Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Real Terror

And real terrorists.

A war of information and dis-information is raging. Kony the Beast's camps were raided. It is almost certain that they were empty, but what the hell. The soil was bombed. Quite unlike what is happening in Gaza at the moment. Shrug...!

Anyway, the beast, having not drawn blood for years (not sure of that, or at least, it hasnt made it into the news here,) has decided to go on a spree of massacres. Now it is not Ugandans. No, it is the long hurting Congo (DRC) people.

What we are hearing of the conflict is, well, slanted. But interesting. The government paper tells of the rebels who have been killed. The 'Independent' paper tells us of the massacres that are ongoing. Oh well....!

Massacre: Kony slaughters 45 in church


Grace Matsiko

Kampala


Suspected Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebels on Friday hacked to death 45 civilians in a church in the DR Congo, bringing the number killed in the central African country and South Sudan to 90 in four days, an aid agency and military officials have said. The army yesterday said it had followed the rebels and killed 13 members of the rebel unit behind the church massacre.


Most of the 45 civilians cut with pangas and clubs inside a catholic church, about 10km south east of Doruma in northeastern DRC, were women, children and the elderly, an aid agency official who did not want to be named for security reasons told Daily Monitor yesterday.


He said the civilians could not flee following suspected LRA rebel attacks on Christmas Day. Doruma is about 80km from the DRC border with the Central African Republic. “Bodies of women and children, with deep cuts are littered inside and outside the church,” the aid official said. “The residents have fled the place and are in Dungu where they expect protection from the DRC government.”


The spokesman for the allied forces, Capt. Chris Magezi, yesterday confirmed the massacre via satellite telephone link from DRC but added that the army yesterday directly engaged the rebels, killing 13 of them.





War without End


War is a very messy business. Very messy.


Yet it is a matter of fact that us humans seem to have this urge to fight and go to war. Sometimes we are very utterly convinced of the ‘moral right’ of our war. Fact is, both bin Laden and GWBush are equally convinced of the rightness of their particular wars. Me, like one of those pieces of grass caught on the ground beneath these massive elephants, I have no option but to react.


I am from a rough continent. There are few nuances about how terrible war and civil disruption can be in Africa. A people, and peoples will always stand up and fight, especially when they are given no option to do otherwise. Poverty has turned most of Africa into a waiting time bomb, war prone because of the utter need and the failure of our weak governments.


Israel and the Palestinians are caught up in their usual nightmare. A piece of modern stupidity beyond end, political emasculation beyond understanding. An endless chess game where the king is never checkmated, and the smaller pieces are always sacrificed for the ‘greater good’. Reason has taken a backseat, in the name of ‘patriotism’ and ‘national need’.


Its stupendous how clever mankind is. Able to clone ourselves, we still are busy sticking to a vaunted belief in the superiority of one sect over another. Clan, class, race, etc etc.


Kony the beast is doing his usual mayhem in DRC. Poor villagers who are caught between ignorance, stupidity and madness.


Yet despite these wars, rumours of war and mayhem, it is a fact that we can still find beauty in life. And enjoy it.


I am at home. Seated, thinking, resting.


A gurgle of kids from the neighborhood have been playing in our compound. Noisy chatterboxes.


Weaverbirds of the morning, though the fact that they do not seem to have a limit of the time they sing is a qualification to their chattering song.


School is out, and it is the December holidays. They are children. Happy in their childhood. More or less un-minding of the war and such issues which may concern parents. Their world of play is perfect.


Beautiful.


We all are like children. We can be perfectly happy in ignorance. And we can hunker down and cry about the problems of the world. Like my sexuality destroying the world. Or not destroying it.


We can, and do cause war and conflicts because of our bigheadedness, pride and ignorance- and of course the idea that, for some reason, we are much, much better than others. Yet we are still the stock from which the great artists, musicians, singers and lovers come.


We humans are a study in contrasts. No wonder we are so persistent in our belief of a deity or deities. We are able to hold out to the highest of ideals, a knowledge of good and evil. Yet, we can also, in the name of our ideals, do the most evil that we are capable of.


