifetime...so why not share the expression of love when it is felt?
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