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Offline Jer009

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #165 on: July 06, 2006, 02:40:49 PM »
Quick reply to Vic re Buddhism--thanks for the link you provided, I'll look into it.

 Cherry-picking holy books is old hat, of course. The problem comes when Christians and others become so powerfull they can spread their hate and bigotry through violence. Garden variety homophobia is enough to deal with,  but  Fundamentalists of every stripe are prone to shove down our throats their insane notions through bombs in the case of the Middle East, and through gay bashing or homicide in the US and elsewhere.

When the DVD-to-libraries project in this Forum was in the early stages, there was enthusiasm for comparing the dissemination of the BBM DVD to Christian missionaries. It lost traction early, however, as cooler heads prevailed. That's one of the great things about this Forum. There's such a diversity of religious belief here that many of its members shuddered--including me-- at the thought of an association with missionaries of any faith,  however sincere the original impulse.

We in this Forum may be unique, in that we have straights, gays and everything in between contributing viewpoints. It's remarkable that a movie that was conceived as an "art-house, little picture" could draw such a wide audience of admirers. Where else could both straight and gay air their views in a civil manner, and with so much love? There's true understanding and a meeting of minds here, and I hope we will continue to build bridges.

Thanks to Ang Lee, everyone involved in BBM, and of course, Dave Cullen and his crew for giving us this opportunity.

Offline Doug2017

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #166 on: July 07, 2006, 03:02:25 PM »
Jason,

Up to my door today the little old mail lady drove up and honked.  Package for me.

Within the movie "Just a Question of Love"

I tore it out of it's package and popped it into the DVD player.  Had to read the subtitles, but man did I cry when he was suffering his folks.  I know that battle so well.  What my parents do not know to this day is if it was not for gay friends of mine telling me it was not fair, I would have moved and never saw them again.  I had my plans, knew exactly how I was going to do it.  Pack one night, not show up for work again, and not leave a forwarding address, move far, far away so they would never find me, drop off the face of the earth. My friends would not hear of it, it was just too cruel they said.  At that point I was much more ready to reject them than have them reject me, which I was sure they would.  A bad habit of mine, I tend to reject before I get rejected, that seems to be my protection, though not a very good one.  Fear, it seems, rules...

I finallly wrote them a 24 page letter.  As it was, Mother cried for over a year, never could talk to her much, and Dad, well he never will talk of it again, anything but that.  I get along with them ok now, but that subject is still a no go.  My tears over BBM was only shared here on this forum.  They made comments that I must have allergies, because my eyes where so swollen and red.  Why bring them into it, it would have made no difference, they would have told me "it is just a movie, get over it."   

I, too, wished I had a parent like C's Mom, it would have been so much easier, would be so much easier.  At times I still wonder what the hell I am doing here, but getting older?  But to where, and for what? I do not fit in the city, and the city does not work in me, so a country bumpkin I stay.  As Ennis says, "nothin and lost".

A very nice ending, at least they have each other, great hopes for a future together, and C's Mom to keep them on track.   I wonder how many more long term relationships there would be if we had parents that loved and went to the extent she did for her son? 

Thanks, Jason, this movie rates a "10 out of 10" in my book.

Doug

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Offline quijote

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #167 on: July 07, 2006, 04:39:23 PM »
Mr. Infidel,

I have been away quite a long time.  You all have travelled far and wide in my absence.  I just wanted to, in the short time I have, answer a few of the questions you posed to me what seems so long ago now.

First, again you are assuming you are speaking to a fundamentalist Christian when you speak to me.  You are not, sir.  The Old and New Testaments are mythological in the main and are not to be literally interpreted by you, me or anyone else.  That should handle your questions about the Old Testament god.  Moreover, if I am a Christian, I am really looking only to the New Testament, not the Old, except as a useful tool to understand how New Testament writers used the Old to interpret Jesus' life and death.  I take very little literally from the Old Testament, unless it gives me insight into ancient Jewish people, culture and their beliefs.

