Louis Theroux And The Phelps Family

[b4mbi]

So you're no different to the Phelps family.

 

 

If you can't see the difference then I could spend from now 'till doomsday explaining where the difference is and you still wouldn't see it because you wouldn't WANT to see it.

 

 

When is doomsday?

 

I'm going on holiday next week, so if it's this Thursday, that's not a good date for me for the ending of space-time. Can you pray really hard for me so doomsday is not on Thursday?

 

It would be un-christian to refuse, and with the added bonus that if we all make it to Friday, I will be a convert, because god must exist because your prayers were answered.

[The Evil One]

 

When is doomsday?

 

I'll let you know.

[somewhatdamaged]

The fact they were making their little children carry such awful signs really made me shudder. To indoctrinate your children into such a cult must surely be tantamount to child abuse?

[La_Dolce_Vita]

How do you know that it was not Satan that initiated the Biblical principles?

 

Although, if you think that humans have morals surrounding murder, theft, and lies as a result of Biblical principles then you really are deluding yourself.

 

Mankind has progressed from a nomadic lifestyle, a life that was short and brutal, to the Western civilisation that you and I enjoy today.

If I can paraphrase Christopher Hitchens, it does seem rather absurd that for many thousands of years mankind lived brutal, short lives and were nearly completely wiped out as a species by disease and supposedly had no morals.

And THEN God, after all these thousands of years, pops by in Palestine (of all places) to make his presence known to just a few group of humans. Incredible!

[La_Dolce_Vita]

The fact they were making their little children carry such awful signs really made me shudder. To indoctrinate your children into such a cult must surely be tantamount to child abuse?

No different from any other form of Christianity. Why do you think they are a cult? This is Christianity, just their interpretation of it. Spook has a different one and a somewhat more moral one.

[spook]

So you're no different to the Phelps family.

 

 

If you can't see the difference then I could spend from now 'till doomsday explaining where the difference is and you still wouldn't see it because you wouldn't WANT to see it.

 

 

When is doomsday?

 

I'm going on holiday next week, so if it's this Thursday, that's not a good date for me for the ending of space-time. Can you pray really hard for me so doomsday is not on Thursday?

 

It would be un-christian to refuse, and with the added bonus that if we all make it to Friday, I will be a convert, because god must exist because your prayers were answered.

 

Although I can't guarantee when Doomsday will be I will use my best endeavours to convey your concerns in as most persuasive way as I can that it doesn't interrupt your holiday!

 

I hope you have a really enjoyable break.

[b4mbi]

So you're no different to the Phelps family.

 

 

If you can't see the difference then I could spend from now 'till doomsday explaining where the difference is and you still wouldn't see it because you wouldn't WANT to see it.

 

 

When is doomsday?

 

I'm going on holiday next week, so if it's this Thursday, that's not a good date for me for the ending of space-time. Can you pray really hard for me so doomsday is not on Thursday?

 

It would be un-christian to refuse, and with the added bonus that if we all make it to Friday, I will be a convert, because god must exist because your prayers were answered.

 

Although I can't guarantee when Doomsday will be I will use my best endeavours to convey your concerns in as most persuasive way as I can that it doesn't interrupt your holiday!

 

I hope you have a really enjoyable break.

 

Thank you. I feel warm inside that you will pray for a person you've not met and don't know to have a good holiday that he may or may not be going on, could this be the work of the lord?

 

I have heard he moves in mysterious ways. Like Michael Jackson when he moonwalked.

[mr blonde]

Many thousands of people have been Saved as a result of the great work done by the public declarations of faith, and for many following on from their first exposure to Christianity.

 

SAVED! WTF from. I was exposed to Christianity from an early age via school and extended family. As I got older and was able to formulate thoughts for my self I saw it for what it was and the fact that it didn't really work for me. So I don't believe in this story. I don't believe in Harry Potter either.

So tell me, what do I (or others) need saving from?

[The Evil One]

Thank you. I feel warm inside that you will pray for a person you've not met and don't know to have a good holiday that he may or may not be going on, could this be the work of the lord?

 

I have heard he moves in mysterious ways. Like Michael Jackson when he moonwalked.

Don't be fooled. Spook is really one of ours (although he may not know it yet)

[Keith]

Imagine if there had been no prohibition on theft, on killing, on lying, on sexual immorality. Imagine if there was no command to not be covetous of what others had, and I deliberately use the word covetous because it goes so far beyond being a bit envious or jealous. Imagine of there was not a commandment to take heed of your parents and look after them in their old age. What would our civilisation look like today?

 

It would look fine & dandy. As an atheist, I lead a decent life, not stealing or killing or coveting my neighbour's wife.

 

I don't do those things, not because a book of stories tell me not to. Nor because I don't have any fit neighbours. Nor because I need to keep a good score card to ensure I end up in Narnia or some other mythical place once I'm dead.

 

I live a decent life because it is the right thing to do. I don't need your book to tell me what is right and wrong any more than I need the law to tell me not to kill someone or my wife's threat to rip off my nuts and feed them to me on a plate, to stop me shagging my neighbour.

