O’Rourke: Churches Should Lose Tax-exempt Status

[Tassman]

Tass, Slavery itself is neither condemned or condoned in scripture. But "manstealing" (kidnapping) is clearly condemned in Scripture and was a death penalty offense in the Old Testament. And slavery in the South was predicated on kidnapping, so immoral. No matter what the slavers claimed. Exodus 21:16, Deuteronomy 24:7, 1 Timothy 1:10.

Your claim was that there are many Christians who do not let the culture change their moral views, but this is not the case. There has been a long history of changing moral views throughout the centuries of Christianity. Clearly there were millions of Christians who justified slavery for centuries and justified it with scripture. Just as they justified the subjugation of women or killing witches or discriminating against blacks and homosexuals and etc. Even divorce and remarriage are seen as less serious than a generation ago among Christians.

Did the Maoists think that the lives of the millions they murdered significant? So who is correct - you or them?

What the Maoists thought or what the Christian colonialists thought as they killed off the indigenous inhabitants of the countries they invaded, is irrelevant. As far as the victims themselves were concerned their lives were significant.

Again, by definition atheism leads logically to existential nihilism. Just admit it...

One can be an atheist without subscribing to any specific philosophical system just as one can be a theist without subscribing to say, Hinduism or Zoroastrianism or Islam.

Again Tass, why won't you give a direct answer? Is a sheep for a sheep just? Yes or no?

I think so, but as I’ve said several times, we have civil courts and penalties to deal with such problems. OTOH you, as a Christian, don’t have that option. Jesus commands you to turn the other cheek. Matthew 5:38-48

[seer]

Your claim was that there are many Christians who do not let the culture change their moral views, but this is not the case. There has been a long history of changing moral views throughout the centuries of Christianity. Clearly there were millions of Christians who justified slavery for centuries and justified it with scripture. Just as they justified the subjugation of women or killing witches or discriminating against blacks and homosexuals and etc. Even divorce and remarriage are seen as less serious than a generation ago among Christians.

First Tass, I know of no Christian who thinks that adultery is a moral good. Second, you can not justify much of the slavery in the West by Scripture since it was based on manstealing and I gave to the Biblical references for that. And I don't know how many Christians over our history justified slavery - was a plurality and minority? And I will ask you again - how, where, am I not following the New Testament moral teachings, or at least trying?

What the Maoists thought or what the Christian colonialists thought as they killed off the indigenous inhabitants of the countries they invaded, is irrelevant. As far as the victims themselves were concerned their lives were significant.

So why was their opinion of their personal significance more correct than those who took their lives? Objective it wasn't, nor can it be.

One can be an atheist without subscribing to any specific philosophical system just as one can be a theist without subscribing to say, Hinduism or Zoroastrianism or Islam.

It is not about what you subscribe to or not, existential nihilism is the logical outcome of atheism.

I think so, but as I’ve said several times, we have civil courts and penalties to deal with such problems. OTOH you, as a Christian, don’t have that option. Jesus commands you to turn the other cheek. Matthew 5:38-48

So a sheep for a sheep is just. So a life for a life would be just. Good.

[Cow Poke]

First Tass, I know of no Christian who thinks that adultery is a moral good. Second...

Bless you for keeping the boy occupied in this thread.

[seer]

No seer, you misunderstand. The B-theory is just as cited in your link, according to that theory time is an illusion. But we are discussing god, who is said to be outside of time, correct. So, when defining gods thoughts, they would need be eternal, correct?

The point is Jim why would God's thoughts being eternal prevent Him from acting in time? If the B Theory of time is correct all your past, present and future thoughts exist simultaneously, yet you still think and act in series. But like I said we can not comprehend how God thinks, saying His thoughts are eternal tells us nothing about how those thoughts are used or ordered.

[seer]

Bless you for keeping the boy occupied in this thread.

Do I get combat pay?

[Cow Poke]

Do I get combat pay?

Hazardous Duty and Shift Differential.

[Cow Poke]

Hazardous Duty and Shift Differential.

(can't be combat pay because your opponent keeps showing up unarmed)

[seer]

(can't be combat pay because your opponent keeps showing up unarmed)

Hehe, but I tie half my brain behind my back just to make it fair!

[Cow Poke]

Hehe, but I tie half my brain behind my back just to make it fair!

I doubledogdareya to tell Tassman you're a Southern Baptist - that really gets him going.

[seer]

I doubledogdareya to tell Tassman you're a Southern Baptist - that really gets him going.

Well I actually did attend Southern Baptist in my town for a couple of years. I never saw any slaves though, they must keep them in the basement...

[Cow Poke]

Well I actually did attend Southern Baptist in my town for a couple of years. I never saw any slaves though, they must keep them in the basement...

Right next to the past Dead Presidents and their personal opinions.

[JimL]

The point is Jim why would God's thoughts being eternal prevent Him from acting in time? If the B Theory of time is correct all your past, present and future thoughts exist simultaneously, yet you still think and act in series. But like I said we can not comprehend how God thinks, saying His thoughts are eternal tells us nothing about how those thoughts are used or ordered.

I don't believe you're thinking this through, seer. If the B-theory is true, then time is an illusion and like with the eternal nature of an eternal god, nothing changes. Thoughts are an action only if they are temporal, if they are eternal then they, in correlatation with the B-theory of time, are an illusion.

[seer]

I don't believe you're thinking this through, seer. If the B-theory is true, then time is an illusion and like with the eternal nature of an eternal god, nothing changes. Thoughts are an action only if they are temporal, if they are eternal then they, in correlatation with the B-theory of time, are an illusion.

Yet you actually do think and act in series. You do it everyday, it is not an illusion that you had a headache yesterday and you don't today. But like I said we have no idea what time really is, we have no idea how God's thinks or how He interacts with the temporal. Yet after all He created the temporal.

[JimL]

Yet you actually do think and act in series. You do it everyday, it is not an illusion that you had a headache yesterday and you don't today. But like I said we have no idea what time really is, we have no idea how God's thinks or how He interacts with the temporal. Yet after all He created the temporal.

seer, again it's either one or the other, of time, or not of time, and gods thought process is either eternal, i.e. timeless, in which case you can't call it a process at all, or it is temporal which concludes to an infinite regress.

[Tassman]

First Tass, I know of no Christian who thinks that adultery is a moral good.

That’s not what I said. I said that social values among Christians re divorce and remarriage (adultery according to Jesus) have changed significantly. NB the Christian Right's support of multiply divorced adulterer Donald Trump, a far cry from a generation ago when Edward VIII was forced off the throne over the issue of divorce.

Second, you can not justify much of the slavery in the West by Scripture

But slave-owning Christians DID justify slavery by scripture. For centuries.

So why was their opinion of their personal significance more correct than those who took their lives? Objective it wasn't, nor can it be.

It is a fact of nature that we DO value our own lives and those of our loved ones regardless of the disregard of genocidal external forces.

It is not about what you subscribe to or not, existential nihilism is the logical outcome of atheism.

We do not live our lives according to the logical dictates of a philosophical theory, whether we are theist OR atheist. Rather we have evolved to survive as cooperative social animals.

So a sheep for a sheep is just. So a life for a life would be just. Good.

Sure, when it comes to sheep. NOT people. Although you as a Christian are compelled to “turn the other cheek” in all instances.