Westboro Baptist Church elohel

[Trippyhippy]

The Bible as we know it was a collection of texts from ancient times, and it was amassed from a pool of literature even larger. It wasn't selected overnight. Lots of texts, some from authors who had other works selected for inclusion, were denied. Parts were added and dropped over hundreds of years. Maybe parts aught be dropped now? If God could change his mind a few dozen times 1500 years ago or so, surely he's not entirely set in stone now?Contradictions and bronze age justice aren't doing any good for the modern age, and only serve to inspire groups like these.

The pope needs to sit down and ask himself: Does God still believe this? And if he decides no, drop the passage. Should adulterers be stoned? If the uppercrust of Christian faith agree not, then remove the passage. The Bible is intended to educate the masses on everything a Christian aught believe. If this is the case, then all opportunities for cherrypicking between opposing statements aught be rectified. If a Christian aught not believe a passage, it shouldn't be included.

Every sect of christianity does this. That is why there are different sects. They all pick and choose what they want to believe from the available material, then they give it a name like "Baptist", "Protestant", "Lutheran", etc.

 

[Linhjah]

The pope needs to sit down and ask himself: Does God still believe this? And if he decides no, drop the passage. Should adulterers be stoned? If the uppercrust of Christian faith agree not, then remove the passage. The Bible is intended to educate the masses on everything a Christian aught believe. If this is the case, then all opportunities for cherrypicking between opposing statements aught be rectified. If a Christian aught not believe a passage, it shouldn't be included.

The pope isn't head over all Christianity, he's head of the Catholic denomination.

 

[Tristam Green]

The pope isn't head over all Christianity, he's head of the Catholic denomination.

This is correct. With all due respect to Catholics in the world, I do not consider Benedict XVI, nor anyone, the Vicar of Christ on Earth, nor do I need his or any other priests' daily absolution of my sins past or present.

 

[Zyndara]

This is correct. With all due respect to Catholics in the world, I do not consider Benedict XVI, nor anyone, the Vicar of Christ on Earth, nor do I need his or any other priests' daily absolution of my sins past or present.

And this is why I like you so much. You hit the nail right on the head.

 

[Xalioniaf]

I wonder if one day in the far future people will look at the bible the same way they look at greek mythology.
If you ran down the streets today claiming to praise the mighty ruler of the pantheon Zeus people would think you're batshit insane.

 

[Halifirien]

I wonder if one day in the far future people will look at the bible the same way they look at greek mythology.
If you ran down the streets today claiming to praise the mighty ruler of the pantheon Zeus people would think you're batshit insane.

Plenty of us are doing it now. Virgin births, Adam and Eve, water into wine, raising friends from the dead... it's as fanciful and nonsensical as Icarus and Thor's hammer.

 

[Xalioniaf]

Plenty of us are doing it now. Virgin births, Adam and Eve, water into wine, raising friends from the dead... it's as fanciful and nonsensical as Icarus and Thor's hammer.

Yeah, but it's not everyone.
Going again with my little greek/roman mythology example, you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who actually believes what they believed so long ago. Sure, you'd have your cult here, your fanatics there, but nowhere near the cities and countries that used to hold them as facts.
It doesn't matter anyway, because when we die we'll know that it was in fact, the Norsemen, who were right all along. And we'll get to party with Thor for eternity.
Provided we die a warrior's death.

 

[Gerry]

Yeah, but it's not everyone.
Going again with my little greek/roman mythology example, you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who actually believes what they believed so long ago. Sure, you'd have your cult here, your fanatics there, but nowhere near the cities and countries that used to hold them as facts.
It doesn't matter anyway, because when we die we'll know that it was in fact, the Norsemen, who were right all along. And we'll get to party with Thor for eternity.
Provided we die a warrior's death.

Valhalla Awaits!!!

In all honesty, even though I'm Christian, I actually like to ideas of Norse religion much better than Christianity as a whole. That's my :2cents:

I'll probably never die a warriors death though to see if Valhalla actually exists XD

 

[Halifirien]

Yeah, but it's not everyone.

True, but the Christians are outnumbered when you combine Muslims, Jews, Buddhists and the other religions. Throw in the atheists who think they're all delusional, and you can at least feel a sense of statistical pride that most people already think the Bible is hogwash.

 

[Stine]

True, but the Christians are outnumbered when you combine Muslims, Jews, Buddhists and the other religions. Throw in the atheists who think they're all delusional, and you can at least feel a sense of statistical pride that most people already think the Bible is hogwash.

You do realize that half of the Christian Bible is the Jewish Bible and that Islam believes that the Jewish Bible was authentic revelations from God but was distorted and misinterpreted by man? All three believe in the God of Abraham but just went down different roads due to different beliefs of prophets and such.

 

[Halifirien]

Yes, I realize that. When most people speak of "The Bible," they're referring to the combined Old and New Testaments and focus on Jesus and how it all relates to him and his message. Great swathes of the population find plenty of things to disbelieve there.

 

[Alyada]

I can't fault them for this analysis. Reading through the Bible -- especially the Old Testament stuff that gives these fundamentalist freaks a huge spiritual hardon -- it's pretty clear that their god can be a major prick.

In other words, they're like most Christians, picking and choosing the parts of their religion that they want to follow and ignoring all the rest. The problem is that they're being extremely rude about it.

I try to avoid generalizations like that, but I'm also not one to let it slide when people say the schmucks at Westboro aren't Christians. They're not Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist or atheist, y'know? They're very explicitly Christian, drawing their own conclusions from the Bible about their relationship with Jesus and what they're supposed to do about it. It's extremist and annoying, but their religion is certainly firmly labeled as Christian. They'd have fit right in at the congregation listening to Johnathan Edwards delivering "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God."

