God Bless the USA?
When Rick Santorum preached about the Devil attacking America I was doing a face palm while my wife was standing and cheering.
"It's about time somebody told the truth!" She was fresh off of seeing her prayers answered as Univision announced God had given Hugo Chavez another tumor, "hopefully fatal, and before the election."
See, I agree with Santorum. I believe what the bible says, and I know "The God of this World" roams the earth, "patrolling it," looking for souls to devour. But I also know that religious kookery doesn't get people elected in this country. We like our presidents to be plain vanilla, no nuts. This despite our choosing Barocky Road ice cream in 2008, a faithful product of Reverend Wright's Church of God Damn America.
As I expressed my sense of doom at the prospect of an Obama reelection, Mrs Silverfiddle, God bless her, exhorted me to pray. Pray! "If we all pray God will save this country just like he saved the Maccabees!"
She got visibly irritated when I told her that the Israelites at the time of Judas Maccabeus were essential to God's plan, while America most likely is not. Why would The Lord give a damn about the USA? We've blown it, we've mooned him and spit on his laws. If I were God, I'd take a giant shit on the United States of America, just for pleasure. He blessed us with so much, and we flushed it all down the toilet. We turned this land of milk and honey into a porn palace full of ripoff artists.
Our government is out of control. It turned simple charity into a multi-trillion dollar money-wasting operation that destroys more lives than it saves. We never tire of travelling to other lands and killing foreigners. At one time I expressed contempt for the realists, George Bush the Elder, George Schultz, etc. But when Bush the Younger kicked over the hornets nest, I realized there may have been some wisdom in leaving well enough alone, or at least proceeding with caution.
We don't know what prudence means anymore, and we scoff at morality and openly mock God, even as we make gods of ourselves and bow down to our idols and golden calves. I think Reverend Wright's wish has come true. Our chickens have come home to roost. Not in the form of terrorists or some external power. We've done it to ourselves. If God still has a purpose for us, it is probably only to serve as a warning to others against arrogance, greed and purposeful stupidity.
God on our side? I doubt it... As Abraham Lincoln remarked, we should be humbly and fervently praying that we can make it back to God's side.
117 comments:
When the 30 year old single woman testified at a Congresional hearing that the thought she might have to pay for birth control was more than she could bear, and was hailed a heroine, confirmed by a call by Obama, I knew we no longer as a nation had any moral compass whatsover. Done.
"Blessed is the Nation whose God is The LORD."
Indeed, we are yet under God's blessings, but not due to our leadership or government.
The LORD is blessing us because of His remnant, His children, His covenantal sons.
If the day comes that there are none among us who call God as Father and King, then America will perish, like the rest. The LORD's hand will be stayed as long as there is at least one who fears Him.
In The BIG Picture, however,all of this will burn, millions will die,cities will be razed,and the enemy of the souls of men will roar in triumph. But not for long.
Everything is fixed, and none can change it.
Oh good Heavens, Kurt! Lighten up. The discourse here is becoming positively lugubrious. You sound as though you're ready to retire from earthly existence, and do the male equivalent of Taking the Veil.
Don't you know we hand the Devil a great victory whenever we allow ourselves to succumb to despair?
Besides, we don't obtain Salvation collectively; it must be achieved individually. God does not favor nations, He is Father to all of us and we are His children regardless of what "nation" we happen to be born in.
Most of us are the innocent victims of nefarious philosophical, ideological and political forces that have been in play for most of the last century. We've been systematically bullied into betraying ourselves in the names of Fairness, Equality, Social Justice and Charity by fiendish intellectual aggressors and powerful, super-rich moguls who, themselves, have God-complex.
We need to focusing on bringing THEM down --or at least cutting them down to size. All this penitent, self-abnegation crap serves only to weaken us further.
We don't need a return to Mediaeval Christianity dominated by the dismal, misanthropic notions of St. Augustine anymore than we need Marxism and Fascism. Every single bit of ALL that stuff is about subjecting ourselves to TYRANNY -- Centralized Power and Control.
What we DO need is a revival of interest in and understanding of The Enlightenment and all the tremendous liberating concepts it brought into the world.
Sing Hallelujah! Come on get happy, man. We need to chase all those blues away.
§;-D
~ FreeThinke
PS: I think I just fell in LOVE your wife. Maybe SHE ought to take over the blog for a while? - FT
American Taliban -- not that uncivilized but theocrats who think the idea of "freedom" (whatever that is) is reserved for the followers of their own religion.
The rest are outside the tribe and can be summarily detained.
The most interesting are those like bunkerville who see morality as a sexual issue. That's what has to b controlled to make us godly.
You can follow a liar like Breitbart and cheer as he slanders people you don't consider part of your tribe and you will call this righteous. Other nations are there for your enrichment.
Whitened sepulchers remember - faith is not a guarantee.
Well, I'm not a religious person. I have a religion, and a theistic belief system, don't get me wrong.
I just don't believe the federal government ought to be big enough to pursue an ecclesiological agenda, be it left-wing, right-wing, up-wing or down-wing.
I also don't believe Sick Rantorum has been mocked enough. [Some other poster here came up with calling him "Sick Rantorum," but it's so golden I adopted it]
Sick Rantorum needs to be pressed hard on how he intends to adapt our military and intelligence agencies towards warfare with Satan (including the 232+ Million non-Catholic Americans he claims are thoroughly corrupted by Satanic forces), or told to STFU.
In short, I don't want a federal government promoting my values - that's my job.
Though I disagree with just about every jot and tittle of Catholic theology, I am supporting a Catholic [Newt Gingrich] for President.
The difference being of course that Sick Rantorum wants to refight the Thirty Years War on American soil in pursuing his war on "apostates" and "infidels" and "Satans" to his Catholic faith with the mechanisms of an even bigger federal government.
"Social conservatism" is an oxymoron. We don't need a god-damned federal government program trying to make us "holy."
"God does not favor nations, He is Father to all of us and we are His children regardless of what "nation" we happen to be born in."
Of course He does, FT. He's God. He does as He wants and none of us can complain about it or say he is being a meanie.
His favor is with spiritual Israel through he covenant He struck with Abram.
To say that God loves us all equally is simply not true. His love for us is offered equally, but He has favor with some and with others not so much. It's His choice.
The devil is the one who is in question here. With him, it's easy: he hates all of us, and uses humanism, atheism, and philosophical elitism to his advantage.
beamish,
"The difference being of course that Sick Rantorum wants to refight the Thirty Years War on American soil in pursuing his war on "apostates" and "infidels" and "Satans" to his Catholic faith with the mechanisms of an even bigger federal government."
Has Santorum said out loud that he will be gunning for the apostates,infidels,and Satans if he becomes President?
Mehtinks you may be reaching a bit, beamish.
