Wonky missile aimed at Israel ends up hitting Aqaba, Jordan

[Scouse]

And plenty of people have come to God from the opposite standpoint, get over yourself already.

I've never actually met a child who wasn't indoctrinated early on into some religion or other so I doubt the accuracy of your statement.

However, plenty of people have indeed hit a low point in their lives and been taken in by well-meaning idiots who prey on the vulnerable.

 

[Turamber]

I've never actually met a child who wasn't indoctrinated early on into some religion or other so I doubt the accuracy of your statement.

However, plenty of people have indeed hit a low point in their lives and been taken in by well-meaning idiots who prey on the vulnerable.

Such an obnoxious small minded individual. You'd be much happier if you'd just accept that people can have different points of view, your view is not the only acceptable one.

 

[DaGaffer]

Such an obnoxious small minded individual. You'd be much happier if you'd just accept that people can have different points of view, your view is not the only acceptable one.

But he's not actually wrong is he? 90% of people have their religion imposed on them as an accident of birth. Its a very small minority who switch religions or who are "born again". The general trend, at least in the west, is either apathetic affiliation or outright rejection of the religion you have imposed on you.

I find myself in a position of outright hypocricy at the moment; my daughter is going to be christened a catholic, because a. her mother wants it, despite only stepping inside church at weddings, christenings and funerals, and b. as an "insurance policy" in case we ever have to return to the UK and want her to go to a good (e.g. catholic) school. Even more ironic is that we won't send her to catholic school here, but hoperfully to one of the (rather excellent) secular schools, which are a distinct minority. I have made it clear that if the priest gives us any lip about not being married or me being "protestant", then the whole deal is off (my family have form in this area, my Dad didn't get christened until he was 25 because my granddad had a falling out with the vicar, and my brother didn't get christened, because my Dad thought the Dutch Reform Minister who was our local vicar when we lived in SA was "an arsehole". I'm quite looking forward to continuing the family tradition )

 

[Scouse]

Such an obnoxious small minded individual. You'd be much happier if you'd just accept that people can have different points of view, your view is not the only acceptable one.

I do understand that other people have views, in my small-minded and obnoxious way. It doesn't mean I have to have any respect for those views. Especially when they're utter, utter, tosh.

In fact, I'd counter that it's obviously religious people who are "small minded" because they refuse to acknowledge the reams of evidence that shows them to be so - by retreating further into their blinkered, comfort-blanket, tiny-world belief systems.

 

[Scouse]

AFAIK Gaff - you don't need to have your kids christened before they get accepted into a catholic school in the UK.

For a start - I went (and I'm a dirty methodist) and for a second - it's not as if they're going to want a certificate of water/forehead interaction are they?

When they ask "christened?" you say "yes" and "abroad" and "with three thousand catholic onlookers in a lake blessed by his holiness roland ratzenberger" and "then we burned some muslims and shot some gays"...?

 

[Chilly]

It's not just about god though is it? Church is about community and group responsiblity - both of which are seriously lacking in modern day britain. We'd be a better country if we were all christians (or whatever), IMO. I'm not religious at all, btw.

 

[Turamber]

It's not just about god though is it? Church is about community and group responsiblity - both of which are seriously lacking in modern day britain. We'd be a better country if we were all christians (or whatever), IMO. I'm not religious at all, btw.

It certainly should be. I'm not arrogant enough to think that non-religious people cannot have strong morals, however I would expect (if not always find) that Church goers would have strong ones.

Strong community ties and moral values benefit society. It can't be a co-incidence that urban degeneration continues a-pace as apathy towards religion rises.

I also know plenty of people who have never had any religious instruction or belief propagated by their parents. It just isn't seen as important. Having Xmas presents is not the same as being taught there is a God, and that can't be taught at school either.

 

[Wij]

You can have communities without sky fairies though. Or do you think that a majority of people won't bother to behave without made-up retribution hanging over them ?

 

[Scouse]

In my experience most people have a strong moral centre, regardless of a religious belief, but religious people also have an extremely strong judgemental streak.

Judging people to be "wrong" or "immoral" or "against god" all the time turns you into a twat.

As an example, one of my best mates' wife won't talk to me. She's never actually spoken to me - but she's heard I'm anti-religion and has therefore decided I'm a "heathen" and not worth her time.

TBFH, it's no loss, but I'd much rather she made an effort for the sake of her husband. But, like most christians, because she doesn't like something she's making life difficult for the people around her - because she's labouring under the delusion that her moral compass is the one that everyone else should be following...

 

[DaGaffer]

AFAIK Gaff - you don't need to have your kids christened before they get accepted into a catholic school in the UK.

For a start - I went (and I'm a dirty methodist) and for a second - it's not as if they're going to want a certificate of water/forehead interaction are they?

When they ask "christened?" you say "yes" and "abroad" and "with three thousand catholic onlookers in a lake blessed by his holiness roland ratzenberger" and "then we burned some muslims and shot some gays"...?

