In Italy, Even Atheists And Communists Respect The Crucifix
Sound of Trumpet
http://fpb.livejournal.com/438034.html
News from my country
You may have heard about the decision of the European Court of Human
Rights (which actually has nothing to do with the EU, although I have
no doubt that its decision was welcomed by parliament and commission)
to order the crucifixes to be removed from all Italian classrooms.
What you will not have heard is the response to this decision. The
country appears to have clenched itself like a fist, and the general
feeling appears to be that if the eminent and learned judges want the
image of the Crucified removed from our schools, they can bloody well
do it themselves - and face the consequences.
Not a single voice has been raised in favour of this decision. Dozens,
maybe hundreds of mayors have passed ordinanze (town laws) that
required the placing of the Crucifix in every classroom. In red
Tuscany, Italy's home of atheists of the left and right, mayors have
been sending the Carabinieri around to check that every classroom had
its little crucified Christ well on display. In Lecco, a city in
Lombardy - the part of Italy where religious practice is lowest and
social mores most like those of non-Christian countries like France -
a high school teacher who tried to remove the image from his own
classroom faced a classroom revolt; when he ordered the students out,
and furiously threw the crucifix into his dustbin, one of his students
saw him, reported him to the headmaster - and the headmaster inflicted
ten days of unpaid leave on him and told him to count himself lucky he
did not report him to the professional authorities.
I am not suprised. Indeed, what surprised me was my own fury at the
news of the sentence. I have been in six different school buildings in
my life in Italy - good schools, bad schools, state schools, church
schools; in not a single one do I ever remember the Crucifix not being
there. It also decorates every Italian courtroom, and most private
homes. Contrary to what you might think, the country of Dolce&Gabbana,
of Versace and of Rocco Siffredi is in no way overwhelmingly
religious; but it is attached to certain symbols, and that symbol of a
naked, suffering, unjustly condemned man in whom all that is good and
worthy of worship and respect in the world is centred, is the most
deeply buried in our soul of them all. It is not a large or
overwhelming presence; it is ordinarily small and dark - made as it is
of almost black wood and of bronze or pig iron - and barely noticed.
Indeed, it is intended to be unobtrusive; the Italian feeling, if I
can trust my own intuition, would be that large and impressive
crucified Christs are for the altars of churches, and that to place
them elsewhere would be, in a sense, like putting oneself forward - an
act of bad taste, as much as arrogance. The very materials of which
the ordinary, everyday crucifix is made are meant to fade into the
bacground: not ivory or silver or gold, but dark wood and darker
metal. It is just there in the background, so unnoticed that we do not
think of it; that we blaspheme, cheat and fight in its presence; that
we do not realize it is there - until.
Until some damned fanatic from Finland, who does not belong here, who
has no idea of the country she has married in, who clearly rejects
everything we live for, and who yet wants to be and remain Italian in
spite of her abysmal and fanatical ignorance of what Italy is and of
what we are - until this alien harpy pretends to take this symbol from
us. Until she is stupid enough, ignorant enough, and fanatical enough,
to want to poison with her intolerance the very country she has wished
to join. And until, far from the country whose every judge (in the
presence of the crucifix in his or her courtroom) has told her to get
stuffed, she finally finds seven deracinated book-blinded idiots who
take her argument seriously.
At which point, the moron and the morons find that their "battle" is
only just begun. Because when it comes to symbols so fundamental to
our lives, then the most eminent court has no more power than seven
kiddies in a corner shop. Because at that point the country in Europe
that has always been most pro-European, which has given up the most
for Europe, in which Europe is regarded as a value in itself, simply
chews this European edict and spits it in the face of those who claim
to speak for Europe. Because, stupid judges and crazy Finn, we are far
more Europe than you will ever be. "Ye worship ye know not what: we
know what we worship" (John 4.22). In Italy, even atheists and
Communists respect the Crucifix, because it means so much about the
condition and value of man. Because our relationship with our Lord is
our own, and woe betide amyone who comes between us and our Lord.
raven1
<soundof...@dcemail.com> wrote:
The author first tries to assert that the crucifix isn't a religious
symbol...
> Contrary to what you might think, the country of Dolce&Gabbana,
>of Versace and of Rocco Siffredi is in no way overwhelmingly
>religious; but it is attached to certain symbols, and that symbol of a
>naked, suffering, unjustly condemned man in whom all that is good and
>worthy of worship and respect in the world is centred, is the most
>deeply buried in our soul of them all.
Then confirms that it is. Bravo!
W.T.S.
news:ae19d9bf-d8b9-4a05...@z41g2000yqz.googlegroups.com...God is a lie. The crucifix is a lie. The crucifix is the symbol of a left
over institution from the dark ages that seeks to rule through fear and
superstition. Religion is the heroin of the people, and the church is the
peddler of this destructive drug. Italy will be enslaved to the church for
many a century to come until it opens it's eyes and realizes what the church
has done to the heart and soul of an enslaved people.
Church, bad. Atheism, good.
--
http://folding.stanford.edu
Save lives, visit today!
Uncle Vic
wrote:
> You may have heard about the decision of the European Court of Human
> Rights (which actually has nothing to do with the EU, although I have
> no doubt that its decision was welcomed by parliament and commission)
> to order the crucifixes to be removed from all Italian classrooms.
> What you will not have heard is the response to this decision. The
> country appears to have clenched itself like a fist, and the general
> feeling appears to be that if the eminent and learned judges want the
> image of the Crucified removed from our schools, they can bloody well
> do it themselves - and face the consequences.
The Bishop!
--
Uncle Vic
aa Atheist #2011
Christians are like Slinkys. They're boring, but they'll put a smile on
your face when you push them down the stairs.
panam...@hotmail.com
wrote:
snip
Oh, well...there were Europeans that collaborated with the Nazis as
well. Human nature, I suppose..
-Panama Floyd, Atlanta.
aa#2015, Member Knights of BAAWA!
"..the prayer cloth of one aeon is the doormat of the next."
-Mark Twain
Religious societies are *less* moral than secular ones:
http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html
Syd M.
> One fine day in alt.atheism, Sound of Trumpet <soundoftrum...@dcemail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > You may have heard about the decision of the European Court of Human
> > Rights (which actually has nothing to do with the EU, although I have
> > no doubt that its decision was welcomed by parliament and commission)
> > to order the crucifixes to be removed from all Italian classrooms.
> > What you will not have heard is the response to this decision. The
> > country appears to have clenched itself like a fist, and the general
> > feeling appears to be that if the eminent and learned judges want the
> > image of the Crucified removed from our schools, they can bloody well
> > do it themselves - and face the consequences.
>
> The Bishop!
>
OK, nobody move!!
PD "The Bishop" W.
Shawn Wilson
> God is a lie. The crucifix is a lie. The crucifix is the symbol of a left
> over institution from the dark ages that seeks to rule through fear and
> superstition. Religion is the heroin of the people, and the church is the
> peddler of this destructive drug. Italy will be enslaved to the church for
> many a century to come until it opens it's eyes and realizes what the church
> has done to the heart and soul of an enslaved people.
> Church, bad. Atheism, good.
Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
committed by atheists... I will take the church over them.
Father Haskell
Some of the most charitable people have been atheist:
http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Pages/home.aspx
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_&_Melinda_Gates_Foundation
says that the Gates foundation contributed 35.1 billion dollars
in 1988 alone.
Christopher A. Lee
<father...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>On Jan 3, 3:31�pm, Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Jan 2, 6:25�pm, "W.T.S." <m...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>
>> > God is a lie. �The crucifix is a lie. �The crucifix is the symbol of a left
>> > over institution from the dark ages that seeks to rule through fear and
>> > superstition. �Religion is the heroin of the people, and the church is the
>> > peddler of this destructive drug. �Italy will be enslaved to the church for
>> > many a century to come until it opens it's eyes and realizes what the church
>> > has done to the heart and soul of an enslaved people.
>> > Church, bad. �Atheism, good.
>>
>> Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
>> committed by atheists... �I will take the church over them.
Yet another bigoted moron too stupid to understand that not believing
in gods is no different than not believing in pixies,
What does that motivate him to do?
Instead of looking at what people aren't, to determine why they did
something you need t o look at what they are.
But the worst atrocities in terms of numbers were black slave trade
and the conquest of the Americas - both done by Christians.
In terms of percentages it was the Thirty Years War that killed about
a third of the German population - done by Christians.
Uncle Vic
Were they committed in the name of atheism, like the Spanish Inquisition
committed its atrocities in the name of Catholicism? This argument boils
down to one of the impossibility of morality to exist without church
guidance - which assumes unreasonably low expectations of the human race.
The next time you make such an assumption, please look up the ratio of
Christians to Atheists in any American prison population.
5321 Dead, 454 since 1/20/09
Interestingly, you're full of shit.
But then, lying for Jesus is second nature to you, isn't it?
Ray Fischer
And so I believe to-day that my conduct is in accordance with the
will of the Almighty Creator. In standing guard against the Jew I
am defending the handiwork of the Lord.
Adolf Hitler -- Mein Kampf
--
Ray Fischer
rfis...@sonic.net
Alan Ford
> Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
> committed by atheists... I will take the church over them.
And also interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history
have been committed by people who wore underpants... I will start going
commando from now on.
--
If you don't beat your meat
You can't have any pudding
How can you have any pudding
If you don't beat your meat?
T Guy
> http://fpb.livejournal.com/438034.html
>
> News from my country
(T Guy):
Fame for Fabio!
T Guy
Paladin
Hitler was a Christian. Hussein was a Muslim.
Ferdinand and Isabella conducted the Inquisition under
edict of Pope Lucius III, a Christian.
"And it came to pass, that at midnight the LORD smote
all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the
firstborn of Pharaoh that sat on his throne unto the
firstborn of the captive that was in the dungeon; and
all the firstborn of cattle." (Exodus 12:29)
"Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones,
and kill every woman who has known man by lying with
him. But all the young girls who have not known man by
lying with him, keep alive for yourselves."