Make no mistake, I am an anti-papist and I firmly believe the Holy Roman Mother Catholic Church is the biggest "christian cult" in the world,ranking above Mormonism, but to imply out loud that Santorum wants what you mentioned above is still kinda a stretch for me.
It is not outside the realm of possibility, though. I will concede that point. Mankind has performed a great many atrocities in the name of religion. And in the name of atheism.
Anyhoos, if you do have a direct quote from Santorum regarding the above-mentioned comments, I would really enjoy reading them.
I do see many signs of hope.
Providence has been Trying to Make Us Go To Rehab - and surprisingly, unlike Winehouse, we actually are going.
Natural law and principles are circulating in ways they haven't for at least 100 years, perhaps even 236 years (1776).
Brave men and women are taking action based on Constitutional principles. People's eyes are opening.
The Empire is fighting back. Why would they fight us if there was no resistance?
The Federales are ramping up to utilize violence in the future, if needed, to subdue principled Americans. What do you think the NDAA, TSA, and SOPA are all about? Wake up and smell the cordite.
It can be very depressing to watch the big tube and get fed the Big Lie - and the Lie is this: just because it is on the tube everyone believes in liberalism.
Not so. America is being driven towards Conservatism. Barrack Hussein Obama was the best candidate in 2008 - the only one that could fully unlock Pandora's Box of Unintended Consequences.
Americans have been asleep for so long that it will take wave after wave of unintended consequences to fully wake them.
But wake they surely will, and sweep this 100 year empire of progressive lies into history.
The road ahead will be difficult. Please do pray for America. As above so below, the saying goes.
I like Rick Santorum, and I do not think he has plans to implement a theocracy, but I love this line from Beamish:
Sick Rantorum needs to be pressed hard on how he intends to adapt our military and intelligence agencies towards warfare with Satan
There's an onion-like blog post in there somewhere, Beamish...
Has Santorum said out loud that he will be gunning for the apostates,infidels,and Satans if he becomes President?
Mehtinks you may be reaching a bit, beamish.
Maybe. But maybe not. It's too late to find out when / if that douchebag becomes President.
Not that I fear that ever happening, even remotely, but the language Sick Rantorum has used certainly puts this Protestant on edge. Particularly when he handwaves away the Catholic Church's centuries of career opportunities for pedophiles as some sort of post Woodstock hippie love phenomenon then has the audacity to state that Protestant churches are "thoroughly corrupted by Satan," as if he's going to do something about it as a politician at any level.
The thing about Sick Rantorum's beliefs is that they become more and more repulsive each time he expounds on them.
I was just listening to Obama say how pro Israel he is and how he's done so much to protect them these last years and how he's done everything to keep Iran from nukes these last three years, so it was difficult to read your post afterwards with "are you NUTS? They've got the homemade RODS now, Barack...you've insulted Netanyahu, you.." swirling through my mind. And they're clapping for him at AIPAC! okay..I got that out of my system!:
I love your wife. She needs to run for something :-)
Having said that...I am one of those nuts who reads the Founding Fathers' quotes, who sees how things fell into place back then as if God held the marionette strings from above, how we've had freedom envied by the world until the Left got so strong and decided we can't handle the freedoms...and that we need to be insulted for our believing in individual freedoms and the exceptionalism of AMerica.
Yes, I still think God's on our side, but I believe some of those strings have fallen loosely to the ground across the heartland...and I can't blame him.
Bunkerville got it right with his comment; how's God look at that Fluke woman? wow. with no shame, to go on public record, unmarried, and say how humiliated her friends are to go to a pharmacy and be turned away from free contraception. Our moral compass is absolutely BROKEN in the name of "nobody should feel shame" "there is no God" "if it feels good, do it"...how sad.
2 Chronicles: 7:14 "if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land."
what a different America we would have.
I think Santorum's beliefs become more and more attractive as he goes along, I'm with Mrs. Silverfiddle on what he's saying, but we're not electing a Pastor in Chief. The president can't fix morality, in my opinion. So, even if some of you agree with what he says, how the heck's he think he's changing things? Sounds to me like he's just piling it on to attract people who relate well to what he's saying. but...for president?
Mrs Silverfiddle is way too smart to get into politics, and she'd never win. Rush Limbaugh claims to be to the right of Attila the Hun, but she really is. My wife is more conservative than I am.
Tomorrow's Western Hero post features Sandra Fluke, but I don't call her a slut. What she should be ashamed of is her brazen mooching.
Anyhoos, if you do have a direct quote from Santorum regarding the above-mentioned comments, I would really enjoy reading them.
Try this
He gets more looney as it goes along, and fully anti-Protestant at the 2:00 mark.
According to the theology of Sick Rantorum, Satan corrupted "academia," then "Judeo-Christianity" (excluding Catholics, of course), then the "popular culture," and has only just now, in the last 20 years, set his demonic sights on corrupting politicians.
And Sick Rantorum is going to save us all. Because he's a Catholic.
I've not been this repulsed by Catholicism since the Vatican's newspapers editorialized the Beslan massacre by Chechen Muslim terrorists as being Israel's fault.
The "official business stances" of the Catholic church are oftentimes different than the opinions of most Catholic people and I think the Catholics here might agree with me... maybe not.
The "official business stances" of the Catholic church are oftentimes different than the opinions of most Catholic people and I think the Catholics here might agree with me... maybe not.
That's all well and good. But it's fairly clear that those "official business stances" of the Vatican's thoroughly inverted, counter-Biblical, anti-egalitarian ecclesiology is that the Pope rules and the parishioners are to obey, period.
We're talking about an organization that has as a part of its history exhuming a dead Pope (Formosus) and putting his corpse on trial. [We're well outside the Christian purview when we speak of Catholics, IMHO, but that's neither here nor there.]
What matters is not what Catholics loyal to Rome or loyal to common sense have to say about the "official business stances" handed down from on high, but what Sick Rantorum believes, particularly in his prospective role as President of 77 million American Catholics "besieged" by 232 million American "agents of Satan" enticing them to tell Hitlerjugend Ratzinger to go get stuffed.
Public Confession:
I am, apparently, an agent of Satan, since I do not revere,fear, acknowledge, acquiesce,or otherwise give a rat's ass about the Holy Roman Catholic Church and its machinations, enslavement, and dire political visions.
Please to meet you...hope you guess my name.
Neither the pope, Santorum, or any human Catholic went to The Cross for me, or can resurrect me. That truth belongs to Christ Jesus of Nazareth. Period. If that changes, please let me know.
I am, apparently, an agent of Satan, since I do not revere,fear, acknowledge, acquiesce,or otherwise give a rat's ass about the Holy Roman Catholic Church and its machinations, enslavement, and dire political visions.
You're in good company. Paul wrote his Epistle to the Romans, apparently unaware that Peter was running the show there. ;)
religious kookery doesn't get people elected in this country
True.