I've never encountered one of the Westboro people, but I've certainly met plenty of assholes who justify their hatred of gay people with the stuff they've read in the Bible -- both Old and New Testaments. The only thing making Westboro special is that they'll go out and act on it by protesting and not giving a fuck what people think about them.

Their beliefs aren't much different than a lot of the churches I grew up in.

Plenty of us are doing it now. Virgin births, Adam and Eve, water into wine, raising friends from the dead... it's as fanciful and nonsensical as Icarus and Thor's hammer.

Yes, I realize that. When most people speak of "The Bible," they're referring to the combined Old and New Testaments and focus on Jesus and how it all relates to him and his message. Great swathes of the population find plenty of things to disbelieve there.

Hali should write a book. I would totally buy it. You just say everything I want to say more eloquently and poised than I ever could. I just turn to rage and anger.

I guess it stems from having to deal with the Westburo assholes myself. They were outside NIU after our shooting this year with picket signs claiming we deserved our friends and family to die because we accepted homosexuals and lesbians into our midst. Hell, one of them spat in an overtly gay man's face here on campus. That's not Christian. Dear sweet Cthulhu, that's not even human. I'm sorry, but I can't take anyone seriously who judges another human being for who they love (and I mean WHO in the most HUMAN sense, in case someone wants to twist my words).

Let's put the gun in your hands then, and see if you would actually pull the trigger.



Or the detonator.

I highly doubt that any single one of you would dare have the nads to attempt such a thing.

Multifold reasons:

1) You know better, and are raised better. Chances are you would never be able to live with yourselves knowing you had taken another human's life, and put their own judgement into your hands.

2) Martyrdom is the number one way to erase any shred of wrongdoing from a person's life.

You're all above this kind of thought process.

I never said I wanted to kill them, Tristam. I just wished they'd die already. Their white church bus crashing somewhere.. or finding themselves in the wrong biker bar.. or, hell, I'd settle for hyenas. Just something to get them off the map.

 

[Bluefrost]

This is correct. With all due respect to Catholics in the world, I do not consider Benedict XVI, nor anyone, the Vicar of Christ on Earth, nor do I need his or any other priests' daily absolution of my sins past or present.

I'm a Catholic and I agree with this. Just because President Bush is my president doesn't mean I need his approval in my every day life.

On another note, all extremists are idiots.

 

[Tristam Green]

I never said I wanted to kill them, Tristam. I just wished they'd die already. Their white church bus crashing somewhere.. or finding themselves in the wrong biker bar.. or, hell, I'd settle for hyenas. Just something to get them off the map.

While I think it's wrong likewise to wish the death of another human being, I didn't quote your wish because I know your history with these 'tards. Being through something like that and witnessing it first-hand would probably leave me wishing for some vindication myself.

I'm a Catholic and I agree with this. Just because President Bush is my president doesn't mean I need his approval in my every day life.

On another note, all extremists are idiots.

Again, I meant no disrespect at all to Catholics worldwide, it's just not something I believe. While I believe in the Second Coming of Christ, the death and Resurrection, and the Ascention, I don't believe that He left the world's "flock" to be tended by one man. He instructed the people of 30-31 AD in the ways of love and peace, and left it to us to decide which path to take.

 

[Legomyeggo]

I believe in the second coming of Christ. He will come. And he will rock. Rock me sexy Jesus!

 

[Alyada]

While I think it's wrong likewise to wish the death of another human being, I didn't quote your wish because I know your history with these 'tards. Being through something like that and witnessing it first-hand would probably leave me wishing for some vindication myself.

Yeah, watching their window blown in really helped.

 

[Pompidou]

It wasn't a good idea to refer to the pope in my last post proposing that the Bible undergo a modern day revision as it had done when it was first collected. I don't know much about Baptists and Protestants and the myriad of offshoots of Christian faith, but I would imagine that each has at least a limited heirarchy. I think it would be in every Christian's best interest to have a clear and irrefutable religious statement. When both the vilest of hate groups and the noblest of goodwill organizations can read the same book and find ample support for their causes (and it's not even taken out of context in many cases), the book needs to pick a message and stick with it. They wouldn't be saying that God was wrong. They'd be saying that when the representatives of Christian sects of ancient times all sent their delegates to the various councils, and when passages were approved and denied, that humans made some mistakes. An unrealistic idea, for sure, but I think it'd be beneficial. The Bible is supposed to be the definition of what a Christian believes, I think. I could be wrong. If I'm right, then the Bible aught to be what Christians actually believe.

 

[Valandil]

It wasn't a good idea to refer to the pope in my last post proposing that the Bible undergo a modern day revision as it had done when it was first collected. I don't know much about Baptists and Protestants and the myriad of offshoots of Christian faith, but I would imagine that each has at least a limited heirarchy. I think it would be in every Christian's best interest to have a clear and irrefutable religious statement. When both the vilest of hate groups and the noblest of goodwill organizations can read the same book and find ample support for their causes (and it's not even taken out of context in many cases), the book needs to pick a message and stick with it. They wouldn't be saying that God was wrong. They'd be saying that when the representatives of Christian sects of ancient times all sent their delegates to the various councils, and when passages were approved and denied, that humans made some mistakes. An unrealistic idea, for sure, but I think it'd be beneficial. The Bible is supposed to be the definition of what a Christian believes, I think. I could be wrong. If I'm right, then the Bible aught to be what Christians actually believe.

This is the socio-relgious equivalent of dividing by zero my friend.

 

[Halifirien]

No work finds 100% agreement about its meaning; otherwise you wouldn't have literary scholars debating what Tolkien meant when he wrote Lord of the Rings.

 

[Gerry]

No work finds 100% agreement about its meaning; otherwise you wouldn't have literary scholars debating what Tolkien meant when he wrote Lord of the Rings.

Wait scholars actually do that?