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Frank777
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2021-01-07, 20:29

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
There may be one member who believes that god annointed Trump to be president, but he's not even from the US so he can kick a brick.
Is this about me? Because I absolutely believe The Lord anointed (that's how it's spelled) Trump to be President.

I also believe He anointed Obama and Clinton, Reagan and Bush, and even the peanut farmer way back when.

When you are the Supreme Authority of what happens on the Earth, that's how that works.
 
Anonymous Coward
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2021-01-07, 21:29

Seems like an appropriate time to mention the Bob Dylan song With God on our side (although I prefer it when sung by Joan Baez).
 
Dr. Bobsky
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2021-01-08, 17:03

Quote:
Originally Posted by Frank777 View Post
Is this about me? Because I absolutely believe The Lord anointed (that's how it's spelled) Trump to be President.

I also believe He anointed Obama and Clinton, Reagan and Bush, and even the peanut farmer way back when.

When you are the Supreme Authority of what happens on the Earth, that's how that works.
🤣🤣🤣🤣
 
709
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2021-01-08, 21:33

Quote:
Originally Posted by Frank777 View Post
When you are the Supreme Authority of what happens on the Earth, that's how that works.
Ya boy got some splainin to do.
 
Frank777
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2021-01-09, 09:31

Quote:
Originally Posted by kscherer View Post
Seems a bit like this thread is morphing into Christians vs. Atheists 6. Which is weird, because I thought it was the Daily News thread.

Quote:
Originally Posted by 709 View Post
Ya boy got some splainin to do.

Never mind.

Last edited by Frank777 : 2021-01-09 at 11:18.
 
Matsu
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2021-01-12, 09:29

Further up thread there was some discussion about evangelicals' world view. Frank may be genuine, but that's not really how it's worked out in civic life, is it? Often, the right wing evangelical base is used to bully progressive policy from the agenda and retard the progress of civil rights, and of knowledge/data/evidence based policy dialogue, in favor of the same archaic polemical positions, which is especially ironic since their main guy, the Jesus of the Gospels, is a radical, a reformer, and basically a socialist.

.........................................
 
PB PM
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2021-01-12, 15:52

Quote:
Originally Posted by Matsu View Post
Further up thread there was some discussion about evangelicals' world view. Frank may be genuine, but that's not really how it's worked out in civic life, is it? Often, the right wing evangelical base is used to bully progressive policy from the agenda and retard the progress of civil rights, and of knowledge/data/evidence based policy dialogue, in favor of the same archaic polemical positions, which is especially ironic since their main guy, the Jesus of the Gospels, is a radical, a reformer, and basically a socialist.
Hit the nail on the head with that last bit, but it doesn’t fit the agenda of the church in North America, so they skirt around it, and hide from it. As someone who studied this stuff in post secondary school the interpretation of their own scripture is very self serving. Part of the reason I got out of the church in the first place.
 
Frank777
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2021-01-12, 17:25

Quote:
Originally Posted by PB PM View Post
Yes please do, enough of this stuff, from both sides, it helps no one.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PB PM View Post
Hit the nail on the head with that last bit, but it doesn’t fit the agenda of the church in North America, so they skirt around it, and hide from it. As someone who studied this stuff in post secondary school the interpretation of their own scripture is very self serving. Part of the reason I got out of the church in the first place.
So you basically just want to rant about people who don't think like you do, and tell them to shut up when they post an answer?

How progressive-tolerant.
 
Frank777
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2021-01-12, 18:02

Quote:
Originally Posted by Matsu View Post
Further up thread there was some discussion about evangelicals' world view. Frank may be genuine, but that's not really how it's worked out in civic life, is it? Often, the right wing evangelical base is used to bully progressive policy from the agenda and retard the progress of civil rights, and of knowledge/data/evidence based policy dialogue, in favor of the same archaic polemical positions, which is especially ironic since their main guy, the Jesus of the Gospels, is a radical, a reformer, and basically a socialist.
Yes, the people who invented hospitals, shut down the trans-atlantic slave trade and even started Guinness to provide clean sources of nutrition are the bad guys. Progressives, who don't even understand where the Western concept of civil rights came from, are the good guys.

