Because Jesus Said Plenty About Marriage, and Other Inconvenient Stuff Too…UPDATED

Hey y’all. Didn’t you know that Jesus didn’t say nothin about homosexuality in the Bible? True story. You ain’t gonna find Our Lord say that particular word nowheres in the Scriptures. It’s like he never heard of that situation. Heck, everbody knows that if Jesus didn’t say it, it don’t exist. Right?

Of course, Jesus said plenty about marriage, and I’m here to tell y’all, it’s damned inconvenient to the spirit of the age nowadays. ‘Cause there ain’t nothin worse than Jesus saying nothin about something than him saying somethin and then leavin out all the good stuff that we want to hear. Can I get an Amen? ‘Cause when Jesus talks about marriage, he only mentions that it’s between a man and a woman. From since always, if you can believe that he’d know such a thing from that far back.

Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator “made them male and female” and said, “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh”? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must separate.

Ssshhhhh, Lord…have mercy. He’s a fixin to talk about divorce too in that passage. Quick! Turn the page and go huntin for when he said the word “homosexual” again. Next thing ya know, he’ll be going off about Hell, eeeeeeeternal fires, and other tall tales he was usin to pull the legs of them there 1st century simpletons to get a rise out of ’em.

Whew. That’s was too close for comfort. Before you know it, he just might say something wacky like he didn’t come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it, or sumpin. Laws…who needs ’em when we can just think for ourselves?

All these fundalmentalist Bible beaters are always bringin up stuff from the past that harps on the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah and all. I mean, for reals? That was sooooo long ago, man. We’s all evolved since them times y’all. Everbody knows that, including our best, and brightest, leaders.

I mean look how effectively we treat others, and how we all live to take care of the poor and the downtrodden, etc. It’s almost second nature to us nowadays, ain’t it? After the Supremes had a long palaver, it’s all blue skies and sunshine from here to eternity.

As for Sodom and Gomorrah, did you know that some fellars actually think that Jesus was one of them angels that destroyed them there cities? I’m serious, y’all.

This guy named St. Justin Martyr, he was one of them Church Fathers, see, and why, he goes so far as to say that the Angel of the LORD was a pre-incarnate Jesus, or something like that.

Talkin like that kin get you kilt quicker than you can say “do you know Jesus, friend?,” which is probably why Justin got that nifty last name. Looky here at what Justin said in this here letter he wrote to a feller named Trypho,

But if you knew, Trypho, who He is that is called at one time the Angel of great counsel, and a Man by Ezekiel, and like the Son of man by Daniel, and a Child by Isaiah, and Christ and God to be worshipped by David, and Christ and a Stone by many, and Wisdom by Solomon, and Joseph and Judah and a Star by Moses, and the East by Zechariah, and the Suffering One and Jacob and Israel by Isaiah again, and a Rod, and Flower, and Corner-Stone, and Son of God, you would not have blasphemed Him who has now come, and been born, and suffered, and ascended to heaven; who shall also come again, and then your twelve tribes shall mourn. For if you had understood what has been written by the prophets, you would not have denied that He was God, Son of the only, unbegotten, unutterable God. For Moses says somewhere in Exodus the following: ‘The Lord spoke to Moses, and said to him, I am the Lord, and I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, being their God; and my name I revealed not to them, and I established my covenant with them.’ And thus again he says, ‘A man wrestled with Jacob,’ and asserts it was God; narrating that Jacob said, ‘I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.’ And it is recorded that he called the place where He wrestled with him, appeared to and blessed him, the Face of God (Peniel). And Moses says that God appeared also to Abraham near the oak in Mamre, when he was sitting at the door of his tent at mid-day. Then he goes on to say: ‘And he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, behold, three men stood before him; and when he saw them, he ran to meet them.’ Genesis 18:2 After a little, one of them promises a son to Abraham: ‘Wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying, Shall I of a surety bear a child, and I am old? Is anything impossible with God? At the time appointed I will return, according to the time of life, and Sarah shall have a son. And they went away from Abraham.’ Again he speaks of them thus: ‘And the men rose up from thence, and looked toward Sodom.’ Genesis 18:16 Then to Abraham He who was and is again speaks: ‘I will not hide from Abraham, my servant, what I intend to do.’ Genesis 18:17

Hey Justin, that sounds like you was on the Road to Emmaus or somethin, having the scriptures opened up, and explained to you, and all. And another thing…are you sayin what I think yer sayin about God, er, Jesus, er, the Angel of the LORD, meeting up with Abraham before Sodom was destroyed?

