Just an observation but it sounds like either you don't like your sis in law or ?

But if you are sure of what these 'non dangerous' areas truly need, why not get in there and start advocating/vol'ing to improve or implement?

Just my opinion, but it sounds like your sis in law is doing 'something' for someone else though. Just like 'someone' has to work in a manufacturing plant to make the pen that is used by the President to sign a document. It all ties in - it sounds like you feel your sis in law should be doing more or doing something different.

I would say to leave that between her and God.

Op (about perverted fundamentalism etc) reminded me of Shirley Phelps and her whole shebang....
Seems more and more "christians" are moving in that direction, but then again it's not like I took a survey of all Christians across the continent. Just an impression, yet a scary one....

Anyone remember her?
Good gawd...help....us all....

Just figured I might post this up for future reference.........

Most of Christianity is illegal in 51 countries

Restricted Nations: 40

Hostile Areas: 11

Now given 11 is incredibly low.

God Bless!!!

It will become "illegal" worldwide eventually - the Bible predicts that Christians will be severely persecuted close to the end days. Even to the point of being beheaded - which is already happening in the third world countries.

I would not want to be a non believer when the final curtain comes down.


Skeery.

Originally posted by phoebeflakes
Op (about perverted fundamentalism etc) reminded me of Shirley Phelps and her whole shebang....
Seems more and more "christians" are moving in that direction, but then again it's not like I took a survey of all Christians across the continent. Just an impression, yet a scary one....

Anyone remember her?
Good gawd...help....us all....

See, that would be like me saying "Charles Manson - alot of non Christians are moving in that direction........ Good "gawd" help us all"

It is senseless and not accurate.

God doesn't hate "fags" but He does hate homosexuality.


Shirley and Fred Phelps remind me of Jim Jones - they are not the 'norm' of Christians, if they are Christian at all.

It's feeling like the bashing is about to begin - so I'm off to bed. The only bashing I'm interested in is bashing my head into my pillow.


Peace to all
God Bless to all

Thank everyone for your responses, particularly the Christians who are willing to put themselves in the line of fire.

I have so many responses that I want to make (kid in a candy store), but I'm going to focus on Water-Tastes-Good's comments.

I agree 100% with what you say but there are only a handful of us. . .

I contend that moderate Christians are not in the minority. I think regular, reasonable Christian folk far outnumber the people who are corrupting your religion. If my contention is true, this means that you DO have the power to make a difference. Christians in the Western world are most definitely not a minority.

We can get angry with these so called "fake Christian Politicians" and do our best to tear them down, but the Government has the rest of the nation in the palm of its hand.

The tone of most of this post is one of the things I was thinking I might see when I started this thread. I don't mean to offend, but the post conveys a sense of helplessness versus an evil world. My question to Water is, do you think that your Christian beliefs encourage this sense of helplessness? Could that be part of the reason why real followers of Christ don't stand up to the 'false prophets'?

People are already against us.

Part of my point is that most people are not against you. Some are and will always be, but most people are against the charletans that Christians have allowed to be the public faces of their religion. By letting them define the rest of the Christian community, you passively allow people to lump you all together under their false banner. If the Christian mission is to spread the word, these false public faces are seemingly a huge barrier to successfully accomplishing your mission. It seems to me that you should stop them so that you can reach more people.

Also, there was a post that may have suggested that I was bashing God and/or Jesus. I don't want any misunderstaning. I wasn't bashing Christianity in general, I am bashing your silence. Those are two very different things.

I'm not a christian because I don't share in the majority or main beliefs of Christians. I see things completely different than they do a good bit of the time.

But I would say it's up to every individual to educate and come to their own understandings. Why allow other people to define things for you?

If I wasn't able to separate the things Jesus said from his "fans", I wouldn't even be able to talk about these things at all. In the OP, you seemed to get the gist of it, so what does it matter what other people say?

Originally posted by nomorecruelty
It will become "illegal" worldwide eventually - the Bible predicts that Christians will be severely persecuted close to the end days...

Lol.

Web Bot had better prediction track record in the first few weeks then Bible...

Illegal ??? How about irrelevant ?

Originally posted by nomorecruelty
I would not want to be a non believer when the final curtain comes down.

Assuming that giving up your free thinking for the promise of eternal life is a fair trade is just your opinion...

