S
- Status
R
RonTheNewJew
Guest
Sedonaman,
Would it be convincing to you if a leading member of the Warren Commission, in 1995, some 12 years before he died, admitted to a government JFK Assassination Records Review Board that he had lied to the Commission, and to the American people about the most important wound, the one on President Kennedy’s back?
The Review Board had obtained from the National Archives in Washington, 40,000 pages of Gerald R. Ford’s hand-written Warren Commission notes that detailed how he ordered the Commission’s medical illustrator to “move upward by several inches the wound on President Kennedy’s back, from where it appeared in the autopsy photographs”. That was the wound that the Commission used in order to blame Lee Oswald for the JFK assassination. Gerald Ford had been a leading member of the Warren Commission and admitted that he was the member who chose which witness testimonies to be incuded in the Warren Commission Report, and which ones were not included.
Ford’s admission made the entire point that the Commission lied to the American people.
An innocent man, Lee H. Oswald, was murdered when he told the Dallas Police that he was “just a patsy.” He was murdered by a man who knew about the JFK assassination plot ahead of time. On film, Jack Ruby told reporters that he had been set up to kill Lee Oswald.
Ruby called in to the Dallas Police Department the night before he shot Oswald on nation al TV, and told them that if they moved Oswald to the County Jail, “we will kill him.”
The officer who took Ruby’s phone call reported it to his superiors who chose not to believe it or change the time of the Oswald visit
Would it be convincing to you if a leading member of the Warren Commission, in 1995, some 12 years before he died, admitted to a government JFK Assassination Records Review Board that he had lied to the Commission, and to the American people about the most important wound, the one on President Kennedy’s back?
The Review Board had obtained from the National Archives in Washington, 40,000 pages of Gerald R. Ford’s hand-written Warren Commission notes that detailed how he ordered the Commission’s medical illustrator to “move upward by several inches the wound on President Kennedy’s back, from where it appeared in the autopsy photographs”. That was the wound that the Commission used in order to blame Lee Oswald for the JFK assassination. Gerald Ford had been a leading member of the Warren Commission and admitted that he was the member who chose which witness testimonies to be incuded in the Warren Commission Report, and which ones were not included.
Ford’s admission made the entire point that the Commission lied to the American people.
An innocent man, Lee H. Oswald, was murdered when he told the Dallas Police that he was “just a patsy.” He was murdered by a man who knew about the JFK assassination plot ahead of time. On film, Jack Ruby told reporters that he had been set up to kill Lee Oswald.
Ruby called in to the Dallas Police Department the night before he shot Oswald on nation al TV, and told them that if they moved Oswald to the County Jail, “we will kill him.”
The officer who took Ruby’s phone call reported it to his superiors who chose not to believe it or change the time of the Oswald visit
S
sedonaman
Guest
Did you read the article in my link?
R
RonTheNewJew
Guest
Sedonaman,
I read the link.
The problem is that the eyewitnesses and news reporters on film in the reports that were coming out that very day, September 11, 2001. said that, at the time just before the buildings came down, they all heard “loud explosions from beneath both buildings.”
Those reports were taken off their air, permanently, that day. WHY?
The initial photographs of the Pentagon after it was attacked, showed a hole way too small to fit into it a Boeing 757 jetliner. WHY? And no wing pieces. No bodies or body parts. Why?
Films taken that day that show one of the jet airliners (if that is what it really was) with a very obvious pod hanging below it. One such airliner, the one that hit the North Tower, had NO windows on it, as reported by a news reporter, and that is on film also. Ever heard of a jetliner with NO windows anywhere on it?
Read up in a search engine under “Operation Northwoods.” A Pentagon plan to have Cuban-Americans, dressed like Cuban Fir Force pilots, and flying repainted US WW11 bombers to bomb and kill enough Americans such that President Kennedy would be forced to invade, and take over Cuba and rid the world of Fidel Castro. Thank God, Kennedy turned it down. This was in late 1962, just after the Cuban missile crisis.
The type of operation we’re talking about here is what is called a “red-flag operation.”
I read the link.
The problem is that the eyewitnesses and news reporters on film in the reports that were coming out that very day, September 11, 2001. said that, at the time just before the buildings came down, they all heard “loud explosions from beneath both buildings.”
Those reports were taken off their air, permanently, that day. WHY?
The initial photographs of the Pentagon after it was attacked, showed a hole way too small to fit into it a Boeing 757 jetliner. WHY? And no wing pieces. No bodies or body parts. Why?
Films taken that day that show one of the jet airliners (if that is what it really was) with a very obvious pod hanging below it. One such airliner, the one that hit the North Tower, had NO windows on it, as reported by a news reporter, and that is on film also. Ever heard of a jetliner with NO windows anywhere on it?
Read up in a search engine under “Operation Northwoods.” A Pentagon plan to have Cuban-Americans, dressed like Cuban Fir Force pilots, and flying repainted US WW11 bombers to bomb and kill enough Americans such that President Kennedy would be forced to invade, and take over Cuba and rid the world of Fidel Castro. Thank God, Kennedy turned it down. This was in late 1962, just after the Cuban missile crisis.
The type of operation we’re talking about here is what is called a “red-flag operation.”
S
sedonaman
Guest
But I guess you missed the point.
There will always be scientifically unanswerable questions about any tragic event, especially one of a large scale. And the inability of science to answer them all is evidence of a conspiracy? Apparently so, because to say that is the same as saying the lack of evidence is now evidence. It’s the job of the advocate to prove his theory, and not the job of the one who questions his theory to prove him wrong.
Be that as it may, I think this report addresses most, if not all, of your questions anyway.
R
RonTheNewJew
Guest
Well, let’s say that if, as was the case with both the Kennedy assassination, and the 9/11 attacks, the Government was/is saying that what they have said about both, as “fact,” have no “facts” with which to back up their claims, and the conspiracists produce massive evidence which the Government admits it cannot account for, and cannot argue, using facts on film and in witness testimony as the conspiracists possess, to argue it’s own case, then that, by definition means that something very different than the Government has stated, actually happened.
Let me give you an example: Dealey Plaza bystander with a color home movie camera, Orville Nix, filmed the north side of Elm Street, including the entire “grassy knoll” area, and 24 years afler the shots were fired that Friday afternoon, late in November, 1963,
British computer digital enhancement experts discovered a figure, long known to be in the film of the assassination, a figure, which, after it was enlarged, and the pixels enlarged enough to almost encapsulate the entire film, frame by frame, they discovered that the figure was that of a man, holding a rifle after just having fired it.
See YouTube Rare Version of Nix Film. You can even see that the man is talking, apparently into a microphone located somewhere on his clothing. The fact that the figure had been there from the beginning. I went back into my documentary films of the event, and found that indeed the figure was there and had been for many years. I just had no idea what it was, although at the beginning of the Nix film, it appeared to make a quick move.
Let me give you an example: Dealey Plaza bystander with a color home movie camera, Orville Nix, filmed the north side of Elm Street, including the entire “grassy knoll” area, and 24 years afler the shots were fired that Friday afternoon, late in November, 1963,
British computer digital enhancement experts discovered a figure, long known to be in the film of the assassination, a figure, which, after it was enlarged, and the pixels enlarged enough to almost encapsulate the entire film, frame by frame, they discovered that the figure was that of a man, holding a rifle after just having fired it.
See YouTube Rare Version of Nix Film. You can even see that the man is talking, apparently into a microphone located somewhere on his clothing. The fact that the figure had been there from the beginning. I went back into my documentary films of the event, and found that indeed the figure was there and had been for many years. I just had no idea what it was, although at the beginning of the Nix film, it appeared to make a quick move.
P
Phil_Stone
Guest
Personally I’ll take Thomas Jefferson over William Rehnquist every day of the week. It sounds as if it is “useless” for Justice Rehnquist because he cannot twist it to his ideology.
More to the point, Jesus told us to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. Well we all want to be free to follow our own faith.( The Church sure seems to think that is important when the freedom of Catholics is in question in other countries.) Well my neighbors happen to be various flavors of Christians and Jews, Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Buddists, And my kids go to school with all of their kids. When someone says that “We have to make things more Christian,” my kids see that as an attack on the constitutional freedoms of their friends and their families. They see such “Christians” as their enemy as well. They love their neighbors. A lot of people could take a lesson from these kids.
Garry Wills’ book on the history of Religion in America makes an excellant case for freedom actually helping the cause of religion, in particular, people tend to be more spiritually religious in places where there is no state religion. And he offers the reminder that were it not for the seperation of Church and State, Catholics would never have been welcome in America, as they were seen as a threat to freedom and Democracy.
Some of the posts above demonstrate why. To some, society is doomed because it refuses to simply accept The Church’s Authority. Many descendants of the victims of the Church’s worst abuses (Historical and Contemporary) will never accept that authority.
Others point out that it is sometimes people voting for who their Bishop endorses that creates or perpetuates the problems. Catholics cant blame Bush/Cheyney on the Protestants when so many BIshops told their people to vote for them. You cannot blame greed on atheism when it was Catholics and Protestants pushing for Republicans who said they would only de-regulate more. God may not like greed, but that apparantly doesn’t stop his soldiers from endorsing it in his name. And what moral Authority can the Church claim when it uses the lives of Americans as a bargaining chip to try to advance its cause with regards to Abortion? Health Care Reform is certainly part of the Church’s social gospel, but the American Church sat on the sidelines in support of its ally in the Abortion struggle, The Republican Party. Thousands of Americans will continue to die through lack of affordable healthcare, but only the Republicans will help end Abortion, so that is alright? The Ends justify the Means?
We have seperation of Church and State if for no other reason than that there is no Church more reliably morally worthy to rule over us than the people themselves.
L
Lycorth
Guest
No, we need to take lessons from the past, where we built a great civilization upon one single religion, not a confused hodgepodge that ultimately leads to moral apathy.
Jesus said to love our neighbors as ourselves, this is true. There is little greater love we can do for our fellows and ourselves than to see that Catholic social and moral teaching firmly and properly influences culture, including government. Otherwise, we make the claim that Catholicism is subjective and ultimately irrelevant; either what we as Catholics believe to be good and right and true is good and right and true for all humanity, under God, or we’re just another robber tribe, another meaningless spirituality afloat in a bland sea of nihilism, where nothing means anything unless some lumpen biped says it does.
Catholics were barely welcomed in America to begin with, in fact merely tolerated (and barely at that) due to force of law. Catholics had it much better in Europe when the government realized its Christian duty to obey the Church and support religious education - when the concept of the Catholic Confessional State actually existed.
If “freedom” (by this we of course mean legalized secularism) helped Catholicism in any way, Catholicism would be the dominant religion in any given democracy. Or, merely replace “Catholicism” with any religion of your choice. Secularism merely creates an environment wherein all religions are marginalized in favor of materialism and worldly values by the bulk of the population.
That some have a chip on their shoulders about the Church is immaterial. The facts are that Western civilization never was so culturally noble or decent as it was under Catholic predominance. Even the predominance of most any traditional Christian sect can boast a far healthier and more beautiful culture than any secularist culture can. Instead of a world where spoiled brat athletes and entertainers are worshiped like gods and crass humor is used to appeal to the lowest common social denominator, a world where virtue was exalted and man strove truly heavenward (to the blessing of his earthly life) is what we need. We have the former, and it’s not doing us any good.
That the modern Church is confused and has become too worldly for its own good is not the issue. The issue is returning to the ancient, traditional values, which will see to it that corporate greed is hemmed in, the poor are cared for more, and social justice is better implemented. American Christianity in particular is practically an oxymoron, as nothing could be less Christian than the American attitude of secularism and self-service. Traditional Catholics in particular do not blindly tout the party lines of either the GOP or the DNC; to use myself as an example, I am a member of neither party and do not believe in capitalism anymore than I believe in welfare-statism, favoring more the approach of Corporatism (essentially the Medieval guild system; it has nothing to do with economic corporations) and, in especial, Distributism.
The Lord will answer our prayers in His time, not ours - and not yours.
The people have turned America from something that may have had potential at its inception into a giant imperial corporation, rich in wealth but poor in spirit, fighting wars abroad when there are battles to be fought at home, trying to feed the world when there are plenty of hungry and homeless right here, piously lecturing to everyone else about freedom and morality while marginalizing the Faith and glorifying hero-worship and immoral entertainment.
Separation of Church and state ruined America before America had a chance to be truly great. When the moral compass was thrown away, it’s no wonder Western civilization (not just America) is lost and confused.
K
kenofken
Guest
If theocracy is such a desireable form of governance, why is it that it only thrives in conditions of abject poverty, ignorance and feudalism? It has been in steady decline since the inception of printing, widespread literacy, sophisticated finance and critical thinking. It cannot be attributed to left coast liberals and atheists in all these cases, it has been a trend across Western cultures for five centuries.
In quite recent times, Ireland has been this model “Catholic Confessional State.” For virtually all of its existence as a republic, Ireland’s elected government has been a decided junior partner to the church in all matters. The record of how they used that vast power is made evident in the Ryan report. Not only are the people rebelling against the church’s role in the state, they are leaving in droves. Ireland stands to become much more secular than the U.S. At any rate, the notion of melding church and state is absurd. You don’t have the numbers for it. Christians as a whole are maybe 70% in the U.S., if you count even nominal self-identity. They represent thousands of diverse views, and only some fraction of them are Catholic. Only a small fraction of them are “real Catholics,” who would be considered in true communion with Rome on key issues, regular practice etc. Most of the small fringe who favor Christian Dominionism are rabidly anti-Catholic and would put all of you against a wall shortly after the gays, atheists and pagans such as myself.
In quite recent times, Ireland has been this model “Catholic Confessional State.” For virtually all of its existence as a republic, Ireland’s elected government has been a decided junior partner to the church in all matters. The record of how they used that vast power is made evident in the Ryan report. Not only are the people rebelling against the church’s role in the state, they are leaving in droves. Ireland stands to become much more secular than the U.S. At any rate, the notion of melding church and state is absurd. You don’t have the numbers for it. Christians as a whole are maybe 70% in the U.S., if you count even nominal self-identity. They represent thousands of diverse views, and only some fraction of them are Catholic. Only a small fraction of them are “real Catholics,” who would be considered in true communion with Rome on key issues, regular practice etc. Most of the small fringe who favor Christian Dominionism are rabidly anti-Catholic and would put all of you against a wall shortly after the gays, atheists and pagans such as myself.
S
sedonaman
Guest
You reject Rehnquist because you perceive that he doesn’t support the “correct” political causes.
What I get out of his statement is that it’s useless because it means something different to different people. For example, your concept is different from mine. If anything can be twisted, it’s a statement that can mean anything you want. This is not to mention that the phrase is not even in the constitution. How do you reconcile 300 million different meanings? Justices are suppose to interpret what’s actually in the constitution because that is what was ratified by the States through the democratic [small “d”] process. To substitute extraneous wording for the basic law of the land is to subvert that process.
I think the ones “twisting” the constitution to their ideology are Rehnquist’s critics, the “living” constitutionalists. They have been amending the constitution without going through the process set down in it; and, only through what can be termed “Newspeak”, they call themselves “Democrats”. They, like Breyer, think the constitution should be interpreted “according to society’s current standards”. But who decides what society’s current standards are? Justices who have lived their entire lives in the ivory towers of the Boston – Washington corridor, or the people of the nation through their elected representatives? What are the “living” constitutionalists going to do when the worm turns and “original intent” supporters take over the courts?
Fortunately, we don’t have to live under your personal preference and “take Thomas Jefferson over William Rehnquist every day of the week.” FYI, here is a Sixth Circuit Court interpretation of the First Amendment from a case, ACLU of Kentucky vs. Mercer County, KY, in which the court ruled the following: “…The ACLU makes repeated reference to ‘the separation of church and state.’ This extra-constitutional construct has grown tiresome. The First Amendment does not demand a wall of separation between church and state. See Capitol Square, dismissing strict separatism as ‘a notion that simply perverts our history’. Our Nation’s history is replete with governmental acknowledgment and in some cases, accommodation of religion. See, e.g., Marsh v. Chambers, upholding legislative prayer; McGowan v. Maryland, upholding Sunday closing laws; see also Lynch, ‘There is an unbroken history of official acknowledgment by all three branches of government of the role of religion in American life from at least 1789’; Capitol Square, describing historical examples of governmental involvement with religion. After all, ‘[w]e are a religious people whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being’, Zorach. Thus, state recognition of religion that falls short of endorsement is constitutionally permissible.” – Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, ACLU of Kentucky vs. Mercer County, KY [Emphasis added]
ca6.uscourts.gov/opinions.pdf/05a0477p-06.pdf
“Separation of church and state” might be a good thing, but not as part of our law.