If Santorum continues to sound like Jerry Falwell, there is no way that Santorum will get the nomination.
He can believe what he wants, but some things should be kept to oneself and pondered privately.
Besides, I have little use for those who claim that they know the Lord's ways, particularly when it comes to pronouncements about God's judgment. He will do what He will do.
FT,
Oh good Heavens, Kurt! Lighten up. The discourse here is becoming positively lugubrious. You sound as though you're ready to retire from earthly existence, and do the male equivalent of Taking the Veil.
I'm still chuckling over that comment.
There is indeed much gloom and doom here in the Righty blogosphere. Understandable, but damned depressing.
Maybe I shouldn't talk. I don't post "happy stuff" much at my own site.
"The difference being of course that Sick Rantorum wants to refight the Thirty Years War on American soil in pursuing his war on "apostates" and "infidels" and "Satans" to his Catholic faith"
"the Holy Roman Mother Catholic Church is the biggest "christian cult" in the world,ranking above Mormonism"
"the Vatican's thoroughly inverted, counter-Biblical, anti-egalitarian ecclesiology"
"Hitlerjugend Ratzinger"
Wow, it's amazing how many No-Nothing Roundheads are still out there. Who sounds like they want to refight the thirty years war?
"Particularly when he handwaves away the Catholic Church's centuries of career opportunities for pedophiles"
Need I point out the number of abuse cases per annum against the Catholic Church (228) versus the number of abuse cases against Protestant Churches (260)?
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/16/us/16protestant.html
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,286153,00.html
http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2007/06/18/80877.htm
Y'all a bunch of sick mofos.
I believe the verse you are looking for is John 8:7 "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her"
Need I also point out that Santorum isn't the only one guilty of wearing his faith on his sleeve?
"I've heard the call. I believe God wants me to run for President. " -GWB
"Gog and Magog are at work in the Middle East. The biblical prophecies are being fulfilled. This confrontation is willed by God who wants this conflict to erase his people's enemies before a new age begins." -GWB to J.Chirac
Word of advice: If you talk to God it's called prayer, if God talks to you it's called Schizophrenia.
That said, I'll leave you with this: Treaty of Tripoli, Article 11
"As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion..." signed by George Washington, ratified by the US Senate 7 June 1797.
Cheers!
Man, I'm the last person to stick up for Catholicism because I'm not a Catholic, but I have rarely met so many women like those at my large, international bible study, who are Catholics and totally put their trust in Jesus and the Bible. Things have changed among the people, even if the Pope hasn't. That's all I'm saying.
And that's all I'll say.
I always see hope. First thing we have to do though is to avoid the trap Silver and freethinker lay.
The Enlightenment was not the apex, Freethinker. And anyway, today's evangelical's are going to bastardize it by ignoring the "godless" foundations in Spinoza and Voltaire. What you get is a curious contortion that tries to scab Luther onto John Locke's cult of property. Doesn't hold up.
The culture wasn't that great either.
Baroque painting pretty much sucked. Bunch of swells posing and showing off how rich they were. Banal and sentimental as that stiff Renoir. Wasn't until the landscapists freed things up that painting advanced.
You'd have everyone on a steady diet of Bach and Mozart. Not that they aren't superb but the romanticists had a superior response to all that mathematical rigor.
No Freethinker, I'm not going to pretend the romantics didn't exist nor am I going to ignore the wars of the 20th century that owe a great deal to your cult of property and privilege.
Neither am I going to accept Silverfiddle's contention that his is the "correct" dogma anymore than I will accept that you can find God by reason.
We progress. We've done it before and we'll do it now.
Won't be the likes of morons like Allen West, Sarah Palin or The Pizza Man who get it done though.
Stop consuming art and create your own.
Man the anti-Catholic bigots are really working the room.
"Stop consuming art and create your own."
Hey! I like that!
Need I also point out that Santorum isn't the only one guilty of wearing his faith on his sleeve?
Need I point out that GW Bush never claimed non-Catholics were corrupted by Satan?
...or implied that had America been founded by Catholics, "Satan" would not have been able to corrupt us?
Excuse me? Show me the Catholic dominant country that isn't a politically corrupt economic shithole.
Man the anti-Catholic bigots are really working the room.
I'm no anti-Catholic bigot. Any religion that can come up with more gods than Hinduism in less time certainly has a creative bent that can't be denied.
I come to the garden alone,
While the dew is still on the roses,
And the voice I hear falling on my ear,
The Son of God discloses ...
And He walks with me, and He talks with me,
And He tells me I am His own,
And the joys we share as we tarry there,
None other, has ever, known!
He speaks and the sound of His voice,
Is so sweet the birds hush their singing,
And the melody that he gave to me,
Within my heart is ringing ...
And He walks with me, and He talks with me,
And He tells me I am His own,
And the joy we share as we tarry there,
None other, has ever, known!
~ C. Austin Miles (1912)
Submitted by FreeThinke
Desiderata
Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant, they too have their story. Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let not this blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism. Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is as perennial as the grass. Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore, be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams; it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.
--- Max Ehrmann, 1927
"Ducky's here said...
Man the anti-Catholic bigots are really working the room."
Ducky, that's rich. I believe every commenter here has seen you drop your ridiculous CALVINIST claims (as if it's a disease?) to anybody who doesn't agree with your religious stances (whatever they are; it's rough to even consider you're a Catholic, that's for sure, Mr. Pro Choice).
"Calvinists" "Fundies" and WAY worse insinutations, uglier terms than that are used by you and you think these people who don't appreciate Catholicism are BIGOTS? wow.
As for the anti-Catholic comments here today (and other times), I don't know how Silverfiddle, a devout Catholic and owner of this blog, does it, but the hypocrisy in Ducky's comment here is breathtaking.
A 17th Century Nun's Prayer
Lord.
Thou knowest better than I know myself that I am growing older and will someday be old.
Keep me from the fatal habit of thinking I must say something on every subject and every occasion.
Release me from craving to straighten out everybody's affairs.
Make me thoughtful but not moody; helpful but not bossy.
With my vast store of wisdom, it seems a pity not to use it all, but thou knowest Lord that I want a few friends at the end.
Keep my mind free from the recital of endless detail: give me wings to get to the point.
Seal my lips on my aches and pains. They are increasing, and love of rehearsing them is becoming sweeter as the years go by.
I dare not ask for grace to enjoy the tales of other's pain but help me to endure them with patience.
I dare not ask for improved memory, but for a growing humility and a lessening cocksureness when my memory seems to clash with the memories of others.
Teach me the glorious lesson that occasionally I may be mistaken.
Keep me reasonably sweet; I do not want to be a saint - some of them are so hard to live with -- but a sour old person is one of the crowning works of the devil.
Give me the ability to see good things in unexpected places and talents in unexpected people.
