God is not dead!

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MindOverMatter

God is not a police officer!!!

But doesn’t Jesus direct traffic here?

“Everyone who acknowledges me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father. But whoever denies me before others, I will deny before my heavenly Father.” Matthew 10:32-33

There are, in the end, only two directions to go: up or down. Heaven or Hell.

People choose Hell, and Jesus is showing them how to get there. But first he blows a warning whistle in Matthew and elsewhere. And not just for unbelievers. There are plenty of “believers” who say that believe but live their entire lives as if they do not. They are, in fact, atheists who are in denial of their own atheism.

Anybody who really believes in God may sin, but will not sin as if it is a way of life to be consummately desired.
 
What the church is or is not

A good question.

Until she speaks clearly, we can still admire her from a far even dearly
 
We don’t have a hierarchy sending down instructions from on high, we’re not political lobbyists, we’re Christians, free to make up our own minds. That’s kind of central to Baptists, btw.
This is a curious paradigm, inocente, that I’m pretty sure is illogical.

Can one be a Christian Baptist White Supremacist? Would he be allowed to preach in your church?

Can one be a Christian Baptist Polytheist? Would she be allowed to preach in your church?

Can one be a Christian Baptist Polygamist? Would he be allowed to preach in your church?

Can one be a Christian Baptist Homophobe? Would she be allowed to preach in your church?

:hmmm:
 
This is a curious paradigm, inocente, that I’m pretty sure is illogical.

Can one be a Christian Baptist White Supremacist? Would he be allowed to preach in your church?

Can one be a Christian Baptist Polytheist? Would she be allowed to preach in your church?

Can one be a Christian Baptist Polygamist? Would he be allowed to preach in your church?

Can one be a Christian Baptist Homophobe? Would she be allowed to preach in your church?

:hmmm:
If inocente is not disgusted by now, I can tell you I am.

Don’t abuse logic this way.
 
Inocente, I am shocked and amazed to see someone of your calibre sidestepping the points made by Charlemagne II and actually using moral relativity as an excuse for moral relativity!

What’s that phrase again about noodling around while Rome burns? 😃
It is rather obvious that the “noodling around” is the realm of those European countries who have abandoned their sense of morality. Yet you blame the Church! That’s back to front thinking. You are effectively approving the abolition of moral imperatives by secular governments. That is akin to accepting the rule of man made law over and above the Natural Law foundations of every nation state in Europe.
Heterosexuals are now immune to AIDS? Condoms are a sensible way to reduce STDs, sent from God as it were. Oh :doh2: forgot they’re also depraved and disordered.
Your answer to Charlemagne II reeks of sarcasm and bigotry. Do some homework and look up the failure rates of condoms. Playing with a loaded gun against such odds would get you locked up for insanity. Also look up the even higher failure rate amongst homosexuals. Then, extend your research a little further if you are able and look up the increasing degree of STDs amongst homosexuals. Try not to puke when you get to the incidence of intestinal worms amongst homosexual men. There are also available research figures to show that introducing condoms into populations actually pushes up unwanted pregnancy rates and STD rates.
Love the use of loaded words like perverts and sodomy. You’re going to install a camera in every bedroom to catch out consenting adults? That wouldn’t be just a little bit perverse?
Doesn’t the word “pervert” have any meaning with you anymore? Has your moral compass become so disordered? What about a man who molests little girls? Is that a perverted act? What about two consenting adults who abuse children in front of PC cameras for the gratification of others? Is that perverted? Or will it be the case that one day your moral senses will be so dulled that even those acts will be considered by you to be just another expression of the lifestyle desires of others? Sodomy, of course, refers to the practice of one man sticking his penis up another man’s elementary canal. You find that normal? You consider that to be a display of ‘love’? Next thing you’ll be Ok with similar displays of affection towards animals.
Exactly, how dare women want equal rights, how dare anyone free the slaves, these serfs are far too big for their boots. Or else that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom – and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. – Señor Abraham Lincoln
What has slavery got to do with one man shoving his sex organ up another man’s anus? Slavery was abolished according to Natural Law arguments which are enshrined in many of the Constitutions of western democracies. Natural Law also condemns homosexuality. Can you explain this dichotomy?
There is no damage to marriage or to the family in allowing two people of the same sex to get married. Rather, these citizens now have the ability to organize their lives according to marital and familial norms and demands. There is no threat to the institution of marriage, but precisely the opposite: this law recognizes and values marriage.
Precisely the opposite. Same sex marriage has devalued marriage. Trying to make same sex acts the same as heterosexual acts is trying to make unequal things equal. It is only one step away from making a man’s desire for a physical union with a canine ‘normal’. If you deny that, then you deny your own argument. Take a shot.
Aware that some people and institutions * profoundly disagree with this legal change, I wish to say that like other reforms to the marriage code that preceded this one, this law will not generate bad results, that its only consequence will be to avoid senseless suffering of human beings. A society that avoids senseless suffering of its citizens is a better society.*Then why do you allow seriously crippled people to live? Why do you allow people to be severely punished and made terribly unhappy by incarcerating them in prisons when all they have striven for is freedom!
In any case, I wish to express my deep respect to those people and institutions, and I also want to ask for the same respect for all of those who approve of this law. To the homosexuals that have personally tolerated the abuse and insults for many years, I ask that you add to the courage you have demonstrated in your struggle for civil rights, an example of generosity and joy with respect to all the beliefs. – Presidente José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, 2005
So you have an El Presidente who is a moral relativist, who went with popular opinion rather than show some moral courage and who has sold out Spain’s proud moral history. The shame is his. And yours. Earlier you quoted President Lincoln. He was a Natural Law trained lawyer. Do you think Lincoln would give a morally vaccuous man like Zapatero the time of day? recall what Lincoln said in his second Inaugration speech - "Woe unto the world because of offences! for it must needs be that offences come; but woe to that man by whom the offence cometh!"
Gay pride, 2005, celebrating same sex marriage law. Just to rub it in, the banner reads “SECULAR STATE!” Yea! Power to the people!
*You are confusing ‘secular’ with ‘immoral’. Hitler and Stalin were heads of secular states. Do you celebrate their reigns?

Don’t forget, Natural Law underpins Catholicism, so you can thank the Catholic Church for its continued development. The Church will stand firm while the citizens demand bread and circuses and the world produces emporers who willingly provide them.
 
Your answer to Charlemagne II reeks of sarcasm and bigotry. Do some homework and look up the failure rates of condoms. Playing with a loaded gun against such odds would get you locked up for insanity.
Indeed.

Any morally sane person who is infected with a virulent organism would never even think of injecting his lover with his seed, which is teeming with that deadly microbe. Even with a condom, which, of course, is not 100% effective.

I ask any pro-condom CAF member here: would you have relations with your lover if you were HIV+, using a condom?
 
This has been addressed already, but obviously you can’t do what you propose to do without understanding what Nietzsche meant when he said “God is dead.” I think part of what he meant was that God had been eviscerated, so to speak, that man could no longer really take God seriously, and so that man was now forced to become God himself, to fill that indispensable role. And that is in fact just what we see has happened in places like Spain, and in ‘Christians’ like inocente. The hollow gestures towards ‘God’ live on, but the reality is that ‘the people’ rule, morality is determined by democracy, and anyone who questions that is mocked and derided, as we see inocente doing.

inocente also effectively introduces the claim that “Catholicism is dead,” since it is out of step with the modern world. But of course that’s not at all evidence that Catholicism is dead and betrays his complete lack of understanding of what the Catholic Church fundamentally is. Of course, from our perspective, his sneering, mocking brand of bigotted ‘liberal’ Christianity is simply anti-Christian. But I think inocente is not so good in the critical thinking department, so he tends to completely ignore that (unless he is in fact not-so-inocente, and is in fact outright deshonesto).
Ah, Betterave old friend, we meet again. Boisterous as ever. Didn’t the mod close the last thread we were both on (feminism?) when someone, don’t remember who, got overly boisterous?

I was with you up to a point. Then you question my honesty, my sincerity, my Christianity, and call me a bigot.

Leaving aside this mock outrage you’re so darn fine at (and you, PR and everyone else should know by now I don’t go in for turf wars), no of course God is not dead, nor am I saying anything about Catholicism, but rather about the strange other-worldliness that seems to be consuming the RCC.

There are no Protestant churches to speak of in Spain, all Christ has is the RCC. It isn’t at all that folk here don’t still hold with Catholicism, they still talk as Catholics, they still spend months preparing for Holy Week processions. But each year there are fewer priests and fewer people going to Mass. Church is where you get married and have your funeral. All these are facts, look them up if you don’t believe me.

But I guess rather than dealing with unpalatable facts it’s easier to insult the messenger, put it all down to dark conspiracies of secularism and materialism, and go back to that nice cozy bubble.

A few months back Pope Benedict said condoms might not be quite as bad as spreading AIDS, that maybe condoms might be a first step on the road to morality. Accompanied of course by outrage for daring to be the slightest bit realistic. Geocentrism anyone?
 
Inocente, I am shocked and amazed to see someone of your calibre sidestepping the points made by Charlemagne II and actually using moral relativity as an excuse for moral relativity!
John, I am shocked and amazed to see someone of your caliber joining in a bar brawl.
It is rather obvious that the “noodling around” is the realm of those European countries who have abandoned their sense of morality. Yet you blame the Church! That’s back to front thinking. You are effectively approving the abolition of moral imperatives by secular governments. That is akin to accepting the rule of man made law over and above the Natural Law foundations of every nation state in Europe.
You must have missed the bit about two thirds of Spanish, in a mostly Catholic country, approving LGBT unions.
Your answer to Charlemagne II reeks of sarcasm and bigotry.
You must have missed the bit about two thirds of Spanish, in a mostly Catholic country, approving LGBT unions.
Doesn’t the word “pervert” have any meaning with you anymore?
You must have missed the bit about etc.
Natural Law also condemns homosexuality. Can you explain this dichotomy?
Yes, there are versions of natural law ethics which don’t condemn gays. It depends on the catalog of goods, and the decision about which goods are placed in the catalog is subjective. All other systems of ethics also involve subjectivity of course, but most don’t condemn homosexuality either. Without looking, the only system I remember that does is the Thomas Aquinas version of natural law.
If you deny that, then you deny your own argument. Take a shot.
Did you miss that was a quote from someone else?
Then why do you allow seriously crippled people to live? Why do you allow people to be severely punished and made terribly unhappy by incarcerating them in prisons when all they have striven for is freedom!
If some of this post seems a bit flippant it’s because of those kind of remarks. Plus you wrote a lot and I’m late for an appointment. Sorry.

Our president speaks of senseless suffering. Spain is a monarchy, the word president means president of the government, i.e. prime minister. Congress and the Senate both voted it through. Several other democracies have done the same. They regard biased treatment of citizens for no good reason to be senseless.
You are confusing ‘secular’ with ‘immoral’. Hitler and Stalin were heads of secular states. Do you celebrate their reigns?
John, I am shocked and amazed to see someone of your caliber joining in a bar brawl.
 
Please everyone, it may make you feel good to call others names, including apparently the entire populations of countries, but doesn’t exactly help anyone. Could you maybe pray over your next post first.

The thread is to do with the relevance of Christ compared with atheism. My contention is that Christ didn’t speak about gays or condoms, He just might prefer us to deal with drug abuse and other pressing issues instead. But more than that, Christ didn’t speak about creationism, evolution, first causes, geocentrism or a load of other things that are meaningless to everyday life, and the world will move on with or without any institution that gets itself sidetracked or stuck in amber.
 
Please everyone, it may make you feel good to call others names, including apparently the entire populations of countries, but doesn’t exactly help anyone. Could you maybe pray over your next post first.
:clapping:
The thread is to do with the relevance of Christ compared with atheism. My contention is that Christ didn’t speak about gays or condoms, He just might prefer us to deal with drug abuse and other pressing issues instead.
I once heard a dialogue on NPR (National Public Radio) between the head of the NAACP (can’t remember who it was at the time) and an objector who called in saying that the NAACP needed to focus on instead of

The NAACP leader responded with, “With all due respect, I believe that the NAACP is big enough to address both.” :tiphat:

On that vein, I would like to profess, “With all due respect, I believe that Catholicism is big enough to address both.” There need not be an either/or, or an “instead”. The Church in general, and we in particular here on the CAFs, are quite capable of addressing both. 🤷
But more than that, Christ didn’t speak about creationism, evolution, first causes, geocentrism or a load of other things that are meaningless to everyday life, and the world will move on with or without any institution that gets itself sidetracked or stuck in amber.
'Tis true that Christ did not speak about the above; that’s why he left us a Church. 🙂
 
Ah, Betterave old friend, we meet again. Boisterous as ever. Didn’t the mod close the last thread we were both on (feminism?) when someone, don’t remember who, got overly boisterous?
Honestly, I don’t remember either. (I do remember there was a rather overwraught woman involved who claimed to be a genius, despite the fact that she evidently had no grasp of basic critical thinking skills - maybe it was her - or was that a different thread? :))
I was with you up to a point. Then you question my honesty, my sincerity, my Christianity, and call me a bigot.
I’m not the only one who noticed and noted the bigotry you have put on display here. That you simply dismiss this charge is further evidence of its truth. 🤷
Leaving aside this mock outrage you’re so darn fine at (and you, PR and everyone else should know by now I don’t go in for turf wars), no of course God is not dead, nor am I saying anything about Catholicism, but rather about the strange other-worldliness that seems to be consuming the RCC.
Mock outrage? :confused: I’d hardly call it that.
You don’t go in for turf wars? I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean.
You think you can comment on the RCC without saying anything about Catholicism?? That seems not possible (so obviously not possible that to maintain that it is possible would seem to be…very strange, let’s just say).
There are no Protestant churches to speak of in Spain, all Christ has is the RCC. It isn’t at all that folk here don’t still hold with Catholicism, they still talk as Catholics, they still spend months preparing for Holy Week processions. But each year there are fewer priests and fewer people going to Mass. Church is where you get married and have your funeral. All these are facts, look them up if you don’t believe me.
Why would you think that I am unaware of these facts or that I wouldn’t believe you when you mentioned them? And what is the relevance?
But I guess rather than dealing with unpalatable facts it’s easier to insult the messenger, put it all down to dark conspiracies of secularism and materialism, and go back to that nice cozy bubble.
That’s a clever random hypocritical comment. :rolleyes:
A few months back Pope Benedict said condoms might not be quite as bad as spreading AIDS, that maybe condoms might be a first step on the road to morality. Accompanied of course by outrage for daring to be the slightest bit realistic. Geocentrism anyone?
Geocentrism que? (By “not getting into turf wars,” do you just mean that you always respond to criticisms of your views with random irrelevant comments, inexplicably, gratuitously dripping with idiotic condescension? 🤷 - FYI, I’m genuinely disgusted by this kind of behavior, I think it’s contemptible and sad; that’s different from outrage.)
 
Please everyone, it may make you feel good to call others names, including apparently the entire populations of countries, but doesn’t exactly help anyone. Could you maybe pray over your next post first.
Your hypocrisy is hilarious, inocente! “Yo, you people who live in bubbles and are consumed with conspiracy theories: stop calling me names, eh? Maybe you should, like, burst your geocentric little universe open and pray, you know?, before you make any more comments in response to my enlightened views about your Church and its moral teachings.” LOL! Good one, bud! Can you really not see your own hypocrisy here? Do you even care??

Our Father in heaven, deliver us from evil.
 
FYI, I’m genuinely disgusted by this kind of behavior, I think it’s contemptible and sad; that’s different from outrage.)
In what way do you think I’m bigoted? Because I chose to move to Spain knowing virtually everyone here is Catholic? Because I chose to post on CAF for the last twelve months? Because I don’t care two cents what religion or sexual orientation you have? :rolleyes:

Grief.

Feels good to have a whipping boy? Even though said whipping boy is just a bunch of pixels on the other side of the world? Be as pious and condescending as you like, gang up with your mates, whip me some more. Christ is beaming at you right now for your outpouring of love. :rolleyes:

Grief.

Completely ignore the topic of this thread. Completely ignore that the RCC is in crisis in Spain, just insult the messenger in as many ways as you can and the problem will magically go away, then you can get back to good old geocentrism, first causes, and all that other stuff that really matters. :rolleyes:
 
inocente

Completely ignore the topic of this thread. Completely ignore that the RCC is in crisis in Spain

The RCC is in crisis all over the world. So is Protestantism. Christianity has been in crisis mode since the crucifixion.

Exactly what is your point? That Baptists like yourself are going to save Christianity by caving in to moral relativism and the spread of sodomy? :confused:
 
In what way do you think I’m bigoted? Because I chose to move to Spain knowing virtually everyone here is Catholic? Because I chose to post on CAF for the last twelve months? Because I don’t care two cents what religion or sexual orientation you have? :rolleyes:

Grief.
Oh inocente, you’re so inocente, aren’t you? I think you’re bigoted because of the bigoted claims you make on these forums and your wildly irrational and closed-minded way of (not) responding to criticisms of those claims. Obviously it’s not for any of the dumb reasons you suggest!
Feels good to have a whipping boy? Even though said whipping boy is just a bunch of pixels on the other side of the world? Be as pious and condescending as you like, gang up with your mates, whip me some more. Christ is beaming at you right now for your outpouring of love. :rolleyes:
No it doesn’t feel good and no you’re not a whipping boy! You’re also certainly not just a bunch of pixels on the other side of the world! And I have not ganged up with my mates. What nonsense, really, almost everything you say: pure nonsense! I humbly submit to whatever judgment Christ has for me right now, but I speak to you in love with a clear conscience, inocente. Our Lord wants you to know the truth about yourself, and I am not making free-floating accusations about matters I am ignorant of; I am commenting on the plain truth as it lies before us in the closed-minded and irrational content and form of your posts here.
Completely ignore the topic of this thread. Completely ignore that the RCC is in crisis in Spain, just insult the messenger in as many ways as you can and the problem will magically go away, then you can get back to good old geocentrism, first causes, and all that other stuff that really matters. :rolleyes:
If I have actually done any of the things you have chosen to accuse me of here, please tell me where. I am sure I have not, and this is apparently just more of your idiotically condescending bigotry that is based on your desperately wanting to feel superior and not caring one whit about the truth. (Seriously? The geocentrism thing again? How can I possibly NOT take note of your dishonesty and bigotry, when your repeated pattern of behavior is so obviously dishonest and bigoted? 🤷)
 
8 When I say to the wicked, ‘O wicked man, you will surely die,’ and you do not speak out to dissuade him from his ways, that wicked man will die for his sin, and I will hold you accountable for his blood. 9 But if you do warn the wicked man to turn from his ways and he does not do so, he will die for his sin, but you will have saved yourself.

11 Say to them, ‘As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways! Why will you die, O house of Israel?’

Ezek. 33
 
t (and you, PR and everyone else should know by now I don’t go in for turf wars),
This is a nebulous reference. What’s a “turf war” as it pertains to CAFs discussions on Catholicism? :confused:

It *sounds *like an excuse to back away from any discussion in which you have no rebuttal. You can always say, “Ah, PR, I told you ‘I don’t go in for turf wars’, remember?”

Like with the very trenchant point I made in which I pointed out the illogic of your proclamation that your type of Christians are “free to make up their own minds”. Nonsense! You wouldn’t allow Fred Phelps to preach at your church. Of that I am certain.
 
John, I am shocked and amazed to see someone of your caliber joining in a bar brawl.
Ha! Sometimes you just have to intervene to save the inocente!!
You must have missed the bit about two thirds of Spanish, in a mostly Catholic country, approving LGBT unions.
No. My response was to your comments, not what two thirds of Spanish people think. After all, you said the words “perverts” and “sodomy”, as used by Charlemagne II were “loaded words”. In other words, you belittled the use of those words because you know full well that their true meanings make what two thirds of Spanish people have decided to accept rather distasteful.
You must have missed the bit about two thirds of Spanish, in a mostly Catholic country, approving LGBT unions.
Nice attempt at sidestepping once again. Because two thirds of Spanish people decide to make a wrong acceptable by law doesn’t alter the wrongness of that which they decide to accept. Nor does it make equal that which is, by nature, unequal.
You must have missed the bit about etc.
And this is your answer to me asking you * “Doesn’t the word “pervert” have any meaning with you anymore?” *Well, does it?
Yes, there are versions of natural law ethics which don’t condemn gays.
You made that one up!
It depends on the catalog of goods, and the decision about which goods are placed in the catalog is subjective
Natural Law is the only objective ethical system mankind has. If you think the contents of the “catologue of goods” are subjectively arrived at, then you have inadvertently condemned all science to the basket of subjectivity.
All other systems of ethics also involve subjectivity of course, but most don’t condemn homosexuality either.
All objective criteria describe homosexuality as disordered and certainly not normative.
Without looking, the only system I remember that does is the Thomas Aquinas version of natural law.
I think you are confusing Natural Law moral theory with Natural Law legal theory. The latter has divergent interpretations, whilst the former is committed only to the objectivity of moral norms.
Did you miss that was a quote from someone else?
Are you referring to our Abe Lincoln quote? Shame you didn’t read my response properly, because I provided another Abe Lincoln quote for your edification!
If some of this post seems a bit flippant it’s because of those kind of remarks. Plus you wrote a lot and I’m late for an appointment. Sorry.
My remarks weren’t flippant. What I did was give you a very Spanish example of the hypocrisy involved in giving certain ‘rights’ to one group of people, while denying certain ‘rights’ to another group of people The notion of “equality” is thus rendered to be little more than one of expediency.
Our president speaks of senseless suffering. Spain is a monarchy, the word president means president of the government, i.e. prime minister. Congress and the Senate both voted it through. Several other democracies have done the same. They regard biased treatment of citizens for no good reason to be senseless.
Senseless suffering!! Tell that to the Basques who have been brutalised for centuries. Meanwhile you have fallen for the propoganda that would have us believe that gays have “suffered” because they couldn’t “marry”. I still await an answer to my query about my intense suffering because I can’t marry my dog. After all, it’s just plain unfair!!
John, I am shocked and amazed to see someone of your caliber joining in a bar brawl.
And that’s your answer to my posting this - *“You are confusing ‘secular’ with ‘immoral’. Hitler and Stalin were heads of secular states. Do you celebrate their reigns?” *Inocente, you celebrate secualrism, yet are blind to what it can turn up and is turning up in society when objective morality is forgotten.

It’s a bar room brawl because you drink the bad grog, shoot from the hip, miss the target and instead blow out all the windows, shatter the bottles and even wound the bartender.

Meanwhile the rest of us lean on the bar casually drinking in perfect safety because you can’t shoot straight!! 😃
 
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