Christian discussion: Everyone welcome, but please respect the intent of the thread

[Elder Sister]

I am so disgusted by that moron on Duck Dynasty and the inevitable fallout and contributions from right wing 'Christians' right now. It makes me sad that once again, all Christians are painted as homophobic, racist asses. :(

[MisterOJ]

Me too ES.

This blog showed up on my facebook feed when you "liked" it and it's definitely worth sharing on this thread. I know you already have seen it, but it's worth others taking a look at as well.

[Ormond]

Me too ES.

This blog showed up on my facebook feed when you "liked" it and it's definitely worth sharing on this thread. I know you already have seen it, but it's worth others taking a look at as well.

Thank you for reposting this. It made my day. :)

[Lily Valley]

I am so disgusted by that moron on Duck Dynasty and the inevitable fallout and contributions from right wing 'Christians' right now. It makes me sad that once again, all Christians are painted as homophobic, racist asses. :(

Did you see the response from governor Jindal? Jindal praised him as a great citizen of Louisiana. I'd post a link, but I'm on my phone. His response was even more disheartening than the original comments.

[Ser Loudmouth]

It's allready the 25-th in my country, so I can say:

Merry Christmas everyone!

[MisterOJ]

So as y'all are all probably aware, the big debate about evolution took place yesterday between Bill Nye and the Creation Museum dude, Ken Ham.

As you'd expect, many Christian bloggers and commentators have been decrying Ham's silly notions about the Earth being only 4000 years old or whatever. Good for them. Here's a commentary I am particularly fond of that more or less echoes my views.

But the one person I didn't expect to hear telling Ham that he was full of crap was none other than Pat Robertson himself.

Wow. Who knew?

[Gears of the Beast]

That debate was so pointless. For 2 hours it was basically Ham trying to argue that any science that says anything about what happened in the past is false because no-one was there...Obviously Nye won but who cares? It's the equivalent beating up a toddler in a fight. I suspect the reason why Nye took the debate is the multiple times throughout the debate he appealed to people watching about how important science is and how we need real scientists etc etc. Obviously an appeal to the younger people watching (creationists making their kids watch etc). I will say Nye did a good job of making it about science v creationism rather than science v religion which kept all the Christians watching firmly on his side. Obviously Ham played straight into that with his absurd comments about belief in evolution.

Is that Pat Robertson guy serious? Does he not realise the irony is that he makes a joke of Christians on a very regular basis?

[Horza]

The science vs creationism debate is about authority, not science and not religion.

There is nothing for reasonable people, believing or otherwise to gain from getting up on stage with Young Earth Creationists. You can't verbally disarm people who've set their minds on propping up crude literalism with whatever pseudoscience comes to hand, and debates are terrible forums for science education. All this did was lend credibility to a failed Biblical DinoPark entrepreneur from Queensland.

[Gears of the Beast]

It is slightly concerning that both this guy AND Ray Comfort are Aussie. They're making us look bad. We're actually a pretty secular country...

That article goes a bit too far but yeah, I kinda agree. A scientist has no business debating a creationist, the creationist has nowhere to go but up. I didn't even know there was a 'creation museum', now I do.

[Ormond]

As Horza's link pointed out, the one thing Nye really doesn't have evidence for is his fear that belief in "Biblical creationism" will cause scientific progress in the US to fall behind other nations. As Ham can point out, there are people with scientific credentials and accomplishments (especially in "applied" fields like engineering and medicine) who are "Biblical creationists." The human mind is very good at compartmentalization and it's perfectly possible to reject evolution while accepting almost everything else in science.

On the other hand, there is even less evidence for the claim of the creationists, as mentioned in Mr OJ's link, that "belief in evolution can lead to abortion, euthanasia, and killing our grandparents ". A lot of Biblical creationists tend to blame all social ills they don't like on "Darwinism" and falsely link belief in natural selection with a lack of morality. This also shows a misunderstanding of how the human mind works.

So it seems to me that the one science both sides of the debate need to study more is psychology. Of course, I'm a psychology professor so I'm biased myself on that one. :)

[MisterOJ]

Reviving this thread to post this awesome review of the new Son of God movie.

I probably won't be watching because this sounds awful.

[rocksniffer]

forgive me for sniffing through...my respect for Mr. OJ and other posters herein has encouraged me to pass through with out comment...except to say many of these posts were interesting and worth the time i spent...thank you all for your insights... :smoking:

[The_BlauerDragon]

My father told me a little bit of wisdom long ago that has always served me well and has proven to be true more than one time in my life. I share it with you all now...

"God gave men faith. The devil organized it into religions."

[DanteGabriel]

Can I just ask... what the Hell is up with Christianity like this?

“Jesus is not a vagrant, Jesus is not a helpless person who needs our help. We need someone who is capable of meeting our needs, not someone who is also needy.”

"It is about people driving into our beautiful, reasonably upscale neighborhood and seeing an ugly homeless person sleeping on a park bench.”