(Moses - Numbers 31:17)
"And the LORD our God delivered him before us; and we
smote him, and his sons, and all his people. And we
took all his cities at that time, and utterly destoyed
the men, and the women, and the little ones, of every
city we left none to remain:" (Deuteronomy 2:33-34)
"And the LORD said unto me, 'Fear him not: for I will
deliver him, and all his people, and his land, into thy
hand; and thou shalt do unto him as thou didst unto
Sihon king of the Amorites......And we utterly
destroyed them, as we did unto Sihon king of Heshbon,
utterly destroying the men, women, and children, of
every city." (Deuteronomy 3:2-6)
"This is what the LORD says: Now go and smite Amalek,
and utterly destroy all that they have; do not spare
them, but kill both man and woman, infant and suckling,
ox and sheep, camel and ass ....' And Saul ... utterly
destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword."
(1 Samuel 15:3,7-8)
"And Nathan departed unto his house. And the LORD
struck the child that Uriah's wife bare unto David, and
it was very sick........ And it came to pass on the
seventh day, that the child died........." (2 Samuel
12:15-18)
"And he went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was
going up by the way, there came forth little children
out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, Go
up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head.And he turned
back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name
of the LORD. And there came forth two she bears out of
the wood, and tare forty and two children of them." (2
Kings 2:23-24)
"Every one that is found shall be thrust through; and
every one that is joined unto them shall fall by the
sword. Their children also shall be dashed to pieces
before their eyes; their houses shall be spoiled, and
their wives ravished...... Their bows also shall dash
the young men to pieces; and they shall have no pity on
the fruit of the womb; their eye shall not spare
children." (Isaiah 13:15-18)
"Prepare slaughter for his children for the iniquity of
their fathers; that they do not rise, nor possess the
land, nor fill the face of the world with cities.......
For I will rise up against them, saith the LORD of
hosts....." (Isaiah 14:21-22)
"And I will dash them one against another, even the
fathers and the sons together, saith the LORD: I will
not pity, nor spare, nor have mercy, but destroy them."
(Jeremiah 13:14)
"The hands of the pitiful women have sodden their own
children: they were their meat in the destruction of
the daughter of my people. The Lord hath accomplished
his fury; he hath poured out his fierce anger, and hath
kindled a fire in Zion, and it hath devoured the
foundations thereof." (Lamentations 4:10-11)
"And the Lord said unto him,....... And to the others
he said in mine hearing, Go ye after him through the
city, and smite: let not your eye spare, neither have
ye pity: Slay utterly old and young, both maids, and
little children, and women: but come not near any man
upon whom is the mark; and begin at my sanctuary. Then
they began at the ancient men which were before the
house." (Ezekiel 9:4-6)
"Behold, I will cast her into a bed, and them that
commit adultery with her into great tribulation, except
they repent of their deeds. And I will kill her
children with death; and all the churches shall know
that I am he which searcheth the reins and hearts: and
I will give unto every one of you according to your
works." (Jesus - Revelation 2:22-23)
Howard Brazee
<ikono...@gmail.com> wrote:
>Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
>committed by atheists... I will take the church over them.
What a silly statement. Do you expect anybody to believe it?
Atheists and theists seem to commit the same atrocities, but theists
have outnumbered atheists throughout history.
--
"In no part of the constitution is more wisdom to be found,
than in the clause which confides the question of war or peace
to the legislature, and not to the executive department."
- James Madison
Howard Brazee
<de...@dead.com> wrote:
>> Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
>> committed by atheists... I will take the church over them.
>
>Interestingly, you're full of shit.
>
>But then, lying for Jesus is second nature to you, isn't it?
Not really. Jesus was about love and tolerance and it's better to be
good than to be Righteous. He's not lying for Jesus, he's lying for
himself.
Shawn Wilson
Which makes them pikers next to the Catholic Church.
Shawn Wilson
> >> > God is a lie. The crucifix is a lie. The crucifix is the symbol of a left
> >> > over institution from the dark ages that seeks to rule through fear and
> >> > superstition. Religion is the heroin of the people, and the church is the
> >> > peddler of this destructive drug. Italy will be enslaved to the church for
> >> > many a century to come until it opens it's eyes and realizes what the church
> >> > has done to the heart and soul of an enslaved people.
> >> > Church, bad. Atheism, good.
>
> >> Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
> >> committed by atheists... I will take the church over them.
>
> Yet another bigoted moron too stupid to understand that not believing
> in gods is no different than not believing in pixies,
I think my life is safer in the hands of people who believe that God
is the judge of the value of human life than in the hands of atheists
who think that THEY are.
> But the worst atrocities in terms of numbers were black slave trade
> and the conquest of the Americas - both done by Christians.
I would rather be a slave than a vicim of an atheiost society that
decided my life had no value.
> In terms of percentages it was the Thirty Years War that killed about
> a third of the German population - done by Christians.
Ah, I get it. Any evil act, done by anyone even tangentally
'christian' is about religion...
Thumb on the scales much?
OK, my turn. I charge every single evil act ever committed by anyone
who didn't attend church against atheists. I win...
> >Some of the most charitable people have been atheist:
> >http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Pages/home.aspx
BTW, as a percentage there are many more Christians who give more than
merely the two atheists you mention here.
Jimbo
wrote:
> http://fpb.livejournal.com/438034.html
>
> News from my country
>
> You may have heard about the decision of the European Court of Human
> Rights (which actually has nothing to do with the EU, although I have
> no doubt that its decision was welcomed by parliament and commission)
> to order the crucifixes to be removed from all Italian classrooms.
> What you will not have heard is the response to this decision. The
> country appears to have clenched itself like a fist, and the general
> feeling appears to be that if the eminent and learned judges want the
> image of the Crucified removed from our schools, they can bloody well
> do it themselves - and face the consequences.
So, basically, you don't believe that your country should enforce the
very laws that your countrymen passed?
Shawn Wilson
> >> God is a lie. The crucifix is a lie. The crucifix is the symbol of
> > a left
> >> over institution from the dark ages that seeks to rule through fear
> >> and superstition. Religion is the heroin of the people, and the
> >> church is
> > the
> >> peddler of this destructive drug. Italy will be enslaved to the
> >> church
> > for
> >> many a century to come until it opens it's eyes and realizes what the
> >> chu
> > rch
> >> has done to the heart and soul of an enslaved people.
> >> Church, bad. Atheism, good.
>
> > Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
> > committed by atheists... I will take the church over them.
>
> Were they committed in the name of atheism, like the Spanish Inquisition
> committed its atrocities in the name of Catholicism?
Gee, in that Christianity is kinda predicated on 'thou shalt not
kill', I don't really see how you think that killing is a Christian
act...
Your understanding of Christianity is as deep and nuanced as a
Klansman's opinion of blacks or a Nazi's opinion of Jews...
> This argument boils
> down to one of the impossibility of morality to exist without church
> guidance - which assumes unreasonably low expectations of the human race.
> The next time you make such an assumption, please look up the ratio of
> Christians to Atheists in any American prison population.
Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Christians win...
Shawn Wilson
wrote:
> >> God is a lie. The crucifix is a lie. The crucifix is the symbol of a
> >> left over institution from the dark ages that seeks to rule through
> >> fear and superstition. Religion is the heroin of the people, and the
> >> church is the peddler of this destructive drug. Italy will be enslaved
> >> to the church for many a century to come until it opens it's eyes and
> >> realizes what the church has done to the heart and soul of an enslaved
> >> people. Church, bad. Atheism, good.
>
> > Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
> > committed by atheists... I will take the church over them.
>
> Interestingly, you're full of shit.
>
> But then, lying for Jesus is second nature to you, isn't it?
Which are you claiming is the lie?
Or is it that whole atheists have no morality thing?
Uncle Vic
>> > Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have
>> > been committed by atheists... �I will take the church over them.
>>
>> Were they committed in the name of atheism, like the Spanish
>> Inquisition committed its atrocities in the name of Catholicism?
>
>
> Gee, in that Christianity is kinda predicated on 'thou shalt not
> kill', I don't really see how you think that killing is a Christian
> act...
http://notachristian.org/christianatrocities.html
>
> Your understanding of Christianity is as deep and nuanced as a
> Klansman's opinion of blacks or a Nazi's opinion of Jews...
As is your understanding of atheism, which is merely the lack of theism.
But don't worry. Your opinion is shared by many millions of brainwashed
fools.
>
>
>
>> �This argument boils
>> down to one of the impossibility of morality to exist without church
>> guidance - which assumes unreasonably low expectations of the human
>> race.
> �
>> The next time you make such an assumption, please look up the ratio
>> of Christians to Atheists in any American prison population.
>
>
> Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Christians win...
I've never seen the inside of a jail cell, except on a few TV reality
shows. I win.
raven1
<ikono...@gmail.com> wrote:
>Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler,
Hitler wasn't an atheist, fool.
Chris
Wow. The Thirty Years' War was only tangentially related to religion?
This betrays a depth of ignorance galactic in scope.
Chris
Uncle Vic
>> > Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have
>> > been committed by atheists... �I will take the church over them.
>>
>> Interestingly, you're full of shit.
>>
>> But then, lying for Jesus is second nature to you, isn't it?
>
>
> Which are you claiming is the lie?
>
> Or is it that whole atheists have no morality thing?
>
>
The whole atheists have all kinds of morality things. But you have to
watch out for the half atheists. Fortunately, the EAC has the situation
nearly under control.
Christopher A. Lee
wrote:
>One fine day in alt.atheism, Shawn Wilson <ikono...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>> > Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have
>>> > been committed by atheists... �I will take the church over them.
>>>
>>> Were they committed in the name of atheism, like the Spanish
>>> Inquisition committed its atrocities in the name of Catholicism?
>>
>> Gee, in that Christianity is kinda predicated on 'thou shalt not
>> kill', I don't really see how you think that killing is a Christian
>> act...
>
>http://notachristian.org/christianatrocities.html
Today's Christians are in denial about its bloody history.
It's the result of redefining it from belief in Jesus Christ as their
god into something touchy-feely coupled with a Borg-like group think:
they imagine they all think the same way, they wouldn't do bad things
therefore other Christians can't.