Second, if you want to understand how non-fundamentalist Christians look at passages from the New Testament that you cite,  you must understand that we see those passages as fully of their time, place and culture and filled with nuance.  They cannot be taken out of their context without doing a great injustice to their meaning.  Regarding the anti-family passages you cite, I agree with John Dominic Crossan on his interpretations of sayings attributed to Jesus.  He says:

"If the supreme value for the 20th century American imagination is individualism, based on economics and property, that for the first-century Mediterranean imagination can be called to the contrary, groupism, based on kinship and gender.  And there were really only two groups -- the familial and the political, kinship and politics -- to be considered.  But we have, precisely against both those groups, biting aphorisms and dialogues from the historical Jesus.  There is, first of all, an almost savage attack on family values and it happens very, very often.

The family is a group to which one is irrevocably assigned, but [as to the whoever does not hate father, mother, etc., saying], that given grouping is negated in favor of another one open to all who wish to join it.....Imagine the standard Mediterranean family with five members:  mother and father, married son with his wife, and unmarried daughter, a nuclear extended family all under one roof.  Jesus says he will tear it apart.  The usual explanation is that families will become divided as some accept and others refuse faith in Jesus.  But notice where and how emphatically the axis of separation is located.  It is precisely between the generations....The attack has nothing to do with faith but with power.  The attack is on the Mediterranean family's axis of power, which sets father and mother over son, daughter, and daughter-in-law....The family is society in miniature, the place where we first and most deeply learn how to love and be loved, hate and be hated, help and be helped, abuse and be abused.  It is not just a center of domestic serenity; since it involves power, it invites the abuse of power, and it is at that precise point that Jesus attacks it.  His ideal group is, contrary to Mediterranean and indeed most human familial reality, an open one equally accessible to all under God.  It is the Kingdom of God, and it negates that terrible abuse of power that is power's dark specter and lethal shadow."


Crossan also explains what Jesus means, given what he is trying to do and teach, this way:

"...the family was a group to which one was assigned....Jesus downplays the family in favor of another kind of group that is open to all who wish to join it.  For Jesus, the given family unit, the kinship unit, is no longer primary.  What is primary is a new community of persons who become "family" to one another in their common effort to do the will of God in the world....[Jesus'] ideal group is contrary to customary human social arrangements, a group that is open and equally accessible to all under God.  In the Kingdom of God there is no abuse of power.  All are welcome, all are equal, and all are alike under the will and purpose of God."

Now, I am one of those non-fundamentalists who think that the "family values" Republicans have a lot of explaining to do given what Jesus was REALLY trying to say.  (For me, what Crossan says convinces me there was a reason Jesus never said a word against homosexuality.)  I also think critics are missing the boat entirely if they don't first get a big picture notion of what Jesus was about and then, second, interpret what he said within that big picture.  Jesus lived in a different time in a different place.  His metaphors speak to those people in a very specific way.  If we keep that in mind, it is easy to understand what he is trying to say to us all.

There is simply no such thing as "plain" meaning.  Reading is a process of interpretation always.  The fundamentalists don't get it.  Neither do non-believers who read passages without any understanding of context.  Of course, an added complication is translation.  The Bible wasn't written in the King's English.  Literalists will constantly sink into the complexities that constitute the written word.  If any human being's philosophy or theology or world view consists of slinging biblical passages at one another, it is a mighty poor intellectual and moral foundation indeed.  Focus on the myth and the arc of the stories.  That's where the gold lies.  Jesus was a peasant living in a time of crushing imperial Roman power and inequitable social and religious rules.  He advocated religious and economic egalitarianism.  When reading what he is alleged to have said, this big picture needs to always be kept in mind.

Jesus' response to oppression and his teaching of the way to an unmediated relationship with something called the Divine had everything to do with our day-to-day treatment of each other.  His message was that the only way to fight oppression or encounter the Divine is to build a life of love, of equal treatment, of justice in our relationsihips with each other.    He, in fact, taught that this was God's will.  This was the nature of the Kingdom of God.

