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Post by pumpkinette on Aug 3, 2009 15:06:39 GMT
Why is it that so many Christian seem to use their religion as a cover for Right Wing posturing? They seem to justify so many wicked acts by their religous 'beliefs'. They follow a man of peace, a rejection of violence a rejection of wealth and a belief that you help the poorest in society. Yet lots of Christian openly believe in guns, killing, murder the acculuation massive wealth and the use of hate and attacking the poor. If Jesus was alive today, would he own guns, a pickup truck and be a Republican? Given that Jesus tried to cure the sick and bring comfort to the poor irrespective of their wealth, it is pretty obvious that Jesus was the forerunner of Marx and Engles. Why are so many Christians so Right Wing? Could it be that they are just hypocritses? Please know that not ALL Christians are neo-conservatives. I'm 1 of them that HATES the neo-conservative views with a passion! Yes, as a Christian I'm more socially conservative than some, but politically, I'm highly Libertarian. However, despite the fact that I am more socially conservative than some, it's NOT the government's place to enforce morality with some things. I'm VERY against the NON-separation of church and state also. A big reason I'm against it is because of the evils done by SOME in the Catholic Church before the Protestant Reformation. Martin Luther is 1 of my heroes because of the FREEDOM he gave to people! We can learn a LOT from that time period. It's very fascinating. I also don't own a gun and never have. Yes, I'm FOR gun rights. However, please don't think all Christians have a bunch of guns, etc. I'm NOT for NO gun restriction laws at ALL either. I think there need to be a few. However, the other extreme is JUST AS dangerous, ie., no one can own guns. I'm not for EITHER extreme, believe me! Please remember: not all Christians are with the neo-cons. I'd rather be DEAD than be with them!
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Post by pumpkinette on Aug 3, 2009 15:14:14 GMT
Well said, Ron! You can find plenty of crimes that have been committed in the NAME of Christianity, just as you can with Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism and paganism. I'd like to make three points here. In the first place a BLANKET condemnation of an entire religion because of the excesses of some of its followers is just stupid. Overall, religion has been a social BENEFIT to humanity and NOT a negative factor. Secondly, on a personal note to Ron, you feel in a minority when you come on my board just as I do when I come on yours. I love most of the people on your board but there really are about half a dozen people who are so fanatical, intolerant, egocentric, arrogant and contemptuous of anyone who differs in the SLIGHTEST degree from what THEY claim to be the Word of God that I've taken to posting there much less frequently than I did at the beginning. I've got tired of certain people either being patronising or downright insulting to me and suggesting that I'm either naive or a conscious tool of Satan. That type of nonsense DOES give religion a bad name because it ISN'T religion; it's religiosity. It's fanaticism and intolerance pretending to be faith. I think St Paul had it right when he said 'I may have faith enough to move mountains, but without love...' Finally, a word to Ratarsed. You can present a highly selective reading of the bad points of any religion or ideology and give the impression that there's nothing beyond that. Don't you think the world would be a lot poorer without, say, Bach's 'Matthew Passion,' the hymns of Charles Wesley, the religious art of Michaelangelo, the poetry of St John of the Cross, Tulsi Das, Firdausi, Rumi, Judah ha-Levi? I hate Communism but I'm quite prepared to admit that it did produce great works of art. I hate National Socialism but Georg Kolbe and Emil Nolde (both, especially Nolde, keen Nazis) are two of the greatest artists of the last century. I am a writer and poet and, like all artists, I can find beauty even in the midst of ugliness. I don't need to ask what beauty is; I can see it in the glint of a broken beer-bottle caught by the rays of the sun and be inspired by it. God is love, God is beauty, God is truth, God is compassion. God made humans in His image and it's US who've perverted his wisdom and his love into hatred and cruelty. THANK YOU! People need to be reminded of the WONDERFUL things that have come out of Christianity: colleges; orphanages; getting rid of slavery; fighting for civil rights (Martin Luther King); freedom from RELIGIOUS oppression (Martin Luther and the Protestant Reformation); LITERACY (thanks to Martin Luther and OTHER monks, etc.); wonderful charities such as Children International; wonderful organizations such as Voice of the Martyrs who fight RELIGIOUS PERSECUTION of Christians all over the world; SCIENCE (at least a few scientists through history have been Christians and changed the world for the better); the formation of the US (at least a few that were for the new country were preachers); working for childrens' rights (Christians helped in the past in England to keep sexual age of consent laws at a DECENT, REASONABLE level to protect children from TRUE perverts) and there's others that if I had more time I'd list also.
