Homophobe Needs to Learn to Read the Bible Properly

There is something that often irritates about some of the so called 'Christian' extremists who preach things like kill the gays and brandish the word abomination around while enjoying their prawn in their polyester/cotton mix clothing.

However, today's 'learn to read the bible' award goes not to an American but Russia's first legal billionaire German Sterligov. He said that he wanted all gay men and women killed when he was interviewed at the weekend on the popular Moscow radio station Echo Moskvi.

When challenged by the host Ksenia Larina:

"I want to understand, German, what what you want to do … what to do not only with atheists but also with gays and lesbians?"

Mr. Sterligov responded:

"As it is written by the Apostle Paul, Let it be their blood upon their heads."

Other guests on the programme chipped in. One asked:

"This is what is written about gays and lesbians?"

"Yes," replied Mr. Sterligov. "This is what is written about the homosexuals."

Now for some facts, yes it is written in the bible,"Let it be their blood upon their heads" you can find Paul saying it in Acts 18:6. However, here is where Mr Sterligov falls down, you cannot take a sentence in the bible out of its context to make it say what you mean.

The context of this passage is Paul visiting the synagogue in Corinth. He was testifying to the Jews that Jesus was the Christ. However, they resisted and blasphemed. So Paul shook his clothes (ie getting the residue of them off him) and said:

"Your blood be upon your own head! I am clean. From now on I shall go the Gentiles."

So instead of it being about homosexual is actually about some of God's chosen people, the children of Israel rejecting the message that Paul was giving to them. It has nothing to do about sexuality and all to do about rejecting the message. Seeing as you who I would expect to accept the message have rejected I'm going to those that you think don't deserve to hear it.

Harsh words and equally applicable to Mr Sterligov. You say that some people deserve to die for who they are. As I've mentioned before people like Mr Sterligov are very particular about which of their priestly laws from Leviticus they want to uphold and which it is ok to ignore in this day and age. Generally if applies to sleeping with man as with woman and includes death keep, if it involves sea food, or slavery or clothing we can ignore that now.

End result of course is a total image of hate, when actually Paul would have been turning his back on that hate and taking his message to those that Mr Sterligov has shown such hatred to. Sadly a recent poll of Russian opinions shows that Mr Sterligov is in a majority. 74 per cent of Russians believe gays and lesbians are morally dissolute or mentally defective, while only 15 per cent think they are normal.

There is still a long way to go in certain parts of the world. But if you are going to have an argument based on biblical references at least use the passages that relate rather that totally twisted, that is debate rather than diatribe.

Governments Move to Green Up Our Act

Yesterday the Scottish Parliament voted announced it is to set annual targets to ensure continuous progression to the reduction of emissions by 80% by 2050. They also voted to include all six major greenhouse gas emissions* rather than just Carbon Dioxide (CO2) in these targets.

It comes the day ahead of the Westminster vote which looks likely to include aviation and shipping emissions in UK targets. Ed Miliband has also said earlier this month that he is looking to increase UK reductions from 60% to 80% matching the Scottish target.

With both the Governments in Westminster and Holyrood taken emboldened steps to include more of the proposals of the Kyoto Protocol we need them to reach out to others, especially USA, Russia and China, to also do their bit. The three largest contributors to climate change through their emissions have yet to make bold or indeed even tentative strides to do much in line with many others in the world. We need the big three on board before much longer. It is not an excuse for them to rely on market forces alone, nor of China to say it needs to catch up industrially to hide the fact that cleaner alternatives and practises are available and should be encouraged as much as possible.

* The other five are methane, nitrous oxide, Hydrofluorcarbons (HFCs), Perfluorocarbons (PFCs), Sulphur Hexafluoride (SF6).