And give me, O Lord, the grace to tell them so.
Amen.
Submitted by Freethinke
Well, z, Catholicism and Calvinism aren't exclusive. Just ask recovering Irish who have freed themselvs from the Calvinist arm of Catholicism.
"There is no life, truth, intelligence or substance in matter.
"All is infinite Mind and it's infinite manifestation, for God is All-In-All.
"Spirit is immortal truth.
"Matter is mortal error.
"Spirit is the real and eternal.
"Matter is the unreal and temporal.
"Spirit is God, and man is his image and likeness.
"Therefore, man is not material, he is spiritual."
~ Mary Baker Eddy
Submitted by FreeThinke
Television on the fritz during a ball game? Burn some incense to St. Clare of Assisi, Catholic patron goddess of television. She can hear your prayer and answer it no matter where you are and even if someone else is praying for her to heal their television somewhere else in the world at the same time!
This is because as a canonized Catholic saint, she possesses omniscience, omnipotence, and omnipresence, just like God!
Why have one omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent deity, when you can have over 10,000?
"Show me the Catholic dominant country that isn't a politically corrupt economic shithole."
Andorra? Austria? Belgium? Ireland? Lichtenstein? Luxembourg? Monaco?
The only thing this little exercise in ridiculousness taught me is that outside the Nordic states, Protestantism isn't in the overwhelming majority anywhere outside of few third world former colonie, and is slipping in the UK (60%) and the US (55%).
Swaziland... I'm still laughing about that one!
Cheerio!
All things good, all thing fair
All things beautiful everywhere
Come to earth from above
From the Father's heart of Love.
~ Traditional Sunday School Song
Submitted by FreeThinke
"I'm no anti-Catholic bigot. Any religion that can come up with more gods than Hinduism in less time certainly has a creative bent that can't be denied."
Beamish:
Your ignorance is irrefutable!
Or as the founding fathers liked to say, "self-evident".
Oh, and I almost forgot, the drycleaners called, your white hood is ready.
Now imagine me standing in lodge with my head bowed in prayer between Brother Mohammed Bokhary and Brother Arjun Melwani. To neither of them is the Great Architect of the Universe perceived as the Holy Trinity. To Brother Bokhary He has been revealed as Allah; to Brother Melwani He is probably perceived as Vishnu. Since I believe that there is only one God, I am confronted with three possibilities:
They are praying to the devil whilst I am praying to God;
They are praying to nothing, as their Gods do not exist;
They are praying to the same God as I, yet their understanding of His nature is partly incomplete, as indeed is mine.
-Christoper Haffner
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Rejoice in the Lord alway, and again I say rejoice. Be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with Thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God.
And the peace of God that passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ, Our Lord.
~ Biblical anthem text set by Henry Purcell
Submitted by FreeThinke
Oh, and I almost forgot, the drycleaners called, your white hood is ready.
I'm not the Pope.
Not the Pope? I was thinking more along the lines of Grand Wizard, Exalted Cyclops, and Kleagle.
But then again, I wouldn't expect you to know the difference between a mitre, a zuchetto, and a pillowcase.
Share the hate dude!
Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.
But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night.
And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.
Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.
For the LORD knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish.
~ Psalm 1 (KJV)
Submitted by FreeThinke
Ah Beamish the culture maven.
I went to a performance of the Beethoven cello sonatas today and I can only remember the brilliant analysis of Beamish, "Yeah, Beethoven's, okay".
Brilliant. Can't hold a candle to Metallica can he, Beamish.
Enter, breath;
Breath, slip out;
Blood, be channeled,
And wind about.
O, blessed breath and blood which strive
To keep this body of mine alive!
O gallant breath and blood
Which choose
To wage the battle
They must lose.
~ Ogden Nash
Submitted by FreeThinke
Share the hate dude!
Hate? Like the Cadaver Synod? The 4th Council of the Lateran (which forced Jews to wear yellow stars centuries before altar boy Adolf Hitler did?) The Inquisitions? The Nazi-Vatican Reichskonkordat?
Had enough hate yet? Want me to share more?
Blaming Israel for the Beslan massacre?
Rick Santorum labeling Protestantism as corrupted by Satan?
Desecrating John Wycliffe's corpse for translating the Bible into English?
A Fairly Sad Tale
I think that I shall never know
Why I am thus, and I am so.
Around me, other girls inspire
In men the rush and roar of fire,
The sweet transparency of glass,
The tenderness of April grass,
The durability of granite;
But me- I don't know how to plan it.
The lads I've met in Cupid's deadlock
Were- shall we say?- born out of wedlock.
They broke my heart, they stilled my song,
And said they had to run along,
Explaining, so to sop my tears,
First came their parents or careers.
But ever does experience
Deny me wisdom, calm, and sense!
Though she's a fool who seeks to capture
The twenty-first fine, careless rapture,
I must go on, till ends my rope,
Who from my birth was cursed with hope.
A heart in half is chaste, archaic;
But mine resembles a mosaic-
The thing's become ridiculous!
Why am I so? Why am I thus?
~ Dorothy Parker 1893-1967)
Submitted by FreeThinke
Shall we discuss Cromwell?
Or perhaps Henry VIII?
Elizibeth I?
John Calvin's Inquisition?
Martin Luther and the Peasant War?
Got news for you, those fleeing religious persecution in Europe for the American colonies weren't fleeing the Catholic Church.
Fred Phelps, Terry Jones, and Beamish... America's enlightened reformationists.
Yeah dude, share... you're entertaining.
The Nursing Home
This is the place were no one wants to go.
Here life pauses, then awaits return
Eerily to infancy with no
New prospects save the grassy plot or urn.
Unless one cannot think or ambulate,
Resorting to this dreariest retreat
Smacks of cowardice. It’s second rate ––
Insipid –– all too eager for defeat.
Not only brave souls love, despite the hurt.
Genuinely curious ones too
Hold on until the second spade of dirt
Obscures their last remains from public view.
Make each moment count. Be someone’s friend.
Eschew complaint. It pays no dividend.
~ FreeThinke
LORD, who shall abide in thy tabernacle? who shall dwell in thy holy hill?
He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart.
He that backbiteth not with his tongue, nor doeth evil to his neighbour, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour.
In whose eyes a vile person is contemned; but he honoureth them that fear the LORD. He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not.
He that putteth not out his money to usury, nor taketh reward against the innocent. He that doeth these things shall never be moved.
Submitted by FreeThinke
~ Psalm 15 (KJV)
FT,
"The Nursing Home" is dreary, huh? Especially sentence #2.
I referred to one hall of the nursing home where Mr. AOW was for five weeks a "the hall of the dead and dying." The cats freaked out when I had to walk them down that hall.
Interesting thing on that hall: all the milling around once dark fell. Perhaps sundowning is restlessness in the face of the dark final resting place or a last attempt to stay alive?
