cuchulain

How do you know Jesus said so? The bible tells you so. How do you know the Bible is true? Once again, the bible tells you it is. So does the national enquirer, by the way.

It gets even better. Shortly after making the initial statement that halloween was first celebrated by the first settlers of America, they said halloween had been celebrated since the medieval times.

I don't think they were referencing the vikings, Pan. Just another sad statement on the intelligence behind our news organizations, I suppose. Is there a shaking your head emoticon?

So, watching the only news channel I get without satellite today, they report that halloween began with the original settlers of america...uuuggghhhh, I hate redneck news.

trick or treating with the daughter first, of course. She is gonna be five this year. Great night for listening to the Otherworld, and what it has to say.

The difference between lawful and unlawful is slim. Sure, a system of government could approve of a specific instance of killing. Funny how the Christians who cite this, fail to cite this when the same system allows a person who is terminally ill to end their own life, though.

Just another conflicting sentiment within the bible, Keystrikr. Perhaps, someone could stretch the words so that they don't conflict in their minds, but not me. And, I like to account for the spirit of the law, as well as the written word. When you look at the spirit of the words within the bible, they often conflict and contradict.

Oh I didn't say I didn't grasp the Christian concept of a God, I understand how they portray him to be. I simply cannot reconcile that image with reality, friend.

The closest I have been able to reconcile free will and an all powerful God who is still good: God has split personalities, and with an all powerful being, that would mean he was in the beginning capable of every good and every evil, but split himself into two beings, one ultimately good and one ultimately evil. With that frame of reference, every evil act in the world can rightfully be attributed to God's evil twin, Satan, while every good in the world could be attributed to his good twin, who is so pure as to be unnamed even. The evil part has control of all evil, the good half has control of all good. Still, it doesn't seem right to me, whatsoever, really, until you remove consciousness from both forces, and then it might as well be Rathar and Mythar, the mythological names given in the Raymond Feist series of books for order and chaos I believe.

A large part of my reasoning, brother Kaman. I see the Christians talk about a loving and caring God, but the bible reference what I would consider a psychopath, and cannot reconcile the two. Good for those who can, however.

Agreed to both. I was referencing the Christian God, my bad, especially considering I am not Christian eh? Answering Pete, there are multitudes of problems when you involve the God of Abraham and time. Even Christians disagree as to what god calls time, so it shouldn't be any surprise that us non Christians can't guess it accurately either, eh?

Others say that it's a ludicrous idea to reference God as the father. Usually during a debate when we equate the way God shows eternal love towards us as hateful(which would be my view if I believed in God). But, the prayer gives the lie to that in my view. "our father, who art in heaven..." is a reference to God as the father, at least, in my view.

Isn't it hubris for man to assume that God would work by man's calendar? Why would an all powerful God work on our schedule, and not simply laugh at us for failing to grasp his?

It is easy to follow a prophet of doom, much harder to follow a prophet that wants us to think in the long term. At least, that is my take.

I just wish I could get the real news, but as I said, I am not willing to pay for a couple of channels, so I get what I pay for I suppose.

Kind of reminds me of our local news crew always managing to pick out that "one" person, you know...its been flooding, and raining, and they get them on camera. "It just won't quit rainin' ". When it does, "Thank God it finally quit rainin' "

I always hate the fluff. I wake up early in the morning to get the kids off to school, and I get the one news channel because I won't pay the outrageous amount satellite or cable companies want, and the only thing on is the Today show. Ugh, talk about a lot of fluff. I wish they would air REAL news, instead of junk about make overs and how to eat cheap(and they actually consider $25 a person a meal cheap, get real too!)