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/02/28/a-homeless-person-turns-out-to-be-a-jesus-sculpture-and-not-everyone-is-happy-about-it/

Because I do have respect for plenty of Christians, I refer to these kind of selfish and ignorant assholes as McJesusites. Yet they seem to believe they have the monopoly on Christianity.

Seriously, how did it come to this, that so many people can believe the antithesis of the teachings of Jesus so blithely and with no sense of their stunning wrongheadedness?

[Matrim Fox Cauthon]

Can I just ask... what the Hell is up with Christianity like this?

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/02/28/a-homeless-person-turns-out-to-be-a-jesus-sculpture-and-not-everyone-is-happy-about-it/

Because I do have respect for plenty of Christians, I refer to these kind of selfish and ignorant assholes as McJesusites. Yet they seem to believe they have the monopoly on Christianity.

Seriously, how did it come to this, that so many people can believe the antithesis of the teachings of Jesus so blithely and with no sense of their stunning wrongheadedness?

Would it help to quote scripture back at them? A lovely passage from the Gospel of Matthew (25:31-46):

³¹ “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. ³² All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, ³³ and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. ³⁴ Then the king will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; ³⁵ for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, ³⁶ I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’ ³⁷ Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? ³⁸ And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? ³⁹ And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?’ ⁴⁰ And the king will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.’ ⁴¹ Then he will say to those at his left hand, ‘You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; ⁴² for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, ⁴³ I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ ⁴⁴ Then they also will answer, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?’ ⁴⁵ Then he will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ ⁴⁶ And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

I would say that the their Christology is biblically unsound.

[DanteGabriel]

Would it help to quote scripture back at them? A lovely passage from the Gospel of Matthew (25:31-46):

I would say that the their Christology is biblically unsound.

It's unsound in so many ways, yet the attitudes expressed by those people is very common.

So how did modern American Christianity come to this? How can people hold beliefs so fundamentally opposed to the tenets of the faith they nominally hold?

[Ormond]

It's unsound in so many ways, yet the attitudes expressed by those people is very common.

So how did modern American Christianity come to this? How can people hold beliefs so fundamentally opposed to the tenets of the faith they nominally hold?

Because they're human.

This is not solely a problem of "modern American" Christianity. Human beings have a huge capacity to rationalize and are subject to distorting any religion and philosophy to self-serving ends if they don't constantly monitor themselves.

HIstorically people have been able to warp their understanding of Christianity enough to justify things much worse than ignoring the homeless. Back in the early 19th century many Americans were justifying slavery using specifically "Christian" rhetoric.

Distorted understandings of Christianity have been used as justifications for warfare and mass murder ever since some people with political power have professed Christianity. If you really want to be disturbed by what some have done in the name of Christ, read up on the Albigensian Crusades in southern France -- or the siege of Jerusalem in 1099 during the First Crusade.

[Wicked Woodpecker of West]

Catholic. Of Latin tradition. Fundamentalist in my belief, really lapsed in my practice.

My father says he goes to Mass every morning not because he is so pious but because he's a sinner.

Well said. Really, well said.

Does the Pope's religious authority apply to all Christians or just Catholics?

Of course to all Christians, but only Catholics admit it ;)

Why do you think it is impossible?

Like hundreds of philosophical, theological and ethical differences. Mixing it up would, without resolving those things (which means all denominations would have to agree about those things in one way or another) would leave us with some totally incoherent and empty Christianity in my opinion. Salt would lost its taste. My believe is that sole name of Jesus is not enough to create one Church, sorry.

Is there a way to reconcile the two dogmas without any glaring conflict?

Papal supremacy in Catholic Church is probably the least important difference between Catholics and Protestants. Man, we are much closer in philosophical terms to Orthodoxes (although some of them would probably say that Catholics and Protestants are basically the same) and we cannot resolve our little problems, then how could you make it with Protestants that have totally different approach to Bible, sacraments, sin, afterlife, nature of God, Jesus and Grace).

Subsaharan Africa and Latin America are the new bastions of Christianity and the Pope has great influence there and he must use it for good.
The Church should help a lot in guiding them to live lives better, not having too many children, especially if they are poor. They must accept contraception (i doubt they can go as far as early abortion) and help happiness and breaking of the circle of poverty as the west also must invest much in them, especially in education.

You see, sir, we Catholic are theocentric not anthropocentric. Earthly life is important, but not as much important. It's better to be poor, and persecuted than to sin. It's better to die than to sin.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

WWotW,

The philoque and the divinity of Mary are big differneces between the Orthodox east and the Romn Catholic west. Also different ideas about "original sin".

[Wicked Woodpecker of West]

I didn't say that's not important, (although if I remember correctly even after great schism few times it was close to resolve at least Philioque problem, and if not for politic schemes in Rome and Konstantinopol, then who knows...) and there are few other things like nature of marriage or purgatory. But still that's kinda details if you compare it to differences between traditional churches and protestants, right.

Also although its statistically true that Catholic Church is Western, and Orthodox Eastern, let's remember there are Latin Orthodox and Greek Catholics ;)