Radorth

How about Muslims? Have you ever attacked them personally? You know damn well Muslims wouldn't be very tolerant of you in their own country, and we know what our currency would say if they were in power, and it wouldn't be "In God.."

I don't buy it Starboy. You'd act no differently towards other theists, if you lived around them and had as many bad experiences with them as with some Christians. (That's assuming they put up with your sweeping generalities without assaulting you in fact)

In any case, the great irony here is that your insults are more limited by the atheist moderators here than by any Christians or their leaders, or their governments. I suggest you wouldn't do well anywhere but here.

Rad

Stephen T-B

Radorth asked a while back (I’ve not been at the computer for a couple of days so have got a bit left behind): “Should I take it you think an extant and good God should create more safe places to live?”

This is the crux of the matter.
Let’s suppose there really is a good, all-powerful entity which created everything and loves us all: what sort of a home would it provide for us?
That would depend on its long-term intention, and since we can only speculate as to what that might be, we might as well go along with the speculations contained in the Bible and said - by those who made them - to be divinely inspired (noting, of course, that we only have their word for it.)
God’s intention would seem to be to give us a choice between good and evil, between loving and obeying him or rejecting and disobeying him: do the former and he rewards us with everlasting life with him in Heaven; do the latter and we consign ourselves to damnation. And that’s just the way it is. Asking why is pointless because God is inexplicable.
We may, however, consider what conditions need to be in place in order that we can make this choice, and my answer is “Alternatives” - equally attractive alternatives, one of which leads us to loving and obeying him and one which leads us to rejecting and disobeying him.

The question is: where do natural disasters come into this?
Does a righteous person not die of disease; do his crops never fail; is his land never subject to drought or flood or landslides or earthquake or volcanic eruption; when he goes to sea is he preserved from shipwreck and storms; is he never struck by lightning?
Since all these things strike the righteous and the non-righteous alike, is it because the righteous are not as righteous as they thought and that God is punishing them? If so, how does that square with the notion of eternal punishment which comes when you’ve lived your life and made your choices?
(What choices, by the way, has a five-year old child made before she was killed by malaria? What choices did an eight-year old make by the time he was killed by a tornado – compared, say, to the choices his 80-year old grandma made when she died in the same storm?)
Natural disasters are arbitrary and random, and they are part, apparently, of God’s creation.
Do they lead people to making a choice between loving and obeying God or rejecting and disobeying him?

If they do, how do they?

Radorth’s next point was: “Is it possible a good Yahweh did not intend the earth to be so crowded, poor and unjust and to have oppressive governments, so that some people would suffer more than others?”

Presumably these ills are the consequence of people choosing not to love and obey God - but I thought the consequence of that was that they should go to hell. Instead, we have perfectly innocent people - people who do love and obey god - enduring terrible lives. This is a difficult notion of Justice to get our heads around:
Mr Jones rejects god, becomes a powerful and avaricious ruler who wrecks his nation’s economy, its agriculture and its infrastructure, dies and goes to hell. Which is what he deserves. But 10-million of his God-fearing countryman have their lives ruined. They will be rewarded in Heaven but meantime they are leading seriously wretched lives. Will God make it up to them by giving them an even better time in Heaven than the sleek Christian who never knew any hardship at all?
Or is it the case that our lives on Earth are of such a brief span that it really doesn’t matter whether they are pleasant or unpleasant? And if it doesn’t, why should Christian’s care?Why should they try to improve other people’s lives? OK, so Christ said they should love their neighbours as themselves, but if the implication of that is that they should try making their lives materially and physically better then we must take it that he believed our lives on Earth ARE important, and not of such a short span that it really doesn’t matter whether they pleasant or unpleasant?

Which brings us straight back to the contradiction of an all-powerful, loving God permitting natural disasters.

mike_decock

Damn thing almost ate my bumper off yesterday!!!

For the record, I never said they should be removed. It's private property and the owners should be able to put up what they please.

-Mike...

Biff the unclean

Others claim we have to remove all the crosses from soldiers' plots in public cemeteries
It's not public cemeteries it's military cemeteries. And it isn't an evil Atheist plot (so to speak) it's so they can easily mow the grass.

remove all biblical inscriptions from public libraries and monuments, such as Washington's,
That correct, you aren't supposed to use tax dollars to support religion. That's one of the things that makes this country great.
and remove even crucifixes on churches which at least one skeptic claims "assault" him when he drives by. I know the corner Baptist church with it's neon cross like a giant beer sign in a bar doesn't do much for my property values. And while we are at it I'd like the Catholics on the other corner to stop ringing that Goddamned bell every f***ing Sunday morning when I'm trying to sleep. If I sat in front of their mass and honked my horn for twenty minutes they would call the cops, but think they have a right to pester the rest of us.

Oh yes, and the President has to stop using even generic terms for God such as "Almighty" or "Providence" or "Creator" as Washington and the rest of the founders did.
A generic God is still a God like a generic drug is still a drug.

In other words, we must do whatever a 2% freaked out minority…
That's a 12% freaked out minority bright eyes. There are more Atheists living in the United States alone than there are Jews in the world

…says will make them feel "free," regardless of our culture or traditions, or what the founders manifestly found acceptable and even efficacious.
The Founding Fathers were nowhere vague about the separation of church and state. That's why you have to embroider our history to support your case.

RufusAtticus

My wife, wildernesse, has used the following question on fundies yammering about Strobel's works?

Why should I read "The Case for Christ/Faith?" I always thought that the Bible was the case for Christ/Faith.

