message board cutting down Catholics

[Ani_Ibi]

Oh this seems libellous to me:

Allen Lubeck: “Yes, he [the Pope] presently occupies the office of the Anti-Christ…”

Let me look up the definition of libel again, but this statement sure seems to cross some legal boundaries to me. Note the bald, unapologetic rhetoric which makes no attempt to seek common ground and makes no provision for the possibility of being incorrect or offensive. A more reasonable manner of phrasing this point of view would be something like:

“Yes, the Pope does occupy a position which could , in my opinion, be viewed as the Anti-Christ.”

But oh no. Whatever comes out of their mouths is delivered as though it were pure unadulterated truth not subject to discussion at all.

It seems from the thread that no reference is given for who the priest is or what exactly he said or from what radio station he spoke. Am I surprised? Of course not. Poor scholarship and poor manners from the likes of that website is not surprising at all.

 

[kamz]

Sir Knight, my friend Mary posted many times but she just got so washed out, she was just emotional and people were private messaging her with very nasty hurtful comments so she is done and I don’t blame her, how do these people claim to be christian but they do things like that? What about love thy neighbor? They don’t even know what that means, very sad.

 

[Kevin_Walker]

kamz:

I just was lurking myself, it makes me sick, now some ex clergy is backing up that Catholics are not christians, um, like he doesn’t have a huge bone to pick with Catholics, great.

Like some say, there’s nothing worse than an ex-alcoholic, so it seems there’s nothing worse than an ex-Priest. There’s a major Boston newspaper here which has an ex-Catholic Priest as one of its writers, and all he does is scathe the Church every-chance-he-gets!

So it is a matter of allowing the ex to give himself enough rope to hang himself. Let him rant away until you find an inconsistency in his screed, then confront him with it.

 

[Ani_Ibi]

kamz:

…Mary posted many times but…people were private messaging her with very nasty hurtful comments

There is no way I would tolerate hurtful comments being sent to me by private message. What? The posters didn’t have the guts to post these things in the main forum? No, I would copy and post their exact words onto the main forum, point out the error in the spirit and form of their messages, and request an apology. This nastiness should not be given sanctuary in the private messaging feature of any forum.

Someone tried to do that to me on another board. I copied their exact words to the moderator and the person was banned.

I haven’t looked at my material on libel yet, but I think a third party has to be privy to the offending statement. In any case, my tendency in all of this is in accordance with Matt 10:14:
“Whoever will not receive you or listen to your words – go outside that house or town and shake the dust from your feet.”

I am grieved that Mary got washed out. Mary is a first-rate apologist. May God restore her to peace and joy. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

 

[Lilyofthevalley]

Kamz, I don’t see the difference between that board and some of The Catholics, here, who start endless threads bashing Protestants. I ,also, don’t see the difference between that board and the snide little quotes on these forums about Protestants.

 

[RomanRiteTeen]

…-twitch- Ehrm, in order to protect my youthful appearance from the scathing remarks of Fundamentalists, I’m just going to watch.

 

[Lisa4Catholics]

Lilly, with all due respect,the instances where the sarcasm comes in is usually after hateful attacks that are continue after explaining the faith,bringing scripture forth for defense,yet it continues.Michaelp is NOT one of those attackers and although he doesn’t agree with everything we believe, he debates we debate(I am not a good debator but put my 2 cents in) and we have a mutual love and repect for each other.I do not think we should be doormats for attacks:nope:

 

[A_Chaoidh]

You may want to consider Defense of the Faith with pagans :ehh: . Yes, I stumbled upon this “interesting” site today,

p205.ezboard.com/bpagansrus

Interesting in that Catholicism is a popular topic in the “all religions” room. As a Christian they don’t want us posting elsewhere. If you want to see some distortions of the Truth, this is a real eye opener.

Oremus!

