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Capitol Ideas
The Decline of Faith
It is caused by something more pervasive than non-judgmental liberalism.
Time recently published a cover story, “Is Hell Dead?” about a “rogue pastor” called Rob Bell in Michigan. We don’t know for sure that anyone is in hell, he argues. Maybe, but fantasizing free heaven passes for all doesn’t make much sense, especially for a pastor. If Bell’s message is that his parishioners are all going to enjoy an eternity of bliss whether they go to church or not, it’s only a matter of time before they stop going. “The doctrine of universal salvation turns out to be as deterministic as the more strident forms of scientific materialism,” Ross Douthat wrote.
Rob Bell represents “the tragedy of non-judgmental mainline liberalism,” said R. Albert Mohler, Jr., president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. I agree with that. Meanwhile I keep thinking of C. S. Lewis’s reminder: “All the most terrifying passages in the New Testament come from the mouth of Our Lord.”
It should be clear by now that the theological liberalism that has dominated our age undermines religious faith, much as secular liberalism, intended to improve society, will end up bankrupting it.
Consider the Church of England, where every progressive cause is embraced. Gay bishops? Who, in our current climate, would dare to disapprove? Out of 60 million people in the United Kingdom, only 1.1 million, or about 2 percent, go to church every week. Once it was 10 times that. Even its leaders seem to have stopped believing in it. Declining congregations and growing costs make the C. of E. an unsustainable venture without the recovery of faith.
The trends in America are similar, although less advanced. The number of Americans who claim no religious affiliation has nearly doubled (from 8 percent to 15 percent) since 1990. In the same period self-identified Christians fell by 10 percentage points (from 86 to 76 percent).
The Catholic Church has likewise declined, and the sex abuse scandal is only partly to blame. One in 10 Americans now identify themselves as ex-Catholics, and one of three raised as Catholic have defected. The Jesuits, by far the most liberal order, have fallen from 8,400 members in 1965 to 2,650 in 2010. Social justice, which really means income redistribution, is their foremost article of faith.
All the most liberal orders of nuns — the ones who threw away their habits in the 1960s and adopted a vaguely feminist mission of peace and social justice — are withering away. Urgent fund-raising appeals are needed to preserve their elderly remnant. On the other hand, the orders that have restored the habit and insist on a strict interpretation of their respective rules are thriving.
The trend is unmistakable. But the senior archbishops in the U.S. remain cowed-intimidated by the zeitgeist. (The younger bishops tend to be much better, however.) The underlying problem can be put this way. The top archbishops are incapable of instilling the fear of hellfire in their most famous parishioners, who without rebuke openly support abortion and other activities irreconcilable with Catholicism. These bishops have been trained to believe that all problems must be addressed by diplomacy, and their faith has turned into a watery thing.
But our declining faith is caused by something more pervasive than non-judgmental liberalism. Rising prosperity makes its own contribution. We have seen this all over the Western world. People will avoid thinking about an afterlife, whether heaven or hell, as long as years of plenty stretch out ahead of them — a new vacation, a new toy, a new mistress. And capitalism does bring prosperity. Not that I oppose it on the ground that it promotes worldly comfort. Nonetheless, if capitalism endures — and we are seeing it spread to China and India — then we may expect a further decline in faith.
What did Jesus say? First of all, he warned that riches put our souls in danger. He didn’t mention the hazards of poverty. Repeatedly, throughout the Gospels, he insists on the need for faith. He also predicted a general decline in faith. He did miracles right in front of people’s eyes but some of them still didn’t believe. Tyre and Sidon would have repented in sackcloth and ashes if they had seen such things, he said. And at the Second Coming, “when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?” (The evangelists would hardly have invented a savior who foresees that his message will become less and less popular.)
Islam has flourished even as Christianity has languished. And notice that Islamic countries seem incapable of creating wealth on their own. When it gushes out of the Arabian sands in the form of oil, the basis of the wealth had already been created in the West (in the form of automobiles).
THE OTHER DAY, the pastor at our local Catholic church in Washington, D.C., wondered about the book-writing atheists in our midst. What goes through their minds in the middle of the night? I don’t think they contemplate either heaven or hell. They assume that at death they enter the void.
Christopher Hitchens, who has written for this magazine, tells me in an e-mail that “annihilation is, to my knowledge, the post-death assumption of most if not all atheists.” I think this also applies to many liberal intellectuals who do not explicitly identify themselves as atheists.
As to heaven and hell, Hitchens added, both have “the insuperable problem of compulsory eternity.” But the “invention of purgatory” has its attractions, he finds, because it does entail “the possibility of some kind of appeal, or change of circumstances.”
Richard Dawkins, the prominent preacher of atheist polemics, finds the doctrine of purgatory ridiculous. He calls it a “sort of divine Ellis Island.” But he seems unbothered by the prospect of an eternal nothing. “Being dead will be no different from being unborn — I shall be just as I was in the time of William the Conqueror or the dinosaurs.”
About the Author
Tom Bethell is a senior editor of The American Spectator and author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science, The Noblest Triumph: Property and Prosperity Through the Ages, and most recently Questioning Einstein: Is Relativity Necessary? (2009).
Letter to the Editor View all comments (322) | Leave a comment
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Darin| 6.29.11 @ 6:53AM
When I hear people like Rob Bell, I immediately think of Acts 17:11. We are to take the teaching of any pastor, teacher, etc. and search the Scriptures to see if it is true. Mr. Bell is most definitely not teaching the truth. I would strongly suggest he read Matthew 18:6, Mark 9:42, and Luke 17:2. Christ had a very strong warning against false teaching.
Isa Potik| 6.29.11 @ 11:40AM
The part of the Bible I like most is when Jesus puts a curse on a fig tree.
To this day I do not eat figs. And it makes me shudder in horror when I am in the grocery store and see shoppers snatching packages of Fig Newtons off the shelf and putting them in their carts.
Any other readers feel the same as I about figs?
Purvis Taylor| 6.29.11 @ 11:44AM
Isa,
I hadn't read that passage until a friend of mine brought it to my attention while we were barbecuing a pig last month.
Well I have this huge hundred year old fig tree next to my pump house, and I took a axe and cut that bugger to the ground.
If Jesus don't like fig trees, then I don't neither. What's right with the Lord is right with me.
Mavis| 6.29.11 @ 11:45AM
THE BIBLE PLAINLY SAYS THAT EATING PORK IS A SIN.
y54| 6.29.11 @ 11:47AM
Well I guess I'm a sinner cause I go to bed every night with pork grease on my lips.
I guess I'm headed to hell on a Greyhound bus.
Petronius| 6.29.11 @ 11:50AM
I'm on the Membership Committee down there. Send in your resume to see if you qualify.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:09PM
Don't talk like that, Petronius.. there is yet hope!
Look at what He says, it is for YOU:
"let him put his mouth in the dust-- there may yet be hope.. Let us test and examine our ways, and return to the LORD!" Lam. 3:29 & 40.
Note: Return to the Lord, not a church!!
Sammy Summerfallwinter| 6.29.11 @ 11:51AM
Is Greyhound still running, y54? If it is, I'm planning a little trip down to Valdosta, Georgia, and I was thinking about taking the bus.
I always did like traveling by bus. You meet the most religious people on the bus. I mean the "washed in the blood of Jesus" kind, and these kinds are getting kind of rare nowadays.
By the way, are there any "washed in the blood" Christians who are readers of this hog, I mean blog?
Iona Townsend| 6.29.11 @ 11:57AM
What this country needs is a HOLY GHOST- BAPTISED IN THE FIRE-REVIVAL CRUSADE!
And I know just the preacher who can put it on: Tommy Lee Tucker of THE TOMMY LEE TUCKER TRAVELING TENT REVIVAL CRUSADES.
You can contact Rev. Tucker at tttuckeriam@yahoo.com
R.H. Watson| 6.29.11 @ 12:05PM
Can he heal the sick? I've got this bad case of bursitis that won't go away, and I've tried everything including acupuncture.
Does he lay on the hands? The bursitis is worst in my right shoulder. If he can heal (through the Lord, of course) I sure would like to go to one of his tent meetings.
And I can bring my wife who is afflicted with "female troubles." Of course I wouldn't want the preacher laying on of his hands down there. The preacher could put his hands on top of her head, and I think that would work just as well.
I imagine a current would run down her body like a steak of lightning. That's what I want to feel.
Quartermaster| 6.29.11 @ 8:46PM
I first rode a bus in 1973. It was great. Greyhound still had nice stations (as did Trailways) I last rode the bus in 2003. I hated it. Other than Columbia, SC, I didn't see a nice terminal on any of the trips I took in 2002-2003. Never again.
W| 6.30.11 @ 8:19PM
Try riding a Greyhound to New York
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 2:35PM
Yeah, Jesus seems to be a bit of a Psychopath on that one, to be mad at a fig tree BECAUSE it didn't have any figs on it, when it wasn't in season....well I think Jesus needs to take his 'happy' pills.
John M| 6.29.11 @ 12:36PM
In Mark 7, Jesus explains defilement does not come from anything we put into our bodies.
Surfer Dude| 6.29.11 @ 1:10PM
What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost [which is] in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? KJV
Recreational drugs do not defile? That's news to me.
John M| 6.30.11 @ 11:50AM
I agree the body is the temple of the Holy Ghost. Jesus, after His anointing drank wine without being a sinful drunk. The only righteous man Noah sinned by getting drunk and cursing his son Ham.
Jack in Wi.| 6.29.11 @ 10:38PM
I can define atheism in 3 sentences. We come from nothing, We are here for no reason. We are going nowhere. Great essay Mr. Bethel.
John M| 6.29.11 @ 12:19PM
Jesus only cursed that fig tree which had no fruit. He then used this as an example of the power of faith to perform miracles.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:43PM
They're trolls, John M.
Surfer Dude| 6.29.11 @ 12:55PM
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whatever. Explanations and interpretations come easy.
One of the gospels has this story where Jesus banishes a demon, or group of demons called "Legion" from a man and somehow directs the demons to a herd of pigs.
The pigs go nuts and drown themselves.
Think about the poor dude in the country of the Gadarenes: he's just minding his own business and some guy in a robe comes along and kills all of his pigs.
And given Jesus' infinite powers, why did he have to kill that guy's pigs. Couldn't he have done something else with the demons?
I think the poor fig tree is in a the same position. Jesus killed the tree in a tantrum. But since Jesus is God, why would he be surprised that the fig tree was barren?
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:04PM
hey Surfer Dude~
Surf this:
"The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction." Prov. 1:7.
Sounds like you could use a little of both.
What say you?
Cicely| 6.29.11 @ 4:43PM
Margie, Margie, Margie, Poor Margie,
It behooves me to point out that you are disobeying scripture by judging Surfer Dude.
"Judge not that ye be judged."
BackToBasics| 6.29.11 @ 11:47PM
You have taken this lone verse out of context. There are many verses about judging. Studying them all gives balance and knowledge about the proper uses of judment / judging. Here is one example of a different verse:
But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
1 Corinthians 2:15
Margie| 6.30.11 @ 1:10PM
B to B,
I'm pretty sure the above persons are one and the same.
And I'm pretty sure they're probably Clint/Tim*.
Hello Kitty| 6.29.11 @ 3:54PM
Those poor piggies.
Josh from Hammy, Mississippi| 6.29.11 @ 4:00PM
Me and my wife were watching Wheel of Fortune the other night and all of a sudden I heard the loudest squeeling I've ever heard in my life.
I turned to my wife and said what the hell's that noise, and she said it's a truckload of pigs going to the slaughter house
And I said them pigs sound demon-possessed! She was sitting right beside me in a recliner and the remote was on a little table between our chairs--we got some comfortable recliners--bought them at Walmarts--, and she picked up that remote, threw it and hit me up side the head.
And she screamed NO NEED FOR YOU TO BLASPHEME.
And I didn't know nothing about demon-possessed pigs in the Bible.
Iona Townsend| 6.29.11 @ 4:02PM
And how is your head now, Hammy?
You know you really should have it checked. A blood clot cound form.
You'll be in my prayers tonight.
Hello Kitty| 6.29.11 @ 4:04PM
That's very kind of you, Iona.
Brandon Rock| 6.29.11 @ 4:13PM
This from today's paper:
LENOIR COUNTY, NC (KINSTON.COM) -- Many Christians believe Jesus can be found anywhere. In southern Lenoir County, he may be found on a utility pole.
The pole, about a mile south of Kinston, has attracted attention of some area residents. Some say the kudzu-covered post bears a striking resemblance to Jesus’ crucifixion.
The pole, which is the only one nearby covered in “the vine that ate the South,” is at the northwest corner of Tyree Road and U.S. 258 S., in the Jackson Heights neighborhood.
Kent Hardison, who runs Ma’s Hotdog House less than a half mile from the pareidolia, rides by the Christ-resembling post each day. He said when he first saw the kudzu growing he almost sprayed it with herbicide.
“I glanced at it, and it looks like Jesus,” Hardison said. “I thought, ‘You can’t spray Jesus with Roundup.’ ”
The kudzu, which has thrived at the top of the pole, is all but dead at the ground. The source of the figure is only a few small vines of the uncontrollable plant.
Appleby| 6.29.11 @ 7:20AM
When Marx said that religion was the opiate of the masses, he spoke the truth -- faith is a defence against otherwise intolerable pain, worry, sorrow and suffering, and without it they would overcome us. The many tragedies we hear of every day are, I think, caused by the despair of those people who have no faith that things can change through the God who hears their cries.
Michael Tomlinson| 6.29.11 @ 7:26AM
What is most terrifying about Dawkins and does not bode well with the growth of atheism is his willingness to resort to repressive means to squelch religious freedom (the ability to believe or not believe in God . . .). His vitriolic tirades against people of faiths right to free speech reveals the inner tyrant that lurks in so many militant atheists. I guess I shouldn't be surprised considering the one political body that embraced and epitomizes atheism, communism, is the most brutal and bloodthirsty political system the world has known. It also explains the sheer maliciousness of the American left and its hatred for Christianity and to a lesser degree Judaism. It seems the only religion that is safe with atheists and leftists is Islam – the most virulently intolerant and violent religion in the modern world. A marriage made in hell.
ShortNSweet| 6.29.11 @ 10:08AM
OMGosh! AMEN!
Petronius| 6.29.11 @ 11:53AM
Well stated. To these people, misery is a wonderful thing because they are imposing and enforcing it.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 3:13PM
In YOUR mind is there a 'Militant' Christian? like the one's who continue to proselytize to me when I am clearly upset by this?
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 5:14PM
KOTN~ You're upset by that? That may be a good thing. Why would it bother you at all if you really believed there was no God? It wouldn't bother you.
You are sticking around and conversing for a reason.
His Word is getting to you..
You know, it doesn't upset me that you mock the God I believe in though.. why? Because I know He is Who He says He is. I have no doubt about it. That's why it doesn't upset me.
Why would it upset you to hear about Him?
Seek| 6.29.11 @ 4:15PM
How is Prof. Dawkins suppressing religious faith simply by not acknowledging it for himself? That's kind of like saying that I'm suppressing rights in Russia by virtue of my not moving there.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 5:18PM
He activly campaigns to supress religious thought. He's suggested that exposing children to it is akin to child abuse. He is then accepted and defended by the majority of athiests at large making him, by default, a figurehead of the movement.
On the other hand, do not want to squelch disbelief, but rather encourage beliefe to those who would listne. And they ask to be left alone otherwise. And to force them to be sechular in public is forcing them to abandom their religion. That's why we still support public displays of faith such as graduation speeches, football game prayers, etc. No one forces you to believe it, but that doesn't mean you can stop others from practicing it. We don't, by our prayer, stop you from NOT praying during the same time, do we? Then, since there isn't any supported and defended Christian pushing for a theocracy, we have the difference. We do not espouse force of belief, yet the athiest supports the forced disbelief.