[spook]

Imagine if there had been no prohibition on theft, on killing, on lying, on sexual immorality. Imagine if there was no command to not be covetous of what others had, and I deliberately use the word covetous because it goes so far beyond being a bit envious or jealous. Imagine of there was not a commandment to take heed of your parents and look after them in their old age. What would our civilisation look like today?

 

It would look fine & dandy. As an atheist, I lead a decent life, not stealing or killing or coveting my neighbour's wife.

 

I don't do those things, not because a book of stories tell me not to. Nor because I don't have any fit neighbours. Nor because I need to keep a good score card to ensure I end up in Narnia or some other mythical place once I'm dead.

 

I live a decent life because it is the right thing to do. I don't need your book to tell me what is right and wrong any more than I need the law to tell me not to kill someone or my wife's threat to rip off my genitalia and feed them to me on a plate, to stop me engaging in adultery with my neighbour.

 

It is a right and proper way to live because you have learned this as a result of being nurtured from birth in the society that you have.

 

If you had been nurtured from birth in a society in which theft from other tribes, ritual murder, sexual immorality and all the things found particular;y in African tribal life then theft, murder, sexual immorality and many other things that are prohibited by our Christian founded society then your values would be very different from those that you have today.

[Keith]

If you had been nurtured from birth in a society in which theft from other tribes, ritual murder, sexual immorality and all the things found particular;y in African tribal life then theft, murder, sexual immorality and many other things that are prohibited by our Christian founded society then your values would be very different from those that you have today.

 

What makes you believe that Christians are the custodians of high morals? Even avoiding the obvious response of paedophile priests, it isn't difficult to come up with non-Christian tribes who lived in peace and with decent morals and examples of Christianity brutalising and murdering. How about the Australian aborigines? They had lived a peaceful existence for millennia. Then the Brits arrived and put up fences on their lands. The aborigines tore them down so they could continue to walk the paths they'd always used. So the Christian church ruled that aborigines were "subhuman" and could therefore be classed as vermin and shot. Christian directed murder of a peaceful, non-Christian people. Whose morals were the higher?

[spook]

What makes you believe that Christians are the custodians of high morals? Even avoiding the obvious response of paedophile priests, it isn't difficult to come up with non-Christian tribes who lived in peace and with decent morals and examples of Christianity brutalising and murdering.

 

 

It's amazing how people still can't see that a person who proclaims a faith doesn't automatically adopt all of the precepts of that faith. A person who claims to be a Christian and yet descends into brutalising and murder is not practising Christianity. They may well be a member of an organisation such as the Roman Catholic Church which makes use of some of the teachings of Jesus for its own ends, but that doesn't make them Christians, just Roman Catholics.

 

 

How about the Australian aborigines? They had lived a peaceful existence for millennia. Then the Brits arrived and put up fences on their lands. The aborigines tore them down so they could continue to walk the paths they'd always used. So the Christian church ruled that aborigines were "subhuman" and could therefore be classed as vermin and shot. Christian directed murder of a peaceful, non-Christian people. Whose morals were the higher?

 

 

And there you have it. Some church (or churches) that used Christianity made the most awful assertion and immediately the problem is attributed not to the churches, but to Christianity itself.

 

Christianity is following the teaching of Christ. There is nothing whatsoever in Christianity that would support or justify such actions as those which took place. In fact the prime mover in this abomination was the Presbyterian church, a church largely based on Calvinism, a teaching that is itself theologically fatally flawed in at least one of its five principles.

 

But Presbyterianism is a wonderful religion if someone wants one that has an inbuilt class system. One that lets you feel OK for setting yourself above other people because you have been chosen to be of The Elect. It was just what the doctor ordered to justify the genocide that took place in Australia not to mention North America and Canada during the early years of colonisation and land theft by Europeans.

 

Don't confuse most churches, especially “High Churches” with Christianity. While you may well find some true Christians being members of such churches it would be entirely wrong to conclude that a Christian church represents Christianity “on the hoof”.

[La_Dolce_Vita]

If you had been nurtured from birth in a society in which theft from other tribes, ritual murder, sexual immorality and all the things found particular;y in African tribal life then theft, murder, sexual immorality and many other things that are prohibited by our Christian founded society then your values would be very different from those that you have today.

But our morals do not come from Christianity in relation to theft and murder. As for sexual morality, that has been dealt with in lots of other threads and I grant that you are partially correct. But the morality of Christianity in this respect is damaging to society

 

It's amazing how people still can't see that a person who proclaims a faith doesn't automatically adopt all of the precepts of that faith.

These people claim to be Christians. It's not for non-Christians to work out who the correct Christians are. You all seem to have all sorts of justifications.

Although I appreciate that paedophilia is not a teaching of the Bible, the degree of this sort of abuse in the Catholic, Methodist, and Baptist churches shows a certain level of hypocrisy (and sexual repression).

[Evil Goblin]

LDV - I am interested in your thoughts as to where our moral views on theft and murder come from if not from a Christian foundation. Also, where do our sexual moral views come from if not from some sort of religious foundation?