We have yet to see one answer that question.

Radorth

Yeah right. You're avoiding the issue of whether a small minority should be able to remove all signs of a present or former culture because they hate what they stand for.

Really? I thought the first Congress imported Bibles because the country was running dangerously low, held services in the Capitol buildings and hired PROTESTANT Christian chaplains at public expense because they thought it was good for public morals and they wanted God's wisdom to prevail amongst themselves (as Franklin so eloquently pleaded for them to do) You could then cynically accuse all the writers of the Constitution and TJ of trying to manipulate and control the masses, but of course the only one who questioned these practices (Madison) never accused them of that. Too bad.

Don Mclean disagreed in one of the biggest selling records ever, leaving you in a tiny and cynical minority apparently.

Well know, the word is used in entirely different ways, which have apparently escaped you, and Bush's motive little different from Washington's.

Really? I believe it was Rhea who claimed we're 90% Christian, so you are either in a 2% minority, or there are no Muslims, Jews or Hindus here, or Rhea was just kidding around. Of course all I know is what rational people tell me.

Really? How exactly have I embroidered Washington's Farewell Address is which he said an unbeliever is no patriot? You're right. There is nothing vague at all there. I'm afraid the embroidery is all done in skeptics' libraries and websites, where you learn things like "Washington never mentioned Jesus Christ." (A blatant lie at worst, an uninformed guess at best.)

Nice try though. Perhaps you should visit the Library of Congress sometime or at least read their website on religion in America.

Rad

Yellum Notnef

Biff:

Rad:

I'm wondering if Radorth would care to name the Don Mclean song(s) in which he tackles the specific issues Biff mentioned in the above quote.

I'm serious. I really don't know much of his lyrics and really don't want to go digging through them all.

Biff the unclean

You're avoiding the issue of whether a small minority should be able to remove all signs of a present or former culture because they hate what they stand for.
Your avoiding the fact that if there are stones that are flush to the ground WITH CROSSES CARVED INTO THEM you can mow the grass in half the time.

I thought the first Congress imported Bibles because the country was running dangerously low, held services in the Capitol buildings and hired PROTESTANT Christian chaplains at public expense because they thought it was good for public morals and they wanted God's wisdom to prevail amongst themselves
I've never heard of that. If they did do these things they were breaking the law.

(as Franklin so eloquently pleaded for them to do)
You realize that Franklin was very out spoken about not being a Christian and was vilified from pulpits in all 13 colonies.

You could then cynically accuse all the writers of the Constitution and TJ of trying to manipulate and control the masses, but of course the only one who questioned these practices (Madison) never accused them of that.
You realize that Jefferson was not a Christian either

Dom Mclean disagreed in one of the biggest selling records ever, leaving you in a tiny and cynical minority apparently.
Dom McLean…American Pie, Dom McLean?
Did some part of your blurb get cropped because I'm missing something, this seems insane.

Well know, the word is used in entirely different ways, which have apparently escaped you, and Bush's motive little different from Washington's.
A generic God is still a God. Our nation is not in the God business.
"Oh it doesn't matter that the sign says NO SMOKING officer, these are generic cigarettes."

I believe it was Rhea who claimed we're 90% Christian,
Gallup claims 12% Atheist.

so you are either in a 2% minority,
What does being a minority matter in terms of the law? Nothing, not a F***ing thing.

How exactly have I embroidered Washington's Farewell Address is which he said an unbeliever is no patriot?
By misrepresenting what he said; which was…
" Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens."
He is talking about freedom of religion, the separation of church and state. One of our basic freedoms. He does not imply that a non-believer is no patriot. Shame on you.

Nice try though. Perhaps you should visit the Library of Congress sometime or at least read their website on religion in America.
And perhaps you might pick up a copy of the Constitution which protects us from subversives like you.

Llyricist

Rad,

Is this the part you are talking about? (found here )

He seems to be saying that the person who would tear down churches or act against them was no patriot, NOT the unbeliever, BIG difference.

And btw, NOWHERE in that speech did he mention Jesus or Christ.

Eidt: Fact is he seems to be coming off as rather "above" the common folk. That this belief that religion is necessary for morals applies to the "unwashed masses" more so than to the "influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure."

Opera Nut

Treaty of Tripoli:

"As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Musselmen; and as the said States never have entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries."

The preliminary treaty began with a signing on 4 November, 1796 (the end of George Washington's last term as president). Joel Barlow, the American diplomat served as counsel to Algiers and held responsibility for the treaty negotiations. Barlow had once served under Washington as a chaplain in the revolutionary army. He became good friends with Paine, Jefferson, and read Enlightenment literature. Later he abandoned Christian orthodoxy for rationalism and became an advocate of secular government. Joel Barlow wrote the original English version of the treaty, including Amendment 11. Barlow forwarded the treaty to U.S. legislators for approval in 1797. Timothy Pickering, the secretary of state, endorsed it and John Adams concurred (now during his presidency), sending the document on to the Senate. The Senate approved the treaty on June 7, 1797, and officially ratified by the Senate with John Adams signature on 10 June, 1797. All during this multi-review process, the wording of Article 11 never raised the slightest concern. The treaty even became public through its publication in The Philadelphia Gazette on 17 June 1997.

So here we have a clear admission by the United States in 1797 that our government did not found itself upon Christianity. Unlike the Declaration of Independence, this treaty represented U.S. law as all U.S. Treaties do (see the Constitution, Article VI, Sect.2: ("This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every State shall be bound thereby, anything in the constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding.")