Sigh, we are all very human.


As 2008 winds down, I would like to wish you, fellow human, a wonderful time. Wherever you are, whoever you are, whatever you think. Yes, gay, straight, phobe or neutral, you are human. Have a lovely wind up of the old year, 2008. And my 2009 be good for you.


You are special. A human being.





GayUganda

Tuesday, December 30, 2008

The Nsaba-Buturo Statement Addendum

I had not seen this. Nsaba-Buturo's assesment of the year 2008 starts with the moral failures that have occured. First and foremost, the rise of homosexuality in Uganda.


Here is his article in the New Vision, the government paper.


Our morals reveal a big national problem

Monday, 29th December, 2008


By Nsaba Buturo


UGANDA deserves a social audit for the year 2008. For the first time in her history, the ugly side of human behaviour reared its ugly face on the conscience of Ugandans as never before. Attempts to dress this ugly face in popular catch phrases such as human rights and freedom were made by advocates of immorality with some degree of success.


Promoters of homosexuality, pornography and witchcraft, etc. were on the offensive seeking to market their philosophies contrary to tenets of Ugandas laws as well as nature. The venom of embezzlement, poor time management and drug abuse, too, had their toll on public service.


In the case of homosexuality, some nations went into an overdrive. They drafted a resolution for presentation to the United Nations which would compel other nations to legalise, in effect, anal sex, in the case of men, as an alternative to heterosexual sex. This is an unprecedented classic case of abuse by these nations which are seeking to use their weight and advantage to impose their tastes and preferences upon the rest of the world. One wonders what divine right they have to do that!



So, what should the government do about all these? Of course the big man has some solutions to the homosexual problem.--
--

Ugandas moral capital is so low that our efforts to graduate to the club of more developed nations will remain a challenge. Governments programs such as Prosperity For All will continue to be threatened by insufficiency of moral capital in the population and more crucially the public service.


The Government will renew its efforts against law breakers. It recognizes that enforcement of laws on witchcraft, embezzlement or theft of public funds, drug abuse, homosexuality and pornography has been weak.


To address the issue of inadequate laws, new legislation will be required. Regarding witchcraft, discussions are underway in Government to distinguish between witchdoctors and genuine herbalists.


The Government is appealing to the public to report all criminal individuals cum witchdoctors in their communities. In 2009, Government will seek to collaborate more with religious leaders and more emphasis on moral education will be made.


The move to universalise immorality in the name of human rights or freedom will not convince Ugandans to abandon what is right in preference of what is wrong.


Uganda will neither legalise nor recognise homosexuality as a human rights issue. Government has completed a nation-wide exercise on Ugandas values.

----


Stronger laws, stronger laws, stronger laws. A law, specifically for homosexuals that makes it a crime to admit one is gay.

Hmmmmm! He has been harping on that subject for a long time.


So much done, 2008.


So much more to be done.


gug


The Nsaba-Buturo Statement

Radio Sapientia is a Catholic owned fm station.


Maybe that is why they did have the Nsaba-Buturo statement in full! I have put it here just for you to understand the 'tone' of the statement... Sometimes too much is lost in translation, and in the reporting!


2008 year of high immorality—Minister Buturo

Written by Joyce Mirembe

Tuesday, 23 December 2008


The Government says 2008 has seen an increase in immorality than the previous years.


The minister of ethics and integrity Dr James Nsaba Buturo says homosexuality is one of the vices, which has resurfaced more this year, castigating its activists who appear to promote the evil under the guise of upholding human rights.


Dr Buturo says the laws against the practice are weak, and that the Government is due to amend them to establish tougher penalties for the perpetrators.


The minister’s remarks come at a time when different countries around the world are increasingly lobbying the United Nations to decriminalise the practice.


Dr Buturo notes that Uganda and other countries that do not support homosexuality are to cooperate and form a formidable ground against others who are promoting it.


He castigates the entertainment industry for promoting the vice.


