Christians are great

reply to post by Kargun


Good thread. One thing. "Evil christian" is an oxymoron as the word christian means "little Christ" or "Christ like". Christians are sinners just like everyone else, the difference is we recognize we're weak and cannot save ourselves on our own power. The root of mankind is evil to the core, and religion is just a scapegoat for now and when there is no religion mankind gets to take a long stare into the abyss and see what it truly is. A blight on this world.

Originally posted by NewAgeMan
because of a love that's out of this world

What do I mean by that?

It's "out of this world" because it preceded the world, and at the same time is the very reason for the world in the first place, that this experience would be possible to begin with, so it's time for a celebration, not unlike a wedding reception at the end of the age where all is well that ends well and begins anew well. It's our present moment condition, already always, and it can never be an imposition upon the mind of man, so it's entirely reasonable, no matter how "unreasonably reasonable" it may appear to be, so there's a joke there at the end of it all waiting for us to share with God, as the scales fall from our eyes and we recognize our true place in the cosmos as children of a loving God who is pleased to share his eternal kingdom. So fear not and be of good cheer, for he has overcome the world!

reply to post by Kargun


Some day us scientists (and aspiring ones as well) will prove the existence of a God. I firmly believe through this electronic age as well as advancements and solidities within Quantum Physics. I'm actually making this bet with a friend of mine that is a strickt atheist. Life is a gamble albeit I am a gambler.

-godspeed and thanks for this post. I am not reading through all of the mumbo jumbo that I assume will be replied.. . (positive & negative, accurate and completely psychotic) but best wishes to you, and God bless. Let love rule.

some Christian's are great now, (present day) but there was many many years where the actions of Christian's (not all but many) seem to be a bit crazy. (no offense) but think of all the murdered individual's, sometimes to suppress science sometimes to force the belief of the church on other individuals. I am not singling out Christianity, there are examples of many people or groups doing the same, but you cant make statements like
"First off we owe everything from space travel to modern medicine to Christian scientists. Now you might not like this but it is a stone cold fact"
Many factors and many people had there hands in this as well. I mean do you really believe that statement? if so WOW....
yes we have Christian scientists but we have many more that don't believe in religion or god so does that mean they are not great as well?
*sigh*
the only thing i wish i could definitively answer is if the 800 to 1,000 years that we call the dark ages (which was a lot of suppression of science by religion) never happened, how far would we be today, with technology with medicine with everything?

i wounder how many people are going to label me a Christian hating atheist. -_-
which i am not, just sating "stone cold facts" o.0

Originally posted by links234
I'll try and make this as non-biased as possible.

reply to post by Kargun

 

God was the answer for everything for millenia. As someone else mentioned, Newton was trying to better understand God by learning more through physics and calculus.

Only in the past two centuries have we discovered some of the more astounding facts about science and the universe that made us ask more questions about more things.

Is this to say that God doesn't exist? No. Many prominent scientists are agnostics. Does the Christian God exist? More and more evidence points to 'no.' That doesn't mean that something didn't create the universe, we just don't know what...yet.

We weren't even sure other galaxies existed until about 100 years ago. The concept of the atom hasn't been around for more than 150 years. Until Einstein, the 'reasonable' explanation for the universe was that it was filled with invisible, weightless ether that permeated all things.

Galileo, though proclaiming to believe in God, was excommunicated for suggesting that the Earth revolved around the sun. The church, or religion in general, doesn't accept opposing viewpoints very well.

This miscomception is very widely accepted as true but is not in fact what happened. Galileo's work was originally undertaken with the full blessing of Pope Urban. Quite frankly, Urban embraced Galileo's work. He and Galileo met numerous times to discuss it, both before he began writing and during the course of his work. There's nothing in the historical record that shows any hindering of his work by the Pope or church in general at this point, with the exception of the fact that Pope Urban wanted final say about the theological implications. Galileo had his own interpretations, which he did include in the final writing and that's where the papal persecutuion kicks in.

