WHO WANTS THEIR COUNTRY TO BE CHRISTIAN?
When you believe in something you lose freedom in
the sense that it will lead to limits. If you believe the world will end
tomorrow that will ruin today. It is not surprising that many countries do not
want to be called Christian for the values of liberty and equality and
fraternity are what they value most.
Re President Higgins of Ireland not mentioning Christ in his 2013 Christmas
Message
The President obviously was trying to avoid offending Jews, Muslims and
unbelievers and in the process offended Catholics by omitting Christ from the
Christmas message.
The reality is that though many Jews and Muslims and unbelievers would not be
offended if he had mentioned Christ but some would. The question is not "Are
they offended?" but, "Should they be if they understand and follow their
religion correctly?" Unless that question is dealt with people will only make a
hypocritical dogs dinner of inter religious respect. They will exude the
following message: "If you are not offended good and if you are I do not care.
Christ is god and if that offends you then tough".
The reality is that religions disagree with one another. For a Muslim, God
strongly disapproves of Christ being honoured as God. The Jew does not accept
that Jesus really was the Son of God and Messiah. The atheist sees Christmas as
honouring a man who he considers to be an ordinary man and a false god. Atheists
actually condemn Jesus' teaching about Hell as objectively (and too often
subjectively) vindictive and his rule of love the sinner and hate the sin as
underhanded hatred of the person and accuse him of failing to do anything to
really help anybody and they put down the miracle stories as mythical displays
of power - they see Jesus feeding the starving as laziness for he did a miracle
to feed them and did not raise money for them. They do not seem him as a valid
role model. Airbrushing the problems between different faiths and philosophies
is itself a form of intolerance. Another form of intolerance is saying that a
good spiritual organisation is a religion and a fanatical or bad one is not.
That refuses to admit a religion even a bad one is a religion. It is intolerance
to call it what it isn't or not to call it what it is. The religions question
each other. Questioning means challenging as opposed to asking. Look at the
reality and then look for solutions to the problems. Certain doctrines such as
airbrushing harmful religion by pretending that all religions are the same or as
good as each other debunk themselves and do not help. Usually a violent religion
is judged by those who claim to be members and who have no time for violence
which is unfair. The religion is violent and they are disobedient - period.
Nothing is to be gained by calling those who obey the religion extremists.
Airbrushing is itself a form of fundamentalism that ignores the truth and
opposes it and criticises those who see through it as threats to "tolerance" and
even makes out they are bigots.
Response to a commentator on the Irish Independent Article who claims to be
Catholic while voting for anti-Catholic policies and is writing on the topic of
how Labour in Ireland promises to promote the right of children who are not
baptised to an education while they are currently being discriminated against in
Catholic Schools
Pope Leo XIII : "The practice of the Church has always been the same, as is
shown by the unanimous teaching of the Fathers, who were wont to hold as outside
Catholic communion, and alien to the Church, whoever would recede in the least
degree from any point of doctrine proposed by her authoritative Magisterium."
(Satis Cognitum, 30).
It is just commonsense that every religion has hypocrites who claim to be
genuine members when by their actions and their lies and their beliefs they show
they cannot be. A person who enables a religion he thinks is cherry-picking and
who cherry-picks is making an idol out of religious structures and is not a
servant of a God of truth. Truth is truth. You accept it or you do not. Truth is
not about you. So picking and choosing is not an option. A religion made up by
man is not a good thing - it is intrinsically hypocritical and corrupt. It is
man pretending or imagining that his rules and ideas came from God when they did
not. A cherry-picker like the fundamentalist is the kind of person that creates
dogmas that they won't change for they don't care about the truth or what
evidence says. Religions refusing to fix their teachings when they are proven
wrong is the reason for the religious discord and suspicion that is rife between
different religions and factions within religions. The good is often the enemy
of the best and human nature loves to invent a good that suits itself and which
so often can pass for the real thing.
It is not up to you to decide if you are really Catholic. It is supposed to be
up to Jesus Christ. It is supposed to be up to the Church that represents him
and it must assess in a rational way. A religion cannot function if it does not
have set rules and doctrines that identify it which means that people become
another religion if they have major disagreements with those rules and
teachings. You have no right to deceive people by trying to make out that your
social liberalism is Catholic. The teachings against divorce and same sex
marriage and homosexuality are core teachings for marriage is as much the
foundation of the Church as the notion that Jesus is God.