I'll end with Crossan:

"The deliberate conjunction of magic and meal, miracle and table, free compassion and open commensality, was a challenge launched not just on the level of Judaism's strictest purity regulations, or even on that of the Mediterranean's patriarchal combination of honor and shame, patronage and clientage, but at the most basic level of civilization's eternal inclination to draw lines, invoke boundaries, establish hierarchies, and maintain discriminations.  [Jesus' program] did not invite a political revolution but envisaged a social one at the imagination's most dangerous depths.  No importance was given to distinctions of Gentile and Jew, female and male, slave and free, poor and rich.  Those distinctions were hardly ever attacked in theory [by Jesus]; in practice, they were simply ignored."

I don't know when I'll have time to return.  I think this pretty much says all I have to say about interpreting Christianity or biblical passages.  You don't have to believe that Jesus was the son of god to understand he was a thoroughly dangerous man.  Just my type.

Much love to you, Doug, darlin'.
 

Offline jasonwv

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #168 on: July 07, 2006, 05:28:12 PM »
                   
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  Thanks, Jason, this movie rates a "10 out of 10" in my book.

I'm glad you liked it Doug! I've watched it about 5 times now.  It's a great uplifter after watching BBM!  :)
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Offline Doug2017

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #169 on: July 08, 2006, 09:55:30 AM »
Mr. Infidel,

Hi Again,

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I have been away quite a long time.  You all have travelled far and wide in my absence.  I just wanted to, in the short time I have, answer a few of the questions you posed to me what seems so long ago now.

Thank You.

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First, again you are assuming you are speaking to a fundamentalist Christian when you speak to me.  You are not, sir. 

 No, I am just trying to get people to see that when they take the label "Christian" it comes with a butt load of baggage.

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The Old and New Testaments are mythological in the main and are not to be literally interpreted by you, me or anyone else. 

Thank You, that was at least part of the point I was so unsuccessfully trying to get across. My point is if something HAS to be interpreted for you then it is a weapon to be used against you by those who do that kind of thing.  I totally agree the whole bible is mythological and not to be taken literally.

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That should handle your questions about the Old Testament god.  Moreover, if I am a Christian, I am really looking only to the New Testament, not the Old, except as a useful tool to understand how New Testament writers used the Old to interpret Jesus' life and death.  I take very little literally from the Old Testament, unless it gives me insight into ancient Jewish people, culture and their beliefs.

Sounds good to me.

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Second, if you want to understand how non-fundamentalist Christians look at passages from the New Testament that you cite,  you must understand that we see those passages as fully of their time, place and culture and filled with nuance.  They cannot be taken out of their context without doing a great injustice to their meaning.  Regarding the anti-family passages you cite, I agree with John Dominic Crossan on his interpretations of sayings attributed to Jesus. 

What I want to understand about non-fundamentalist christians is why they stand by and let fundamentalist define them, let them speak for them, and let them manipulate them. Taking out of context is everyday practice by most, so when I do it, it is just as valid as when they do it.  Of course, I know that wrong, that is also a point I am trying to make. 

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He says:

"If the supreme value for the 20th century American imagination is individualism, based on economics and property, that for the first-century Mediterranean imagination can be called to the contrary, groupism, based on kinship and gender.  And there were really only two groups -- the familial and the political, kinship and politics -- to be considered.  But we have, precisely against both those groups, biting aphorisms and dialogues from the historical Jesus.  There is, first of all, an almost savage attack on family values and it happens very, very often.

Certainly agree there, however, the point was that one never hears that acknowledged.  Thanks for that.