So earlier Christians couldn't by definition do bad things. If they
did they weren't real Christians. Especially if they were from the
other side of the Reformation.
If they can't be rationalised away they either try to defend them or
just shut them out their actions if it's one of their founders like
Augustine, Chrysostom, Luther or Calvin.
>> Your understanding of Christianity is as deep and nuanced as a
>> Klansman's opinion of blacks or a Nazi's opinion of Jews...
Klansmen have a rose-tinted view of their organisation as well.
>As is your understanding of atheism, which is merely the lack of theism.
It's part of his being in denial. They are incapable of grasping that
their god is only considered "real" inside their family of religions.
And that we wouldn't even give it a thought if they kept it to
themselves - it means no more that Zeus etc do them.
So they invent positions we don't have as if it were as "real" for us
as it is for them. And then turn them into some kind of equivalent but
opposite counter-ideology to theirs, with the same role in our life.
Even though being atheist is incidental not foundational.
>But don't worry. Your opinion is shared by many millions of brainwashed
>fools.
His understanding of Christianity is severely lacking as well.
>>> �This argument boils
>>> down to one of the impossibility of morality to exist without church
>>> guidance - which assumes unreasonably low expectations of the human
>>> race.
>> �
>>> The next time you make such an assumption, please look up the ratio
>>> of Christians to Atheists in any American prison population.
>>
>> Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Christians win...
A standard Christian bigoted lie.
Why does the moron imagine the exact equivalent of not believing in
leprechauns, motivates anything?
Why does he imagine Hitler (a Catholic), Stalin (educated in a Russian
Orthodox seminary, attended services and as a church funeral) and Pol
Pot (Buddhist) were atheist?
Uncle Vic
>> >> Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have
>> >> been committed by atheists... �I will take the church over them.
>>
>> Yet another bigoted moron too stupid to understand that not believing
>> in gods is no different than not believing in pixies,
>
>
> I think my life is safer in the hands of people who believe that God
> is the judge of the value of human life than in the hands of atheists
> who think that THEY are.
>
Maybe, but watch out for your children.
>
>
>
>> But the worst atrocities in terms of numbers were black slave trade
>> and the conquest of the Americas - both done by Christians.
>
>
> I would rather be a slave than a vicim of an atheiost society that
> decided my life had no value.
>
What atheist told you your *life* had no value? I'll tell you your
beliefs have no value (in today's society), but as far as your life goes,
that's your business, not mine.
>
>
>
>> In terms of percentages it was the Thirty Years War that killed about
>> a third of the German population - done by Christians.
>
>
> Ah, I get it. Any evil act, done by anyone even tangentally
> 'christian' is about religion...
No, only the ones that actually are. Dude. Bring some actual knowledge
to the table here. The thirty years war began as a conflict between
Protestants and Catholics, although it eventually morphed into a
political clash.
How do you explain away the Spanish Inquisition?
And what specific acts committed by atheists were committed in the name
of atheism? Don't forget to provide an unbiased cite.
>
> Thumb on the scales much?
>
> OK, my turn. I charge every single evil act ever committed by anyone
> who didn't attend church against atheists. I win...
>
What? No trial? Even the hundreds of thousands of witches burned at the
stake by Christians had a trial. Well, at least some of them did.
>
>
>> >Some of the most charitable people have been atheist:
>> >http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Pages/home.aspx
>
>
>
> BTW, as a percentage there are many more Christians who give more than
> merely the two atheists you mention here.
>
What significance to numbers have when considering morality?
Syd
You mean, you'll believe a lie over the truth.
PDW
Syd
Like I said, another idiot theist who let facts get in the way...
PDW
Syd
No.
PDW
Syd
You just won't stop lying, huh?
PDW
Lord Vetinari
news:0317efc3-d6e0-44e4...@a32g2000yqm.googlegroups.com...
: On Jan 2, 6:25 pm, "W.T.S." <m...@earthlink.net> wrote:
:
: > God is a lie. The crucifix is a lie. The crucifix is the symbol of a
left
: > over institution from the dark ages that seeks to rule through fear and
: > superstition. Religion is the heroin of the people, and the church is
the
: > peddler of this destructive drug. Italy will be enslaved to the church
for
: > many a century to come until it opens it's eyes and realizes what the
church
: > has done to the heart and soul of an enslaved people.
: > Church, bad. Atheism, good.
:
: Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
: committed by atheists...
Ignorant one, keep on lying.
: I will take the church over them.
You can KEEP your fucking church...its foundations are crumbling.
Christopher A. Lee
wrote:
>On Jan 4, 1:45�pm, Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Jan 3, 1:56�pm, Christopher A. Lee <ca...@optonline.net> wrote:
>>
>> > >> > God is a lie. �The crucifix is a lie. �The crucifix is the symbol of a left
>> > >> > over institution from the dark ages that seeks to rule through fear and
>> > >> > superstition. �Religion is the heroin of the people, and the church is the
>> > >> > peddler of this destructive drug. �Italy will be enslaved to the church for
>> > >> > many a century to come until it opens it's eyes and realizes what the church
>> > >> > has done to the heart and soul of an enslaved people.
>> > >> > Church, bad. �Atheism, good.
>>
>> > >> Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
>> > >> committed by atheists... �I will take the church over them.
>>
>> > Yet another bigoted moron too stupid to understand that not believing
>> > in gods is no different than not believing in pixies,
>>
>> I think my life is safer in the hands of people who believe that God
>> is the judge of the value of human life than in the hands of atheists
>> who think that THEY are.
What an amoral, lying moron.
Like far too many religionists he is a sociopath incapable of
understanding other people to realse how they see the effect of his
actions towards them which is how the rest of us see good and bad.
He has replaced this with what somebody else tells him an imaginary
alpha male says is good or bad without knowing whether it actually is.
And he is both proud of this and nasty towards those who still have
their innate empathy.
>> > But the worst atrocities in terms of numbers were black slave trade
>> > and the conquest of the Americas - both done by Christians.
>>
>> I would rather be a slave than a vicim of an atheiost society that
>> decided my life had no value.
Is this sociopath really, honestly incapable of reading for
comprehensionor just being an asshole for the sake of it?
>> > In terms of percentages it was the Thirty Years War that killed about
>> > a third of the German population - done by Christians.
>>
>> Ah, I get it. �Any evil act, done by anyone even tangentally
>> 'christian' is about religion...
Where did I say that, liar who puts words in other people's mouths he
knows they didn't say?
But the thirty years war WAS about religion. Catholics vs Protestants
each treating the others as heretics, fighting over which religion to
impose on people.
Stop being so dishonest.
>> Thumb on the scales much?
Lie much?
>> OK, my turn. �I charge every single evil act ever committed by anyone
>> who didn't attend church against atheists. �I win...
Which you know would be a lie.
Becaue as you know the exact equivalent of not believing inleprechauns
doesn't motivate or justify anything.
Whereas the evils I described have documented admission by those
involved that they were either motivated or jutified by religious
beliefs.
Stop pretending.
5321 Dead, 454 since 1/20/09
wrote:
>On Jan 4, 1:48�pm, Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote:
This has gotta be a sock puppet account for fake Bill. Nobody else is
as obsessively dishonest about this subject than he.
The Chief Instigator
> On Mon, 4 Jan 2010 14:12:39 -0800 (PST), Syd <pdwri...@yahoo.com>
> wrote:
>
>>> On Jan 3, 1:59?pm, Uncle Vic <addr...@withheld.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> > >> God is a lie. ?The crucifix is a lie. ?The crucifix is the symbol
>>> > >> of a left over institution from the dark ages that seeks to rule
>>> > >> people, and the church is the peddler of this destructive drug.
>>> > >> until it opens it's eyes and realizes what the church has done to
>>> > >> the heart and soul of an enslaved people. Church, bad. ?Atheism,
>>> > >> good.
>>>
>>> > > Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
>>>
>>> > Were they committed in the name of atheism, like the Spanish Inquisition
>>> > committed its atrocities in the name of Catholicism?
>>>
>>> Gee, in that Christianity is kinda predicated on 'thou shalt not
>>> kill', I don't really see how you think that killing is a Christian
>>> act...
>>>
>>> Your understanding of Christianity is as deep and nuanced as a
>>> Klansman's opinion of blacks or a Nazi's opinion of Jews...
>>>
>>> > down to one of the impossibility of morality to exist without church
>>> > The next time you make such an assumption, please look up the ratio of
>>> > Christians to Atheists in any American prison population.
>>>
>>
>>No.
>>
>>PDW
>
> This has gotta be a sock puppet account for fake Bill. Nobody else is
> as obsessively dishonest about this subject than he.
You're as wrong as you can be, anonymous GigaNews coward.
--
Patrick L. "The Chief Instigator" Humphrey (pat...@io.com) Houston, Texas
www.io.com/~patrick/aeros.php (TCI's 2009-10 Houston Aeros) AA#2273
LAST GAME: Abbotsford 4, Houston 3 (OT, January 3)
NEXT GAME: Wednesday, January 6 at Texas, 7:35
Paladin
"The Christian (Republican) god is a three headed
monster, cruel, vengeful, and capricious. If one wishes
to know more of this raging, three headed beast-like
god, one only needs to look at the caliber of people
who say they serve him. They are always of two classes:
fools and hypocrites."
- Thomas Jefferson
Syd
<ze...@finestplanet.com> wrote:
> On Mon, 4 Jan 2010 14:12:39 -0800 (PST), Syd <pdwrigh...@yahoo.com>
I dunno... There is Failednuts. He's as obsessed about it as well.
PDW
Ray Fischer
WHich spends hundreds of milions of dollars an cathedrals to benefit
itself. And hundreds of millions more to because it enabled child
molesters.
--
Ray Fischer
rfis...@sonic.net
Ray Fischer
>Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Christians win...
Another liar for Jesus.
And so I believe to-day that my conduct is in accordance with the
will of the Almighty Creator. In standing guard against the Jew I
am defending the handiwork of the Lord.