BackToBasics| 6.30.11 @ 12:15AM
Why should athiests be concerned if someone has faith in God? Most atheists I know think they have the superior intellectual ground to stand on. Most also are at least mildly contemptuous of those who have faith in God. They think we might just as well believe in any nonsensical word you can think of that refers to God since a non-existing God is the same as believing in any made-up word.
So, where's the threat to you? Why fight believers then if all we are doing is believing in the equivalent of Santa Claus? From your perspective just let us go on in our delusions.
Occam's Tool| 6.30.11 @ 1:57AM
Dawkins is actually aggressively making it difficult to practice religion. Live in an atheistic hellhole like New Zealand for a year and you will understand.
Occam's Tool| 6.29.11 @ 6:13PM
Hello, Michael.
I, myself, find it humorous that no one on American Spectator has ever answered my question: Name a Secular Humanist society with a long term viable birthrate (I mean one in which the people do not regularly go to religious services. We aren't one, neither, really, is Israel.)
The answer is: none. None, none, none. So, if all the laws are torn down to destroy the Devil, then what will you hide behind when he turns on you and the winds begin to blow?
What will the Secualar Humanists and the Ron Paullists who advocate Heroin legalization and fight not for the West do when the sharia advocates turn on them, when they are allyless and alone, and have no faith? (Or when their faith has no spine to fight those who would rape and murder infant and young girls)
What will happen then? Because it will happen by 2030.
Seapuss| 6.29.11 @ 7:54AM
Modern liberalism is anything but "non-judgmental". Liberals certainly do pass judgments, but according to the dictates of their new god: Equality. Liberals love the Sermon on the Mount because of its message of social justice, and use it to pass judgment on rich people, big corporations, and free market capitalism. But they detest just about everything else in the Gospel.
For example, liberal churches don't ordain gay ministers because they don't want to pass judgment on homosexuality. Rather, they ordain gay ministers in the name of equality.
It's radical egalitarianism, not "anything goes" relativism or hedonism, that explains modern liberalism.
Ted| 6.29.11 @ 8:19AM
"The Catholic Church has likewise declined, and the sex abuse scandal is only partly to blame. One in 10 Americans now identify themselves as ex-Catholics, and one of three raised as Catholic have defected. The Jesuits, by far the most liberal order, have fallen from 8,400 members in 1965 to 2,650 in 2010. Social justice, which really means income redistribution, is their foremost article of faith."
The "defections" (for lack of a better term) were caused by a lack of proper catechesis in the post Vatican II church, among other things. The Jesuits reaped from the same harvest as did many of the non-orthodox orders of nuns: God stopped sending them vocations. Notice where those vocations are going. To the orthodox religious orders who fully preach Gospel and fully bear true witness to Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. As Pope John Paul II might have noted, these are not coincidences.
"Islam has flourished even as Christianity has languished."
Where orthodox Christianity has been preached (e.g. Africa), it has done quite well.
JP| 6.29.11 @ 8:38AM
But orthodox Christianity is wilting in developed nationss. In Europe, it is morbid. In North America, it is giving way to a more flaccid, "faith and worship" type of emotionalism. Rob Bell may be a crank; but he has tapped into something the Mega-Churches and oldline Protestant Churches, as well as Catholic Churches fail to provide. His creation (a mish-mash of all 3) cannot last. But it does shed light on what''s going on over here.
And Islam, for many over here, does provide something that Christianity fails to provision - an unbenidng orthodoxy that transcends bourgeois life. As Niethzsche pointed out over 100 years ago: it is that Christ has left Christians; its the Christians that left Christ.
Occam's Tool| 6.29.11 @ 12:00PM
Another, basically utilitarian point---where there is no faith, there are insufficient children. Where there is faith, there children are also.
Hmmm. Having faith is a pro-survival characteristic for a society. Why? Riddle me that, Richard Dawkins. (And for those antisemites who read this site, consider this---the Axis powers in WWII, Germany, Japan, Italy---none of them have a birthrate above 1.3. Russia, well known for its antisemitism, is dying, with a very low birthrate and a male life expectancy of 58 years. The Islamic world is a cesspool, and birthrates, though high, are starting to fall.
Israel has a birthrate per woman of 2.7. The next highest birthrate in Western Countries is in the USA, home to the second highest number of Jews in the world Hmmm....)
CalMark| 6.29.11 @ 12:22PM
Hey! Don't you Jews be taking ALL the credit for big American families.
There's plenty of Christians who also think sex is a mitzvah (as a Jewish author gracefully put it) of which a big family is a happy consequence.
Occam's Tool| 6.29.11 @ 6:15PM
I didn't say we should. I point out that faith counts, CalMark.
The churches are empty in Europe. So are the nurseries, except for kids named after the head of the 3 stooges. Interestingly, those religious congregations, where they preach things that Ron Paul supports, are full.
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 12:30PM
Oy Vey Occam, my daughter and her husband have five, my son and his wife (note the conventional family structures) have three. We are of course on the post Messiah side.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:42PM
Sadly, Russia is well know for its alcoholism as well. The state manufacturers all it wants, and they sell it cheaply. Addiction is the opiate of the peoples.
Cecelia| 6.29.11 @ 2:00PM
Lips that touch alcohol shall never touch mine.
Ruth 3:11
Le Cracquere| 6.29.11 @ 3:25PM
You're in luck, Cecelia: shotgunning bypasses the lips nicely!
Occam's Tool| 6.29.11 @ 6:17PM
You sound delightful, Cecilia. I don't drink. But I already have the perfect woman. I wish you luck, as you are following a correct path.
Margie| 6.30.11 @ 1:07PM
She's a troll. That Scripture says nothing of the sort, guys.
Occam's Tool| 6.29.11 @ 6:16PM
Dear Margie,
G-d Bless you and your hubby! I loved Steyn's description of the modern Russian male: "give him two more legs and a tail and he would be an endangered species." Life expectancy: 58 years.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 7:01PM
Hi O.T.
My Hubby's of pure Russian decent. He was born in Canada while his parents waited for 10 years on a list to come to America after the war, where they both were in Nazi camps. His Dad met Stalin once, (because he was friends with his son) went to his academy and graduated with honors. He hung out with his son, but his son drank so much that his father quit hanging around with him.
He flew a fighter plane in Stalin's "air force", helping to fight against the Nazi's. He pretended to be a Communist in order to become a fighter pilot. But he never was one. (You had to be a Communist in order to be an officer). He lied.
He got shot down and captured and used his gold watch (he was first in his class), that he got when he graduated from the academy to bribe the guard at the prison camp. When they both got to Canada, they met at church and they had my hubby and so when he was 5 they came here, never to go back to Russia again.
Hubby's father got a letter from Stalin "inviting" him to return. He wrote back saying, "NEVER!" Of course, everyone knew that if you went back, you were put in prison because you were considered a traitor. Stalin scratched his name off of a plaque that was on the outside of the academy he was so angry. His Father rejoiced at that.
He became an engineer here and eventually retired to FL where he died a few decades ago.
Mom's in her final days as we speak, she's 86. I have never met a more cheerfully disposed person in my life. She never complained. Ever.
She told me about how when in the Nazi camp the boys were starved more than the girls, (she was 16 when they came and threw her in the back of a truck never to go home again), so she and the other girls would give their daily portions to them sometimes. Mom wouldn't eat the maggot soup but the boys would. Yes, maggot soup.
When you go through that and then come here to the greatest country on the face of the earth~ you have no need to complain.. ever.
Bless you, O.T. and thanks for the kind words.
RCV| 6.29.11 @ 7:45PM
What a terrific tale of courage, Margie. Your father-in-law sounds like an amazingly wonderful human being. Thanks for sharing his story.
RCV| 6.29.11 @ 7:46PM
... and dittos for your mother-in-law.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 7:58PM
Thanks, RCV, lots.
Occam's Tool| 6.30.11 @ 1:59AM
Well, that sounds like the types of heroes who would raise you two, Margie.
donserge| 6.29.11 @ 8:55AM
Many years ago in an adult Sunday school class held in an evangelical, John chapter three preaching church, I was floored that about 50% of the attendees believed that it was highly probable that people who lived a good life would be spared the horrors of hell. The Bible (what else is there to go on....fallible human philosophy?) clearly states that to be saved one needs personal faith in Jesus' substitutionary death (and resurrection). And this was not a liberal church with a liberal pastor.
ShortNSweet| 6.29.11 @ 10:21AM
John 14:6 - Jesus says, "I am the way, the truth, and the life, and NO man comes unto the Father, except by me." One way. There will be a multitude of "good men, and women" bust hell wide open. Disbelief exempts NO one; just because you don't believe it doesn't make The Truth go away. Unfortunately, for many, and all atheists, will stand before (My) God, right next to me, and answer for what they did or didn't do with His Son, Jesus Christ! Those who chose to except Christ, found the way to heaven, those who didn't choose Christ, found the way to hell. Plain and simple.
victor| 6.29.11 @ 12:00PM
Better watch that preaching of the gospel. You just might get called a Pharisee by some modern day Catholic Papal Inquisitor!
Clint| 6.29.11 @ 12:54PM
American Spectator's Resident Anti-Catholic Joisey White Trash Bigots Are In The Building.
Occam's Tool| 6.29.11 @ 6:18PM
And The American Spectator's celebrant of 3 month old baby beheadings as long as they are "sandmonkeys" is also in the building. Terrorist Catamite and Hoar.
Clint| 6.29.11 @ 8:10PM
You're A Slandering Liar, Maniac Israel Firster Neo-Chickenhawk Coward Tool Job.
You're All Atwitter & Angst Ridden Because Many Of We,Tea Party Patriots & Our Tea Party Co-Favorite Dr.Ron Paul & Our Tea Party Senator Dr.Rand Paul.
The Tea Party Rebellion Escalates.
Christus Dominus.
Occam's Tool| 6.30.11 @ 2:02AM
Not particularly worried about Paul given that Bachmann is kicking his scrawny Nazi sympathising ass. More just bothered that I have to discuss him with soi disant Conservatives like you, loser.
You know, I have no problems with Catholics, so long as they are Conservative and have a brain. That doubly locks you out, catamite Clint.
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 10:22AM
Couple things:
#1: I'm fairly sure Church attendance does not = Heaven entry card.
#2: I'm also fairly sure Ggd is a fair judge. In other words: If you are raised a (pick a religion), you are surrounded by it & never really confronted with Christ & reject Him, you are going to be just fine.
He is not going to toss you into fire for eternity on a technicality. He knows your heart. Just like you would not burn your child for lack of understanding. Why would you assume an all knowing, all loving creator would do such? It is utter & complete nonsense. Just as Jesus had to come to "clarify" common sense actions on the Sabbath, such is the case with such idiotic pronouncements of damnation.
David T| 6.29.11 @ 11:01AM
So you would stake your eternal destiny on being "fairly sure" about the grace and mercy of God?
Le Cracquere| 6.29.11 @ 11:27AM
To a point, that's all one really CAN stake it on. Consider: no matter what you believe, someone out there is sure you're going to Hell for believing it.
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 1:17PM
It's called Faith, not proof. I did not set the rules.
Le Cracquere| 6.29.11 @ 3:28PM
Didn't mean to imply that, Steve. I was simply responding to David T, pointing out that metaphysical certainty wasn't on tap, and that one's "eternal destiny" can't be idiot-proofed this side of the veil.
David T| 6.29.11 @ 4:32PM
And my point to Steve A was this:
Is it wise to stake your eternal destiny on the belief that neither church attendance nor even choice of religion has any bearing on one's eternal destiny? God is, of course, gracious and merciful. But His Son said that if we love Him, we will obey Him. Jesus also said no one can know the Father except through the Son.
I agree that metaphysical certainty is hard to come by in this world, but a casual attitude about what we believe and what we do would appear, based on Christ's own words and 2000 years of Church teaching, to be a very dangerous thing from an eternal perspective.
victor| 6.29.11 @ 12:04PM
"I'm also fairly sure Ggd is a fair judge. In other words: If you are raised a (pick a religion), you are surrounded by it & never really confronted with Christ & reject Him, you are going to be just fine."
Really?
"He who believes in Him is not condemned; he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the Name of the only Son of God." Jn. 3:18.
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 1:03PM
Wow victor, what a deep thinker you are. You are a narrow minded fool. You are the equivalent of the Old Testament goons who chastized a shepherd for pulling his sheep out of a ditch on the Sabbath. You are the zealot who thought he could get to heaven on his good works alone. You are like those Jesus had to explain to that a sin of thought is the same as a sin of the flesh.
A child is born in Iran, raised Muslim. Good heart, never harms a fly. Dies in an accident at 21. Never confronted with or rejects the ministry of Jesus. He burns for eternity according to your moronic theory while Jesus stands by & comments what "tough luck" it was to be him.
Get a grip on the spirit.
Jon| 6.29.11 @ 1:35PM
Wow, sounds like Victor touched a nerve there!
Your example falls apart at "good heart". Romans 3:10 says "There is none righteous; no, not one." There's no such thing as a child (or anyone else) with a "good heart"; we're all born sinners, and we all deserve Hell. Apart from a saving knowledge of Jesus, that's where we end up; not because of an arbitrary decision on God's part, but because we've earned it through our sin.
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 2:02PM
Jon, I sincerely feel sorry for you. I really do. God must have some common sense, otherwise, what's the point? He is not going to reject anyone, unless they directly choose to reject him. You condemn yourself to Hell (absence of God). You specifically & knowingly reject God & choose the absence.
Everyone must be offered a choice, otherwise God is unjust & it just aint so.
ShortNSweet| 6.29.11 @ 3:13PM
Every word is truth in God's word. You obvious don't like all of it, and therefore throw out the parts you don't like (Romans 3:10).
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 1:42PM
Even where man does not preach the truth, "even the very rocks will cry out." All men will, either through someone following the Great Commission, or through God's own divine working in the world, will be confronted with a choice to accept or reject the calling of the Spirit. Muslim upbringing or no.
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 1:51PM
Utter & complete nonsense. At what age does this eternal condemnation apply?? At birth? 5 years old, 11 years old?? Depends? Please clarify.
My child dies in a car wreck at 9. Has not been baptised. Eternal fire?? Answer me.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 2:53PM
I don't pretend to have all the answers... just trying to find them right along with you. From what I know and have been taught growing up, a young child who does not know what he is doing is not held accountable. But once a child grows and recieves a calling from the Spirit, they are held accountable and unless they accept that calling, they will be defaulted to damnation. That's our "natural" state... if we don't do anything to change it, then that's where we end up... not the other way around.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 3:11PM
Steve,
Your answer:
"But Jesus called them to Him, saying, "Let the children come to Me, and do not hinder them; for to such belongs the Kingdom of God." Lk. 18:16.
His Kingdom belongs to the children! No need to worry or doubt that ever again. :^).
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 4:07PM
You put it much more clearly than I did... thanks!
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 1:55PM
Steve,
That is why it is written that the gospel of Jesus Christ will be preached throughout the world. God's plan is that everyone gets to hear it.
And I'm sorry, but that was me who posted that, above, not my hubby, so I take full responsibility for it. :^).
The thing is, when my husband posts late at night, and I go to post the next day, his name stays in that box.. and sometimes I don't catch it.
Steve, I was going to your point of saying, "If they reject Him".. no one is permitted to reject Him. That is why I posted that verse. It is nothing personal! It's just the truth.
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 2:04PM
Sorry, confused. Are you telling me I am unable to reject the blood of Christ as payment for my sin?? I most certainly can reject it & not accept the payment. It's called free will.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:22PM
No, it was to when you said that if you are surrounded by another Religion, and never confronted with Him, and reject Him, you will be just fine.
