LGBTQ in the Church? Andrew Wilson vs Brandan Robertson - DEBATE!

Welcome everybody to another live Rattlesnake TV debate between Andrew Wilson and Brandon Robertson. If you guys would like to find these gentlemen, their links are all going to be below.

A few pre-show notes before we get into it. Don't forget to like the video on your way in. Shows YouTube that this is worthwhile watching. The topic of the debate today is: Should the church be accepting of LGBTQ people? There is a poll in the chat right now, guys, so make sure to get to the chat, put your vote in, cast your vote. Very important that we get as many votes as possible so we get an understanding of the breadth of the audience to see where people stand on this issue.

After introducing themselves, each debater will get to make an opening statement of up to 7 minutes. We will then get to read out some super chats after the opening statements before getting into open dialogue for around 90 minutes or so, more if we need. At the end, if we have sufficient interest, we will take some callers and you guys can have your chance to ask ask whatever questions you would like to the debaters. If you would like to call in, message me on Twitter, guys. Jake Rattlesnake, that's Jake Rattlesnake. We'll put that in the chat so you guys have that link. And if you're a real person, and if you're not naked when you get onto the stream or something, then you can by all means ask a question.

As the moderator, I will only intervene if the debaters are talking over each other too much, or if we need to get back on topic, or if we need clarification on something. At any point, the debaters can appeal to the moderator. Super chats will be put on screen as they come in, unless, of course, they are unbecoming of this civilized debate. $10 and above will be read out after the opening statements, and also at the end for the two gents to respond to. We could increase that price depending on the volume of the super chats, guys.

I am not monetizing this debate whilst it is live for your convenience because we don't want the ads popping up and you guys being all behind that cost me. So, in order to keep that going, I will need my palms greased. So please, guys, get your super chats in and contribute to the grift.

And finally, you'll see in the chat that there is a poll up with the prompt, as we said before. Get your votes in now, and then at the end, we are going to do the we're going to do the poll again. The idea of the debate is for these gentlemen to put the most convincing argument forward possible and to see how many people they can bring over to their side. We want to be changing minds. So, with that, ladies and gentlemen, let the games begin! And now, for the thousands in attendance, let's get ready to rumble!

All right, guys, we are here with our debaters. We are going to take some opening statements after these gentlemen both introduce themselves, tell you guys where you can find them, and also a little bit about themselves. Starting with you, Brandon.

Well, hey, yeah, thank you so much, Jake, for having me and Andrew. So good to meet you finally after watching so many videos. My name is Brandon Robertson. I'm a pastor and a queer theologian. And you can find all my stuff at queerchristian.org. But for me, today's debate couldn't be easier for anyone who's familiar with...

Quickly, Brandon, we just want a quick introduction. So I'm going to get Andrew to introduce himself, and then we'll go into opening statements. Sorry about that.

Gotcha. Yeah, it's my intro. Brandon. So my name is Andrew Wilson. I am the host of The Crucible, popular entertainment channel on YouTube. I'm a political analyst, a political satirist, and also I engage in debates all over the world with various people, mostly on politics, not usually Christian apologetics, but occasionally I like to take those on too.

Lovely. All right, Brandon, you have got seven minutes on the clock, my friend. Let's get into it.

Thank you. Yeah, so as I was saying, today's debate for me couldn't be any easier than as somebody who's familiar with scripture, morality, and basic human understanding of sexuality and gender. The question of whether queer people belong in the church to me seems trivial. It's already answered. LGBT people are already a part of the Church of Christ and have always been. And to begin with, I think it's important to frame this discussion properly. This isn't just about interpreting a few Bible verses. It's actually at the heart of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And I think Andrew probably would agree. The gospel at its heart, from my perspective, is a message of love, liberation, and ultimately salvation through God's inclusive love. Jesus welcomed those on the margins, those who were excluded by religious authorities. He never asked people about their specific standards of worthiness. Instead, he simply invited people to come and follow him and be transformed.

So the question of why we're still debating LGBT people belonging in the church is interesting to me. And let me make this clear: what makes this debate challenging isn't the facts or the theology. It's that Andrew and I are beginning from two fundamentally different places. I am a Protestant who rejects the authority of the Catholic Church and the supposed infallibility of any human being, past or present, including myself. I also don't accept Evangelical Protestant frameworks of inherency for the Bible because I think it's simply not true. What I do believe is that scripture is inspired, authoritative for our faith when it's paired with reason, science, tradition, psychology, and experience. And that's where my theology comes alive. As a theologian and a scholar, I can confidently say that there's not a single verse in scripture that condemns loving, same-sex consensual relationships. There's not a single place that the Bible mandates a male-female binary for romantic relationships. And even if it did, the question would be why? Because there's zero moral harm caused by consensual adult same-sex relationships or by people expressing their authentic gender identities. The moral logic is clear, the psychological data is clear, and history shows us that Christians have revised their positions on topics like this, including slavery, divorce, and a plethora of other issues over the centuries.

Some may argue that the church needs to hold to traditional values. But let's think about what tradition means. If tradition meant preserving outdated practices, the church would still condone slavery. It would still refuse to marry divorced individuals. It would still stand against interracial marriage. Thankfully, the church has always had the capacity to evolve. I believe we've listened to the spirit of God and science and culture and the lived experiences of people. And so revising tradition, in my opinion, is actually fulfilling it. And let's not forget that a majority of Mainline Protestants and denominations in the country today are already inclusive of LGBT people. Even Pope Francis himself has moved towards welcoming and blessing LGBT individuals and our love. And as an openly gay pastor who has served in three Protestant denominations, I can tell you that being gay has not had an impact on my ability to minister in my faith in Christ. In fact, it strengthens my connection to the gospel, a gospel that has always been, in my opinion, about love, justice, and inclusion.

I think the real issue we're debating is fear. Fear that LGBT inclusion threatens the nuclear family, despite zero evidence for such a claim. Fear, fear that certain Christians will undermine faith, even though we reflect the same diversity and devotion as straight believers. Fear that somehow by embracing LGBT individuals, we will dilute the gospel. I think this message of fear is antithetical to the gospel, and fear doesn't get the last word. Scripture declares that God's love casts out all fear. Love, God's love is not a gatekeeper, measuring or doling out blessings based on whether we fit some narrow mold. It's an abundant, unmeasurable, and unconditional love. And LGBT people don't need to earn their place in the church. We've already are and always have been part of God's family. So my final plea is simply this: It's time for the church to catch up. The spirit of God is moving, and the question of LGBT inclusion is not a question at all. It's a call to action, a call to embrace, affirm, and celebrate the beauty of God's diversity revealed in humanity. And so, with that, I'm excited to hear from you, Andrew.

All right, Andrew, it is your time. You've got seven minutes on the clock. But guys, just after this, after Andrew's opening statements, we will be reading out some super chats. So, Andrew, floor is yours.

Mr. Robertson is an object lesson and a thing I talk about often, the cult which exists in Christianity. I call the cult of "Be Nice." I refer to these people in other ways as well. "Sewing Circle Christians" is the most notable way in which I set them apart. A sewing circle Christian, reduced, is simply a person that believes Christian ethics boils down to one tenet: "Be Nice," based around the culturally relative societal taboos which exist, instead of actually following Christian ethics. Mr. Robertson is a product of the sewing circle Christians, all of whom go out of their way to be nice to him, which creates a vampiric relationship or a parasitical relationship between both. The sewing circle Christians get to flout their virtue and talk about how they showed tons of love and grace to Mr. Robertson, of which they are actually showing neither. And Mr. Robertson, in turn, gets to use this virtue signaling as a weapon by saying, "Due to the niceness you show me, I can weaponize your own faith against you." They're both products of each other, which is ironic and sad.

Mr. Robertson is, simply put, a subversive. He's here with a specific mission, which is to subvert Christianity, and he takes great joy in doing so. You can see him smiling even right now. His entire history is that of a subversive Log Cabin Republican subversive element in the Republican Party. Don Lemon, unless I get this wrong, and you can correct me right now, wrote a forward in your book, is that not correct? An endorsement, but not a forward. Yeah, sorry, an endorsement. Saying, quote, "Brandon Robertson is a fearless and one of the clearest voices for faith and LGBT inclusion." Don Lemon, by the way, who hates Christians like you can't imagine, absolutely loathes them and bashes them every chance he gets. He's an anti-Trumper. Mr. Robertson is who uses his non-existent faith on behalf of a progressive secularist agenda to advance that secular agenda. And part of that agenda is homosexuality in church.

Now, Mr. Robertson, hilariously enough, has a worldview riddled with contradictions. He says he was afraid to come out, but was lobbying for gay Republicans. He says homosexuality is innate and immutable, but claims ancient people had no understanding of sexuality and that sexuality is a 19th-century construct. Total contradiction. He believes God can lie, but also claims he received divine revelation from him and knows it's true. He says sin is harm to yourself and others or God's design, by whose standards do we appeal for harm in his system? It can't be the Bible, as Mr. Robertson says it is unnecessary to use that as a standard for morality. The list is actually endless of contradictions which make no sense at all.

The reason Mr. Robertson essentially is taken seriously at all by at least some people, mostly women, is because of the flowery language he uses. "Love is love." "Love between adults shouldn't be restricted." "Man, Jesus Christ was all about the love, bro." These are masking terms which Christians, in their foolishness of following the cult of "Be Nice," actually let him get away with because they don't want the flak of using what they consider to be vulgar language. It's actually pretty hilarious. Here's what we're actually talking about in plain English so nobody can run from it. Mr. Robertson believes that marriage between men and the consummation thereof is pleasing to God. Consummation, to him, means a man sticks his penis into the anus of another man and ejaculates into it. This, he thinks, is pleasing to God. Further, that pornography is not objectionable, but that it is also pleasing to God when many men put their penis into other men's anuses and ejaculate. That's what we're actually talking about here. Don't look away. That's what we're actually talking about. Not love between two men in the church, but the acceptance that's pleasing to God to stick your penis into feces. That's what we're talking about. From his view, Jesus rejoices at this. That's what he's actually saying. And that multiple men doing this with each other is what Christ would want. Jesus died on the cross so that men could have orgies. You may think this sounds absurd because it does, but it's his actual view. And no, I'm not sugarcoating it. I'll demonstrate it shortly, in fact, when we get into the cross-examination.

Now, Mr. Robertson also has a problem with morality. Mr. Robertson has to date never actually established his moral standard except from consensus and intuition, of course. The glaring contradiction there is that if it's the vast majority of Christian intuition and consensus that LGBTQ churches are a reflection of the will of Satan, he can't object. I intend to fully put Mr. Robertson to the question on his beliefs today. And a few things just to respond to in my opening: He says, "Do queer people belong in church?" "They always have been." Yeah, to repent. They're there to repent, and they're there to be treated for the spiritual sickness which afflicts them, called homosexuality. "The heart of the gospel is love, liberation, salvation." Has nothing to do with liberation. That's a new doctrine. This came around during Enlightenment principles as well, he knows. He says that it should be inspired by authority, psychology, and science. Psychology, sir, is not scientific. All right? It's not. That is not science. It's not even a soft science. It's a study of the mind. There's no scientific methodology really utilized in psychology at all, except perhaps for data gathering purposes. He says there's no place for a male-female binary. Well, Paul would disagree. He says there's zero moral harm. But we haven't established a harm principle. He says tradition means condoning slavery. Under Christian ethics, when it was indeed Christians themselves who were the primary abolitionists of slavery. Amen. Openly gay pastors, he says, can serve as ministers. Why? Because he wants to serve as a minister. So with that, I'm actually happy to just kind of yield the rest of my time and dive right into this debate.

All right, gentlemen, I'm going to quickly read out a few super chats. For the ones that I'm not reading out, we have to keep them to guys, but I do appreciate the support. Ryan Slater gifted five Rattlesnake TV memberships. The Ghost of Pinet said, "Queer pastor, more Protestant heresy." ELO also, "Hello from The Crucible crew." I'm sure Brandon, you'll get into that during the debate. Nick Brone for $10 said, "Daddy chill." Ghost of Pinet for $10 says, "Yes, the time-honored tradition of man on man buggery. Yes, we should totally replace the ing of the nuclear family and its formation for this instead." Brandon, do you have a response to that quickly?

I think it's not an either or in my perspective. So, no, we're not replacing one for the other.

Yep. Ryan Slater for $10 says, "Thanks for not monetizing this." Jake, super chat for the support, brother. Thank you, Ryan. I appreciate that. We want to have this show as free-flowing as possible. Hly for $5 said, "Gay ad blocker." I missed that one. Made by Jim Bob for $10. Brandon, what's the meaningful difference between brotherly love and homosexuality, if you want to give a quick answer to that one?

Yeah, I just think they're two different types of love. I think the Bible talks about a variety of different kinds of love, but we'll get into that.

Yep. Cool. All right, fellas, well, I mean, are you guys comfortable just doing open dialogue, or would you like to do a... Yep, okay. Open dialogue. Open dialogue. Can we clarify a few terms before we dive into the debate? Just kind of get a few things clarified. I was going through, you have a multitude of videos and and I kind of went over the positions, and I just want to make sure that this is correct. Essentially, you believe that people should strive to act with compassion, empathy towards everybody and kind of all creatures which exist, right?

Yes.

Okay. That there is a struggle, an ongoing struggle for justice, and that that needs to prevail, right? Including if it needs to prevail over the law, which which Jesus Christ himself did, right?

Yeah.

Okay. One's body is their own and it's not subject to somebody else, right? And their will.

I would talk about God having some authority and ownership of that too, but yes.

Okay. Freedoms for people should be respected, and you should not in any way unjustly encroach upon other people's freedoms.

Sure.

Okay. Beliefs should conform to one's best scientific and psychological understanding of the world, and one should take care not to distort scientific facts.

Yes.

Okay. And people are fallible, they make mistakes, and you should do your best to rectify those mistakes. Is that correct?

Yes.

Okay. Now, real quick, I just wanted to show you. I'm going to share my screen here, real quick. Jake, can you, can you pull that up for me, please? Yeah. Can you read the title of that?

Seven Fundamental Tenants.

Yes, the seven fundamental tenants. Yeah. Now, let me, let me scroll down briefly. I know where this is from. And can you tell me, can you read that? What does that say?

The Satanic Temple.

Of the Satanic Temple. So essentially, your doctrine and dogma, right, 100% conforms with the seven tenants of Satanism, by your own mission, is that correct?

Yes. But if you know about the Satanic Temple, they're actually an atheistic organization that does not believe in Satan or God. So...

Do we lose him? I apologize for that. Anyway, go ahead.

No, I was just saying the Satanic Temple, if anybody knows, is an atheistic movement that does not believe in Satan or God. So it's an interesting thing to try to bring up to try to align it with Satan, but there's no biblical basis that those are Satan's values. And the movement itself doesn't believe in Satan or God, correct? It's a secular organization, right?

Yeah. And its stated goals are to be a subversive element to Christianity by utilizing Christian ethics against Christians. And they utilize these tenants in order to do that, which are borrowed from Christian ethics, as a way to snub their nose and say, "Na, na, na, na, na, na, we got you Christians, and you agree with every single tenant of the Satanic doctrine." The secular subversive organization, which is there specifically to destroy Christianity, is that not correct, sir?

That's not correct, actually. I'm good friends with a Satanist who belongs to the Satanic Temple, and his goal, and their goal, is not to subvert Christianity. It's to subvert conservative Christianity, Christian nationalism, the kind that I do think that you probably represent.