 

[Peace-bwu]

p207.ezboard.com/fdiscussingreformationfrm2.showMessage?topicID=789.topic

if any of you are interested in defending the Catholic faith this message board I found is so confused about Catholics that it simply sickens me, they are saying that Catholics worship the Pope, Mary, dead people, the saints, rosary beads and that we are all doomed.
in particular one messager named grahame feels it is his duty to save the Catholics or their souls will be lost
Just wanted all the Catholics who want to defend our faith know about this, its sad how really confused these people are about us.

Unfortunately, they probably don’t care what we have to say because they won’t believe us, they choose to believe lies. It is a noble cause to defend the Church and maybe it will help people who are honestly misinformed about the Catholic Church, but I would be willing to guess many of those involved know they are spreading hate and prejudice and don’t care because they enjoy scandal and feeling like the “God loves me more, I have a job to do” kind of self riteous feeling. This is the kind of mentality one encounters in hate groups like the KKK (also anti-catholic)
Anyone who feels called to defend the Church to these idiots, God bless!
From personal experience with other forums like this, I woudl guess they will edit you out and kick you off the site.

 

[Peace-bwu]

One tip I could give you when debating on sites like this is to write a list of Catholic Truths, some short paragraph long apologetics tidbits. Write several about Mary, the pope, etc. etc. and save them in a file so that you can save alot of time and heartache by doing the research first (make sure you have Bible quotes for EVERYTHING and then you can have prewritten intelligent replies that you wrote ahead of time and can just cut and paste. There are times when you will need to write something fresh depending on the conversation, but for the most part, this will make you more prepared and help you to waste less time and cut down on becomming upset.

I hope this helps, it seems like alot of work but you will always have your Forum debate file to use from site to site.

Say someone says “Catholics worship Mary.”
You can say "Actually that is a common misconception, please do some research and then paste the correct prewritten information. You wont’ miss a beat!
God Bless

 

[Peace-bwu]

One tip I could give you when debating on sites like this is to write a list of Catholic Truths, some short paragraph- long apologetics tidbits. Write several about Mary, the pope, etc. etc. and save them in a file so that you can save alot of time and heartache by doing the research first (make sure you have Bible quotes for EVERYTHING and then you can have prewritten intelligent replies that you wrote ahead of time and can just cut and paste. There are times when you will need to write something fresh depending on the conversation, but for the most part, this will make you more prepared and help you to waste less time and cut down on becomming upset.

I hope this helps, it seems like alot of work but you will always have your Forum debate file to use from site to site.
When someone says “Catholics worship Mary.”
You can say "Actually that is a common misconception, please do some research and then paste the correct prewritten information. You wont’ miss a beat!
God Bless

 

[Ani_Ibi]

Lilyofthevalley:

Kamz, I don’t see the difference between that board and some of The Catholics, here, who start endless threads bashing Protestants. I ,also, don’t see the difference between that board and the snide little quotes on these forums about Protestants.

Does that mean you are opening to seeing the difference? Let’s see if you are…

First of all, I am relatively new to this board. Please give me four examples of Protestant-bashing threads. It may indeed be true that some of us have crossed the boundaries of charity, reasonable discourse, and good taste. If that is the case, you are perfectly justified in objecting. But please give us the opportunity of examining which threads and posts you object to.

If it is a case of Catholics posting material with which you merely disagree or which casts a particular Protestant apologetic as unsound, then that is fair comment and must be allowed to stand. If you are unhappy with this, then it is contingent upon you to find arguments which successfully defeat that particular Catholic apologetic. If, after searching your heart, soul, and mind and after praying for guidance, you cannot find such arguments, then it is reasonable for you to consider the possibility that the particular Catholic apologetic in question is sound.

Moreover, on this thread, several of us have been sharing horror stories about our experiences on Protestant boards. If anything, I have understated my particular experiences. I have listed above the methodology used by some Protestants – not to argue against Catholic positions – but to sidestep them, reword them inaccurately, limit their scope without first negotiating this limitation, and so on. To the extent, at times, of actually ceasing to comment on the commentary but instead trashing the individual making the commentary.

The Baptist website being discussed on this thread has posts on it which make frighteningly bald and unsubstantiated claims about Catholic practices and beliefs. Not only are they bald and unsubstantiated, but they are false and injurious.

Let us back up a moment. Discussion normally has more than one side. Regardless of how strongly one feels that one’s own position is correct, it is critical that one consider the validity of the opposing position. This operates to allow the possibility (a) that one is in error completely, (b) that one is in error partially and thus able to be corrected or to have one’s truth enlarged, and (c) that both participants can leave the discussion in the spirit of friendship instead of seriously offended and wounded from the encounter and never wanting to speak to each other again.

We are human. Whether we disagree as Protestant and Catholic is not the point. It is obvious that we do. Show me where Jesus asks that we be rude to each other or that we employ any of the methodology I have listed in my previous post. Rather than automatically making the counter claim about Catholics indulging in Protestant-bashing (without even considering the specific problems being discussed in this thread), please go to the website and read for yourself to what exact, specific behaviour we refer.

 

[Ani_Ibi]

Lilyofthevalley:

Kamz, I don’t see the difference between that board and some of The Catholics, here, who start endless threads bashing Protestants. I ,also, don’t see the difference between that board and the snide little quotes on these forums about Protestants.

Does that mean you are opening to seeing the difference? Let’s see if you are…

First of all, I am relatively new to this board. Please give me four examples of Protestant-bashing threads. It may indeed be true that some of us have crossed the boundaries of charity, reasonable discourse, and good taste. If that is the case, you are perfectly justified in objecting. But please give us the opportunity of examining which threads and posts you object to.

If it is a case of Catholics posting material with which you merely disagree or which casts a particular Protestant apologetic as unsound, then that is fair comment and must be allowed to stand. If you are unhappy with this, then it is contingent upon you to find arguments which successfully defeat that particular Catholic apologetic. If, after searching your heart, soul, and mind and after praying for guidance, you cannot find such arguments, then it is reasonable for you to consider the possibility that the particular Catholic apologetic in question is sound.

Moreover, on this thread, several of us have been sharing horror stories about our experiences on Protestant boards. If anything, I have understated my particular experiences. I have listed above the methodology used by some Protestants – not to argue against Catholic positions – but to sidestep them, reword them inaccurately, limit their scope without first negotiating this limitation, and so on. To the extent, at times, of actually ceasing to comment on the commentary but instead trashing the individual making the commentary.

The Baptist website being discussed on this thread has posts on it which make frighteningly bald and unsubstantiated claims about Catholic practices and beliefs. Not only are they bald and unsubstantiated, but they are false and injurious.

Let us back up a moment. Discussion normally has more than one side. Regardless of how strongly one feels that one’s own position is correct, it is critical that one consider the validity of the opposing position. This operates to allow the possibility (a) that one is in error completely, (b) that one is in error partially and thus able to be corrected or to have one’s truth enlarged, and (c) that both participants can leave the discussion in the spirit of friendship instead of seriously offended and wounded from the encounter and never wanting to speak to each other again.

We are human. Whether we disagree as Protestant and Catholic is not the point. It is obvious that we do. Show me where Jesus asks that we be rude to each other or that we employ any of the methodology I have listed in my previous post. Rather than automatically making the counter claim about Catholics indulging in Protestant-bashing (without even considering the specific problems being discussed in this thread), please go to the website and read for yourself to what exact, specific behaviour we refer.

 

[kamz]

Lily of the Valley,

The difference is that on this forum you get warned for poor behavior or the thread is shut down and if you keep on acting up you get suspended on this baptist forum they seem to encourage their baptists members to cut Catholics down and say nasty things but if the Catholic visitor says anything they are blocked, now that is all I’m saying is unfair, I’ve seen threads closed very fast on this board, the moderators are pretty good at keeping a close eye on things and they are willing to listen if you have a complaint.
Thats the difference

 

[Cairisti]

First of all, I commend all those who have been able to go on those boards and try to set the record straight. All of you have done great! pats you all on the back

I find those kind of sites rather like a train wreck. They are horrible, but you just can’t help but looking. For health reasons, I have had to stop going to lurk at some of the more venimous ones (formercatholicsforchrist - for one) - the ole blood pressure tends to shoot through the roof! The several Baptist ones just make me more convinced that I’ve made the right decision to leave the denomination of my childhood. The hatred just turns my stomach.