So, the thing is, that God has arranged it that everyone will hear the gospel, and have the opportunity to accept Him. I'm basing that on the verse that says that the gospel of the kingdom will be preached throughout the world, and then the end will come. (Mt. 24:14 & Mk. 1:15).
From those verses, it shows that everyone will hear it, otherwise, why would He say what He says in Jn. 3:18?
The fact is His Words say that:
1. Everyone will hear the gospel.
2. Anyone who rejects Him is condemned.
And rightly so~ we were all bought with a price, His suffering and dying for all of our sins!
I think that you must agree?
God bless.
Occam's Tool| 6.29.11 @ 6:21PM
Steve A, hey, I think it was some bishop said someything about god in his official capacity doing things he despised in his private capacity.
Not my chihuahua in this fight, except to note that 80% of Mosques in the US preach violence. What's the likelihood in Iran?
RCV| 6.29.11 @ 7:47PM
I'm with you on this one, Steve A.
BackToBasics| 6.30.11 @ 12:37AM
Steve A - your questions about how God will judge are valid. Here's a couple verses in Luke that I will include below may be of some help. A large part of Faith is having trust in God and in His love. I do not know exactly how God will judge but I do believe it will be done fairly. Every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord. -Phillippians 2:10- How could we do this if there was unfair justice in God's judgement?
I do not have all the answers about judgement for those who have never heard of Jesus name; after all, I am not God. But after knowing His personal love and forgiveness and learning more from the Bible and from personal experience and answered prayers, I do believe we can trust Him.
But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more.
Luke 12:47, 48
Ken (Old Texican)| 6.29.11 @ 9:04AM
I truly don't like "hell fire" preachers, and "You better go to church and be a good boy...OR ELSE" types.
I don't spend a lot of time contemplating death and beyond either.
Rather, my faith is in God's justice and mercy, and in the fact that my eternal life began in 1968 when I committed my life to try to follow Jesus.
My "profession of faith " was kinda' simple.....
"From now on, Lord, my life is in your hands. Do with it as you will."
...But see, there is a peculiar thing about being "born again into eternal life" heh, it means "eternal". How can that be taken away without destroying the very definition of "eternal".
DUH!
John 3: 16 says it all.
(OKOK, for those of you who haven't memorized it:
"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life."
For the Bibli-idolators among us, I refer you to another passage in St. John: 5: 38-40.
More than anything .....I'm enjoying the fruits of my eternal life right now. Aint that neat?
Bruce| 6.29.11 @ 9:15AM
Ken;
I would submit to you that your eternal life did NOT start in 1968, but before the world, sun, stars and mankind were all created. If this were not true, how could their have been a battle waged in Heaven? Who were the winners and losers? Our spirits (which God placed into a mortal body) return to Heaven and we are told it will be placed back into an incorruptible body.
David T| 6.29.11 @ 11:04AM
Human beings did not exist until God created them on "the sixth day."
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 11:55AM
Pre-existence? When does the human posses the soul?
skip| 6.29.11 @ 12:32PM
"Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. " (Psalms 139:16)
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:48PM
When? He tells us when:
"And Jehovah God formed the man out
of dust from the ground, and breathed into
his nostrils the breath of life; and man became
a living soul." Gen. 2:7.
David T| 6.29.11 @ 11:09AM
So how do you explain Hebrews 6: 4-6?
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:57PM
From this here Bible "Idolator" and worshipper of His Word I present to you the following:
Hebrews 6:4-6:
"For it is impossible for the ones once
having been enlightened, and having tasted
of the Heavenly gift, and becoming sharers
of the Holy Spirit,
and tasting the good Word of God, and
the works of power of a coming age,
and having fallen away, it is impossible
for them again to renew to repentance,
crucifying again for themselves
the Son of God, and holding Him up to
public shame."
David T| 6.29.11 @ 1:40PM
Thanks Margie. I know the verses very well. My comment was aimed at Ken (Old Texican), who seems to subscribe to the "once saved, always saved" heresy.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 1:47PM
Hi David, yeas I realized that, I just wanted to write out the verse there. :^).
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:11PM
"How can that be taken away without destroying the very definition of "eternal".
DUH!"
"If you forsake the LORD and serve foreign gods, then he will turn and do you harm, and consume you, after having done you good." Jos. 24:20.
"For if we sin deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful prospect of judgment, and a fury of fire which will consume the adversaries. A man who has violated the law of Moses dies without mercy at the testimony of two or three witnesses.
How much worse punishment do you think will be deserved by the man who has spurned the Son of God, and profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and outraged the Spirit of grace?" Heb. 10:26-29.
Yeah, I'm one of those accused. "Bible idolators"~ I believe every Word of God. Yeah, I'm a "Pharisee" according to you~ for preaching His Truth.
Well, He says it IS possible to go to Hell if you spurn Him AFTER having received His mercy.
Who shall we believe? The WOrd of God? Or Ken?
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 12:37PM
Good day Margie,
It doesn't seem as though you and Ken are all that far apart. If we have our soul and our soul is eternal we are living part of (perhaps the prenatal if you will experience of the soul) our eternal life. Can we as believers recant or apostocize and lose that promise? Some hold a position of "once saved always saved" but it does seem as though one can reject the faith and return to a state of non-grace. It would be a shame to have doctrinal disputes set brother against sister and perhaps cause others to stumble.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:52PM
Al Adab,
The problems arise when one disagrees with what the Holy Spirit has written through the men God appointed to write God's Words.
I'm in agreement with His Words, and I am willing to forsake the friendship of any who do the same~ no matter what they may call themselves.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:53PM
should be, of any who forsake same.
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 2:00PM
"Father I pray that they may be one as you and I are one."
I really do want to meet with you someday margie, it would be wonderful to have our conversation, brother to sister and face to face.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:26PM
Al Adab,
I've told you before, I think you're awesome. Did you know that in Heaven we'll be able to recognize each other? Looking forward to it.
I have posted my e mail here though.
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 2:59PM
While I know that day is coming, perhaps tomorrow, and we will meet there, it would be nice to meet you in this life as well. As always thanks for your kindness to me a poor (redeemed) sinner.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 1:06PM
As a believere in "Once saved, always saved" I find it prudent to explain that it's not quite so simple as that.
One who is truely saved, will remain in God's good graces. Thus, once saved, always saved. If one goes through the actions of salvation but their life does not bear fruit, then one would determine that those actions were all for not and that salvation never took happened in teh first place.
We are told in Hebrews I believe that Jesus' sacrifice is suffecient for all sin for all time. Thus, once save, all of your sins are cleansed, those today and those of tomorrow. The question then is not can you fall out of grace, but did you ever have it in the first place. To fall out of grace would imply that your salvation has a temporal limit on it. It's only as good as my experience of today... a construct of time observed by man, not by God. He saves you in your entirety... that's for your sins before you come to Him, your sins after you've come to Him.
I'm no theologian, so I'm not trying to defend it, or offend someone who may understand differently. Just trying to clarify.
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 2:02PM
I appreciate your comments Yelo. It is one of those doctrinal areas where eventually we will know the truth, but in the meanwhile we do our best to follow The Way. It need not seperate us one from the other, one part of the Body from another.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 2:57PM
Very well put.
And God bless you for your understanding of a relative child in the ways of "deep religious study."
Bruce| 6.29.11 @ 9:04AM
I can only imagine what my grandparents, country born and raised and members of the Methodist Church are thinking now. My grandfather took up religion late in life, but he believed in attending services no matter what, personal prayer, family prayer, and scripture study. When relatives visited, you knew he disapproved if you didn't show up for breakfast so you could avoid hearing a scripture reading and having to get on your knees before God to thank Him, plead to Him and speak to Him as you would your earthly father.
Bill| 6.29.11 @ 9:09AM
I was gratified to read that the writer sees that religious faith is, to a significant degree, fed by the exercise of will.
I am a believing Christian. I am also fairly well-educated. As a result, I am subject to frequent moments when I doubt that there is an afterlife, when I am convinced that when we die we just take a new position in the nitrogen cycle. I have doubts about the divinity of Christ, which is the true Christian church, about the endless discussion and debate over faith versus faith and good works, and so on and so on.
It is my desire to believe that sustains and nurtures my faith. It is so easy just to throw one's hands up and quit having religious belief. The problem is that the need to believe in something larger persists regardless of religious belief. The part of our lives occupied most usually by religious belief becomes humanistic, and humans are so disappointing in nearly every way, and so rarely fulfill our hopes, that we have to believe in something. If it's not religion, it will be something else, usually a life grounded in reason.
Unfortunately, for most people, a life grounded in reason is elusive. So in the end, if we're not religious, we're left with a gap in ourselves that nothing can fill. Into that gap will go the fads and fancies of the moment, and those fads and fancies have shown themselves not only to be useless in fufilling that particular human need, but downright destructive to humanity.
The Big E| 6.29.11 @ 9:32AM
Doubt is the cutting edge of faith.
Dan Hirsch| 6.29.11 @ 11:07AM
Just throw out all of your doubts, what's left is your faith...
autoacct628| 6.29.11 @ 11:56AM
As a man of faith, I believe that the Lord WANTS us to fully explore our own capacity to reason on the issue of His existence.....He doesn't want blind robotic faith and obiescence....he wants considered, rational, orderly (which He created our minds to be) thought on the issue, and He wants us to choose.
Think about it....God could make it EASY for us to believe by showing up and repeatedly doing miracles for us....it is easy to believe what you can see....but what good would that do? How much of a reach would that be? He wants us to reach for Him, to doubt and then overcome doubt, to question and then decide the answers are in Him and one day HE may share them but until then, we must make a LEAP of faith....
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 3:09PM
BS, I KNOW law enforcement, the criminal justice system and prison exist, yet there doesn't seem to be a shortage of people breaking Man's law's.PROVING you exist and me following yo are two different things.
The Big E| 6.29.11 @ 2:11PM
I have found throughout my life that nothing strengthens my faith as much as doubt. It is when I am in doubt, that I always find God waiting for me in the details of life. I know He's waiting there all the time time anyway, but it is when I am in doubt that His presence is the most reassuring. It is when I am in doubt that my faith grows, and I have found over the years that invariably, my doubt precedes events which might otherwise have presented a serious crisis of faith. It is as if God uses my doubt to temper my faith, and strengthen it for the trials ahead.
So I will not simply, "throw out all" my doubts. I will embrace them as blessings from the Almighty.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 3:06PM
Just throw out your 'Healthy' skepticism, what left is FAITH
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 5:04PM
If you put your faith in the living God and sought Him accordingly, He would gladly reveal Himself to you.
But you are too busy walking all over Him.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:14PM
Doubt is Sin.
The Big E| 6.29.11 @ 2:17PM
To doubt is no more a sin than to be tempted. Christ Himself was tempted, yet Christ was without sin. The sin comes in surrendering to the temptation, or surrendering to the doubt. The act of surrender is the sin because it means the person who has surrendered to the doubt or temptation has surrendered himself to something other than the will of God. When I am in doubt, I turn first to God for answers, and He is always there. Were I to turn elsewhere for answers, were I to deny that the answers to my doubts lie other than in God, then I would have surrendered to the doubt, and yes, that would be sinful.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:59PM
Hi Big E,
Doubt and temptation comes from the same place, the Sin that's in our members.
It is good that you take it to Jesus instead of indulging it. We all have our areas of weakness. Mine is remaining calm in the face of slander, especially when it comes from other so called Christians. And laziness, a constant battle for me. It all comes from the same place, Sin in my members.
But!
"But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of Sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from Sin, have become slaves of righteousness." Rom. 6:17 & 18.
I want to forever be.. a slave of righteousness. By His Grace.
The Big E| 6.29.11 @ 9:29AM
With all due respect, I think your are being somewhat unfair to Mr. Bell, and I wonder how familiar you are with his ministry. We used his Nooma videos as well as the long video, "Everything is Spiritual" as a basis for discussion in our adult Sunday School class a couple of years back. In addition, I've read one of his books, "Velvet Elvis." I don't necessarily agree with his interpretation on everything, but I have no doubt that I have a stronger faith, and a better understanding of my faith, because of the way his work challenged me to think about what I believe, and why. The Nooma videos are excellent, each one takes a simple aspect of Biblical teaching and expands on it and illustrates it in a manner that forces you to ask yourself how you manifest that teaching in your life, and "Everything is Spiritual" is one of the, if not the, most cogent and persuasive arguments I've ever seen for the inherent rationality of Christianity, and the twisted irrationality of atheism. I can highly recommend those to any Christian.
Does he question certain aspects of traditional Christianity? Yes he does. Is that necessarily a bad thing? Personally, I don't think so. We live in a society at war with Christianity. We do not have the luxury of retreating into a cocoon of tradition and hiding from the reality of the world around us. Christ didn't give us that option. If we are unwilling to allow our faith to be challenged by those who share our faith, but who disagree with us on the details, then how do we expect to be prepared to meet the challenge that comes from those who abhor the basis of our faith to begin with?
Christ did not command us to preach only to the faithful, to those who were already prone to righteousness. He commanded us to spread His word among ALL men. We cannot do that if we are unable to answer the serious questions of those who are prone to despise us.
Clint| 6.29.11 @ 9:44AM
Try reading the latest statistics from the National Councll of Churches.Their 2010 edition is out.
Roman Catholics, the nation's largest Christian denomination, grew 1.49 percernt to 68 million members.
Michael L. Hauschild| 6.29.11 @ 10:07AM
I will wager Clint that many of these new Catholics are citizenship challenged, but maybe that was your point.
W| 6.29.11 @ 12:08PM
The approved words you are to use are:
"undocumented Americans"
"future citizens"
Michael L. Hauschild| 6.29.11 @ 10:08AM
I will wager Clint that many of these new Catholics are citizenship challenged, but maybe that was your point.
PJ| 6.29.11 @ 11:16AM
I'm afraid you are correct.
Clint| 6.29.11 @ 11:26AM
My point is that, contrary to the author's statement,"The Catholic Church has likewise declined", The Catholic Church in America is Growing.
CalMark| 6.29.11 @ 1:34PM
Speaking as a lifelong Catholic:
The Catholic Church in the USA has declined morally, spiritually, and materially. Why else are so many old parishes being closed?
The addition of a large number of Mexican peasants (whose "Catholicism" incorporates a LOT of intolerance and pagan mysticism, by the way) doesn't encourage me.
I see huge numbers of empty pews, the full ones mostly old people. I see nasty, hate-filled, intolerant old radicals ranting modified Marxism from the pulpit. I see unmarried young-looking men being treated with undisguised hostility by clergy and lay leaders (from the experience of attending church regularly in almost a dozen locations in the last 20 years).
The Catholic Church is in crisis. You remind me of the young woman who told me, "There aren't a lot of young people in church. But gather us from all across the city in a big room, and it seems look more." Fallacy, blindness, and stubborn denial of reality.
Clint| 6.29.11 @ 9:49AM
Update: National Council Of Churches 2011 Edition:
The Catholic Church, the nation's largest at 68.5 million members, reported a membership growth of .57 percent.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:17PM
Numbers mean nothing if you're preaching another gospel, and not that of Jesus Christ.
Islam has big numbers, too. So what?
"For many are called, but few are chosen." Mt. 22:14.
Clint| 6.29.11 @ 12:32PM
Uh Oh ! Fixated Ax Grinder Lapsed Catholic-Anti-Catholic Serial Screwball Apocalyptic Crank Lady Victor-Margie-Sandy-Sybil Is In The Building.
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 12:39PM
Oh that was real helpful Clint. NOT.
Clint| 6.29.11 @ 12:57PM
Ohhhhh !