Witchcraft, pornography, corruption and poor time management, according to Dr Buturo hamper the country’s national development programmes, thus promoting poverty.


Monday, December 29, 2008

Kuchu Bar


Uh, this is suspicious. The days of Christmas have not had the blazing sunlight customary here. Dry and summery days, that is what my mind associates with Christmas. But not this time.


An overcast has been around over the last three or so days. There was a drizzle yesterday. Not enough to say that it rained, and lasting just a few minutes. Not enough to make us forget that we are in the dry season.


Beautiful Uganda.


Last night we were in our bar, the ‘kuchu’ bar. Remember that this is Uganda. It is not officially a gay bar. It is a kuchu bar just because we decide to go there and feel comfortable when we are there.


It was lovely, soothing. Just being with people who know we are gay, and have no problem with it. Because they are also gay.


There is a sense of belonging which beats many of the other places that we find ourselves visiting. In all the other places, our anonymity is the best protection that we have. We do not flaunt ourselves, our identity. A few may suspect what we are, but, not having ‘proof’, we are left to our devices.


Last Monday was when the Victor case judgment was read. A win for the kuchu community. And it was a sweet one. There was a sense of euphoria. Precedent set, we had actually affirmed our rights as Ugandans. Challenged the state on its treatment of us as under class citizens, and actually WON! It was fantastic.


But, it was inevitable that there would be backlash.


We had exposed ourselves. Some people (including Nsaba Buturo) claim that there were no homosexuals in Uganda, that it is a recent phenomenon. No friend, I am quoting what I heard him say on Tuesday at a press conference. In the last couple of years, we have dealt that myth a death blow.


In the court on Monday, there were cameras. Journalists just took hundreds of photos. When the judgment was read, the joy of the kuchus could not be contained. There was ululation, jumping around, hugging and shouting. In the heat of the moment, people ‘knew’ who was kuchu and who was not. The fact that homosexuals had won a case was on the news bulletins on at least 3 of the television stations. Including the government owned ‘big network’. Surprisingly, it did not get into the print media. (Something to do with the regulatory body desperate to deny us any sort of access? I know, I am paranoid.)


The next day, Tuesday, Nsaba-Buturo came out with his dooms-day prophesy. A press conference. 2008 was a bad year for Ugandans. Homosexuals came out. And they won a case in the courts!

Imagine!!!! Unfortunately, the law is weak. It allows homosexuals to come out in Uganda and do such things. But anyway, the government would not appeal the judgment.


For the second day running, we were on television stations. With Nsaba-Buturo, and flashbacks showing the shameless homosexuals. Lingering shots on our faces.


That was Tuesday last week.


That evening, some guys went out, to celebrate our victory. ‘Stake Out’. A popular joint in Wandegeya, one of the suburbs here.


The kuchus were identified. And very quickly, they were invited out of the place. They were making the other clients ‘uncomfortable’. Huh, the price of fame.


Another of our own, a trans, also had the experience of being informed that gay money seems to have less value. Was in a supermarket, and was informed that, well, he was making other customers uncomfortable. So, will you not do your shopping here please!


Pariahs we are. Especially when recognized. The fact that we look so much like the other Ugandans makes us ‘hide’ very effectively. Especially in public- in the bars, clubs, social places.


A few years ago, me and my partner were dancing. We were told to get out of the club. Reason, one of the bouncers had recognized us. That we are gay. Or suspected that we are.


The invitation out was not very polite. Some pushing and shoving, the bouncer using his mass to intimidate and loom over us, and well, with my partner livid, he was literally thrown out- shoved out of that bar.


It was my first time to experience overt discrimination, and it did hurt. We never went back to that bar.


That is why we love ‘our’ kuchu bar.


It is not perfect. Not very conveniently located, off the usual beat. The music is too loud, it is not cheap to enter. But we do belong.


We are not perfect. Some of us love to flaunt our identities. Cross dressing, cross acting. When we get high, we do forget the constant need to hide and disguise ourselves. And, there are those who are not kuchu in the place.