And for the record I am not a believer and if I am labelled Catholic that is
only a man-made label and is only a word. If religion causes war and discord,
religious labels are better at it. Religion and society in so far as labels are
encouraged is to blame.
Nicky Morgan and Britain being a Christian Country
Nicky Morgan and Britain being a Christian Country: On Morgan calling Britain a
Christian Country
I don't think Britain even claims to be a Christian country any more! To be
Christian you have to conform to a standard which for many means believing the
Bible. Otherwise the word Christian can mean anything!
Morgan probably does not really know what she is talking about. But you would
expect her to know that the bible Jesus upheld scriptures as from God that
endorsed the stoning of gay people to death. That seems to be fairly common
knowledge.
Read http://www.equip.org/articles/killing-the-canaanites/ which shows that
Christianity today condones all the murdering done and commanded by God in the
past. The religion might be non-violent in some nations, but it is not
non-violent in how it approves fanaticism. I would prefer to be taught atheism
in school than that sick tripe.
The Telegraph's Tim Stanley writes that atheists should be glad to be living
in a Christian country like the UK and stop complaining
My problem as an atheist with Christianity is that though people claiming to be
Christian tend to have a very humanistic approach to life, they are
cherry-picking. The reality is that the consistent Christian will rant and rave
religion like Jesus did and praise God for decreeing murder by stoning in the
Old Testament. It's about the principle. And Stanley, stop trying to make out the
Militant Atheists are irrationally hating a God they think does not exist. It is
not about hating God as such. It is about hating a belief that ignores science
in their view and thus endangers it.
Re: Pickles saying Britain is a Christian nation and militant atheists will
just have to accept it - Telegraph 2014
Accept that Britain is a Christian nation?
Mr Pickles forgets that the New Testament warns about religious labels. The
Jewish leaders of Jesus' day were not very bad people - Jesus himself said they
were religious and prayed a lot and fasted a lot and would make huge sacrifices
to get converts - but Jesus still said they were not really Jews for they were
not holy enough and were really hypocrites. The Bible says that only somebody
who is miraculously changed inside into one who has faith without reservations
and without cherry-picking is a real Christian. And as nobody can see the heart
but God it is up to God if he exists to judge who is a Christian and not the
census or the government or Mr Pickles. It is easy to call yourself a Christian
while showing no signs of a Christian faith. Labels can demean or hide the truth
about what you really are. Pickles is really trying to get special rights for
those who claim to be Christian. It's dishonest.
Context - Kay saying that the United State constitution was formulated under
Bible influence and thus that the USA is not a secular nation
Kay said, "Our Constitution has always looked to the scriptures for its guidance
and its columns and its foundations and its leanings, its underpinnings." He
lies because it is more accurate to say that it may have looked at some of the
scriptures. The Bible does not agree with itself. Kay implies it is good and
wholesome whole but it is not. He thus insults the people in the Bible who were
murdered because of its prophets and its God. For example, the homosexuals who
Leviticus commanded to be stoned to death.
Tory MP saying drag queen Conchita Wurst won Eurovision because of votes
from "trendy intellectuals"
He didn't mean it that way but it is a compliment to the LGBT community to hear
that it was intellectuals backed Conchita. Only bigots and fools believe in
hating or criticising the behaviour of somebody who is doing no harm. It is also
important to remember that if religion is behind the bigotry, that religion is
man-made and though the state may have to respect different beliefs, the state
must be careful to avoid reasoning, "We must legislate in accordance with those
beliefs in case they really are revealed by God". Secularism cannot allow that.
Mel a journalist said that atheists need to stop criticising the Christians
for the Christians are at the forefront of providing essential services such as
health and education to the people unlike the atheists
Mel you should live in my area where people who have little or no interest in
religion do all the community work. I personally resent the amount of money that
the parish has sitting doing nothing and how the clergy are into charm and
comfort but never actually do anything. I have seen the harm done in my
community from the Christian belief that faith is a choice and you must never
change the principles of your faith such as opposition to abortion even if it
saves the mother's life. Think of the long-term damage.