Christian nationalism did not even exist at the time of Lean Satanism. Satanism wasn't even a thing. And the modern Satanic Temple, which took its lead from Lean Satanism, 10 tenants for the now seven, right, also existed before there was a Christian nationalist movement at all, in order to remove the Ten Commandments from any type of public area, in order to remove any type of public prayer from schools, things like this. I suspect these are all things you support.

Yes, absolutely, 100%.

How is that not subversive?

It is subversive. I believe Jesus is subversive.

So you're a subversive?

Yes, I agree with what you said there. Of course.

Gotcha. And you agree with all of the tenants of Satanism?

Yes, I do, absolutely.

Okay. So now that we have some of that clarified, can we just move on to a couple of basic questions that I have for you?

Yeah.

You converted to Christianity when you were 22? No, 12. 12. I'm sorry. I read here that you made your your final conversion or acceptance at 22. Is that right? When you were an adult, or what did I get wrong? The few things like the Log Cabin Republican thing is also interesting and incorrect. But I became a Christian at the age of 12 in a fundamentalist Baptist Church, and ended up in an Evangelical Church, then went off to Moody Bible Institute to become a pastor and graduated there when I was 21.

And I see. Yeah, maybe that's where I conflated the two. Is you graduated there when you were 21, and you now serve as as a pastor in pastoral duties, correct?

Absolutely.

I have a direct question for you. You may find it offensive, but I would like to have it answered. Have you engaged in group sex with men since you've been a pastor?

No, never.

No. Do you condone group sex with men?

No, I would not say that's a general sexual ethic that I would endorse. Why? Because I believe that sex is best consensually, lovingly, between usually two people. But I also, if, and I write about this extensively at the end of my new book, that my version of sexual ethics isn't about rules. So you're going to be hard-pressed to get me to come down firmly and say something is right or wrong objectively in all situations.

Then why not engage in group sex? Because that's not what I want to do.

Yeah, I know, but if somebody does want to do it, why wouldn't you condone it?

I think that if your values are centered on love, consent, and adult relationships, then anything can be a healthy expression and anything can be an unhealthy expression.

Okay, so then you would, if if somebody came to you and said, "Well, there's four of us men and we all want to get married to each other," yes, you would marry all of them together, correct?

Yeah.

You couldn't, couldn't have an objection to that, right?

No.

And so if then if they all went home that night and had a big gay orgy, you would not, or if they're married, I wouldn't say that.

Okay. You wouldn't condemn it, right?

No.

Yeah. So you would condone it. You would marry. So you do condone this, this activity?

Sure.

Okay. Now, the way that you're framing it now, yes. Yeah. Now, if six secularists made the declaration that they were married, right, absent your authority to marry them, of which you have none, but if you, assuming I just granted that you did, the secularists who give themselves the authority and then they all marry each other, all six of them, you couldn't say that they're doing anything wrong, right?

I don't think consensual adults in relationships are doing anything wrong.

No, never. Not if it's a consensual loving relationship, because there's no harm, right?

Yeah. Yeah.

Can you tell me then, sir, Brandon, I'm I'm really curious about this. If your grandmother died, and you dug her up from the grave, and nobody knew about it, and you had sex with her corpse, can you demonstrate for me the harm?

She can't consent. So yes, that would be the harm.

She, well, she, wait a second. She doesn't need to consent. She's not alive.

What? No.

Why?

Wait, what? I think you're spinning yourself in circles here. My standard for sexual morality is that all sex has to be consensual.

Can a tree consent?

No.

And I don't think you should have sex with trees.

So then if you have a wooden dildo, that's a no-no in Brandon's world?

I think that's a little bit different than having sex with a tree.

By why? Why? Why is that different?

I think sex toys and trees are different.

Because it's dead?

Brandon, I honestly am not sure exactly what...

Because it's dead.

Right. The wooden dildo, fine. Be even though it's a part of the tree, because it's dead, right?

Brandon, this is an absurd word game. Can you, can you answer my question, please?

It's not an absurd word game.

Yeah, because it's dead. So then if Grandma's dead, what's the objection?

My standard for sexual morality is that all sex has to be consensual between human beings.

That's not a human being. That's a dead body. It's a corpse. It's not a human.

I think it's still a human being.

What makes it a human? Do you consent?

What do you think about, uh, masturbation on your part? I'm interested.

I think it's, I think it's sinful and that you should stay away from doing it.

Now, I've answered that question. Let me finish. You can ask your questions, right? We've got a long debate, but can I, can I finish my inquiry, please, before you move off of it? If you masturbate with a wooden dildo, and that's conceivably fine, but having sex with a tree, which is alive, is not, then the only threshold breaker there is that the wood is dead. That is the only...

Well, then what's the threshold breaker? Human? Tree?

I don't, I don't concede the point that a dildo is a tree, first of all. But I also, I didn't say it's a tree. I said it's it's part of a dead tree.

So then what if we just cut off Grandma's head and you just had sex with that?

I believe that a sexual relationship has to be consensual between two human beings.

Yeah, but they're not H... What makes them human beings? They're not alive.

Consenting human beings is how sex should be expressed.

Yeah, I know, but that makes no sense, Brandon, because how, if they're not alive, what makes them now human beings?

Clarify what, which one you're talking about at this point.

Well, a human, a human being. You're talking about a corpse, right?

A corpse. And I, I guess you don't think that it's okay to have sex with any part of a corpse.

Consenting human being, yeah. Right. You can't have sex with any part of a corpse. But you can't have sex with anything that's alive that doesn't consent. So if, if you have sex with wood, right, that's a part of something which is dead, just like if you were to have sex with Grandma's head. How am I wrong?

Brandon, I think you're wrong because again, the way I schedule, the center of my sexual ethics is not through confining, but through a set of values in the middle and moving out from there. If you are engaging in a sexual practice with oneself that is consensual, I think that is fine generally.

Okay. And a wooden dildo, it was fine. Sure. Okay. But that's, I would part, but that's part of a dead now. Dead tree. So if you say the wood is no longer a tree, and the wood can no longer be the tree because the tree is dead, right? Then how does that not apply to human human beings?

Brandon, can you explain?

Needs to consent in order to engage sexually with.

Yeah, that's not my question. Can you repeat my question so I know you know it?

No, because this is what I'm going to answer.

So you're not going to answer any questions because you don't like the entailment of it. So here's the logic. Brandon says only human beings should be able to have sex, right? Consenting human beings. If a human being masturbates, that's fine because after all, they're masturbating. In Brandon's view, that is not sex. I'm not incorrect so far, right? That's all good. Perfect. Okay. So if you take a piece of a tree and you shove it up your butt, right, in a masturbatory fashion, that is fine from Brandon's view, right? Because after all, there's no human being requirement there to consent. You, if you use Granny's dead arm, where's the human being now?

Granny. I don't, I don't accept the premise that because Granny's dead, she's not a human being.

No, it's just Granny's arm. It's still part of Granny, and she is not a consenting.

So, so if I got my arm cut off, that arm is a separate human from me?

No, but if any, if somebody tried to use your cut-off arm for sex without your consent, that would be wrong.

Why?

Because it cannot consent.

Yeah. How? But neither can the piece of wood. But the wood is not a human being.

Yeah, but neither is an arm.

We're going to keep going in the circle and know I'm going to keep saying.

Yeah, well, what makes an arm a human being?

The arm is a part of a human being.

Does the arm have a soul?

I actually don't have answers to questions about the soul. I think that's beyond our pay grade.

Do dead bodies have souls? Perhaps you think you think that the soul stays with the dead body too? Perhaps. I don't know. I've never died.

So you don't know. You don't. Do you think that the, that human beings have a soul?

It seems likely, yes.

Seems likely. Okay. So you don't know where the soul goes. So if somebody cuts off my arm, would it stand to reason then that it could have split my soul?

I don't know. You don't know. It's above my pay grade.

Okay. So, so when it comes to then, just basic ontology, if there is no soul, we can't demonstrate a soul.

I think there is a soul. I said I think there is. I just...

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But you, you don't know how it operates, how it works, nothing like that. Which is fine. Okay. That's fine. Okay. So let's talk about basic ontology absent Christianity, right? If you cut your finger off, are you less of a man?

I don't know how to answer that question.

Yet, are you less than a full human body? That's not what I'm asking. I'm asking if you're less of a person.

But what, what constitutes a person? In this...

Well, from from your perspective, I think a person would be like it would have to have consciousness, perhaps self-awareness. That would be person. What a person is.

Yeah. So the finger couldn't be a person.

Yeah. So a finger couldn't be a person. So if a finger's not a person, I still think it belongs to a person. And therefore, I would want consent.

What makes it, why does it belong to you if you're dead? Nothing belongs to you.

Do you think people have belongings when they're dead?

Sure. I'm sure you believe in an afterlife, perhaps they do. The Egyptians sure thought so. Yeah.

You gentlemen, maybe we should, uh, get back on topic a little bit more. And, uh, if I don't know if you guys want to continue the cross-examination on a different topic. I think that this is pertinent to the topic because what we're establishing is metaphysical principles and ontology. And so what I'm trying to determine is what Brandon, I'm just doing a basic consistency check. If Brandon says there is no soul and he doesn't know what happens in the afterlife, well, you're not sure. So it's possible there isn't. It's possible there isn't. Pretty sure means it's possible there isn't, right?

Sure. I'm on a...

So if it's possible that there is no soul, yeah, right? Then if the finger is cut off, right? Then I mean, even if there is a soul, that can't be what constitutes you, right? The finger cannot be what what constitutes you.

Absolutely. But it's a part of you. It's a part of you.

I would say. Okay. So, got it. Now I understand what you mean by person. So let me reframe the question then. If it were the case that Granny gave consent that you could have sex with her dead body after she died, can you demonstrate the harm?

I think you need conscious consent in my sexual ethic. So no, I think that would be wrong.

Need conscious consent. But that's really weird, is because Granny's not conscious.

Exactly. So you could not have sex with Granny, then you couldn't have sex with a piece of wood. You couldn't have sex with anything.

I, again, I understand the argument you're making, but I reject the premise that a piece of wood that's turned into a dildo, by the way, wouldn't dildo sound like a terrible idea, but any other sort of sexual toy, like I think that's a wholly different inanimate object category that we're talking about versus a con human being.

What I'm asking you for is to demonstrate the harm, not how your feelings. I don't care how you feel about it. I don't care what you believe about it. Well, my personal feelings are that I don't like it. You, your, your whole position is based around a harm principle. You have three, you have three tiers. You have, you were asked this. You have three tiers. Your first tier is harm to self, second tier harm to others, third tier harm to God's creation. Demonstrate the harm. For if Granny leaves behind a note saying, "I want my son to sexually abuse my body all day long," demonstrate the harm.

I think that's an immoral action.

Yeah. Demonstrate it.

She cannot consent.

So what? How does that harm?

I think non-consensual sexual engagement is harmful.

Demonstrate what? What does "harmful" mean?

[ __ ] well, okay. Brandon, all our lives, but Chuck over there doesn't think it's harmful. Can you tell Chuck why he shouldn't do it, other than because Brandon just, well, he just thinks you shouldn't. Chuck, Chuck, so Chuck's over there. Yeah, I know we have laws, but let's say that the law said you could do it, then I would reject that law. So then it, the law argument doesn't matter. So Chuck over here says to you, "Ah, you know, Granny said, left a note behind saying I could bang her dead body, and you know, Brandon, I really want to. I'm going to go do that. Can you give me a good compelling reason not to?"

Your answer is she cannot consent.

Yeah. And he says, "Uh, well, I don't need consent because she's dead and gave me consent."

You still need active consent in a sexual relationship. That is active consent. It's not a dead person writing a note.

That is not active. It's no different than if I wrote a note today and said, "Someone could have sex with me." I can remove or revoke that consent.

Consent needs...

Yeah, but if you're dead, how do you do that?

Exactly. So you shouldn't. So, but, so, so he says, "Okay, well, I disagree with you, Brandon. I don't think that I need to have consent from someone who's already consented." Right? Because by this view, you're saying that if you rolled over in the morning and banged your wife, you woke her up right? You woke her up with sex. That you, what, that is there problematic without consent?

Absolutely. It's problematic to do.

Yeah. Oh, okay. So is that, is that rape in your view? Is that what that is?

If somebody is not consenting to you have sex with them and you have sex with them, probably.

Yeah. So if I, or any other man, ever woke up with their wife straddling them, right, she would be raping them? I mean, this goes into hyper-individualistic context of relationships. You can give consent in relationships.

Do you know what implied consent is?

Yeah. Yeah. And do you know that the entirety of society operates on implied consent, including in marriage? And you kind of have to, because otherwise you would make rapists out of millions of men who wake up their wife with sex all the time, and vice versa. And obviously, they don't consider that to be rape. There's an implication there of consent. So if it's implied by a note from Granny, you still don't really have much of an argument here. Your only argument about why you haven't demonstrated any harm, so your principle's not consistent. Your only argument is because I just really feel like you shouldn't.

No, it's first of all, harm is one of the principles. I think do no harm is generally a good principle for all of us to live by. But also, again, I state, Granny can't consent. A note from a dead person is not active, conscious human consent. Neither is waking your wife up with sex. And again, I think that sounds pretty morally ambiguous to me.

But it's morally ambiguous. I think you don't think that there's an implication for sex. What happens if your wife says no?

Well, then you would stop. I hope.

Yeah. Yeah. Then he would stop. But so what? There's still an implication there. But from your standpoint, you know how stupid this view is. This would be like saying anytime you're on a first date and you leaned in for a kiss, you'd be like, "Okay, is it okay if I kissed you? Is that okay? Is that all right? Do you think human beings don't operate that way, dude?"

I do. No, they human beings don't operate that way. They don't go, "Oh, okay, sweetheart. Now, now, just what I'm going to do is I'm going to lean in for a kiss. Is it okay if I use my tongue?" Like, do you have to ask that? Is it all right if I use my tongue? Can I give, can I give a little nibble on the lip? Do you need consent for each individual activity? Like, what do you need here, Brandon?

No, I think you're, you're taking one statement about the need for consent and turning it into a boogeyman that doesn't exist. Because when you say, "Yes, there's an implication," the point is that when you enter into any physical sexual relationship, romantic, intimate relationship, however you want to frame it, there should be consent.

Yeah, I get it. But you do realize that when you say, "Well, if you slip in the tongue or things like this, there's an implication there that she said yes as well." I agree.

The implication there is that when she said yes, she's also consenting to these other factors. Because otherwise, you can create a microcosm. There would be no good reason for you to consistently not apply that to Granny's body if she left the note behind.

Well, I do inconsistently apply that to Granny's body. So.

Okay, got it. So that, I mean, okay. Well, let's move over to some of your other contradictions. You say that, uh, sex is an immutable characteristic for men and women.

Yes, depending on how you're using the word sex.

Are we talking about sex with Granny or sex as the immutable char?

Sexual proclivities, sexual identity, I would frame that as.

Okay. Well, then how can you make the case then that thousands of years ago, people didn't understand sexuality if it's immutable?

Sexuality as such, talking about homosexuality, bisexuality, and heterosexuality, did not exist as principles.

What do you mean? Of course they did. It's mutable. It's mutable. No, see, you're conflating things. You can, you're conflating the idea that people in the ancient world could have sex with anybody of any gender, but they didn't have a language to say that this is a sexual orientation. When I say that sexual orientation came about in the 1800s, that's because that is when psychologists came up with the idea that there are sexual orientations that are innate.

