Devout Christianity! Living the Myth!

[Azrael]

Star Burst:

Jesus was a fake! Just like the religion named after him...stop the pity party for Christians.

It is necessary to attempt to reason with people when they hold unreasonable beliefs, otherwise they are inclined to feel righteous in blowing the rest of us to bits.

I don't believe in being deliberately confrontational. It doesn't get us anywhere:-

War does not
Determine who is right, war determines who is Left.

I so agree Penelope. Whether Jesus is a "fake" character or not, the Gospels have had a profound affect on humanity. I my self am in awe of some of what is contained in the New Testament.

For all that, I fall into the category of those who does not believe what is contained in the most of these stories really happened. There are people some smarter people then me however, that would disagree.

There a many reasons not to be confrontational, insulting or dismissive of others ideas. As you pointed out, it does not get anyone anywhere.

Like I care..............................

[Penelope]

Star Burst wrote:

Like I care..............................

[Azrael]

Star Burst wrote:

Like I care..............................

I don't have to tell you what you can do with that do I!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Robert Tulip]

There a many reasons not to be confrontational, insulting or dismissive of others ideas.

Confrontation over ideas should always be civil. The majority of ideas, true or false, are harmless and more damage is caused by the surrounding ideological conflict than the idea itself. In other cases, the ideas cause people to behave in ways which is harmful to society. I strongly believe fundamentalism is damaging to our country. It does a lot of harm by corrupting the education of our youth and undermining people's trust in science. "Somebody has to stand up to those experts!" Such stupidity is harmful in the long term, and will not go away on it's own. Even still, confrontation may not be the anwser. After wading through the spaghetti-tangle of Starhwe's apologies, the wisdom of not engaging in conversation with fundamentalists starts to sink in. Education is a better approach.

The point about civility is true up to a point Interbane. However, when you consider the rise of Nazism and communism, people initially confronted them with civil methods, and did not imagine that Hitler or Stalin would be so extremely evil as to make rational debate irrelevant when alarm was needed.

Your point about the futility of debate with fundamentalists is illustrated in Tat Tvam Asi's debate with Stahrwe over Genesis. It provides Stahrwe with opportunity for confident bluster, as good as any megachurch preacher, deftly avoiding reality while evangelising about a delusory dream.

As George Burns said, if you can fake sincerity you've got it made. Fundamentalists have raised faking sincerity to a genuine art form. You can admire them for that, while pointing out the harm it causes by corrupting education and undermining trust in science.

Fundamentalist Christianity is a fantastic bubble that is on track to burst with great danger, considering the size of the armoury of the USA. It may still be possible to deflate the bubble using civil ideas. I hope you are right.

[Penelope]

Star Burst

I don't know why you are so angry.

You can always ignore us - I think you are young......and we......well, at least, I, am quite old and dithery......

One gets dithery and flexible as one gets older - or one would go barmy...innit?

Didn't mean to taunt you with those smileys - they were meant to depict me!!

Isn't it difficult to joke on the internet?

I'm going off to lurk in the background....tell me when I can come out from behind the sofa.

[stahrwe]

Stahrwe wrote:

It came from one of your fellow countrymen and arrived less than a week, faster than many books I get from here.

My job at the bookstore is to process the orders from the internet. So it is good to hear of your satisfaction. We get many orders from the US and as we have something of an economic squeeze here, we are very grateful for overseas orders, and try to get them mailed efficiently.

Of course Guiness - Records and Beer - are an Irish company. Lulu Guiness, designs handbags and is an heiress of the family, I believe. Sir Alec was just Sir Alec Guiness - a wonderful actor but no relationship to the others.

To distract from this post being off-topic, I will say that Interbane probably means your posts tend to be looooong - like spaghetti. Whereas mine go round in circles - like pasta hoops.

The internet provides a bit of security in its anonymity and if you wish to preserve it I understand, on the other hand, if you would like to share the web address for your store I would be happy to visit it and see if you have any titles of interest to me. I am generally interested in stuffy old volumes that few others would notice, and if you happen to have a first edition Christmas Carol, signed by Mr. Dickens for under $20 I would snap that up.