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The family is a group to which one is irrevocably assigned, but [as to the whoever does not hate father, mother, etc., saying], that given grouping is negated in favor of another one open to all who wish to join it.....Imagine the standard Mediterranean family with five members:  mother and father, married son with his wife, and unmarried daughter, a nuclear extended family all under one roof.  Jesus says he will tear it apart.  The usual explanation is that families will become divided as some accept and others refuse faith in Jesus.  But notice where and how emphatically the axis of separation is located.  It is precisely between the generations....The attack has nothing to do with faith but with power.  The attack is on the Mediterranean family's axis of power, which sets father and mother over son, daughter, and daughter-in-law....The family is society in miniature, the place where we first and most deeply learn how to love and be loved, hate and be hated, help and be helped, abuse and be abused.  It is not just a center of domestic serenity; since it involves power, it invites the abuse of power, and it is at that precise point that Jesus attacks it.  His ideal group is, contrary to Mediterranean and indeed most human familial reality, an open one equally accessible to all under God.  It is the Kingdom of God, and it negates that terrible abuse of power that is power's dark specter and lethal shadow."

That explanation is the best one I have heard to date.  How many of the "ordinary christians" do you think know this?  Very, very few is my guess. 


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Crossan also explains what Jesus means, given what he is trying to do and teach, this way:

"...the family was a group to which one was assigned....Jesus downplays the family in favor of another kind of group that is open to all who wish to join it.  For Jesus, the given family unit, the kinship unit, is no longer primary.  What is primary is a new community of persons who become "family" to one another in their common effort to do the will of God in the world....[Jesus'] ideal group is contrary to customary human social arrangements, a group that is open and equally accessible to all under God.  In the Kingdom of God there is no abuse of power.  All are welcome, all are equal, and all are alike under the will and purpose of God."

Damn, it is too bad that the majority of christians do not believe this or practice it.  All are not welcome, all are not equal, this group is not open, with equal accessibility.  If this is the way it is supposted to be, how come I do not hear an out cry from the christians against their leaders who teach the opposite?

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Now, I am one of those non-fundamentalists who think that the "family values" Republicans have a lot of explaining to do given what Jesus was REALLY trying to say.  (For me, what Crossan says convinces me there was a reason Jesus never said a word against homosexuality.) 

Thank You!!  I really wished I could believe you are the majority, rather than a small minority.  This Jesus I could get behind, even if I believed he was a myth.  The Jesus I hear preached is a monster of manipulation and hate, of course, that is really the man doing the preaching. Also another point. 

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I also think critics are missing the boat entirely if they don't first get a big picture notion of what Jesus was about and then, second, interpret what he said within that big picture.  Jesus lived in a different time in a different place.  His metaphors speak to those people in a very specific way.  If we keep that in mind, it is easy to understand what he is trying to say to us all.

This I will never understand, why did he not speak in plain language?  Why the stupid metaphors to create need for interpretation? Why not state plainly?  I can not trust anything that needs interpretation, there is just too much room for manipulation. 

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There is simply no such thing as "plain" meaning.  Reading is a process of interpretation always. 

Of course, but there is a marked difference between "Ennis had sex with Jack" and "Ennis was stemming the rose with Jack".   One is straight forward, and the other requires interpretation.  All it takes in the second is for the interpreter to tell his followers that "stemming of the rose" means "killing infidels" and we are right back to where we are with religion now.

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The fundamentalists don't get it. 

Absolutely true. What I do not get is why there is not a big up roar against them, but there is not a whisper, therefore one has to conclude there is nearly total agreement.

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Neither do non-believers who read passages without any understanding of context. 

Why should the non-believers be any more knowledgeable than the people who profess to believe? If they use passages out of context, then to expect the non-believer to not do the same is irrational.  He is going to try and turn the weapon against him to his advantage.  To fight fire with fire.  They stop using out of context passages as weapons, they will not find them being used against them.

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Of course, an added complication is translation.  The Bible wasn't written in the King's English.  Literalists will constantly sink into the complexities that constitute the written word.  If any human being's philosophy or theology or world view consists of slinging biblical passages at one another, it is a mighty poor intellectual and moral foundation indeed. 

Absolutely agree.  However, being the one having biblical passage slung at him, having biblical passages used to make laws that prevent freedom, having biblical passages used as proof of evil, how does one fight this?  The turning of the other cheek has been tried, they take that as a success and press on to limit even more. 

