Moved Cafe Society --> Great Debates.
So let me see if I understand this–football player publicly bows to God with millions watching= nice, pleasant decent fellow, though thanking God has fuck-all to do with football.
But–atheist comic points out how irrelevant religion is to football= angry, disturbed troll.
If Maher had merely said, in a dispassionate manner, “Religion is irrelevant to football,” then your objection might conceivably be relevant to the topic at hand. We all know that what he said went far beyond that though, and that he did so in a deliberately offensive manner. Heck, he didn’t even allude to relevance, much less mention it.
Funny you should mention Ned Flanders. There’s one goalie in the NHL (I can’t remember who it is), who’s a born-again Christian who has Ned Flanders on his helmet. I love it – I think that’s awesome.
Except he didn’t say that. He was mocking what the guy was doing, just to be a dick.
For godsakes, many people here go on about how religion is nothing more than “superstition”. Athletes are notorious for being superstitious – whether they’re religious or not.
Lets look at the passage in question.
**" And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly." **
So, looking at the second verse absolutely looks like Jesus is telling you specifically what to do. The first verse tells you what the problem is and the second verse tells you what to do to avoid it. It really can’t be much clearer than that.
If he was only warning you about being a hypocrite he wouldn’t have needed to say or said the second verse. He already told you what not to be like. Why muddy the waters telling you what to be like?
Looking at it, the misunderstanding can’t be that. No, the misunderstanding is clearly that this is an admonishment. It’s not. He’s just saying that you won’t openly get your reward if you pray publicly not that it’s a bad or forbidden thing. It just gives suboptimal results.
To me, that explains Buffalo.
It’s not Tebow’s beliefs you hate-- it’s Tebow himself!
Why do you see hatred behind mockery and sarcasm?
In your words, you describerd him as “cock sure jock, with an unrealistic view of the world molded around religion, and the unfortunate ordeal and wake-up call that is Home schooling.”
Doesn’t sound like you’re very fond of the man.
Do people not know how Twitter works? It was just a passing comment, something Maher found amusing to think about. It wasn’t meant to be a big thing.
How is Bill tweeting TO HIS FANS trolling again? I’ve followed his tweets for years and there is nothing in that tweet that was out of the ordinary. The ‘troll’ was the fox news ‘fan’ who obviously was following Bill in hopes of finding some outrage.
If you don’t like Bill fine, but if you don’t like him yet lurk in his shadow in hopes finding some juicy tidbit … You are a troll.
A star… don’t think so. He’s presently a starting QB, but he’s hardly a star. He’s well known because he was a star college quarterback who very few thought would be successful in the NFL. The fact that his team has won a few games while he was playing and his polarizing religious beliefs has caused him to be in the news.
I think Bill has a crush on Tim Tebow and is trying to hide it with snark.
I don’t see how they’re mutually exclusive. The admonishment is that if you’re praying hypocritically, IOW as a display of your “piety,” then you’re missing the boat, and the only reward you’ll receive is the shallow admiration you’re shooting for. “This is not a good thing,” he is saying. An admonishment.
That doesn’t contradict the notion that public prayer, even if not done to garner a reaction from those around you, is “sub-optimal,” that one needs a private prayer life as well–needs it even more so. Public prayer is not forbidden, per se (as noted, Jesus did so himself, though clearly he was more inclined to pray privately, to the extent it’s noted).
That was funny.
He’s not a star quarterback, but he’s most definitely a star at the moment.
He’s certainly getting a lot of press here at SD.
First, thank you for appreciating my little joke.
Second, I don’t believe Jesus was in the habit of praying publicly. His prayers were always within his definition of church services. People gathered to hear him preach and that includes prayer.
He didn’t go down to his fathers carpentry business and say “Nice cabinet there dad, let us pray.” which is the kind of thing he was talking about.
This is how I learned it years ago and I can only offer this as a cite that illustrates what I mean. I have no idea about the authenticity of the commenter.
http://barnes.biblecommenter.com/matthew/6.htm
Mr Tebow certainly appears to be practicing the bolded part which has little bearing on his actual faith. He didn’t really say there was anything bad about it though. They will get their reward after all. Maybe he just felt it was as tacky as many in this thread do?
If your argument is based on a claim that the Sermon on the Mount was not “public”, you should probably find a new argument.
Preaching is not prayer.
Thank you.
No, but the cites I provided you, at your request, were prayers, by Jesus, in public.