If not, I understand.

I want you to know that I am not ignoring your comment about sociopath. I am thinking about it. Not that I think I am one, but it is beneficial sometimes to be reflective.

[stahrwe]

An irrelevant post this. But it is spelt Guinness - with two n's. That should be etched on my brain since I spelt all our catalogue of record books wrongly with one 'n' - and the boss beats us you know.

I aim a teurible spellar

[Penelope]

Stahrwe wrote:

The internet provides a bit of security in its anonymity and if you wish to preserve it I understand, on the other hand, if you would like to share the web address for your store I would be happy to visit it and see if you have any titles of interest to me. I am generally interested in stuffy old volumes that few others would notice, and if you happen to have a first edition Christmas Carol, signed by Mr. Dickens for under $20 I would snap that up.

If not, I understand.

I want you to know that I am not ignoring your comment about sociopath. I am thinking about it. Not that I think I am one, but it is beneficial sometimes to be reflective.

In reply to your first paragraph, I will send you a PM with the web address of our bookstore. This is Chris's website and I know he gets some sponsorship (or summink) from Amazon, so I don't think it is fair to advertise competition on here.

But if anyone wants to look us up with Google, it's Cheshire Book Centre.

You may ignore my comment about sociopath. It is good that you might think about it. I was told recently, by someone I love, that I was very 'selfish' and it had a very salutary effect on me. I keep thinking about it.

Yesterday, was a horrible day for me. I went to the dentist, who was a dashing young Spaniard with a very pretty blonde assistant. It is the first time that I felt patronised and treated as though I was a stupid old woman. I suddenly knew what it must feel like to be old and helpless. Then I came on here and upset Star Burst with my smilies, last thing at night here too. So, not a good way to go to sleep.

But, today is a new day....and I am working on all of these issues. And I'm sorry StarBurst.

[Penelope]

Once again - 'the force' teaches me a lesson!!

I go to Google and up pops this:-

I’m sorry your house was burned down in the fire. my heart breaks that you never got see what your dreams could be. i’m sorry that raging rivers and their seas came in and stole everything. i’m sorry you lost your wife and unborn child to an unlawful army raid. i am so sorry that your daughter has had a daughter, because rape was somehow acceptable. i’m sorry that you live in a dilapidated cardboard box; and i am sorry i pass by you everyday. i’m sorry that my beliefs keep me from treating you like your someone. i’m sorry that my church has a broken heart for you along with their broken feet. i am so very sorry your baby has a bloated belly while I sit and eat in ths nice restaurant. i am sorry you are dying of disease when i have the cure. i’m sorry that we can’t be friends because my religious views say we can’t, i wish your lifestyle was different, maybe then i could be more understanding. i am sorry you are in prison and that people think that you are your bad decisions. i’m sorry that i know that love could change everything, but i just can’t fully mean this. if i do then it means i have to do something that might cost me what i believe.i know its wrong, hope you understand. God please make them understand that these are your rules not mine. i’m just doing the right thng. but how can it be the right thing if people are dying? maybe somethings wrong with ll of this. maybe i got you wrong. maybe. i’m so so very sorry.

[stahrwe]

Once again - 'the force' teaches me a lesson!!

I go to Google and up pops this:-

I’m sorry your house was burned down in the fire. my heart breaks that you never got see what your dreams could be. i’m sorry that raging rivers and their seas came in and stole everything. i’m sorry you lost your wife and unborn child to an unlawful army raid. i am so sorry that your daughter has had a daughter, because rape was somehow acceptable. i’m sorry that you live in a dilapidated cardboard box; and i am sorry i pass by you everyday. i’m sorry that my beliefs keep me from treating you like your someone. i’m sorry that my church has a broken heart for you along with their broken feet. i am so very sorry your baby has a bloated belly while I sit and eat in ths nice restaurant. i am sorry you are dying of disease when i have the cure. i’m sorry that we can’t be friends because my religious views say we can’t, i wish your lifestyle was different, maybe then i could be more understanding. i am sorry you are in prison and that people think that you are your bad decisions. i’m sorry that i know that love could change everything, but i just can’t fully mean this. if i do then it means i have to do something that might cost me what i believe.i know its wrong, hope you understand. God please make them understand that these are your rules not mine. i’m just doing the right thng. but how can it be the right thing if people are dying? maybe somethings wrong with ll of this. maybe i got you wrong. maybe. i’m so so very sorry.

