THE FIRST Amendment is an interesting thing. It protects Americans' right to practice just about any religion they care to and it protects Americans' right to say pretty much anything about religion - and other things - they care to say.
From that perspective, there was nothing wrong with the opinions in Jamie Dailey's column ("Discrimination by interpretation," March 25). Dailey is entitled to have an opinion and he's free to express it. But when he chose to express that opinion in a column in The Cavalier Daily, Dailey took on some responsibilities he did not live up to. Accuracy for one. Evidence for another.
For anyone who may have missed it, Dailey's column said, "Congress, the White House, state legislatures across the nation, the court system, the Catholic Church and right-wing religious institutions are bursting at the seams with blood" because, according to Dailey, they "instill prejudice in the minds of youth" - prejudice toward gay people.
An accusation like that cries out for support. Dailey did not offer any.
He did offer this: "Conservative churches argue the Bible says homosexuality is a sin. Yet if Christian groups are going to take one unclear sentence from the Bible and use it to persecute a minority group, then other Bible 'sins' including wearing gold, playing football, eating shellfish, wearing blended fabrics such as polyester and having round haircuts should be equally as important. The fact that conservative churches do not consider these other actions to be sins reveals them as organizations that manipulate Christianity to justify personal prejudices."
Of course, some conservative churches and other religious groups do consider those things sins. And it is not "one unclear sentence." All it took was a quick Google search to turn up five Biblical references to homosexuality - and they do not seem all that unclear to me. A verse in Leviticus says, "If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them."
Of course, the Old Testament also prescribes the death penalty for adultery, blasphemy, cursing a parent, working on the Sabbath, being a wizard and being a disobedient son, among other offenses. Jesus cast some doubt on all that when he told some folks who wanted to stone an adulteress that anyone in the crowd who was without sin should start things off, but Dailey did not mention that, either.
Dailey declared that "anti-gay politicians and select religious leaders
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