Surely F..F..Fox news is reliable, right?(sniff)

Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy. "In the middle of the journey of our life I came to find myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost"

As I have said before, friend, people are stupid. Their heads are filled with all sorts of facts and tidbits and pieces of information, most of which is wrong, and they will base a lot of things on all that wrong information, believing either because they want to believe it or because they are afraid that that is the truth. I first encountered this idea, by the way, in a fiction book by terry goodkind, just to give proper credit. Religious people will believe their philosophy, even when it differs from their church, because they want to believe it is true the way they see it, or they are afraid that their philosophy is true. That is, people will make excuses to justify their actions when their actions go against what they allegedly believe.

Sometimes, Keystrikr, religious or philosophical views can override what the average person would know was good or evil. Then they try to claim that their view is what is common sense after all.

Humans are perfectly capable of defining what is evil without spiritual scripture to rely upon, otherwise the people writing the scripture in the first place would have absolutely no frame of reference as to what inspiration they were following, now would they? They would be unable to recognize the difference between good and evil, by that argument, and so unable to know whether they were listening to the devil or to god, yes? Because, before it was written, they didn't have scripture to tell them, now did they? They had to make their own judgement call about what voice was speaking to them, or where the inspiration for the bible itself came from, without having any scripture to fall back on. Assuming, of course, that such beings exist, which is a huge assumption in my view.

I have often had gay men hit on me, and then get mad at me when I said I was straight and tell me "don't knock it till ya try it". This is one of my pet peeves. My usual response at that point is to ask them if they have ever jumped off the empire state building, then say don't knock it till ya try it. I agree with Johnathan, I can reasonably infer that I would not be interested in homosexual intercourse from the fact that I have no interest sexually or romantically in men. I don't need to try it to know it isn't for me. I can certainly understand the concept that some things must be experienced to really understand, but I personally find it a flawed concept. As humans, we are capable of empathy. Not all of us use that empathy, and some of us use that empathy to get things we want, such as telling someone, don't knock it till ya try it. I can feel empathy for people who are homosexual being discriminated against, not because I am homosexual, but because I have suffered different forms of discrimination, much as we all for the most part have. In terms of spirituality, I see nothing at all wrong with telling someone about your faith, beliefs, etc... The problem comes in when ANY particular group starts singling out those who don't belong using acts of violence. Tolerance should end at another persons rights, in my opinion, and I am fairly convinced that witches should have the right to not have their heads cut off for any reason, same as free masons, Christians, Muslims, and others. Just my opinion, of course

I have been persecuted by Christians for being Pagan. The people in question attended the Catholic school across the street from where I lived, made a wrongful accusation against me and later admitted it was because I had a pagan bumper sticker. They told the prosecutor it was because their teacher put them up to it. The prosecutor, even having this information, refused to drop the charges. On the other hand, I have never heard of a pagan making wrongful accusations against a Christian for having a Christian bumber sticker. This is Illinois, by the way, in case anyone wondered where at in the United States. The people made a complaint against me to the police, which was picked up by the prosecutor and I had to go to court. Nothing was done against them, nothing was done to the Catholic school, the teacher the principle, anything. I had to go to court for something I didn't do, because Christians thought that I was evil. Guess they never heard of not bearing false witness. The case was dismissed because the witnesses failed to appear in court. It wasn't dismissed due to a lack of evidence, or anything like that. The arrest sits on my record, because the witnesses failed to appear, because the prosecutor when presented with testimony to the actual facts failed to drop the charges. I know this doesn't rank with beheading, but persecution is there nonetheless. Pretending that it doesn't exist in the United States is kind of silly. As far as Christians being persecuted historically, Pan, I agree. I think if you go back far enough in ANY groups history, they were probably persecuted at some point. Still, doesn't make it right to keep it up now, does it? Two wrongs don't make a right? Aren't Christians supposed to turn the other cheek, and all that? Just my opinion, of course, about the two wrongs not making it right.

What I am saying is if God is all powerful, there is no power left over for anyone else, therefor nobody else has any power to alter the course of events. It seems built into the definition for me. In order to be all powerful, God must by definition have ALL the power, right? Leaving none for anyone else? And will wouldn't come into it at all, because will is a form of power.