But, and it is a big but, we feel comfortable. I can hold my partner’s hand there. Unobtrusively, yes. But I can. I cannot do that in other bars, which can be a strain because, for some reason, I am a touchy-feely person. I am comfortable in the kuchu bar.


Kuchus dance, talk, meet and make connections there. And they love it. Because, in that bar, we feel that we belong. Not all of us can get to the place- it is not free. Not all of us can make it all the time. But we belong.


And that makes it a beautiful place for us.


This year has been long and eventful. Lovely. Hope you make it through, and continue enjoying the holiday season.



GayUganda

Sunday, December 28, 2008

Mystery of Competing Logic

Logic is a perspective, isnt it?


I like the article below, a wrap up of the defence to the Pope and his statement of bigotry. It is not bigotry… it is truth! So is the logic behind the defence…


Matter of fact it is interesting to try to understand why apparently logical individuals can get wrapped up in bigotry and their own prejudices. Some just do not see the log in their eye. Others see it, but for some reason develop some very interesting blinding defences. Many are not concerned, don’t take the time to grace their prejudices with any apparent logic, except ‘the church says’ or ‘our culture’ etc, etc.


Makes an interesting study of the logic and psychology of our humanness. Dump in the cultural differences from my continent, and the brew that we call human logic can be a cauldron of bewildering illogic!



gug


Religious Conservatives Defend Pope’s Anti-Gay Message

by Kilian Melloy

EDGE Contributor

Wednesday Dec 24, 2008


Pope Benedict XVI: gay and lesbian families a lethal threat to all humankind (Source:Associated Press)

Catholic publications have rushed to the defense of Pope Benedict XVI’s comments that the human race is as imperiled by gay and lesbian families as by the wanton destruction of the rain forests.


Saying that the "order of creation" must be respected, the pope claimed for the Catholic church a privileged place of instruction and authority over humanity, declaring that the church "must defend not only the earth, the water and the air as gifts of creation belonging to everyone, but it must also protect mankind against the destruction of itself. The tropical forests deserve our protection, but man as a creature deserves it no less."


The pope also denounced families that do not consist of a man, a woman, and children, saying that recognition of family structures other than that constitute an "author-destruction of mankind."


The pope made his remarks as part of his annual Christmas Message, which he delivered on Dec. 22.


Catholic Online in a Dec. 24 article, instantly grouped homosexuality with "promiscuity, pornography, [and] adultery" and declared that all those things are "hurting [gays] physically, psychologically, but most importantly--hurting them spiritually."


Catholic Online slammed Pink News for posting the headline, "Pope Benedict learnt nothing from his time in the Hitler Youth," and denounced headlines in the San Francisco Chronicle ("Pope Benedict at Christmas: Preaching bigotry disguised as compassion") and the Times of London ("Christmas was never meant to be about this").


The article defended Pope Benedict on the grounds that he had not used the world "homosexual," though he had made his meaning explicitly clear by talking about a divine plan for families to consist of one man, one woman, and children.


Read the Catholic Online article, "In this respect, he spoke not only to the problem of homosexual acts but also other sexual aberrations such as sex outside of marriage, adultery, pornography, and even contraceptive sex."


Added the Catholic Online item, "This is borne out by the fact, unreported by the mainstream media, that within the speech he urged the faithful to re-read the encyclical Humanae Vitae--known most for its prohibition of contraception."


Continued the article, "Trust me, the Pope is not going on about such matters to be popular, not because he has some vendetta against gays.


"He is preaching the truth out of love; love for God and his Truth, love for mankind as a whole, but specifically love for his fellow human beings who are hurting themselves with destructive sexual lifestyles."


Added the article, "The Pope has sounded the alarm on rejecting God’s plan for human sexuality and pointed to the dangers for those involved and society in general of fostering such behavior.


"He is now experiencing the backlash, but like any good parent, he will weather it in patience and love, knowing that one day, his aberrant children will come to their senses or at the very least that he has tried his best to get them to do so."