No, now you're conflating this word concept fallacy. You're claiming that because the ident, the way that psychologists identify sexual proclivity with different languages, that that means that there was no concept of the same exact thing in the ancient world. This is categorically false.

No, it's not. We know this from Roman emperors. We know this from ancient Egyptians. What? No. What we know, we know that the idea of same-sex activities or the idea that two men could love each other was a possibility in the ancient world. Absolutely.

I completely agree. What's the distinction between that view and your own?

They did not see it as sexual orientation.

Yes. Emperor Hadrian. What does that? What does orientation here mean? That we now believe that psychology, which you probably reject, we believe that sexual orientation is an innate part of a human being, that you are oriented towards attraction, whether that's by hetero or homo.

Yes. But if it was innate, that means they couldn't help themselves, right?

Totally.

Yeah. Totally. So then if that's the case, if that's the case, then obviously the activity which is around these immutable characteristics happened. So if it happened, so if it happened, then it's descriptive. So when you say, hang on, hang on, let me finish my point, then you can clarify. So when you say, Brandon, the ancient world didn't really understand homosexuality, they did understand it very well. If it's innate, they couldn't control it, right? Then they gravitated towards this innate characteristic.

You're misunderstanding the argument I've made consistently across four books and thousands of videos, which is not... It's a bad argument. I don't misunderstand it. Make the argument. Make a bad argument. The argument I am making is the argument is that yes, people engaged in same-sex relationships all throughout history. I agree. Emperor Hadrian and Antinous were in a very famous same-sex relationship in the Roman Empire. They existed. And in fact, I would even concede that in the Greek Roman world of the first century, there are over 13 words for different kinds of sexual relationships between different genders. However, they did not understand that as sexual orientation. Meaning that in the Roman world, you were permitted to have sex with men, women, as long as they were a lower social status. You were legally and morally allowed to have sex with whomever you wanted. So people did not conceive of themselves as gay. They conceived of themselves as a person who's having sex with somebody that they're interested in.

Yeah, okay. But this is an immutable characteristic.

I believe so.

Yeah. That attraction. Okay. So if that attraction is an immutable characteristic, then they were following their immutable characteristics and their proclivities, correct?

Yes.

Okay. So if that's the case, then saying that the ancient world didn't really have an understanding of this would be incorrect.

No, they did not. Only did they... Well, wait. Not only did they, but what you're trying to do is you're trying to smuggle in this word "orientation," but you're actually saying the same thing twice. You're saying, "They gave into their sexual orientation," then, which was an immutable characteristic, and they give into their sexual orientation now, which is an immutable characteristic. You're just saying the same exact thing twice. That's it.

Yeah. The literal argument only argument I'm making is that the language of sexual orientation did not exist in the ancient.

And what does orientation mean? I want to have sex with same sex. Yes, absolutely. Then that definitely existed. Not have those languages. The language to speak of it. This. Yes, they did not. They most certainly understood that I want to have sex with man. If I want to have sex with man, I can describe that. I want to have sex with man. The Japanese did this. The ancient Samurai did this. They have documents, documented history of ancient Samurai, and they would use boys who they were, um, they were trying to make into Samurai. They would use them as essentially sex toys. And, yeah, they talked. And by the way, there's old books on sexuality. I don't know if you know this or not. Very, very old, detailed books. My arguments from hundreds and hundreds of years before your idea of orientation. You're just piggybacking on the same ideas which already existed.

I think you're completely misunderstanding.

Okay, give me the argument again. But I don't understand where you think I'm taking this argument. The argument quite simply is, this is not like a foundational point to anything, but simply an objective reality that the concepts of homosexuality, bisexuality, and heterosexuality did not exist as such in the ancient world. Yes, people understood. I don't think Emperor Hadrian would have said, "I am gay." He, in his lifetime, had sex with men and women. And then he has this beautiful relationship between him.

Yes, but that's where the smuggle comes in. It is foundational, whether you know it or not. So here's the smuggle. All you're doing is taking language.

And adding new descriptors to Old activity, it's just new descriptors, that's it. Right? When you say they didn't have the command of the language, they did. They just called it different things, but it was the same exact thing. All you're doing, you're—well, while you're creating this conflation. When you say to Christians, "They didn't really have a concept of homosexual," well, no, actually, they did have a concept of homosexuality. It's just that they didn't use the same descriptive terms that you use from the 1900s.

So what would—so what, why would that matter? They would not describe it in the same way. When they thought about sex, it was more about social status than it was about an orientation or a psychological disposition. First of all, can we clear this up? Because what you're talking about is mostly with nobles, right? And the way that peasants, the way that peasants and non-noble classes viewed marriage was completely different than how nobility viewed marriage. Even when you're talking about Rome, for instance, when you're talking about the social classes and you're saying, "Well, you know, higher rank classes could basically, at their whim, they could rape their slaves," things like this. This is true, right? But for the average Roman citizen, it was not. And when you're talking about in medieval Europe or in Japanese culture, these are cast systems, okay? And the meaning, the meaning of these things from the nobility class was completely different than it was for the peasant class. So again, these descriptors don't actually make sense.

I'm not a scholar of any of those other places. I'm—when I'm speaking, I'm speaking of the Greco-Roman world of the first century. That is all I claim to know. Yeah, I know. But don't you think that it's important if you're going to make these kind of bold claims about the conflation of human sexuality and then you only isolate it to one particular culture, in this case Rome, even though the entire rest of the world actively participated in sexual activity, that your idea that people just didn't know what the [ __ ] it was is absurd because it's so isolated? Because, because I'm a scholar of the New Testament, and that's what I'm interested in in these arguments and conversations. Yeah.

Well, this, uh, would go to this idea. So, uh, Romans themselves studied all sorts of cultures, right? They studied what they considered "barbarian" cultures. That's where we got, we get "barbarian" from, because you all sound like this, "bbbbbb," right? That's where we, that's where "barbarian" comes from. Yeah. And they documented many of these cultures and they definitely gave descriptors for these activities, sometimes frowning upon these activities, sometimes not. Depends on which scholar you're looking at, depends on which philosopher you're looking at. But to say that the people who grasped, uh, logic, comprehensive propositional logic, which modern logic is based on, modern philosophy, didn't understand keys to human sexuality and only through esoteric psychology in the 1900s we were finally able to grasp it, is [ __ ] insane.

The, the, what you're doing is you're using a fallacy of modernism. So you're saying, you're—the entire argument that you're using is fallacious. It's from a modernist perspective. You're making the claim that we came up with new descriptors for an old phenomenon which already was known. It was, was debated about in many cultures all over the world. And even the Romans themselves, uh, discussed this, depending on which era they were in, based on their observations. And we know these insights because we have their observational papers of other tribes. It's simply not true. Sexual orientation as a psychological, biological, innate disposition towards an attraction was not how the ancient Greco-Roman world thought about sexuality.

Let's see if this is true. When you say psychological phenomenon, psychology is the study of the mind. Yes. You don't believe in it? Yes. Okay. Is it the study of the brain? Partially. Yes. No. Yes. It's no. Okay. Well, so, so psychologist, what part of the brain do they study? If you're going to try to make the argument that there's a, that we're going to talk about like neurology and people that are actually studying the physical nature of the brain. Yeah, those aren't psychologists. Those are neuroscientists. Those are, uh, those are— Yeah, yeah. So there is a massive separation between a neuroscientist and a psychologist. Psychologist study pastoral counseling classes. We studied the brain itself. Oh, which part? We talked about what each part of the brain does and what. Okay. Yeah. Okay. So the anxiet—so let's, so let's dive into this. Psychology is a predictor for human behavior. That's it. That's all. That's all it even can be. Okay. Yeah. Can you tell me what the disease process is in psychology? What is the process? The disease process? Tell me more about what that means. Well, in science, science is only as useful as the controls which you add. So in medical science, if we're going to diagnose a disease, we use a process called the disease process. It's a step-by-step inductive process which goes through and utilizing strict regulatory scientific controls, rules everything out that the thing can't be, therefore isolating the thing that it is. What is the disease process in psychology? Again, I'm not a psychologist, so I don't know actually how to answer this question. I thought you were super familiar in your pastoral. No, I said all I said was that. Well, let me help you. There isn't one. There isn't one. There is no disease process in psychology. And the reason there is no disease process in psychology is because it's the study of a metaphysical mind. It is not the study of anything which is physical.

Really? Then tell me this, sir. Could a psychologist diagnose a person with narcissism? What makes them correct? That you can see behavior patterns that clinically line up with narcissism. Interesting. But every single behavioral pattern a person can have, they can have all of the patterns which would fit with a narcissist and not be diagnosed as a narcissist because it's completely, objectively up to the psychologist, the studier of the mind, to make this assessment. When you have a disease, an actual disease or illness, there's a process that is absent your independent subjective mind. You go, "Wait, you see that big [ __ ] tumor right there? That's the problem." And here it is, and I'll show it to you. That process does not exist with psychology. What you've done is you've made a grouping, a mind grouping, based on, uh, what you consider to be proclivities, and just renamed them, and then you try to pass it off as though it's true.

