Apples growing on orange tree?

Whew, busy weekend (had to take the wife to see Star Wars) and just now had a chance to get back on. I figured there would be pushback on my post being in the general discussion forum, but I decided to post it here anyway because I wanted it to actually be seen and hopefully be helpful to somebody.

I didn't post to start any arguments or to give a defense of Christianity. I will happily tell you why I believe what I believe, but I don't think anyone has asked yet, so I will refrain. My post was just to say happy New Year and legitimately challenge folks to read one of the four gospels. I think the Word of God is perfectly capable of defending itself and its truth is readily evident and still applicable. Surely somebody is willing to trade two hours in front of the good ole idiot box to read a book of the Bible. The other part of the challenge is to pray the prayer I mentioned previously. It won't take long. If God doesn't exist, no harm done, you just feel like an idiot for thirty seconds. If He does, it will change everything. If nothing else, you can say you've read some piece of ancient world literature and possibly glean some ammunition to make fun of me with. Anybody game?

As far as what southsound just said, that's tough and I won't pretend to answer for God or give any answers for why He does what He does. I will say what I do know: God loves us so much, that He says He sent Jesus to die for us. While Jesus was on this earth, He cared for the poor and healed the sick. He gave sight to the blind. He cleansed the lepers. He went directly to the folks that the religious leaders of the day rejected. He conquered death and rose from the grave and promised to come again. You can say a lot of things about Jesus, but you can't say Jesus doesn't care.

Maybe some of you are afraid of doing this. Maybe you are afraid God will actually answer. Maybe you look at your life and all the things you have done and say that there is no way God could forgive you. Heck, you can't even stand yourself. Maybe your mistakes haunt you. God is willing to forgive, you just have to ask.
 
Guns, Germs and Steel gives an excellent reason for the introduction of religeon into society. Plain and simple...a controlling mechanism. Chiefs would claim they were the divine and could speak with their god(s), people would worship these gods and chiefs and that is how they remained powerful and maintained order in a growing society. Great Book by the way. It is the history of mankind since the last ice age. Approx 13,000 years ago and why certain societies and cultures ended up where they are today
 
RyTheTreeGuy said:
Guns, Germs and Steel gives an excellent reason for the introduction of religeon into society. Plain and simple...a controlling mechanism. Chiefs would claim they were the divine and could speak with their god(s), people would worship these gods and chiefs and that is how they remained powerful and maintained order in a growing society. Great Book by the way. It is the history of mankind since the last ice age. Approx 13,000 years ago and why certain societies and cultures ended up where they are today
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Same thing, mainly, but my fave:

Ishmael (disambiguation) - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org en.m.wikipedia.org

Nothing like story about a man in a room with a talking guerilla.
 
southsoundtree said:
And the Tooth Fairy, Easter Bunny...

God doesn't do shit for innocent, starving children, why would he intervene for a tree climber?
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Does evil exist?

The university professor challenged his students with this question. Did God create everything that exists? A student bravely replied, “Yes, he did!”

“God created everything? The professor asked.

“Yes sir”, the student replied.

The professor answered, “If God created everything, then God created evil since evil exists, and according to the principal that our works define who we are then God is evil”. The student became quiet before such an answer. The professor was quite pleased with himself and boasted to the students that he had proven once more that the Christian faith was a myth.

Another student raised his hand and said, “Can I ask you a question professor?”

“Of course”, replied the professor.

The student stood up and asked, “Professor, does cold exist?”

“What kind of question is this? Of course it exists. Have you never been cold?” The students snickered at the young man’s question.

The young man replied, “In fact sir, cold does not exist. According to the laws of physics, what we consider cold is in reality the absence of heat. Every body or object is susceptible to study when it has or transmits energy, and heat is what makes a body or matter have or transmit energy. Absolute zero (-460 degrees F) is the total absence of heat; all matter becomes inert and incapable of reaction at that temperature. Cold does not exist. We have created this word to describe how we feel if we have no heat.”

The student continued, “Professor, does darkness exist?”

The professor responded, “Of course it does.”

The student replied, “Once again you are wrong sir, darkness does not exist either. Darkness is in reality the absence of light. Light we can study, but not darkness. In fact we can use Newton’s prism to break white light into many colors and study the various wavelengths of each color. You cannot measure darkness. A simple ray of light can break into a world of darkness and illuminate it. How can you know how dark a certain space is? You measure the amount of light present. Isn’t this correct? Darkness is a term used by man to describe what happens when there is no light present.”

Finally the young man asked the professor, “Sir, does evil exist?”

Now uncertain, the professor responded, “Of course as I have already said. We see it every day. It is in the daily example of man’s inhumanity to man. It is in the multitude of crime and violence everywhere in the world. These manifestations are nothing else but evil.”

To this the student replied, “Evil does not exist sir, or at least it does not exist unto itself. Evil is simply the absence of God. It is just like darkness and cold, a word that man has created to describe the absence of God. God did not create evil. Evil is not like faith, or love that exist just as does light and heat. Evil is the result of what happens when man does not have God’s love present in his heart. It’s like the cold that comes when there is no heat or the darkness that comes when there is no light.”
 
