its been done before.
What would be the point?
unless you want to get general and talk about “fundies”.
That god commands his people to love him with all their minds; I would say that those who do not question, do not think, do not reason – those sin against his word and command. I see no possible virtue in such a belief; it is not somehow rendered pure through thoughtlessness.
I’m not all that sure that a god so fond of edgeplay would consider playing it safe to be especially virtuous, either, but that’s just going on my impression of scripture.
People used to sit around Jesus all the time and ask him questions constantly! When the Apostles complained about it, he told them what they could do with themselves (well, a bit more politely, but you get the idea.)
The problem is, His is quick to jump in and start something she KNOWS will on people’s nerves, but then she turns and runs, whining about how we persecute her. I think subconsciously, she sees herself as a true martyr for Christ-that she’s “picked on” for her faith, when really, it’s all about her attitude.
I’m sorry oeZ, I must have missed your questions to me. What page were they on? Sometimes, I don’t read these things for awhile, and miss stuff.
Thanks, JD
**
yes, how else would I be able to type or respond. :rolleyes:
**
So you don’t have an official position on this, but my answer is in my link. ohhhkaay. So I would gather that means that you believe what the link from the LDS website says, and you just don’t want to say it offically on SD, or that you, personally, don’t believe what the link says, but this is what the LDS believe. I was under the inpression that you were Mormon, unless being Mormon means you can hold any belief you want.
Love, the bitch 
Guin, you got it sorta right, but we do mean it in a fairly literal and realistic sense, not just in a semantic way. We are all part of the same family, members of the same species–angels (fallen or not), people, etc. This isn’t really the place to discuss the details, though; another thread or email would be better.
Jersey,
You forgot to inlcude the rest of your “sig” there: “Love, the pretentious clairvoyant makingcrapuponthespot bitch.”
Guin: genie filled in the rest of what I should’ve said.
The old “Satan is Jesus’s spirit brother” thing that came up, genie and Monty leads me to wonder about something:
“Traditional” (i.e., non-Mormon) belief defines there to be two sapient species capable of moral judgment and thus of sinning: angels and humanity. The former are comprised wholly of spirit; the lattr are a composite of spirit, soul, and body. They are carefully distinguished, and while there are some angels who have not sinned, and constitute the heavenly choirs, Satan and his demons are angels that have. Thanks to the Fall, there are no humans who have not entered into sin, save Jesus (who is also God the Son), and according to some interpretations of Catholic doctrine his Mother the Virgin Mary.
I was under the impression that LDS doctrine retained this distinction, and that mistaken references to “Archangel Moroni” showing Joseph Smith the Plates would be swiftly corrected to identifying Moroni as a Resurrected Personage.
Jesus would on this take be the first and prototypical Resurrected Personage, whose Atonement made it possible for anyone else to be one. Satan would be altogether distinct, as a fallen archangel, carefully distinguished from humanity, Resurrected or not.
These distinctions would make the passage Jersey Diamond found and genie clarified almost moot – equivalent to saying that lel and the pine tree in my front yard have kinship in that they are both living things – true in essence, but almost worthless to point out in most contexts.
Would one of you be willing to clarify where my misunderstanding in these questions lies, from the POV of LDS beliefs?
Wow, Poly, that is very careful and clear. I would be very willing to tackle this, but I’m not sure I want to do it in on this thread, in the Pit. If you don’t mind, I’ll move the discussion to GD. I’ll post the link when I finish.
And please, I’m not going to get involved in trying to answer a bunch of angry questions as a result of my answers to Poly’s questions to me. I’ve tried to answer the best I can my true feelings on the matter.
Don’t you?
This thread has been a revelation [;)] to me. It is a smorgasboard of hatred, loathing, fear, disgust, emotional turmoil, intellectual relativism, moral uncertainty, psychological gamesmanship - in short, it is almost exactly like Friday night at our local gay bar…
But seriously, I have a simple question that NO ONE has ever been able to answer to my satisfaction - and this is the thread into which to gingerly toss this lit cherry bomb, as it were - so here goes:
Exactly when did the status of MY faith (or lack of it) become the business of ANYONE else? If I am interested in pursuing different belief systems and religious faiths, are there not facilities and sources that I can consult WHEN I AM GOOD AND READY? Are prosyletizers so arrogant that they assume they know better than I do when and to what extent I am ready for a philosophical ‘overhaul’.
I’m going to try to answer a few of your questions. I feel that I’m being bombarded with too many. So what I feel I can answer I’ll try to answer. I may not address everything.
I don’t think I can answer your first question about condemning groups of people with a yes or no. I’m not attempting to condemn people but to compare their teachings and doctrines with scripture, whether or not I do a good job of it which I probably don’t.
Just because individuals in other religions say they don’t believe certain things doesn’t necessarily mean that their religion or some in their religion doesn’t teach those things.