So, so let's start with this. Give me any scientific proof whatsoever that homosexuality is an innate characteristic, that it occurs naturally throughout the world. I think that's what we would mostly say. Wait, wait, I'm sorry. Uh, let's, let's back up. Did you just, did you just appeal to nature? Yes. I'm going to make lots of appeals in this debate. But first of all, and also, I'm going to say I'm humble enough to admit that I'm not going to, I'm not here to debate psychology. I'm here to debate theology and the Bible. Yeah, but the problem is is that, well, no, you're not. You're here to debate whether or not LGBTQ belongs in church. And one of the premises, one of the premises for that is that your worldview is dependent upon science, psychology, sociology, and a few other things. So, so, so, so you making justifications based on those things, perfectly acceptable for me to enter into criticisms on the tenets in which you hold the values that you make these assessments. So when we're talking, acceptable for me to say, "I don't understand psychology enough to feel like I can credibly debate it with you." Great. But you can credibly base your worldview on it? Yes. I can cite psych, psychotherapists, psychologists, and trust their work. Yes. Based on that, their work is peer-reviewed scientific. Faith? No. Well, actually, most of it did. Well, I am a man of faith. So, yeah. There's called a replication crisis. I don't know if you know this or not, but inside the replication crisis, almost all, we're talking 60, 70% in psychology, even worse, sociology, cannot be replicated, which is a key component to the scientific method, as you know. Um, by the way, can you just tell me real quick what the scientific method is? Yes. That you're able to repeat a process. No, no, just tell me the method. I don't, I'm not going to know what language. You don't know the scientific. So you base your worldview on science, you don't know the scientific method. You base it on psychology, and you don't know anything about psychology. Like, where, I don't understand. What do you actually base your worldview on, sir? Um, scientific consensus, psychology, reason, experience, theology, tradition, the Bible, faith. Yeah. You base it all on faith. Yeah, I do. I'm a man of faith, of course. So you base, you base the fact that we should utilize psychology, which you don't know anything about, on faith? And, and you base the fact that we should base these things on science on faith as well? Right. Amen. Okay. So if you should base these things on faith, these human institutions that you just have broad faith in for no particularly described reason, should, why shouldn't I have? Well, okay, yeah. Peer review can be good. Meta-analysis is way better. The problem is in psychology, you don't have a lot of that. You have peer review, that's true. But a meta-analysis for the actual proofs of reproducibility, not very good at all. So since you have faith in these things, in these institutions, why shouldn't I have faith that LGBTQ, open LGBTQ, and the activeness of, uh, gays in the church, shouldn't be re—why shouldn't I just have faith in that? I don't think that you shouldn't have faith in that. I disagree with it. I think it's wrong. But I don't object to the fact you have the right to believe that. So do we just come to all of our moral decisions via consensus then? No. I am actively against your view. I actively spend my life working against your view, subverting. So even if there was consensus that it was the case, that most people agreed with me, you would, of course, say that that's incorrect, right? Of course. Based on scripture, science, reason, psychology, we can go through the list again and again. B— Well, but all of those things you said, uh, the, the things, we'll leave scripture, we'll leave scripture side for a second, right? We'll just focus on the materialist perspectives. These things you said, you claim you don't even understand, and you just have faith in them as being true. Yeah, I have a general understanding from being in with a psychotherapist for 15 years of my life. I understand how that works in my own world, and it seems to work. So I have a lot of reason to trust that that's good. True faith? Yeah. Amen. Yeah. Faith. So the thing is is that, uh, I, well, I don't understand because if that is the standard of just have faith, if you have faith in this thing, then it's true, right? Or at least it's the only truth we can ascertain. No, I don't. I don't believe that we can absolutely ascertain the objective truth. Then what makes, what makes your view true? It's true in the way it lives out in my life. I'm not. So then, so then if, so then if it is the case that the thing, the thing is only true because it's true to you, right? Therefore, faith, your faith would have to be true. It's true to you, right? It's true to me. But I'm not going to say it's objectively true for all people. No. Okay. I'm not saying it is. But even if it wasn't, right? Then there's no actual good reason you can give me why subjectively, if I can't just convince everybody to agree with me in this whole Christian nationalism crusade thing in order to discriminate against LGBTQ people by pushing them out of the church. Can you give me a good compelling reason outside? Because I really don't want you to. Andrew, I can give you a good biblical reason for sure. Give me a good, good. Well, we'll get to, to the biblical ethics soon. That's what I'm here to talk about. I just want to start with the, the, the. Well, but that's not your only foundation. You don't appeal. Okay, so you appeal to the Bible. A biblical scholar. I function as a biblical scholar. Is the Bible the ultimate truth? No. Okay. Well, then whatever your epistemic claim is then about the Bible, you basing your worldview off of the Bible is meaningless to me because you're already saying it's not true. I didn't say it's not true. I didn't say it's not the ultimate truth. Yeah. Okay. Ultimate being, ultimate being 100% true. No, no book is ultimately true. Okay. Got it. So then, so then again, any claims you make there are going to be faith-based. And just like any claims that you, well, I'm sorry, are the, are the claims you're about to make true? I believe they are true. Yes. Okay. Why do you believe that they are true? For the, I believe there's great biblical evidence and moral evidence that they're true. Let's start with the moral evidence. Well, I think we've already beat that one down when we got stuck on a. We haven't. We haven't beaten down moral evidence with truth. So now we're, now we're getting into epistemic claims. We're talking about epistemology. So I would like to know, uh, what is your theory of truth? I believe that an objective truth exists. I don't believe that we can know it objectively. I think that's quite clearly true that every—ation, we continue to wrestle with the same questions and try to get to the same truth. However, I do believe in revelation of truth. I think we get glimpses of truth, and that's in my Christian faith tradition, and the way I hold the Bible, that's what I use to guide my own sense of truth. So then truth itself is not a thing which you can know. Objective truth is not a thing that I can know objectively. Okay. So I don't understand when you say something is true, what does that mean? Well, I do think there are different kinds of truth here that we're talking about. And so is it true that we are on a live stream right now debating? Yes, that's one kind of truth claim. I think totally. I think categorically it's different when we're talking about divine truths. Does God exist? What does God desire? That's a different kind of truth. Why? I think, I think it's just obvious. Well, I don't know. It's not obvious to me. What makes him different? As far as, I'm not a philosopher, so you're not going to get me to use, uh, the correct language here and be able to out. Well, I need to, I'm just trying to understand the view. I'm not even asking for a philosophical justification yet. I'm just trying to ask if there's a distinction between divine truth and the truth that we're right now having this discussion. What is it? Because I think the divine truth claim ultimately comes down to a claim of faith. This, uh, experience that we are having a live stream right now, we can deduce from logic, reason, all those other things that are, that help us function on our day-to-day lives. Okay. So, so, so you know we're on a live stream right now because you know it, because I can see it, I can touch it, I'm talking to you. Yeah. So then truth, truth would rely on sense data then sometimes? Yeah. Okay. Well, what, what divine truth would not rely on sense data? I don't think whether or not God exists is a truth claim that needs to rely on sense data because I think a vast majority of people that believe in a God that exists, don't have sense data that God exists. Yeah. So what would make it true? Faith. Faith. Okay. So then is faith true? It's true that you have faith. But is the thing you have faith in true? I think by the very fact that you have faith, I don't think you can answer whether it's true or not. It's a faith claim. Okay. Got it. So then when you say that claims about divinity are a different kind of truth, yeah, you're actually saying that, well, we have faith, and so they're not true. No, I'm saying we have faith because we can't prove that they are true. So then, so then are they, so then you can't ascertain that they're true? Yes, that is what faith is. Not being able to. Okay. Got it. So when it comes to scripture and when it comes to Christianity, all the claims that you're making, which are faith-based, you are stating right now are not true. Are not true? No. Okay. Well, then what would make them true? The fact that we have faith in them. Ultimately, we believe as Christians that one day we will know the full of truth. Okay. So then, so then we should ascertain here that everything that you're saying or about to say to me about scripture could not or may not be true because it's all, because it's based on faith. I say it every single Sunday in my pulpit. Yes. That's exactly what I say. So God may not be true. Yes. God may not be true. Jesus Christ may not be true. May not be true. I have faith. I don't have certainty. Okay. And, uh, the ethics which you are basing your entire life on, also may not be true. Sure. And, and the only reason that you have them is because you have faith in them, right? Absolutely. So if somebody else does not share this faith with you, I just have a simple question for you. Why are they wrong? I don't have a good answer for why they're wrong except that my claims, I can hold up to them and say that if you're causing harm to another person, and my faith claim says that you should love your neighbor as yourself, that to me seems wrong. I see. So, um, and I think it's fair for you to get a cross-examination of your own. And I'll give you one. Uh, but the thing is, but the thing is that I, I still don't actually understand this. So if Christian nationalists make all of their claims of truth through faith, yeah, what is your objection that I believe it causes harm to other people? That I believe it's anti-constitutional? And I do trust our system of governments. I see. So the reason that they're wrong is because they're going to do harm. So that's what that, then is what we're actually, so when we s—when we get all this kind of reduced, then here's what we figured out. Your actual objection to my worldview is that you think it's harmful. I do. Yes. Okay. And we have deduced that your harm is a subjective metric, which you come up with through faith. Not completely. I would argue that some of the things that you think are subjective are not subjective. I think psychological harm and psychological data is not subjective. I do think that that psychological harm is not subjective. Really? No. I think it's very clear that if somebody is increasing in depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation based on an experience, that that is something easily seen objectively. But could you, uh, identify it and cure it? Yes. How? Religious trauma therapy is something I help people with all the time and connect people to psychotherapists all the time to do that. And, and what is the cure rate? Pretty high. My life, I've benefited greatly from it. I can speak subjectively. And you're, so you're cured? I'm a lot better than I was 10 years ago. That's not the question I asked. Are you cured? I don't know what cure means in a psychologic— The disease no longer is there. The illness is not there anymore. That's not the language. It's not a disease. So what is it? It's a disorder. It's a trauma. There are other language that's used. But you know what else is a language besides illness? Something not right. Something not correct. So you're, you're operating incorrectly, right? You're malfunctioning in some way? Less than, less than. Okay. So what is that besides illness? I think it's a game. It's not a word that. Well, semantics are super important to debates for reason that way we have clarified language. Not a professional debater. You are. So thank you for. Okay. So, so just let's, let's clarify this real quick so that we have this down to. So we've deduced that truth is not only subjective, but that most of your worldview resides around faith. Not just faith when it comes to God, but faith in human institutions as being true, or at least truth apt. Truth apt, maybe. There there could be, if they're aligned with my central principle of loving your neighbor as yourself. Yeah. With your, with your, and that's a subjective principle too, right? Because that might not be true. There's no way to know it's true. Yeah. Yeah. So if we're both subjectivists, let us, let us assume for a moment that I was not a Christian at all, but rather that I was an atheist. Okay. Okay. A secular atheist, but held the exact same views, the exact to the letter that I hold right this second. Yeah. How could you, the subjective observer who bases everything along faith and intuition, possibly object to me who's doing the exact same thing? Talk to me a little bit more about what you're trying to ask. What I'm saying is this, in very, very plain language. Yeah. If I came to all the views that I currently hold right now, absent God or Jesus Christ or anything like this. Sure. The only objection that you would actually hold against it is that it's against your preference. No, I would look at the harm as well. I believe. Yeah, that's going to be a subjective metric. Well, I do think that most metrics that we function by as human beings are subjective. Yes. Yeah. So if it's a subjective metric, then from my subjective metric, I could just as easily deduce it's non-harmful and great. I'm glad you do that. So if that's the case, how do you object from a person who says, "No, it is." Let me give you an example. Do you think it's harmful to not, uh, label people with their correct pronouns? Yes. But in a different, there are gradations of harm. Sure. But do you also agree that it would be harmful from somebody who had religious values to not lie to tell them those pronouns? I would think that that's wrong because I would say that the. I'm not asking you that. I'm not asking you if you think it's wrong. I already know that you think it's wrong. I'm asking from the, from the viewer's perspective, the person who you're asking to label them, if they think it's a lie, how can you demonstrate it doesn't harm them? Well, see, I wouldn't use harm as the only frame. I would also use, as you've so brilliantly said in your opening, kindness as a frame. I do think there's value to kindness and kindness, and I do think it is unkind to refer to someone in a way that they do not want to be referred to. Is it kind to me? Is it kind to ask people to lie? I don't think it's a lie. I know, but the other person, we've already ascertained, you, you don't know if anything is true. We've already ascertained that. So the other, you could never tell a person who said, "Me, me saying to this person over here, giving them the incorrect pronoun harms me. It harms me in my mind. It harms me, my psych, my, it harms my psychology or whatever the [ __ ] it is." Right? Yeah. You have no way that you could ever determine that statement is not true. The way that you are articulating this debate, and I appreciate it, and I understand what you're doing, but it's not the way people walk through the world. No, it is not. Then why do you think we're fighting about this all the time? Do you think that people are fighting, fighting over pronouns because they just want to be mean? Or do you think that they're fighting over pronouns because they think that they're lying and that there's a truth which we can clearly see is a truth, which is, uh, you are trying to mask this truth and pretend it's something other than it is? So they feel like they're compelled to lie. That is how people move through the world. I think that what's actually happening here is that there is a group of people motivated by political power rather than religious conviction that have stoked fears for people about what pronouns mean. Fear is harmful. You shouldn't. Here's the thing. If you're going to be, if you're going to engage in a behavior which stokes fear, how's that not doing harm? I think the only reason using pronouns stokes fears is because conservatives with YouTube channels have stoked the fears of people. Perhaps. But, but if the, absent this behavior, they couldn't stoke that fear, therefore you're doing them harm because it's a subjective metric. Do you understand? Like it's a subjective metric. You can't make the demonstration that, oh, it's harmful to us if you don't do it. But at the same time, not concede that it's harmful to us if we don't, if we don't, if we don't. Like for me, I'm going to tell you, it's like, it's actually harmful to me when you ask me to lie about a person's sex, right? But also, can I, can I just say, but I'm not also, I'm not, I would agree with like, I don't believe the government should compel speech either. So I don't think that this should be. I do think there's room for disagreement on the issue of pronouns. I don't think anybody should be forced by law to use language. But this is very sneaky, isn't it? Because you still think that people should, they ought to do it because it reduces harm, right? Yeah. Yeah. But why is it that we need to default to what you think reduces harm instead of the default to the other P? So for instance, there's way more people who don't want to use pronouns than people who do. Way more people who don't. I would like to on that. So, so if that is the case, okay, and it is the case that they don't, that they don't want to go and use your [ __ ] correct pronouns, right? They just don't want to. Um, but let's assume for a second, right? Let's just fact, we'll just assume I'm wrong, right? But I'm just going to say this for the purpose of demonstration. Let's just say it was like 51%. Okay. Every time they used a pronoun that they didn't agree was true, that's going to harm them. Why is it that you don't default to them? I don't. This way you're trying to use harm is a very interesting way. What way should we use harm? I think that there's a demonstrable harm that's being done. I'm not, I'm not with. Well, that's just saying the word as the word. What is harm here? You let me finish. Yeah, but I need you to clarify that. What is har— I'm trying to clarify, right? So I think that there's a distinction between, and I agree, I think one of the problems on the left is that we have melded offense with harm. I don't think that being offended is necessarily being harmed. I don't think being, feeling disrespected is necessarily being harmed. So that's all, that's all, uh, uh, you know, misallocating a pronoun is is offensive. Yeah, I think it's rude. I think it's not loving your neighbor as yourself. I don't. Yeah, but it's offensive. We're going to give it five. Understand. We'll go into Brandon's. Yeah. How can this be? How can this be an a claim, Brandon, that you say that I think that, uh, when you're offensive, right, that people shouldn't take offense, but at the same time say that it's rude in some way to not tell a person the truth about what their sex actually is? So again, my claims are rooted in the person and the faith of Jesus Christ, and therefore I believe loving your neighbor as yourself means referring to them the way that they would like to. Now, I get your point that you think, uh, it's lying to them. And to that, I would say, you have every right to believe that. That doesn't mean that it's not unkind, uh, to speak whatever you believe is true. Don't you think that it's kind to not lie to people? I know that you think that. Yeah. Don't you think that? I don't think it's a lie. Do you think it's kind to not lie generally? Yes. But I, okay, great. So, so then if that is, okay, well, demonstrate the truthfulness of it. I think gender is subjective. And I believe that gender, Iden—there's no truth. I, if it's objective, then there's no truth. So all you're saying, oh, so here's what you're actually saying is based on the conditions of social relativity within the society that I live, this is considered to be a social taboo, and so you should adhere to it because I don't like it. That's it. You're just saying the offense, the risk of offense here is trumped by the risk of offense to me because you just don't like it, right? I would actually say that there is biblical justification for where my worldview is rooted. And again, we can play in the philosophical space. Why do we need to use biblical justification when the Bible may not, when it, but it may not be true? Brandon, I'm a Christian, and I do believe that Jesus's words are true. Okay. Can you demonstrate the truth of the, of your Christianity? For me, loving my neighbor as myself leads to abundant life, just as Jesus taught. I've witnessed that and experienced that. Prove it. Show it in my experience. I think experience isn't proof. That's anecdote. Prove, prove it. Experience is an authority. Yeah. It's one of. Experience is an authority on what? Yes. This is, I mean, the Wesleyan quadrilateral, experience has always been an authority for Protestants, of course. Oh, help, help me out here. Uh, if somebody experiences great joy when they're murdering somebody, right? You couldn't trivialize that experience then, right? I didn't say experience is the authority. I said it's an authority. Oh, well, what is the authority? There is no the authority. We have. Well, then, well, you just contradicted yourself. You say experience is not the authority. There is no the authority. So if there is no the authority, you appeal to an authority which again isn't even true by your own metric. It's God. You're appealing to God. Yeah. That, but God may not be true. Yeah. That's why I have faith in God. Yeah. So this, so what you're making here is an appeal to something you don't even, you're not even sure is true. If, if you were to go, if the tenant is logic and science and reason, right? Do you think anybody who, who, who engaged in reason ever engaged in reason if you walked over to them and said, "I'm about to tell you something, but there's a possibility, and it's even a good possibility, it may not be true. I just want you to believe it because I have faith in it." Do you think that any reasonable person who, who uses reason, would ever believe what you said after that? Yeah, I think billions of people do believe that in various religions around the world. That's not what I asked you. I asked you if a man of reason, reason, if you went over to him and said to him, "I'm about to tell you something that may not be true," that he would say that he would say, "Oh, well, then I should believe that." No. Right? No. I do think so. Yes. Think so. I think that's what faith is about. Okay. Okay. So, uh, very quickly, I'll wrap up with this, but so that we can get over to, you know, your, uh, your attack or whatever. Um, here's, here's a couple of questions I have from the biblical stance. Um, from, and I, I'll read this out to you. I would like to know the answer to this. Ephesians 5:22 through 33. This is Paul's prescriptions on marriage, as you know, okay? Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do the Lord. If two gay men get married, who's the wife? So you're trying to make a descriptive statement, a prescriptive statement. Paul is writing to a general heterosexual context. He's not addressing same-sex marriage relationships, which did not exist readily in his world. So he had no reason to address them. Paul was in Rome. And so, hang on, back up, back up. Peter, when you're talking about Peter, you're talking about Paul, you're, these people were dealing with cultures which were inundated with homosexual relationships, not marriages. Yeah, no, not marriages, but they didn't make a prescription for marriage. So the thing is is that are you just saying that Paul was only applying this to this particular people group and that's it? Yeah, he was writing a letter to a specific. So then if that's the case, then prescriptively, this shouldn't actually yield us any fruit for any marriage ever? No, I think you're not hearing exactly what I'm saying. Paul was writing that letter to a specific church of which he was the founder and the pastor of. So he's writing about a question that was raised to him. That's what an epistle is, a response to. Sure. And he's, so someone asked a question about a husband and wife, and he's responding about husbands and wife. If he was asked a question about two men getting married, Paul certainly would have responded, but he was asked that. I see. So, um, you don't believe that the idea of marriage is that the man takes the Christ head and the woman represents the body of Christ, and the man the head? You don't believe that that's true in marriage? I don't think that that has to be limited to male or female. Okay. So can you explain how that would work with males who would be the Christ head? I don't think it's a precisely how it works with male or female either. Well, how does it work? You're the authority here. Tell me. No, I'm not interested. I want to. How does it work? You're the one using a metaphor used by the Apostle Paul and taking it as an ob— Now, it's a metaphor. I thought you just said it was a descriptive claim that he was making based on the people group of the time. You're using different verses. Paul can switch between, uh, linguistic styles as he's writing, and he does often. So when he starts talking about the head, the male being the head, do you actually think he means that the male is Christ? No, no. It's a representation of the Christ head, and the woman is a representation of the body of Christ. So if it is the case, Brandon, that he's just silent on this, and this is, by the way, I would say Paul was kind of the authority on, uh, how it works with Christian marriage. This is how most Christians model marriage is after Paul. I just want to know since he didn't give us anything on this, Brandon, what does Brandon think? Who is the representation of the Christ head in a gay marriage, and who's the body? I think that either person in a male or female relationship could represent Christ or represent the Church. Of course. Okay. So, so Paul was wrong? Yeah. Paul's wrong on lots of stuff. Oh, okay. So you just don't believe that Paul was correct about anything he endorsed? No, I didn't say that. See how do you jump from that? This is the problem with your side. I say Paul is wrong on something because wrong on everything. Because the, the thing is is that the Bible self-referencing, and because it's self-referencing, it has to build off of itself, and it has to be coherent. Has to be. It's not a coherent book. It's a, it's not. If it's not coherent, there's no reason for us to believe anything that's stated in it. That's such an absurd argument. It's ridiculous. That's how any historian would view anything, by the way. Why would you? Bible is, you don't know what the Bible is. I'm sorry. Help me out. Help, help me out here. Uh, I'm, I'm guessing you don't believe in Exodus, right? There's no, there's no actual physical proof that, uh, the Jews, um, were ever in Egypt and that they were ever cast out. Correct. Uh, no, I think some of the growing historical consensus is that it was probably much smaller than the Exodus. Well, they don't know. Presents. They don't know. The physical proof is is extremely scarce, right? Sure. Okay. But if you have foundations which are laid, okay, foundations which are laid inside of something, and then one turns out to be false, the rigorism of the text itself should be in question. But the Bible is not self-referential. It is a library of texts. People didn't know that they were going to be part of one compiled text, especially the New Testament and the Old Testament. And so I think it's completely absurd to try to say that the Bible needs to be univocal. It's not. It was never a book. It's a library. You're, you're what you're doing again is you're jumping ahead. I need you to address what I'm saying to you. Yeah. Address, if you had any historical text in which a pillar which it rested upon ended up being false, would it not then be the case that you should question the rest of the hypos of such a text? No, no, because I don't think the. Can I finish? Can I finish? The writer of Exodus was not intending to write his history. MH. Okay. So how would a historian verify the accuracy of a document? What do you, in relation to Exodus? Tell me what you're, in relation to anything. How would a historian verify? You look for historical archaeological truth. If, if, but that's in a historical text. Exodus is a mythological text, quite clearly. So Exodus isn't true? It is mythically true. I believe myths contain great truth. Yeah. Yeah. No, no, but I mean, it didn't happen in reality, in objective reality. I don't think it did. No. Okay. Gotcha. It didn't happen in objective reality. So the thing is, right, is that if we're talking about Paul, Paul being wrong, if you say Paul's wrong on X, Y, or Z, right, you're kicking a fundamental pillar out in which the rest of his text should be questioned. Because any historical document, any historic document in which you find that there's things in it which are not true or were wrong or incorrect, the rest of it needs to be questioned, right? I agree. You should question all of it. That doesn't mean that there's not truth in it. It just means you should be skeptical. You should question. Of course. So you think that the Bible's all you can eat buffet? Like you just pick what you want and leave the rest behind? No, I think you use good scholarship, which clearly it doesn't sound like you understand how to do. If you read Genesis 1, for instance, Genesis 1 is a poem. It's been, it's a poetic mythic text. So the fundamentalist who want to claim that it's now a historical biological text that talks about how the creation of the world and the universe came about, they are misapplying a lens to the text that it was never intended to bear. It doesn't make the text untrue in the lessons it's trying to communicate. It just means it was not intended to be a scientific text. So you're forcing it into something that's not, which then makes it false. So when we say truth, right? When you say something is mythically true, are you saying that when you close your eyes and you envision a unicorn, right? That the unicorn is true because you're envisioning it, but it's not materially true, like the, a unicorn doesn't exist in objective reality, right? Let the metaphor that I would use, which is because I think this is what we're trying to get out, in the myth of the boy who cried wolf, this is a fable. It is true and it is not true. I think that is how much of the stories of the Hebrew Bible, in particular, function. It communicates a moral truth, but the story itself is not true. Yeah. No, no, I understand what you're saying. So in material reality, yeah, the story itself never happened. Yeah. Okay. So how do you think, well, then this, this actually, I have a bunch of questions, then I don't even know if I'll have time to feel them all, but let's just start with this. How do you think that the world came to be then? I think that God created the world in seven days. No, how long? I have no clue, and it's irrelevant to me. Okay. But he did create it. I believe that by faith. Sure. Yeah. And is that because he, he told you that? No, I believe it by faith. Did. So just through faith? And so if I said, "Well, through faith, I don't believe he did that." I'm not wrong? No, I think, I think you're wrong. But that doesn't, I can't objectively figure wrong. No. Okay. Yeah, that's, I'll just leave it there and let you. I want to be fair and give you your chance. So, no, these are good questions and I appreciate your robust, uh, dial. We might have a chance to, uh, get back into it at the end if we get a little bit of time. But how are you guys going? Do you, do you want to take a one-minute break and go to the toilet or anything like that? Uh, yeah, I could take a leak real quick. Yeah, let me do it. Yeah. All right. All right. We'll, we'll take a one-minute break. Thanks, everyone. Tell the woman to get me some more coffee.