Adolpf Hitler -- Mein Kampf
--
Ray Fischer
rfis...@sonic.net
Ray Fischer
>> Yet another bigoted moron too stupid to understand that not believing
>> in gods is no different than not believing in pixies,
>
>I think my life is safer in the hands of people who believe that God
>is the judge of the value of human life than in the hands of atheists
>who think that THEY are.
This kind of "morality".
Six days may work be done; but in the seventh is the sabbath of
rest, holy to the LORD: whosoever doeth any work in the sabbath
day, he shall surely be put to death.
Ex 31:15
The religibots don't even realize that they CHOOSE thweir morality
just like everybody else, and many of them choose a morality of hate,
killing, and intolerance.
--
Ray Fischer
rfis...@sonic.net
haiku jones
> On Jan 3, 1:56 pm, Christopher A. Lee <ca...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
> > >> > God is a lie. The crucifix is a lie. The crucifix is the symbol of a left
> > >> > over institution from the dark ages that seeks to rule through fear and
> > >> > superstition. Religion is the heroin of the people, and the church is the
> > >> > peddler of this destructive drug. Italy will be enslaved to the church for
> > >> > many a century to come until it opens it's eyes and realizes what the church
> > >> > has done to the heart and soul of an enslaved people.
> > >> > Church, bad. Atheism, good.
>
> > >> Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
> > >> committed by atheists... I will take the church over them.
>
> > Yet another bigoted moron too stupid to understand that not believing
> > in gods is no different than not believing in pixies,
>
> I think my life is safer in the hands of people who believe that God
> is the judge of the value of human life than in the hands of atheists
> who think that THEY are.
Um...you ARE talking about the God who thinks that the
tiniest, most inconsequential sin you may commit -- even
the "sin" of being born to human parents -- makes you
a candidate for being tortured in a manner that no
person in history has been tortured by another person,
and this for ever and ever and ever and ever and
ever and ever and ever...that IS the God who is
"the judge of the value of human life" you're talking
about, is it not?
Haiku Jones
Shawn Wilson
> > > In terms of percentages it was the Thirty Years War that killed about
> > > a third of the German population - done by Christians.
>
> > Ah, I get it. Any evil act, done by anyone even tangentally
> > 'christian' is about religion...
>
> > Thumb on the scales much?
>
> Wow. The Thirty Years' War was only tangentially related to religion?
> This betrays a depth of ignorance galactic in scope.
You really think the 30 years war had anything to do with religion
beyond it being the 'team color'?
Shawn Wilson
> >> Gee, in that Christianity is kinda predicated on 'thou shalt not
> >> kill', I don't really see how you think that killing is a Christian
> >> act...
>
> >http://notachristian.org/christianatrocities.html
>
> Today's Christians are in denial about its bloody history.
I knopw its history perfectly well. Just because some mass murderer
calls himself Christian doesn't make him one.
> >> Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Christians win...
>
> A standard Christian bigoted lie.
Or, in the real world, not.
> Why does the moron imagine the exact equivalent of not believing in
> leprechauns, motivates anything?
>
> Why does he imagine Hitler (a Catholic),
Not really, no.
Stalin (educated in a Russian
> Orthodox seminary, attended services and as a church funeral)
Communist and atheist in his actual life.
> and Pol
> Pot (Buddhist) were atheist?
Because communism is atheist? Religion is the opiate of the masses
and all that.
Shawn Wilson
> > I would rather be a slave than a vicim of an atheiost society that
> > decided my life had no value.
>
> What atheist told you your *life* had no value?
Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao, to name just a few. Feel free to
explain how life has intrinsic value to an atheist. "God says so"
doesn't leave room for debate, and that's the idea.
Atheists can't claim one set of values is 'better' than another- all
are equally valuable. You may disagree as an individual, but you
can't say 'X is simply wrong'.
> I'll tell you your
> beliefs have no value (in today's society), but as far as your life goes,
> that's your business, not mine.
Which makes Christians better than atheists...
> >> In terms of percentages it was the Thirty Years War that killed about
> >> a third of the German population - done by Christians.
>
> > Ah, I get it. Any evil act, done by anyone even tangentally
> > 'christian' is about religion...
>
> No, only the ones that actually are. Dude. Bring some actual knowledge
> to the table here. The thirty years war began as a conflict between
> Protestants and Catholics, although it eventually morphed into a
> political clash.
No, it began as a political clash where for historical reasons the
sides had different religious affiliations. Northern Ireland isn't
about religion either, though religion is a pretty reliable 'team
color'. How you can think a war with Catholic Spain and Catholic
France supporting opposite 'sides' is about religion is beyond me...
> How do you explain away the Spanish Inquisition?
Why would I?
> And what specific acts committed by atheists were committed in the name
> of atheism? Don't forget to provide an unbiased cite.
I cite Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao.
> > OK, my turn. I charge every single evil act ever committed by anyone
> > who didn't attend church against atheists. I win...
>
> What? No trial? Even the hundreds of thousands of witches burned at the
> stake by Christians had a trial. Well, at least some of them did.
All made trivial in a few decades by unrivaled atheism.
> > BTW, as a percentage there are many more Christians who give more than
> > merely the two atheists you mention here.
>
> What significance to numbers have when considering morality?
Funny how numbers were important when it was The Gates' $35 billion...
Shawn Wilson
> > Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
> > committed by atheists... I will take the church over them.
>
> You mean, you'll believe a lie over the truth.
A lie? No. You think you have the truth? No there as well.
Shawn Wilson
> >> I think my life is safer in the hands of people who believe that God
> >> is the judge of the value of human life than in the hands of atheists
> >> who think that THEY are.
>
> What an amoral, lying moron.
Amoral? Desperate much?
> Like far too many religionists he is a sociopath incapable of
> understanding other people to realse how they see the effect of his
> actions towards them which is how the rest of us see good and bad.
Ie, only in your own reflection. We have seen where that leads. How
high does the pile of bodies have to be before it occurs to you that
maybe there is an alternative?
> He has replaced this with what somebody else tells him an imaginary
> alpha male says is good or bad without knowing whether it actually is.
Whereas you seem to want permission to kill whoever you don't like.
> And he is both proud of this and nasty towards those who still have
> their innate empathy.
Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao. I will take "thou shalt not kill" over
'empathy' every day of the week and twice on Sunday.
And, I will be forebearing enough not to mention that having disposed
of God given morality in one go, you then seem to find a need to
recreate it in other, and inferior, terms...
Difference between "God says" and 'exercise of reason' is that
exercise of reason leaves room for debate and disagreement. A lot of
bodies will fit in that room.
> But the thirty years war WAS about religion. Catholics vs Protestants
> each treating the others as heretics, fighting over which religion to
> impose on people.
This explaining how Catholic France and Catholic Spain were supporting
opposite sides. Or not...
Shawn Wilson
> "The Christian (Republican) god is a three headed
> monster, cruel, vengeful, and capricious. If one wishes
> to know more of this raging, three headed beast-like
> god, one only needs to look at the caliber of people
> who say they serve him. They are always of two classes:
> fools and hypocrites."
> - Thomas Jefferson
On the other hand, Jefferson supported the murderous revolution in
France...
raven1
<ikono...@gmail.com> wrote:
>Hitler
Was not an atheist, idiot.
Shawn Wilson
> >> Some of the most charitable people have been atheist:http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Pages/home.aspx
>
> >>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_&_Melinda_Gates_Foundation
> >> says that the Gates foundation contributed 35.1 billion dollars
> >> in 1988 alone.
>
> >Which makes them pikers next to the Catholic Church.
>
> WHich spends hundreds of milions of dollars an cathedrals to benefit
> itself.
And billions annually (every year, not just once...) helping the
poor.
> And hundreds of millions more to because it enabled child
> molesters.
Wow, so being in the forgiveness and redeption business you criticize
them for taking their beliefs seriously?
Shawn Wilson
> > I think my life is safer in the hands of people who believe that God
> > is the judge of the value of human life than in the hands of atheists
> > who think that THEY are.
>
> Um...you ARE talking about the God who thinks that the
> tiniest, most inconsequential sin you may commit -- even
> the "sin" of being born to human parents -- makes you
> a candidate for being tortured in a manner that no
> person in history has been tortured by another person,
> and this for ever and ever and ever and ever and
> ever and ever and ever...that IS the God who is
> "the judge of the value of human life" you're talking
> about, is it not?
And you think that why?
Chris
I think that for the average German getting slaughtered/raped by the
armies, religion became pretty meaningless. I also think that plenty
of mercenaries jumped from one side to another.
But the war itself was a direct result of the Peace of Augsberg, which
was all about religion- and all about Christianity, in fact. It was
supposed to settle the balance of power between Catholics and
Lutherans in (primarily) Germany. Problems arose when a prince-bishop
converted from Catholicism to Calvinism, upsetting the balance of
power in the Holy Roman Empire. Meanwhile the Calvinists were being
persecuted all throughout Germany by then, leading to the
defenestration of Prague (the second one).
So yes, in fact, the causes of the Thirty Years' War were ALL about
religion. It later became more secular, but by then, it didn't really
matter. Most of Germany was ravaged, and a third of its population was
dead.
Chris
Mike Schilling
>> And hundreds of millions more to because it enabled child
>> molesters.
>
>
> Wow, so being in the forgiveness and redeption business you
> criticize
> them for taking their beliefs seriously?
Yeah, don't you remember Jesus saying "Go forth and sin some more"?
Richard R. Hershberger
They certainly thought so at the time. Of course saying religion was
all there was is a gross oversimplication, but no more so than saying
religion had nothing to do with it. (The analogies to the American
Civil War and slavery practically jump out.)
In any case, the original claim was not that the Thirty Years War was
about religion, but that it was fought by self-identified Christians.
That this is factually correct is surely non-controversial. Since the
discussion was a comparison of atrocities performed by atheists versus
those performed by believers, it is on point as well.
I am a believer myself, but I recognize that religion of any sort is
rather poor at influencing society, for good or ill. Taking the
example of Christianity, its scripture is clear and explicit about its
trans-national nature. Yet history and the present day are full of
examples of tribalism in the name of Christ. To the extent that the
purpose of Christianity is to prevent atrocities, it is a clear
failure.