It is easy to become jaded. Beggars come to our church with 1,000 hard luck stories. We give them food but not money and later find the food discarded unopened.

When my children were younger we were headed shopping before Christmas. At a major intersection there was a juggler taking handouts. The next week we were planning another shopping trip passed the same spot so we made a lunch for the juggler. He was there. The kids were so excited to take food to someone who had to resort to begging for money. He asked what was in the bag and promptly told me he didn't accept food. In a way, I understand that part, but he also told me that he was staying in a nice hotel on Cocoa Beach and made enough doing the juggling a couple of times each year to support him the rest of it.

Those examples don't lessen the fact that there are people who really need help. The chaplain of the local jail spoke at our church. He criticized us because we didn't take newly release prisoners into our homes to help them. I have a wife and two daughters living in the home. Should I have volunteered.

Would I have acted like those in the below story? Probably.
Were they wrong to act the way they did?

A Homeless Lesson by Tim Manzer

02/13/06

One day I received a phone call from Lake Ann Baptist Camp, asking me to play the part of a homeless person at a youth winter retreat for a downstate youth group. The camp staffer stated that I was the only person that he could think of that would do such a thing. What he really meant that I was the only one stupid enough to do such a thing. So naturally, I said “Yes”.

I began to prepare for this new challenge. I took an old wool jacket out of my dog’s house. It was disgusting and filled with dog-hair. I bought an old beer T-shirt. I pulled out my oldest and most dirty blue jeans. I rubbed the winter dirt off my messy van with those old jeans. I went to the little machine shop where my wife worked. I picked up and emptied all the dirty contents of the ash-trays into my dirty dog jacket. I filled the pockets with all the empty cigarette packs I could stuff into the pockets. I went to the local costume shop and bought teeth make-up that yellowed my teeth. My teeth had the worse fuzzy gross feeling. I didn’t wash my hair for a few days before the retreat and then put Vaseline into my hair. A friend gave me a little bottle of deer bow hunting juice. He told me not to put it myself till I saw the bus of kids.

I was ready to play the part of an undercover bum. I waited one night at a Shell gas station in Grawn, Michigan. It was raining a cold wet ugly snow that cold February night. I was freezing! I heard the large church bus approach the northern gas station. I opened the little bottle of deer juice and placed a few drops on me. UGH!! I smelled like a buck had just urinated on me.

Then the youth pastor left the church bus for the inside of the gas station. That was my clue to make my move on the bus. I hurried to the bus door and knocked on the exit. The bus door opened and then it slapped closed. A female youth leader had run down the aisle yelling, “No, no close the door!” I knocked again and again. This time the terrified youth team sent out the biggest male youth leader. I told the big boy my hopeless story. I explained how very cold and hungry I was. I asked if I could ride with them and how bleak I felt at that moment. The big old heartless sponsor spoke in a deep and firm voice, He stated “Beat It”. My assignment to get on the bus was becoming desperate! So I went to Plan B and began to beg the big boy for mercy. He did have a heart because he said that I could talk to the youth pastor.

The young pastor gathered all his youth sponsors in a circle and let me tell my sorry homeless story to the entire group. I did an academy award performance as I told a tale of hopelessness, hunger and cold. The youth pastor said “We can’t leave him out in the cold, let’s take him to the camp and see what they can do for him.” His youth staff looked at him as if he needed brain surgery. He received the most evil look from the female leader that had closed the door.

The noisy church bus went quiet. I sat down next to the only kid without a seat-mate. Jason was the rejected kid’s name.
We had a lot in common; no one wanted to sit by him either. The girl in back whispered to Jason in a loud tone, “Jason are you afraid?” The big youth sponsor sat across the aisle from me with his meaty arms crossed. He was guarding the youth from the new dangerous bum.