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Post by Liberator on Aug 3, 2009 16:33:55 GMT
You can add to that that Tony Benn comes out of a tradition of Chapel Socialism that was once very strong in the American Bible Belt, but between them the businessmen and the Marxists had killed it off by about 1950. You can trace it back to the Diggers and Levellers and maybe even the Peasants' Revolt but it's always more often individuals working together in the name of their belief than it is any official religious organisation. Squire Cromwell soon sorted the Ds & Ls out because he and Fairfax weren't giving their lands and position up. The moment it gives itself a name and a doctrine, a way of life starts to become a religion. On the other hand without some sort of general agreement you get the situation that allows crackpots to make their own version up because there is nothing to say that they are wrong.
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Post by randomvioce on Aug 3, 2009 16:51:40 GMT
Please know that not ALL Christians are neo-conservatives. I'm 1 of them that HATES the neo-conservative views with a passion! Yes, as a Christian I'm more socially conservative than some, but politically, I'm highly Libertarian I am sure that there are a great deal of people who are genuine Christians like yourself. No doubt there are many people who follow the teachings of Christ in all sincerity; I do not have anything against that. I do not actually have anything against Christianity per se, but for some reason, the term ‘Christianity’ is a term banded about by some of the worse half witted people in the West. I accept that many honest Christian go about God’s work without too much fuss. The Salvation Army, Christian aid etc come to mind, but why is it that the most evil ‘Christians’ in the World that seem to come to prominence? I see people like Bush and his evil cohort proclaim their Christian roots, but I never see the work Jesus in anything they do. I see the poor punished, the sick untreated, the starving unfed, yet for two terms, Bush did little to address these issues. But when it comes to unleashing war and weapons of mass destruction and the unholy accumulation of wealth, there is Bush, front and centre. Not only that, but I see thousands of Christians standing next to the murderers. When I hear the term ‘Christians’, I immediately think of those people not the person Jesus appears to be in the Gospels. Christians aren't all nasty, but it is the ninety percent that gets the rest a bad name.
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Post by randomvioce on Aug 3, 2009 16:54:30 GMT
THANK YOU! People need to be reminded of the WONDERFUL things that have come out of Christianity Yes, there are good things that came out of faith, but the Christian faith is now a hinderance to progress, not a boon any more.
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Post by pumpkinette on Aug 3, 2009 17:05:48 GMT
Please know that not ALL Christians are neo-conservatives. I'm 1 of them that HATES the neo-conservative views with a passion! Yes, as a Christian I'm more socially conservative than some, but politically, I'm highly Libertarian I am sure that there are a great deal of people who are genuine Christians like yourself. No doubt there are many people who follow the teachings of Christ in all sincerity; I do not have anything against that. I do not actually have anything against Christianity per se, but for some reason, the term ‘Christianity’ is a term banded about by some of the worse half witted people in the West. I accept that many honest Christian go about God’s work without too much fuss. The Salvation Army, Christian aid etc come to mind, but why is it that the most evil ‘Christians’ in the World that seem to come to prominence? I see people like Bush and his evil cohort proclaim their Christian roots, but I never see the work Jesus in anything they do. I see the poor punished, the sick untreated, the starving unfed, yet for two terms, Bush did little to address these issues. But when it comes to unleashing war and weapons of mass destruction and the unholy accumulation of wealth, there is Bush, front and centre. Not only that, but I see thousands of Christians standing next to the murderers. When I hear the term ‘Christians’, I immediately think of those people not the person Jesus appears to be in the Gospels. Christians aren't all nasty, but it is the ninety percent that gets the rest a bad name. It didn't take me long to believe that Dubya was a candidate for the anti-Christ position. Please remember that at LEAST a few who call themselves Christians really aren't! I'm convinced Dubya is 1 of them. Jesus warned about these people MANY times. I've met my share. 1 of them I worked with a few years ago and she was fired for harrassing/stalking me despite repeated warnings to stop. We have to be VERY careful who we follow! Jesus said "you'll know them by their fruits". As you know, Dubya's fruits were/are rotten! I hate very much that these FALSE Christians have been so politically involved. Check out the book "Blinded by Might". I think you'll enjoy it and learn from it as I did.
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Post by pumpkinette on Aug 3, 2009 17:11:57 GMT
"By their deeds ye shall know them". Unfortunately, Christianity has been a death cult since its beginnings. When it wasn't encouraging its own to get themselves killed in asochistic glory, they were tortuting themselves as anchorites and saints wallowing in filth or doing it to each other and everything else in sight. It is just the supposed humane ideals that make the horrific monotony of hatred for the human race stand out so much. "Christians are condemned through hatred of the human race" Tacitus I think, said ambiguously. Christianity has been intolerant from the start, according to Acts there was nearly a war betwen Paul and the other apostles. Any religion whose main concern is the exact nature of its central figure and not following precepts can only allow one view on the subject. They have always been far too busy torturing each other and everybody else to believe the right things about Jesus to waste time on anything he is supposed to have told them to do. Those few who did try to follow his precepts kept very quiet because they were always the first victims. If people CHOOSE to be martyrs isn't that their business? FYI, I'm against the EVIL of killing ANYONE for his/her faith. It doesn't matter WHAT the faith is: it's evil to kill people for it. But, martyrs who make the choice...I feel differently about. If so many Christians really hate humanity, then why did they: stop slavery; work for civil rights; speak out about, etc., the religious oppression from SOME in the Catholic Church (Martin Luther, thank God for him!); work for literacy; start colleges, orphanages, etc.; start wonderful charities such as Children International? There's more examples I can give.