In theory you don't need to, in practice, you'll be at the back of the queue. And they don't just expect baptism, they'd be looking for proof of communion and confirmation as well (My neice has just gone through the same rigmarole in London). Faith schools are definitely a seller's market in the UK at the moment. It actually makes my skin crawl having to jump through hoops like that, but I'm already finding principles get sacrificed pretty damn quick where your kids are involved.

 

[Scouse]

What sort of proof of communion and confirmation do you get? Lets face it - it's not as if the church is going to have a massive, easily checkable, sky-fairy database...

...is it?



Anyway. Forgery and deception of god-botherers FTW

 

[DaGaffer]

What sort of proof of communion and confirmation do you get? Lets face it - it's not as if the church is going to have a massive, easily checkable, sky-fairy database...

...is it?



Anyway. Forgery and deception of god-botherers FTW

Well, they have this:

 

[Raven]

It's not just about god though is it? Church is about community and group responsiblity - both of which are seriously lacking in modern day britain. We'd be a better country if we were all christians (or whatever), IMO. I'm not religious at all, btw.

Couldn't agree more. While I think religion itself is utter bullshit, some of the values are sound (on paper) except for the fact 99% of Christians are hypocrites who have absolutely no sense of empathy.

Fear of something greater is a good tool to control (keep in line) society.

 

[Turamber]

As an example, one of my best mates' wife won't talk to me. She's never actually spoken to me - but she's heard I'm anti-religion and has therefore decided I'm a "heathen" and not worth her time.

She maybe onto something

 

[Scouse]

Fear of something greater is a good tool to control (keep in line) society.

I disagree with the fundamental assertion that oppression is a "good" tool to control people. Using fear as a control mechanism for everyday life is, IMHO, probably counterproductive.

Well, they have this:

Oh I don't know Gaff, I'm sure you could stand the comfy chair for a few minutes without giving the game away

 

[Wij]

Couldn't agree more. While I think religion itself is utter bullshit, some of the values are sound (on paper) except for the fact 99% of Christians are hypocrites who have absolutely no sense of empathy.

Fear of something greater is a good tool to control (keep in line) society.

Which values are sound (on paper) ?

A large part of the Commandments are to do with protecting Jahweh's image from infringment

The old Bible is full of vile acts being committed by characters we are supposed to admire (e.g. Lot)

The Gospels have various tales of Jesus espousing a few hippy-ish truisms but they aren't very consistent. Jesus is seen as meek and humble in Mark, Matthew and Luke but a big-headed prick in John.

Paul's letters appear to completely throw out the old laws laid down to the Jews and espouse the view that Jesus freed everyone from them. All that's needed is belief in him. Except, of course, for the letters now believed to be later additions, like the one on women which is a jolly good sexist rant.

And Revelations, quite obviously, is gobbledigook.

How you can get any ideas of 'Christian Values' out of that is beyond me. The various churches just pick the bits they like and pretend the other stuff which contradicts it don't exist. But then they aren't Christain Values, they're a particular churches values.

Morality is a human construct not something from the sky.

 

[Scouse]

Morality is a human construct not something from the sky.

This

 

[ECA]

Uh oh, skygods gonna push your shit in now wij.

 

[Scouse]

Uh oh, skygods gonna push your shit in now wij.

Thought sodomy was illegal under christianity, under threat of very painful death in intricately contrived torture machines used to push the muslims out of Spain for having the wrong faith?

Or something?

 

[Raven]

I meant what they preach (not what most Christians actually practise)

Compassion
Empathy
Respect for property
Respect for human life
Respect for other peoples quality of life
Helping those in need

All 6 are what is lacking from society.

Obviously these aren't exclusive to religion and most of the time aren't carried out by most modern religious people, who these days only really use religion as a stick to beat people with.

I didn't mean on paper as in whats written in the bible, I meant in the context that on paper England are a good football team.

 

[Scouse]

All of the ideas above are "human" ideas, adopted by various churches and presented as the church's own ideas.

All humans love compassion, empathy, respect etc - how else would they have written the official church guide-books unless these ideas were already things that people had thought about?

 

[ECA]

Thought sodomy was illegal under christianity, under threat of very painful death in intricately contrived torture machines used to push the muslims out of Spain for having the wrong faith?

Or something?

I meant what they preach (not what most Christians actually practise)

Compassion
Empathy
Respect for property
Respect for human life
Respect for other peoples quality of life
Helping those in need

All 6 are what is lacking from society.

Obviously these aren't exclusive to religion and most of the time aren't carried out by most modern religious people, who these days only really use religion as a stick to beat people with.

I didn't mean on paper as in whats written in the bible, I meant in the context that on paper England are a good football team.

Stuff being unchristian never stopped god killing everyon except Noah or the whole fire and brimstone on Sodom and Gomorrah.

( Or the whole old testament part contradicting the hippy jesus ).

 

[Turamber]

Stuff being unchristian never stopped god killing everyon except Noah or the whole fire and brimstone on Sodom and Gomorrah.

( Or the whole old testament part contradicting the hippy jesus ).