Fixated Ax Grinder Lapsed Catholic-Anti-Catholic Serial Screwball Apocalyptic Crank Lady Victor-Margie-Sandy-Sybil, Apologist.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:58PM
He isn't here to help.
Clint| 6.29.11 @ 1:20PM
I Don't Help American Spectator's Resident Obsessed Lapsed Catholic-Anti-Catholic White Trash Joisey Bigot, Victor-Margie-Sandy-Sybil.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 1:43PM
Hey Clinty-poo:
I'm not my husband (victor), and I'm not (Sandy), and I'm not (Sybil) or anyone else you think I might be.
I'm also not white trash, I actually work, and own a home with my husband.
I'm not a a bigot~ I simply love the Word of God and reject false Religion.
I'm not obsessed, but I do have a zeal for the Lord.
And last, but definitely not least, I'm not a lapsed Catholic, or a lapsed anything.
I simply serve the Lord my God.
Now I know that's too truthful for you to handle, as your M.O. is one of a blatant liar and slanderer, (you know~ that thing you constantly accuse everyone else of)~ but there you have it.
God helps those who can't help themselves. Did ya know that, Clint/Tim*?
Le Cracquere| 6.29.11 @ 3:35PM
Clint and Margie:
When are you two crazy kids going to realize you were made for each other and get hitched? I smell a high-concept reality show.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 4:20PM
Nah,
I think he's more up your alley.
Clint| 6.29.11 @ 8:13PM
I Just Threw Up In My Mouth.
Occam's Tool| 6.30.11 @ 2:06AM
Funny, Clint, that's what anyone with a brain does when they meet you.
Clint| 6.29.11 @ 8:17PM
Apparently, They Are Very Much You, Ax Grinding Lapsed Catholic-Anti-Catholic Joisey White Trash Bigot Apocalyptic Crank Lady Victor-Margie-Sandy-Sybil.
Occam's Tool| 6.30.11 @ 2:08AM
Clint,
bashing women is what I would expect of a man completely lacking manners, grace, or tact. I'm sure it's what your daddy taught you too, right?
Boy, you are a Worthless. Catamite. Hoar.
Margie| 7.2.11 @ 2:18PM
Of course, my comment was to Clint/Tim"
Thanks, Occam. At least there is ONE real man here who stands up for a woman.
You see, Clint/Tim*'s Religion~ Catholicism allows him to do this~ it is a blasphemous false Religion~ they stick together in their hatred of real Christians~ and what is a real Christian? One who stands on what is taught in the Bible, and nothing that disagrees with what God actually taught through Christ and the Apostles~ which all are in agreement with the Holy Scriptures.
This is why the hatred toward me here~ and note Ken's hatred~ for he is a Catholic as well!!
Margie| 6.30.11 @ 1:03PM
No, they aren't you piece of human excrement.
Now go say 1 million Hail Mary's and soak your brain dead body in some "Holy Water".
Sparky| 6.29.11 @ 9:59AM
I fear, wherever riches have increased, (exceeding few are the exceptions,) the essence of religion, the mind that was in Christ, has decreased in the same proportion. Therefore do I not see how it is possible, in the nature of things, for any revival of true religion to continue long. For religion must necessarily produce both industry and frugality; and these cannot but produce riches. But as riches increase, so will pride, and anger, and love of the world in all its branches. -- John Wesley
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 10:06AM
I attend a very conservative Baptist church. I assist in the boys HS Sunday school department. Each week the guys come to class and quickly zone out as we follow the "lesson" for the week. That lesson seems to be a re-hash of the week before, which was re-hash of the week before, etc. It's always, "Be good and love Jesus." Even the sermon boils down to this most of the time. As a Christian, I attend church to recieve a strengthening of my faith, to "recharge" and "reset" my life so that I don't stray too far (I notice that if I miss a week, the next week is harder spiritually as one could expect). Sunday is the day for Christians to come to their Lord and recieve His message. That message usually wasn't, "Be good and love Jesus!" As C.S. Lewis stated, usually when God speaks He means business. Why don't churches spend Sunday, the day for Christians to come to the Lord, speaking on the sticky subjects, the tough stuff, and the hard to understand? Because they don't want to chase away the "visitors." I get it, we want to be welcoming to visitors. We are to try and bring people to faith in Christ. That's important. But so is recieving instruction about our already accepted faith. I wager this may be a large reason many leave the church. You hear one sermon, you've heard them all. Why go back? A visitor SHOULD be completely lost on a Sunday service. It shouldn't be about something they can understand since they don't have faith (and when I say visitor, I mean, obviously, the lost looking for a church). Mission work should happen OUTSIDE the church. INSIDE the church is for the saved to grow deep not just in faith, but also understanding. I'm not saying I want Fire and Brimstone every week... but sometimes it's good to be reminded a) what's at stake and b) that is IS REAL.
Bruce| 6.29.11 @ 10:22AM
Yelo;
I would submit that one of the reasons you don't hear churches preach that God means business is because people don't want to hear the truth. If they hear it and obey it, they might have to make the sacrifices to be doers of the word and not just hearers. As we learn more or Christ, we find that more is expected of us. Many people can't bear the thought of that.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 10:51AM
I would agree with you on this... but the thing is, that as we look at which churches grow and which shrink, it's often the truth-espousing churches that grow. Although, that is, if one is honest, a very scary thing... to live in the truth. I know that while I try to be a good example, I fall WELL short of where I could be. And that's hard to swollow. But, when I'm not getting the education of not just a strong foundation (the fudamentals are Accept Jesus and Be Good!) it becomes harder to address the concerns that non-believers have bout faith. We are called to be ready with an answer for our faith. Yet most of the time, if we were to share only what we recieve from sermons we would be ill equipped to do this.
ShortNSweet| 6.29.11 @ 10:37AM
The divine Word of God is powerful; it is capable of drawing men and women to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. A pastor shouldn't be worried about growing memberships, or hurting peoples' feelings, those are God's jobs, for which He is completely able. Pastors, and leaders are to preach the Word, and to be led by God's Holy Spirit. It is not their decision what they should preach...It is God's decision, and anything else is sin!
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:18PM
Yep. Well said.
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 10:54AM
Yelo, I am a Christian. Saved back in 1994 & baptised as an adult. I believe Jesus hung on the cross by choice to wash my sins.
However, I am bored stiff by Church. I dread going, I dread being there & I look at my watch the whole time. The message is usually Ok but if I wanted to sing songs & stand up & sit down for a few hours, I would go to a Kid Rock concert. I have quit attending & do not intend to return anytime soon. I am not going to torture my kids with forcing them to endure these services.
Kyle| 6.29.11 @ 11:54AM
Steve, may I suggest that going to church is not about what we get out of it. Perhaps you could go to church as an act of worship and service. I'm betting that your church, like most, is in constant need of volunteers during services for things like childcare or Sunday school. That would free up some folks who would probably like to take your place in the pew.
And if your church does not have age appropriate services for your kids, maybe you are just the one to create such a ministry and keep it vibrant and relevant to the kids.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 12:16PM
Would I be right in assuming you would, much like me, rather get a down and dirty about the nitpicky stuff like why we believe in Creation, or why we believe in Heaven and Hell, or what to expect in the end times rather than another does of "Love your neighbor,"? I mean, I'm not knocking that lesson. But it would be nice to be able to learn some of the hard stuff every now and then in church in not just on my own.
With that being said, I concure that attendance should not simply be about what we get out of it. I find, even no matter how weak the sermon may be, I am still able to come away better than when I entered. And for that, I am thankful to God for providing me a source for sustanance of the spirit in my church family.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:22PM
Church is wherever two or more are gathered in His Name. Get together and have Bible studies, get out your concordances and study the Word, pray together and have fellowship.
This is what Christians do in Communist countries that have no real church building they can go to. Here in the USA, with all the phony baloney good time rock n' roll churchy stuff~ it's like having no church to go to. The physical building isn't even the issue anyway, it's what you do there.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 1:07PM
Well put Margie!
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 1:24PM
Thanks. :^)
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 1:13PM
I do not disagree with any of the above comments & / or suggestions. I am simply stating the reality of my experience ( as well as a huge segment of those others sitting through these affairs, I am sure)
It's not all about "what I get out of it." Although it is impossible for man to fully comprehend the mind of God, I am going to "wager" that he does not want me sitting in the pew, staring at the clock, wishing I was home cutting the grass. All of this display for what? For whom? To what purpose?
I know what I believe. He knows all of my thoughts. Tthat's enough for me without enduring 47,000 hymns to prove it. Sorry.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 1:32PM
You know, Steve, I would personally rather go to a Buddy Guy concert than sit in a Catholic church service.
In fact, over my dead body would I ever attend one.. except for the funeral services of a relative.
Jesus died to set us free form guess what? Religion!
To be "fair" I would also rather go to a Robert Cray concert than sit in a feel-good goody-two-shoes rock n' roll "church" service by Christians.
Nope. Put me with a bunch of other ruined sinners saved by Grace who admit how utterly RUINED they are by sin but have known the Grace and Mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ and KNOW how much we NEED Him every single day. And let's get on our knees and pray and submit our will to His will.
Then, lets really get into the Bible! It's pure joy.
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 1:48PM
Margie, I'm completely down with that!
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:30PM
Alright, steve!!
Jesus is Lord!
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 1:51PM
I would "wager" that you are correct. God wants honesty first. Without it, everything else we do is pointless... even confession and repentance must first spring from honesty.
I do not like the "Stand up, Sit down, FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT" structure of my church. I go for the pastor. I make a willful effort to worship (I'm not much of a sing/praise worship kind of guy... more of the "I'll pray and thank you for being as great as You are" kind of guy for worship) in service... but God knows I'm trying. And he knows when I'm just biding time for the sermon. I think he would rather me be honest about what I'm doing there rather than throwing my hands up and getting all emotional singing some song that sounds more like a chant than any of the good old stuff. I'll emotional singing a tradtional version of Amazing Grace... I'll just stand there to sing most of the new stuff.
BUT... God knows and I know I'm not going for the music. And as long as you give the Sabbath to the Lord, in or out of a church, He will be pleased. Just be sure to honor it... it's one of the Big 10 after all!
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 2:17PM
Yelo, We agree (caution, this could mean we are both wrong!) Anyway, your last paragraph sums it up well.
I fail to follow through on that enough. I fail to pray as I am not sure it matters. I do not believe God runs a rigged game. I do not believe he intervenes to keep a lightning bolt from my head. He is not indifferent, but non invasive. I could be completely wrong here.
When you have multiple family members as victims of homicide, as I do, you can tell me about God's hand preventing the bus from running you over all you want, but I know you were just lucky.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 3:16PM
When we pray for the things we want, you'll find your right... it probably doesn't matter. We should express our desires to God, but always second to our desire to accept and understand His will and that His will be done. I find that when my prayer is one of submission and a stregthening of my spirit and resolve against temptation, His blessings soon follow. When I pray for a new car... He probably laughes as I walk out to my beat up Honda knowing that if I want a new car I need to go buy one.
"He is not indifferent, but non invasive. I could be completely wrong here."
This I agree with completely. He calls us, He tugs at our hearst to do this or that... to guide us. But His love means we are free agents and so are everyone around us. That means a lot of what happens He allows because if He didn't... we would be puppets. And if we were puppets, we would not be capable of loving Him... only acting like it at His direction.
Steve A| 6.30.11 @ 9:17AM
Yelo, Enjoyed the conversation. You are very rational. Thanks
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:33PM
YeloStalyn~
You are awesome!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DcF75h4BHk8
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 3:05PM
I can't watch it since I'm at work. Well... can't listen to it rather. But Alan Jackson? C'mon! Country? Bleh! Although... as long as he sticks to the old, slow, powerful version of that song I'd wager I'd be all over it.
Whenever I find myself singing in the shower, it's always Amazing Grace. I've told my wife a number of times that when I die, that's the song to be played at my funeral... the old, slow, full version. Followed by It Is Well. The first would be a testamony for me, the second would be a suggestion for those who would greive my passing.
I, on the other hand, will busy celebrating getting out of here and going home!
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 4:36PM
Yelo,
I'm not a country fan either, BUT! When I was looking for this song on youtube I came across his, and it is done well. He's a Christian and sings it from the heart.
I love the old hymn too, and here are some of my faves:
Blessed Assurance
The Old Rugged Cross
Amazing Grace
How Great Thou Art
Just as I Am
The Solid Rock
Rock of Ages
Battle Hymn of the Republic
Fairest Lord Jesus
and last but not least: Handel's Messiah.. the whole wonderful thing!
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 5:07PM
Pretty good list Margie, good doctrine and expression of Faith. Could we add "Praise Ye the Lord and A Mighty Fortress" (yeah I know but it really is majestic music)?
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 7:54PM
I can't believe I forgot A Mighty Fortress! Been singing that one for decades, too.
I don't know the other one you mentioned.
Will have to look it up.
Have you ever heard Fairest Lord Jesus? After being a Christian for almost 40 years I had never head it before. I cannot help but to cry every time I hear it. It's like God saved the best for last for me to hear. It's so beautiful.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 5:27PM
That is a good list.
I really like the Battle Hymn. I can't help but get all pumped up when I hear it!
It Is Well is probably my second favorite after Amazing Grace. The story behind it is just crazy.
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 5:39PM
Yelo,
Agreed with "It is well", the story is as you say amazing as is the story behind "Amazing Grace".
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 3:39PM
One of my favorites. Another is "Be Still My Soul" Wherein the verse: "Be still my soul the winds and waves still know/ His voice who ruled them while He walked below."
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 3:00PM
God is Jealous, you have to appease it's vanity or SUFFER forever!
Occam's Tool| 6.30.11 @ 2:09AM
Might I suggest a different church, Steve? Perhaps the pastor is clueless. Most of my fellow students at TCU enjoyed their services.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 3:02PM
The Reason it's 'harder' if you miss a week is that the 'brainwashing' starts to lose it's hold. Like a Junkie or Drunk the FIRST missed week is ALWAYS the worst...It get's easier after that
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 4:37PM
KOTN~
You're either a slave to Sin, or a slave to righteousness.
Occam's Tool| 6.30.11 @ 2:15AM
King:
again, if you would kindly answer my question: are there any secular humanist political entities that have a birthrate that will replace their population? If not, consider causes.
You know, it took me a while to get my head around the abortion question. When I realized there was a culture of death with euthanasia on one end and abortion on the other, the light went on.
We are given various qualities and gifts by G-d to help us thrive and survive. Considering that no secular societies thriive, what concl;usion should we draw?
And, incidentally, I don't care what you believe, so long as it doesn't involve the toleration of rape of 9 year old girls or the beheading of 3 month olds, which seems to be fine with an asshat who posts here and CLAIMS to be Roman Catholic.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 3:04PM
The Reason it's 'harder' if you miss a week is that the 'brainwashing' starts to lose it's hold. Like a Junkie or Drunk the FIRST missed week is ALWAYS the worst...It get's easier after that
Deb| 6.29.11 @ 10:08AM
Book recommendations:
The Greatest Hoax on Earth by Jonathan Sarfati (Response to Dawkins' book)
The Deluded Atheist by Douglas Wilson (response to Dawkins' The God Delusion)
God Is by Douglas Wilson (response to Hitchens)
C Smith| 6.29.11 @ 10:19AM
I took my father for a drive one evening not too long ago. Over old country roads that were once so familiar. Latent memories brightened his face at every turn: “I used to plow that field for Jake, or plant that one for Dave, or harvest that for Marlon.” Returning from the war, he and his often envied Oliver 70, purchased for several hundred dollars and a mule, not only tended his land but that of a multitude of others, land he knew as intimately as his own.