I believe that free thinking is worth dying for, even if that means forever

Reality of the situation is that for some of you curtain comes down and for some of us it goes up, lol

Originally posted by zefiro
I contend that moderate Christians are not in the minority. I think regular, reasonable Christian folk far outnumber the people who are corrupting your religion. If my contention is true, this means that you DO have the power to make a difference. Christians in the Western world are most definitely not a minority.

I understand your point. I also do not know the actual statistics of the Christian majority. The thing is, many Christians are hypocrites. Well, all Christians are hypocrites at one time or another. Like Sundance or Republican put, "many care not about other people so much, but about greed" That's where I was coming from. Remember the parable of the rich man that wanted to follow Jesus? Jesus said to give up his possessions to the poor yet the man couldn't do it. That's all I meant. There is nothing wrong with owning things, just don't let it corrupt you. Now give or take I'm not sure if it's a majority or minority so when I stated that, I lied and didn't know and for that I'm sorry.

The tone of most of this post is one of the things I was thinking I might see when I started this thread. I don't mean to offend, but the post conveys a sense of helplessness versus an evil world. My question to Water is, do you think that your Christian beliefs encourage this sense of helplessness? Could that be part of the reason why real followers of Christ don't stand up to the 'false prophets'?

No offense was taken and I honestly was not mad at you. Your right. As a Christian I am very angry at these Politicians. That is why I said I agreed with you. Your question is a very good one. Of course I want to stand up to this villiany. Regardless what anyone believes, this is wrong. But the only thing I don't agree with is calling followers of Jesus "Weak". Instead, we operate at another level than just boasting at the politicians. Let them have their talk, but God is on our side. That means we have won.

You want me to stand up to the false prophets? I'm not the greatest in speech but I'll give it my shot. Mark my words.

Part of my point is that most people are not against you. Some are and will always be, but most people are against the charletans that Christians have allowed to be the public faces of their religion. By letting them define the rest of the Christian community, you passively allow people to lump you all together under their false banner. If the Christian mission is to spread the word, these false public faces are seemingly a huge barrier to successfully accomplishing your mission. It seems to me that you should stop them so that you can reach more people.

Now I never said "many are against us". But you may be right. I'm not certain on the statistics on this either. But there are people hurting the religion you are correct. But I can argue with them all day and never solve a thing. People are natural followers always needing someone to follow. Especially in the here and now. My thing is, there will always be charletans doing this because of their great speaking methods. I can't control who anyone follows. Now regardless more Christians stand up and as you say "fight" we may gain some ground but not much. If you follow the "Book of Revelation" it only gets worse. But as I mentioned above, I will speak out. Just for you. I will take a stand on how these people have defiled God's Holy Temple. Thanks for commenting back. God Bless!!!



[edit on 6-6-2009 by Water-tastes-good]

Originally posted by nomorecruelty
It will become "illegal" worldwide eventually - the Bible predicts that Christians will be severely persecuted close to the end days. Even to the point of being beheaded - which is already happening in the third world countries.

I would not want to be a non believer when the final curtain comes down.


Skeery.

Oh, you mean like how the RCC did to anyone who didn't go along with them? The religion in the name of Christ, that got political and military power and then proceeded to kill all those who stood in their way?

The religion that won't be happy until they are the 1 world religion?

Funny, I remember it being that those who truly believed would always be persecuted, and yet you can't really even get elected if you don't claim to be a christian.

Try looking at your own religion and applying the same principles to it. You'll find it fits in very nicely with the prophecies.

As a Christian, I don't believe in Satan/ Devil (unless in a metaphorical way) same with Hell, metaphor at most, and I don't believe in an "End Times" nor do I believe in a fleshly 2nd coming of Jesus. I think all those things are a bunch of hooey. So many of those concepts are fabrications that developed much after the NT was written, or they are based of an interpritation (key word) of one sentence from the Bible and the "higher ups" tell us what that sentence means. Think about what the Christian community has taught you and what is written. A lot of myths and strangeness frankly has been growing within the community, like the rapture for example. Hardly any basis, yet the popularity of some of these ideas are growing way too fast and mistakenly being seen as pure "Christian" doctrines.