Progressives are the ones who have control issues. They feel the need to control everything in our lives, even to the point of dictating who must pay for and distribute birth control pills, sterilizations, and abortion-inducing drugs. Liberals don't believe in the notion of conscience or they wouldn't be forcing people to abandon their consciences. Obama is a tyrant who clearly has much disdain for the Constitution which gives citizens rights from God or he wouldn't be trampling on citizens First Amendment right to freedom of religion.
People in the United States need to turn toward God and away from the works of the devil - such as abortion and euthanasia. The people in this country need to repent and pray. I do believe God cares about this nation for he would not have allowed for it to exist and prosper the way it did for many years. God is a bright light amidst the darkness that progressives have cast on this country. God shall prevail in due time.
AOW, your ruminations brought this to mind. It's very strong, and examines into our deepest fears without flinching, but because it has about it the ring of truth, I find it inspiring for all its evocation of terror and dread.
I felt a funeral in my brain,
And mourners, to and fro,
Kept treading, treading, till it seemed
That sense was breaking through.
And when they all were seated,
A service like a drum
Kept beating, beating, till I thought
My mind was going numb.
And then I heard them lift a box,
And creak across my soul
With those same boots of lead,
Then space began to toll
As all the heavens were a bell,
And Being but an ear,
And I and silence some strange race,
Wrecked, solitary, here.
And then a plank in reason, broke,
And I dropped down and down--
And hit a world at every plunge,
And finished knowing--then--
~ Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)
Submitted by FreeThinke
Ducky says:
"Man the anti-Catholic bigots are really working the room."
Only a liberal accustomedto attention through victimization would say such a thing, for common-sense Conservatives know better.
Despising Catholicism as a belief is not the same as despising Catholics or those who profess to be as such.
That's just a typical liberal leftist whining thing to say. in the vain hopes of getting a fight started amongst the non-leftist commenters here.
That kind of thing may work for the left, but Conservatives are not so weak-minded. The Catholics that read my words against Catholicism do not take it personal, as you would have them do. This is totally out of the realm of touchy-feely emotionalism.
Finntann,
"Oh, and I almost forgot, the drycleaners called, your white hood is ready."
Seriously? Being anti-Catholicism is the same as being in the KKK? Where, oh where, does it teach that in your catechism?
*facepalm*
But then, after eloquently evoking the depths of despair this dear little recluse was capable of an outburst of unbridled joy such as this:
I taste a liquor never brewed,
From tankards scooped in pearl;
Not all the vats upon the Rhine
Yield such an alcohol!
Inebriate of air am I,
And debauchee of dew,
Reeling, through endless summer days,
From inns of molten blue.
When landlords turn the drunken bee
Out of the foxglove's door,
When butterflies renounce their drams,
I shall but drink the more!
Till seraphs swing their snowy hats,
And saints to windows run,
To see the little tippler
Leaning against the sun!
~ Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)
I once set that -- and several of her other poems including I Felt a Funeral In My Brain, -- to music. Too bad the set was never recorded. I think you might have enjoyed it. Unfortunately the score was lost. I should have taken better care of my things, but I was young and careless back when I was composing music.
~ FreeThinke
I find this a perfect antidote to dreary, fractious, ill-tempered commentary:
The soul selects her own society,
Then shuts the door;
On her divine majority
Obtrude no more.
Unmoved, she notes the chariot's pausing
At her low gate;
Unmoved, an emperor is kneeling
Upon her mat.
I've known her from an ample nation
Choose one;
Then close the valves of her attention ––
Like stone.
~ Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)
She appears to have discovered early on that it's far better to be alone than in bad company.
~ FreeThinke
Rick Santorum is right. The devil is attacking the United States. He's also attacking Europe, Asia, the Middle East, etc. He's basically attacking the whole world. But is Rick Santorum the man to lead this country against satan? Or is Santorum a false idol pandering to the religious? My money is on the latter, and my faith is in the Lord alone. Besides, is Santorum really the exemplar of Catholicism when he doesn't even understand the basic Catholic concept of subsidiarity?!
Got news for you, those fleeing religious persecution in Europe for the American colonies weren't fleeing the Catholic Church.
Nor were they fleeing their Protestant faiths. Seems to me they took them with them.
Again, Catholic colonizers in Central and South America built what? Shitholes?
Fred Phelps, Terry Jones, and Beamish... America's enlightened reformationists.
LOL! Not.
I'm Baptist. As in "John the." Christianity's been around a few centuries longer than Roman Catholicism. Try the real thing, you'll like it.
I can almost see why Catholics threw such a murderous hissy over the Bible being translated away from Latin. That whole Paul being unaware of "Pope Peter" in Rome in his Epistles really brings a spotlight upon the charlatanism of the mackerel snappers, in ways trying to figure out how the mythological Celtic goddess of fire and the Roman god of wine became Catholic "saints" just falls short.
Y'all really do make it up as you go along, don'tcha?
Call the Vatican! There's a water spot on my deck that looks like Mary! It's a sign...
...that Catholics are pretty stupid.
ODD HOLY PLACES
To see the Christ in coffee grounds,
Or on a slice of moldy bread,
Or in the chocolate of Peter Paul Mounds,
Or on an old man's grizzled head ...
What harm is there to look for Him
In these unlikely places?
The dullest minds become less dim
When hope shines in their gaping faces.
Why opt so quickly for division
When all comfort you deny
To those sore wounded by derision
When kind thoughts their tears might dry?
~ FreeThinke
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Talk HEALTH! There's nothing
That can either charm or please,
By harping on that minor chord
Disease! Disease! Disease!
~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox
~ FreeThinke
The devil got into our system over 100 years ago and solidified his grip with the Establishment of the Fed. Once he got a hold of our money, changing our education over to secular humanism and laying down regs and controls was easy. Not to mention all those weapons manufacturers to carry out the old battle of Armageddon.
People know me as a strongly spiritual person and ask me about America's place in prophecy. I tell them -- selling weapons to both sides at Armageddon.
Besides, is Santorum really the exemplar of Catholicism when he doesn't even understand the basic Catholic concept of subsidiarity?!
Ker-pow!
1st Century Christianity never had that problem, never had to create a "doctrine of subsidiarity." Organizing congregations along egalitarian lines was working just fine until Constantine invented that "Peter founded the Roman Church and it is supreme to all other churches" nonsense.
Psst. Peter's apostolic ministry took him east, to Babylon. It's all recorded in that dusty book in Catholic living rooms.
There once was a guy disputatious
Whose lust for combat was rapacious.
The poor soul has no friends,
'Cause he won't make amends,
By admitting his thinking's fallacious.
~ FreeThinke
@twoguys2012 - Seriously? Being anti-Catholicism is the same as being in the KKK? Where, oh where, does it teach that in your catechism?
