rglullis

And the main reason that I had no objections to join the Orthodox Church (wife is Greek, she wanted a Church wedding and for that to happen I needed to convert to any Christian denomination) was because my priest said : "I am not going to baptize you just so you can marry in the Church, I want you to attend the Catechesis for at least the next six months. I want you to learn Orthodox doctrine, but the main reason I want you here is to understand our traditions and our values as Greeks. I don't particularly expect you to become a devout Christian, but I do expect you to find harmony with your community, your wife and your extended family".

He wasn't trying to convince me to accept and blindly repeat key doctrine points. He wasn't telling me what to do in a ritual "because that's what God wants us to do". He was telling me "these are what these rituals represent, and if you have some faith it will mean something for you".

I found his take surprisingly effective. Going to Catechesis was not a chore, but something captivating. I probably wouldn't have converted and just done the civil cerimony if the priest was just trying to brainwash me into repeating Dogma.

The divorced Christian is hypothetical, but you applied the judgemental logic to the LGBT one, which pretty much exists.

A very short description would be to look at the Bible not as prescriptive rulebook which we should be using to measure ourselves against, but as a descriptive collection of stories that can help us make sense of human nature and understand that all these "contradictions" are not meant to be solved, but manifestations of our fallibility.

E.g, I see the story of Babel and I don't think "that's why we have different languages in the world" or "if you try to reach God by other means than salvation, He will punish you" but simply "technological progress and science alone are not enough to bring us closer to some utopia (closer to God)". I think of Kosher diets not as "if you eat pork you are a bad person and deserve eternal damnation", but "at that time and historical contexts, pork meat was full of deadly pathogens, so it would be wise to avoid it".

This is just scratching the surface and it would take a bit more time than I have now, but I will try my best to answer you later.

Ah, so it’s the “no, actually I am a Christian, despite not following any of the rules. I just make up my own”.

Notice I did not say "I am a Christian", but "accepting of Christian values". If you can not understand this difference, I am not sure how much I can help.

All your rant after that is built out of a strawman, so there is no point in arguing further.

The US is almost a theocracy nowadays

This is the type of Motte and Bailey that people love to throw around, but is oh-so-tiring. Yes, you can argue that religious leaders are taking a lot of the power structures, but they are all still acting within the framework of a Democratic institution. There is no single Church or religious group who is in direct control of the political institutions and indirectly it is impossible to argue that any Church has more power or influence than the Corporations: tech companies, Hollywood, banks, the auto industry... All of them have way more lobbying power than Mormons, evangelicals, Catholics or SDAs.

Accepting Christian teachings/ Christian values is not the same as taking the Bible as irrevocable truth, much less as something that should be used as a law code.

Only fundamentalists would argue as such.

I guess you are too eager to preach and are missing the point of my inquiry.

I am not saying "there is no contradiction in Christianity", but "who are we to say that a gay person can not be accepting of Christian teachings?"

Something amusing: looking at the profiles of the people who are voting your comment up, it's mostly people who have a history of very progressive comments and posts. They are voting you up because they think you are arguing that being religious is incompatible with being LGBTQ.

So, in a perfect illustration of horseshoe theory, you are getting the support from people who think that Christianity is wrong,

You haven't even seen what the community is about and yet you are ready to pass judgement on it.

That does not answer the question.

Do you think a "divorced Christians" community would be a contradiction?

So, what is the contradiction here?

We are all sinners, aren't we?