OasisTree said:
Does evil exist?
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This tiresome, aged, chain e-mail tripe requires an audience devoid of even the most basic elements of critical thinking or analytical reasoning to be taken as anything other than the product of an extremely unimaginative author with a library card.

The alleged physics is actually not accurate, a college professor (atheist or otherwise) who bothered to "prove" unprovable tenants of philosophy or religion, let alone single out one particular religion, would be unemployed rather quickly, tenure or not. The final argument is happy crappy, feel good nonsense that goes no further to proving anything than do the ludicrous arguments of the imaginary university professor. The weak attempt to use a little science to divert attention to a ray of sunshine and unicorn farts by another author (without credit, of course) shows a remarkably sophomoric understanding of the very nature of philosophy and religious belief.
 
"Hopefully, our billboard will serve as a daily reminder to the citizens there that they live in a barbaric backwater town where dysfunctional and possibly sexually disturbed middle-aged men may depravedly titillate themselves by violently spanking teenaged girls," Satanic Temple spokesperson Lucien Graves said in the church's statement



The joke in Utah is "Welcome to Utah. Set you watch back 20 years." I avoid Texas, too.

Join the 21st F-ing century. Actually, Join the 1980's.

Freedom from belief in magic.


Please put this crap in a NON-TREE area. Last I checked, there is an area for this kind of bigoted, religious crap. Unless this is the place for brainwashing and bigotry, then PLEASE let me know, I'll join in.


The Catholic church just settled another suit. I bet those priests loved punishing teens, amongst other things.
www.seattletimes.com

Seattle Archdiocese pays nearly $7 million to settle men’s claims that six priests abused them as boys

Jim Hauer and the five other men each claim they were victimized as children decades ago by priests assigned to churches and schools throughout Western Washington. In addition to receiving settlements, several expressed a demand that the church reveal its...
www.seattletimes.com www.seattletimes.com
 
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This thread inspires me, for some reason makes me think alot less about how rough I have it, and alot more about how blessed I am! I’ve been smiling at people more, using a little less sarcasm, letting people around me that I love and appreciate know, also New Year resolutoin ; share some of my gifts with the less fortunate everyday. Thanks all, this has been a great wakeup call for me!
Happy New Year!!!
 
southsoundtree said:
Please put this crap in a NON-TREE area. Last I checked, there is an area for this kind of bigoted, religious crap. Unless this is the place for brainwashing and bigotry, then PLEASE let me know, I'll join in.


The Catholic church just settled another suit. I bet those priests loved punishing teens, amongst other things.
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Sean, I can understand your animosity towards religion, but I am really confused as to who said anything bigoted. I just reread the whole thread and didn't see any hate or bigotry.

As far as to how those Catholic priests behaved, that was not because they believe in Jesus, it was in fact because of their lack of Jesus. Their behavior is despicable. Don't look at the priests, look at what Jesus said and did. Let Jesus be the test. "Love your neighbor as yourself." "This is my commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends." "Do unto others as you would have them do to you."

Suppose a man and his wife went on a Carnival cruise. There are rules and warning signs posted everywhere. For whatever reason, way out at sea, the man ignored every instruction of the cruise company and jumped off the ship and drowned. The wife couldn't blame the cruise company and sue for millions because of her husband's disobedience (although in this day and age she would sure try). It was not the cruise company's fault; the ship was good, if the man had been in the ship, he wouldn't have drowned. The shameful priests doing such things are not a representation of Christ. If they had been in Christ, there wouldn't have been a problem.

Jesus said, "The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed tares (weeds) among the wheat, and went away. But when the wheat sprouted and bore grain, then the tares became evident also. The slaves of the landowner came and said to him, 'Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have tares? And he said to them, 'An enemy has done this!' The slave said to him, 'Do you want us, then, to go and gather them up?' But he said, 'No; for while you are gathering up the tares, you may uproot the wheat with them. Allow both to grow together until the harvest; and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, 'First gather up the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them up; but gather the wheat into my barn'"

There are many tares in any church. The tares look just like the wheat until the head matures. Just because someone goes to church doesn't mean they are a Christian. In fact, I would say a high number of people in church probably aren't Christians. You aren't born a Christian because your parents were Christians. God doesn't have any grandchildren, only children. Salvation is by faith alone in Jesus Christ.

Again, Jesus said, "Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes nor figs from thistles, are they? So every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then, you will know them by their fruits."
 
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So, don't go on a boat ride with your nagging wife or farmers with weedy wheat fields, if your apples have worms in them, cut the damn tree down and burn it for firewood, avoid whistle pigs and thistle figs, ignore the hired help because underpaid slaves know squat about wheat harvesting, burn the weed, drink the wine and if you're a Buddhist you're pretty much hosed, cuz ya' gotta get the right flavor of Jesus in ya' or it's off to the Roaring Flames of Damnation. Ignore those pedophiles behind the curtains and the white collars... let God sort 'em out after they're dead.

Got it. Carry on.
 
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