Suddenly, pointing toward the fading sun, he became disturbed: “There used to be a church there and a graveyard.” But I saw nothing but the silhouette of a fencerow entwined with reeds and vines. Yes, there had been a church, and perhaps as many as a dozen other one room sanctuaries scattered along that dusty meandering road, but like this one, little or nothing now remains. The voice of mirth, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride are now forever silent.
These forgotten churches of fair meadows and vale are so unlike those of today: No satellite receiver affixed to a steeple. No sermons to “spiritually” download or hymns with copyright code. No worship bands to rival a night club or bar. Or messages patterned after some Hollywood movie or star. No popular book studies other then the King James. No “Lights, Action, Camera” directing performers to take the stage. And sometimes not even a pastor. But they continued steadfastly in the apostles teaching and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers in a time when apostasy could travel little faster than an occasional circuit rider, in a time when Satan could deceive but one church at a time.
http://popularapostasy.blogspo.....art-3.html
Le Cracquere| 6.29.11 @ 11:31AM
It's a real shame. Anyone out there who'd like to be buried in a churchyard? Good luck with that. Whether because of legal barriers or because of modern priorities, I don't know of any churches built in the last couple generations that have a graveyard. It's either a private suburban cemetery (the dead's version of a strip mall) or cremation. Seems like that ought to be a bigger deal than anyone treats it.
skip| 6.29.11 @ 5:35PM
The solar system is 4.6 billion years old. The lifespan of the sun is 9 billion years. As the sun runs out of fuel it will expand past earth's orbit, vaporizing the earth in the process. Seems like where human remains were buried while earth existed might not be a very big deal at all.
Occam's Tool| 6.30.11 @ 2:16AM
Skip,
the start of ceremonial burial is where we date the start of human civilizations in that area. 'Tis a big deal.
Conservative Bob| 6.29.11 @ 10:32AM
Revelations 3:16 “So, because you are lukewarm--neither hot nor cold--I am about to spit you out of my mouth.”
Main line Protestant Churches have seen their governing structures taken over by progressives. Read of their evolving views on abortion, gay marriage homosexuality, marriage almost any issue facing our society over the past several decades.
At an accelerating rate every belief and behavior if not condoned outright is accepted. Compare their evolving ‘beliefs’ with both Old and New Testament scripture, and it becomes clear there is unmistakably a divergence.
If you stand for nothing you will fall for anything. Revelations 3:16 tells all you need to understand what is happening in these churches.
What has destroyed our society is destroying our churches as well. It is not possible to condone all beliefs and behaviors and still be a Christian.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:27PM
Watch it Bob, you're getting close to be called a Pharisee~ you're quoting Scripture!
You are exactly right, of course. Lukewarm is the keyword.
Bible? What Bible? Oh no, you aren't supposed to stand on the Word of God anymore~ don't you know that anything goes now? Just create your own personal Jesus, even use his name in vain because in your mind you think you have a "deal" with him. I know someone who calls himself a Christian and actually says this.
The reason we have fallen so low is BECAUSE we have rejected His Word and created our own gospel.
Get accused of being a "Bible Idolator" for standing on His Words, a bigot, a hater, a Heretic, et al.
But as for me, I will serve the Lord, and hope to be counted among those worthy by the Lamb in the end for so doing.
God bless.
Conservative Bob| 6.29.11 @ 1:41PM
I expect to be called many things before all of this is over.
I believe a great tribulation is coming, and the relatively easy life Christians in this country have enjoyed will be exchanged for an extended persecution.
I pray for our nation.
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 1:56PM
We are witnessing a great apostacy and a great tribulation is indeed before us. Not in the pre-millenial sense but as you note through a growing persecution of "the church" by the secular power. When exposition of the Word is labled a hate crime it cannot be long.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:40PM
Amen, Al Adab & Conservative Bob.
Praise His Holy Name.
And when preaching the gospel is considered "bludgeoning" and "Pharasitical" or however you spell it, you know that what Jesus said in Mk. 13:12 & 13 is coming true:
"And brother will deliver up brother to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death; and you will be hated by all for My Name's sake. But he who endures to the end will be saved."
But!
"My Father, Who has given them to Me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's Hand." Jn. 10:29.
tadcf| 6.29.11 @ 10:46AM
I was watching the movie "Clash of the Titans" this weekend, and found quite amazing how the American belief in god resembles the ancient Greek beliefs--but the latter is considered a myth, and the former isn't.
Sam Vaughn| 6.29.11 @ 10:48AM
Nice article. I've been asked why I believe. My response is simply that I chose to believe. What's the alternative, I grew out of the muck and pass back to the muck, nothing I do on this earth matters, there are no consequences? No, without any proof whatsoever I choose to believe.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 10:57AM
"No, whithout any proof whatsoever I choose to believe."
I like this. So many times we are pressed for "proof" especially by Darwinian atheists. They fail to understand we aren't making a statement of fact that God Is. Just a statement of faith that needs to proof. And we, if honest, can admit it. That, I find, is the difference between the non-believer and the believer... intellecutal honesty about what one actually does beleive.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:29PM
Heh, there are Darwinian "Christians" too. They reject the very Word of God in place of a fraud's word.
God says He CREATED.
The fraud Darwin says we "evolved".
PJ| 6.29.11 @ 11:32AM
Please check this video out on Fr Robert Spitzer, a priest & physicist: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1cy3iCrxic.
Of course we believe but isn't it nice to have some rational, physical theories to back up our belief in God.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 12:20PM
It certainly is. But it's also nice comming to know the Truth after it is shown to you, but also only after you accept it by faith. It's like that scene in Indy Jones and the Last Crusade where he has to walk across the invisibel bridge. I really would like to know I'm about to walk across a bridge, but a step of faith that ends with a reassurance of truth after the fact is much more exciting! Nothing prohibits us from learning of the bridge's existence once we step out on faith. And once we experience it, we know rather than believe it to be true.
But that's hard to explain to the lost.
Kelly Staples| 6.29.11 @ 10:52AM
Darn all that 21st century reason and science.
Dr. X| 6.29.11 @ 10:53AM
As a lifelong Catholic and product of Catholic schools, I've lost a LOT of faith in the Church recently and basically have become a C&E guy. I had one priest go to prison of possession of kiddie porn, another who was obviously gay get booted for some previous act of "misconduct" and another who failed to show up for Mass one day, and showed up drunk at Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve before getting booted.
I agree fully with the Pope on just about every ethical issue, but the priests I've had are less intelligent than I am and behave worse than I do. Aside from that I could preach better sermons myself. I can count the number of GOOD sermons I've heard in a Catholic Church on one hand with a couple of fingers left over. It's always some inane gibberish like "God loves us. And we love God. And when we love God, God's love is expressed as a manifestation of his Grace and his holiness." I've NEVER heard a sermon as to why God disapproves of abortion or gay marriage.
And finally, aside from the Pope and the upper hierarchy, the church is, as Ann Counter once wrote, "the Democratic Party in robes." EVERY left-wing position -- partial birth abortion, gay marriage, gun control, illegal immigration -- is pushed by Catholic politicians and the Church nearly always gives them a pass. If you're a married U.S. Senator and an Irishman and you drive off a bridge drunk while you're going out to bang some young chickie and you kill her, and you spend the next 40 years in the Senate championing abortion, when you die you'll get a huge Catholic funeral concelebrated by seven priests lauding you as a man of "compassion."
That's why I've lost my faith. Screw the Church.
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 11:02AM
I would ask you to reconsider your choice to "Screw the Church."
Maybe the church... sure. The body of men that make up a group of worshipers. However, the Church... the universal Body and Bride of Christ... stands quite squarely against these things you've expressed disaproval of. It is unfortunate that man is God's tool to express His message. We are, after all, rather faulty. Therefore, it is imperative that we not discount the message because of the messanger. It doesn't matter how many priests abuse their parishoners, or how many politicians promote the things God is against, or how many pasters cheat on their wives... they are mere men, tainted by sin and struggling with temptation. They have no authority over what is the Truth, only over their choice to stick to it. If we look at self-proclaimed Christians as examples of Christ... we are doing ourselves, and Christ, a GREAT disservice.
Occam's Tool| 6.29.11 @ 12:04PM
Contemplate an evangelical church then, Dr. X. I'm Jewish, but the majority of my in-laws are Evangelical Protestants. They seem to like it.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:31PM
Good advice. Find a non-denominational one. One where the people actually love His Word so much, they carry their Bibles around with them.
They would be what Ken calls "Bible idolators".
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 12:30PM
The "Church" is already screwed.
simon templar| 6.29.11 @ 12:50PM
Consider this, X. As I understand your disappointment, disgust, and frustration, I would ask you is your "soul" and your love for the truth and your search for it in this life dependent on a church or a group of men? Must your identity be tied to an institution? If these man made institutions fail, must we abandon our cherished values and our own self determination to live righteous, sane, and moral life? The vision and dream of this Republic was begun by a few men who put their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor on the line for you and me. Many men have come after them seeking to destroy that vision, corrupt it, spit on it. Shall we loose our faith in this vision because of these men? Perhaps, it is time for you and I to stand up and take back what is good, defend it, and lead others back to what is what all about in the first place. Faith is a useful and great thing. But what really is it? Faith in an institution? Faith in certain men? Faith in a dogma or religious traditions that no one remembers why these traditions were established? I think it is faith...faith in an idea, a vision, a fundamental universal and timeless truth that we must fight for, forever...that is the true faith that we must have. Expect corruption, expect failure, expect subterfuge, expect resistance. It is a war out there. Truth is on the wanted dead or alive list. Do not let them push you to loose your faith and abandon who You really are and what You cherish and believe. Yes, screw them, but keep YOUR faith, my brother.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 1:11PM
oooo, well said, brother!
This here "Bible Idolator" knows that the Word of God says that "church" simply means assembling together.. that is all it means. It is NOT a building, but the actual gathering of believers in His Name.
If only we Christians would get into what His Word actually says.. so much of the phony Religious stuff, which He hates anyway~ would be cast aside in favor of a real actual relationship with Him, seeking His will, and great fellowship and prayer with others of like mind.
For example, look what Jesus says here:
"Jesus answered and said to them, This
is the work of God, that you believe into
Him whom that One sent." Jn. 6:29.
See what He says? Look how easy it is to believe in what He actually says! If believing into Him is the work of God~ and not having to "perform" and sit, kneel, stand, do "pennance" (unscriptural)~ say 5 Hail Mary's for your sins, (unscriptural)~ or any other garbage that phony Religion teaches you~
How much more inviting is it to actually know what God actual thinks?
His Words tell us what He really wants, and His Words are in the Bible.
Become a "Bible Idolator" like me~ "Taste and see that the Lord is good."
"O taste and see that the LORD is good! Happy is the man who takes refuge in him!" Ps. 34:8.
SF_Exile| 6.29.11 @ 1:06PM
Like YeloStalyn, I urge to reconsider. I agree with you - the examples you cite and the unnamed individuals to whom you allude make it difficult to stay focused. Sometimes the hardest thing to do is to remain faithful in the face of such ugly and blatant faithlessness in Her servants. But please don't let your disillusionment and anger separate you from Christ. Lay it at the foot of the cross - bind that pain to His.
I dropped out of attending Mass and being observant for a while in my twenties for just these reasons. It took a lot of prayer and thinking to work these things through. I started attending the Latin Mass when I could. Many scoff at the 'smells and bells' aspect of the older Liturgy, but I felt it put the emphasis back where it belonged for me. I would not presume to say this is what you need, merely that there's a path for you that works.
PS: Fr. Z had lots to say regarding the funeral of that individual. If you haven't heard of him, check out his blog... http://wdtprs.com/blog/
Dr. X| 6.29.11 @ 1:51PM
Don't get me wrong. I have plenty of faith in Jesus. I'm just sick of the Catholic B.S. Take transubstantiation, for instance. And I supposed to believe that when the pedophile priest pulls his hands out of the altar boy's pants in the sacristy and goes out and blesses the Holy Wafer that God Almighty, Creator of the Universe, ACTUALLY turns it into the ACTUAL "body and blood of Christ" and I'm supposed to EAT it? What does that make me -- a cannibal and a vampire?
Thinking this way is somewhat difficult for me because I am aware of and appreciative of all the good things the Church has done, and how it has propagated Christianity for 2,000 years. Unfortunately it has done so often by lies, stupidity, inanity, and the creation of an immense clique -- the flock -- and let me tell you from personal experience sheep are VERY stupid.
I certainly don't think that the Left or the Marxists, who have as much or more blind faith as any religion, have the answer. But I think that the real message of fallen human nature --Jesus getting railroaded, tortured for sport, and executed -- has been pretty much lost by organized religions that are much more interested in social and political organization. Machiavelli had it right when he criticized the Medieval pope (Innocent or Urban? I can't remember) who named his 18-year old bastard son a cardinal.
PJ| 6.29.11 @ 3:36PM
Dr X,
Transubstantiation occurs through a validly ordained priest because even God can work miracles through sinners. (IMO when a priest sins, the sin tends to be extra horrible compared to when a lay person commits the same sin.)
A similar conundrum occurred during the Roman empire. Christians were sometimes allowed to practice the faith only if they paid homage to the Roman gods. Of course if they didn't, they would be executed. Many choose to be totally faithful to Jesus & died. Many others including the clergy, paid homage & lived. (Let's be honest, how many normal joes would die for their faith if the only thing they had to do was offer a sacrifice once to a god?) When the persecutions temporarily abated, there was a fierce discussion within the Christian community on whether these cowardly priests can preside over a mass after receiving the sacrament of Penance or did they excommunicate themselves when they paid homage to the gods? After many years & a declaration by 1 of the councils, it was decided that these priests & the laity did not leave the Church but needed to receive the Sacrament of Penance to be in full communion.
I have known persons who were abused by priests & sisters. I have known about the priestly abuse since I was a young teenager in the 1970s. I am a perfect candidate to leave the Catholic Church. Yet, thank goodness for my mother, who told me our beliefs are not based on a priest's sinful actions. That goes for other religions too.---------practice a religion based on the beliefs not on the personality of the minister, rabbi, or iman who states them.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 7:23PM
"Transubstantiation". Another truly wacky and unbiblical doctrine and practice of Catholicism:
CATHOLIC TRADITION - The mass. Through transubstantiation, the wafer/host and the wine supposedly become the actual blood and body of Jesus Christ when the priest prays over them.
WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS - Jesus died once for sins, never to be repeated. He sits on the right hand of God and does not reappear in the mass as a mass of blood and flesh.
Hebrews
10:12
But this man [Jesus], after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God;
10:13 From henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool.
10:14 For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified.
10:15 Whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us: for after that he had said before,
10:16 This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them;
10:17 And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more.
10:18 Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin.
John
19:30 When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost.
1 Corinthians
11:24
And when he [Jesus] had given thanks, he brake it [bread], and said, Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of me.11:25 After the same manner also he took the cup, when he had supped, saying, This cup is the new testament in my blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me.
11:26 For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do shew the Lord's death till he come (not for the forgiveness of sins or to receive Jesus).
http://www.thebereans.net/foru.....hp?t=34036
PJ| 6.29.11 @ 10:04PM
Oh Margie, Margie, Margie,(sigh!!)
You need to read John 6 in the context that the Jews took His word literally not symbolically when He was talking about His body & blood being life-giving food. See John 6: 60-62.
Marge, what are you out to prove? That you can quote scripture. --- Even the devil is competent at quoting scripture. See Matthew 4.
Remember Margie, I am always praying for you. I hope you do the same for me.
Margie| 6.30.11 @ 12:59PM
PJ,
Jesus said, "Do this in remembrance of Me." 1 Cor. 11:24.
I love God, and I love His Holy Word. I am here to say that Jesus said to do the breaking of the bread in remembrance of Him, like He said.