New Testament and Old Testament are quite in harmony. A fair amount of the NT deals with future events where the earth will be judged and those that reject God and his standards will be destroyed.

The NT also shows that God was pretty tough with people who claimed to follow him (like Ananias and Saphira), just as he had been in the OT.

There are plenty of examples of God's mercy in the OT, but neither is Jesus a "hippy". Pontius Pilate calls him "the man" because of the punishment he endures. He also didn't shirk from calling a spade a spade when he had to.

All of the Gospels give different images of Jesus as they were each intended for a different audience, and the writers saw things from their own angle. If Jesus was just made up, or the Gospels had been anything but eye witness accounts, the writers would have made an effort to make their books even more similar than they are.

Anyhoo, the Bible says that man is made in God's image, so we have his moral standards in our being. Hence most reasonable people find murder abhorrent.

Oh, and whoever mentioned Lot needs to do some re-reading. The account clearly shows that his daughters got him drunk and their actions were not approved, they are shown in a bad light. But the Bible records good and bad, yet again an indicator of its truth and not otherwise.

 

[old.Tohtori]

the hippy jesus

Just wanted to point out that jesus was an anarchist, objecting to rule and law, against people ruling over people, trashed marketplaces etc

 

[Wij]

Oh, and whoever mentioned Lot needs to do some re-reading. The account clearly shows that his daughters got him drunk and their actions were not approved, they are shown in a bad light. But the Bible records good and bad, yet again an indicator of its truth and not otherwise.

Yes - shagging your daughters because they slipped you a few special brews is quite understandable.

Anyway, I wasn't referring to that. I was referring to him offering his daughters up for rape by the angry mob in preference to his guests.

The new testament (more correctly the Roman Bible imo) bit about judgement is, as I said, in Revelations, which is a bat-shit crazy nonsense ramble. It can be interpreted in any way you like much like Nostradamus' pointless brain-farts. The number of the beast was 616 by the way not 666. The version that the Septuagent made canon differs from the earliest versions found.

Anyhoo, the Bible says that man is made in God's image, so we have his moral standards in our being. Hence most reasonable people find murder abhorrent.

That's just assuming your conclusion. The meta-ethical position that morality comes from God has been demolished by Hume and Kant and such centuries ago.

Try the thought experiment that it has been incontravertably proven that God deems it right to chop the left hand off every first-born child. How would you respond to that ?

 

[Turamber]

Anyway, I wasn't referring to that. I was referring to him offering his daughters up for rape by the angry mob in preference to his guests.

So because you find something distateful it never happened? Or it proves the Bible is nonsense? I hope you never read any Roman or Byzantine histories.

His actions have more to do with the view of hospitality for strangers that people in that era had, and people reading that account would have been shocked at the actions of the Sodomites. However the times they are a-changing, and now calling for people to be sodomised is acceptable behaviour (/tongue in cheek).

The new testament (more correctly the Roman Bible imo) bit about judgement is, as I said, in Revelations, which is a bat-shit crazy nonsense ramble.

Revelations says it is written in signs itself, but other NT passages are eschatological in nature. Jesus was very clear about who wouldn't be in the Kingdom of God and Paul was even more explicit, hence the hatred for the man from homosexuals and others.

Try the thought experiment that it has been incontravertably proven that God deems it right to chop the left hand off every first-born child. How would you respond to that ?

Sophistry.

 

[Wij]

So because you find something distateful it never happened? Or it proves the Bible is nonsense? I hope you never read any Roman or Byzantine histories.

I never said that proved the bible was nonsense only that it is full of reprehensible characters.

Sophistry.

I'm very familiar with Sophistry and that isn't it.

Anyway, got to make dinner. Back later.

 

[mr.Blacky]

Using fear as a control mechanism for everyday life is, IMHO, probably counterproductive.

Fear of the repercussions is normal. Peer pressure is an example, or even how kids are raised.

Be nice or the boogey man will catch you, Santa sees if you are being nice or naughty etc etc.

 

[Turamber]

I never said that proved the bible was nonsense only that it is full of reprehensible characters.

Lots of books are, you have to remember the period the people lived in and the context of their actions.

By itself Basil II putting out the eyes of 99/100 Bulgarian soldiers and sending all 15,000 back to the Bulgarian Tsar was cruelty of the worst kind, but when read in context with other world leaders of the day and other battles it was par for the course.

 

[nath]

Not too keen to get in to a massive flamewar about this so I will do my utmost to keep thing totally rational.

Given the situation with Prop 8 over in the states, I watched a very interesting documentary about the American religious attitude to homosexuality and was interested to hear the attitude of a strongly religious Brit who clearly isn't a total moron (as far as I can make out anyway - so many of the yanks in the docu were just so).


So Turamber, if you're willing to discuss it, do you consider homosexual sex an abomination, how do you define "abomination" more explicitly and do you feel similarly about those that eat prawn cocktail sandwiches? I'll genuinely understand if you'd rather not get in to it and no hard feelings if that's the case.