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Post by Liberator on Aug 3, 2009 17:53:21 GMT
And Christians, just as much argued slavery and racism to have biblical support, cause oppression of Jews, pagans and heretics in the Roman and even more the Calvinist church, and oppose education for the lower classes in case it gave them ideas above their station. You get Christians on both sides, so their beliefs can't be said to have influenced them one way or the other.
Where Christianity has a lot to answer for is its glorification of martyrdom, often with magistrates doing everything they could to avoid it, and when that became impossible, morbid obsessions with self-deprivation and self-harm. There are some saints who must have been at the least sad anorexics and at worst seriously disturbed girls probably reacting against being locked in a nunnery in the first place. The Cathars rejected sex for the logical reason that it condemned heavenly souls to earthly life (and I have some sympathy with them), but non-heretical Christianity condemned it because it was enjoyable. Calvinism takes a similar line, that life is fine as long as it unenjoyable. There is nothing of the Eastern belief in withdrawal in order to reach a higher state of being, that has been lost (if it ever existed). It has become nothing more than centuries of God wants you to be miserable, wear a hair shirt, don't wash, flog and starve yourself, if you can find somebody with a horrible disease crawl all over them in the hope of catching it, the more you hate life, the more you please God.
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Post by Big Lin on Aug 3, 2009 21:08:08 GMT
Slavery was ended largely because of Christians.
So were the Roman Games.
Prison reform began with the Christians John Howard and Elizabeth Fry.
Most social reforms began with the influence of Christianity.
So too did the spread of freedom and democracy.
Wherever you go, you can see clear evidence of how greatly Christianity has benefited the world.
And that's just the social benefits.
As someone who was a terrible person as a teenager and who was blessed enough to have found grace at the hands of Jesus, I also have a personal debt to Him as My Saviour - a debt that was freely given by Him and which I can never hope to repay with my sinful self.
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Post by Liberator on Aug 3, 2009 21:27:46 GMT
Certainly social reformers appealed to Christian principals. But so did their opponents. Usually, the opponents were official church denouncing the reformers from the pulpit. All these reforms happened in Christian states. The situations being reformed were the product of Christian governments. It took them the best part of 1300 years to end slavery for instance. Why didn't they it the moment Christianity became the only religion permitted and started to persecut all the others far worse than they had ever been? So religion really had nothing to do with it. Quakers were behind a lot of reforms. But Quakers were suspect even to other non-conformists.
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Post by randomvioce on Aug 3, 2009 22:08:40 GMT
Wherever you go, you can see clear evidence of how greatly Christianity has benefited the world. Then again, Lin you can look around and the damage Christian have done too. Christians started the crusades. Christians used their faith to justify the slave trade. Christians used their faith to the slaughter of American Indians. Christians have used their faith to stimie scientific progress and political freedom. If the Christians are so great, why do they kill so many people? Why are so many people allowed to starve without Christian intervention? Why are the sick and the lame untreated? Why do so many Christian now believe in usury when God expressly forbids it? Why are Christians allowed to collect massive wealth when the bible express forbids it? Why do so many Christians openly flout the teachings of Jesus, if Jesus is the path to God?
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Post by ronmorgen on Aug 3, 2009 22:32:29 GMT
My definition of Christian may be different than some of you. To me it is someone who believes in Jesus and follows his teachings. That could hardly include murderers as some of you suggest. It may be good for you who have done this to check your own motives as to why you would want to condemn Christianity. Perhaps it's Jesus himself that is bothering you. Believing in him might require repentance and a change of lifestyle on your part .
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Post by Big Lin on Aug 3, 2009 22:45:22 GMT
Wherever you go, you can see clear evidence of how greatly Christianity has benefited the world. Then again, Lin you can look around and the damage Christian have done too. Christians started the crusades. Christians used their faith to justify the slave trade. Christians used their faith to the slaughter of American Indians. Christians have used their faith to stimie scientific progress and political freedom. If the Christians are so great, why do they kill so many people? Why are so many people allowed to starve without Christian intervention? Why are the sick and the lame untreated? Why do so many Christian now believe in usury when God expressly forbids it? Why are Christians allowed to collect massive wealth when the bible express forbids it? Why do so many Christians openly flout the teachings of Jesus, if Jesus is the path to God? RV, you are talking about people who CLAIMED to be Christians but did NOT follow the teachings of Our Lord. I might as well argue that because Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot were atheists that therefore atheism was directly responsible for mass murder. It's what my hubby Mike would call an 'argumentem ad hominem' and someone as intelligent as you knows perfectly well that any argument of that kind is logically invalid. Are there bad Christians? Yes. Does that mean they are bad BECAUSE of or IN SPITE OF the faith they proclaim? It's obviously the LATTER.