Mike Schilling
> On Jan 6, 2:17 pm, Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Jan 4, 12:22 pm, Chris <chris.linthomp...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>>>> In terms of percentages it was the Thirty Years War that killed
>>>>> about a third of the German population - done by Christians.
>>
>>>> Ah, I get it. Any evil act, done by anyone even tangentally
>>>> 'christian' is about religion...
>>
>>>> Thumb on the scales much?
>>
>>> Wow. The Thirty Years' War was only tangentially related to
>>> religion? This betrays a depth of ignorance galactic in scope.
>>
>> You really think the 30 years war had anything to do with religion
>> beyond it being the 'team color'?
>
> They certainly thought so at the time. Of course saying religion
> was
> all there was is a gross oversimplication, but no more so than
> saying
> religion had nothing to do with it. (The analogies to the American
> Civil War and slavery practically jump out.)
The start of the Thirty Years War was entirely about the Hapsburg
emperor's desire to re-Catholicize the Holy Roman Empire and
Protestant resistance to that. By the end, when the Hapsburg's chief
antagonists had become the Catholic Bourbons, the religious aspect had
largely disappeared. To recap, to begin with, religion as far more
than a team color; by the end, it wasn't the team color at all.
haiku jones
> On Jan 4, 1:23 pm, Uncle Vic <addr...@withheld.com> wrote:
>
> > > I would rather be a slave than a vicim of an atheiost society that
> > > decided my life had no value.
>
> > What atheist told you your *life* had no value?
>
> Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao, to name just a few.
All tyrants from feudal societies where life
had little value (well, except for HItler's Germany,
which was modern, as well as being almost entirely
either Lutheran or Catholic)
Hitler, as far as I know, never killed anyone.
He had those hundreds of thousands of
Lutheran and Catholic young Germans to
do it for him.
Compare contemporary Europe, which is
increasingly non-religious at the least
and atheistic at most, with the Christian
Europe of the first two thousand years
when it was dominated by Christianity.
Which Europe held wars on a weekly basis?
> Feel free to
> explain how life has intrinsic value to an atheist.
Because I'm happy to be alive. Because I'm
glad my loved ones are alive. Because I
intrinsically try to extend to others what I
feel for myself -- herd animals, such as
ourselves, tend to be wired that way.
> "God says so"
> doesn't leave room for debate, and that's the idea.
Given the thirty thousand or so sects who cannot
agree on what even one god meant, I think it leaves
nearly infinite room for debate. Are you for or against
the death penalty? How much of your wealth does God
want you give to the 100,000 people who die of starvation
every day? Are the descendents of Ham still condemned
to serve the offspring of his brothers, and if so,
are Africans the sons of Ham?
No room for debate? The abolitionists and the
slave owners thundered Scriptural support for
their positions at one another for decades leading
up to the Civil War (of course, the slave owners had
the upper hand when playing that game). No room
for debate? Me, I would suffer any number of witches
to live.
>
> Atheists can't claim one set of values is 'better' than another- all
> are equally valuable. You may disagree as an individual, but you
> can't say 'X is simply wrong'.
Whereas a believer can say that "someone wrote that
someone wrote that someone said that someone said
that someone said that someone said that some ghost
said that X is simply wrong".
A shrimp cocktail was once not merely "simply wrong",
it was a transgression and a sin so dreadful that only
calling it an "abomination" was sufficient to capture
the awfulness of its trangressive nature. And then
one day <POOF!> a shrimp cocktail was no longer
"simply wrong", it wasn't even impolite.
Some Absolute Ground and Foundation of
Unchanging Moral Verities you got there.
Haiku Jones
5321 Dead, 454 since 1/20/09
<ikono...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Jan 4, 1:23�pm, Uncle Vic <addr...@withheld.com> wrote:
>
>> > I would rather be a slave than a vicim of an atheiost society that
>> > decided my life had no value.
>>
>> What atheist told you your *life* had no value?
>
>
>Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao, to name just a few. Feel free to
>explain how life has intrinsic value to an atheist. "God says so"
>doesn't leave room for debate, and that's the idea.
All you've done is take the unknown, stuck the label "god" on it, and
quit thinking about it. If there really is an omnipotent,
omnipresent, and omnibenevolent being, why would it need to create
humanity in the first place?
>
>Atheists can't claim one set of values is 'better' than another- all
>are equally valuable. You may disagree as an individual, but you
>can't say 'X is simply wrong'.
No, but we -can- say "X is simply absurd".
Jimbo
The Thirty Years War was so multi-faceted, that pinning it down to one
cause would be impossible, but yes it was, in part, a religious war
which pitted Catholics, Lutherans, and Calvinists. Ferdinand II and
to a lesser degree his primary ally Maximillan I representing the re-
Catholicizing zeal of the Jesuit Counter-Reformation, while Frederick
V of the Palantinate represented the equally militant forces of
Calvinism. It wasn't just a simple matter of "team color" as you so
errouneously put it, it was also contained large element of a very
real struggle for religious idiological dominance. The religious
aspect was far more than tangental.
Paladin
> On Wed, 6 Jan 2010 11:29:09 -0800 (PST), Shawn Wilson
> <ikono...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Jan 4, 1:23 pm, Uncle Vic <addr...@withheld.com> wrote:
>>
>>>> I would rather be a slave than a vicim of an atheiost society that
>>>> decided my life had no value.
>>> What atheist told you your *life* had no value?
>>
>> Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao, to name just a few. Feel free to
>> explain how life has intrinsic value to an atheist. "God says so"
>> doesn't leave room for debate, and that's the idea.
>
> All you've done is take the unknown, stuck the label "god" on it, and
> quit thinking about it. If there really is an omnipotent,
> omnipresent, and omnibenevolent being, why would it need to create
> humanity in the first place?
Maybe She was lonely? Maybe He wanted beings to feed
His holy ego?
something theists won't consider. If man is made in
His image, then God eats, shits, has a penis and needs
sex regularly. Logically speaking, the pagan, greek
and Egyptian gods were much more realistic--they too
looked just like mankind, and they too had all the
imperfections of character humanity enjoys.
Paladin
> On Jan 5, 11:44 am, rfisc...@sonic.net (Ray Fischer) wrote:
>
>>>> Some of the most charitable people have been atheist:http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Pages/home.aspx
>>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_&_Melinda_Gates_Foundation
>>>> says that the Gates foundation contributed 35.1 billion dollars
>>>> in 1988 alone.
>>> Which makes them pikers next to the Catholic Church.
>> WHich spends hundreds of milions of dollars an cathedrals to benefit
>> itself.
>
>
>
> And billions annually (every year, not just once...) helping the
> poor.
>
Funny that the poor don't come out and praise their
generosity. Pat Robertson uses his church's planes to
bring out gold and diamond ore from his slave labor
mines.
My very own sister is a Christian missionary; her
mission travels to South America and Africa and with
their own money builds churches--not hospitals or
schools mind you--but churches. That is the extent of
their help to the poor.
>
>
>> And hundreds of millions more to because it enabled child
>> molesters.
>
>
> Wow, so being in the forgiveness and redeption business you criticize
> them for taking their beliefs seriously?
Courts had to force them to pay up. And they moved the
pedophile priests to other countries and turned them
loose to sin again. Not one--not one church pedophile
has been excommunicated for molesting children.
>
haiku jones
I think what why? That God created a Hell? That
in Hell the torment is both unbearable and unending?
That everyone has sinned, and thus will end up in
Hell unless their sins are cancelled by one or more of:
accepting Jesus/good works/faith/priestly absolution/
predestination, depending on your favorite flavor of myth?
That even the newly born are stained with Original
Sin (claimed by Augustine to be transmitted via the
semen)?
I think these things why? Actually, I don't think
a single one of them. But that -- in differing
proportions, and with various spices added --
is what Christianity teaches.
Haiku Jones
Paladin
> On Jan 4, 1:08 pm, Christopher A. Lee <ca...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
>>>> Gee, in that Christianity is kinda predicated on 'thou shalt not
>>>> kill', I don't really see how you think that killing is a Christian
>>>> act...
>>> http://notachristian.org/christianatrocities.html
>> Today's Christians are in denial about its bloody history.
>
>
>
> I knopw its history perfectly well. Just because some mass murderer
> calls himself Christian doesn't make him one.
What does it make him? Christianity bases itself on
the teachings of a wandering holy man who preached,
Give away your wealth if you want to get to heaven.
Then along came Paul and later, Emperor Augustus, who
transmogrified Jesus' teachings into a celebration of
wealth and power and SIN.
>
>
>
>
>>>> Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Christians win...
>> A standard Christian bigoted lie.
Hitler was a devout Christian. Stalin was raised in
Christianity and saw its hypocritic support of the
robber barons who ruled Russia at the time of the
Revolution: he learned from the Holy Russian Tsars just
how to keep the people down. Pol Pot was a bloody
bastard, no doubt, but you can bet your ass he was an
avowed Buddhist.
>
>
>
> Or, in the real world, not.
>
>
>
>> Why does the moron imagine the exact equivalent of not believing in
>> leprechauns, motivates anything?
>>
>> Why does he imagine Hitler (a Catholic),
>
>
>
> Not really, no.
>
>
>
>
> Stalin (educated in a Russian
>> Orthodox seminary, attended services and as a church funeral)
>
>
>
> Communist and atheist in his actual life.
>
>
>
>> and Pol
>> Pot (Buddhist) were atheist?
>
>
> Because communism is atheist? Religion is the opiate of the masses
> and all that.
Fact-- it it. Here in the US, prior to the Civil War,
Christian ministers preached from the pulpit that
slavery of lesser races was ordained by god; that by
enslaving Negroes we were giving them a chance to
become Christians. That's the same logic used by
Spanish conquistadors and their padres when they
annihilated and enslaved whole civilizations.
>
>
>
archie dux
> On Jan 5, 11:44 am, rfisc...@sonic.net (Ray Fischer) wrote:
>
> > >> Some of the most charitable people have been atheist:http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Pages/home.aspx
>
> > >>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_&_Melinda_Gates_Foundation
> > >> says that the Gates foundation contributed 35.1 billion dollars
> > >> in 1988 alone.