Yeah, so, um, yeah, so, so I'm fine with the cross-examination the other way of LGBTQ in the church. I think that we were able to demonstrate a whole lot of inconsistency with the opponent's view. So just to outline mine to save him a bunch of trouble. Um, yes, I think that it's extraordinarily harmful to have LGBTQ people in church. I think that generally speaking, um, if you want to have a robust society, then you would be focusing on the normality of what makes it robust, and through that normality, people end up having predictability. And predictability in society makes society stable. Unpredictability makes it not stable. You'll see this with markets, you'll see it with everything. Sure. So instead of, uh, I'm not advocating that gay people go to prison or anything like this. This is not the advocation of the Christian nationalist, but rather that if there's going to be government campaigns and there's going to be, uh, you know, push for regularity in society, that considering we have a birth rate which is far under replacement, and most of the West does as well, that we should be focusing our national campaigns around the normality of a nuclear family, a man, a woman, because they can actually reproduce. The adoption argument here doesn't make a lot of sense. All babies are adopted. There's so many, all, by the way, and there's such a huge waiting list of heterosexual couples waiting to adopt them. There's, there's no limit. It's not like, uh, gay gay men or gay women who, by the way, don't adopt much anyway, are stepping in to fill a void where they needed. They're not. So the thing is is like, uh, yeah, I think the advocation of normality in society in order to one, assist with the reproductive rates, which I think is key, uh, for the world, especially if you're a Christian, right? I would think that you'd want people around to keep worshiping. That would be part of the point here. So the thing is is, um, yeah, that's, that's my stance. I don't think that it's good for society at all, and I don't think anybody's ever sufficiently demonstrated that it is. They just say, I just want to, that's it. Yeah. So do you think the existence of LGBT people, just the existence of them in our society, is harmful? It's not the, the existence itself. It's the normalization of this as being in some way akin to a relationship between men and women and the subversion which happens for things like marriage. So for instance, what, like, why do gay people even need to get married? It makes no sense. What is the institutional reason for this? Any more than secularists like, if you just made the declaration, "I am married," why wouldn't you be? It's, uh, the legal argument is the one I would fall down on there. That yes, I do think equality for all people, including minorities, is important. And so if two consensual opposite sex couples can have a legal status in our country, LGBTQ couples should have that same status as well. I don't think it harms anybody by giving them the same status. Yeah, but when you're talking about legalism in this sense, okay, what was the, what is the actual problem then with saying, okay, you can have the same legal statuses, we just don't call it marriage? What is the issue there? I actually, I'm again, I'm pretty ambiguous on this myself. I did advocate for gay marriage because I think if government's going to call it marriage, then that should be it. And from a religious perspective, of course, I do believe that it's not a sin to.

Be gay, so we should have access to church marriage. But in your tradition, queer people can't get married. They can in my... TR? Well, no, they... no, no, no. In, in our tradition, uh, sin is reflective of illness. We consider sin an illness. Yeah. Okay. And the church is the cure. That's, that's the tradition of Eastern Orthodoxy. Okay. We believe that, uh, the spiritual illness that homosexuals are suffering from needs to be treated. And so we would not be against homosexuals getting married, just not to men. They could get married to a woman, the same as a man. Totally equal. So the church is actually giving you the same equal prescription. It's saying, "Hey, straight men can get married to women, and gay men can get married to women." There is no big here, sir. It's the same exact case both ways. Yeah.

But do you see the problem of how unfair it would be to have a gay man enter into a relationship with a heterosexual woman, and they don't have to? Why do they have to do that? Nobody says they have to. Well, you just, you just posited the idea that gay men could get married to women. Yes. And just like straight men can get married to women. So the church is offering the same prescription to both. It's not excluding either from the prescription of marriage and who they can get married to. Gay men can get married to women, and straight men can get married to women. Both of them can get married to women. So the prescription's not changing. What's the, what's the distinction?

The question is, don't you think it's unfair to a heterosexual woman to be in a relationship with a gay man who is not sexually attracted to her? Well, this would, this would have to, um, have a supposition that, uh, sexuality is not, uh, fluid or cannot be influenced. And, and I disagree, uh, significantly with you, sir, that these are innate and immutable. It's very clear that people have changed their sexual dynamics through faith and have changed, uh, how they do things through faith and have changed how they do things through habit. And clearly, you can do something about your proclivities. It's not something you can't do anything about. I think that's true for some people. I acknowledge that fluidity, fluidity in sexuality exists, and for some people, that is a true story. I think bisexuality is demonstrable, obviously. But for those who do not have attraction to the opposite sex, I think it's unfair for them. And I, I think mixed-orientation marriages... Anybody can Google that. What do you mean? What's... Well, what's unfair? Both of them can get married to women. That seems totally for... That's fair. Like, if I say, "You can't do a thing," I can do the thing. Well, let's just clarify this. If I say I can... Well, you don't get to make the value assessment of what's unfair from a woman's preference. The church isn't forcing women to marry gay men. The woman would be wanting to marry the man, and the man, the woman. So I don't even know how you can make the claim it's unfair. To make a claim of unfairness, I... you would have to say, "Andrew, you can do a thing, and the church that I can't do." No, sir. I can't. You can't marry a man, and I can't marry a man. I can marry a woman, and you can marry a woman. So, so there, what, what, there is unfair? It's completely fair. I do, again, I would posit that it is unfair for a lesbian woman to marry a straight man or for a gay man to marry a straight woman because they, they don't have to. Exactly.

But I'm saying, and at the core, this also comes down to the obviously theological and biblical difference here that is at the core of where your tradition... Some in your tradition, there are affirming Orthodox people, of course. Uh, but some in your tradition believe that the Bible and tradition say that there is not... No, there's not, no. Listen, I can... Maybe schismatics. Maybe schismatics. But the authority on this has been, has been laid down from the church, and the, there is an official position on this. You are not to be practicing homosexual in the church as a baptized. Now, it's not to say that there's not people who suffer from recidivism or of sin, right? Or they can't have lapses that the church is going to assist with those ailments. Of course, it is. That's not what they're saying. But they're saying that you cannot be openly saying that it's perfectly acceptable to be a homosexual and an Eastern Orthodox Christian and advocate that these are reconcilable. The church does not have that stance. Nowhere theologically. Tell me how you get there.

So, so here's the thing. Uh, we can look at scripture for the theological aspect here. But the, the thing is, is the value assessment to me now for, uh, for using a scriptural argument doesn't really matter much. And here's why, because the evidences which are convincing to you are external to scripture itself, right? Us, us, us utilizing it. Even if I were to concede to your points, for instance, if we're already in the vague, uh, address here that, well, this could maybe not be true anyway, then you can just simply switch to your position to the secular idea that, well, wait a second, um, you know, I still have to use reason and science and psychology and all of these kind of end up with my harm principle. So you're mixing and conflating two different forms of ethics. So from the, from the position of Christian ethics, why it is the case is less, uh, or how even the Orthodox Church gets there is less valuable, then, uh, from your view and from mine, than whether or not we can demonstrate actual harm or unfairness here. So how is it the case, sir, that it would actually be unfair to tell men they can only marry women and women they can only marry men, regardless of their sexual proclivity? How's that unfair? I think you're mishearing that argument. But before I, the question I want to ask you is about how are you defining faith? Um, so in the Orthodox lens or in the layman's lens, how you, in your day-to-day life, think about the word faith? What does it look like? Yeah.

So I tie, well, I tie faith, Eastern, the Eastern Orthodox lens, and I'm not the authority, and I don't speak on behalf of the church. I want to make that clear. But I'll give you my, my best understanding. Faith is tied with theosis. Theosis is tied with partaking in the, in the energies of God. And that these are the affirmations of faith and what faith means. Now, if you just want, like, the layman, what is faith? It would be an unjustified belief, from a secular perspective, or it could perhaps be a justified belief absent evidence. But we would tie it to belief, right? Okay. And so that's part of this whole, in your cross-examination, the part that I honestly don't get, and maybe it's because I'm dense, but help me here. If we are people of faith, we are admitting that there are things about God that we cannot know for certain, and yet we have faith that they are true. Isn't that the basis of what faith is? No, I think that there's good philosophical evidence. So I came to Christianity logically, okay, long before I came to the faith aspect of it. So the thing is, is like, there's really good philosophical evidence, I think, for Christianity, uh, being true, and for God, most certainly being true. Like, there's really good, good evidence for this. So no, I don't think that it's contrary to logic or it's contrary to reason to... I mean, secularists and, uh, Christians both are going to end up in the same position using inductive reasoning that something uncreated created everything. Like that, that's just inductive reasoning. There's no way around that. So the thing is, it's like, then we quibble about, well, you know, could it be this or could it be that? Regardless of those things, though, um, I would say that revelation is true. You agree that revelation is true? And, uh, there's been divine revelation in my life that Orthodoxy is true as well. Though I would not use that normally in a debate because ultimately, uh, this would be anecdotal evidence. I would use other evidences. In this case, though, we're talking about LGBTQ in the church. I haven't actually seen you demonstrate how it's harmful for them not to be included, uh, as far as they must be able to have sex with each other, or else it's not fair.

Well, I just, the foundation of my argument is that it's not a sin according to the Christian scripture. As a Protestant, that is ultimately, we don't have a long tradition of robust authority or, uh, tradition that we're appealing to. So scripture alone is how I came to this conversation as a Protestant. And my study of scripture was that based on culture, context, and original languages, the Bible's not condemning same-sex relationships that are consensual and loving. Therefore, the question that I then asked was, why is the church condemning this? And that is where I get to the place that if scripture is not condemning this, and there is no moral harm from two men being in a consensual relationship, why should we continue?