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♫anna♫
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Aug 18 2017 - Always In Our Hearts
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Post by ♫anna♫ on Aug 3, 2009 23:30:34 GMT
THANK YOU! People need to be reminded of the WONDERFUL things that have come out of Christianity Yes, there are good things that came out of faith, but the Christian faith is now a hinderance to progress, not a boon any more. A hinderance to progress? I suppose you think outlawing religion or religious expression in public schools is progress.
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Post by randomvioce on Aug 3, 2009 23:40:07 GMT
A hinderance to progress? I suppose you think outlawing religion or religious expression in public schools is progress. I don't have a problem teaching about religion in schools as long it is taught in a theolgy class not part of the science programme.
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Post by ronmorgen on Aug 3, 2009 23:47:07 GMT
I understand why we wouldn't want the government teaching religion but what about a student's spontanious expression of faith, or little prayer groups unorganized by the administration.
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♫anna♫
Global Moderator
Aug 18 2017 - Always In Our Hearts
The Federal Reserve Act is the Betrayal of the American Revolution!
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karma:
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Post by ♫anna♫ on Aug 4, 2009 3:48:11 GMT
Christianity and Churchianity are generally very different! Christ had no trouble accepting people, who betrayed their country like Matthew, who collected taxes for the Romans, or Mary Magdaleine and other women of "ill repute". Christ found good in all classes of people because he looked at the person's heart and soul and not his/her reputation.
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Post by lonewolf on Aug 4, 2009 4:57:07 GMT
I suppose you think outlawing religion or religious expression in public schools is progress. I am not opposed to an individual or group of individuals saying grace in the school cafeteria before their noontime meal, provided, of course, that they do not ask those around them to quiet down or refrain from eating while such ritual is being conducted. Also, do understand that until the existence of God can be scientifically proven he/she/it will remain a superstition and nothing more.
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Post by pumpkinette on Aug 4, 2009 6:57:37 GMT
Wherever you go, you can see clear evidence of how greatly Christianity has benefited the world. Then again, Lin you can look around and the damage Christian have done too. Christians started the crusades. Christians used their faith to justify the slave trade. Christians used their faith to the slaughter of American Indians. Christians have used their faith to stimie scientific progress and political freedom. If the Christians are so great, why do they kill so many people? Why are so many people allowed to starve without Christian intervention? Why are the sick and the lame untreated? Why do so many Christian now believe in usury when God expressly forbids it? Why are Christians allowed to collect massive wealth when the bible express forbids it? Why do so many Christians openly flout the teachings of Jesus, if Jesus is the path to God? Please remember all through history there's been and are GOING TO BE FAKE Christians. Jesus Himself warned us about this many times! Satan has LOVED to use these people to discredit Christ and His TRUE followers and always will! Also, please remember that once a person accepts Christ, he/she isn't instantly FIXED. I used to believe that myth for YEARS, unfortunately. I've learned through experience, etc. that it's a PROCESS. You don't quit having faults, problems, etc. to fix once you accept Christ. However, if there's NO change in a person's life EVER after accepting Christ, it's likely he/she really isn't saved. Please remember that. A true Christian will take accountability for his/her sins, problems, etc., during the process of becoming more like Christ. The person will at the least feel bad when he/she does wrong. A FALSE Christian never will. As far as your disillusionment with some "Christians" (I put that in quotes because of the many FALSE Christians), I'm in agreement! Not enough is being done and neve has been! However, what would the world be like WITHOUT the true Christians! Ever worse than it already is which is a horrible thought. Yes, you are right, but again, please remember there's many false "Christians" and always will be, unfortunately.
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Post by pumpkinette on Aug 4, 2009 6:59:47 GMT
Slavery was ended largely because of Christians. So were the Roman Games. Prison reform began with the Christians John Howard and Elizabeth Fry. Most social reforms began with the influence of Christianity. So too did the spread of freedom and democracy. Wherever you go, you can see clear evidence of how greatly Christianity has benefited the world. And that's just the social benefits. As someone who was a terrible person as a teenager and who was blessed enough to have found grace at the hands of Jesus, I also have a personal debt to Him as My Saviour - a debt that was freely given by Him and which I can never hope to repay with my sinful self. I remember reading about Christians in England who fought to have sexual age of consent laws be reasonable and wouldn't give into perverts wanting the age of consent to literally be for children who weren't even physically developed. Do you happen to remember the names of the people involved in this? I'm pretty sure this was in the 1800's.
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