===========
You get the anti-papist meme really cooking on your site. The Klan ratcheted that hatred up pretty high also.
No move along, you're late for the White Citizens Council meeting.
The Catholics that read my words against Catholicism do not take it personal, as you would have them do. This is totally out of the realm of touchy-feely emotionalism.
I hope my anti-Catholic statements are not taken as personal attacks either. As a Christian and comparative theology enthusiast, I find conversations with polytheists like Catholics and Hindus absolutely fascinating. Having a seperate omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent deity for every aspect of your life is rather novel and creative. Beautiful, even. I just have a problem with Catholicism mistaking itself for Christianity, but that's not a fight I'll take to the battlefield until Papists get their dander up again. Seems they're content canonizing African animist spirits as "saints," and it's good to see the Caesarean Pontifex Maximus tradition still expanding its diverse pantheon. Saint Isidore of Seville, Catholic god of the internet. What other religion can claim it has a god of the internet in its pantheon? That's just wicked cool!
My whole point is not to disparage the alien and archaic beliefs of non-Christians, but rather to question the motives of a Presidential candidate claiming a higher theology than the rest of us as an agenda to be imposed by the federal government, no matter if that theology is Christian, Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist, Hindu, Shintoist, or something closer to the absurd views of Rick Santorum.
@Beamish - I'm Baptist. As in "John the." Christianity's been around a few centuries longer than Roman Catholicism. Try the real thing, you'll like it.
----
The Baptist church was established in the 17th century you moron.
Go listen to some Rush (the group) or Megadeth. Keep it simple. You headbanger morons can't handle a melody line longer than a measure.
Although I have to give it to you, Beamish. Takes some work to get myself and Finntann in common cause.
Wow! Seems I've missed a busy day, but as long as you're all quoting scripture, try this.
"He who knows does not speak. He who speaks does not know.
Lao Tse
viburnum
The Baptist church was established in the 17th century you moron.
Not.
Quite technically Baptists are not a "Protestant" Christian sect, as we existed in some form long before Rome was even evangelized.
Baptists have a theological heritage and unbroken line of congregations going back to 1st Century Jerusalem.
The "Anabaptists," a Catholic pejorative for our forefathers, were established as a sect in 251 AD, and refused Constantine's invitation to establish a council of Christian congregations with Rome as its head.
When you hear stories of "Christians being tossed to the lions in Roman colosseums," guess who those Christians were?
That's right, Baptists.
Go listen to some Rush (the group) or Megadeth. Keep it simple. You headbanger morons can't handle a melody line longer than a measure.
Or what, you'll Gregorian chant me to death?
Although I have to give it to you, Beamish. Takes some work to get myself and Finntann in common cause.
Y'all can come venerate my Mary-shaped water spot on the deck if you promise not to get candle wax everywhere.
Just got back from an afternoon at the opera, La Traviata.
Looks like the Beamish has his hands full against the Catholics, who appear to be getting the best of him..
And I want to thank Tony Fernandez (a most articulate libertarian) for the best comment of the thread:
Besides, is Santorum really the exemplar of Catholicism when he doesn't even understand the basic Catholic concept of subsidiarity?!
"Were it not that the baptists have been grievously tormented and cut off with the knife during the past twelve hundred years, they would swarm in greater number than all the Reformers." - Cardinal Hosius, President of the Council of Trent, writing in 1524 (Hosius, Letters, Apud Opera, pp. 112, 113.)
Hmmm. 1524 minus 1200 years equals Baptists existed long before Catholicism.
We'll work on shapes and colors next, Ducky.
"It must have already occurred to our readers that the Baptists are the same sect of Christians that were formerly described as Ana-Baptists. Indeed this seems to have been their leading principle from the time of Tertullian to the present time." - Edinburgh Cyclopedia (a Presbyterian work).
Tertullian was born in 160 AD.
Catholicism is at least 300 years younger than Christianity.
Do you have a professional company Silver?
Wish there were one in Boston.
Looks like the Beamish has his hands full against the Catholics, who appear to be getting the best of him
Can you box with thimbles over your fists? Your hands must be really small.
"I just got back from an afternoon at the Opera -- La Traviata."
YOU at the OPERA? Who'd a thunk it? Well, I'll be swanned! Life's just full of surprises -- not all of them unpleasant. BRAVO! You've made my day. ;-)
However, you also quoted this as the best comment on the thread:
"Besides, is Santorum really the exemplar of Catholicism when he doesn't even understand the basic Catholic concept of subsidiarity?!"
Sorry, but it hardly competes with Emily Dickinson. Besides, it's much too cryptic -- or would "parochial" be a better word -- to have universal appeal to mass audience. (Pun intended.)
One of the many many things I cannot begin to grasp about the primary battles for the Republican nomination is the way Roman Catholics appear to be flocking to support the MORMON Mitt Romney, when they have not only Rick Sanctum Santorum but also Newt Gingrich -- both Roman Catholics, and both much better candidates -- available.
As Alice said, "Things are getting curiouser and curiouser."
Hope you enjoyed the Verdi. I've always liked it, myself.
~ FreeThinke
Thrice married Gingrich is a Catholic? Figure it out Freethinker.
They've also got L'il Ricky Retardo sussed as insane.
American Catholics tend to be moderate.
I'll state up front I don't know opera from beer barrel polka. My daughter's choir teacher is a mezzo soprano and played the part of Flora, so we went and watched it. My daughter got to meet all the principles and she was so jazzed.
Beamish: Baptists, anabaptists, go check your history, it's dubious. It all branched out from the catholic church. Read the end of the Gospel of John.
The modern-day Catholic Church has its problems, no argument, but we're all human beings after all...
Omar Khayyam (50)
You’ve seen the world,
and all you’ve seen is nothing;
and everything, as well,
that you have said and heard
is nothing.
You’ve sprinted everywhere
between here and the horizon;
it is nothing.
And all the possessions
you’ve treasured up at home
are nothing.
To Mr. Free Thinke,
Someday when we're off the subject of politics, we can talk about Maestro Verdi. I made a Verdi pilgramage years ago while in Italy. Also one for Puccini, and later, Mozart.
As much as I adore the Italian opera repetoire, for me, the most perfect opera ever written is La Nozze di Figaro.
FT,
Since it seems you enjoy poetry, I have a little play on words for your perusal:
Real eyes,
Realize,
Real lies.
-Machine Head
"Seriously? Being anti-Catholicism is the same as being in the KKK? Where, oh where, does it teach that in your catechism?"
Here, I'll try and keep it simple and at your level:
Dint larn dat in church larnt dat in a mary can histree.
I think you'll find few who will argue, klansmen included, that the Klan is not a white-supremacist, anti-semitic, anti-catholic organization.
As to Baptists:
Historians trace the earliest Baptist church back to 1609 in Amsterdam, with English Separatist John Smyth as its pastor.In accordance with his reading of the New Testament, he rejected baptism of infants and instituted baptism only of believing adults.
