Religion and politics.

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I'm saying that if George wants to use Pope John Paul's message of "the culture of life" then he should render the pope's message the way it was intended, and not only take from it what he finds politically satisfying. He took from it only what he found politically advantageous and it helped get him reelected.

BTW - I removed the "finger" from the previous post...

[ May 08, 2005, 23:25: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

 

No. Foeti are foeti. They aren't children, and you do yourself--and those you disagree with--a disservice to describe them as such. It's no more intellectually honest to call a fetus a baby or child than it is to call a baby a seventy-year-old man.

It's fine to discuss abortion. But please, if you're going to do so, discuss abortion, don't discuss the murder of infants.

 

Yes, like this: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7774784/site/newsweek/

It breaks my heart to see that.

 

I agree.

BTW, if you made a photo of a foetus being torn from limb to limb, it would do the same on me.

You're proving my point. You have just acknowledged foetus as a stage in human life.

 

Yes, I did acknowledge that the foetus is a stage in human life. Which isn't at all relevant to what my point was.

Since when is "a stage in human life" synonymous with "child"? Right, it's not. So, again; if you want to discuss abortion, that's great, but don't talk about the murder of children, because that's not what abortion is.

 

But from that logic, it seems that abortion is murder of humans at another stage in life.

And child is until grown up. Before that, it's a child. Foetus, infant, toddler etc till adolescent.

 

Thank you, Chandos, this seems to be the main sticking point in the arguement. There is one side that states that Religeous organizations shouldn't be involved in politics. As long as the state doesn't favour one religeon over another, and no religeon support any specific candidate over another, then there shouldn't be a problem. Religeon reserves the right to address issues, but cannot specifically state that one candidate is right.

But that was a factor in the victory for the Republicans. Perhaps some of the religeous people that may have voted Democrat voted Republican becasue of the stances on moral issues. Likewise, some of the religeous right made an extra effort to vote because of the stance of the Democrats. What separates this Democratic candidate from past (more successful) Democrats is the nature of the issues. These issues were pushed to the forefront. The Democrats took the same, liberal stance, and these issues were so important that this stance offended the religeous right. It was that offence to the people that made the difference between red and blue in November...

But can that really happen? I am not convinced that it can. As long as people follow the church, and those people are the ones that vote, then Religeon will continue to mingle with politics.

And they will. Put a popular cardinal forward as a candidate in a state with a large Catholic population, then you will see religeon directly meddling in politics. If the various Christain faiths were to band together, they could even get a substantial representation in the various state and federal legislatures, maybe even in the White House! Isn't that exactly what you don't want? That's what they'll have to do if you start taxing them. If they can't hold the government accountable, they can take over the government...

 

I have to agree with that. I think many lower income, single moms and low wage working families voted against their own interests, by voting for George II, because of those issues: gay marriage, abortion, etc. I heard stories of low wage earners saying they would "rather starve than see another abortion." Too bad Iraqi children don't count for them.

But things have a way of evening out in the long run. This story which broke earlier had everything that Jefferson destested. A small group of Democrats were kicked out of a small church by the pastor for not voting for George. Now he may be the one leaving.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7769149/

What happened at that chruch is exactly the point that many have been making on this thread regarding politics and religion. But these issues are often self-correcting. Sometimes you just have to believe in the decency and good sense of common people to work through these differences.

As his actions should have.

 

Chev, I was just hoping I could get you to drop the inflammatory rhetoric; I guess that won't happen. Since I'm not fond of beating my head against a wall, I'll stop

I was also working off the dictionary definition of child being "a person between birth and puberty," fyi.

 

Never completeley, no. But what I would wish is that people like the pope who have significant power over religions would steer their organisations free out of politics and let political parties and the people decide how religious dogma and doctrine should be fitted into the law without getting pressure from the Church.

I'm not very convinced that the Churches have enough power to take over the government. In Finland they definently do not have any such power and I doubt they have such power anywhere else in the western world either. The Churches have too many differences to unite, and taxes really would not kill them. Americans can do what they want with the tax exempt status of Churches, I do not expect it to work there in the current political and religious climate of the country, but as someone said in another thread "the world does not start and end in the US".

It's really not the tax exempt status that annoys me however it's really more how the things are done in Finland where the Church actually have a tax as their method of collecting money. One can avoid this tax by resigning from the Church but still I feel it's a wrong way to go and is definently not a sign of separation between Church and state.

The difference was still quite small. Religion was certainly an issue in the elections but I do feel that those votes could have been taken from elsewhere too.