And now I shall again recite the words which I have spoken in proof of this point. When Scripture says, ‘The Lord rained fire from the Lord out of heaven,’ the prophetic word indicates that there were two in number: One upon the earth, who, it says, descended to behold the cry of Sodom; Another in heaven, who also is Lord of the Lord on earth, as He is Father and God; the cause of His power and of His being Lord and God. Again, when the Scripture records that God said in the beginning, ‘Behold, Adam has become like one of Us,’ Genesis 3:22 this phrase, ‘like one of Us,’ is also indicative of number; and the words do not admit of a figurative meaning, as the sophists endeavor to affix on them, who are able neither to tell nor to understand the truth. And it is written in the book of Wisdom: ‘If I should tell you daily events, I would be mindful to enumerate them from the beginning. The Lord created me the beginning of His ways for His works. From everlasting He established me in the beginning, before He formed the earth, and before He made the depths, and before the springs of waters came forth, before the mountains were settled; He begets me before all the hills.’

Whoa there, Justin. Sounds to me like you think that Jesus was some kind of forward observer calling in the fires on Sodom and Gomorrah for God’s artillery battery up in heaven. Iszat right?

Me, I prefer to think of the gentle Jesus instead. Aside from that one time where he came unglued in the temple, breaking out a whipcord (where’d he get that thang?) and throwing over tables and stuff like an Ugly American trying to get some good service in Italy, everbody knows that Jesus was gentle, kind, and loving. And he loved everbody, and that meant never telling folks the truth of the error of their ways, right? He was always talkin sweet talk, all the time.

Show of hands from the parents in the readership here who love their children, but never correct them, for fear of hurting their feelings with the truth when they lie, cheat or steal. Uh-huh. I thought so. Loving parents never do anything like correct errors of their children. And looky, everthing is fine and dandy, as it’s always been.

If we ain’t careful, folks are going to ask themselves to think that Jesus is God, or somethin eerily Trinitarian like that. I don’t know about you, but thoughts like that will mess up my worldview, brother. I suppose you’ll say next that the Holy Spirit is God too, and he’s the one that inspired St. Paul to write all those inconvenient things that seem to frown upon same-sex relations and such. St. Paul, you know, after the risen Jesus appeared to him on the road to Damascus, had a close relationship with the Lord, despite the fact that Jesus was up in heaven to boot.

You remember them stories about St. Paul and sin from Sunday school too, right? There’s that letter he wrote to the Romans, for instance, and the one to the Corinthians, and the one to his young lieutenant named Timothy. You know, the one where he mentions them pesky laws and the “S” word again and again.

And don’t get me started on that biblical letter by that feller named Jude.  Instead, I’m glad I’ve got Stephen Colbert, Nancy Pelosi, and the President of these here United States to inform me on all the really solid Catholic teaching in regards to these matters. Not to mention Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, and Madonna. That way, see, I don’t have to think, which is the best way to be religious anyway. It’s self-evident, and all.

Lord knows I don’t wanna have to rely on the teachings of the Church, or her priests and bishops, on top of all them pesky scripture passages above. And who’s got time for Canon lawyers, and their highfalutin idears? I thought Christians was agin violence! Why we gotta bring guns to the table, I’ll never unnerstand.

And don’t git me started on ole Pope Francis! What’s he know that the President of these United States doesn’t?

Besides,  life is too short for all that rigamarole, know what I mean? Readin books and going to Church is just about a complete waste of time. Can I get another Amen? Okey dokey.

Look here, that’s about all I’ve got to say on this matter. I’ve gotta go supervise my son as he cuts the yard now. If he misses a bunch of spots, and forgets to edge around the trees, and the sidewalk, and the driveway, and such like, I won’t pay it no never mind. That wouldn’t be very loving of me to correct his mistakes, you know. Lord knows I love my children so much that I never, ever, do anything to call attention to their errors. Know what I mean? And since I like the idea of God in my image, I’m pretty sure the Big Guy upstairs agrees with me on this here idear too.

Have a good weekend and don’t do anything that our fearless political leaders and celebrities wouldn’t do too. Peace and love y’all.

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Mark Shea: The Prophet GKC on the Culture of Polymorphous Perversity.

Joan Desmond: If Marriage Is the Sanctuary of Life, What Happens When That Sanctuary Is Redefined?

Steven D. Greydanus: Redefining Marriage, Part 1: Who’s to Blame? (A Ten Part Series).

Monsignor Charles Pope: Jesus Rejected Unlawful and Unchaste Marriages in His Own Day – Here’s Why and Where.

Melinda Selmys: So I Guess My Marriage Is Over Now.

Fr. Jay Scott Newman: The Evangelical Possibilities Presented by the Victory of the Sexual Revolution.

*Image Credit: “Jesus Christ and the rich young man,” Heinrich Hoffman.