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Focus on the myth and the arc of the stories.  That's where the gold lies.  Jesus was a peasant living in a time of crushing imperial Roman power and inequitable social and religious rules.  He advocated religious and economic egalitarianism.  When reading what he is alleged to have said, this big picture needs to always be kept in mind.

For me it is nearly impossible to separate what is being said and taught day to day, and this.  For me, it is much more simple to dismiss the whole myth, and use my own loving, conscious being to know right from wrong.  I always try to come from a place of love, though that is very difficult sometimes when I am dealing with hatred wrapped in a cloth of make believe love.  The very word "christian" brings up all sorts of barriers and assumptions. You was hit with some of them.  Are they unjust?  Perhaps, but necessary if one is to be left sane. 

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Jesus' response to oppression and his teaching of the way to an unmediated relationship with something called the Divine had everything to do with our day-to-day treatment of each other.  His message was that the only way to fight oppression or encounter the Divine is to build a life of love, of equal treatment, of justice in our relationsihips with each other.    He, in fact, taught that this was God's will.  This was the nature of the Kingdom of God.

Then why is the congress trying to pass laws again gay unions?  Then why are open gays not welcome in many churches?  Then why is there such shame attached to being gay?  They all profess to worship this Jesus, but where is his teachings then?  Where the hell is this Divine to build a life of love, of equal treatment, of justice?  Do you see my point?  Your belief is wonderful, and I only wished that more believed as you do.  I believe as you, but not because of a Jesus or teaching, but because I love, and want love and acceptance.  More or less the golden rule.   However, when one is meet with hatred... it is very hard to not give that back.

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I'll end with Crossan:

"The deliberate conjunction of magic and meal, miracle and table, free compassion and open commensality, was a challenge launched not just on the level of Judaism's strictest purity regulations, or even on that of the Mediterranean's patriarchal combination of honor and shame, patronage and clientage, but at the most basic level of civilization's eternal inclination to draw lines, invoke boundaries, establish hierarchies, and maintain discriminations.  [Jesus' program] did not invite a political revolution but envisaged a social one at the imagination's most dangerous depths.  No importance was given to distinctions of Gentile and Jew, female and male, slave and free, poor and rich.  Those distinctions were hardly ever attacked in theory [by Jesus]; in practice, they were simply ignored."

Those man made distinctions should be ignored, and the loving, conscious human being seen and accepted.  Agree.

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I don't know when I'll have time to return.  I think this pretty much says all I have to say about interpreting Christianity or biblical passages.  You don't have to believe that Jesus was the son of god to understand he was a thoroughly dangerous man.  Just my type.

I do not believe "Jesus" ever existed as one being, but as a aggregate of many.  I know there is a lot of positive in the bible, but the same can be said for many, many books.  I am not sure that myth is the way to teach, especially myth that is so far from our time that it has to be interpreted.  That brings me to another point, why do we put stock into a book that is 2,000 years old, when in no other area of our lives we do the same? 

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Much love to you, Doug, darlin'.

Same to you.  Thank You for taking the time to explain youself, you have done what no other person do date has bothered to do.  Usually, because they have no idea what they are talking about.

Take Care,
Doug
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Offline Jer009

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #170 on: July 09, 2006, 01:54:29 AM »
Doug, here's a link to an article about the Pope's recent visit to Spain:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/09/world/europe/09pope.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

"...the Church's opposition to gay marriage and Europe's long slide into secularism." indeed! To me, what the Pope bemoans as a "...slide into secularism..." is a reason to rejoice! Spanish gays have had the right to marry for a year now and the sky hasn't come crashing down, no rioting in the streets, no public fornication.

This is a serious problem....for the Church! Having life go on with married gays being a non-issue only shows how flawed and perverse (and anti-family!--gays have kids, too) the Church's teachings were from the very start.

Offline Vic

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #171 on: July 09, 2006, 04:08:42 AM »
Thanks for that, Jer009.