[ May 09, 2005, 12:52: Message edited by: Morgoroth ]

 

Its good that times have changed since the Church ruled the lands.

During the potatoe famine in Ireland, the English are generally blamed for this, but the Catholic church was also to blame, as they rejected a shipment of grain from the Ottomans (and other peoples/countries), because the grain came from a Muslim country. They preferred their people starve than accept Turkish produce.

 

Awww... looks like some bishop had a weird idea. Turkey wasn't that bad at the time, but there was a huge problem with the Berberic Muslims. About one million of Europeans have served as slaves in Muslim countries, wonder if anyone here knows this. If you ask me, all those fights had been against what both religions teach. Then again, we can say they should have got along but it's easier said then done. Well, anyway, I doubt the Catholic Church has ever ruled anything in a Protestant country.

@AMaster: Inflammatory? I believe it's inflammatory to claim that foeti aren't human beings or are responsible for any bad situation or bad deeds of the parents. It would be inflammatory if I said that everyone with a shade of pro-choice belief is a child murder, which I don't say because I don't believe thus. However, anyone who believes that foeti are innocent humans and aborts them regardless, such a person gets really close to meriting such a name, not like I have nothing better to do than calling people names. What we need to do is to save the little ones, not throw rocks around. Doesn't mean I'll ever agree to disagree or anything.

[ May 09, 2005, 15:16: Message edited by: chevalier ]

 

I am not sure what you mean as Ireland is not a Protestant country. Ulster used to be mostly Protestant, but things are more or less even now.

 

@Gnarfflinger

THis has absolutely no relevance to what I said to you though. THe point I made to you(which you apprently ignored) was that we should expect GOD to know better than MAN. THe "historical context" should not matter one iota when we are examining GOD'S alleged deeds/actions/inaction. GOD should have known that taking slaves from neighboring nations was wrong. God should have forseen how his creations would (mis)behave and taken measures to recitfy this, rather than waiting for them to do what they have no ability to avoid doing and then punishing them for it!
Free will and omniscience are incompatible. Eitehr humans could have chosen 'A' or 'B'(or whatever) OR God KNEW what they would do and they could not have made decisions without thwarting God's omniscience. FUrthermore, even GOD could not have free will if he were "all-knowing". If HE KNEW that he would create Adam and Eve then he could not decide to do otherwise without invalidating this "knowledge".
That was a bit of a side issue but it is important to remember in relation to my overall points.

WHether I support a particular decision to go to war or not is completely irrelevant. Leaders of nations go to war because they have no means to solve certain dillemmas otherwise. GOD however, is oknipotent, no? All-wise?All loving? an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent bgeing can easily solve problems(which should not exist in the first place) with his creations without dashing babies heads on rocks or commiting genocide of hundreds of thousands of people!

Now think about this for a few seconds.

Why not just make his presence known to the heathens/unbelievers,natives whom he allegedly created(and why did he create people whom would be his enemies?!)? FOr example: I might well speak ill of Mike Tyson while at a sports bar with some friends. If Mike Tyson was aware that I had been doing so adn cared that I were doing this, then he has a bunch of options he can take:

1)Ignore it altogether as the opinion of some sickly man in Tacoma, WA cannot hurt him.

2)Show up at my favorite sports bar, in the flesh and sit down and explain to me what he is really about and why is he not as bad as I think he is.

3)Send a group of thugs over to Tacoma to beat me to an unrecognizable carcass.

Now with Mike Tyson being a human, I might not be surprised if #3 was the option he chose.

But when GOD can see no better way to deal with people he disagrees with, I am sorry but that is jsut more stuff to set off my BS detector.

*Boggle*

Do you guys EVER stop to think about the stuff you parrot? I mean, it seems to me like, at some point SOMEONE would stop and say "Uh...guy. That is downright flakey!". First of all, why did God create people so ill-equipped that they behaved, in his eyes, like defective wind-up toys? Why create humans who will, in the span of time it took for Moses to go get the ten commandments, start worshipping a golden calf?!? Why did God not forsee this occuring and alter his design doc's for creating humans? None of what you said makes ANY sense! Are the commandments good or are they not? Are they just some scrapped together substitute for a doctrine we are not worthy of(and why create a doctrine he knew we would be unworthy of?!?)?
How does ANY of what you said even address to the points I made about God's actions?