The article went on to appropriate a quote from Penn Jillette, the comedian who, along with partner Raymond Teller, has hosted a documentary series titled "Bullshit!" devoted to debunking myths and superstitions.


Noting that Jillette is an atheist, the article quoted him as saying, "If you believe that there’s a heaven and hell... how much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytize? How much do you have to hate somebody to believe that everlasting life is possible, and not tell them that?"


Meantime, at right-wing Christian site CNS, conservative author Ben Shapiro wrote a Dec. 24 op-ed piece titled, "Gay Community is Intolerant, Too," in which Shapiro did not deny that religious conservatives are intolerant of gays, but cast that intolerance in the form of a competition of ideas, declaring that, "There’s intolerance on both sides. But someone has to win.


"The people should decide who wins."


Shapiro mentioned both Pope Benedict’s Dec. 22 comments, and selected recent remarks of mega-church pastor Rick Warren, who has been in the news lately due to having been selected by President-Elect Barack Obama to deliver the invocation at next month’s inaugural ceremonies.

Shapiro quoted Warren as saying, "I’m opposed to the redefinition of a 5,000-year definition of marriage.


"I’m opposed to having a brother and sister be together and call that marriage.


"I’m opposed to an older guy marrying a child and calling that a marriage.


"I’m opposed to one guy having multiple wives and calling that marriage."


Those comments, as well as Warren’s having worked for the passage of California’s Proposition 8, the ballot initiative that revoked the right of gay and lesbian families to marry in that state, have contributed to the GLBT community’s denunciation of the Obama pick.


Saying that Benedict and Warren were merely "articulating the same traditional Judeo-Christian perspective that has been a moral standard for thousands of years," Shapiro queried, "So why the hubbub?


"Warren is not stating that he wants to criminalize homosexuality. And the pope is merely suggesting that sexuality may be flexible, and that sexual behavior can be changed. Where’s the big threat to the gay community?"


Added Shapiro, "The gay community constantly asks: If we want to marry, how does it hurt you?


"Here’s a similar question: If religious people don’t approve of homosexual behavior, how does it hurt you?"

Shapiro went on to claim, "We’re not advocating violence against gays and lesbians--far from it."


Added the author, "We’re just saying we don’t approve of your behavior. It’s that simple."


Acknowledged Shapiro, "The fact is, of course, that a religious standard of marriage does hurt gay people."


Added the writer, "The gay community wishes to hijack marriage and use it as a shield to legitimize traditionally immoral behavior.


"By opposing gay marriage, traditionally moral folks prevent the gay community from having its way."


Claimed Shapiro, "But by the same exact standard, the gay community’s insistence that homosexuality be respected--their insistence that figures from Pope Benedict to Rick Warren treat homosexuality as a perfectly acceptable way of life--hurts religious people."


Explained Shapiro, "By opposing religious people’s freedom to articulate their view on homosexuality, they encroach on religious freedom."


Noted Shapiro, "Someone’s standard has to win. If the pope and Warren have their way, traditional morality will remain the standard and the gay community will feel left out.


"If the gay community has its way, traditional morality will be discarded and the religious community will feel left out."


Noting that whenever gay and lesbian equality has been put up to a popular vote, gays and lesbians have lost, Shapiro suggested that all such questions be put to the ballot, writing, "the systemic answer is simple: Let the people decide."


Added Shapiro, "The gay community has won its victories in the courtroom, calling on elitist judges to twist the words of state constitutions.


"It’s illegitimate, and it cuts against the most basic American value: the right of the people to decide how to regulate their communities."


Wrote Shapiro, "The gay community has every right to oppose the pope and Warren. And the pope and Warren have every right to blast the gay community.


"That’s freedom of religion and freedom of speech."

Saturday, December 27, 2008

Sad, Very Sad

Its late in the night.

For, errr, domestic reasons I am on my computer instead of wrapped round my lover's body. Yeah, I am missing bed. And his warmth...

But, well!

Came across this story on CNN. I appreciate the differences in our cultures, but sometimes I do feel that culture, like religion, is too often used to mask cruelty and unthinkingness on our part as human beings.