I am a Christian and will stand on His Word till the day I die, no matter what any modern day Papal Inquisitor tries to do to me.
It is blasphemy to say that His Body is re sacrificed again somehow, and that you are actually committing cannibalism when taking the Lord's supper.
Nick| 7.2.11 @ 8:19PM
Margie,
The Catholic Church doesn't teach that "His Body is re sacrificed [sic]". The Church teaches the perpetual sacrifice of Christ made present in the Holy Mass.
The sacrifice of Christ on the Cross is re-presented, i.e., made present again, at every Mass. Christ's sacrifice is perpetual.
Pope John Paul II explains this far better than I ever could:
http://www.vatican.va/holy_fat.....ia_en.html
I write this not to try to change your mind. Only to show you what the Church actually teaches about the Eucharist.
God Bless!
Margie| 7.5.11 @ 3:32PM
"The Catholic Church doesn't teach that "His Body is re sacrificed [sic]". The Church teaches the perpetual sacrifice of Christ made present in the Holy Mass."
What psychological babble!
So, you're doing it, but your not doing it?
You're not re sacrificing, but your "perpetually sacrificing?"
It's a disgrace and utterly against the Word of God, and furthermore to actually believe you are committing cannibalism while so doing~ and you do not even see how insane that is?
And I am here to quote God's own Word against the Whore of Babylon:
"For Christ has entered, not into a sanctuary made with hands, a copy of the true one, but into Heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf.
Nor was it to offer Himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the Holy Place yearly with blood not his own; for then He would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, He has appeared once for all at the end of the age to put away Sin by the sacrifice of Himself.
And just as it is appointed for men to die once, and after that comes Judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for Him.". Heb. 9:24-28.
Atheist| 6.29.11 @ 4:36PM
Dr.X sounds exactly like Dr. Right and Nurse Margie. The Church is much better without you. It is called addition by subtraction. Hurry with some biblical quotes.
David T| 6.29.11 @ 1:36PM
Dr. X--The Catholic Church of the 60's and 70's ordained too many liberal (and homosexual) priests. John Paul II and now Benedict XVI put rigor back into the priestly selection and formation process. Most young (under 40) priests today are smart, disciplined, and well grounded in the faith. I urge you to return to Mother Church and be reconciled.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:43PM
"I urge you to return to Mother Church and be reconciled."
No, be reconciled to Christ:
"So we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We beseech you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God." 2 Cor. 5:20.
Petronius| 6.29.11 @ 12:33PM
Churches have regard only for those who make places for themselves in it. Catholicism today is a loose conglomerate of mobs, ranging from hard core leftist universities to polished marble toney suburban country clubs decorated with crosses and statuary. I've seen the lot. And which ever type of community you attend, the 1st commandment is, go along with the crowd. Diversity is a misnomer everywhere, but say just one thing that ruffles the feathers of the parish king pin or queen bee and you are toast. The Gospels are just another book. All parishes really revolve around the sub rosa unwritten laws and diktat of their councils and clergy. In parochial school, the first thing one learns is get with the program and fit into the group template. My life had no value because I was no good at team sports, I'm also a hopeless romantic. For that I was branded a homo. The nuns and teachers punished me for no reason. I found out much later that they abused me trying to force my father to convert and join the church. When he volunteered to become scout master, he was told, "you're not one of us." I should have never looked back after leaving the first time. It's all that really matters. Are you one of THEM? As to my eternal destiny, see my second post on this thread.
simon templar| 6.29.11 @ 1:06PM
That was an amazing accurate description of your experience with many churches today. I have no doubt that it is true and truly am sorry that you experienced this. I must tell you that your comments are testimony and proof a man who is sincerely seeking the truth and has the ability to recognize evil and untruth. It is a rare trait, you are blessed. Please recognize this in yourself and claim it. Do not let these people make you bitter or distract you on your journey to find truth and live a moral life. Do not allow them to force you to abandon your faith and cherished values.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 1:19PM
Petronious,
I always read your posts because they are usually dead honest. I like that.
"The Gospels are just another book."
And therein lies the problem with Religious organizations.
But! Petronious, love the Word of God yourself. Return not to an organization that says this or that, but return to Him who loves you and died for you. He hasn't changed, He's still faithful.
For this, I know.
God bless you.
P.S.
Being the "Bible Idolator" that I am, I just couldn't leave you without giving you a verse from the Bible, from Jesus Himself:
To Petronious from Jesus:
"Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls." Mt. 11:29.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 1:21PM
apologies for misspelling your name, and not catching it, dear Petronius.
Petronius| 6.29.11 @ 9:01PM
Thank you both for responding. Know also that what attachment I maintain with the Almighty is due to erstwhile relations with wise and even Holy people who have preceded us. I respect and still hold dear my friendships with a few priests who did not perceive their offices as license to exercise power. They were contemplatives, altruistic to a fault, and living treasures next to all the human debris. In each of them as well as a hand full of true Saints I've known, there is something they possessed that embodied Christ Himself. I cannot define it in identifiable terms. But when you cross the path of such a person you will know and possibly react physically. The thing I have in common with them is that the church has slight or no regard for them either.
And the real issue getting put through the ringer here are the attempts of political factions to project their earthly desires as God's will. They can keep trying to harness state power as their Deus ex machina until the Second Coming with only bad results because they all have it backwards.
Your next assignment is to reread Cold Iron. And for those who thirst for more, read Heavenly Discourse by Charles Erskine Scott Wood; Vanguard Press, 1920.
Margie| 6.30.11 @ 12:53PM
Thanks for the book suggestions, I love reading and will look for them at the library. I've a couple of hundred books and so I've begun going there instead of buying more.
"May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope." Rom. 15:13.
Sandra| 6.29.11 @ 12:38PM
Matthew 7:15-20
15 “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.
16 By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?
17 Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.
18 A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit.
19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.
20 Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them."
Bill S| 6.29.11 @ 1:58PM
Catholics aren't even Christians. We're saved by faith alone not by infant baptism and obedience to church rules. Most people won't be saved. The Bible warned us what people would be like in the last days.
(2 Tim 3:1-5 NIV) But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. {2} People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, {3} without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, {4} treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God-- {5} having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with them.
Dave Williams| 6.29.11 @ 2:26PM
The reason for the decline in religion is obvious: the rise of science. Religion provides a false map of the world, and science provides a true on. To take just one example: if you are a true and believing christian, you MUST believe that the bible is divinely inspired, and that every word of it is true -- none of this cherry-picking nonsense. OK, the bible tells us 1) that the sun goes around the earth, and 2) Joshua was able to make the sun stand still. Modern astronomy tells us, rightly, that both of these ideas are HOGWASH. To take another example: following Bishop Usher's chronology, the earth must have been created in 4004 BC. Again, using PROVEN methods, science tells us that the actual age is several orders of magnitude larger.
Is science fallible? Of course it is. But unlike religion, it is perpetually self-correcting, because it is based on intellectual integrity. A scientist proposes a theory, which is then challenged and tested by other scientists. Result: the theory stands, falls, or stands with some amendment(s). Religion, on the other hand, is based on mere FEELING. I "feel" that there is some supernatural being watching over my life, who will, at my death, send my soul to either eternal bliss or torment. Well, feelings ain't facts...how many people have "felt," with total and utter certainty, that their horse would win the Kentucky Derby?
Now, as to religious ethics: that's a different story entirely. Speaking as a rock-ribbed atheist, I find the golden rule to be an absolutely wonderful ideal, one to which all humanity should aspire. Same thing for the non-Yahweh-centered ten commandments. And I suspect any thinking, moral person would be perfectly happy leading his or her life by these guidelines...but as for the metaphysical garbage that seems always, needlessly, to accompany it...no thanks.
And it doesn't even bother me so much that other people are perfectly happy to believe things that are manifestly untrue. What I object to is their forcing their beliefs upon me. On our money is written "In God we trust." Well, no. I trust in human intellect and dignity, not something that DOESN'T EXIST. And when I say the Pledge of Allegiance, which I do with all the fervent belief of any bible-thumper, I always omit the "under God" part...which, by the way, was good enough for Americans until the busybody christians in 1956 decided it wasn't.
So, let the decline in religion continue: only good can come of it.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 2:40PM
The ardent followers don't see the similarities to the terrorists, but that is were they get their 'inspiration'.
To do bad things you just need to be human, to do ATROCITIES having god inspiration helps tremendously.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:45PM
You are mistaking zeal for the Lord with Sin.
Christians are motivated by God's Holy Spirit.
Murderous terrorists are motivated by Sin.
Try and perceive the diff., KOTN.
simon templar| 6.29.11 @ 4:39PM
Unless your a socialist, then you rely on the will of the people and the vanguard of the revolution to commit your atrocities. Since you have no God, you have no restraint, no fixed morality, thus fire up the camps, the gulags, the ovens, it purgin time by the millions. You know, you are really so full shit I can smell you over the net.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 6:09PM
Yup, the jails are ALL filled with Atheists!
Truth to Power| 6.29.11 @ 7:42PM
A lot of nerve pussofthenet. Secular governments killed over a hundred million people last century. You have to go back to the Muslim conquest of India before you even get close and that was over a longer period of time. Maybe you meant, To do bad things you just need to be human, to do ATROCITIES having no god as an inspiration helps tremendously. You need to wake every once in a while and look around, maybe read a book or something.
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 3:04PM
Hey Dave The Scientist; If there is no God it follows that all of the matter we see spontaneously sprang fourth from a void of nothingness. I'm not positive but I think it was either Physics 101 or Chemistry 101, or both, may beg to differ with the concept of matter generating itself from nothing. I'm just sayin.....
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 6:11PM
What 'generated' your God? or is it 'cool' to suspend Physics and Chemistry for it?
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 6:32PM
That's backwards. He generated Physics and Chemistry. To understand the nature of physical reality- quantum mechanics, string theory, M-branes, etc. - is to grasp the nature of God.
PJ| 6.29.11 @ 4:03PM
Dave Williams,
You must have had some very bad experiences with religious persons &/or clergy. I write this with kindness.
Good religion does not contradict good science but actually embraces it. I urge you read about doctors such as Fr Robert Spitzer, a physicist, & Dr Francis Collins, a biologist, who are able to seamlessly mesh their Christian beliefs with their scientific backgrounds. (I'm sure there are Jewish & Muslim scientists who can also do the same thing w/their faith.) I also urge you to read about European scientific history & learn how men of religion made major contributions to the scientific & social disciplines.
Please understand that legitimate religions are not about feelings but are about faith & reason.
I write this post not to convince you about God's existence but hopefully to help you understand that there are rational people just like yourself who just happen to believe in a superior being. --> And they wish you, a very small minority in this world, no harm.
simon templar| 6.29.11 @ 4:22PM
What you need to do is become more tolerant of others beliefs and respect the first ammendment...besides pick up a few books on western civilization and history. Religion is not declining in the world but growing both in China and Africa, for example, at rapid rates. Religion is not declining due to science either....there is no correlation other than one you just made up to suit your lambasting. As for someone forcing anything on you..utter ridiculous fantasy..you live in the freest nation on earth....largely due to christian-judeo values..the values of our founding fathers. It is precisely those societies that have moved toward atheism that have created the most evil and atrocities of the twentieth century. You need to ask yourself why you trust in human dignity..just where does that logically come from?
DaveD| 6.29.11 @ 6:21PM
"...if you are a true and believing christian, you MUST believe that the bible is divinely inspired, and that every word of it is true -- none of this cherry-picking nonsense."
Sez you, but don't try to tell me what I MUST believe, as I don't try to tell you what you MUST believe. What you SHOULD believe is another story, but you are free to believe or disbelieve as you see fit.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 2:31PM
We might not all be Atheists, but we are most certainly ALL 'Godless'.... KOTN
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:49PM
We are all most certainly "Godless."
That's why we need a Saviour. His Name is Christ, the Lord.
"since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, they are justified by his Grace as a gift, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus.." Rom. 3:23 & 24.
Interested?
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 3:36PM
I would be more impressed if you quoted something with a little more 'gravitas'. Like a Fortune Cookie...
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 4:42PM
Confucius say:
"Everything has its beauty but not everyone sees it."
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 5:36PM
Perhaps our friend KOTN would prefer the Koran sura 109, "Say to the unbelievers, I do not worship that which ye worship" .
How's that for gravitas?
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 2:44PM
Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
The Force shall free me.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 2:49PM
Which "Force"??
There are 2.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 2:55PM
Margie, the 'Force' STRONG in you, here is the full version for you to chant...
There is no peace, there is anger
There is no fear, there is power
There is no death, there is immortality
There is no weakness, there is the Dark Side.
I am the heart of darkness
I know no fear
But rather I instil it in my enemies
I am the destroyer of worlds
I know the power of the Dark Side
I am the fire of hate.
All the universe bows before me
I pledge myself to the darkness
For I have found true life
In the death of the light.
Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
The Force shall free me.
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 3:07PM
Hey Kingofthenuts, I think I saw you last October. You were my 43 year old neighbor running around in the Darth Vader suit at the Holloween Party, correct?
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 2:57PM
One too many Star Wars movies.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 3:04PM
Is that what that's from? I'm one of those rare birds that never took an interest.
KOTN: sounds like Satanism, to me.
Steve A| 6.29.11 @ 3:10PM
Margie, You are correct. Kingofthenuts is Rosemary's baby. Ohhhhhhhhh, we should be so scared.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 3:22PM
Well I like 'Rosemary Chicken' does that count?
Seriously thou, to the faithful, ask yourself HONESTLY this question. Why am I faithful to my religion? Is it because I have looked at all the worlds religions and picked the one that most shares my values or is it because it's the one you were taught as an impressionable child? You KNOW the answer.
simon templar| 6.29.11 @ 4:01PM
You could do the same with your political philosopy. Ask yourelf, am I a communist social progressive because I am mentally ill or because I am a criminal? Is it because of some deep rooted problem stemming from my childhood rebellion against my parents? Something to ponder....
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 4:15PM
I guess I don't have enough money to be that 'selfish' to the poor.If i hit the lottery I will become a 'get your hand's off mines' Rethug.
simon templar| 6.29.11 @ 4:29PM
Is that all you got? Still peddling the class warfare nonsense? Most rethugs, jackass, are actually not rich but rather working class and middleclass. If you actually picked up a book on political demographics other than your communist manifesto, you might know that. You do not give a crap about the poor. The only thing liberalism and socialism ever did for the poor is make more of them. We have a whole century of proof of that both here and abroad.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 4:45PM
Hey, did you hear what Rush said recently? Socialism is theft, and Obama is a burglar.
Of course, he;s "doing it (stealing your money) for the greater good of "society".
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 4:58PM
For the government "To take from one person, group or class and give to another person group or class, is theft."
John W. Davis
Democrat candidate for President 1924
Kind of makes you wonder what happened doesn't it?
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 4:51PM
KOTN,
I'm not into Religion. I'm into God and His only begotten Son who died in my place for my sins.
You can't beat that with ANYTHING no matter how hard you try with all your nonsense.
You need to get serious, KOTN. REAL serious. The short little life you are living will be ending sooner than you think.
Same goes for me, and all of us.
You know, Eternity is forever. God's warnings are out of love. PURE love. You do not want to thumb your nose at Him... no one can, and live for Eternity in Heaven.
"He who believes in the Son has eternal life; he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God rests upon him." Jn. 3:36.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 4:59PM
Margie, the ONLY way I could be a 'believer' is if I also became a pathological lair and hypocrite.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 7:32PM
Wrong. It would take you getting really honest. You're not even giving Him a chance~ you're trashing His Name, mocking Him and allowing yourself to say things that aren't true about Him.
God calls Mankind to reason:
""Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.
