Merde! >:(

How interesting. *shakes her head*

I would like to ask Archbishop Paarma about a situation like this: a married couple is trying to have a child, but can’t. They discuss assisted conception with each other and their doctors and decide to go for it. Somewhere in the middle of the process they separate, for whatever reason. The woman still wants to have a child, but according to Archbishop Paarma’s idea of a “blessing”, it is not possible anymore. Why? What has changed in this woman? Bingo – her marital status. Nothing else.

I could go on forever, but things like this just make me so angry. And I don’t want to be angry today.

The fact that lesbian couples can’t have children has nothing to do with sickness so why should it be treated medically? Why should a different lifestyle be paid from health care funds when there is no sickness? Why should the state sponsor fatherless children into this world? If you want to have children then you should live in a heterosexual relationship, for that is the way children are done – and preferably in faithful, loving relationship, so that the child has a good environment to grow up.

If having a child is a subjective right (which I doubt) why is it only women who have that right? Shouldn’t human rights be universal? Why don’t we talk about gay or single men’s rights of having children? The state could e.g. rent a womb if we would follow this perverse logic.

Summa summarum, I’m fully with Paarma on this one.

It’s always an individual decision to leave the Lutheran Church. I think many left the Church a while ago as it became easier to do so. Many people probably leave the Church because of the tax, not because of what this or that bishop says.

An atheist friend of mine once said the Church is so irrelevant to him that he couldn’t be bothered to turn up to leave the Church. If he’d actually do something to leave the Church, that would be proof that he cared. A Christian friend of mine actually left the Church because he had a theological quarrel with a priest. Right now less people in Helsinki are leaving the Church than a while ago. The priests are already talking about a positive trend.

I’m not with Paarma. This increases my potential to leave the Church but doesn’t tip the scales decisively just yet. What bothers me more is that the Church calls itself LUTHERAN rather than “Evangelical” or something else. Kirkko & Kaupunki had once this article about Luther’s anti-semitism. It really disturbed me because at school I never learned about Luther’s advocacy of burning Jewish books. I really wouldn’t want to belong to any organization named after that guy. I went to see the film “Luther” and the film-makers had omitted the ugly part of Luther’s legacy as well.

The fact that lesbian couples can???t have children has nothing to do with sickness so why should it be treated medically?

Good point actually, maybe you should just think of as being “treated” rather than being “treated medically” – The welfare state treat lots of things that aren’t a “sickness”

Why should a different lifestyle be paid from health care funds when there is no sickness?

This is probably a terrible example and I’ll get flammed for this but – homosexuality is something you’re born with, ask any gay/lesbian and they’ll tell you this, it’s not a choice, so I don’t consider it a “lifestyle” – But imagine a handicap person, they were born that way and they’re not “sick”, the same with gays and lesbians, they’re born that way.

Why should the state sponsor fatherless children into this world?

Ehh, that’s like saying the state shouldn’t sponsor a poor person because they’ll most likely grow up poor or they shouldn’t sponsor a black person because their children will grow up in a racist society.

Why don???t we talk about gay or single men???s rights of having children?

Definitely, I think gay and single men should have the same rights.

Marlowe wrote:

“Why should a different lifestyle be paid from health care funds [...]?”

I don’t think the debate is (only) about who’s paying. It’s about the right of getting the assisted conception at all.

“Why don???t we talk about gay or single men???s rights of having children? The state could e.g. rent a womb if we would follow this perverse logic.”

We should in fact be talking about gay men’s rights too. But dont’ jump into any extreme conclusions. I don’t think state should rent wombs (necessarily). But if a gay couple has found a woman who’s willing to give birth to the couple’s baby (only one of them being the biological father, obviously), the same clinical assistance should be available for them as is for heterosexual couples.