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Originally Posted by Iago
Haiti is about 90% Christian. I don't think anybody is denying that.
"Audio Bible company Faith Comes By Hearing is providing portable, solar-powered audio Bibles to local pastors so people can hear the Bible in Haitian Creole, according to ministry spokesman Jon Wilke. Faith Comes By Hearing is hoping to send a total of 3,000 Proclaimer audio Bibles to Haiti in the hands of disaster relief teams, church teams and ministries. "
I've read several reports on this story. Nobody seems to have 'requested' the Bibles.
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So a country that is 90% Christian won't have requests for Bibles during a national calamity where churches and houses have been utterly destroyed? Who is kidding whom?
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Originally Posted by Iago
In this case they are going out through visiting 'ministries' (careful not to say missionaries!) and local pastors working in tandem.
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Every Christian is a missionary. Period.
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Originally Posted by Iago
It's extraordinarily unlikely that anybody sensible enough to be doing humanitarian work in Haiti would think it worthwhile or appropriate to start peddling mythology to them when they need urgent aid.
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Not worth the comment.
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Originally Posted by Iago
I think the overarching point everyone is making on this matter is that you're seeing Bibles taking up time and resources that should be used for other things. If each aid shipment coming in takes 5 minutes to process, and there is only one shipment of these Bibles, any food aid or equipment is therefore delayed by 5 minutes. Multiply that however you will.
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Nobody in any position on the ground has alleged that processing shipments of Bibles is in any way, shape or form delaying the relief effort. This is a manufactured controversy, pushed by the usual suspects, most of whom have never gotten off their butts to deliver humanitarian disaster relief anywhere in the world.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Iago
The further issue is that religions are using this as an opportunity to "get" people at their lowest ebb. These people have been through an awful time. Religions are scoring PR points by pretending to do good, when in reality they've got a bible in one hand and an aid parcel in the other. Why can't this be non-partisan? Why can't religions just fucking drop it, for one second, and focus on real problems?
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Again, such nonsense is usually spouted by people who have no history or experience in disaster relief.
Every time there's a situation like this, you hear people stateside complaining about these "converting missionaries"
But despite being watched by news crews from around the world, you never hear such reports from the field.
If there was one single relief agency created and supported by atheists, I might be more inclined to listen to such complaints.