If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land; But if you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured by the sword; for the mouth of the LORD has spoken." Is. 1:18-20.
You need to do what God says:
"The beginning of Wisdom is this: Get Wisdom, and whatever you get, get insight." Prov. 4:7.
What say you?
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 3:25PM
Cannot we rather sum up this conversation with, "Why do the heathen rage?"
JimW9| 6.29.11 @ 3:42PM
Secular Conservatism
Great article, Mr. Bethell. I would hope you would consider another view in the pantheon of religious understanding: Secular Conservatives, a group of which I am one.
I hold no animus toward religious believers - I once spent a year of my young life in a Catholic seminary - and I defend the social value of religion in society (although not as reflected in violent, repressive Muslim circles).
The basic principle that guides my belief in anything is best stated as: I accept no idea or belief as real unless verified in the natural world.
This philosophy is simple and serves me well. For all those who believe that a divine presence is both the cause of all existence and is present to our daily lives I hold no beef or grudge - I just don't agree with that belief since it violates my core principle of beliefs.
As far as "non-judgmental liberalism" I am in pretty fair agreement with your basic statement that an "anything goes" society is probably heading for failure. Rules are critical to social cohesion and I would agree with you that the refusal to hold people responsible for their behavior is tearing away at the very fabric of society.
As far as an afterlife I am agnostic. I have no more idea than a jackrabbit what, if anything, will happen to me after I die. If there exists a vengeful God that condemns me to the everlasting fires of hell - so be it. That notion does not frighten me - and I am sixty years old - rather I find it unbelievable that I would be punished for living life with as much integrity as I can. I don't mean by that statement that believers are lacking integrity, but rather that my foundational principles of belief are based in natural world verification and I would be acting without integrity to accept a belief that violates these principles.
I also recognize that my principles are only that and do not apply to others who share different foundational principles of belief.
I do not wish that I had religious faith for I have examined the basis of religious belief and rejected it from the principle mentioned above.
I also separate religion into what I see as its two basic components: ethics and cosmology. The non-theistic, social Christian principles of how to lead a good life, respecting and hopefully loving my fellow humans, I find to be brilliant, wise codes of behavior. I simply part company on the cosmological side of Christianity that explains why we and the universe exist.
Again, great article and please write again soon.
DaveD| 6.29.11 @ 6:06PM
Interestingly, it is a much an article of faith that nothing exists that cannot be seen, heard, tasted, smelled or touched, as it is that there is also a spiritual world that is unseen, unheard, untasted, unsmelled and untouched along side the physical world. Both positions are faith based, and fait6h based to the same extent. You can prove neither.
Margie| 6.30.11 @ 6:46PM
Heh, they put their faith in always proven Darwinian fallacies.
They'd rather come off as intellectuals then admit the truth.
That God created. Darwin says we "evolved".
The evidence of God is all around us, yet they choose to believe a fantasy.. of some rebel against God.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 3:46PM
Do you REALLY want to exist forever?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6nQSe4scww
simon templar| 6.29.11 @ 3:57PM
In your case...No.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 4:03PM
The FULL video, it also talks about 'EVILUTION'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....re=related
Naturalborn Texican| 6.29.11 @ 3:59PM
When Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God returns to catch up His own and carry them to Heaven, there will be no turning back, no second chance for those who reject Him.
Remember, Satan was once an angel. And when he choose to reject God and the Son, he took a third of the angels with him. Today, the devil wanders the earth, walking to and fro looking for those who will listen to his deceptive lies and follow him.
Do not be deceived. The reckoning IS coming......it doesn't matter if you believe in the 2nd coming or not - it IS COMING!
And Jesus is the ONLY way to get out of this life, ALIVE!!!
Jesus IS!!!
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 4:13PM
Need's moar EXCLAMATION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Pat| 6.29.11 @ 4:24PM
Interesting that Richard Dawkins tends to fascinate so many writers within the professional scribbler ranks. As a zoologist, no one had ever heard of Dr. Dawkins, including the lab coat wearer at the adjacent microscope. His acknowledged contribution to the advancement of science can be charitably described as miniscule – and, as an “accomplished scientist” turned social commentator, the media never bothered to find out what he had actually “accomplished” before his present incarnation as Liberal Atheist Icon. His persistent claim that life is meaningless is correct regarding his life, why won’t the media take him at his word? Only volunteers manning the Suicide Hotline and Dawkins’ bankers have specific reasons to find substantive meaning in what Dawkins is peddling, yet his name pops up time and time again - somehow the media, Liberal and Conservative alike, think his present 5 minutes of fame must indicate something very profound relative to present day society – they’re not sure what this profound new thing is, but they’re all positive it must indicate something.
What does it actually mean? It simply means Dawkins is in the Big Question business for financial profit and a little fun – and with his grim philosophy, he needs more fun than most. Plus, Dawkins saw the distinct financial advantage in simultaneously exploiting two of our most important Big Questions: “Where did we come from?” – a single cell living in the primeval slime is his answer and “What happens after we die?” – straight back to that primeval slime according to Richard.
After 5,000 years of serious intellectual investigation into the meaning of life and humankinds’ relation to God, Dawkins’ puerile revelations are the Geico commercials of religious philosophy, a tedious pause in the main event featuring a cute gecko doing cute antics with a fake English accent in order to sell car insurance. Mildly amusing sure but, in the end, just another car insurance commercial – so what is it the media professionals finds so profound about Dawkins? Perhaps simply those same profound philosophical concepts they find in car insurance commercials, only his English accent isn’t fake and the cute antics are solely intended to sell Richard Dawkins.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 4:57PM
Wait you are SERIOUSLY complaining that Dawkins sells books for profit, but not a WHISPER about a church that want's 10% of your gross income?
Pat| 6.29.11 @ 5:10PM
What's with capitalizing SERIOUSLY and WHISPER? You do know you can't actually shout on the interet? As a child, you were anally probed by aliens, right?
YeloStalyn| 6.29.11 @ 5:41PM
How many food kitches does he fill with his money? Or clothes provided to the poor? Or medicine to the sick? Shelter to the homless? The answer better be zero. If life is meaningless... he has no compelling reason to give any of it away. As such... teh 10% I give is to do just these things because life is NOT meaningless.
Kingofthenet| 6.29.11 @ 6:06PM
Your idea of the word 'Meaningless' is different from mine. To me something is Meaningless if it doesn't have a purpose. Making me feel good IS a purpose (Same reason why I drink) To you 'Meaningless' requires some divine plan, and immortality. I build a house to live in, I don't expect it will last forever, nor do I care.
BTW: The lifestyles of most of those TV evangelists is hardly modest, no way am I buying some guy a mansion and Rolls Royce.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 7:36PM
Hey KOTN,
I'm not a Catholic. I'm not into Televangelists. I'm into God and His Son, Jesus Christ.
Forget Religion.
God is calling you to know Him.
Do you want to know Him?
YeloStalyn| 6.30.11 @ 11:20AM
I wasn't speaking about the worth you put on life, but Dawkins. He said it's meaningless, hence, he should horde it all for his own pleasure as there is no real benifit to him, thus no evolutionary cause, to give it away. To do otherwise would be to act counter to the very forces of nature that he claims dictates every other living creature on earth (which, according to him, we ought to be bound to as well since we are nothing more than just another variation on our universal shared ancestors).
As for TV guys... no one mentioned them. I'm talking about the people who gave up their nice jobs and live in huts in the middle of the 3rd world helping the poor and sick. The people who's only income comes from churches... who get that money from peoplel like me. You know... the dumb ones.
Michael L. Hauschild| 6.29.11 @ 5:06PM
http://search.yahoo.com/search.....w-corr-top
Mike| 6.29.11 @ 5:30PM
Good news. John Galt, were he real, goes to heaven.
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 5:44PM
Nope, John Galt is atheist. One of the failings of Objectivism as it attempts to create a secular morality. The closest anyone ever came was with the Stoics.
Mike| 6.29.11 @ 5:47PM
No virgins for John?
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 6:06PM
Mike: in re John,
Inchallah
Mike | 6.29.11 @ 5:45PM
Consider reincarnation. Palin is P.T. Barnum reincarnated. The time is ripe - the suckers are in abundance.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 7:39PM
Nope. The suckers are the atheists and unbelievers. Palin's fine.
Obama on the other hand is leading the country like the Ringmaster he truly is~ and they're all buying it.
Ready for Socialism phase II?
Mike| 6.29.11 @ 8:13PM
Thank you for proving my point.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 8:15PM
Aww, really?
victor| 6.29.11 @ 9:56PM
Mike:
"(Obama) is P.T. Barnum reincarnated. The time is ripe - the suckers are in abundance."
Yes, they were and still are. Is that why you are going to vote for him?
Mike| 6.29.11 @ 10:24PM
Victor,
C'mon, moron. Make up your own material.
victor| 6.30.11 @ 1:55AM
Answer the question:
Is that why you are going to vote for him?
Russ Neal | 6.29.11 @ 6:19PM
The new atheists seem a curious mixture of modernism and post-modernism. All of their arguments are re-hashed rationalist ones from the 19th century, while their attitude is combative "language as a weopan to destroy our enemies" stuff that characterizes the post-modern mind. I think they are mostly post-modern "will to power" types, believing they can create a reality with their polemics since there is no pre-existing reality to oppose their efforts. They just use the old rationalist chestnuts because they are handy and good enough for their purposes.
Ken (Old Texican)| 6.29.11 @ 7:30PM
I wrote Margie privately.
She has chosen to twist my words in a public forum.
She has no honor.
Evidently she hates herself.
I pray she can repent and forgive herself.
She creates stumbling blocks to those among us who have not met Jesus yet.
Those of you who have NOT met Jesus yet, please forgive her.
The poor ignorant woman cannot find it in her to cease throwing the first stone at someone who fails to enter the kingdom through HER narrow gate.
Fortunately, Jesus Christ is more forgiving than Margie has projected here.
Instead of using scripture to grasp the fact "for God so loved the world..." .....Margie chooses to mix Old Testament and New Testament understandings to use as a cudgel to anyone who dares to cross her.
I am a happy Christian, saved by Grace. One day in heaven I'm going to get a belly laugh at Margie being pithed off at many of us being there.
...In the mean time, I'm reading the "words in red"....and stumbling along in His footsteps....and enjoying His fellowship.
Bless her heart, Margie is in the darkness of despair.
Her own life is a mess...and I gave her a whole new career...no charge. She has turned on me like a rabid dog....in public.
She has turned my "agape" love into hatred and spite.
Please use your scoll button henceforth.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 7:43PM
Way to slander, Old Tex.
You're a slandering liar. I am not rabid, as you say~ like your pal, Clint/Tim*.
I stand on God's Holy Words~ ALL of them, unlike you.
You do know what God says He will do with those who bear false witness, don't you?
You wrote to me in private. Now you lie. I will post your e mail for all to see:
Hi Margie
"...suffer the little ones to come unto me..."
Please quit being a Pharisee, building walls against the "unborn-agains".
Thank you.
We are not to be prosecutors, but rather witnesses, and extenders of Grace.
Think I'm wrong?
Then define what "suffer" means in the scripture quoted above. (The King james Translators did the best they could, but they are NOT the final word.)
Behave,
or I am going to have to "out" you, publicly as a mere "pharisee". It is my duty to the Grace of Jesus Christ.
You might want to review Jesus' rebuke to the Pharisees...using scripture as a club rather than an instrument of Grace.
Please do not go there anymore. Please!
Souls are at stake, and I can no longer allow you to use King James translators as your source of Phariseeism without responding .............ruthlessly.
There are "sinners" out there in the hedgerows that Jesus came to save. The "scriptures" cannot save you....................or them, but only the grace of God.
I have been very patient with you.
Your hiding behind the "scriptures" is no longer acceptable. Either be a loving, pitying Christian.....or be carefully defined...by me... as a self righteous Pharisee."
Your disgusting accusations will not run me off of this website.
You're a liar.
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 7:58PM
Ken, Margie:
The right or wrong of it does not bother me as much as witnessing a brother and sister at odds. Both of you are, as you know, dear to me and I value your posts and thoughts. My heart is heavy with you at odds.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 8:28PM
Ken doesn't want me witnessing, or apparently quoting from the Old Testament. He doesn't like that I stand FULLY on the Word of God and wants me to shut up.
Like a good Catholic, he cannot stand me obliterating false Catholic doctrine, that's for one thing.
The typical Liberal Christian who wants to "keep the peace", and let everybody die in their darkness.
Typical Liberal Christian that accuses Bible believing Christians of being "Pharisees" for preaching the gospel.
Yet it's ok for him and his ilk to openly say what THEY believe~ but they believe it ought to go unchallenged.
No one is to dare speak truth to the lies of Catholicism~ or speak in Scripture (what God commands us to do) to the unsaved.
I mean, just look how AWFUL I was here, right?
Ken (Old Texican)| 6.29.11 @ 8:02PM
YEP!!!
That iswhat I wrote!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Now you got a problem. Throw the first stones like a Pharisee ... or say " Father forgive them."
As I have said before...(in private),
NAW... I will leave that all in private...unless you provoke me further.
Souls are at stake, knothead!
Behave!
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 8:06PM
ken,
I do not get why you are doing this... but you can throw your weight around here all you want.. and get others to clack with you.. as you know full well they will be more than happy to.
Your disgusting threatening only puts you in a real bad place, not me.
If you want to post our personal e mails in public~ go ahead~ and God will deal with you. You will only prove what kind of man you are.
Ken (Old Texican)| 6.29.11 @ 8:20PM
Hey dumbunny!!!!!!!!!!!!!
YOU posted the private discussion!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 8:29PM
And you know why. So now everyone has seen your accusations and threats to me.
you want me to shut up.
OK~ maybe I will.
It's been swell. Thanks.
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 8:41PM
Ken's last e mail to me accusing me of HATE:
"Fortunately, you dear sister are not in charge!!!!!!!!
Jesus Christ is in charge.
...PS: you are toast on American Spectator. Your hate will be peeled like an onion.
You will no longer spew hate in the name of Jesus...because of me.
There is nothing you could write that I cannot overcome with truth. Every scripture you can quote I can counteract with LOVE...(agape love).
So just go for it and blush...or get your "agape" together.
It might be fun on my end. I am speaking for "agape")".
Yes, Ken, Jesus Christ is in charge. He sees what you are doing.. to me.
Kingofthenet| 6.30.11 @ 12:01AM
This proves my point, ONE of you is right and ONE of you is going to Hell, I have NO idea which ONE is which. What if i pick the wrong religion and it angers God?
Kingofthenet| 6.30.11 @ 12:06AM
It's like that Indiana Jones movie, where they have to pick the Holy Grail, 'choose wisely' or it could be a Farce like Monty Python's version...
Kingofthenet| 6.30.11 @ 12:09AM
This 'Agape Love' sounds interesting, is it some sorta sex thing?
Margie| 6.30.11 @ 5:19PM
What a joke you are, Ken.
What I post is the WORD OF GOD ALMIGHTY.
YOUR truth holds absolutely NO water.
HIS TRUTH REIGNS, bud.
Rich D| 6.30.11 @ 5:33PM
With you encouragement, I made several posts on the Methodist article. Have you read them?
http://spectator.org/archives/.....r-methodis
Margie| 6.30.11 @ 6:42PM
Rich D.,
It's great to know there is at least one or two other real Christians who care to take on the Despicable human being named Clint/Tim*. But I must say, your posts will not matter here. If you keep it up you will be hounded to leave here and cast out by the modern Papal Inquisitors. They will accuse you of HATE and that you need to repent, for you DARE to speak in Scriptures to the lies that they present.
I read your EXCELLENT posts, yes.
Keep up the GREAT work!
God bless!
