Another question: skeptics like Hang praise those who do good deeds, but deplore religious commitment. How many of these praiseworthy people DO their deeds BECAUSE oif their faith? These life effects of faith are being entirely overlooked by the anti-religionists who post here.
What? I could care less what color stripes are on your robe Sunday morning. Or any other day of the week. Do your good works in any name that makes yah feel good.
Pick up a rock, utter nosies like 'heritic' or 'unbeliever', you'll be dealt with like any other rabid nutcase... regardless of how may puppies, starving children or emotionally distraught folks your good works have accomplished. Nothing, NOTHING excuses religious extremist behavior.
Is anyone really considering their opposite's points, or are we just venting prejudices? In short, is this a college dorm discussion or is it Archie Bunker's living room?
I dunno.. you tell me. Seems like a reasonable discussion so far.. aside from the odd comments from the peanut gallery; to be expected in any public venue such as this. But, should your require some 'opposite points' that display the 'christiandom' the 'unbelievers' seem so annoyed about lets try a few of these..
House Majority Whip Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) at the First Baptist Church of Pearland, Texas, on April 12, 2002:
Ladies and gentlemen, Christianity offers the only viable, reasonable, definitive answer to the questions of 'Where did I come from?' 'Why am I here?' 'Where am I going?' 'Does life have any meaningful purpose?' Only Christianity offers a way to understand that physical and moral border. Only Christianity offers a comprehensive worldview that covers all areas of life and thought, every aspect of creation. Only Christianity offers a way to live in response to the realities that we find in this world -- only Christianity.Jerry Falwell "Moral Majority Report," September, 1984:
If we are going to save America and evangelize the world, we cannot accommodate secular philosophies that are diametrically opposed to Christian truth.Jeff Fugate, Pastor of Clays Mill Road Baptist Church, Lexington, KY, July 3, 2002:
If you don't want a Christian nation, then go to one of the many nations that are heathen already, rather than perverting ours. You're welcome to come, but leave your religions, your bibles, all your other things back where you came from. Islam and America are opposites. They hate us. They want to kill us. I'm not anti-Jewish or anti-Catholic. I'm anti-Islam because that religion right there is anti-American.Jerry Falwell, "Sunday Live with Jerry Falwell," July 23, 1995:
Most American children do not know that this is a Christian nation... Our Constitution won't work in Russia, won't work in Haiti, won't work in Iraq. It only works where the people believe in the Christ of the Bible. The United States of America.D. James Kennedy, Character & Destiny: A Nation in Search of Its Soul (1994):
This is our land. This is our world. This is our heritage, and with God's help, we shall reclaim this nation for Jesus Christ. And no power on earth can stop us.Francis J. Lally, American Roman Catholic Monsignor. Interview with Mike Wallace:
The Church doesn't believe in book-burning, but it believes in restricting the use of dangerous books among those whose minds are unprepared for them.