-The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church.
Historians trace the earliest Baptist church back to 1609 in Amsterdam, with John Smyth as its pastor.
- A Very Brief Introduction to Baptist History, Then and Now. The Baptist Observer.
English Baptists, with continuous history from the beginning of the seventeenth century, have the longest history of any Baptist group in the world.
-Baptist Origins, John Briggs
Our best historical evidence says that Baptists came into existence in England in the early seventeenth century. They apparently emerged out of the Puritan-Separatist movement in the Church of England.
http://www.baptisthistory.org/baptistbeginnings.htm
The earliest Baptist churches (1609-1612), although comprised of English speaking congregants, flourished in Holland, where religious toleration was much
greater than in England. Among their leaders were John Smyth, who led the first congregation of 36 men and women, and Thomas Helwys, who returned to England in 1612 to establish the first Baptist church in England.
http://www.abc-usa.org/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=cgvZuPqWxVU%3D&tabid=80
Even the Anabaptists themselves claim an origin of 1517
http://www.anabaptists.org/history/anastory.html
Your claims are about as solid as the Virgin Mary on Toast.
I hope I'm not the only one enjoying the irony of one Christian accusing another of "making it up as you go along." Remember guys, not one of you reached Christ by reason alone, so how about treating each others' faith with a little humility.
jez : I hope I'm not the only one enjoying the irony of one Christian accusing another of "making it up as you go along."
You're not, and I hope I'm not the only one to realize they're just bolstering the argument for keeping religion out of the public square. Nearly 500 years since the Reformation and Christians are still willing to fight about it.
viburnum
Wow! Quite the poetry thread here.
I should post a featured question at my site. Something along the lines of "What is your favorite poem? Feel free to cite more than one example."
Here's MY candidate for The Most Trenchant Comment of the Thread:
"He who knows does not speak.
He who speaks does not know".
~ Lao Tse
Thank you, Viburnum, for finding such an elegant way to tell us all what fools we are without stooping to insolence and vituperation.
Truly a Master Stroke!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A favorite poem, AOW? What an impossible request!
I believe that for me it may be the following:
Pickles and Tea
There was an old woman
Who lived in Dundee
She dined upon nothing
But pickles and tea.
Of course on a diet
As silly as that
This foolish old woman
Could never grow fat.
As a matter of fact
She stuck to her whim
Until she at last
Grew exceedingly slim.
And one day a high wind
That chanced to blow by
Blew this silly old woman
Right up in the sky.
She was blown up and up
Right into the blue
Until she just vanished
Entirely from view.
But while her relations
Bewailed her sad loss
Down dropped the old woman
Exceedingly cross.
And she said, “There’s two things
Don’t mention to me,
And one of them’s pickles
The other is tea.”
from Runaway Rhymes
by Alice Higgins
Copyright 1931 by P.F. Volland Co.
Joliet, Illinois
I believe that may well be "What Started It All" for better or for worse. I had a wonderful mother.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
My dear, Ms Shaw,
I share your love for Mozart. If I had to choose but one opera to keep with me always, it surely would be one of his. I'm unprepared right now to choose among them, however. Le Nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni, Die Zauberfloete, and Cosi fan tutte all carry a great deal of weight with me.
Oddly enough after being treated recently to a particularly fine, well-integrated production, I've just come to a new level of respect and admiration for Bizet's Carmen.
I'm mad for Wagner and Strauss. Tristan und Isolde and Die Meistersinger still raise goose bumps every time I so much as think of them.
Such disparate offerings from Richard Strauss as Der Rosenkavalier, Salome and Elektra never fail to stir me.
I enjoy Italian opera, of course, but with the possible exception of Verdi, I can't take it as seriously as I do the others. I'd have to claim Madama Butterfly, however, as my favorite Italian Opera.
Best regards,
~ FreeThinke
@ Jez: "so how about treating each others' faith with a little humility"
Amen, my British friend. Alas, a few who visit here don't know what humility means.
Discussing secular religion is poison, which is why I don't do it.
Baptists, anabaptists, go check your history, it's dubious.
Cardinal Hosius' writings are dubious? Who were the baptists with a 1200 year history of persecution he was writing about?
...in 1524 AD?
Historians trace the earliest Baptist church back to 1609 in Amsterdam, with English Separatist John Smyth as its pastor.In accordance with his reading of the New Testament, he rejected baptism of infants and instituted baptism only of believing adults.
A Baptist ecclessiology of rejecting infant baptism which traces to at least the time of Tertullian and the Montanists of the early 3rd Century.
Your "historical" analysis is flawed, hung up as it is on looking for congregations that called themselves "Baptists" rather than congregations where Baptist ecclesiology draws its ideological lineage from. Rejection of the absurdities of "apostolic succession" and infant baptism are the hallmarks of Baptist theology and ecclessiology going all the way back to before Tertullian.
Anabaptists / baptists were persecuted and slaughtered by the Catholic Church as "heretics" for 1200 years BEFORE the Reformation, primarily because they refused to participate in Constantine's wedding of religion and state.
It is Baptists, primarily, from which the religious argument for keeping religion and state seperate historically emerges.
...and Catholics, primarily, who have shown many blood-soaked examples of why church and state should not be fused into one.
The Baptist vs. Catholic feud is roughly 1800 years old.
I hope I'm not the only one enjoying the irony of one Christian accusing another of "making it up as you go along." Remember guys, not one of you reached Christ by reason alone, so how about treating each others' faith with a little humility.
Christ may have been reached by faith, but the rejection of Catholicism by the earliest of Baptists, nearly exterminated out of existence by the Catholic Church by the time of the Reformation, was most assuredly reached by reason.
"Were it not that the baptists have been grievously tormented and cut off with the knife during the past twelve hundred years, they would swarm in greater number than all the Reformers." - Cardinal Hosius, 1524
Who were the "baptists" that Cardinal Hosius was gleefully thankful in recounting that their numbers had been exterminated down to near zero over 12 centuries so that they were not adding in significant numbers to Protestant forces he was tasked with fighting?
Bueller? Bueller?
Historians trace the earliest Baptist church back to 1609 in Amsterdam
This is like saying the first democracy was the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
Blah Blah Blah, Blah Blah Blah, Blah Bl;ah BLAH!
Blah Blah Blah, Blah Blah Blah, Blah Bl;ah BLAH!
Blah Blah Blah, Blah Blah Blah, Blah Bl;ah BLAH!
Blah Blah Blah, Blah Blah Blah, Blah Bl;ah BLAH!
Blah Blah Blah, Blah Blah Blah, Blah Bl;ah BLAH!
Blah Blah Blah, Blah Blah Blah, Blah Bl;ah BLAH!
Blah Blah Blah, Blah Blah Blah, Blah Bl;ah BLAH!
Blah Blah Blah, Blah Blah Blah, Blah Bl;ah BLAH!
Baal, we cry to thee!
Baal, we cry to thee!
Hear oh hear and answer us!
Hear our cry, Oh Baal!
Hear our cry, Oh Baal
Baal, let thy flames fall,
And extirpate the foe
.
Baal, let thy flames fall,
And extirpate the foe.
Baal, we cry to thee!
Baal, we cry to thee!
Hear oh hear and answer us!
Hear and answer!
Hear and answer!
The response?
DEAD SILENCE
Finn,
"Seriously? Being anti-Catholicism is the same as being in the KKK? Where, oh where, does it teach that in your catechism?"
Here, I'll try and keep it simple and at your level:
Dint larn dat in church larnt dat in a mary can histree.
I think you'll find few who will argue, klansmen included, that the Klan is not a white-supremacist, anti-semitic, anti-catholic organization."
--------
Again, by that rationale you are saying that since I am anti-Catholicism, I am in cahoots or sympathetic to the KKK.
Will you also tell me since I am critical of Obama that I am a racist?
Straw man argument, Finn.
Your sensitive religious adoration of Catholicism is being offended and hurt, so you label me as a KKK associate. Bad form, Finn, and wholly ridiculous. I would expect that kind of reasoning from Ducky, but not from you.
I'm still waiting for the Catholics allegedly "filling my hands" to refute their own history's documentation of Catholic persecutions of the Baptists that existed long before Roman Catholicism came on the scene.
I guess Cardinal Hosius was some sort of knave, LOL.
Oh, let's stop talking about Catholic history and delve into Metallica, LOL.
If you love the concept of seperation of church and state, thank a Baptist.
Years ago I went through a spell where I read a lot about the early Christian Church. I find your theory intriguing, and I remember reading something about it. It's controversial whether the two Baptists are connected, with some arguments on both sides.
It's one of those angels dancing on the head of a pin arguments. You had "baptists" as well as "circumcisionists" and many other groups struggling through what it mean to be part of The Way.
You should go blog about it at your place.
http://drbentownsend.com/Documents/HosiusQuoteInBaptistBooks.pdf
Oh and by the way, he's a Baptist Minister:
http://drbentownsend.com/aboutus.aspx
As to the subject of Anabaptists, rejecting infant Baptism no more makes you a "Baptist", any more than not eating beef makes you a Hindu.
So again, where they may have been people who rejected infant baptism prior to 1609, the Baptist Church was founded in 1609.
"Again, by that rationale you are saying that since I am anti-Catholicism, I am in cahoots or sympathetic to the KKK"
That wasn't a rationale, it was an insult, pointing out that your rabid, frothing at the mouth anti-catholic ravings make you appear as an uneducated lunatic.
And don't worry, you're not offending my Catholic sensitivities any more than you're offending my Zen Buddhist sensitivities.
As I've always said, the problem with religion lies not with God but with man. I love God... it's the majority of his followers I can't stand.
Cheers!
I believe that God can save America, I didn't have the energy to real all 106 comments. But We are still a nation Under God, even though, Obama denies that fact.
I am with Mrs. S. God can always turn things around. Why? Because there are still many believers in this nation that believe God is still in control.
God gives us so many chances, I know there will be day when He will not will take His elect and children out of this world and leave to Satan, but until THAT day, I will never give up praying for this nation or her people.
Just my two cents.
"You should go blog about it at your place."
My! What splendid advice!
The display of bigoted buffoonery on this thread may very well be unexcelled.
~ FreeThinke
Oh and by the way, he's a Baptist Minister
Further to the point, he's a Baptist minister that admitted up front that he's unfamiliar with Latin yet he's trying to analyze a Latin text and translate it for you anyway, ROFLMAO!
But it's really no shocker to see a Baptist in disagreement with other Baptists. It's kinda what we do, being egalitarian rather than hierarchical in our ecclesiologies. ;)
Baptist successionism is a view that has come to be rejected by the larger Baptist sects within the last 100 years or so, but that rejection has more to do with the rejection of apostolic succession ecclesiologies in general, rather than denying Baptist beliefs have no lineage in the historical rejections of infant baptism in pre-Catholic Christian times in specific. Landmark Baptists are just as Baptist as Free Will and Southern Baptists.
As to the subject of Anabaptists, rejecting infant Baptism no more makes you a "Baptist", any more than not eating beef makes you a Hindu.
Of course. There are other things to being a Baptist, such as actually believing the Bible documents correctly that Paul was advising early Christian congregations with his Epistles, including the congregation in Rome that apparently had never even heard of "Pope Peter."
As I said Beamish, interesting theory you have there. You should explore it further...
...at your blog.
Some people find it all-but-impossible to take a hint, SilverFiddle.
Logorrhea gone viral would be my diagnosis. Also punctus non concedus risolutus -- a once-rare disease fast reaching epidemic proportions in the blogosphere.
~ FT
Good post Silver, even if we don't know it because we're either too stupid or too arrogant, we need him far more than he needs us.
He loves us even if we are not much more than crap on the street.
Silverfiddle,
As I said Beamish, interesting theory you have there. You should explore it further...
...at your blog.
The point of contention seems to be that I am stepping on your right to believe Peter was the first Roman Catholic Pope despite much historical and Scriptural documentation to the contrary, while it is perfectly okay for your sectarians, Rick Santorum included, to deny 12 centuries of pre-Reformation persecutions of my sect by that same "Council of Rome" it refused to join in 313 AD. Despite there being far more historical and Scriptural basis for Baptist successionism ecclessiology than Catholic "Peter was the first Pope even if Paul forgot to mention it in his Epistles to the Romans" ecclessiology.
I simply belong to a faith that prefers to remember history over fabricating it as it goes along.
This lil dustup on you blog is merely illustrative of precisely why the idea of separation of church and state came to be.
I apologize that my argument put you in the role of unseparated church and state, or at least unseparated church and governing authority of this blog.
It was for illustrative purposes only. No inquisitors were harmed in the making of this point.
It's not even a dustup, just you going off on a tangent that interests no one but you.
As I said, it's an interesting theory, but there is plenty of scholarship on the other side as well.
It's a deep issue unresolvable in a blog post. The very lack of calling Peter a "Pope" in the Bible is but one example.
Of course no one ever called him that. It's a Roman word that didn't come into use until after all the NT was written and he was long dead. And it's just a name anyway. The important thing is that Jesus charged Peter to Shepard his flock.
See, now you've got me going again...
It's all dueling historical accounts until the pitchforks and torches and forced confessions of heresy come out. ;)
Silver said: "The very lack of calling Peter a "Pope" in the Bible is but one example."
True. The office of Pope and everything about it is entirely non-Biblical. It arises instead from the traditions of a denomination.
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