foxjazz

At one time in my Christian endeavor I thought that being a Christian (a forgiving and loving person) negated the possibility of killing in wars. Of course I remember the Holy wars within the Christian heritage and can either think:

1: they weren't really Christian.
2: They were indeed Christian, and fought with their leaders.
3: No one is really Christian, because there really isn't any such thing because we are all human anyway.

Atheism however doesn't get a moral reason for killing or not. It isn't good or bad. Just like hunting deer, or killing cattle for meat. People die in the end, and war is just a form of population control.

I think it is only when we have empathy as humans, that we decide wether killing is ok.

Fox

Pouye

Think what you want to.

I made my points and you don't like them. Sorry. As far as being all "hoity-toity", I am frustrated when I make what I feel are valid points and you tell me nothing I say is relevant. I don't agree with everything you said. You seem to be convinced that you are much smarter and wiser than the likes of myself.

Have a good day.

Rock
:notworthy

Pouye

If I'm not mistaken, the USA is founded on Christian values and principals such as "all men are created equal" and hundreds of other references to God in our foundational documents...

I think we are getting along better than Russia was under Lenin and Stalin...

Just a thought.

Rock

diana

Let's see. All men are equal in the sight of the Lord might be a Christian concept, but as for all men being created equal, Rock? Read Philemon lately?

Hundreds of references to God (yours, I presume) in our "foundational documents"?

This I gotta hear. Proceed. You have my rapt attention.

d

Biff the unclean

Gurdur not only told you that your points weren't valid, Gurdur was also quite eloquent in explaining why they weren't.

Gurdur

Actually, no, you didn't make a point --- trying to get you to actually make a concrete specific point has been the main argument here --- shall I repeat my relevant criticism again for you ?
1) Your talk of "dethroning God" is meaningless, since you cannot point at any society where God is enthroned and therefore things go better.
Then you had better re-examine yourself, your points and your pointblank refusal to specify what you mean.
You know something ?
I find that last bit from you very immature indeed. I answer you fully and consistantly, I defend your OP, and I try getting you to specify your claim quoted above ?
And the best thing you can come out with is some playground version of ultra-defensiveness ?
Tcha.

Gurdur

*cough*
Ham, Shem, Japeth.
Many slave-owners were Christian, You cannot automatically call a value like "all men are created equal" a necessarily Christioan virtue.
By the way, care to explain why your USA Constitution initially refused women the vote and also allowed slavery ?
All leading to a seperation of church and state. Now why do you think that is so ?
Not much of a comparison at all.
Why not try modern secular Sweden or Germany for alternative comparisons ?

Or say Britain in 1859 with the USA in 1859 ? Specifically, slavery.

Calzaer

You are amazingly mistaken.

Clipped from http://freethought.mbdojo.com/foundingfathers.html (again):

"One of the most common statements from the Religious Right is that they want this country to "return to the christian principles on which it was founded". However, one only needs to do a little research into American history to discover that the individuals who were responsible for building the foundation of the United States wanted nothing to do with christianity, and were in fact directly opposed to it.

When the founders wrote the nation's Constitution, they specified that "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States." (Article 6, section 3) This provision was radical in its day-- giving equal citizenship to believers and non-believers alike. They wanted to ensure that no one religion could make the claim of being the official, national religion, such as England had. Nowhere in the Constitution does it mention religion, except in exclusionary terms. The words Jesus Christ, Christianity, Bible, and God are never mentioned in the Constitution.

Most of the Founders were Deists (and also Freemasons), which is to say they thought the universe was created by a god, but that he was no longer in the universe, or that he does not concern himself with the daily lives of people. Some people believe that if Charles Darwin had lived a century earlier, the Founding Fathers would have been atheists. Most of them were stoutly opposed to the bible and the teachings of Christianity in particular.

If the Christian Right Extremists wish to return this country to its beginnings, so be it... because half a century after the establishment of the United States, clergymen complained that no president up to that date had been a Christian. In a sermon that was reported in newspapers, Episcopal minister Bird Wilson of Albany, New York, protested in October 1831: "Among all our presidents from Washington downward, not one was a professor of religion, at least not of more than Unitarianism." The attitude of the age was one of enlightened reason, tolerance, and free thought. The Founding Fathers would turn in their graves if the Christian Coalition had their way with this country."

diana

At this point, he isn't the only one who's convinced.

Speak in your defense, sir. Sometimes, silence is overrated.

(I'd also appreciate a response to...pretty much anything I've posted to you in the past three days. Ta muchly.)

d

foxjazz

My hero TP who wrote the D of I for Thomas Jefferson.

Wasn't a Christian to his death bed refused any sort of Christian junk.

Now there is a man of integrity.

Fox