>
> > >Which makes them pikers next to the Catholic Church.
>
> > WHich spends hundreds of milions of dollars an cathedrals to benefit
> > itself.
>
> And billions annually (every year, not just once...) helping the
> poor.
Got some actual figures to stick in front of that "billions"?
(be sure you subtract my donations to the
Catholic Relief Fund; those were mine)
archie
Paladin
He supported its aim of achieving a democracy. But
deplored the bloodletting, as he made plain at the
time. And, hell, beheading the royals may have been
necessary, because kings never go quietly into the night.
5321 Dead, 454 since 1/20/09
53"@giganews.com> wrote:
>5321 Dead, 454 since 1/20/09 wrote:
>> On Wed, 6 Jan 2010 11:29:09 -0800 (PST), Shawn Wilson
>> <ikono...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> On Jan 4, 1:23 pm, Uncle Vic <addr...@withheld.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>>> I would rather be a slave than a vicim of an atheiost society that
>>>>> decided my life had no value.
>>>> What atheist told you your *life* had no value?
>>>
>>> Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao, to name just a few. Feel free to
>>> explain how life has intrinsic value to an atheist. "God says so"
>>> doesn't leave room for debate, and that's the idea.
>>
>> All you've done is take the unknown, stuck the label "god" on it, and
>> quit thinking about it. If there really is an omnipotent,
>> omnipresent, and omnibenevolent being, why would it need to create
>> humanity in the first place?
>
>
>Maybe She was lonely? Maybe He wanted beings to feed
>His holy ego?
>something theists won't consider. If man is made in
>His image, then God eats, shits, has a penis and needs
>sex regularly. Logically speaking, the pagan, greek
>and Egyptian gods were much more realistic--they too
>looked just like mankind, and they too had all the
>imperfections of character humanity enjoys.
You could have a helluva good, long-running soap opera based on the
family lives of the Greek and Roman gods. Granted, it would make
"Caligula" look tame, and leave many people wondering if Gods weren't
just Republican Senators with thunderbolts, but it would be riveting
television.
archie dux
That he did. He also supported that bloody revolution
in the American colonies, in which 25,000 died and
another 25,000 were wounded.
archie
Ray Fischer
>On Jan 4, 3:40�pm, Christopher A. Lee <ca...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
>> >> I think my life is safer in the hands of people who believe that God
>> >> is the judge of the value of human life than in the hands of atheists
>> >> who think that THEY are.
>>
>> What an amoral, lying moron.
>
>Amoral? Desperate much?
You claim to have chosen to follow parts of the Bible that you agree
with, and yet you persist in lying which is a no-no according to that
same Bible.
Obviously you only care about the Bible as a weapon, and not as a
guide.
>> Like far too many religionists he is a sociopath incapable of
>> understanding �other people to realse how they see the effect of his
>> actions towards them which is how the rest of us see good and bad.
>
>Ie, only in your own reflection. We have seen where that leads. How
>high does the pile of bodies have to be before it occurs to you that
>maybe there is an alternative?
Like the 6,000,000 people killed because of religious hatred during WWII?
>> He has replaced this with what somebody else tells him an imaginary
>> alpha male says is good or bad without knowing whether it actually is.
>
>Whereas you seem to want permission to kill whoever you don't like.
That sort of evil lie is explicitely condemned in your Bible.
--
Ray Fischer
rfis...@sonic.net
Ray Fischer
>On Jan 5, 11:44�am, rfisc...@sonic.net (Ray Fischer) wrote:
>
>> >> Some of the most charitable people have been atheist:http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Pages/home.aspx
>>
>> >>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_&_Melinda_Gates_Foundation
>> >> says that the Gates foundation contributed 35.1 billion dollars
>> >> in 1988 alone.
>>
>> >Which makes them pikers next to the Catholic Church.
>>
>> WHich spends hundreds of milions of dollars an cathedrals to benefit
>> itself.
>
>And billions annually (every year, not just once...) helping the
>poor.
Unless you're a lying again.
>> �And hundreds of millions more to because it enabled child
>> molesters.
>
>Wow, so being in the forgiveness and redeption business you criticize
>them for taking their beliefs seriously?
Tell us, hypocrite: Did Jesus forgive the thief on the cross?
Did that mean that he was free to steal again?
--
Ray Fischer
rfis...@sonic.net
Ray Fischer
The tree of liberty must from time to time be refreshed with the
blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.
Thomas Jefferson
But we know that you rightards would rather see people killed by
dictatorships.
--
Ray Fischer
rfis...@sonic.net
Father Haskell
> On Jan 2, 6:25 pm, "W.T.S." <m...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> > God is a lie. The crucifix is a lie. The crucifix is the symbol of a left
> > over institution from the dark ages that seeks to rule through fear and
> > superstition. Religion is the heroin of the people, and the church is the
> > peddler of this destructive drug. Italy will be enslaved to the church for
> > many a century to come until it opens it's eyes and realizes what the church
> > has done to the heart and soul of an enslaved people.
> > Church, bad. Atheism, good.
>
> Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
> committed by atheists... I will take the church over them.
Which church, and how do you know it's right and the
9,000 other churches are wrong?
Uncle Vic
> On Jan 4, 1:23�pm, Uncle Vic <addr...@withheld.com> wrote:
>
>> > I would rather be a slave than a vicim of an atheiost society that
>> > decided my life had no value.
>>
>> What atheist told you your *life* had no value?
>
>
> Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao, to name just a few.
You knew them personally then? Yup, there goes the last of your
credibility.
<snip>
--
Uncle Vic
aa Atheist #2011
Christians are like Slinkys. They're boring, but they'll put a smile on
your face when you push them down the stairs.
Richard R. Hershberger
> Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >On Jan 4, 3:40 pm, Christopher A. Lee <ca...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
> >> >> I think my life is safer in the hands of people who believe that God
> >> >> is the judge of the value of human life than in the hands of atheists
> >> >> who think that THEY are.
>
> >> What an amoral, lying moron.
>
> >Amoral? Desperate much?
>
> You claim to have chosen to follow parts of the Bible that you agree
> with, and yet you persist in lying which is a no-no according to that
> same Bible.
As a point of information, and not in any way intended to serve as a
defense of Shawn, if you are thinking of the eighth or ninth
(depending on which counting system you use) commandment, it does not
proscribe lying in general. It forbids a specific subset of lies:
false witness against one's neighbor. You can with a clear conscience
tell your wife those pants don't make her butt look big.
Richard R. Hershberger
Richard R. Hershberger
I'm not sure how surreptiously shuffling pedophile priests to other
parishes with scant regard for the children of said parishes
constitutes "forgiveness and redeption [sic]". It is not hard to
imagine a course of action which would simultaneously include
forgiving and redeeming a truly penitent sinner, lovingly helping the
victims of said sinner, and protecting potential future victims. The
scandal of the church is not that some priests are pedophiles. The
scandal is the hierarchy's response.
Richard R. Hershberger
Richard R. Hershberger
> Shawn Wilson wrote:
> > On Jan 4, 1:08 pm, Christopher A. Lee <ca...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
> >>>> Gee, in that Christianity is kinda predicated on 'thou shalt not
> >>>> kill', I don't really see how you think that killing is a Christian
> >>>> act...
> >>>http://notachristian.org/christianatrocities.html
> >> Today's Christians are in denial about its bloody history.
>
> > I knopw its history perfectly well. Just because some mass murderer
> > calls himself Christian doesn't make him one.
>
> What does it make him? Christianity bases itself on
> the teachings of a wandering holy man who preached,
> Give away your wealth if you want to get to heaven.
> Then along came Paul and later, Emperor Augustus, who
> transmogrified Jesus' teachings into a celebration of
> wealth and power and SIN.
I think you are confusing Augustus with Constantine. In any case,
that is a very poor characterization of the teachings of Paul. It is
fashionable in some circles to blame Paul for a wide swath of ills,
real or imagined, with little regard to the actual texts.
> >>>> Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Christians win...
> >> A standard Christian bigoted lie.
>
> Hitler was a devout Christian. Stalin was raised in
> Christianity and saw its hypocritic support of the
> robber barons who ruled Russia at the time of the
> Revolution: he learned from the Holy Russian Tsars just
> how to keep the people down. Pol Pot was a bloody
> bastard, no doubt, but you can bet your ass he was an
> avowed Buddhist.
Hitler opposed the Catholic church. The Lutheran church in Germany
largely went along to get along, to its shame, so this wasn't really
an issue. I have no idea what Hitler's private religious beliefs
were. I would be surprised to find good evidence of his being a
devout Christian, but I am willing to see what you have got.
I'm not sure what point you are trying to make with Stalin. As for
Pol Pot, I take your "you can bet your ass" as a less refined version
of the academic "doubtless". That is to say, you haven't any actual
evidence.
None of this is intended as a defense of Shawn's position. I just
admire arguments based on something other than making shit up. So far
as I can tell, neither side here shares this esthetic ideal.
Richard R. Hershberger
5321 Dead, 454 since 1/20/09
On the other hand, claiming to know the mind of god is taking the lord's
name in vain, the way THAT commandment was written.
Shawn Wilson
> > > Um...you ARE talking about the God who thinks that the
> > > tiniest, most inconsequential sin you may commit -- even
> > > the "sin" of being born to human parents -- makes you
> > > a candidate for being tortured in a manner that no
> > > person in history has been tortured by another person,
> > > and this for ever and ever and ever and ever and
> > > ever and ever and ever...that IS the God who is
> > > "the judge of the value of human life" you're talking
> > > about, is it not?
>
> > And you think that why?
>
> I think what why? That God created a Hell? That
> in Hell the torment is both unbearable and unending?
> That everyone has sinned, and thus will end up in
> Hell unless their sins are cancelled by one or more of:
> accepting Jesus/good works/faith/priestly absolution/
> predestination, depending on your favorite flavor of myth?
> That even the newly born are stained with Original
> Sin (claimed by Augustine to be transmitted via the
> semen)?