I'm tired of people talking about "Satan" tempting people and whatever as if he's a real being, it sounds stupid from a religious and secular view point.

You can't obey some laws and oppose the others, believe in it fully or believe nothing of it is my opinion.

If I was a christian now, I would've never had sex before marriage, never would've told a lie, even a white lie, wouldn't of ever ingested somethings. I would of done alot less in life, but I do rebuke it, and it's in writing here!

I wouldn't say you have to obey all laws, frankly some of the laws are barbaric and you'd be put in jail today if you followed them, like killing a child that doesn't always listen to you. All Christians seem to pick and choose what laws they want to follow or what laws to emphasize. A lot of heterosexual Christians for example love to emphasize that homosexuality is a sin (which is another thing as a Christian I don't believe in in the traditionally understood way) and isn't that convenient, putting so much focus on a sin that you'll never have a problem with, but forgetting the other sins that you have a problem with.

As a Christian, I don't think the sex before marriage thing has anything to do with Christianity. I don't think lieing matters. I don't think it has anything to do with not ingesting substances. A lot of those things are just what the Christian culture has come up with, but culture can be wrong.

[edit on 6-6-2009 by ghaleon12]

Boy, there are some really broad strokes being painted about Christians here.

Originally posted by ghaleon12
As a Christian, I don't believe in Satan/ Devil (unless in a metaphorical way) same with Hell, metaphor at most, and I don't believe in an "End Times" nor do I believe in a fleshly 2nd coming of Jesus. I think all those things are a bunch of hooey. So many of those concepts are fabrications that developed much after the NT was written, or they are based of an interpritation (key word) of one sentence from the Bible and the "higher ups" tell us what that sentence means. Think about what the Christian community has taught you and what is written. A lot of myths and strangeness frankly has been growing within the community, like the rapture for example. Hardly any basis, yet the popularity of some of these ideas are growing way too fast and mistakenly being seen as pure "Christian" doctrines.

I'm tired of people talking about "Satan" tempting people and whatever as if he's a real being, it sounds stupid from a religious and secular view point.

You can't obey some laws and oppose the others, believe in it fully or believe nothing of it is my opinion.

If I was a christian now, I would've never had sex before marriage, never would've told a lie, even a white lie, wouldn't of ever ingested somethings. I would of done alot less in life, but I do rebuke it, and it's in writing here!

I wouldn't say you have to obey all laws, frankly some of the laws are barbaric and you'd be put in jail today if you followed them, like killing a child that doesn't always listen to you. All Christians seem to pick and choose what laws they want to follow or what laws to emphasize. A lot of heterosexual Christians for example love to emphasize that homosexuality is a sin (which is another thing as a Christian I don't believe in in the traditionally understood way) and isn't that convenient, putting so much focus on a sin that you'll never have a problem with, but forgetting the other sins that you have a problem with.

As a Christian, I don't think the sex before marriage thing has anything to do with Christianity. I don't think lieing matters. I don't think it has anything to do with not ingesting substances. A lot of those things are just what the Christian culture has come up with, but culture can be wrong.

[edit on 6-6-2009 by ghaleon12]

What makes you a Christian? (asking a thought provoking question on the basis that your version of Christianity isn't found anywhere in the Scriptures.)

nomorecruelty, you're hijacking this thread a bit. Please stay on topic.

ghaleon12 seems to be the kind of Christian I am asking to step up. I'm very interested in what your answers are to the questions/premises in the OP. Why do you think the reasonable Christian communities allow the perverse to define you?

Water mentioned that 'many Christians are hypocrites'. I would describe these people in much gentler terms. These are the reasonable Christian base. They do the best that they can to be 'good' Christians while stuggling through the other challenges of life. These 'hypocrites' are your power. . .and these are some of main victims of the Fundamentalists that you allow to define you.

This isn't about 'dying for God'. This isn't about putting yourself into harms way. What this is about is breaking your silence.

What would it be like to half of the pundits on TV be from moderate Christianity rather then just the Fundamentalist fringe?

What would it be like if Christians organized a campaign to denounce Rush representing himself as a Christian?

What would it be like if every Christian spoke up when their co-worker complained about paying taxes to help the weak? What would Jesus want you to spend the money on?

Sorry, but I'm getting signaled that I got get away from the computer. Be back Sunday.