W| 6.30.11 @ 8:37PM
This is the agent for the Papal Inquistion. We have you under surveillance, Margie. After reading your posts,( if you read one you have read them all), we have concluded that: You are the only true christian in the world. Your reading of the bible is the only correct reading. We are glad you left the Catholic Church to start your own church of which you are the Ayatollah. You are correct and the rest of the world is wrong. You can keep posting, we will not mess with your computer. You are the best example we can find of a close-minded bigot, unable to reason or discuss but only insult and cut/paste bible pages, and you serve to show what we should not be.
Do you have a cut/paste job ready? You are an embarassment to christians, jews, catholics, and all other religions.
Margie| 6.30.11 @ 8:53PM
What I post is the Word of God~ you know, that book called the Bible.
You might actually want to try picking it up sometime. It can only do you good, and who knows, it may even bring you to repentance and you just might actually want to unite with real Christians.
Otherwise, you have a very, very comfortable place here with your anti-Christian pals.
W| 6.30.11 @ 9:32PM
What you post is hate. You cannot persuade anyone with your hate and insults. You have created a Sharia-Bible-Christianity which has nothing to do with the Bible or Christianity. For your sake, wake up. I read the Bible, and to paraphrase Senator Bentsen, you do not a Bible reader or Christian. You are a dogmatic,narrow minded person who drives people away from the Bible with your hate filled nonsense.
Take a rest, for your own sake, and learn. Try the Sermon on the Mount, read it slowly.
Margie| 6.30.11 @ 11:32PM
Sorry, but I haven't insulted anybody. You on the other hand just finished another one of your diatribes.
Now git along little doggie.
W| 7.1.11 @ 8:15AM
God bless you, christian lady
victor| 7.1.11 @ 2:38AM
W:
"This is the agent for the Papal Inquistion."
Glad you admit it W, which of your ancestors, forebears or grand-pères assisted the various cardinals or bishops in their quest for Religious Purity, eh?
The Medieval Inquisition is a series of Inquisitions (Catholic Church bodies charged with suppressing heresy) from around 1184, including the Episcopal Inquisition (1184-1230s) and later the Papal Inquisition (1230s). The Medieval Inquisition was in response to large popular movements throughout Europe considered apostate or heretical to Christianity, in particular Catharism and Waldensians in southern France and northern Italy. These were the first inquisition movements of many that would follow.
The Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition (Spanish: Tribunal del Santo Oficio de la Inquisición), commonly known as the Spanish Inquisition (Inquisición española), was a tribunal established in 1480 by Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. It was intended to maintain Catholic orthodoxy in their kingdoms, and to replace the Medieval Inquisition which was under Papal control. The Inquisition was originally intended in large part to ensure the orthodoxy of those who converted from Judaism and Islam. This regulation of the faith of the newly converted was intensified after the royal decrees issued in 1492 and 1501 ordering Jews and Muslims to convert or leave.
The Portuguese Inquisition was formally established in Portugal in 1536 at the request of the King of Portugal, João III. Manuel I had asked for the installation of the Inquisition in 1515 to fulfill the commitment of marriage with Maria of Aragon, but it was only after his death that the Pope acquiesced. This inquisition was a Portuguese analogue of the more famous Spanish Inquisition.
The Roman Inquisition was a system of tribunals developed by the Holy See during the second half of the 16th century, responsible for prosecuting individuals accused of a wide array of crimes related to heresy, including sorcery, immorality, blasphemy, Judaizing and witchcraft, as well for censorship of printed literature. The tribunals covered most of the Italian peninsula as well as Malta and also existed in isolated pockets of papal jurisdiction in other parts of Europe, including Avignon, in France. The Congregation of the Holy Office, one of the original 15 congregations of the Roman Curia created by Pope Sixtus V in 1588, presided over the activity of the local tribunals. While the Roman Inquisition was originally designed to combat the spread of Protestantism in Italy, the institution outlived its original purpose, and the system of tribunals lasted until the mid 18th century, when the Italian states began to suppress the local inquisitions, effectively eliminating the power of the church to prosecute heretical crimes.
W| 7.1.11 @ 9:25AM
We don't need inquisitions now, we just show your posts to show bigotry,intolerance, and outright lunacy.
Please keep the posts coming and do cut and paste. You are doing a terrific job for us.
Margie| 7.2.11 @ 2:24PM
Only a modern day Papal Inquisitor would HATE the Word of God, and them that preach it!
Margie| 6.30.11 @ 11:52PM
I'm going to take apart your disgusting words piece by piece here you despicable liar.
First, you said, "I wrote Margie privately."
You wrote me "privately" but you threatened me and so before you could carry it out~ I revealed what you were going to do here, which you did, but even worse~ you revealed very personal information about me for all to see.
What kind of a man does this sort of thing?
You threatened me that if I didn't shut up, you would come after me here~ and so I posted your threat for all to see the kind of man you really are.
The you say: "She has chosen to twist my words in a public forum.
She has no honor."
This shows your a liar. I didn't "twist" your words. I posted your words!
You say, "Evidently she hates herself."
Another lie. You are now into slandering my person, and that makes you disgusting, just like your pal Clint/Tim*.
Welcome to the hateful human being club.
"I pray she can repent and forgive herself."
LOL. For what, Ken? I'm not sure who you pray to, but it must be your own personally created Jesus. Because what you have done here is lie about and personally slander your sister in Christ.
Someone has some repenting to do, but it isn't me.
"She creates stumbling blocks to those among us who have not met Jesus yet."
Another blatant lie, and sadly, you know it is a lie.
Why do you do this? To raise yourself up somehow?
What I do is actually witness to the unsaved here. How come you never join me? Instead you choose to slander someone who cares enough to speak truthfully to the unenlightened about where they are heading apart for the Saviour. And you choose to slander me for this?
"Those of you who have NOT met Jesus yet, please forgive her.
The poor ignorant woman cannot find it in her to cease throwing the first stone at someone who fails to enter the kingdom through HER narrow gate.
Fortunately, Jesus Christ is more forgiving than Margie has projected here."
I pity you, Ken. This is just so disgusting and filled with lies.
What a horrible, horrible man you are.
"Bless her heart, Margie is in the darkness of despair."
Really? It really shows in my encouraging others here, and in my proclaiming the Word of God to KOTN and others who are in darkness, right?
You sound like the Devil himself in what you just said.
May God have mercy on YOUR sickened soul!
"Her own life is a mess...and I gave her a whole new career...no charge. She has turned on me like a rabid dog....in public."
My life is a mess? Why? Because my husband lost his job? Like many Americans, and what~ you are holding this against me and trying to paint me in a bad light?
You are an utter disgrace.
And a rabid dog?
Read your own words and your slandering lies and God will be the Judge, will he not?
You gave me a career? That is really funny. No, what you did is introduce me to a friend of yours who has some automobile brochures he can't sell. So far they haven't even covered the cost of shipping. We will be sending them back because I will have nothing to do with you or anyone connected to you.
"She has turned my "agape" love into hatred and spite.
Please use your scoll button henceforth."
You may have succeeded here in turning others against me but in the eyes of God you are in Big Trouble.
Now~~ STOP calling me. Stop e mailing me with more threats. LEAVE ME ALONE!
Mike| 6.29.11 @ 7:30PM
Russ,
You seem interested in "philosophy." I recommend for your consideration Harry G. Frankfurt's book, "On Bullshit." Spoiler alert: Dr. Frankfurt is a professor at Princeton. Therefore, to the geocentric, flat earth, the universe was created in six days and everything else in the Bible is literally true, global warming and evolution are a hoax crowd, this is just another liberal screed worthy of no attention.
SuffolkVA| 6.29.11 @ 7:55PM
First off, the few mentions of hell by Jesus in the Bible are not very specific and can be explained in certain ways involving translation and Old Testament references. Secondly, even if there is no Hell, it does not mean that everyone will go to heaven. The Bible says that the wages of sin is death. Death can be considered to be the absence of God. Perhaps sinners actually die and cease to exist and perhaps the few (few are chosen!) who please God do enjoy eternal life in His presence.
As usual, those who set up either/or scenarios using langauge usually have an agenda. All linguistic dichotomies have resolutions not requiring that either side of the dichotomy be right.
This same concept applies to the silly argument over creation vs. evolution between the believers and the atheists. Perhaps that dichotomy is answered by a God driven evolution process. What's the problem with that?
Margie| 6.29.11 @ 8:03PM
As to your last sentence, it cannot be because God tells us that HE CREATED, and created each "according to its kind" in Genesis.
As to whether or not there is a place called Hell.. translations do vary~ but the Lake of Fire is quite clear. And He does send liars and all who reject Him there.
We can try and rationalize and think it away all we want, but His Word is Truth.
Al Adab| 6.29.11 @ 8:47PM
Let us all beware lest this internecine feud cause others to stumble.
POST American| 6.29.11 @ 10:07PM
Remembering that, in any event, scripture tells
us the TRUE church is everywhere, ultimately
a remnant. In other words, TOTAL DEPRAVITY
is the lot of fallen mankind in a fallen universe
(and in 2011 POST America who'll deny this?).
Nevertheless, the takedown of America's churches always bears more attention.
Certainly the Freemason antics have been
at work since the revolution.
The central private bank was then as now the vortex of their intrigue.
The man who really got the FAKE 'feel good'
enmeshment fantasy religious trip going
was Freemason Charles Finney. His tent shows
in the early 1800's on got the heresy rolling.
IN FACT what he preached was nothing less
than the Arminian Heresy.
Interesting, the EUGENICS obsessed Mormons,
and later the ever sinister Rockefeller cabal,
all got their start on this same western New York state turf.
The systematic subversion of churches in this
century is somewhat better known. AGAIN,
Freemasonry (ie Luciferian Social Darwinism)
in league with just the usual wastrels, oppurtunists
and 'atheists', esp. clustered around the ultra-rich
TAX FREE foundations (--Ford/Carnegie---and
again Rockefeller) played a HUGE role.
As we write an est. 90% of ALLLL Lutheran,
Methodist and even Baptist leadership ---IS
FREEMASON.
Also interesting to note that the man who got
the elite instigated 'Sex and dope' culture of
the 60's onward going was one Willis Harmon
of Stanford (SEE his paper 'Changing Images
of Man'). He TOO had a bloodline from this
same western New York region, and family
from the Christian front EUGENICS operation
---Oneida community.
----------------SMALL WORLD ----EH?
Brian| 6.29.11 @ 11:34PM
Jesus knew why ppl would turn from faith. He said in Matt 24:12 "When iniquity abounds, the love of many will wax cold."
Dacron Mather| 6.30.11 @ 12:43AM
The score to date:
More strident forms of scientific materialism 1
Bethell O
TWAIW| 6.30.11 @ 2:04AM
Wow. How well you all quote the oft translated words of bronze age goatherders. Get a life (this one not your imaginary after- one).
Rich D| 6.30.11 @ 5:43PM
Change your handle, or is that term a new favorite of master debaters?
victor| 7.1.11 @ 2:41AM
I believe it is pronounced "twee"
Mark30339| 6.30.11 @ 10:06AM
As Mr. Bethell takes a nostalgic look back to nuns in habits and warnings of eternal damnation from the pulpit, I think an appropriate phrase for then and now is: "Many who belong to God, do not belong to the Church, and many who belong to the Church, do not belong to God. While I agree that the increased comfort of this age may contribute to increasing detachment from religious faith -- I think the real culprit is the obsessive focus on the ego-centric self. What I know, what I think, what I have, what I want, what I do, what I feel, what I say -- these matters have crowded out all others. And who can blame us, given the inundation of media that compels self-absorption. We are so ego driven that perhaps we are no longer able to devote heart and mind, body and soul to anything (let alone to faith in Jesus Christ).
Ponder, for example, the Solidarity movement in Poland. After suffering under great privations for decades under Soviet rule, the workers dedicated their bodies and souls to confront the injustice with a non-violent dedication to Christ. A decade after the Soviet collapse, John Paul II was chastising Poles vigorously for having let their society slip into the amoral ethos of license embraced all over the West. Instead of being a people in solidarity with each other and in Christ, they've been reduced to individuals pre-occupied with their own comfort. Contrary to Mr. Bethell's unfair dismissal, social justice is about belonging to your neighbor and your neighbor belonging to you; it begins by being in relationship with the other -- rather than being absorbed in the self. Our adventure is to act justly with our neighbor, to embrace and love mercy, and to walk with our God with an honest and humble sense of self -- statistics on Church attendance in the West may be interesting, but they don't diminish the adventure in the least.
P Naylor| 6.30.11 @ 3:25PM
Here is something I found in an old book, one published for use by the military in 1941.
Washington’s Prayer for the Nation
Almighty God, we make our earnest prayer that Thou wilt keep the United States in thy holy protection, that Thou wilt incline the heart of the citizens to cultivate a spirit of subordination and obedience to government, and entertain a brotherly affection and love for one another and for their fellow citizens of the United States at large.
And finally that Thou wilt most graciously be pleased to dispose us all to do justice, to love mercy, and to demean ourselves with that charity, humility, and pacific temper of mind which were the characteristics of the Divine Author of our blessed religion, and without an humble imitation of whose example in these things, we can never hope to be a happy nation.
Grant our supplications, we beseech Thee, through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.
(Written at Newburg, June 8, 1783, and sent to the Governors of all the States.)
believer| 6.30.11 @ 10:03PM
The only way I know of to reverse the trend of Americans losing faith is for Americans to get your kids out of public school. Even our conservative politicians dont have the guts to say that the teaching of evolution in schools is totally without evidence, Educators and scientists know that if they question the system they lose their jobs. You as Americans will see they downfall of the greatest Nation in history, you could have prevented it but chose to continually support the men of both partys and the public school system that are the root cause. pray for your kids.
weddingdress | 7.1.11 @ 12:37AM
As Mr. Bethell takes a nostalgic look back to nuns in habits and warnings of eternal damnation from the pulpit, I think an appropriate phrase for then and now is: "Many who belong to God, do not belong to the Church, and many who belong to the Church, do not belong to God. While I agree that the increased comfort of this age may contribute to increasing detachment from religious faith -- I think the real culprit is the obsessive focus on the ego-centric self. What I know, what I think, what I have, what I want, what I do, what I feel, what I say -- these matters have crowded out all others. And who can blame us, given the inundation of media that compels self-absorption. We are so ego driven that perhaps we are no longer able to devote heart and mind, body and soul to anything (let alone to faith in Jesus Christ).
Marcio| 7.1.11 @ 11:39PM
I agree with everything with this article until the author chose to discredit evolution. I see no problems in reconciling the common origin of life and its development towards man with God and faith. I see it as the way Genesis is revealed in the historical record of the Earth. The mistake that Dawkins and many other make is denying the Creator by sticking to the process of creation and reducing man to our material selves. This mistake is as old as history. Consider the passage "the foolishness of nature worshipping" on Wisdom 13. It could have been written today. But evolution is sound science: it is not only a theory used by a few to deny God, its application have saved millions of lives as its insights allow mankind to better combat contagious diseases, to diagnose and treat genetic diseases, etc. As with all fruits of the God-given ability to Reason, scientific ideas can be used to enlighten or to corrupt.
shipley130| 7.2.11 @ 12:21PM
I personally think Americans (and maybe Europeans) have all been beaten into submitting to a lower standard of education and culture. Case in point. I was having dinner in restaurant yesterday, where the customer made such a big deal of telling the server that they spoke Spanish. The server being a Mexican, spoke English. It seems to me that the server should be making a big deal of his ability to speak English instead of the brain dead caucasian making a mountain of speaking the server's native language.
All I can say is that I am not going to be the brain -washed, pandering American anymore. I'm returning to America is #1 and tough sh*t if you don't think so mindset.