>
> I think these things why? Actually, I don't think
> a single one of them. But that -- in differing
> proportions, and with various spices added --
> is what Christianity teaches.
No, it doesn't. I am not sure what gives you that impression.
Shawn Wilson
> > I knopw its history perfectly well. Just because some mass murderer
> > calls himself Christian doesn't make him one.
>
> What does it make him?
A mass murderer.
Christianity bases itself on
> the teachings of a wandering holy man who preached,
> Give away your wealth if you want to get to heaven.
> Then along came Paul and later, Emperor Augustus, who
> transmogrified Jesus' teachings into a celebration of
> wealth and power and SIN.
Or, you know, not...
> >>>> Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Christians win...
> >> A standard Christian bigoted lie.
>
> Hitler was a devout Christian.
Or, you know, not...
Stalin was raised in
> Christianity and saw its hypocritic support of the
> robber barons who ruled Russia at the time of the
> Revolution: he learned from the Holy Russian Tsars just
> how to keep the people down.
Stalin was an atheist. Whatever his upbringiing was apparently it
didn't take.
> Pol Pot was a bloody
> bastard, no doubt, but you can bet your ass he was an
> avowed Buddhist.
No, he was an avowed communist and atheist.
> > Because communism is atheist? Religion is the opiate of the masses
> > and all that.
>
> Fact-- it it. Here in the US, prior to the Civil War,
> Christian ministers preached from the pulpit that
> slavery of lesser races was ordained by god; that by
> enslaving Negroes we were giving them a chance to
> become Christians. That's the same logic used by
> Spanish conquistadors and their padres when they
> annihilated and enslaved whole civilizations.
So?
Shawn Wilson
> > > >Which makes them pikers next to the Catholic Church.
>
> > > WHich spends hundreds of milions of dollars an cathedrals to benefit
> > > itself.
>
> > And billions annually (every year, not just once...) helping the
> > poor.
>
> Got some actual figures to stick in front of that "billions"?
Feel free to Google it yourself. Not quite $4 billion annually is for
Catholic Charities alone.
Shawn Wilson
> >> "The Christian (Republican) god is a three headed
> >> monster, cruel, vengeful, and capricious. If one wishes
> >> to know more of this raging, three headed beast-like
> >> god, one only needs to look at the caliber of people
> >> who say they serve him. They are always of two classes:
> >> fools and hypocrites."
> >> - Thomas Jefferson
>
> > On the other hand, Jefferson supported the murderous revolution in
> > France...
>
> He supported its aim of achieving a democracy.
And he had nothing to say about the mass murder, which basically tells
me evrything I need to know about Jefferson.
But
> deplored the bloodletting, as he made plain at the
> time. And, hell, beheading the royals may have been
> necessary, because kings never go quietly into the night.
Revolutionary France was worse than anything Monarchical France ever
was.
Shawn Wilson
> > On the other hand, Jefferson supported the murderous revolution in
> > France...
>
> That he did. He also supported that bloody revolution
> in the American colonies, in which 25,000 died and
> another 25,000 were wounded.
That was war, not premeditated murder. There is actually a difference.
Shawn Wilson
> >> >> I think my life is safer in the hands of people who believe that God
> >> >> is the judge of the value of human life than in the hands of atheists
> >> >> who think that THEY are.
>
> >> What an amoral, lying moron.
>
> >Amoral? Desperate much?
>
> You claim to have chosen to follow parts of the Bible that you agree
> with, and yet you persist in lying which is a no-no according to that
> same Bible.
Funny how you can't identify this supposed 'lies'. Bt you just claim
everyone who disagrees with you is 'lying'.
> Obviously you only care about the Bible as a weapon, and not as a
> guide.
And I have used it as a weapon when???
> >Ie, only in your own reflection. We have seen where that leads. How
> >high does the pile of bodies have to be before it occurs to you that
> >maybe there is an alternative?
>
> Like the 6,000,000 people killed because of religious hatred during WWII?
Right, the Nazis were atheists so obviously the Holocaust was
religiously motivated...
Shawn Wilson
> >Wow, so being in the forgiveness and redeption business you criticize
> >them for taking their beliefs seriously?
>
> Tell us, hypocrite: Did Jesus forgive the thief on the cross?
> Did that mean that he was free to steal again?
Yes. If he chose. That would have been new sin of course.
Shawn Wilson
> > Interestingly, most of the worst atrocities in human history have been
> > committed by atheists... I will take the church over them.
>
> Which church, and how do you know it's right and the
> 9,000 other churches are wrong?
All I really need to know is that the atheists are wrong...
Ray Fischer
Lying about atheists is false witness, and it what I was referring to.
--
Ray Fischer
rfis...@sonic.net
Shawn Wilson
> > > And hundreds of millions more to because it enabled child
> > > molesters.
>
> > Wow, so being in the forgiveness and redeption business you criticize
> > them for taking their beliefs seriously?
>
> I'm not sure how surreptiously shuffling pedophile priests to other
> parishes with scant regard for the children of said parishes
> constitutes "forgiveness and redeption [sic]". It is not hard to
> imagine a course of action which would simultaneously include
> forgiving and redeeming a truly penitent sinner, lovingly helping the
> victims of said sinner, and protecting potential future victims. The
> scandal of the church is not that some priests are pedophiles. The
> scandal is the hierarchy's response.
In other words, poor management practice. That really has nothing to
to with Christianity...
Ray Fischer
>On Jan 4, 1:08�pm, Christopher A. Lee <ca...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
>> >> Gee, in that Christianity is kinda predicated on 'thou shalt not
>> >> kill', I don't really see how you think that killing is a Christian
>> >> act...
>>
>> >http://notachristian.org/christianatrocities.html
>>
>> Today's Christians are in denial about its bloody history.
>
>calls himself Christian doesn't make him one.
Fallacy: No true scotsman
The no true scotsman fallacy is a way of reinterpreting evidence in
order to prevent the refutation of one's position. Proposed
counter-examples to a theory are dismissed as irrelevant solely
because they are counter-examples, but purportedly because they are
not what the theory is about.
Example
The No True Scotsman fallacy involves discounting evidence that would
refute a proposition, concluding that it hasn't been falsified
when in fact it has.
If Angus, a Glaswegian, who puts sugar on his porridge, is proposed as
a counter-example to the claim "No Scotsman puts sugar on his
porridge" the "No true Scotsman" fallacy would run as
follows:
(1) Angus puts sugar on his porridge.
(2) No (true) Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge.
Therefore:
(3) Angus is not a (true) Scotsman.
Therefore:
(4) Angus is not a counter-example to the claim that no Scotsman puts
sugar on his porridge.
This fallacy is a form of circular argument, with an existing belief
being assumed to be true in order to dismiss any apparent
counter-examples to it. The existing belief thus becomes
unfalsifiable.
--
Ray Fischer
rfis...@sonic.net
5321 Dead, 454 since 1/20/09
And he needs to know that because he has no other way of justifying his
faith, other than through that sad little lie.
--
"Normandy beachhead participants did not know or guess that most of them
would die" - David Heil
5321 Dead, 454 since 1/20/09
Oh, good. Let's talking about Iraq and Afghanistan...
5321 Dead, 454 since 1/20/09
> On Jan 6, 6:12 pm, Paladin <"paladin 53"@giganews.com> wrote:
>
>> >> "The Christian (Republican) god is a three headed monster, cruel,
>> >> vengeful, and capricious. If one wishes to know more of this raging,
>> >> three headed beast-like god, one only needs to look at the caliber
>> >> of people who say they serve him. They are always of two classes:
>> >> fools and hypocrites."
>> >> - Thomas Jefferson
>>
>> > On the other hand, Jefferson supported the murderous revolution in
>> > France...
>>
>> He supported its aim of achieving a democracy.
>
>
> And he had nothing to say about the mass murder, which basically tells
> me evrything I need to know about Jefferson.
Not a very bright jeezus-wheezer, are you?
http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/592/
>
>
>
>
> But
>> deplored the bloodletting, as he made plain at the time. And, hell,
>> beheading the royals may have been necessary, because kings never go
>> quietly into the night.
>
>
> Revolutionary France was worse than anything Monarchical France ever
> was.
Yeah, starving millions is so much more Christian than beheading
hundreds...
Taemon
There were many, many more people killed in WWII. Those six millions were
Jews, killed *because* they were Jews, which sounds pretty exclusively
religious to me.
Not that there aren't better reasons for atheism, but it always surprises me
that something so obvious keeps getting overlooked.
T.
Christopher A. Lee
<ikono...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Jan 4, 1:08�pm, Christopher A. Lee <ca...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
>> >> Gee, in that Christianity is kinda predicated on 'thou shalt not
>> >> kill', I don't really see how you think that killing is a Christian
>> >> act...
>>
>> >http://notachristian.org/christianatrocities.html
>>
>> Today's Christians are in denial about its bloody history.
>
>I knopw its history perfectly well. Just because some mass murderer
>calls himself Christian doesn't make him one.
A liar as well as an idiot. Or are you pretending the Protestants and
Catholics who slaughtered each other duringthe reformation weren't
Christians? Or Martin Luther whose writings about the Jews were a
model for centuries of anti-Semitism culminating in the Holocaust? Or
Chrysostom "the good" who wrote much the same thing? Or the slave
owners who justified their actions by describing black people as
"descendents of Ham"? Or the crusaders? Inclusing the first crusade
which exterminated not just a heretical sect, the Cathars, but the
entire population Beziers? "Kill them all, God will take care of his
own"?
>> >> Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. �Christians win...
>>
>> A standard Christian bigoted lie.
>
>Or, in the real world, not.
Hardly, bigoted liar. Hitler was a Catholic in good standing and his
orders were carried out by the good Christians of Germany, who were a
mixture of Lutherans and Catholics. Stalin was educated for the
priesthood in a Russian Orthodox Seminary and when he died had an
Orthodox funeral. Pol Pot was a Buddhist.
You aren't just in denial about your religion but history in general.
>> Why does the moron imagine the exact equivalent of not believing in
>> leprechauns, motivates anything?