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From the article:
The Vatican, which normally seeks to smooth over all embarrassment, reacted with unusual force, commenting that other leftist leaders had attended such Masses when Pope John Paul II visited their countries.

When the previous pope expressed his wish to visit the Netherlands some years ago, the answer was plain.

Amsterdam and the northern half of the Netherlands is mostly protestant and they told the Vatican plainly that they had no intention to pay for his visit. If he wanted to visit the Netherlands he can go to the Southern part, which is mostly roman catholic, and if they want to pay for it, that's fine.

So he visited the southern part only.

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From the article:
"You know that I follow closely and with much interest the life of the church in your country, a country with deep Christian roots, one which has greatly contributed and must still contribute to the proclamation and spread of the faith," Benedict wrote in his message to the bishops {of Spain}.

By contribution he means the Inquisition, which was started in Spain, and which eventually caused the death of tens of millions of innocents across Europe and South America? Only to solidify the church's stranglehold on knowledge and the masses and keep them perpetually in a state of poverty and ignorance?

Of course the church is horrified that traditionalist countries like Spain embrace secularity, and it is not surprising that the previous hypocrite targeted South America and Africa for his visits - the poor have more need of religion and a god to explain their misery than others who are more concerned with the realities of daily life and who have long since found out that the church is no help at all but rather another hindrance to their happiness.

Besides, I find the whole idea of a pope a joke, a farce, and an affront to belief and religion. Neither Islam nor Buddhism has one, for that matter.

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Offline Doug2017

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #172 on: July 09, 2006, 08:59:08 AM »
Doug, here's a link to an article about the Pope's recent visit to Spain:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/09/world/europe/09pope.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

"...the Church's opposition to gay marriage and Europe's long slide into secularism." indeed! To me, what the Pope bemoans as a "...slide into secularism..." is a reason to rejoice! Spanish gays have had the right to marry for a year now and the sky hasn't come crashing down, no rioting in the streets, no public fornication.

Thanks Jer009 for linking to this story, I had not heard of it before.  I had heard that religion is decreasing in Europe, which is very hopeful.  Indeed it is a reason to rejoice!  Now if we can only get a few other countries to try it, they will most likely find the same, but one statistic I would like to see from Spain now is how much more stable are the gay relationships?  Has marriage allowed those folks a better foundation to hold onto their relationships?

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This is a serious problem....for the Church! Having life go on with married gays being a non-issue only shows how flawed and perverse (and anti-family!--gays have kids, too) the Church's teachings were from the very start.

Absolutely right gays have kids too, my best friend for many years was a gay woman with three boys in tow.  Many things are a serious problem for the Church, they like to take a non-issue and turn it into a real mess, all in the name of love of course.  A really big problem for the Church, if it can be found out, is if gay marriage proves to help the one problem the church has always claimed proved something, their relationships do not last, therefore are not natural.  Of course, it is little wonder gays have more problems with relationships considering how much pressure from all quarters is put on them to break up.
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Offline Doug2017

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #173 on: July 09, 2006, 09:37:56 AM »
On the "issue" of gay marriage, I have never understood how it can have the anti hold it does.

If a man talks to HIS god, and his god thinks it is a good idea. Then a man talks to HIS church, and they think it is a good idea, and a man talks to HIS pastor/minister and he is also in agreement. Is it not then a matter of FREEDOM OF RELIGION, rather than morality issue?  Who the hell is Pat Roberson, Jerry Falwell, Lot, Frist, etc to make law to deny freedom of religion? These nuts and other churches want it to be only freedom of THEIR religion, congress is now in the process of making a whole class of people less than the rest, it is one thing to believe it, another to codify it in the law.  IF this matter of Freedom of Religion is mute, then does that not mean that ALL matters of Freedom are mute, if the majority does not like it?  For this to even be a discussion for changing the Constitution is beyond all understanding of that very Constitution. 