Again, which brings us back to my original point here that these are HUMAN construtions! It is humans TELLING you that other HUMANS WROTE the Bible but were allegedly inspir3ed by an all-knowing God who cannot himself think or behave any better than HUMANS!?! God exhibits every madness and vice of humanity in the Bible! Every emotional outburst(which is puzzling since emotions are physiological reactions of creatures with physcial brains like ours), every violent and irrational murderous rampage that humans are capable of are attributed to God in the Bible.

This indicates to me that it was HUMANITY behind the authorship of the Bible.

No guy. What happened is what ALWAYS happens with religion. It changes with the times and shifting political climates. Early on in judaism, they were under the yoke of oppression and God/yahweh was only one of a PANTHEON of jewish gods and was depicted as a sort of spirit of reprisal. A deity who would right the wrongs against the jews with his holy wrath. The Bible's tone changes as the times change adn during the New Testament we get a lot more "Lion lying down with the lamb" type hippy stuff because the jews were free(mostly) and their religion was making headway in the world(although it would be an off-shoot called "Christianity" whcih would REALLY take off!).

The question is WHY? WHy did God need such Rube Goldbergian mechanisms to achieve these things? I know it makes for a nice, dramatic morality fable but why on Earth would God need to impregnate a virgin, have her give birth to a son. Have his son live for 30 years as a normal carpenter then have him suddenly realize he is God incarnate/the son of God, THEN have him follow in the footsteps of many pagans of the time, allegedly preaching monotheism, peace, love and performing miracles before finally being crucified by Romans(though we have no credible historical evidence to say this ever occured even sans the supernatural elements)???
That is so much like :"I am going to tun on a light so I can see. I will need a fishing pole, a bowling ball, a candle, two boiler room cut-off valve bolts, a wrench, a piece of strawberry short cake and a naked virgin!".

AGAIN, this same was said about what you NOW call mistakes! There is absolutely NO REASON to say that these dark ages morals you are advocating are any less a mistake than the flat eartthism, geocentricism adn racism that were once "unmistakable and certain" morality for Christians/Catholics! Don't you see? You have BELIEFS and you are quite convinced that your beliefs cannot possibly be wrong. Those before you who spoke against interacial marriage, spherical earth and heliocentricism had the SAME DEGREE OF CONVICTION and the same amount of evidence to support their beliefs as YOU! The Islamic terrorists get their morals DIRECTLY FROM GOD, according to their religion and their morals are not only strinkingly similar to conservative Christian morals but they have the same evidence you have!

For the thrid and final time now(so pay attention): I NEVER SAID ANY SUCH THING. EVER!!!
They SHOULD have the right to preach WHATEVER THE BLOODY HELL THEY WANT!! As Morogoth(IIRC) said though, they should also pay taxes like the rest of us who have that right. Charitable orgnaizations are financially supported by US and I am all for supporting charities. But CHARITY ENDS right at the point where extraneous advertising for religious denominations, political ideaologies etc, begin! I am all for finanacially supporting a charity called Books for Children which provides educational as well as requested books for impoverished children(be it a children's illustrated Bible or Harry Potter). But I do NOT want to support Bibles for Children, Teaching Children Liberalism or the like.

Catholcism is NOT a charity because no matter how many hungry they feed or homeless they clothe(charitable acts), they act as a political organization and religious recruiting machine. They should NOT be supported by ME financially so that they can campaign for political canidates or legislation.

Listen up because you are somehow not getting this: I do NOT care whether I or anyone else find any particular position agreeable. This has NOTHING to do with what we are talking about. I do not want TAX-EXEMPT organizations campaigning for ANY political positions/issues/candidates! This does NOT imply that I do not want CATHOLICS or CHRISTIANS SPEAKING on issues. AGAIN, TAX-EXEMPT organizations! You want to play politics? Pay taxes like the rest of us have to! You know why the British do not get to vote on new budget proposals or legislation for our highways? Because they do NOT PAY TAXES which support our highways! It is NOT because they live somewhere else as there are Americans who live in other places(at least for a good portion of the year) and still get to vote on stuff here because they pay taxes!

Because your "point" is FALSE/Invalid!! We do not agree because it is irrational and lacks any substantiation! In the other thread I asked you guys: If you were in a clinic with your 10 year old son/daughter(or ANYONE's 10 year old child) and a fire broke out and you had a choice of either recusing the 10 year old child or grabbing a cooler full of embryonic cells, which would you "save"?

No one on the "pro-life" side wanted to touch this! You guys can talk all you want out of the side of your mouths about believing that life begins at "conception"(also hard to define apparently) but your actions speak LOUDLY to the contrary!