The worst Evangelical church, run by the most craven money-grubbing lunatic, still operates or networks into community supports like food and clothing banks, addiction recovery groups, crisis pregnancy centres, marital, post-marital, family and grief counselling, job finding helps and homelessness supports. And literally hundreds of other ministries in the community and around the world. That church on your block adds more to your standard of living in North America than you even know. And the Church works because those "same archaic polemical positions" are grounded in the Bible and Truth.

With regards to the idiotic "Jesus was a socialist" canard, an earnest internet search should be able to fix that kind of misinformation.
It's ground that's been well-covered.
 
turtle
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2021-01-12, 18:35

Yes, thank you Ken.

I will say I'm totally with Frank777 on this one. I do find it wild that people make assumptions on Christianity and have never studied it.

On the Trump topic I'm still completely dumbfounded. I mean, we all knew he was an asshole and never tried to be politically correct. Heck, it is one of the reasons I was happy to have him in office. Not everyone needs a trophy and not everyone should get a handout. However, the actions from Tuesday are just not something I thought I would ever see.

They overran our Capitol building and ran amok looting and desecrating. For what? To say they are mad that Trump lost? I'm disappointed he lost but I respect our government and the freedoms we have. If a mob can force the vote to go one way or another then where is our actual freedom? Where is our democracy?

I'm still not one for having Trump impeached again. It would simply be pomp and circumstance at this point. All it would do is waste taxpayer money with no actual gain. Trump is so disgraced that he might continue in his business empire, be he is going to be hard pressed politically now.

I do however believe that the legal system should do what it is supposed to do and convict, with criminal charges, those who are found guilty. I'm so happy to see so many of those in the mob getting arrested and brought up on charges. Who knows what kind of sentence they will get in the end, but at least they get their day in court.

Louis L'Amour, “To make democracy work, we must be a nation of participants, not simply observers. One who does not vote has no right to complain.”
Visit our archived Minecraft world! | Maybe someday I'll proof read, until then deal with it.
 
Dr. Bobsky
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2021-01-12, 19:01

Quote:
Originally Posted by Frank777 View Post
Yes, the people who invented hospitals
Just wrong. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_hospitals

Do you really believe the Romans and Greeks didn't treat their ill in centralised locations? What's wrong with your head? (Even this history is so euro-centric I suspect it's missing hospitals that existed in our oldest civilisations in Asia and Asia Minor)...

Quote:
shut down the trans-atlantic slave trade
And started it too, and were defending it and segregation to this day! WOO free muslim black labor!



Quote:
The worst Evangelical church, run by the most craven money-grubbing lunatic, still operates or networks into community supports like food and clothing banks, addiction recovery groups, crisis pregnancy centres, marital, post-marital, family and grief counselling, job finding helps and homelessness supports. And literally hundreds of other ministries in the community and around the world.
This is nonesense. There are 'churches' that absolutely don't do any of these things. And because of your fast and loose definition of evangelical church you will merely say they aren't *really* evangelical churches.

Quote:
That church on your block adds more to your standard of living in North America than you even know. And the Church works because those "same archaic polemical positions" are grounded in the Bible and Truth.
Ah yes, Churches are good for the GDP. So are wars, but we tend to recognise their danger, unlike Churches. And 'Truth' with a capital T is not discovered in archaic texts, or deep in the flawed brain we develop.

Quote:
With regards to the idiotic "Jesus was a socialist" canard, an earnest internet search should be able to fix that kind of misinformation.
It's ground that's been well-covered.
Of course he wasn't a socialist. He wasn't even real. And yes, ground well covered.
 
Kickaha
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2021-01-12, 19:08

Y'all, I was raised in what can only charitably be called a fundamentalist evangelical Christian sect, and got the hell out by the skin of my teeth.

Walk away. There's no reasoning with the mindset.
 
Matsu
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2021-01-12, 21:07

Context is important. You'll notice I was careful to qualify my observations of the Jesus of the Gospels. Within those narratives the character's politics resemble a modern day, western, small 's', socialist, progressive. He spends a great deal of time demonstrating or counselling wisdom and a view of justice that includes a strong bias towards pacifism, servitude, wealth redistribution, and care for the poor and marginalized, together with a strong anti-authoritarian weariness of the dangers of accumulated wealth, concentrated power, and institutional bias.

It's not perfectly clear cut both because competing narrative aims seek to establish more than his politics (not least of which including a claim of divinity) and because the time within which the stories are written do not graft cleanly onto our contemporary idiom, but his politics are far from peripheral considerations both in the time into which they are written and the times in which they are likely to have been written.