Yeah, so this is the point that I'm focusing on is the harm, right? So I'm just granting for the sake of argument here, we just grant that, um, that I come to the same conditions in my brain, absent any faith in Eastern Orthodoxy or faith in Christianity at all, and still think there's actually not any harm in churches excluding LGBTQ individuals, uh, from participating in, um, sexual activity with each other. Like, there's no actual harm there. And saying, "You can't, you can't join up if you can't keep your dick in your pants." Like, what's the harm? Like, what, what is the demonstrable harm here? Yeah, precisely. And that's the question. But what is the harm? That's what I'm asking you. If you say my position is, there is no harm in sex couples having sex with one another consensually. Oh, no. Well, that... No, no, no. There's tons of harm in that. So we have, let's start with, let's start with normalcy, right? So you want, reg... Society needs to operate based on regularity. Like, you agree that that's true, don't you? There needs to be regularity in society. I think regularity changes and evolves. That's demonstrably true. Not quickly. No, not quickly. Which is why... Not quickly. So, but regularity, regularity does not evolve quickly, and it can't, because then people would go into a panic and this type of thing, right? Reproduction, reproduction is a key note for a society to sustain itself. There's no way around that. You have to have reproduction. You have to. There's no reason for us to in any way, shape, or form, if it offends the societal sensibilities, if it offends societal sensibilities for there to be gay pride parades, if it offends societal sensibilities in any way, shape, or form, to have the promotion of LGBT TQ. I can't see a good conceivable reason why society cannot just summarily reject it. It doesn't seem like it would be particularly harmful to society. I don't think it would be. Did it seem like there's a lot of bonuses? Like, here, I'll give you a hypothetical to demonstrate this, right? Yeah. Uh, you said you would marry as many men as wanted to marry each other, right? Not... I would not frame it in that way, but yes. Yeah. Okay. What if all men... Is not necessary. What, what if all men wanted to marry each other, each other, and only each other, and didn't want to marry women? Would you marry them all? I don't think that's how homosexuality works. But if it were the case, would you marry them all? I don't... I don't even know how to answer a hypo... That hypothetical. That all men want it to marry each other. Yeah. I don't... Why? Why can't you answer it? It's a simple question. It's not logically impossible. It doesn't create a contradiction. I do, because it is possible that men that there, let's say it's possible... Think that homosexuality is a choice, which is our fundamental difference. I don't think that there's... Let's just say it's immutable. And the gay gene, just like some for some reason, spreads like wildfire. I don't think a gay gene. But if there was, right? And then now, hypothetically, all men want to get married to each other and they don't want to marry women anymore. Would you marry all of those men who want to marry each other? I don't even... I don't even know how to answer this hypothetical. It seems to... Okay. Well, let's, let's try to make it, uh, less absurd. Then all men wanted to marry one other man, but didn't want to marry women anymore. Which you marry all of those men who wanted to marry one other man? Again, on, on one side of the coin, I don't believe that there's a moral harm in men marrying one another. On the other side of the coin, if we're getting to the reproduction question, I think we would have a societal issue if everybody was homosexual all of a sudden. I agreed. Now, let's reverse it. Like that homosexuality is gone. It just disappears one day. Okay? And now all of the homosexual men marry women. Uh, there's lots of benefit there. Not a single harm. Whereas in the reverse, if we did it in reverse, it would mean the extinction of humanity. So if we took, were to, if we were to take what you say is the harm to God's creation, right? The reflection of God's creation, if all men marry women from now on until the end of time. Yeah. Clearly, that is a representation of a non-harm principle in the image of God because it, that's the only way you can reproduce, right? Is for man to stick penis and vagina, right? That's the only way that that can happen. So, but the other way, it's not. So if all men turned gay, that could not glorify God's creation because reproduction would necessarily go away. But in God's good wisdom, God has only created five to maybe 10% of the population that, that has been a stable general number throughout the past however many thousand years. They could change, and it is increasing. You... No, it has. In fact, with... Is not a threat to... Let's take, let's take the trans, uh, the trans phenomenon. Trans is very different than sexuality. Yes. But most trans are homosexual men. If they are, uh, the MTF, they are... Well, by definition, they are. They're engaging in same-sex activity. Now, you can make this clarification. True. Yes. It is true. No, I don't think you know very many trans people. This is what the literature says. Most, most, most, most MTF transitioners continue to sleep with males. I'll grant you that. Would be homosexual by definition. So homo meaning same, right? Not if female. Not if they've transitioned to female. Well, they wouldn't be female. They are... No, they're not. Not even trans, not even gender ideology would say that they're female. Gender identity-wise, they are female. Yes. No, they would just say they're women. They wouldn't say they're female. Female is a sexual categorization. So, yeah. So that, that makes no sense. They're not females, for sure. Okay. So even then, and you can see the uptick in this since trans ideology has come out, which means there is at least some evidence towards social indoctrination. And the thing is, is like, when you take into account things like unal living, let's take unliving for instance. This would be a great harm by not affirming trans identity. However, if this was truly an immutable characteristic, we should have seen teens who were had this immutable characteristic in the 20s and 30s unliving themselves, and they weren't. Which either means that social stigma really works well as a counter to the idea of you unliving yourself, thus reducing harm, or it's not immutable. So that, that there's like only really two ways you can walk away from that with those outcomes.

So here's my question. If it is, were the case, even it's five or 10%, there's no logical reason for us to assume it could not grow higher. There's no reason for us to assume that. And if that is the case, except for the stability of those numbers over generations to generations, we don't know what the stability of those numbers are over generations. We only recently started the concept of sexuality. We only recently started keeping tabs of this as it became a social phenomenon, right? What you're making is an estimation. Yeah. But so your argument is based on fear that that number is going to increase such that there's not going to be any more heterosexuals in the world and the population's going to end. That seems... Yeah. Well, what I'm saying to you is that if hypothetically, were the case that homosexual sexuality increased to the point where you could no longer sustain society because people were not having sex with women, men were just preferring to have sex with each other, and that's it. Okay? Um, and by the way, this is a valid argument which is brought up against inceldom, that there can't be any male incels because they could have sex with each other. Right? I mean, that is an actual logical argument for this from your view. So it is logically possible. Um, well, I don't understand why you say no. That's a logical... Because the way you're thinking is, it seems like what you're positing is that sexuality is a choice. I don't... That's not an argument I make. So I don't think immutable. There's no reason for us to believe then if it's immutable that you couldn't have, uh, this immutable trait pass down to the point where over time, let's say 300 years, uh, it was 51% of the population is now homosexual. Something like this. Your reproductive rate is in the toilet. And since it's immutable, you don't want to sleep with women, you find it revolting, or whatever. Would you, could you see how that would not be a great reflection of the, of God's design? Because it wouldn't be reproduction going on, right? No, I think if that did happen, it would be God's design. That's the only way it... So if, if all, if all men, let's just say, turn gay tomorrow, right? Let's just say from the will of God, of course. From the will of God. Okay. So then, so then if society went extinct because of it, you would marry all those men? If... Well, society went extinct, there's no marrying of anybody. So, yeah. I know, but if the cause of marrying these men led to the societal extinction, you just wouldn't care, right? No, that would just be the will of God. Clearly. If God... Do you understand in my argument that if you believe that sexuality is innate, then it's created by God? Therefore, if all of humanity became homosexual, that would have to be God's will. So yes. Is it God's will that you have to act on it? I believe that homosexuality, as it exists, just like heterosexuality, is God's will. And therefore, we're also wired, people, to act on heterosexuality. I think a vast majority of people are wired for sexual relationship. I think, as... I'm not asking if they're wired. Like, I'm wired to punch people I don't like in the face. Does that mean I have to punch people that I don't like in the face? I reject that. You're not wired that way. I think that's okay. What about alcoholics? They're wired to, uh, to be alcoholics, but they don't. But they don't. But many of them abstain from alcohol. Like, clearly you can be wired towards an activity, not do the activity. Of course. Yeah. Celibacy is a choice. You can choose to do that. I don't think marriage or relationship is mandated. But for those for whom it is a natural wiring for them, because homosexuality is not a sin, I believe that they should engage in those relationships. Okay.

Right. So then the idea here is that, uh, what you're really advocating for is that men should be allowed to have anal sex with each other, and the church shouldn't condemn it, right? Well, I believe they should be in loving, consensual relationships with one another, yes. I don't know. What does that mean? What does that mean? It is fascinating to me that you and so many of the folks that seem to follow you on Twitter are so fascinated with the sexual part, the anus and the penis, that you love talking about. Why are you reducing it to the sex act and not also considering what it looks like for gay men or gay women? Question. I'll answer it. I'll answer it for you. Yeah. Because ultimately, what you're discussing here, if you had, uh, two really close male friends, okay? Yeah. And they just loved each other. They thought, they thought that the other guy was great. They love being in each other's company all day. They did everything together. But they never had sex. They wouldn't be homosexual. They wouldn't be. Yeah, they would just be close friends. So really, the, when you reduce the position from your end down, it's not that you're advocating for love between men. Men already love each other. The, the advocation is actually that the church says that it's perfectly acceptable for you to insert your penis into a man's anal cavity or suck them off. Like, that's the truth. That's the, that is the, it reduces to it. Like, okay, absent sex, then, absent the sex, what are we talking about here? To be very frank, I think there's something deeply disturbing about the fact that it needs to be reduced to sexual, uh, from your end. Because, yes, would you say that a male and a female can't just be in a relationship and not need to have, like, this applies across all relational patterns? Yes, you can have people that are just friends, same-sex, right? But when we're talking about marriage, right? When in the church capacity, literally what is assumed in that, what's baked into the cake there, is the distinction between you and a female friend, right? The reason this is your wife is because you're going to have sexual intercourse with her, you're going to reproduce. This is the one person you're allowed to do that. Listen, reproduction is the key. It's a key point. It's not the only point, but it is a key point. And so the thing is, is like, are there relationships between men and women that are non-reproductive? Yes. But they reflect the relationships of those that are reproductive. Homosexual, homosexual sex does not do that. And ultimately, what you're doing is your worldview does reduce down to you want the church to give permission for the sex. If that was not the case, then you would just advocate that men be really good friends. Well, I do advocate for that as well. But, um, I, yeah, I will concede to that point that of course, yes, I do believe that same-sex sex is not sinful. But it's not just the sex that we're advocating for. It is for the relationship. It is for...

Just quickly, fellas, in about 10 minutes, we're going to get to closing statements. So Brandon, you've got 10 more minutes. Whatever questions that you wanted to ask in terms of your cross-examination, then we'll get to some closings and we'll get to Super Chats. Yeah, I mean, this one, you're going to think this is nonsensical, but if I had objective evidence to prove that LGBTQ inclusion was not harmful and it actually fostered spiritual growth in people, would you be willing to reconsider your position? I think... Well, what you're asking me, I think, is logically impossible. Okay. So worldviews, worldviews are dependent upon logical possibility, sure. So if you were to, let's say, say, "Andrew, um, uh, I don't know, like, can contradictions exist?" Or something like this, or you ask me a hypothetical which entailed a contradiction, I would be able to answer it for the same reason because logical possibility can only exist within the purview of the worldview you have. Yeah. So in this case, I would say this is actually logically impossible that this could ever be demonstrated, and logically impossible that this could even happen. It's not even possible within the confines of the worldview. So no, the answer is the answer is no because it's not, it's not possible. But you've asked me a lot of things that are logically not possible. No, they're logically possible from your view. No, there's lots of... No. Okay. So you're not willing, one thing, which is logically impossible that I've asked you from your view, you're not willing to concede that if there was evidence that LGBTQ people experienced spiritual growth, LGBTQ relationships flourished as spiritual relationships in the Christian tradition, that would not be enough to have you reconsider your view? No, I'm saying that you're asking me, "What if fire wasn't hot?" You're asking me, "If all the men in the world turned gay," and all of a sudden, that's logically possible from your viewpoint. Where's the contradiction? Where's the contradiction to your worldview? Where is it? Point. It's not. No, it's not absurd. The point of a hypothetical is to test the logical consistency of the, the other person, because you're testing the logical consistency of the view in which the logic resides. Right? It only has possibility based on the view, okay? Period. So you can imagine if somebody created a religion based that said, um, aliens can't exist. Okay? Our religion is the religion against aliens existing. That's our entire religion. All of the logic and apologetics which revolves around the idea of aliens not existing, literally starts with the foundation, they don't exist. So then if you ask them, "Well, what if aliens existed?" It would be an illogical question from their view. Yeah. Do you understand? Yes. What it sounds like, what it sounds like to me, is that both of us have constructed worldviews, and your worldview is constructed in such a way that there is no possibility that you're going to get to a place where you can accept and affirm LGBTQ people. Um, I think we knew that at the beginning of... Wait, wait. Accept. I can accept that LGBTQ people exist. I can accept that there are men who have a proclivity to have sex with each other. I accept all of this as being true. What I don't accept is the idea from your view that you can demonstrate. So let's just say I even bit the bullet, right? And said, "Okay, you know, uh, it somehow it is logically possible for my worldview that this, that this could happen, that including, uh, homosexuals into the church itself is somehow going to make the church way better and assist with the spiritual health of everybody and blah, blah, blah." Let's just say that I assume this for a second, just for the sake of argument, right? So what, like, what does that prove? You're necessarily is the one who wants to be the arbiter of change. It's the radical who wants to make the introduction of the new thing to the old thing. The burden is on you to demonstrate why we shouldn't. Not on me to demonstrate why we shouldn't. We already don't. It works fine, right? There's no problem here that I can see. And you have not yet once demonstrated any unfairness. You haven't demonstrated, uh, uh, that actual harm. You haven't demonstrated anything. I can... But the problem is that you cut the foundation of the evidence because you don't believe psychology. Let's go over the evidence. I can give you psychological data reports that show consistently that rejection from the church of LGBTQ people results in higher rates of mental illness, suicidal ideation. Jesus says, "By the fruit you shall know a teaching." And clearly, if the teaching of the church is producing psychological harm in LGBTQ people, to me, that seems pretty damn basic that that must be a bad teaching. But here's the problem with this. There's a logical problem you have right away. Even assuming psychology, uh, bore good fruit, right? And wasn't pseudo-scientific nonsense. Let's just assume for a second that it wasn't, okay? The issue that you have is, show me the counter-study on the harm of the people who are in these congregations, right? And the harm that they perceive by allowing these people in. That doesn't happen. And do you know why those studies are not conducted? Because the, the harm principle here is not consistent because most of the funders of these studies are, you guessed it, LGBTQ groups, aren't they? In fact, I bet you anything that any of these studies, psychological studies that you're going to produce, and I'm happy if you produce them, I will literally send them off right this second and we'll find the source, and I can almost guarantee you that there's going to be one of two sources, and both of them are going to be gay advocacy groups. No, not the American Psychological Association or the American Psychiatric Association. But again, you're going to, you're already cutting out because you have... What I'm actually stunned that you don't believe that psychology is... The former head of the American Psychological Association came out as a whistleblower years ago and said that gay conversion therapy was bearing a lot of fruit, and that activist groups were able to infiltrate into the AMA with their political agenda to declassify homosexuality as a mental illness. That this was from outside agitation groups who were pushing versus dozens upon dozens of studies over the past 20 years. Yeah. The thing is, is that most of these studies are not reproducible. They have a publishing bias. The publishing bias is often based around the funder. You can imagine if I said, "Ah, well, I have tons of studies which are funded by Christian nationalists to say, 'Oh, it hurts the psychology of Christian nationalists if we're not allowed to not have LGBTQ in our church.'" You would, you would immediately say, "Wait, this is bias. That's unreasonable. This is ridiculous." You would say the exact same thing. So the thing is, is like, look, uh, I want to see if you want to really do scientific evidence. You want to really convince me with scientific evidence, then do it. Then do it the proper way with proper control sets. Control set one: LGBTQ group feels discriminated against, so therefore it harms their psychology. Okay, I'm willing to concede that. That's not what the... That wouldn't be it, precisely. It's much... Okay, but I'm willing to concede that. But show me the counter data for all of the other people which have to deal with that, and what their psychology is like. Do you have any of that? No. What? Tell me what they have to deal with. What does that mean? It means that the idea, the idea of you attacking, like, let's say, for instance, you were fundamental Muslims, like a core part of your belief is like that homosexuals have to be executed. Let's say, like, let's just say that's the core part of your belief. Are you saying that necessarily, if people came in and said, "No, you have to deal with this now, right? We're calling ourselves Muslims and we wrap ourselves in like a, a rainbow shroud, all right? And, and march and march around in the streets and things like this." Uh, you, are you saying that that's not going to psychologically upset all of the fundamentalists? Of course, it is. So when we're talking about the demonstration of harm, the same thing would apply here with fundamentalist Christians. You need to show me that it's not harmful to me when I say, "Wait, based on my faith and based on my truth, you're not allowed to be gay and a Christian." And for you to claim that you are, it hurts. It hurts me psychologically. You've already conceded that it's not harmful. You said the Orthodox Church is happy to have gay people in the congregation. So clearly it's not harming any acting, not as acting homosexuals, but to treat them, to treat them... How do you know? Do you kick out people who masturbate? Are they allowed to... No, they, they, they're, but they're there to be treated for masturbation. Or they to be treated for these things. How do you know if they're masturbated? Confession is for, okay? Yeah. The idea is that you have to take them. The idea is that they're telling you these things, these spiritual struggles that they have, so that you can assist with those struggles. That's what the whole point of it is. And so the thing is, is like, that's the only way you could ever do anything, by the way. So they, they let you know what the, the sins are that they're experiencing struggles with. Your spiritual father, in this case, your priest, his entire job, and that of the church as a congregation, is to assist you with not just this, not just with sin, but in all aspects of life, to, to, to assist you if you're in financial straits, to assist you if you're having marital issues, to assist you for all sorts of things, because there's the community aspect which goes with a spiritual aspect. So here's the question. The question becomes, like, if you want to uproot that, if you want to uproot those fundamental beliefs, it would be impossible, I think, for you to demonstrate that would not be harmful to the people whose beliefs you're uprooting. I think the degree of harm is a difference here. And I do think that the, again, there is, of course, psychological data, I'm sure, would support that forcing anybody to believe one thing or another thing through some means of force is going to be harmful. But I do think it's objective in any situation, whether it's homosexuality or... Nobody's using force against LGBTQ people. Sir, they're not using force to reject them from the church. Yes, they are. What, what force is being used? Have you seen Stephen Anderson down in Arizona? Have you seen what force is he using? What force is he using? He's literally talking about getting guns, lining them up, and shooting them. So... Sounds like for... Yeah. So, so wait a second. So you can't say that if you have somebody who is utilizing a rhetoric against the laws of the land, right? That this is a reflection of mainstream Christianity. It most certainly is not. That's one. And two, hang on. But two, the thing is, is like him, even you saying him talking about this, right? Him talking about this, that is not actually the use of force. Same thing if you say, "Well, wait a second, we're not forcing you to accept us. We're just petitioning that you do." Okay? We're not forcing you out. We're just not including you. What force are we using? To your point, I'll concede to you that not, I don't think all situations of exclusion are force. But I do think when you're a young person sitting under the teaching week after week, or in a family week after week, where you're being told that this part of you, which you believe is innate, that you did not choose, and you cannot change, is fundamentally broken, flawed, and if you take the Bible literally, worthy of death, that is going to have psychological impact. And I do believe there are ample studies that show that. Sure, there'll be psychological impact the other direction too, if you say, "You have to accept." "You have to accept." So all you're talking about is a mindset of feelings, right? Which is a thing that you, is a thing that you are in control of. Is your mindset. And so the thing is, when you say, when you say, "Wait a second, uh, this is harmful because you won't include." Okay, well, it's harmful if I can't exclude based on what my priority values are. For instance, if you said that I have to accept, I don't know, like, a kid diddler next door, right? I have to, you have to accept that, Andrew, right? And I'm not drawing the comparison to saying homosexuals are kid diddlers. It's not what the point was before you go there. I'm sure you've heard that a million times, right? Um, though we could get into... But the point is, is that if there was, right? You say, "Well, you have to accept it." No, I don't. Why do I have to accept? No, no, I don't have to accept it. They can [ __ ] right off. I don't have to accept it at all. They can kiss my ass and screw. All right? I don't have to accept that. Why should I? And if you say I do have to, how could you, how could you then not make the same claim? It's the same thing. It's the same type of psychological harm, same kind of psychological harm that you're experiencing by... Yeah. So, so then this is the thing, right? Yeah. So, so you're talking about is freedom of association here, okay? I mean, at the end of this, just quickly, fellas, we're going to wrap this up in a minute. So a little bit here, and then we're going to get into Super Chats. I know Brandon, you've got it hard out at 8:00. So, uh, yeah, we'll just wrap this up after a few minutes. Yeah, I mean, this is kind of going towards closing statement, but it does seem like, and I think you've pointed this out, that we have two fundamental, very different starting points and assumptions. I know you believe that my worldview is inconsistent because I rely so heavily on subjective, uh, knowledge and what I would call faith. Um, but because we don't have the same authorities, it's impossible to come to any sort of agreements on almost any of these issues. And but that's where you fail, though. You see, because there is no normative authority for which we can appeal to, and you don't even think that there is one. Which is possible. I do believe. Okay. What is it? God. Okay. God. Okay. So we're both appealing to God. I say I have divine revelation from God that LGBTQ people cannot be a part of the church. You make the counter claim, I have divine revelation from God that they can be. Right? Who do we go with here? You have to use logic, reason, you know my spiel. All right? So, so, so the normative authority can't be appealed to if there's disagreement based on the normative authority. So there isn't one. So ultimately, if we have to appeal to reason and logic and all these other things, that's fine. But I've given you plenty of logical reasons why there is no unfairness. I've given you the same logical reason back as to the harm principle and why that doesn't make any sense in this context, because everything that you claim is harmful from being excluded, I can make the counter claim, I'm being harmed by not being allowed to exclude, thus curtailing my freedom of association. So the thing is, is like, all of these claims that you make, you don't really have a good grounding to make any type of rejection to me, except because really, your whole worldview reduces to, "My preference, my preference, Andrew, is that you accept me." And I'm like, "Well, my preference is that I don't." And so where, so where do, so, if all that that's going to end up coming down to is consensus and force doctrine, ultimately, like, what else can it come down to? Yeah. And I would argue, I think that this, uh, kind of very put-together objective sense of worldview that you have based on all of the philosophical arguments you're making, is again, it's just a constructed worldview. It has no objective basis in reality either. I think we're all functioning from the same place because we... I'm even, I'm willing to grant it. I'm just willing to grant the entire thing because it doesn't hurt or refute in any way that LGBTQ shouldn't or should be in the church. All you're saying, ultimately, is, "Me, Brandon Robertson, has a set of preferences which are subjectively informed by other things that I can't even make the claim are true because of those things. I want you to accept me." I, okay. I'll do the same appeal. I, Andrew Wilson, don't, don't have any objective basis for truth and use logic and reason and came to a totally different conclusion than you did based on those subjective things. Why is Andrew wrong? Brandon says, "Well, he's not." Okay. Well, Andrew, why is Brandon wrong? I say, "Okay, well, he's not." So this reduces to a force value. It always reduces to a force value, ultimately. So I say, "Okay, well, no, I'm just not going to associate, and neither is the church, and we're going to widely condemn this." You don't really have any metric for which to say that's wrong. You don't really have one. And I do agree with that. At the end of the day, we're going to see who wins this argument, and I do think that our side, because it's on the side of God and truth, is going to win at the end of the day.

