"By adversity are wrought the greatest works of admiration, and all the fair examples of renown, out of distress and misery are grown."
1] "Gay" is a misnomer. All of my reading about such people has revealed that they are anything but "gay". They are usually somewhere in between miserable and suicidal. I take no pleasure in that fact and actually feel a great deal of sympathy towards them [while of course remaining firm in my belief that such a lifestyle is against G-d, the Torah and the Jewish people].
2] Many have "decided" after publicly revealing their inclination towards men that the Torah is not true or that we are misunderstanding the Torah and that consensual relations between men is really permitted. This is very unfortunate. I will not relate to those in the second cateegory who tendentiously pervert and twist a pasuk in chumash to fit their own agenda. I direct my words at those in the first category who chose to stop believing They should consider the following: IF the Torah is just a bunch of fairy tales [as they claim עפ"ל] then the six million who perished in the holocaust did so for no reason at all. They died for a myth that was the figment of the imagination of a few nefarious men who sought to mislead an entire nation into keeping some laws that they cavalierly invented - including mandating the death penalty in certain instances, making them murderers. So in our belief system we can say that 1 and a half million children were gassed and killed in other brutal ways for a higher Divine purpose known only to a G-d whose ways are inscrutable. These souls we believe are now enjoying an eternity of bliss for their acts of sacrifice. Denying the Torah means that they all died for naught and they long ago ceased to exist. I feel that this is a desecration of the memory of people I believe to be holy.
If they deny the Torah and G-d then they have to explain how the world got here. That is a question atheists have yet to satisfactorily answer. Remember the definition of an athiesm: The belief that there was nothing and then nothing magically exploded for no reason, creating everything and then a bunch of everything magically rearranged itself for no reason whatsoever into self-replicating bits which then became dinosaurs". Hmmmmmmmm.
If they deny the Torah then they have to explain how an entire nation was convinced that they all saw something they didn't see [i.e. maamad Har Sinai].
If they deny the Torah they are saying that their parents, grandparents, great grandparents and all the way back for thousands of years, have been living a lie.
Denying the Torah means many more things but we try to be brief. The point is that when someone has a bias his judgement is going to be colored by his bias [called in the mussar sefarim a "negiya"]. It is inconceivable that given their attraction to other men that they can make an objective decision as to whether the Torah which forbids such a relationship, is true.
If a person has difficulty believing I have an address for him - 42nd street.
?????
The New York City Public Library.
AHHHHHH! There he can find the Rambam's Moreh Nevuchim, the Kuzari and many of the other classics of our tradition that deal with questions of faith and doubt [he can also read Rabbi Norman Lamm's tome of that name]. He can speak to Rav Shlomo Fischer who knows everything under the sun [slight exaggeration] and see how he deals with the questions. He can also consider that Rabbi Yosef Dov Sloveitchik was quite an educated individual with a once-in-a-generation-brilliant-off-the-charts-mind and HE believed in the veracity of our tradition. He would then have to ask himself what information he is privy to that Rabbi Soloveitchik was missing. Rejecting our faith system is a decision that has eternal ramifications and should only be done [if done at all] after many years of intense study. Such a program will yield at least one result - it will show that it cannot be proven that there is no G-d and Judaism has never been proven to be wrong. People have questions on Judaism - but not believing comes with its own set of difficult questions.
[Reminds me of the holocaust survivor who was if he has questions. "Qvestionss? I have many qvestionss! My qvestions are so good that G-d vill call me up immediately to the heavens to answer my qvestions. I vait vit my qvestions."]
One person who has semicha became a "secular humanist rabbi". A lesson in the levels of absurdity a person's sexual orientation will lead him to reach. A "secular rabbi" might be compared to a Medical Doctor who doesn't believe in using medicine.
I know many people who pick and choose. Some women don't cover their hair but are otherwise wonderful people and Jews. Some men don't learn but do many other mitzvos. Just because someone doesn't keep one law doesn't mean that he must jettison the entire system. It's not an all or nothing proposition.
Homosexual [we have proven that the word "gay" is inaccurate] people have a tremendous battle ahead of them if they want to stay in the faith community but it's worth it to fight the battle. No, it's not easy but nobody ever said life is easy.
Yesterday I was reading about an Israeli soldier who lost many family members in a terrorist attack. He didn't give up. He continued going to school and insisted on enlisting in the army just like everyone else even thought he could have easily gotten out of it. He never looked for the easy way out in life even though he could have wallowed in self pity. Did I mention what else he lost in the terrorist attack?
His vision.
Life is an uphill struggle but he keeps plowing away.
Having cancer isn't easy either. Ask anyone who had it. The way it has been described to me is that the only way you can only understand the unbearable suffering is if you've been through it yourself. No descriptions can possibly illustrate the dimensions of the suffering.
A person who has an attraction to other men has clearly been given a herculean nisayon in life - to restrain himself and not act on his desires. I really don't envy such people and all of my own difficulties in life pale in comparison. But Hashem has a plan and a purpose which we can't understand and our job is to show personal heroism and pass our tests.
I said I'd be brief and there is so much more yet to say.....
A blessed day to all!