The youth pastor had told me to bring nothing and come as a mess. I was the mess. I had no towel, toothbrush, soap, food, clean clothes, toothpaste, shampoo, sleeping bag or any other thing with me. The plan was for the youth group to supply my needs. The plan did not work! By bedtime, I had received only an offer of a banana. I had secretly asked some kids for some smokes. They told me, “We go to church and we don’t do stuff like that!” Nice kids.

The youth pastor had brought an extra sleeping bag for me, if I received no help from the campers. Well I received the full course “NOTHING”. As he bought the bag to me, Jason told him that he had forgotten his sleeping bag. I was without a bag; I tried to sleep in the cold winter cabin. For warmth, I was sleeping with my dog’s old jacket. The reason we have outdoor dogs is that I am allergic to dogs, especially dog hair. So I slept on a cold mattress in a cold cabin in the winter with only that dirty dog jacket for my source of heat. As the evening progressed I had a full allergic reaction, watering eyes, itching and deep choking fits. I looked the part of a drug user.

I was told that the girls’ cabin had a prayer service for their safety. The kid in the bunk next to me stayed awake all-night. Later, He told me that he knew karate and planned to use it on me if I got out of bed. What sweet kids!

The theme of the youth speaker’s messages where What Would Jesus Do? During each chapel I acted bored and pretended to sleep. The youth pastor had placed the exact number of chairs as kids in the chapel, plus two extra chairs. During the three chapels the two chairs next to me where always empty.

During a devotion time where the youth group went off by themselves to have a time with God, another youth sponsor came to me and handed me a tract. I was excited! I have never had anyone try to witness to me. I had a bunch of questions to ask about salvation and God. However the youth leader merely said, “You ought to read this, sorry if you can’t read.” and left on his mission to meet with God. I was now angry, I felt homeless and rejected! I wanted to yell, “You idiot! I’m an ordained pastor with a master’s degree.” I stayed in character but that,” bitter chip on the shoulder- homeless look” was real.
I counted my losses during the retreat; a dirty body; gross teeth; awful oily hair; a sleepless night, itchy eyes and a very bad attitude. At the last chapel the youth pastor had asked me to be the chapel speaker. I was worried about my growing hostility. I was going to be one mean, crabby orator. At the final chapel, I pretended to sleep during the lively youth worship. The big boy sponsor was sitting a few chairs away, keeping a close eye on the dangerous bum.

The youth pastor announced that they had a special speaker for this chapel, since there was no unknown person in the crowd. They were confused! Then I stood up and stretched. The pastor introduced me as Tim a pastor from Traverse City. The group sat in silence. Then they began to talk. I had really fooled them and they where ready to share their thoughts. I just let them speak, it was better then my thoughts. The big guy said that he planned to go to town to buy me carharts that day. Others talked about what they planned to do to help me. My thoughts were, "Yep, sure, I believe this trash.”

After the chapel ended without me ever talking [I really had nothing nice to say.] A whole bunch of the youth leaders and youth came up to talk to me after the service. A few of them wanted to express how sorry they were for how they treated me. The youth pastor’s wife was one of them, she was the sponsor that closed the bus door and gave him the evil eye when he let me on the bus. The youth pastor was one brave kid, he had not even told his wife about the bum adventure.

One girl said the most unbelievable statement to me. It went like this, “I’m sorry! I would have helped you if I had known you were a pastor.” She missed the whole point of the weekend! I was shocked! Sometimes we Christians are so dumb! That is why God compares use to sheep. You do not need to help a pastor playing the part of a bum, help someone who is in real need.

The Bible says in James 2:1-4,” My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don’t show favoritism. Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, “Here’s a good seat for you,” but say to the poor man, “You stand there” or “Sit on the floor by my feet,” have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?” It can be found in the Old Testament, Lev. 19:15,” Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or favoritism to the great...” or Proverbs 21:13, ‘If a man shuts his ears to the cry of the poor, he too will cry out and not be answered.” And the Lord plans to meet the needs of the broken and hurting, Isaiah 61: 1-3, “The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn. And provide for those who grieve in Zion- to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor.”