Well, is it on the truth? That is a very, very good place to wrap up and to get into closing statements. So Brandon, you opened before, so Andrew, you can open with your closing statements. Uh, we say, uh, probably won't need more than two or three minutes, so that way he gets the last word. Yeah. Yeah, that's fair. Um, because you did open first, so, uh, look at that. Jake running a debate the proper way. I was robbed. I was robbed of my last word in the previous debate. I was pretty upset about that. But I mean, to be fair, that, like, the only way to be really fair is if you're the opener, you get to have the last... I think that that's fair. So first, first and foremost, yeah, first and foremost, I did enjoy, uh, the debate. There was some blood sport in there, but I think it was good for Brandon to hear a lot of that. So his, here's the thing. His entire worldview reduced, when you reduce it right down to its base, you can just agree with it. You don't even, you don't have to disagree because there's no way for him to make an objection other than from the perspective of preference. And if that's the case, then he has no real grounds for which to attack your preferences back. So if it's just a reduction to preference, my preference versus your preference, then we just get down to the consensus of the majority and force doctrine every single time. So this would mean that if I can convince enough people that Brandon and and LGBTQ should stay out of churches, his only objection there is like, "Well, I just don't prefer that." That's true. Or I just don't prefer that that happen. And it's like, "Well, so what? I prefer that it does happen." And this, you'll find reduced in Christian nationalism versus this worldview. You'll, you found that he agrees with all the tenets of Satanism. And all of the tenets of Satanism also reduced to this. Right? No matter what, you can always reduce this worldview down to its actual absurdity, because the absurdity is just preference. When he says, "I want to make an appeal to the Bible." Well, he can't make an appeal to the Bible because he doesn't know if it's true. I want to appeal to psychology, but I can't defend any of its principles or values. I want to appeal to science, but I don't even know the scientific method. I want to appeal to all of these different things, but can't make a statement they're true. Don't know anything about them. Don't even understand why I follow them. And then he says it's due to faith. Okay, great. Great. Faith is a wonderful thing. I don't dispute this or disagree with this in any way. Um, the problem is, is that when you have such a, uh, low value epistemic foundation for faith, there's no justification even for having faith. That just becomes another set value of preferences again. So it's like, why should I even give a [ __ ] if he has faith? I shouldn't, right? I shouldn't even care because there's no real set value there for him. It's not even true. Like, his faith, by his own admission, might not even be true. And the Bible probably not true, or may be true, but at least a lot of a lot of it isn't true. Like Exodus, that's not true. Genesis, that's not true. What Paul says, a lot of that's not true. It's only true in the of good storytelling, but like materially true, it's no, there's no material truths there whatsoever. So everything he appeals to, he claims is false, and you can't know the truth of it. He doesn't know the methodologies behind the very things he appeals to, which is [ __ ] insane. He makes category errors based around human sexuality, claims are immutable, people could never have understood them, even though they were immutable and engaged in them all the time. And then what he does is he kind of inserts this loaded language of, "Due to psychoanalysis is in modern psychology, we're able to give descriptive terms they didn't have before." Are those terms true though? Well, no, we can't even know the truth of those terms. And from the psychological perspective, I would say, in the study of the mind, I could make counter claims on these all day long, and they would be just as true as his, because you can't demonstrate them scientifically. You cannot demonstrate a claim of the mind scientifically. Science doesn't even try because you can't make controls for it. They can't do it. So ultimately, uh, the, the whole thing reduces to this, and I'm just going to be blunt with...

This Mr. Robertson is not a Christian. There's no, it's not possible. He can't even make an appeal to Christianity because he doesn't even believe in it, okay? Or, or the truth of it. He also can't appeal to psychology. He can't appeal to medicine. He can't really appeal to anything. Uh, he doesn't even understand the basic foundations of any of these things. So, as he's going through his worldview, the whole thing just reduces to this.

"Ultimately, I believe, Andrew, that there is harm in the exclusion of gay sex from the church." That's what it reduced to. He agreed, right? That it had reduced to that. Okay. And I say, "Well, I don't think there is." Then the burden falls upon you to make the demonstration that it is. And Brandon never, ever made it. He never, ever made the demonstration. So, uh, I gave him ample opportunities, right? Um, and while I enjoyed, like, you really need to think about this, bro, because you, you really are just reducing your worldview to my preferences. And so you have no claim, no way to make a claim of justification against somebody else's preferences, including if they enslave you, if they rape you, if they do horrible things to you. You have no grounding foundation from which to object because it's just their preferences versus yours, and he who has the force wins. So I'll leave it at that.

Uh, I did appreciate the spirited debate. And just before we get into your closing, Brandon, uh, we are going to be taking callers after this. After we read a few super chats, we've already got some down there. Um, we have also got a poll on this, on in the chat at the moment, guys. The first one: Should the church be accepting of LGBTQ+ people? 84% of people said no, 8% of people said yes, 7% undecided. 500 votes. So guys, get your vote in now to see if that has changed at all. Brandon has a big opportunity to bring some people over to his side, and we'll see how that goes. So, uh, like I said, Brandon's going to close up now. Then we're going to read some super chats. Then we're going to have some callers. And guys, some people talking a lot of smack about Andrew in the comments as well. Uh, Zen Lauren and a few others. Come and call in, guys, because you don't want them to just be all, uh, directed at Brandon. So, Brandon, with that, uh, your closing statements.

Yeah, no, I really appreciate this debate. And I know, and I knew entering into this, that my worldview and expertise is rooted in a progressive understanding of biblical interpretation, and that's my sweet spot. And I do appreciate, Andrew, the way that you've pushed on some of the philosophical, uh, weak points of my argument. Willing to concede that at the end of the day, though, I do think that psychological data is clear that LGBT exclusion in the church does result in demonstrable harm to LGBT people, especially LGBT youth. I do think the preponderance of the evidence from biblical scholarship is that the Bible does not condemn LGBT people or our lives in love. And I believe that there is clear good that comes from LGBT people being in consensual, loving relationships and having access to the same full, equal rights that all other heterosexuals have in society. I see no harm, I see only good. Um, and yes, that might be based on my own experience. Yes, ultimately, all of my claims, when it comes down to, um, ultimate and objective truth, do rely on faith. And I would say that I do believe that Andrew's view, and anybody else who holds his view from a Christian perspective, ultimately relies on faith at the end of the day. You can have philosophical arguments for God and for your religion, but at the end of the day, it's the leap that is going to be into the faith category, uh, not to an objective proof that God or any of the theological claims are true. Um, but most of all, I'm just grateful that this was a spirited and good debate. So thank you both for having me.

All right, thank you very much. So we're going to read out a few super chats, guys. Then we're going to read out the results of the poll, and then we are going to get into some callers. I'm going to speed read through these, guys, unless there's a question that we really need to address. Uh, so Eddie for $10 says, Brandon, how would, uh, Paul in Romans 12:6, referring to, how would you answer, how would you answer Paul? I think you, you get what the question is. Yeah, yeah. Romans 12:6 is quite simple. I would argue that in the first century Greco-Roman world, the primary way that same-sex sex took place, primarily, not only, was between people of higher status and men of lower status. And I would say it's sexual exploitation and abuse. And so what Paul is referring to, and this did happen among both men and women, is the sexual excess of the Roman people. Paul says that the people engaging in these acts are idolaters. So he's referring to pagans, um, and they're unable to control their lust, and so they sexually exploit and abuse people of the same gender. Uh, and I agree with Paul that that's unnatural and wrong. Yeah. Where does, where does Paul actually make any statement about, uh, the fact that they're being abused or that there's a social status distinction in the category for their sexual intercourse? Yeah, this is why you need to read the Bible with context. We know that he doesn't say that, right? He doesn't say that it's consensual, loving same-sex relationships either. So argument from silence. Yeah. So, well, the thing is, is that you're actually making an inference here, uh, that you can't, that you, that you can't prove. But we do have the proof on our side for what Paul is saying here. And when you're talking about the social context, not every relationship was about social status. This is the heart of this argument. But if that is the case, then why would Paul not have made a distinction and said something like, well, unless they're in a loving relationship with each other? Why wouldn't he just done that? They could have, by the way, those relationships existed, barely, but they existed. The thing is, is like, no, it wasn't all about just raping the peasant. Like that was not, no, that's not true. Read Roman law. Read Roman law. Listen, listen. I've, I've gone through all sorts of Roman law, pagan law, okay? It is, you are correct in the fact that it, there is, um, access nobility does have to people who are under them. They couldn't do it to Roman citizens unless the Roman citizen agreed to it for some price or something like this because they wanted to. All right, they could do this with slaves, but the average citizen could do it with slaves too. But there were also same-sex couples who just did it because they wanted to. But see, that's the problem. In, in the consciousness, it was not permissible for two Roman men of equal status to have same-sex sex. That was, it was permissible. It's just that society said, oh, that's kind of gross because one's the dom and one isn't the dom. The person who was the mounter was considered the person who was in control. That doesn't mean that they were saying you can't do it or it's not permissible. You, you are very clever with your language here. It was permissible. It's just that there was a social stigma. And by the way, if there was in this social stigma, Paul would have pointed it out. He pointed out social stigma constantly. No, not on this.