Why does not the gay community use this fact? Yet, to date, I have not heard ONE word of Freedom of Religion on this argument from the gay side. Plenty of Freedom of Religion from the other side, they scream it in a non-stopping thunder day and night.  When are we going to learn to do the same?
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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #174 on: July 10, 2006, 12:24:31 AM »
Here's a thought I had over the weekend while watching some of my favourite SF.

When we discover alien civilisations that also have a single omnipotent god as their main religion, will these Christians (and other religious zealots) accept this god as their god as well? Or, which I think is much more likely, will they instantly go to war with them because their god is the only one? They already have serious problems thinking of god as possibly female let alone accept her/him as some slimy 10-tentacled creature? They can't even love their neighbour who is human and gay. Forget about "love thy neighbour" when that neighbour turns out to be non-human.

For that matter, will they accept any god when that god reveals him/herself as simply a superior alien race that's been fiddling with humanity?
I think with what we already know of the universe today the whole concept of an omnipotent god is totally outdated anyway. And that would include any sons or prophets of him/her as well.

Vic
« Last Edit: July 10, 2006, 12:33:38 AM by Vic »
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Offline Jer009

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #175 on: July 10, 2006, 03:29:29 AM »
Folks, Doug mentioned Sci Fi in an earlier post, and Vic wondered how Earthlings would treat aliens at first contact. What did you both think of Deep Space Nine, with all its religious themes? Sisko as a Prophet and all. Sure is a long way from the original Trek, which only mentioned religion a couple of times during its run, and The Next Generation which seemed to be, at times, way agnostic.

Was DS9 an abberation or an advance? Posters on the Sci Fi thread seemed to like it's more dark nature, and the religious nature, too.

Offline Jer009

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #176 on: July 10, 2006, 04:02:24 AM »
You've got to see this picture....I tried to capture it, but I couldn't.  It's in the "Start Your Own Threads" section, at Jack's Cracker Barrel, page 39.

It's a picture of a mini Statue of Liberty, only with a cross in one outstretched arm, and carrying tablets with the 10 commandments in the other.

I thought it was perfect for this thread, sickening though it is.

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #177 on: July 10, 2006, 04:45:58 AM »
Opps... a couple of posts back I was mentioning Star Trek: The Next Generation and I mentioned that Next Generation was often agnostic. What I meant to say is that the crew of the Enterprise seemed to be secular humanists, which religious conservatives seem to despise about as much as atheists. Me, I think secular humanism is our only chance if we're to get to the stars without blowing ourselves up in a war....probably caused by some extreme religious zealot. I think of agnosticism and secular humanism as a continuum, at least at this point in history.

In any case, the question stands: DS9, the wrong road or....?

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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #178 on: July 10, 2006, 05:50:28 AM »
y'all have to see this.  its real.



this may explain the previous post above.

jack

You mean this one? Yes, I find it quite disturbing.
If you want it out of your thread, Doug, just let me know and..... Zzzzaaapp.

;D
Vic
« Last Edit: July 10, 2006, 06:12:10 AM by Vic »
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Re: Non believers who love Brokeback Mountain
« Reply #179 on: July 10, 2006, 06:15:57 AM »
Folks, Doug mentioned Sci Fi in an earlier post, and Vic wondered how Earthlings would treat aliens at first contact. What did you both think of Deep Space Nine, with all its religious themes? Sisko as a Prophet and all. Sure is a long way from the original Trek, which only mentioned religion a couple of times during its run, and The Next Generation which seemed to be, at times, way agnostic.

Was DS9 an abberation or an advance? Posters on the Sci Fi thread seemed to like it's more dark nature, and the religious nature, too.

DS9 is very spiritual, yes. I sort of liked it as it didn't detract from the main storyline. But if it had involved humans directly they would have lost me real quick, which is probably why they let an alien race, the Bajorans, handle it. And, of course, the human ego, in this case that of Captain Sisko, isn't above being considered a prophet for an alien race...

Which reminds me of another question that came to mind:

How is the large Latin population of the United States, who are mostly catholic, buying into this religious cr*p?

Vic
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