In response to Lilly, as someone who was raised Baptist (and technically is until Easter 2006), I have found the treatment of protestants here more compassionate, though spirited than the treatment of Catholics on protestant boards.If a Protestant comes here and doesn’t have “an agenda”, but is sincere, they will be treated well. The same is rarely the case from what I’ve witnessed on the other side. (And if a Protestant comes here with an agenda, they get what they deserve imho. )

 

[kamz]

Exactly, the train wreck is right on, you don’t want to look but you do, I keep lurking and when I do I get just horrified and what else is being said and then I’m like “why did you look, uhg!!!”
I just wish I could shake those people and say what is wrong with you? Where is your brain? Believe me when I had wondered away from God in my teens someone basically said that very thing to me “What are you doing, use your brain” and it worked
I just keep praying for these very misguided people, my gosh, it is very hard to love them when they hate us so much but I have to keep telling myself, they are Gods children too over and over and over.

 

[bobsmith]

Guys-we have to stay aware that 99% of Protestants are just like us in our beliefs,we dont agree but do respect eachother.Those sites,and their users,are the Right Wingers (I dont mean that in the political sense,so please no flak)who can’t and won’t adjust their agenda in any way.we can learn from them in NOT showing such intolerance and remaining true to Christs teachings.We can give respect and love,maybe they dont understand that about us and the MAJORITY of Protestents.

 

[kamz]

thank you for letting us know that bobsmith, that makes a difference for me and I do feel better about this whole thing, it puts it in a whole different light, thanks for helping remind me of this, I appreciate it
Peace to you

 

[Sir_Knight]

kamz:

Sir Knight, my friend Mary posted many times but she just got so washed out, she was just emotional and people were private messaging her with very nasty hurtful comments so she is done and I don’t blame her, how do these people claim to be christian but they do things like that? What about love thy neighbor? They don’t even know what that means, very sad.

Can you forward those PMs to me? I have a plan for what to do with them.

By the way, your friend Mary has done an EXCELLENT job. If she ins’t a member here, please invite her to join. She is definitely an asset when it comes to this type of stuff.

 

[Ani_Ibi]

bobsmith:

Those sites,and their users,are the Right Wingers (I dont mean that in the political sense,so please no flak)who can’t and won’t adjust their agenda in any way.

Are you saying that all Protestants who do not identify themselves as being ‘right wing’ are people who can and will adjust their agenda? If so, I disagree. Here is the exception:

I have seen a particularly subtle and self-aggrandized group of Protestants ruthlessly spam the boards with trollers on homosexuality and on genesis/creation as a means to to foster supposedly Protestant agenda which, upon examination, turned out to be individual agenda. This group cultivated a clatch of groupies looking for a place to call virtual home and labelled them fundamentalists (even though their own views were equally fundamentalist). As soon as the moderators turned up the heat, the group cut their groupies loose without even a second thought. But did not adjust their own agenda one iota. Not nice.

The weakness of protestantism, in my opinion, is that while claiming to protest the hierarchy and authority of the Catholic Church, it unwittingly creates conditions for an untempered ghost hierarchy and authority of individual over individual without adequate checks and balances.

In good faith, however, I think what you are suggesting is that:

a) There is no merit in only looking for flaws in each other’s faiths and conversely there is much merit in looking for strengths;

b) there are extremists in every faith (and yes we have our right-wing as well, although their views are not supported by the Church)

c) most folk are not extremists but instead are people who are at least of good common sense and good will

OK. If that’s what you can agree to, then I can agree to it as well and we have some common ground.