All right, guys, we're going to get to the next one. I'm just going to read out 20 and up, uh, because there's, we need to get to the callers as well. So, uh, The Ghost of P said, "Ha logic trap." At some stage. Air Aircraft Sparky for $20 said, "How can this heretic be a pastor when he is unsure of a soul and openly flaunts his violations of EDI broken down in Leviticus 18:22? It's an abomination. There is no wiggle room here." Black, you want a quick response to that, Brandon? Just simply, obviously, I don't. I think Leviticus 18:22 is referring to the sexual abuse being done by the ancient Egyptians and Canaanites, as it says in verses 1 through 3. And, um, I'm a pastor because progressive Christian denominations allow their pastors to be honest. And so I identify as a Christian agnostic. I don't know the answers to all the theological questions. Okay. Andrew, you got anything for that one? Uh, yeah, what's a Christian agnostic? Just summarized. A person who has faith in Jesus, but also admits that they don't know. Ultimately, the truth that Jesus even existed. I believe that Jesus certainly existed as a historical figure. Yes, the historical data is pretty clear. All right. And, uh, Silent sent $100 and said, "Absolutely nothing," which is just delightful. Um, Joshua Clan for $21. True to his name, huh? That you love it. Uh, Joshua Clan for $20 says, "2 Corinthians 11:14, For such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light." I'm reading good. T normally I can't read so good, but, um, yeah, the good news is I don't identify as an apostle, so that can't be about me. But thank you. Okay. Uh, okay, so I can't read that one out. Okay. C something said for $20, "A church should accept the LGBT community so Christians that seek him to follow God, God, and live accordingly will flee the churches that create loopholes for sin. More concern on what God accepts and not the church is the only way." Andrew, do you want to respond to that one? Yeah, I've heard this argument before. So the basic argument is by essentially the congregations or this type of thing that do allow the influx of LGBTQ, which are mostly Protestant, let's be real. Though he's right that Catholics have softened their position a bit. They still don't allow openly gay priests. They don't allow females to be, uh, priests. They don't allow any of that. So like, I'm not going to lie and say they do because they don't. They don't. Um, but they have softened a bit on the rhetoric. Though even then, they seem to have like various justifications for why, uh, that I'm not even going to beat him up on just yet. It does seem like it's moving that way, but, um, but we'll see. Ultimately, though, it's Protestants who mostly have this problem. So what his, his claim is, is like, by opening those up, you're going to see which churches are false, right? And so then people can leave those churches. The problem is, is that when you create normalcy around this kind of thing, it can take root. Heresy does this constantly. It takes root, and if it takes enough root, it's really hard to root it out because it becomes a form of social normalcy. And we can avoid that by instead creating the social stigma, which is desirable for Christians against the open advocation of homosexual sodomy sex, which is what is being advocated for here. Not men-loving men, not even, not, not, it's actually just reduces to want to have sex in the anal cavity because of that. We want you to accept it. We say no. So you have to, you have to be very cautious in the wording and the normalcy here. So I, I reject this argument. I think there's good evidence against it.

All right, and Ryan Slater gifted 20 memberships. But a great man. Darimar for $20 says, "Thank you, the King of Australia, for hosting this debate. Not one step back. Thank you very much." I appreciate. King of Australia himself is coming for a visit. That's what, that's what they call me these days. Uh, Kov again for $50. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. Says, "When the Israelite men left their aging wives to marry younger women, God told the men that he did not recognize their new marriage, despite it being consensual, and told them they had to return to their previous wives to be in good standing." Brandon, I think that's a beautiful story. It's about protecting the rights of the women that were being abandoned by men wanting younger women. So yes, and amen to God doing that. All right. And, uh, last one here. Wrongful Rage for $50 says, "No amount of conjecture makes you right. The context you espouse is incorrect upon analysis, Brandon."

All right, we're going to end the poll now, guys, and then we are going to get some callers going. Just wanted to say, thank, thank you very much to both of you. I really appreciate it. It's been a good, good spirited debate, and there wasn't too much overt talking, which is fantastic. So the results of the second poll are as follows: Should the church be accepting of LGBTQ people? Yes, 7%. No, 88%. And 5% undecided. So I think that that's actually gone down a little bit for you, Brandon. Uh, I figured had yes eight before, and then it was 7% this time. So Andrew actually managed to grab a little bit of the minority there, but you're definitely on way turf here. So we do appreciate you coming over, Brandon, having the debate. So we're going to, no, appreciate it. And, uh, we're going to bring up some callers now, guys. Still accepting super chats, guys. If you do want to grease my palm, still, you can. I will, I will accept it. So starting with Ashley. Uh, hello. Have we got Ashley? Is that in? Can you guys see Ashley there? Or is that not in? I can't see anybody. It's a four-person thing. Ah, there we go. There we go. Ashley, who is your question directed at? What is your question? Um, my question is directed at Mr. Brandon. Um, I'm curious to know, um, were you, when did you become a pastor and Christian? And what makes you really secure and like, why, why do you believe what you believe and still think you're considered a part of Christianity? Yeah, I became a Christian at age 12 in a fundamentalist Baptist Church, and I became a pastor about 10 years later after studying and getting a master's in theology and a bachelor's in pastoral ministry. I think I'm a Christian because I believe the definition of Christian is one who declares Jesus is Lord and seeks to follow Jesus's teachings, and that's the basis of my faith, the basis of my foundation. Uh, and that's what I seek to do every Sunday in my pulpit when I preach. So, can I ask one more? Yep, make it quick. Okay, okay. Um, when did you find out that you were gay? I kind of knew during middle school, but I didn't, um, I did conversion therapy. I tried to be healed of my sexuality. And it was when I was like 22 that I got publicly outed in Time Magazine, and that's when I came out. So, heal, like, so do you still consider it something like an ailment that needs to be healed? Not anymore. I did in that time. My theology was similar to Andrew's, actually. I was flirting with the Eastern Orthodox Church, uh, and and tried to be healed, but it didn't work. You can still go back. They'll cure you, ma'am. God works. I mean, yeah. All right, thank you very much, Ashley. Appreciate that. Uh, we've got RC here as well. RC, welcome to the conversation, my friend. Who is your question for, and what would you like to ask? For Brandon. Hey there. So, hi. So, clarifying question. Uh, you claim that a romantic relationship is not sinful so long as that it involves two consenting adults, right? Yeah. Okay. Then is it sinful for two consenting adult males to be in a romantic relationship if they're siblings? Yeah, I think that's an interesting question. I would say that, uh, what we know from incestuous sex is generally that it does not result in, uh, in a procreative version of it. It does not result in good. Uh, that's why I said two males. I was spe- Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I would say, yeah, generally, I would say because the law is clear on incest, that I would say it's wrong. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's not my. I'm just, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm saying, reading back, I think it's a problem for Christians to read back into the Hebrew Bible things that are not there. Uh, and I don't think, um, I think that reading Jesus into the Davidic line or those images of the lines, I just, I don't think that's a helpful theological move to be making. Okay, two last questions because I want to have other calls come on. Uh, first question for Brandon. Um, you brought up anti-Semitism. Keep it TS friendly, of course. I don't want Jake getting nuked off of YouTube. Why would that be objectively wrong then? Anti-Semitism? Because it doesn't love your neighbor as yourself, and that's my guiding value. Okay. And then my next question, uh, then is, why is that objectively good if ultimately the Bible is not, uh, uh, factually correct? Objectively? I didn't say that. You all, this is the thing that I keep finding in the conservative argument. When we say that you need to interpret the Bible contextually, it doesn't mean that all of the Bible is inaccurate or unreliable. It means that you have to read it in culture and context. I understand your point now. Just, this is my last statement. But if you're going to appeal to the Bible, but then at the same time say the Bible isn't always correct, why are you appealing to the Bible? That Bible is myth is one of my authorities as a Christian. And I would say that's a circular argument. But anyways, I have to go. I know there's other callers. Thank you for entertaining me. Uh, you as well, Jake. I'll tell Gail that. Yeah, he failed. He didn't show up. So get out of here, Gail. Get, we'll see you in a TikTok invasion. See you. All right. Eliazar, what's happening, brother? Who's your question for? Um, I see you, you call yourself Easy. Is that sort of some sort of like gangster alter ego you've got going on there? It's easier to say. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, who's your question for? Him. What's your question? Yeah, first off, good debate, guys. My question is for Brandon. So, Brandon, are people born gay? I believe so. Yes. Okay. Are you saying that because they are born gay, therefore it is moral? No, I'm saying that there is no moral harm being done in a same-sex relationship, and therefore it is moral. So it is moral or it's amoral? That's a fair question. I think it's amoral. I think there are ways that it can be immoral and ways that it can be moral. Sure. Okay. What, what's the threshold that one thing has to meet for it to be moral or amoral? A non-consensual relationship between somebody who's, uh, not two loving adults. I think that would make it immoral. Uh, so is there a specific reason why you choose adults? Like, cuz, um, if I heard correctly, the two criteria that one has to meet is that it has to be conscious and then, uh, consent, correct? Be very careful with this inquiry because we're on YouTube. There, Easy. Okay. Yeah. Uh, yeah, I, I won't say specific words. Uh, yeah, but you're crossing, crossing a line. I was pretty consistent throughout the argument that I believe it's loving and consensual adult relationships, uh, between the same sex. The reason I believe that, I'm going to appeal to psychology and all those other good things that say that the human brain develops, and in order to have a sexual relationship between two people, I believe that you need to be on the same, uh, developmental level in order to consensually engage with one another. And so if there was a non-consensual same-sex relationship, that's sinful. It's wrong. Okay. What if the law said that it was acceptable for two men who were brothers to have sex with each other? Would you have any objection then? I have no clue. I don't know how to answer that question. So, well, it would be with, uh, I can tell you how you would say yes or you would say no. Those are the two ways that you would answer that question. Yeah, and I plead the fifth because I'm not comfortable with that question. I don't think that there's an, uh, inherent moral harm in a consensual relationship, but I also, it's not something I'm ever going to advocate for or, uh, promote because I do. Those are the qualifiers you, you put. Yeah, but I also said, yeah, so you appeal to the law. Yep. On this. I would. Okay. But if the law changed? Yeah, that's the question, right? Like, if the law changed, what would the answer be then? If the law changed, let's have that conversation. I can ask. I have one more question. Is there time? Okay, because you also, in the debate, said that you appealed to nature. Yeah. Okay. So there's a lot of species of animals that engage in rape. Yeah. Okay. So then if you're appealing to nature, is rape? Sorry. So if you're appealing to nature, then is rape immoral? But remember what I said, one of my standards is consensuality. So I don't believe that's consensual. When I appeal to nature, I'm appealing to the fact that homosexuality is occurring in many thousands of species, not that everything animals do is good. It's not consensual. So then don't appeal to nature. No, I can appeal to nature because homosexuality is a natural. Selectively appeal to nature. Just like you selectively pick and Spark. You also shouldn't do that because it's fallacious. So it's an appeal to nature fallacy. The appealing, appealing to nature itself does not give us the proper conditionals for the argument. Just saying a thing occurs in nature, ex there's an ought there, which is why my whole argument wasn't nature. It was one part of the argument that we actually didn't address in the debate at all. So, all right. Hey, thank you, Jake. I appreciate the time. No worries. El, you take it easy, man. You too. All right, we've got, uh, what was you, Jonathan or Gail? Which one? Which one would you rather? Who's Gail? I never heard of this guy before. Okay. Yeah, yeah, sure. All right. What's your, what's your question and who's it directed at? It's for Brandon. Just a couple quick questions. I have to be heading out soon myself. Um, with Romans 1:26, let's just hypothetically say the traditional interpretation of Paul's talking about all forms of homosexuality is correct. Would you say Paul is wrong then? Yes. And can Paul be wrong in his epistles? Yeah. Yes. And would you say Galatians 3:28 is correct then? Um, I think the way you interpret that, I think we're going to interpret those words differently based on our theological context, but yes. Well, no, no, no. Galatians. Okay. Yeah, you know what Galatians 3:28 is, right? I to read it out. Okay. Okay. So I'm just wondering how do you determine that difference then? Um, so I believe, as I said at the very beginning of the debate, I believe scripture is inspired by God, right? But that doesn't mean that it's without error. I think it's a human product. And so the Apostle Paul often, even in the scripture, the Apostle Paul says things like, "I'm giving you my opinion, not a dictate." And I think there are areas where Paul says lots of things that are very context-specific to individual congregations that he was, uh, writing to, that are not meant or were never meant to be applied universally 2,000 years later. Um, and so it's a case-by-case way of engaging with. Yeah, but, but if you're going to say that the Bible is, uh, inspired, and sure, I could accept maybe scriptural errors, but ultimately, the, the core messages behind it would have to be infallible if it's going to be inspired by God. Would you say God's not perfect then? No, I don't think inspired. I think you have a different definition of inspired. Uh, I think many people are inspired by God. I'm inspired by God. You're inspired by God. When you go to church, uh, yeah, but, but if you're going to make moral oaths for the church and ultimately for society, you're going to appeal to the Bible. It wouldn't make sense if it's not perfect, at least with core messages. None of the authors of the Bible thought that they were writing a document that was going to become the. Whether that, that doesn't, that doesn't, that's not relevant. Whether or not they thought they were writing a library. God didn't write the Bible either. God didn't write. Why, why, why are we using the Bible then in the first place? Because it's the library of texts from the tradition that I belong to, and therefore it has authority in my tradition. But I don't think it's a. So we can, so we can, we can appeal to tradition only when it appeals to your tradition then? Like, no, I'm talking from my perspective. However, the way that I use the Bible, because I'm a Protestant, everyone, everyone has their own perspective. But how do we know which perspective is correct then? Yeah, that's a great question. I think you heard that all throughout the debate. I think, yeah, well, how do we know? Why should we prefer your perspective or Andrew's? You shouldn't. I should. That's eventually the conclusion. Why, why are you here? I don't, I don't mean to be rude, but why are you here? The point is simple that I don't think Andrew's perspective is objective. I don't think mine is objective. I think you have to use your own moral reasoning. And argumentation. Is Andrew subjectively wrong then? Yeah, I, that's, but he's not objectively wrong. Oh, okay. Well, then you're subjectively wrong. That's how we end it. That is how we end it. PR. Yeah, that's how it reduces, right? So the thing is, is like, with, with when it comes to these, uh, epistemic claims, right? The claims of knowledge. And then when we get over to the ontological claims, we didn't get into those quite as much. But his grounding knowledge claim just comes from preference. And so he really doesn't have any ground to say that my preference is in any way wrong, or that any prescription that I would make, which would be adversarial to his own, is in any way incorrect. He just can't make that claim. You could just say, well, this violates my preference, and I'm the ultimate arbiter of all things which are good based on my preference. It's like, well, so am I. H. I just, I just got one, one last like question or maybe a line of questions about two to three minutes and I'll be off. Uh, yeah, make it quick. We got, we got to move, we got to move it on pretty quick. Of course, of course, of course, of course. So let's just say, for example, I read the Bible and I say, okay, I say most of the Bible is true, but I don't believe that Jesus has to be of the line of David. He can't be of David's line. Would that be wrong in your opinion, Brandon? No, that won't be wrong. So the Bible, even the Bible says throughout all the prophets has says it has to be of David's line. I think you're misinterpreting. I think you're misinterpreting the prophets, bordering on anti-Semitic. I think reading back into my exposition. That's