As written in the Gospels, what modern political idiom would he most resemble in 2021? Capitalist? Imperialist? Republican? Monarchist? Oligarch? Militant? Nihilist, Anarchist? Theocrat? Democrat? None graft onto the character traits established in the Gospels so well as socialist progressive.

I'm not a partisan, I just find it slightly amusing that whole movements can place Jesus at the centre of their iconography while rejecting nearly all of the values that define him.

.........................................

Last edited by Matsu : 2021-01-12 at 21:27.
 
Frank777
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2021-01-12, 23:49

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
Just wrong. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_hospitals

Do you really believe the Romans and Greeks didn't treat their ill in centralised locations? What's wrong with your head? (Even this history is so euro-centric I suspect it's missing hospitals that existed in our oldest civilisations in Asia and Asia Minor)...
Oh come on. That's like saying that cavemen taught their kids, so Christians didn't pioneer the public education system in North America.

The Roman system of health care was largely reserved for the well-off, and mostly took place in personal homes.
Christians started what we now recognize as hospitals, during an epidemic.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
And started it too, and were defending it and segregation to this day! WOO free muslim black labor!
There was truly a plethora of indefensible stupidity within Christianity around the origins and propagation of the African slave trade.

But I would point out that for 1500 years after the Resurrection of Jesus, Christians went far and wide across the Earth, preaching to all who would listen that all the children of Adam had been redeemed by the Blood of the Lamb. The New Testament catalogues the Apostles' journeys and archeology and historical evidence showcase their zeal to take the Gospel all across the known world.

Ideas that the Bible's Book of Genesis was only myth, amidst the Age of Rationalism/Reason/Enlightenment cemented the notion that there were different races of mankind - an idea foreign to the Bible's historical take. That cultural lie penetrated the North American Church, and even split whole denominations. But faithful Christians held out, challenged and worked to eventually overthrow the slave trade.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
This is nonesense. There are 'churches' that absolutely don't do any of these things. And because of your fast and loose definition of evangelical church you will merely say they aren't *really* evangelical churches.
Just because you don't know what goes on inside a church doesn't mean stuff doesn't happen.

My phrasing was careful. Not all churches run all of those outreaches themselves, but they still support and use them. Local food and clothing banks might be community based, but almost every church runs collections that are dropped off monthly. Ditto for Crisis Pregnancy Centres, where a church might drop off used toys, diapers and formula. A city doesn't need 58 crisis pregnancy centres.

Likewise, only one church building in a city might host a Celebrate Recovery, DivorceCare or GriefShare group meeting, but all the churches in the city offer referrals for people with personal issues, divorce or grief counselling. {Not to mention hosting general AA groups & others.)

Here in Downtown Toronto, churches rally around ministries like The Scott Mission and Yonge Street Mission to fight homelessness and hunger. Plus free dental clinics and educational endeavours (schools and such). And I've barely got started. Almost every congregation supports overseas missions work as well. We have a nagging tendency to show up first in war zones and other distressed areas and leave after everybody else. Ask almost any foreign war correspondent. Or Charles Darwin.

Call me when you have a progressive NGO that can accomplish even a fraction of that, while still focusing on their primary mission.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
He wasn't even real. And yes, ground well covered.
If that was true, one would need to ask:

When was the last time a fictional person had that kind of impact across an entire planet for thousands of years?
 
Dr. Bobsky
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2021-01-13, 04:55

Quote:
Originally Posted by Frank777 View Post
Oh come on. That's like saying that cavemen taught their kids, so Christians didn't pioneer the public education system in North America.

The Roman system of health care was largely reserved for the well-off, and mostly took place in personal homes.
Christians started what we now recognize as hospitals, during an epidemic.
This argument is specious. Just as the rest. You're trying to beg a uniqueness to Christians, assign them the full measure of advancement in a prodigious amount of advancements, and then imply this was because of their religion. When in point of fact, Christians killed off competing ideologies that were arguably more advanced, and allowed no other belief systems to exist.

And yet still even with that historical cultural dominance in European history (and NOWHERE else), you forget that the earliest General hospital was actually a Muslim invention, based upon hospitals for antiquity. You can choose to have your limited definition of hospital to suit your needs, but it is clear to EVERYONE that you're scraping the bottom of the barrel here.

Quote:
There was truly a plethora of indefensible stupidity within Christianity around the origins and propagation of the African slave trade.

But I would point out that for 1500 years after the Resurrection of Jesus, Christians went far and wide across the Earth, preaching to all who would listen that all the children of Adam had been redeemed by the Blood of the Lamb. The New Testament catalogues the Apostles' journeys and archeology and historical evidence showcase their zeal to take the Gospel all across the known world.
oh and blood libel (murderous rampages against Jews in europe were all the rage until, well today, supported by Christians), and indoctrination of indigenous people, and elimination of native knowledge of plants and history. All because of the Cultural Ego you display here. Christianity is one religion amongst a plethora, it is no more true than the rest, and it is one of the more violent ones in its written fabric building out a story of purpose around a religious war at the end of times.

Quote:
Ideas that the Bible's Book of Genesis was only myth, amidst the Age of Rationalism/Reason/Enlightenment cemented the notion that there were different races of mankind - an idea foreign to the Bible's historical take. That cultural lie penetrated the North American Church, and even split whole denominations. But faithful Christians held out, challenged and worked to eventually overthrow the slave trade.
The stories of genesis (and there are two versions of the story within the old testament that do not line up perfectly) are non-literal allegories written by a population with its first encounter with a writing system in an attempt to record its oral history -- prior to this it was telephone tag, so your faith in this written word as literal truth is sad. How many awesome allegorical histories do you think Christians killed off in their preaching to, or killing if that didn't work, indigenous populations the world over? Thousands? Millions? How many?

Quote:
Just because you don't know what goes on inside a church doesn't mean stuff doesn't happen.
Just because you are a member of one church doesn't give you insight into the function of any other church. Particularly ones build on Christian Capitalism and the Money Gospel.


Quote:
My phrasing was careful. Not all churches run all of those outreaches themselves, but they still support and use them. Local food and clothing banks might be community based, but almost every church runs collections that are dropped off monthly. Ditto for Crisis Pregnancy Centres, where a church might drop off used toys, diapers and formula. A city doesn't need 58 crisis pregnancy centres.
Your phrasing and argument are specious. Plenty of secular organisations do this as well and other religious organisations do too. And the government as a secular organisation does this even better than the Church on a scale no Church or group of Churches could possibly. So sure, these things are great. But you cannot blame Christianity for something every single human group does, even ISIS.

Quote:
We have a nagging tendency to show up first in war zones and other distressed areas and leave after everybody else. Ask almost any foreign war correspondent. Or Charles Darwin.
No you have a nagging tendency to claim to be showing up first in war zones, when in point of fact you're most often part of the warring groups.

Quote:
Call me when you have a progressive NGO that can accomplish even a fraction of that, while still focusing on their primary mission.
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Carter Foundation. But this argument is again specious -- you're trying to suggest that Christians do this uniquely. And they don't. And your argument is that you can exclude government from this because of reasons? Government particularly our modern secular democratic governments exist because the Church as a whole and in part is incapable of doing 1/100 of the amount needed for communities to survive. The catholic church once attempted to run Europe. It didn't work out so well.


Quote:
If that was true, one would need to ask:

When was the last time a fictional person had that kind of impact across an entire planet for thousands of years?
This isn't at all the question you need to ask. There are plenty of fictional person's that have had the same effect. The entirety of the old testament is chock-a-block full of them, whose impacts have been even more significant. Your question is more about why Chritianity developed out of a Jewish-Roman cult into the obnoxious, arrogant, swaggering-until-it-is-dead religious bullshit it is today. And this has fuck-all to do with a handful of myths written about a non-existent person two-millenia ago, and much more to do with the machinations of the Catholic church integrating itself into power structures in Rome and other European capitals as history developed. Without the desire to be close to power, Christianity would have died off like so many other Jewish Cults...

Last edited by Dr. Bobsky : 2021-01-13 at 06:09.
 
chucker
 
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2021-01-13, 05:40

Quote:
Originally Posted by Frank777 View Post
Oh come on. That's like saying that cavemen taught their kids, so Christians didn't pioneer the public education system in North America.
No, it's a convergent evolution argument. Public education happened in other regions regardless of whether they were Christianity-dominated, and so did hospitals.
 
Dr. Bobsky
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2021-01-13, 08:19

Quote:
Originally Posted by chucker View Post
No, it's a convergent evolution argument. Public education happened in other regions regardless of whether they were Christianity-dominated, and so did hospitals.
Indeed. Even the conceit that "public education" was pioneered by Christians in North America is incorrect, as parochial schools are not public. Nor is it particularly a relevant statement: does anyone really know whether the native populations had only private education?

The first public school in NA wasn't established by a church, it was established by wealthy elites for their own children. The first properly public school funded by tax payers followed and wasn't at all a Christian affair...
 
Frank777
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2021-01-13, 12:13

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
This argument is specious. Just as the rest. You're trying to beg a uniqueness to Christians, assign them the full measure of advancement in a prodigious amount of advancements, and then imply this was because of their religion. When in point of fact, Christians killed off competing ideologies that were arguably more advanced, and allowed no other belief systems to exist.
I nowhere said that other religions didn't do good works, or made strides in public health. It's clear that Moses was educated as a Egyptian Royal, and that education shows in the ways he compiled the Old Testament laws. [Of course, there is much unique to Leviticus that did not come from surrounding societies.]

[quote=Dr. Bobsky;812583] And yet still even with that historical cultural dominance in European history (and NOWHERE else), you forget that the earliest General hospital was actually a Muslim invention, based upon hospitals for antiquity. You can choose to have your limited definition of hospital to suit your needs, but it is clear to EVERYONE that you're scraping the bottom of the barrel here./QUOTE]

Look I was trying to be charitable here. You are the one who posted the wiki link to the History of Hospitals, and I thought I was being kind by not posting the very first paragraph:

Quote:
The Greek temples were dedicated to the sick and infirm but did not look anything like modern hospitals. The Romans did not have dedicated, public hospitals. Public hospital, per se, did not exist until the Christian period.[1] Towards the end of the 4th century, the "second medical revolution"[2] took place with the founding of the first Christian hospital in the eastern Byzantine Empire by Basil of Caesarea, and within a few decades, such hospitals had become ubiquitous in Byzantine society.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
oh and blood libel (murderous rampages against Jews in europe were all the rage until, well today, supported by Christians), and indoctrination of indigenous people, and elimination of native knowledge of plants and history. All because of the Cultural Ego you display here. Christianity is one religion amongst a plethora, it is no more true than the rest, and it is one of the more violent ones in its written fabric building out a story of purpose around a religious war at the end of times.
The entire Bible showcases the stupidity and ignorance of man, and I can't and won't argue that Christians have not done some very stupid things. However, I would say that it's important to distinguish actions that are driven directly by Scripture, and those that are simply political actions that use religious belief merely as a pretext.

As for the last sentence, you should re-read the very end of the Bible again. The Messiah's return ends all war on Earth, not starts it.
Men do world wars very well, all by themselves.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
The stories of genesis (and there are two versions of the story within the old testament that do not line up perfectly) are non-literal allegories written by a population with its first encounter with a writing system in an attempt to record its oral history -- prior to this it was telephone tag, so your faith in this written word as literal truth is sad.
Understanding ancient historical methods can indeed be a complex business.
But modern archeology doesn't write it all off derisively as 'telephone tag', and with good reason.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
Just because you are a member of one church doesn't give you insight into the function of any other church. Particularly ones build on Christian Capitalism and the Money Gospel.
This is hilariously wrong, for reasons I won't expound on now. But I did post links to some of the group support networks that area churches use on a daily or weekly basis to co-ordinate outreach and counselling. Feel free to look into them and see how widespread they are used in cities across North America.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
Your phrasing and argument are specious. Plenty of secular organisations do this as well and other religious organisations do too. And the government as a secular organisation does this even better than the Church on a scale no Church or group of Churches could possibly.
Lol. I understand that government is god to an atheist. But it's amazing to be saying that in the midst of a pandemic, where government incompetence - regardless of country or party affiliation - is directly responsible for the deaths of a staggering number of people.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
No you have a nagging tendency to claim to be showing up first in war zones, when in point of fact you're most often part of the warring groups.
Weren't you complaining about blood libels just a few sentences north of this?


Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Carter Foundation. But this argument is again specious -- you're trying to suggest that Christians do this uniquely. And they don't. And your argument is that you can exclude government from this because of reasons? Government particularly our modern secular democratic governments exist because the Church as a whole and in part is incapable of doing 1/100 of the amount needed for communities to survive.
You again misunderstand the point. It's not that good works don't exist outside of Christianity. Of course they do. I'm talking about the sheer scale of Christian ministry in the world, without any umbrella co-ordination outside of the Holy Spirit, dwarfing everything else. Every city, tribe and nation. Working in every corner of the Earth, without a central government authority responsible for co-ordination. Christianity has been [rightfully at times] criticized for fracturing into hundreds of smaller church families or denominations. And yet somehow, they are working globally largely in unison.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr. Bobsky View Post
This isn't at all the question you need to ask. There are plenty of fictional person's that have had the same effect. The entirety of the old testament is chock-a-block full of them, whose impacts have been even more significant. Your question is more about why Chritianity developed out of a Jewish-Roman cult into the obnoxious, arrogant, swaggering-until-it-is-dead religious bullshit it is today. And this has...to do with a handful of myths written about a non-existent person two-millenia ago, and much more to do with the machinations of the Catholic church integrating itself into power structures in Rome and other European capitals as history developed. Without the desire to be close to power, Christianity would have died off like so many other Jewish Cults...
As opposed to all those other world religions that demonstrate a desire to be far from power?

I posted a link above to a book by an Indian intellectual on how Western Civilization was shaped by the Bible. You should look into it. You're arguing that Christianity wedded itself to power and survived. But Roman gods were embedded into the political system and daily life with dissenters being thrown to lions as public sport. And they were still overthrown by a God who told His people to care for children abandoned to die outside cities, and for those abandoned by Roman society and dying in epidemics.
 
kscherer
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Join Date: Aug 2004
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2021-01-13, 12:39

I have my own religious views, but I am not here to preach.

You guys want to have a religious discussion? Knock yourselves out. However, I'm not going to be very nice to name-calling. Save that crap for a less civilized forum.

Please!

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Matsu
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2021-01-13, 16:53

I didn't think I was explicitly having a religious discussion so much as a political one.
 
kscherer
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2021-01-13, 17:48

Quote:
Originally Posted by Matsu View Post
I didn't think I was explicitly having a religious discussion so much as a political one.
I would call it 50/50.

I went back through all of the posts that I wanted to split off and yours fell within the group that was getting caught up in Biblical interpretation, so it got stuck in here. Nothing personal, it was just a context thing.

- AppleNova is the best Mac-users forum on the internet. We are smart, educated, capable, and helpful. We are also loaded with smart-alecks! :)
- Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. (Mat 5:9)
 
Dr. Bobsky
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2021-01-14, 11:29

Quote:
Originally Posted by Frank777 View Post
I nowhere said that other religions didn't do good works, or made strides in public health. It's clear that Moses was educated as a Egyptian Royal, and that education shows in the ways he compiled the Old Testament laws. [Of course, there is much unique to Leviticus that did not come from surrounding societies.]
You're claim was "Christians invented hospitals." Not founded, not advanced, not moved from hospices for the poor to treatment of illnesses generally (which they were not the first to do so anyway). So you're lies (a sin) are pretty clear here.

Quote:
Look I was trying to be charitable here. You are the one who posted the wiki link to the History of Hospitals, and I thought I was being kind by not posting the very first paragraph:
Perfect. Nowhere does it say Christians invented hospitals. In fact, if you bothered to look further into the article, you'd note that Muslims created the first general hospital. The way this jives with all of the other statements you glommed onto with false hope is that Byzantine hospitals (the ones you call Christian hospitals), were hospice care for the poor as a principle means of proselytizing to dying men. From my standpoint this is kind of sickening, but Christians will love it.


Quote:
The entire Bible showcases the stupidity and ignorance of man, and I can't and won't argue that Christians have not done some very stupid things. However, I would say that it's important to distinguish actions that are driven directly by Scripture, and those that are simply political actions that use religious belief merely as a pretext.
And when the Scripture's interpretation is subject to modern readings and shifting meanings of words and you do not have the author to guide you with every single literal interpretation you've got to make except by feeling a movement, religious belief as a pretext for political actions is the default. Including anything you might think to claim is spelled out explicitly in the Bible. Even truisms like murder is wrong isn't as far as the bible is concerned.

And anyway, do you read ancient greek, or Aramaic or ancient hebrew? Or are you depending upon stupid and ignorant men to translate original version texts. I know the answer for most Christians, but how is this at all acceptable for folks who take it literally. Which version do you take literally?

Quote:
As for the last sentence, you should re-read the very end of the Bible again. The Messiah's return ends all war on Earth, not starts it.
Men do world wars very well, all by themselves.
And god pointed the way for Israelites to wage wars as well. If you're a literalist, and you believe this is all foreordained, then god starts these wars right there with men.



Quote:
Understanding ancient historical methods can indeed be a complex business.
But modern archeology doesn't write it all off derisively as 'telephone tag', and with good reason.
But it largely does treat oral traditions as having a higher rate of evolution than written traditions. For obvious reasons.




Quote:
This is hilariously wrong, for reasons I won't expound on now. But I did post links to some of the group support networks that area churches use on a daily or weekly basis to co-ordinate outreach and counselling. Feel free to look into them and see how widespread they are used in cities across North America.
Yes, well done colonising north america and killing off hundreds of millions of indigenous people so you can have church bake sales.



Quote:
Lol. I understand that government is god to an atheist. But it's amazing to be saying that in the midst of a pandemic, where government incompetence - regardless of country or party affiliation - is directly responsible for the deaths of a staggering number of people.
i think you don't understand the definition of atheism with such a stupid, vapid statement. atheists don't have a god. as far as governmental incompetence: what exactly have the churches done during this time, oh great wise Christian? They certainly didn't bring the vaccines to the forefront. The inventors of the Pfizer vaccine aren't white, or christian. The economic activity catalysed by government programs dwarfs whatever you think churches did. Sure food banks were helpful, but more important were programs to keep businesses afloat so that people can have jobs at the end of the pandemic. We're not even talking about the same order of magnitude of efforts. Not even with the catholic church.



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Weren't you complaining about blood libels just a few sentences north of this?
Nearly every major conflict in recent history has had Christians on one or more sides. That is a fact.

Blood libel claims Jews eat Christian children. Which is not a fact.



Quote:
You again misunderstand the point. It's not that good works don't exist outside of Christianity. Of course they do. I'm talking about the sheer scale of Christian ministry in the world, without any umbrella co-ordination outside of the Holy Spirit, dwarfing everything else. Every city, tribe and nation. Working in every corner of the Earth, without a central government authority responsible for co-ordination. Christianity has been [rightfully at times] criticized for fracturing into hundreds of smaller church families or denominations. And yet somehow, they are working globally largely in unison.
blah, blah blah. Coordination does in fact exist between churches across the globe, but that isn't even the point, the scale of individual good works dwarfs the scale of Christian good works, so... yawn.



Quote:
As opposed to all those other world religions that demonstrate a desire to be far from power?
At last the truth: it is a detestable feature of Abrahamic religions (particularly Islam and Christianity) to aim towards theocratic states as a given. Religions and state power are entirely separable and should be. Period.

Quote:
I posted a link above to a book by an Indian intellectual on how Western Civilization was shaped by the Bible. You should look into it.
I don't offer folks prosletyzing their faith any good faith with respect to their motives. The author of the book you are selling here is Christian. He has written several of the polemics about the inherent superiority of his religion. There's no added value that he is Indian. That you added this feature to your description of him and highlighted it again suggests you want to consider him exotic or coming from an outsider perspective. This is not only suspect, it is a clear attempt to argue by authority...

Quote:
You're arguing that Christianity wedded itself to power and survived. But Roman gods were embedded into the political system and daily life with dissenters being thrown to lions as public sport. And they were still overthrown by a God who told His people to care for children abandoned to die outside cities, and for those abandoned by Roman society and dying in epidemics.
And yet, Christians continued the tradition of tossing non-believers into the proverbial lion pit. So, I don't see your point other than to say that Christianity is a Roman religion, and is in fact the only thing from Rome left. Absorbing gods of Rome into elements of god or as saints doesn't really count as vanquishing the god of the israelites, it's more akin to revising your story to present more options.
 
drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2021-01-14, 15:19

Ugh. I must be one of those weird Christians who doesn't have the time or inclination to judge people who aren't Christian. I suppose I'm doing it badly.


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Kickaha
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: May 2004
 
2021-01-14, 15:52

Naw, you're doing it right. Jesus would be down with the drew.
 
PB PM
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Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Vancouver, BC
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2021-01-14, 16:20

Considering that most NA Christians I knew did not have a background in hermeneutics, it’s highly unlikely that most of them have heard more than a few words in Greek or Hebrew. Even that is hopeless without context. Even after taking classes on Greek and Hebrew my knowledge was just scratching the surface. Not only do you need the language, but also a need a lot of time studying the background of what was said to understand it.

To get around this some Christians will simply say that they listened to God or the Holy Spirit to explain away their individual interpretations. Add that to layers put onto the meaning of the texts by the councils of Nicaea, it’s easy for modern English readers to lose what was intended.
 
Frank777
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Toronto
 
2021-01-14, 16:46

Quote:
Originally Posted by drewprops View Post
Ugh. I must be one of those weird Christians who doesn't have the time or inclination to judge people who aren't Christian. I suppose I'm doing it badly.


...
I've got meetings tonight so I'll answer the Dr's post later. But I honestly don't see why any religious discussion instantly gets criticized for "judging" people on the other side.

I enjoy discussion and debate with people on the other side. The more removed from my own views, the better. Even if there's dripping sarcasm levelled at times (oh great wise Christian...) no-one's forcing anyone to comment and it's even now a separate thread, so no one has to see it.

It's weird that Kick will come into a discussion thread on a discussion board to warn people not to discuss things.

No-one is swearing at each other, or name-calling or inciting any kind of violence.
Both sides can be passionate, even argumentative when need be, and still get their point across.

I guess it's representative of a culture that is bitterly divided, and has lost the ability to reason around a dinner table together and express their personal views honestly and respectfully. So we all just form our own like-minded silos and online mobs, and attack each other on Twitter.
 
chucker
 
Join Date: May 2004
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2021-01-14, 18:15

I don't think I'm seeing Frank be particularly judgmental here, but I only skimmed. I do think he's attributing a few too many successes in history to Christianity (rather than to a natural force of progress that was going to happen one way or another*), but I don't see much judging? What I see, perhaps, is a little bit of confirmation bias. Perhaps even on both sides — Christians arguing "this happened in large part because of Christianity" a bit too much, and atheists arguing "this would've happened regardless and Christianity played no relevant role" a bit too much.

*) this goes both ways. I apologize in advance for invoking argumentum ad hitlerum, but eugenics were a big deal in many Western countries in the first half of the 20th century, so in an alternate history where Hitler hadn't risen, some other country could've become the poster child of genocide. Likewise, back to the other extreme, if Christianity hadn't spread throughout Europe, I'm sure we would've progressed towards hospitals and public education being common regardless.
 
kscherer
Which way is up?
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Boyzeee
 
2021-01-14, 18:43

I don't think I want to enter the religious debate, but I do want to input that Christianity had absolutely nothing to do with the atrocities committed by the Communist "cleansings" of the late 19th and 20th centuries, in which no less than 100 million* people died at the hands of atheists—primarily in Russia, China, and Cambodia, but also in many other nations across the globe.

And, in fact, are still dying to this very day *coughChina*.

P.S. This post is not here to give one side or the other fuel for their fire. It is here to demonstrate that all groups have the capacity to commit evil, and that no one grooup gets to hide behind "we better than you!"

* The numbers are so despicably bad that they range from 50 million to 160 million, with most estimates hovering around 100 million. While I have no proof to offer, I suspect that the high estimate is much closer than the low.

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Last edited by kscherer : 2021-01-14 at 19:11.
 
Matsu
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: May 2004
 
2021-01-14, 19:11

Some other countries did become poster children for genocide in the Americas. We have only recently begun to acknowledge the extent of the damage to Indigenous people. They just came a bit too early to be televised.
 
Brad
Selfish Heathen
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
 
2021-01-14, 21:50

Yikes. I haven't had to do one of these in a long time.

I'm closing this thread now because no good will come of it if it keeps going. There is no argument that can be made here that will seriously convince someone else to change their views on religion, agnosticism, atheism, organizations of those large or small, etc. "Debating" or pointing out flaws or logical fallacies or inconsistencies or digging up and correcting historical records in this kind of venue will only end with people getting upset at each other. It's happened plenty of times before here and elsewhere. You and I both know it.

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