L
Lycorth
Guest
That is false. Theocracies can thrive regardless of economic conditions. I suggest you purchase and read Regine Pernoud’s Those Terrible Middle Ages! at the very least in order to get a real handle on what Medieval practices were really like; you will be surprised to find that the real barbarity is found now, not then.
It is also based on the patently false assumption that the Medieval era was rife with ignorance. Learning was in fact common in the Middle Ages, literacy was widespread (but because it was literacy in the vernacular as opposed to proficiency in Latin people assume illiteracy was common), and both feudal subjects and feudal lords were bound together in a mutually beneficial relationship that arose out of necessity when the Roman Empire collapsed and could no longer enforce order. Feudalism was in fact one of history’s truly grassroots efforts in which all strata of society banded together and cooperated for survival, and succeeded beyond mere surviving.
Regarding poverty, a saying goes that hard times are good for the soul. We could use a little poverty in the West; we are too addicted to our material plenty and worldly comforts to really change society in any meaningful way. Besides, being wealthy is not the be-all and end-all of life; just ask those who are addicted to reaping profits and making money.
As said, literacy was already widespread, so that much is false.
Printing initially enabled bad information to be spread easily, so that’s nothing to be celebrated, though printing had relatively little to do with our problems in the West, and is easily used to facilitate the truth.
“Sophisticated finance” - you mean the spread of corporate greed, industrialist greed, and profit-driven economics otherwise known as “capitalism”? You mean a system where the poor are bled dry to feed the coffers of a few powerful and wealthy? A system where local jobs are currently sent to foreign and oftentimes hostile nations where actual slave labor is often used and those who once had jobs now must live on unemployment? Citing “sophisticated finance” is citing greed.
No, the Reformation was pretty much the ground zero of Western civilization’s mortal wounding. Atheism and secular liberalism are merely its fruits.
Ireland’s troubles have nothing to do with religion. They have almost everything to do with either British interference in Irish affairs or the Irish people’s own inability to truly unite and throw off foreign shackles. The history of the IRA alone testifies to this.
What is absurd is a confused and secularist society with no moral compass. Melding Church and state is a proven winner.
We’re not crying over that.
Very true; I have little faith that rabid fundamentalists will offer any real cooperation. In fact, I’m mostly afraid that they’d fight us as much as they’d fight secularists and so forth. That is why “melting pots” do not work; differences in core values and root identities always lead to friction and turmoil, and eventually violence. That is why a Catholic Confessional State is best (at least for Catholics) because we can live in a society where we are not marginalized.
That is why the separation of Church and state has been so ill for the West. Once, we followed the same path, and followed it to cultural vitality and spiritual growth. Now, we’ve gone astray, run about in a hundred different directions without guidance or hope or certainty, and we wonder why the West is in moral shambles.
Sadly, we humans have to learn the hard way
R
RonTheNewJew
Guest
Since it is unlikely anytime soon that the RCC will take over America with a “Confessional State,” because ever since Benedict made his rather confrontational statements about protestants, thereby uniting the ones who are dedicated to the Christian principle of the right of free human moral agents to deternine for themselves how and when they will, or will not worship God, the obvious seems to be the case. It means, thereby, that the middle ground is that people be allowed to worship the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob according to the dictates of their consciences, rather than the dictates of a power-hungry centrally dominated hierarchy that feels threatened when ordinary, God-fearing adults decide to follow what they read in the Scriptures for themselves.
The fact that they are free to discover God’s message of individuals showing His love to others in daily acts of unreported kindness and friendship, is a testament to the rightness of freedom of religion. They do not claim that their denomination, let’s say, Baptist, or Lutheran, or Methodist, or Adventist, or Presbyterian or Mormon, etc. is the only true church. They claim to have researched the Scriptures and found nuggets of truth which they follow and believe in, as their sacred right is.