Read this below. If you are Saudi, and offended by this, my apologies. Yet, even when I do offer my apologies, and ackowledge the fact that ideals are not universal, there are some things which grate on my very soul. Read, and judge for yourself.

Saudi judge refuses to annul marriage of girl, 8

* Story Highlights

* Girl's father arranged her marriage to a 47-year-old to settle debts, lawyer says

* Lawyer: Girl's mother sought annulment, but judge ruled she isn't legal guardian

* Judge ruled girl may request divorce when she reaches puberty, lawyer says


(CNN) -- A Saudi judge recently refused to annul a marriage between an 8-year-old girl and a 47-year-old man -- a union apparently arranged by the girl's father to settle his debts -- a lawyer in the case told CNN.


On Saturday, the judge, Sheikh Habib Abdallah al-Habib, dismissed a petition brought by the girl's mother because she "is not the legal guardian of the girl," the woman's lawyer Abdullah al-Jutaili said.


"Therefore, she cannot represent her daughter in these proceedings," al-Jutaili said.


Her parents are separated, he said.


According to the lawyer, the girl's father arranged the marriage in order to settle his debts with the man, who is "a close friend" of his.


The judge did ask for a pledge from the husband, who was in court, not to consummate the marriage until the girl reaches puberty, according to al-Jutaili.


The judge ruled that when the girl reaches puberty, she will have the right to request a divorce by filing a petition with the court, the lawyer said.


Christoph Wilcke, a Saudi Arabia researcher for Human Rights Watch, said his organization has heard many other cases of child marriages.


"We've been hearing about these types of cases once every four or five months because the Saudi public is now able to express this kind of anger, especially so when girls are traded off to older men," Wilcke said.


Zuhair al-Harithi, a spokesman for the Human Rights Commission, a Saudi government-run human rights group, said his organization is fighting against child marriages.



"The Human Rights Commission opposes child marriages in Saudi Arabia," al-Harithi said. "Child marriages violate international agreements that have been signed by Saudi Arabia and should not be allowed."


The spokesman said he did not have specific details about this case but his organization has been able to stop at least one other child marriage.


Friday, December 26, 2008

Galileo Galilei

Vatican Rewrites History On Galileo


Galileo Galilei is going from heretic to hero.


The Vatican is recasting the most famous victim of its Inquisition as a man of faith, just in time for the 400th anniversary of Galileo's telescope and the U.N.-designated International Year of Astronomy next year.


Pope Benedict XVI paid tribute to the Italian astronomer and physicist Sunday, saying he and other scientists had helped the faithful better understand and "contemplate with gratitude the Lord's works."


In May, several Vatican officials will participate in an international conference to re-examine the Galileo affair, and top Vatican officials are now saying Galileo should be named the "patron" of the dialogue between faith and reason.


It's quite a reversal of fortune for Galileo Galilei (1564-1642), who made the first complete astronomical telescope and used it to gather evidence that the Earth revolved around the sun. Church teaching at the time placed Earth at the center of the universe.



The church denounced Galileo's theory as dangerous to the faith, but Galileo defied its warnings. Tried as a heretic in 1633 and forced to recant, he was sentenced to life imprisonment, later changed to house arrest.


The Church has for years been striving to shed its reputation for being hostile to science, in part by producing top-notch research out of its own telescope.


In 1992, Pope John Paul II declared that the ruling against Galileo was an error resulting from "tragic mutual incomprehension."

But that apparently wasn't enough. In January, Benedict canceled a speech at Rome's La Sapienza University after a group of professors, citing the Galileo episode and depicting Benedict as a religious figure opposed to science, argued that he shouldn't speak at a public university.


The Galileo anniversary appears to be giving the Vatican new impetus to put the matter to rest. In doing so, Vatican officials are stressing Galileo's faith as well as his science, to show the two are not mutually exclusive.


At a Vatican conference last month entitled "Science 400 Years after Galileo Galilei," the Vatican No. 2, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, said Galileo was an astronomer, but one who "lovingly cultivated his faith and his profound religious conviction."


"Galileo Galilei was a man of faith who saw nature as a book authored by God," Bertone said.


The head of the Vatican's Pontifical Council for Culture, which co-sponsored the conference, went further. Archbishop Gianfranco Ravasi told Vatican Radio that Galileo "could become for some the ideal patron for a dialogue between science and faith."


He said Galileo's writings offered a "path" to explore how faith and reason were not incompatible.


The Rev. John Padberg, a church historian and the director of the Institute of Jesuit Sources at St. Louis University, said he suspected the Vatican's new emphasis on Galileo's faith came from the pope himself.

--

Religion, like all institutions of human beings, is political in nature.


That is something that I have to accept, a ‘truth’ I have to figure into the things which I know.


I used to be (and still am) irked by the assumption of a un-errant revealed truth. One which never changes. I dislike the argument that reason and logic can be put aside for this kind of revelation from god, that our intelligence can logically be subservient to what I would call faith without fact. Faith as the absence of reason.


A pet point of itch.


Religion is a politics. A way and means of controlling the way we all think. I am a non-believer now. Maybe I see it in ways that should not be seen… or maybe it is because I am gay and my most ardent critics of what I am are religious figures, in the name of religion.


Last year, Benedict cited homosexuality as one of the dangers confronting the world. It was sometime near Christmas. This year, he repeats the warning. Comparing my act of love with my lover as one of the dangers to the human race.


If 400 years from now, the ‘Church’ accepts my sexuality as a normal part of life, will it make up for the persecution and pain that it has caused for so long?


But that is life, and it is not going to change for my sake. I will have to begin my own journey of faith, wonder where it will lead me in the coming year!


PS, I lifted the article above from the Huffington Post. But it is not the most interesting part of that. Just check out the comments on the post. Guaranteed to make you laugh!


GayUganda

Thursday, December 25, 2008

The Pope and Gay Human Beings

Pope Benedict criticizes homosexual behavior


VATICAN CITY: Pope Benedict said Monday that saving humanity from homosexual or transsexual behaviour was just as important as saving the rainforest from destruction.


The Church "should also protect man from the destruction of himself. A sort of ecology of man is needed," the pontiff said in a holiday address to the Curia, the Vatican's central administration.


"The tropical forests do deserve our protection. But man, as a creature, does not deserve any less."


The Catholic Church teaches that while homosexuality is not sinful, homosexual acts are. It opposes gay marriage and, in October, a leading Vatican official called homosexuality "a deviation, an irregularity, a wound."


The pope said humanity needed to "listen to the language of creation" to understand the intended roles of man and woman. He compared behavior beyond traditional heterosexual relations as "a destruction of God's work."


He also defended the Church's right to "speak of human nature as man and woman, and ask that this order of creation be respected."


Benedicto, Benedicto, why are you persecuting me?


Matter of fact, the effrontery of this is breathtaking. I do love my man. I am not ready to abstain because the pope believes that my making love is a sin.

But to be told that me making love is akin to the destruction of the rainforest that is bringing about climate change, that is really breathtaking.


Maybe when I have sex I emit a lot of carbon causing global warming? eh?


We homosexuals have been there for eons. And we will continue to be. We didnt cause the world to end before, why are we going to cause it to end now? Wow, the accusation is so breathtaking in magnitude that it is mindboggling.


Imagine. The population of humans at this particular moment is the highest since the humanity became the most successful specie on earth. Homosexual behaviour has been, and will continue to be. But, with some weird papal chemistry, we are the seeds of the destruction of humanity!


The accusation is absurd. The comparison nonsensical. And any rightfully thinking person will dismiss it out of hand.


Yet, we cannot. Because it is the pope who has uttered those words. A major religious leader dares to utter a statement steeped in the hate of a minority, in the name of God. And people believe it.


He gives them legitimacy to persecute me.


Benedicto, Benedicto, why are you persecuting me?



A disappointed, and shamed



GayUganda