The Church has through the centuries, understood that ideas are really more dangerous than other weapons. Their use should be restricted.Rev. Joseph Morecraft, Chalcedon Presbyterian Church, "Biblical Role of Civil Government" speech delivered on August 21, 1993 at the Biblical Worldview and Christian Education Conference:
Nobody has the right to worship on this planet any other God than Jehovah. And therefore the state does not have the responsibility to defend anybody's pseudo-right to worship an idol.Gary North, "The Intellectual Schizophrenia of the New Christian Right" in Christianity and Civilization: The Failure of the American Baptist Culture, No. 1 (Spring, 1982), p. 25
So let us be blunt about it: We must use the doctrine of religious liberty to gain independence for Christian schools until we train up a generation of people who know that there is no religious neutrality, no neutral law, no neutral education, and no neutral civil government. Then they will be get busy in constructing a Bible-based social, political and religious order which finally denies the religious liberty of the enemies of God.Gary North, Political Polytheism: The Myth of Pluralism (1989)
This is God's world, not Satan's. Christians are the lawful heirs, not non-Christians. The long-term goal of Christians in politics should be to gain exclusive control over the franchise. Those who refuse to submit publicly to the eternal sanctions of God by submitting to His Church's public marks of the covenant - baptism and holy communion - must be denied citizenship, just as they were in ancient Israel.Bailey Smith, a founder of Pat Robertson's Christian Coalition, speaking during a Religious Roundtable briefing in Dallas, Texas, on June 26, 1994:
With all due respect to those dear people, my friend, God Almighty does not hear the prayer of a Jew.Jimmy Swaggart, The Evangelist, January 1988:
The Media is ruled by Satan. But yet I wonder if many Christians fully understand that. Also, will they believe what the Media says, considering that its aim is to steal, kill, and destroy?Randall Terry, Speech in Jackson, Mississippi, April 1992:
What this is coming down to is who runs the country. It's us against them. It's the good guys versus the bad guys. It's the God-fearing people against the pagans, and some of the pagans are going to church.Randall Terry, The News Sentinel, (Fort Wayne, Indiana), August 16, 1993:
I want you to just let a wave of intolerance wash over you. I want you to let a wave of hatred wash over you. Yes, hate is good... Our goal is a Christian nation. We have a biblical duty, we are called on by God to conquer this country. We don't want equal time. We don't want pluralism.Randall Terry, Why Does a Nice Guy Like Me Keep Getting Thrown in Jail? (1993)
The next step, if at all humanly possible (and in 90% of the cases it is), it is to get our children out of the humanistic, brianwashing institution called `public education.' Frankly, it is a mixture of insanity and irresponsibility to turn our children over to our adversaries and their curriculum in a God-less education system (i.e., a system that teaches history and science without God).Randall Terry, Speech to "Cities of Refuge" campaign, Willoughby Hills, Ohio, July, 1993:
America is under the judgment of God. And if we are ever going to rebuild this country, it must be under God's law. Our goal must be simple: We must have a Christian nation built on God's law, on the Ten Commandments. No apologies.Randall Terry, Speech before the U.S. Taxpayers Alliance on doctors who perform abortions. August 8, 1995:
When I, or people like me, are running the country, you'd better flee, because we will find you, we will try you, and we'll execute you. I mean every word of it. I will make it part of my mission to see to it that they are tried and executed.Jerry Vines President of the Southern Baptist Convention, speaking at the June 2002 SBC convention:
Islam was founded by Muhammad, a demon-possessed pedophile who had 12 wives, the last one of which was a 9-year-old girl. And I will tell you Allah is not Jehovah either. Jehovah’s not going to turn you into a terrorist that’ll try to bomb people and take the lives of thousands and thousands of people.James Watt, Secretary of the Interior under Rondald Reagan. Washington Post, May 24, 1981:
Responsibility is to follow the Scriptures which call upon us to occupy the land until Jesus returns. We don't have to protect the environment, the Second Coming is at hand.It would seem to me that the diatribe of hate is not just an Islamic Exclusive. Neither is Arrogant Religious Stupidity. I've said it before, I'll say it again.. your sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so, and will follow it by suppressing opposition, subverting all education to seize early the minds of the young, and by killing, locking up, or driving underground all heretics. In short, more of the same for this tired world lays down the paths your cult leaders or thiers would have us take.
Now, glance again at all the 'good works' of all religions, everywhere.. everywhen.. and tell us with a straight face it's worth the death, horror and destruction it brings along in the baggage train.
Neither side deserves to 'inherit' a damn thing. Take yer hate speach and murderous wars for religoius supremacy and stuff 'em where the sun never shines... and if the price for winning the war on terror stamping out ALL religious hate dogma, then so be it.
Again I ask.. who's the biggest threat to this nation? The Islamic Terrorists.. or the wolves in our midst preaching for Christ Supreme Uber Ales?