The science did not get him in trouble with the church, it was the theology. Human dogma in other words.

reply to post by Kargun


Notice how all the 'christian' scientists existed quite a while ago. Mind finding me a current list? Also not that I find it ironic or anything, but a christian tooting their own horn. That never ever happens.

reply to post by Kargun


I agree with OP and have been saying this for years. Christians have done tons of good in the world. I'm not sure why ever since YouTube was invented people have been trying to wipe us off the face of the earth and from the history books.

Whatever. The early Christians were living in underground caves when they weren't being fed to lions. We still have it good by comparison. All that matters is that we retain our faith. I'm not sure what the number of worldwide Christians is needed to continue the faith, but we probably have at least a thousand times what is needed. It's weird that people even bother attacking us. There's nothing to gain from destroying us and it would be nearly impossible to accomplish anyway.

Originally posted by Kargun
These people were not the evil Christians. Some posters often say " I'd love to get rid of all the Christians" by doing so we would be living in the dark ages.

we wouldn't live in the dark ages, we would live far far more in the future than we currently are.
destroying ancient knowledge of sciene like the library alexandria wasnt helpful

im not saying crhistians are evil.
religion is a fine thing, people made a perversion out of it.
but burning everything in the old times which was seen as sorcery, for this i wouldnt mind if the whole christians religon go in hell for this

Originally posted by mythos

Originally posted by Kargun

These people were not the evil Christians. Some posters often say " I'd love to get rid of all the Christians" by doing so we would be living in the dark ages.

some would say it was the Christians who brought us into the dark ages.

And many others would say it was Christians who brought us out.

Hello, Reformation. Printing Press. Without which their would be no Enlightenment.

(BTW - Christian doesn't mean "perfect". It means an person recognizes their imperfection, indeed, sinfulness, and accepts Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior of their life.)

Originally posted by JeSterR117
reply to post by Kargun

 

I agree with OP and have been saying this for years. Christians have done tons of good in the world. I'm not sure why ever since YouTube was invented people have been trying to wipe us off the face of the earth and from the history books.

Whatever. The early Christians were living in underground caves when they weren't being fed to lions. We still have it good by comparison. All that matters is that we retain our faith. I'm not sure what the number of worldwide Christians is needed to continue the faith, but we probably have at least a thousand times what is needed. It's weird that people even bother attacking us. There's nothing to gain from destroying us and it would be nearly impossible to accomplish anyway.

Here is why (and not just since youtube was invented, but that sure gave both non-Christians and Christians an interesting new medium)....directly from the mouth of Jesus:

18 “If the world hates you, remember that it hated me first. 19 If you belonged to the world, it would love you as it loves its own. But I have chosen you out of the world, so you don’t belong to it. That is why the world hates you.

Originally posted by NoJoker13
reply to post by Kargun

 

Notice how all the 'christian' scientists existed quite a while ago. Mind finding me a current list? Also not that I find it ironic or anything, but a christian tooting their own horn. That never ever happens.

Georges Lemaitre original proponent of the Big Bang theory. But he's dead, do you want a list of the really good living ones? I can make one if you want. Sorry, didn't mean to interupt your irrational focus of hating on Christians. Just out of curiosity, do you despise other faiths or just Christians?

reply to post by MrInquisitive

Your OP talked about us owing space flight to Christians, hence sheepslayer called you out on your knuckle-headedness. As for civilization owing a lot to Isaac Newton, didn't Newton, in turn, owe a lot to pagans, such as the ancient/classical Greeks who developed math and geometry? Wasn't most all of agriculture developed by pagans/heathens, so we owe a great debt to them. Christians are just johnny-come-latelies when it comes to human civilization. Isaac Newton did some despicable things, like try to undermine the man that developed accurate time pieces for determining longitude.

Exactly! And Newton also owed a lot to the Muslim world.

The Muslims arriving at the correct hypothesis of the solar system's functioning was made possible only because Islam had broken down the walls of conditioned thinking which had acted as a barrier to man's intellectual progress.