@Chev'

Your point? YOU are claiming that embryonic cells are lifeforms. YOU make your case. YOU believe that using contraception(effectively preventing sperm from reaching the uterus) is on par with killing lives then make your case! Your actions betray hypocrisy! You and I both know nthat given the choice between saving an ambulatory, conscious, non-fetal child and saving a thousand embryos, you will chose the former.

The church also believed we lived on a flat disc orbited by the sun in the center of the universe. They MURDERED people for disagreeeing with this. You will pardon me for not giving a rat's a$$ what the church believes.

Have to stop you there and call "Bulls#!t" on that one. Abortion is not punishment for parental wrongs. No one murders children because they have bad parents and calls it "abortion"(at least no one relevant to THIS discussion). This is more hyperbolic nonsense and I will NOT let you get away with it. A lie is a lie friend adn you WILL be called on such.

There is no responsibility for the bacteria that we "murder" when we wash our hands. Bacteria which are comparable to the human foetus(at the time when most abortions occur) in developement.

THAT is the point of discussion/debate here. I think that even if you somehow define the foetus as "human"(not saying it is not), this is irrelevant. SPerm is also "human" and it is "killed" in our sleep and every act of masturbation which we ALL engage in (catholic or otherwise).
The relevant point is whether the aborted foetoi are persons. We make furniture out of trees, not because they are not "life" but because they are not sentient/persons.

Rather than argue this point, let me assume this is true and point out that cows, trees and termites are seperate beings from humanity and we kill them.
If trees could think and feel we would have a much harder time doing so. Feotoi are non-sentient adn non feeling at the point when pregnanices are usually terminated(barring some medical emergency).

I am tired of this nonsense. You just keep repeating the same bald assertions over and over. Make your case or move on. I probably don't have as much life left as I would like to have and if this is so then I do not want to waste any of it on "Is so!"/"Is not!" arguments.

Again, you are making no sense. To say that aborting a fetus is like murdering a child is like saying that wiping up sperm is like tortuning a baby.

I was not screaming. Now would you address the points made? I suspect you cannot adn this is why you are going for the distraction.


(Numerous Biblical quotes and Chev's selective interpretations snipped because, aside for reiterating MY point, they are irrelvant.)

 

@RuneQuester: Please note that this is simply a history lesson. I am not trying to engage you on the content or validity of these beliefs, I just want you to have your facts straight - as you have endeavored to enlighten us about atheism. You said:

Wrong. There were no Jews until Abraham (who was a Babylonian, and presumably believed in the standard Babylonian pantheon) had a flash of insight that the only way for the world to exist as a (mostly) harmonious whole was for there to be one God, not a group of gods bickering amongst themselves. Monotheism has always been the fundamental premise of Judaism.

What you raise is a fundamental question of theology. You have resolved it by turning to atheism; others have found very different solutions. On the existence of "problems," in general the thinking tends to be that God gave mankind free will and problems arise when people apply their free will in isolation from God. As for the other, a rabbi told me something that struck very close to home for me. "God is omipotent, omnibenevolent, and omniscient - pick any two."

 

Monotheism or monolatry? From what I know, it was more of monolatry until Isaiah and the struggle between iahvists and elohists (roughly the Southern and Northern kingdom) involved among other concerns the struggle between strict monotheism and monolatry until eventually strict monotheism won. Then again, I'm not Jewish myself and I only know the matter from books I've read and courses I've taken.

@RuneQuester: Sorry, but I've had enough of mud slinging.

 

"Monolatry"? That term makes me wonder just what was being idolized... If you're referring to the idea that some people were more rigorous in their Temple observations than in their everyday ethical conduct, I don't see how that's a distinction between monolatry and monotheism.

But that still doesn't change the fact that, hundreds of years before Isaiah, the Jews were the first ones to accept the idea of one God.

 

But the Religeous leaders can't totally steer themselves out of politics. Politicians have invaded Religeon's territory, not the other way around. Politicians have attempted to make issues of morality. When this happens, the Church is obligated to speak.

No, they are not. We were given free will by God, and he knew that we would fall short of the expectations that are placed upon us. He KNEW that Adam and Eve would partake of the forbidden fruit.

When Freewill was given to mankind, God knew that there would be the chance that many would fall for the temptations of the Devil and many would band together in their sins. And he did have other options. God destroyed Sodom and Gamorah. There was a flood to wipe out all but a handful of righteous peole. There were plagues that really worked Egypt over. The Lord had other options.