That there is sin in this land or this world, is not because they didn’t follow the Catholic Church’s teachings or rituals. It is because they are human beings who can only choose God’s way when they discover for themselves, and themselves alone, what God wishes for them. Goodness knows, there are enough Catholics who, like everyone else, are sinful and need to study the dedication that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Moses, Jesus the Messiah, and Jesus Apostles had. Even then, their human natures will often lead to sin, but over a lifetime of study and prayer on their own can they attain to “the righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and pharisees.”
As Jesus said in Matthew 23, when He spoke to His followers about the religious leaders of Israel, “Listen to them. But do not do as they do. For they say but do not do.” He was speaking of their private lives, outside of their explanations of the laws many of which were not contained in the written Torah, given to Moses by God, Himself, but were “given” to man by themselves while telling the people their preachments came from God. Ie. the Talmudic writings, only a portion of which accurately explained the Torah.
Such is why man, himself, whether religious or otherwise, is to blame for the hypocrisy of today. Jesus explained not the Talmud, but the Torah which contains His love in actions described therein. He did this with the Sermon on the Mount.
The principles contained in His Sermon on the Mount cannot be enforced on anyone. The principles of the Law God gave to Moses in the everlasing Covenant, as explained by Jesus, stand opposed to such legislated religion!
Ministers, Priests, Rabbi’s, Imams, etc. should preach Jesus’ love, and confront the wealthy and powerful to do ever more for "the poor, the blind, the naked, widows, orphans, and strangers and all other outcasts by “good society,” which includes "religious people who love entertainment that draws attention to themselves, rather than attending to the needs of the poor that their religious leaders are afraid to tell them that they actually owe to the poor. That is what all the denominations of religion that claim to believe in one God should be doing.
They should be firmly behind any president of the United States who is trying to reduce the differences between wealth and poverty, and encourage him to lead members of their religious flocks to support things like a public works program that is well funded to put millions of the unemployed back to work at decent wages, instead of telling their members to vote for one candidate because he does’t want abortion, which I also stand against except where the life of the mother is provably threatened, while they vote for candidates who cut health and welfare spending which helps young families get out of poverty and get a better education so they can make greater contributions to their communities and to society.
If the denominations do the above, then they will see large numbers of people come into, or back into their flocks, willingly, and without any religious or religiously associated legislation.
God bless ya’all
The fact that they are free to discover God’s message of individuals showing His love to others in daily acts of unreported kindness and friendship, is a testament to the rightness of freedom of religion. They do not claim that their denomination, let’s say, Baptist, or Lutheran, or Methodist, or Adventist, or Presbyterian or Mormon, etc. is the only true church. They claim to have researched the Scriptures and found nuggets of truth which they follow and believe in, as their sacred right is.
That there is sin in this land or this world, is not because they didn’t follow the Catholic Church’s teachings or rituals. It is because they are human beings who can only choose God’s way when they discover for themselves, and themselves alone, what God wishes for them. Goodness knows, there are enough Catholics who, like everyone else, are sinful and need to study the dedication that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Moses, Jesus the Messiah, and Jesus Apostles had. Even then, their human natures will often lead to sin, but over a lifetime of study and prayer on their own can they attain to “the righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and pharisees.”
As Jesus said in Matthew 23, when He spoke to His followers about the religious leaders of Israel, “Listen to them. But do not do as they do. For they say but do not do.” He was speaking of their private lives, outside of their explanations of the laws many of which were not contained in the written Torah, given to Moses by God, Himself, but were “given” to man by themselves while telling the people their preachments came from God. Ie. the Talmudic writings, only a portion of which accurately explained the Torah.
Such is why man, himself, whether religious or otherwise, is to blame for the hypocrisy of today. Jesus explained not the Talmud, but the Torah which contains His love in actions described therein. He did this with the Sermon on the Mount.
The principles contained in His Sermon on the Mount cannot be enforced on anyone. The principles of the Law God gave to Moses in the everlasing Covenant, as explained by Jesus, stand opposed to such legislated religion!
Ministers, Priests, Rabbi’s, Imams, etc. should preach Jesus’ love, and confront the wealthy and powerful to do ever more for "the poor, the blind, the naked, widows, orphans, and strangers and all other outcasts by “good society,” which includes "religious people who love entertainment that draws attention to themselves, rather than attending to the needs of the poor that their religious leaders are afraid to tell them that they actually owe to the poor. That is what all the denominations of religion that claim to believe in one God should be doing.
They should be firmly behind any president of the United States who is trying to reduce the differences between wealth and poverty, and encourage him to lead members of their religious flocks to support things like a public works program that is well funded to put millions of the unemployed back to work at decent wages, instead of telling their members to vote for one candidate because he does’t want abortion, which I also stand against except where the life of the mother is provably threatened, while they vote for candidates who cut health and welfare spending which helps young families get out of poverty and get a better education so they can make greater contributions to their communities and to society.
If the denominations do the above, then they will see large numbers of people come into, or back into their flocks, willingly, and without any religious or religiously associated legislation.
God bless ya’all
L
Lycorth
Guest
There is no such Christian principle and never has been.
Individual interpretation of Scripture is forbidden in the Scriptures themselves and individual interpretations have only led to willy-nilly spirituality in the place of solid and serious religion, causing cultural chaos in Western civilization.
The Catholic Church is not and never has been power hungry. Were it so, churchmen would have insisted on the exclusive right to secular government in the early Middle Ages instead of ceding that duty to non-clergy nobility and choosing instead to act as moral guide.
The road to Hell is paved with good intentions, and the good intentions of the Sola Scriptura non-denominational crowd have led us to the Hell of the modern world and its profligate culture. Only a strict discipline can bring forth truly good and worthy results, not a cavalier approach to God and His teachings.
Actually, each sect claims that they are the true church - that is the natures of sects. Even those who think themselves “nondenominational” (though that is a denomination unto itself) think that their way is the truly right one and that everyone else is wrong, even if just a little. Your anti-Catholic polemic is showing
Furthermore, God’s message is not kindness and friendship. Those are encouraged by the Lord and taught by His Church to be sure, but that is not the primary reason Christ came to us. He came here to die as a sacrifice for our sins, for the sins of stubborn, sinful, backsliding humanity who always thinks it knows what is best. Temporal acts of mercy are valuable and important, indeed indispensable, but not the primary reason that the Lord came to earth. Otherwise, Christ would have spent His entire earthly ministry doing only acts of charity and He would have not preached moral law, defied the Sanhedrin and the Pharisees, fulfilled the Old Law, and instituted the Church through Peter.
Besides, charity and charitable organizations practically began with the efforts of the Catholic Church, be it clergy or lay faithful who went on to found religious orders with heavy charitable duties. The history of the Medieval era is rife with this, if you had bothered to give it an honest treatment instead of brush it off as some mythical “dark age” where only the meanies in the Church knew how to speak or bathe or think
They are one in the same. The Catholic Church is the only sect that can trace its roots directly back to Peter and to Christ. Sorry, but that doesn’t fly here.
There certainly are. There are also plenty of non-Catholics in the exact same boat who wax self-righteous about history and the Church, assume they know the precise mind and heart of God, know everything about Jesus and His purpose in coming to the earth, and everything else about everything else.
Since you’re so fond of making Scriptural references, I’ve got one for you: look not on the splinter in our eye but the plank in your own.
L
Lycorth
Guest
They do no such thing. To make Christian teaching the law of the land is part and parcel of fulfilling Christ’s Great Commission, to go out and convert the whole world. We Catholics take that seriously, believing that culture and politics must be converted as well. The disastrous effects of secularism are clearly seen today in a world with no moral compass.
However, all of them believe in a different version of God, so there is no chance in any universe that any of them will preach any basic, condensed message. In the real world, each religious leader you’ve mentioned is part of an entirely different religion that may or may not bear some resemblance to that of the other leaders, and as a result will have an entirely different agenda and goal to follow.
If we want to do good for the poor, confront the greedy, and help the needy, we will implement Catholic social teaching. This is what the Medieval world did, to great effect. This is what must be done now; the rules do not change, only the times change.
It is most definitely the fault of human beings that we are in this mess. We have turned from the Faith, from the unity of doctrine and goal and purpose we once took for granted, and now society seems beyond help. Hopefully, God will answer our prayers and a miracle like that at the Milian Bridge will happen.
Nice try to attempt to mix liberal agendas with Christian truth. Sickening, but nice try.
Handouts to the poor can’t be justified by promoting the abortion industry. The murder of the unborn is a sick thing that any human with a conscience ought to rail against. Christ cares more than about giving handouts to the poor, you know.
If you want to change society for the better, the past is the way to the future. The Catholic State, one wherein the social teachings of the Church influence law and policy, is the answer, not a secularist welfare state.
If we continue to do the above, Western civilization will become Western barbarity.
God help us all.
S
sedonaman
Guest
Sounds like you have an infallible conscience.
R
RonTheNewJew
Guest
It appears to me that the Catholic Church now teaches that it can and should take over the political and reigious institutions of this world. History has only told the truth about this kind of attitude. The attitude that says that freedom of conscience is not Scriptural is the cause, rather than the remedy for sin and suffering in the world. This is to turn God’s word against itself.
It tries to say that there is on this earth a human perfection: the Catholic Church. I agree with the posting from a Catholic that indicated that the Catholic Church is a “sect.” It is. It is only one of many. The difference between it and the others, mostly protestant ones, is that they do NOT say that their brand of Christianity has the right, if not self-appointed mandate to dominate the political and religious beliefs and activities of the rest of human-kind. Such a belief system says thereby that a human organization, which has persecuted Jews and other Christians in the past to the extent that a pope apologized for just such behaviors (John-Paul 11), has the right or even the duty to negate what John-Paul11 did, and reverse course on a papal apology and the basis for it.
“infallible conscience?” Well, when one believes as I do that I have the God-given right to decide for myself what the Sacred Scriptures tell me is true, then when someone else knows about it, and I choose to remain faithful to what Torah tells me, along with Jesus’ teachings about it, then if one says I have an infallible conscience, I will agree, but add that I continue learning from what Jesus defended in Matthew 23, hoping that it results in at least a good conscience.
It tries to say that there is on this earth a human perfection: the Catholic Church. I agree with the posting from a Catholic that indicated that the Catholic Church is a “sect.” It is. It is only one of many. The difference between it and the others, mostly protestant ones, is that they do NOT say that their brand of Christianity has the right, if not self-appointed mandate to dominate the political and religious beliefs and activities of the rest of human-kind. Such a belief system says thereby that a human organization, which has persecuted Jews and other Christians in the past to the extent that a pope apologized for just such behaviors (John-Paul 11), has the right or even the duty to negate what John-Paul11 did, and reverse course on a papal apology and the basis for it.
“infallible conscience?” Well, when one believes as I do that I have the God-given right to decide for myself what the Sacred Scriptures tell me is true, then when someone else knows about it, and I choose to remain faithful to what Torah tells me, along with Jesus’ teachings about it, then if one says I have an infallible conscience, I will agree, but add that I continue learning from what Jesus defended in Matthew 23, hoping that it results in at least a good conscience.
S
sedonaman
Guest
The next time you need brain surgery, read the medical books and heal yourself.
G
gamewell45
Guest
RTNJ,
I honestly don’t believe the Catholic Church is teaching that it should take over the political and religious in this world; rather I believe it is the rantings of a few extreme conservative Catholics with very strong convictions in their beliefs. I personally wouldn’t lose too much sleep over it. Besides, even if it were true; there are too many evangelical/non-demoninationals/people of other religious persuasions that would never allow it to happen in this country.
Furthermore, expressing your opinion as you have aptly done in here does not mean you are spewing forth anti-catholic polemics inspite of what some in here may maintain.
Film at eleven!
S
SugarMagnolia
Guest
- Separation of Church and State also keeps religion out of government which is a good thing for us Catholics. To those who voted against the separation of church and state, I’m guessing you’re all assuming church means Catholic Church. Not necessarily. Suppose the church that ends up influencing government is a Protestant church or even some non-Christian church?
- The Founding Fathers weren’t even Christian (much less Catholic). They were Deists.
S
sedonaman
Guest
I can see it now: When Sharia Law takes over, you will be saying it’s the Catholic Church’s fault for not “doing enough.”
- Status