As soon as this artificial barrier was out of the way, the caravan of human thought began to move on its journey with a hitherto unimaginable rapidity. And thus it brought us finally to the spectacular scientific feats of the present century. In 830 AD, Al-Mamun established in Baghdad his famous Bayt al Hikmah, a combination library, academy and translation bureau, and an astronomical observatory.

This work started under the patronage of the stats. Al-Mamun's astronomers performed one of the most delicate geodetic operation -- the measuring of the length of a a terrestrial degree. The object was to determine the size of the earth and its circumgerence on the assumption that the earth was round. The measurement, carried out on the plain of Sinjar, north of the Euphrated, and near Palmyra, yielded 562 Arabic miles as the length of a degree of the meridian -- a remarkably accurate result, exceeding the real length of the degree at that place by about 2877 feet. This would make the circumference of the earth 20,400 mules and its diameter 6500.

Among those who took part in this operation were the sons of Musa ibn Shakir and al-Khwarizmi, whose tables, revised a century and a half later by the Spanish astronomer Maslamah Maslamah al-Majrity and translated into Latin in 1126 by Adelard of Bath, became the bases for other works both in the East and the West.

In those days, Muslims were so ahead of other nations that when they were driver out of Spain, the astrolabes they left behind, by means of which they had studied heavenly bodies, were turned into the clock tower of a church, as the Christians did not understand their use.
www.islamawareness.net...

Some posters often say " I'd love to get rid of all the Christians" by doing so we would be living in the dark ages.

Spoken like somebody who hasn't picked up a history book in their entire lifetime.

The period of time known as "The Dark Ages" refers to the time AFTER the collapse of the PAGAN Roman Empire and DIRECTLY COINCIDES WITH THE ADVENT AND SPREAD OF ORGANIZED CHRISTIANITY.

The Dark Ages ENDED in the 15th century when the RENAISSANCE took hold and people, governments, and scholars MOVED AWAY FROM the teachings of the church and decided it was time to stop burning scientists at the stake for practicing "sorcery"...although it should still be noted that non-scientists continued to be roasted alive for another three hundred years or so whenever crops failed, somebody's pig died, or anything at all happened that the semi-literate-at-best peasants couldn't wrap their heads around.

Since then the pattern has held true. Every significant burst of scientific achievement and invention occur in countries ( or during time periods in those countries) when society at large moves TOWARDS secularism and AWAY FROM religious fundamentalism.

[shaking my head and walking away in amazement at how people form what passes for conclusions these days]

A tounge is a small urban lounge. (That's tongue in cheek)

I see in this thread what I see in a lot of places. People just can not seem to grasp that people do bad things in the name of God and in the name of many religions. These things are done by PEOPLE.

Yet what may be excused in one religion is picked apart if done by Christians. You can deny this but really all you have to do is read some of the post in this thread to see that it is the truth.

If you (who ever may be reading this) think that to be a Christian automatically makes you unintelligent then I would love for you and I to take an IQ test. We can then compare the results. As I said before, some Christians may surprise you.

If you do refuse to believe, that is fine, I can not make you but I can pray for you.

Despite what many people think they know of Christians for the most part they are mistaken.
I was not brain washed, I was not forced, no one made me see what I now see clear as day.

I wish you could see what I do. I wish you could feel what I do. One day perhaps, until then I will pray.
Quad

Exactly! And Newton also owed a lot to the Muslim world.

Actually...in REAL LIFE the Isaac Newton who ACTUALLY EXISTED believed that practicing Christianity was akin to idolatry and heretical by it's very nature. Mostly because Isaac Newton was a practitioner of the Arian faith which was founded by the early christian Arius in Alexandria, Egypt c. 250-336 AD.

This is particularly important, because Arians were declared heretical by Eastern Orthodoxy AND Catholic Church BOTH given that they steadfastly reject the divinity of Jesus Christ and instead refer to him as "Christ the Logos" which means "Christ the Reason" or "Christ the Discourse". You see...unlike the fictional character Isaac Newton the REAL ISAAC NEWTON poured over the Bible because he thought that early Christian Occultists and Heretics encoded secret messages in the text which he would need to decipher in order to become fully enlightened by the God of Reason that he worshipped.