Yes, I think there are people who are in many churches who lack personal relationship with Christ. I can say that as a whole Baptists or whatever are Christians because of the teachings and doctrines of their church. If other religions have teachings and doctrines contrary to scripture, then many of us feel that we can and should point out the false teachings. I may not be explaining this well.
My faith has transformed me in that once I was lost but now I’m found. My eternal destiny has changed. I belong to Christ and look forward to His return and desire that others that are lost come to know Him. I struggle in my daily life as do many other Christians.
I can’t say whether or not I’d become a Christian based on what I’ve posted here. I very well might, but I can’t say because I’m not in that situation.
I wasn’t aware I’d omitted anything. I quoted from the KJV. If I left out part of a verse, it was unintentional.
No, I’m not aware that my actions meet the definition of slander. If it’s considered slander to give an opinion about a religion and it’s views, then I’m sure I’m guilty in a lot of people’s eyes. Especially since I’ve probably not used the right words to explain or whatever. But I believe that no matter how I try to say something, it’s going to be flamed.
That scripture applies to me as well as all of us. I’ve asked forgiveness for it.
I serve or am trying to serve the Lord. What that means to you I’m sure isn’t the same as it is to me.
I’ve had enough questions, please. Whatever I say, however much I try to answer some of them, it’s not going to be accepted probably and just bring another deluge of questions that I won’t be able to answer to everyone’s satisfaction.
How about answering just one, then, His4Ever? How many books comprise the volume known as The Book of Mormon?
Polycarp, and Guinastasia too, here’s the new thread.
Joseph Campbell theorized that evangelizers are driven by their own cognitive dissonance. The subconscious mind will not accept irrational beliefs, regardless of what people try to tell themselves on a superficial level. Deep down inside, fundies like H4E know they’re full of shit. At the same time, they have a tremendous emotional investment in the belief system they have chosen. Consciously they’re telling themselves “I DO believe in fairies. I DO believe in fairies…”
But their SUBconscious minds are going :rolleyes:
This creates a great inner tension and their anxiety is aggravated by the existence of other people who don’t believe what they believe, especially when sometimes those people can PROVE that certain beliefs are not true (evolution, for instance).
So they seek to relieve this tension by persuading other people to believe what they believe. It doesn’t really work , though. For one thing it’s rarely successful and even when it is it still doesn’t relieve any tension or change subconscious doubt.
Fundie: Hey, Subby, I convinced Joe Mark to convert to Christianity. He used to be an atheist. That really proves there’s something to this stuff, huh?
Subconscious mind: :rolleyes:
They try to couch it in terms of “concern” for other people’s souls but really it’s about their own emotional bullshit.
Please note that I don’t mean this to apply to all people of faith. I’m just referring to those who define their faith purely in terms of converting others (to the exclusion of actually practicing stuff like charity and compassion), who are afraid to learn about other beliefs or even associate with practitioners of other traditions, and who hold demonstrably irrational beliefs (believing in God is not irrational. Believing in Noah’s flood is irrational).
Faith and reason can go hand in hand and each can guide the other. People who are not afraid of reason, and are not afraid to adjust their faith to accomodate reason, are generally not the ones who feel the need to proselytize. People who subjugate reason to faith are in a constant state of tension because reason is always in their faces, taunting them wherever they go. It drives them crazy, and the only way they think they can fix it is by making everyone else crazy too.
His4Ever is new to the idea of checking sources and not just quoting what she’s been told. Lately, it had seemed that she was responding to what I was telling her about doing her own research instead of simply taking Christian glurge and urban legends at face value.
Instead of firing a barrage of questions at her, which has to be confusing and difficult for her to handle, maybe we should ask her to investigate the Book of Mormon for herself and come up with some inconsistencies with mainstream Christian theology (Jah knows there are enough with history, archeology, linguistics, and anthropology).
His needs to learn to read primary sources for herself, instead od relying on other people to do it for her.
Good call, gobear.
Thanks, genie. I think I know what you mean, but by semantics, I mean that people who have an anti-Mormon agenda try to pull it as you saying Christ and Satan are brothers-oh my god!!!
I guess it’s like trying to explain Transubstantiation (damn, that’s a hard word to spell!), or the Immaculate Conception. I know what it means, but it’s hard to explain.
So, instead of going by what the people who actually belong to the faith say, you go with what people with an agenda against that faith have to say? Your basic premise, which you finally admit, is that you believe we don’t know our own belief systems, that we are the liars here about our beliefs.
TDB. You’ve posted numerous erroneous assertions on this board. It’s your problem that you’ve cut & pasted those assertions from elsewhere (without, I might add, attributing the actual sources of them) and just chucked them up here without checking their veracity for yourself. Quite a few people who have negative opinions of the groups you’ve targeted here have told you often that your statements are mistaken.