I hope you don't have any say in educational curiculum. By your take on thing children should be able to grasp advanced calculus the first day. That's Not the case. Likewise, the jews, which had lived in bondage in Egypt for generations, were raised in polytheism and idolatry. Moses was gone for several days, and in that time, they began worshiping a golden calf like they had always done. They needed a simpler set of commandments to help them adjust to what the Lord asked of them. This is why the children are taught the ten commandments in Sunday School when they are young, and the sermons they hear when they get older focus on higher principles like charity. It's not that they were stupid, just unlearned. From there, the cast of scribes and pharisees interpretted the law, and the record was kept so that the future generations would know of them at the Lord's command.

LMAO. You aetheists are hilarious. You try to sound all high and mighty and claim that you're dumbing your arguement down for us "children" who don't seem to understand your point. But I digress, let's get back to the topic, shall we?

The purpose of Jesus Christ was threefold:

1) To die for us that our sins may be forgiven if we believe on His name and obey his commandments.

2) To set straight the law that the faithful were to live under. Parts of the Law of Moses were restrictive beyond the desires of the Lord, and the point of the law was lost over the years.

3) To teach the higher law that the Lord's people weren't ready to learn in the time of Moses. Just as a child in kindergarden weren't ready to learn Calculus, but Highschool seniors have had the training to prepare them for the material, the former slaves from Egypt weren't ready for the higher law, but after generations of obedience, they were finally ready. The prophets since Moses have taught more and more since then to the point where the people were ready.

Just as the scribes and Pharisees erred when they went beyond the laws given by the Prophets, so to did the Catholic church err when they went beyond or deviated from the Holy Scriptures. A Geocentric, flat earth is not mentioned in scripture. A forbiddance of interracial marriage is not in any laws given of the prophets. Homosexuality, on the other hand, is STRICTLY forbidden in scripture. If the Bible is accepted (and for the purposes of this discussion, the church accepts this), then the position of life beginning with conception is explicitly made by the prophets. By this, abortion is a violation of the commandment that states that "Thou Shalt Not Kill."

The point of this discussion was about whether Religeous organizations should be allowed to speak on political matters. Your position seems to be opposed. If you're instead trying to use this forum as a means to attack Christianity and Christians, then I apologize for missing your point and assuming that you were actually on topic or something. You are free to decide what you will and will not support. You've made those lines clear.

First, religeous funding should be voluntarily contributed, not made mandatory. Second, They shouldn't support particular candidates. But don't belittle what they do for those less fortunate than themselves.

It's not a case of Religeon invading politics, it's politics invading Religeon's territory. How would you feel if an uninvited guest came into your home and tried toimpose their rules on your household? I doubt that you'd like that too much. Now Someone is telling you that you can't require this guy to shut up, obey your rules or leave. That's the position that Religeon is placed in. They have a band of immoral louts coming into their house, telling their people that they don't have to follow the rules of the house and there are some people trying to tell the church that they have no right to tell these louts to shut up.

Truthfully, The contents of that cooler wouldn't cross my mind. Theologically, the needs of the many outweight the needs of the few (Yeah, I know that's from Spock, but those were the best words I could think of), but if I had a son, and they were there with me, That's who I'd go to first. I'd even save him over others in the waiting room. If I had the choice between saving my son and saving you, I'm sorry about your luck. I just hope you don't mind being creamated...

 

Hey now, I resemble that remark.

 

I'll have to disagree. How exactly have politicians invaded Religion's terretory? How even can they do that? The only way I see that possible is for them to become priests or twist the religious dogma to fit their personal gains. If some politician misquotes the Church or attacks it directly then it naturally should defend itself against such attacks. The Churches does not have an monopoly on the subject of morality however so making issues of morality is really not invading Church terretory unless Politicians actually directly attacks Church morality, in which case the Church naturally has the right to defend itself against such attacks.

Actually the government tends to do this to me all the time.

Taking back the tax-exempt status is really more about politics invading politics or preventing religion from invading politics. Personally I feel that the only condition that allows a groups to keep its tax-exempt status is if it works only for charity and not for say polishing of the pope's tiara or political campaigning. So quite frankly I don't see what right over anyone else religion has to a tax-exempt status.


Offtopic note: I'd prefer that we stick to the topic of politics and religion. If you'd like to discuss what the Bible says about various things or about other of the numerous offtopic subjects that have been discussed in this thread please take them to PM or make your own thread for them. Sorry for playing a moderator but it gets really frustrating when there's a real interesting ontopic conversation somewhere in between. Anyway if a moderator comes and issues an official warning or notice to stick on the topic they can feel free to delete this notice.