Note that if any of this sounds familiar, it's probably because that Arians are often compared to Deists and Unitarians such as our Founding Fathers...most of whom loudly and clearly denounced the Divinity of Jesus Christ every chance they got...even going so far as to take a razor blade to the bible and cut out each and every reference to supernatural phenomena and magical powers out of it and advocate that what remains ought to be used as sort of a general handbook of morality. This book still exists and is on display in the Smithsonian. It's called the "Jefferson Bible" after it's creator, Thomas Jefferson.

Similarly we should note that the non-fictionalized Isaac Newton who was real also wrote letters to John Locke in which he stated that he rejected the Holy Trinity, did not believe in personal devils, literal demons, or Evil Personified, and the concept of the Immortal Soul which would imply by extension that Isaac Newton also did not believe in Heaven or Hell.

The real-life Isaac Newton, that is...not the make-believe version.

Not surprisingly, Actual-Isaac Newton also refused the viaticum on his very deathbed because he thought it was superstitious nonsense. This final act of defiance did not come as a surprise to those who were close to Isaac Newton given that most of them were well aware that he only bothered going through the motions of pretending to be Anglican in order to avoid being executed for defiance of the Blasphemy Act of 1697.

But hey...since when the hell do facts and history matter when inventing a convenient narrative to help you re-entrench the pre-existing conclusion/illusion that must be maintained at all times lest one's worldview be completely shaken to the core of their very existence.

In that case...what the hell. Isaac Newton was a devout christian, Muslims are scary, the indians were the bad guys, and America is a "peaceful" nation.

It's just way more comfortable to believe those things.

Originally posted by Quadrivium

Yet what may be excused in one religion is picked apart if done by Christians. You can deny this but really all you have to do is read some of the post in this thread to see that it is the truth.

Well...for what it's worth...I think ALL religions are EQUALLY the bane of human existence. I make no differentiation between Taliban executing homosexuals and teenage girls who don't listen to their fathers or State Representative Charles Fuqua and pastor Charles Morley's calls for the same in the name "jesus".

I think in both cases it's equally dangerous to society as a whole.

Originally posted by PlayerOne

Originally posted by spyder550
The basic underpinnings of science is math -- sorry definitely not thunk up by christians

Oh and think where we would have been today if the christians hadn't brought us the DARK AGES.

The Dark Ages where brought to you by the Visigoths destroying the Roman Empire and all of the security it brought. A power vacuum along with a lack of law and order and education then occurred followed. As far as I am aware the Visigoths where not Christians.

Yeah as if that isn't debatable -- if it hadn't been for christians I would have my flying car by now.

The problem with most Christians, is that they hold their conceptions and proclamations out at arms length, and proselytize to others without actually taking their beliefs to heart and in the process becoming transformed and entering through the gateway into a new domain of liberation and freedom (heaven). In other words their Christianity is little more than a shield of some kind by which they can feel special and part of an inside club, and a sword by which to cut down the heathen and the unbelievers. Carl Jung said that religion is a defense against having an authentic spiritual experience. It's so ironic, when all the while Jesus wanted people to fully grasp his teachings and receive what he was offering and in the process recognize (re cognize) their true self and destiny (even as I was sent so too do I send you) and realize the promise of eternal life, not as something to be put off until we die, but as a present moment state of mind and heart and being through a shared koinonia which is the "substance" of an intimate, participatory, familial relationship with God.

That said the bashers are certainly no better, and possess a rather high degree of ignorance in all their assumptions and presuppositions, because they hold in contempt that which they've never really investigated fully with an open mind and heart.

It's so sad how stupid we are.

Originally posted by FinalCountdown
News Flash, everyone was a "Christian" back then.
I doubt these scientists were "really" Christians however.
They were too smart for that.

So typical, yet another baseless insulting post about Christians. Yes, just deny the faith of others of whom you have zero facts to back up your views. In fact, your post offers nothing to this thread which is about some great contributions to society by true believers in Jesus Christ.

Here's a contemporary one who is very well known: