Well, yes and no. Monks, particularly the religous communities of Ireland, did preserve the works of ancient Christian authors like St. Clement of Alexandria and Tertullian, but we owe the preservation of many ancient authors’ works, like Aristotle and Plato, to the Muslim scholars in Cordoba, Granada, Cairo, and Damascus who had kept the works alive in Arabic, and to the Byzantines who saved the works of Greek and Roman authors.
Well, come on, who nowadays reads John Calvin, Thomas Aquinas, or St. Augustine? Heck, who reads the more modern works of Henri Nouwen or Thomas Merton? Even Christians don’t read such difficult works. They’d much rather swallow the pablum of Chuck Swindoll and James Dobson.
Guinistasia, you’re not helping your case. In 1632, Galileo was placed under perpetual house arrest by the Inquisition for the crime of publishing books that supported the Copernican theory that the earth revolved around the sun.
Isaac Newton, after his second nervous breakdown in 1693, retired from research and wasted the last 30 years of his life in decoding the Revelation of St. John.
ahem…need I remind you that it took four centuries for the Catholic Church to admit that, yes, the earth does revolve around the sun? :rolleyes: Oh, and how about that list of banned books? Boy, a whole lotta intellectual freedom goin’ on!
Uh…since my grandfather was an Orthodox priest, I do realize that. My boyfriend’s parents are devout Pentecostals, and they’re not intolerant zealots, either.
Still, even many Christians who are not intolerant zealots have a tendency to want to decide what’s best for my country as a whole, according to their beliefs, without taking into account that not everybody agrees with their beliefs.
Again, you need to read a good intellectual history of thought in pre-Enlightenment Europe.
Regarding the “Index Librorum Prohibitorum,” or Index of Prohibited Books, here’s some info
The Catholic Church recognized the the truth of the Copernican theory over the next century, and as I posted, the work by Galileo that instigated his punishment by the holy Office was removed from the Index in 1824. In fact, the Catholic Church has been very friendly to science, regarding as a method of revealing God’s handiwork in the universe. The Jesuits, in particular, have been very avid astronomers and helped convey knoweldge of Western science to the Qing rulers of China. You should read a biography of Mateo Ricci.
Moron? For pointing out a flaw in your argument, an argument, BTW, I AM SUPPORTING? If you wish to demonstrate to Squish that Christianity and intellectual achievement are not incompatible, it would be smart not to use as your example the most notorious case of a scientist being silenced by the religious establishment! Jiminy!
You would make a far stronger case by pointing to the work of the Jesuits in China, to Gregor Mendel, the Catholic monk who discovered the laws of genetic inheritance, to Lord Rutherfurd, a famous physicist and Christian, to Michael Faraday, the English physicist who discoveed electromagnetic induction and a believing Christian.
There is no inherent incompatibility between religious faith and science, primarily because they answer two entirely separate sets of questions. Theology can give us the “why of creation” and science can give us the “how.”
Disclaimer: I don’t agree with the OP. I’m not even necessarily defending WV, especially as it appears that there may be an issue regarding her membership.
But, if someone expounds on a touchy issue in an inflammatory manner it should not give people the right to state “FUCK OFF” as a response. I heartily disagree with the baby murderer comment, but I do realize that some people see abortion as such…wrong, yes, but I can see where that opinion could come from.
Given the sock issue, maybe this person IS a troll but how about addressing the issue and perhaps try to fight ignorance (insult away if you want).
People DO have non-tolerant opinions and they may find their way to this board. Maybe we can make a diference with some of them…
Not everyone can be as tolerant/accepting of different viewpoints as our SDMB folks. Let’s see if we can hammer open their shells and expose them to different ideas…
I AM NOT ADVOCATING TOUCHY-FEELYNESS
Like I said, call them a drooling imbecile, but maybe try to point out how/why their opinion is wrong…
Squish, your list is mighty selective in that you are only citing books that were censored by the RCC. If you look at the Web site that you cited, you’ll discover that books are banned as often by civil authorities as by religious.
The United States banned books, including Ulysses, Lady Chatterley’s Lover, and Sir Richard Burton’s translation of The Thousand and One Nights, not to mention the perpetual censorship of Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn on purely secular grounds.
Neither one of you is doing a good job of pleading your case. IMO, **Guinstasia[/b[ is right, and Squish is dead wrong.
No, I’m not only citing books banned by the RCC; some of the works I cited were banned by Protestant authorities. Might I venture to submit that books banned by the US were banned because of moral objections stemming from a Christian viewpoint (the telling phrase “banned in Boston” stemming from Boston’s notorious Puritanism)?
And what about the burning of books in Nazi Germany? What about the banning of Lewis Carroll by Nationalist China? What about the banning of authors under the Communist governments of the Soviet Union and China? Suppressing the voices of people you disagree with is a human trait, a trait not limited to one sect or political system. People have been burning books since the reign of Shih Chin Huang Di, the founder of the short-lived Qin dynasty and the first emperor of a unified China. He ordered all works burned that predated his reign, so that Chinese history would start with him. He failed, of course, as all such tyrants do.
I’m just curious. Your whole argument is based on the fact that other groups have been repressive, not just Christians. Doesn’t this go back to the simplistic “two wrongs don’t make a right” theory? I just don’t see how more than one group doing something wrong makes it suddenly okay. There should be less finger pointing of course, but we shouldn’t close our eyes to it all together.
I am dumbfounded how people who are pro-life could be anti Planned Parenthood.
Planned Parenthood’s goal is to preventunwanted pregnancies. That is a good thing, especially if you’re pro-life. PP offers free or reduced cost birth control to sexually active girls regardless of age or income. They give gynecological exams and STD screenings to women who would otherwise never set foot in an ob/gyn’s office because of the cost and proximity.
And, if a young woman finds herself pregnant, they offer counseling services to discuss options. Yes, one of those options is abortion because, like it or not, it is a legal alternative. But they don’t push it.
I’m a pro-lifer and I think PP deserves our support, not our condemnation.
Good point…Gaudere? Same forum, same type of statement. Why not the same “official warning”? Or is the board supportive of tolerance for all creeds except Christianity? Does the Chicago Reader now officially sanction bashing religion, as long as it’s the “right one”?
+ :wally = :smack: .