14 Sins and Nothing Gay

I was catching up on some blog reading and delighted when BoingBoing ("Vatican comes up with a new list of Seven Sins") alerted me that the Vatican has released a list of seven "social sins", apparently augmenting the seven "cardinal sins" (otherwise famous as the "deadly sins") noted down by Pope Gregory I in the sixth century.

You recall the earlier list:

1. Pride
2. Envy
3. Gluttony
4. Lust
5. Anger
6. Greed
7. Sloth

Here is the new list:

1. "Bioethical" violations such as birth control
2. "Morally dubious" experiments such as stem cell research
3. Drug abuse
4. Polluting the environment
5. Contributing to widening divide between rich and poor
6. Excessive wealth
7. Creating poverty

I'm disappointed. I've looked and looked and I still don't see homosexuality listed. Perhaps if one could consider it a "bioethical violation"….

(By the way, for the count in the title I decided to include Christianity's "Ten Commandments", none of which are directed precisely at gay people, except perhaps that bit about coveting one's neighbor's wife, if one happens to be a lesbian, which could be a problem. Also a possible problem: coveting one's neighbor's male or female slave, although that may be technically taken care of by the Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, at least here in the US. I always figured that if the Big Guy were all that concerned about us gay folk he could have at least mentioned us in the Big Ten.)

(It's another Biblical argument in favor of marriage equality for gay people, really. The commandment about coveting makes it clear that only male people can be neighbors, and the list of things not to be coveted are all property: wife, oxen, slaves of either type, or any other property of one's neighbor. These days, though, we don't like to think of wives as property so we've reconstrued that bit to refer to one's neighbor's spouse. Therefore, if the neighbor happened to be married to a man then we gay folk would be drawn under the 10-commandment umbrella and prohibited from coveting our neighbor's husband. Wow. Fortunately it says nothing about the guy next door to our neighbor.)

Posted on March 14, 2008 at 20.59 by jns · Permalink
In: All, Faaabulosity

2 Responses

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  1. Written by S.W. Anderson
    on Saturday, 15 March 2008 at 19.05
    Permalink

    Obviously, the Vatican used George W. Bush for its template. That's laughable, considering how some Catholic clerics dumped on John Kerry four years ago.

  2. Written by S.W. Anderson
    on Saturday, 15 March 2008 at 19.09
    Permalink

    Regarding all the coveting, I think any more that's entirely too delicate a term. The expression "get it on with" would probably be more serviceable.

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