Well, moron?
>> Why does he imagine Hitler (a Catholic),
>
>Not really, no.
In his own words, liar.
> Stalin (educated in a Russian
>> Orthodox seminary, attended services and as a church funeral)
>
>Communist and atheist in his actual life.
Communism does not equal atheism, imbecile. But even if he were
atheist WHICH HAS NOT BEEN DEMONSTRATED that neither motivates nor
justifies anything.
>> and Pol
>> Pot (Buddhist) were atheist?
>
>Because communism is atheist?
It isn't, moron. Central and South American communists tend t o be
Catholics. The soviets allowed the Russian Orthodox Church to
continue.
> Religion is the opiate of the masses
>and all that.
Do you even know why Marx said that? And that is pretty much all he
had to say about religion.
Hint: it is because the Tsars and the Church had been hand in glove
keeping the peasants "content" with their lot with the promise of a
better life after death. HAving the same effect as opium.
Get an education.
Richard R. Hershberger
Fair enough. You snipped over-enthusiastically, but it is an easy
thing to do.
Richard R. Hershberger
Richard R. Hershberger
wrote:
Eh? That interpretation is non-obvious. What do you have to support
it?
As a point of interest, this is what Martin Luther wrote in his Large
Catechism, and a fairly non-controversial interpretation:
"[Taking the Lord's name in vain] is misiusing God's name when we call
upon the Lord God, no matter in what way, for purposes of falsehood or
wrong of any kind. Therefore this commandment enjoins this much, that
God's name must not be appealed to falsely, or taken upon the lips,
while the heart knows well other. For God's name cannot be misused
worse than for the support of falsehood and deceit."
He goes on at considerable length expanding on this: it is, after
all, the *large* catechism.
Claiming to know God's mind is simply a different discussion. It is
certainly possible that the original Hebrew was misinterpreted, but I
want to see the evidence.
Richard R. Hershberger
Richard R. Hershberger
You believe that Christianity doesn't affect management practice, even
in the church? What a bizarre idea!
Do we all get to play this game? If we get to restate an action using
secular vocabulary and claim that this therefore has nothing to do
with religion, then religion is effectively removed from public
discourse. Is this your intent?
Richard R. Hershberger
Paladin
You should read your bible more.
Paladin
Catholic schools, which require tuition, are not
charities in any sense of the word. Building churches
are not charities. Feeding the poor beans then urging
them, as Jesus in the bible does, to give that last
penny to the Church is hypocritical.
Father Haskell
Very well. At which yeshiva will you be studying for
your conversion?
Paladin
In your mind, then, the Inquisition had nothing to do
with Christianity.
Paladin
> On Jan 6, 8:09 pm, Paladin <"paladin 53"@giganews.com> wrote:
>> Shawn Wilson wrote:
>>> On Jan 4, 1:08 pm, Christopher A. Lee <ca...@optonline.net> wrote:
>>>>>> Gee, in that Christianity is kinda predicated on 'thou shalt not
>>>>>> kill', I don't really see how you think that killing is a Christian
>>>>>> act...
>>>>> http://notachristian.org/christianatrocities.html
>>>> Today's Christians are in denial about its bloody history.
>>> I knopw its history perfectly well. Just because some mass murderer
>>> calls himself Christian doesn't make him one.
>> What does it make him? Christianity bases itself on
>> the teachings of a wandering holy man who preached,
>> Give away your wealth if you want to get to heaven.
>> Then along came Paul and later, Emperor Augustus, who
>> transmogrified Jesus' teachings into a celebration of
>> wealth and power and SIN.
>
> I think you are confusing Augustus with Constantine. In any case,
> that is a very poor characterization of the teachings of Paul. It is
> fashionable in some circles to blame Paul for a wide swath of ills,
> real or imagined, with little regard to the actual texts.
I stand corrected on a name, but not on the facts.
Paul was fanatical. In one letter he urged his
followers to remain celibate; in a follow up letter
(book of the new testament) he said, well, okay, if you
can't keep it in your pants then you should get
married. Thusly, Catholic priestly celibacy was born.
Paul transmogrified Jesus' teachings into a church
pretty much like the church Jesus rebelled against.
Constantine/Augustus a great Christian? He recognized
Christianity as a powerful opiate; he encouraged it in
order to better control the people. And the devout
Christians he put in charge took the power and ran with
it. Catholicism was founded on hypocrisy and sexual
deviation. Though they preached keep it in the pants
or risk the fires of hell, the first couple of dozen
popes openly sired children. The graveyards of every
Catholic monastery on Earth contains the bones of
babies born of nuns whose babies were killed at birth.
>
>>>>>> Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Christians win...
>>>> A standard Christian bigoted lie.
>> Hitler was a devout Christian. Stalin was raised in
>> Christianity and saw its hypocritic support of the
>> robber barons who ruled Russia at the time of the
>> Revolution: he learned from the Holy Russian Tsars just
>> how to keep the people down. Pol Pot was a bloody
>> bastard, no doubt, but you can bet your ass he was an
>> avowed Buddhist.
>
> Hitler opposed the Catholic church. The Lutheran church in Germany
> largely went along to get along, to its shame, so this wasn't really
> an issue. I have no idea what Hitler's private religious beliefs
> were. I would be surprised to find good evidence of his being a
> devout Christian, but I am willing to see what you have got.
>
Read Mein Kampf. He spells it out quite well. And the
Church--all forms of Christianity in Germany--
supported his rise to power and his attempt to cleanse
Europe of the "killers of Jesus." Switzerland's
cardinal did not attempt to stop the deportation of
Jews to the death camps. 'Going along to get along' is
not an issue? Here in America, Christians "went along
to get along" with their wealthiest contributors (who
happened to be slaveholders). They preached from the
pulpit that God Himself ordained slavery as right and
good for the enslaved because it allowed the heathen to
hear for the first time about the big heart of God.
Give me a fucking break! Why in God's name would any
black American proclaim himself to be a Christian???
> I'm not sure what point you are trying to make with Stalin. As for
> Pol Pot, I take your "you can bet your ass" as a less refined version
> of the academic "doubtless". That is to say, you haven't any actual
> evidence.
Too lazy to conduct your own research, or are you
frightened you'll be proven wrong?
Pol pot was raised a Buddhist: he attended both a
Buddhist monastery and Catholic schools.
Pol Pot’s Education: 1934 – 1935 Buddhist monastery
Wat Botum Vaddei in Phnom Penh 1935 – 1943 Catholic
school in Phnom Penh École Miche 1943 – 1947 Collège
Preah Sihanouk at Kampong Cham 1947 – 1948 Lycée
Sisowath in Phnom Penh 1948 – 1949 Technical school in
Phnom Penh 1949 – 1952 École Francaise de
radio-électricité.
King of Cambodia from 1941, Head of State from 1955 to
1970 who resigned in 1976 Prince Norodom Sihanouk said:
"Pol Pot thinks that *heaven wants him to guide
Cambodia* in the way he thinks it the best for
Cambodia, that is to say, the worst. Pol Pot is mad,
you know, like Hitler."
Pol Pot's political party, breaking with Marxism,
declared rural peasant farmers to be the true working
class proletarian and the lifeblood of the revolution.
This is in some sense explained by the fact that none
of the central committee were in any sense "working
class". All of them had grown up in a feudal peasant
society. The party *adapted elements of Theravada
Buddhism to justify their non-standard communism*.
Hitler was a Christian. Pol Pot was not an atheist.
>
> None of this is intended as a defense of Shawn's position. I just
> admire arguments based on something other than making shit up. So far
> as I can tell, neither side here shares this esthetic ideal.
>
> Richard R. Hershberger
Since I myself have read the bible front to back three
times, I think my knowledge of the bible is far
superior to that of Shawn, who rants about a religion
he can't comprehend.
I have a brother who holds a doctorate in theology and
a sister who is a Christian missionary. They are
sincere in their beliefs, and I respect their adherence
to the teachings of Jesus. Both are liberals. I
happen to think their religion doesn't deserve people
who live a moral, generous lifestyle.
Paladin
> On Jan 6, 6:09 pm, Paladin <"paladin 53"@giganews.com> wrote:
>
>>> I knopw its history perfectly well. Just because some mass murderer
>>> calls himself Christian doesn't make him one.
>> What does it make him?
>
>
>
> A mass murderer.
>
>
>
> Christianity bases itself on
>> the teachings of a wandering holy man who preached,
>> Give away your wealth if you want to get to heaven.
>> Then along came Paul and later, Emperor Augustus, who
>> transmogrified Jesus' teachings into a celebration of
>> wealth and power and SIN.
>
>
> Or, you know, not...
>
>
>
>
>>>>>> Atheists STILL get Mao, Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Christians win...
>>>> A standard Christian bigoted lie.
>> Hitler was a devout Christian.
>
>
>
>
> Or, you know, not...
>
>
>
>
>
> Stalin was raised in
>> Christianity and saw its hypocritic support of the
>> robber barons who ruled Russia at the time of the
>> Revolution: he learned from the Holy Russian Tsars just
>> how to keep the people down.
>
>
>
>
> Stalin was an atheist. Whatever his upbringiing was apparently it
> didn't take.
No, it didn't. Perhaps because the church doing the
teaching/preaching fully supported the Tsar in whatever
bloody business he committed in the name of God.
>
>
>
>> Pol Pot was a bloody
>> bastard, no doubt, but you can bet your ass he was an
>> avowed Buddhist.
>
>
> No, he was an avowed communist and atheist.
Do a little research and get back to me.
>
>
>>> Because communism is atheist? Religion is the opiate of the masses
>>> and all that.
>> Fact-- it it. Here in the US, prior to the Civil War,
>> Christian ministers preached from the pulpit that
>> slavery of lesser races was ordained by god; that by
>> enslaving Negroes we were giving them a chance to
>> become Christians. That's the same logic used by
>> Spanish conquistadors and their padres when they
>> annihilated and enslaved whole civilizations.
>
>
>
> So?
So, religion is in fact the opiate of the masses. It
links itself with whatever ideology those in power
want.