You know why you can’t answer those questions to anyone’s satisfaction? It’s because you haven’t done any research: the stuff you’ve posted is someone else’s work. You haven’t done any studying of the matter: the stuff you’ve posted is someone else’s work. You haven’t compared the assertions you’ve posted with anything: the stuff you’ve posted is someone else’s work. In other words: you have elevated mistaken hate speech sites to the same caliber of the Holy Bible. You believe what’s on those sites just like it’s Scripture itself. In short: you have added to the Bible.
Do you want to know why I asked you twice so far in this thread how many books are in the Book of Mormon, or why I asked you what are the names of those books? It’s something you would know had you actually gone to, as Guin tried (in vain) to explain to you, the primary source of what you’re condemning. GET THIS: I don’t care if you condemn my church, I don’t care if you condemn Islam, I don’t care if you condemn Buddhism. I care if you do it dishonestly or ignorantly. Your entire behaviour on this site is the epitome of dishonesty and ignorance. Heck, you told me above you got quotes from primary sources. You did not. You lifted those quotes from a secondary source. Feel free to check http://sja.ucdavis.edu/avoid.htm for what the university I attend has to say about plagiarism. Academia takes that stuff seriously: If I were to do on my schoolwork what you do here, I could get expelled. Even worse, in the field for which I’m studying, the taint of plagiarism would most likely destroy any chance I have of working in that field even if I weren’t expelled. Of more import to this issue on this site is what the FAQ - guidelines for posting at the SDMB say about the issue:
[ul]Arnold Winkelried at 05-08-2002 04:23 PM {California time})
Only quote directly in very rare circumstances. Instead of repeating a source word-for-word, read the article, attempt to understand it, and rephrase what it says in your own words. Again, include a link to the source if the source is available online. Otherwise indicate a reference to the source (e.g. Science News, issue x, pages yy-zz).[/ul]
By posting what you post and in the manner you post it, you have set yourself up as an authority on a number of things. If that were true, you should have no problem answering the “deluge” of questions your postings engender–they are very easy questions for an expert. Your audience here is not a group of sheep sitting on their hands willing to accept what you say is Gospel. They are very inquisitive and are not motivated by hate, except for the odd handful. Those that are motivated by hate get banned quickly. Your audience here already knows what the Bible says. You say your motivation is love. I see contrary evidence: the corpus of your postings here. Your motivation, IMHO, is pride and hate.
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gobear: That’s her tough luck. She’s a member of this site and that means she’s agreed to follow the rules. Perhaps a better expression would be that she’s elected to play with the grownups this time and is upset she’s getting grownup responses.
Guin: I think I understand the concept of Transubstantiation, and I’m sure you know that I don’t agree with it. What I don’t understand is the Nicene Creed, the Apostles Creed, and the Athanasian (sp?) Creed. I grew up reciting the first two; I didn’t understand them then and I don’t understand them now. Do you see me condemning them because I don’t understand? What I do understand is my church’s Articles of Faith; therefore, when the issue comes up, I elect to discuss that which I understand, that which I’ve researched.
Diamond Jersey, here is a very slightly edited version of the post that I directed to you and His4Ever:
Hi, His4Ever and Diamond Jersey.
Also, which of these beliefs are Christian beliefs? If you do not hold a particular believe that is listed, is it possible for someone else to believe it and still be a Christian as long as they believe the other things I have listed?
The Bible is the Word of God.
Belief in God the Father, Jesus the son and the Holy Spirit
Because Jesus died on the cross, everyone can be saved by following the teachings in the Gospel.
Belief in repentance of sins
Faith in the teachings of the Gospels
Baptism by immersion
People will be punished for only their own sins.
Belief that man can be called by God and his church to teach the Gospel
Belief in repentance of sins, faith in the teachings of the Gospels and Baptism
People will be punished for only their own sins
Belief in miracles such as the healing touch that Jesus demonstrated in the Bible and told his disciples to also go and do
The church has disciples, ministers, evangelists, teachers and so forth – just as in the original church.
The belief that Christians sometimes speak in tongues and have visions.
Christians should try to live within the laws of their countries.
Some Christians can have the gift of prophesy that comes from God.
Belief in being kind, truthful, and chaste
Belief in all that God has revealed and may reveal in the future
Belief that each person should worship God according to what he believes in his heart and mind
Belief in the teachings of Paul that we should hope all things and endure all things, and that we should concentrate on things that are pure, good, lovely, virtuous and praiseworthy
Belief that we should seek these things in our lives
Belief that the tribes of Israel will be restored.
Belief that someday Jesus will reign over all of the earth
I hope that you will take the time to respond. Did I leave out anything that is essential to being a Christian?
Thanks!
Pax
Why, His; I thought you considered Holy Writ to be the primary compulsion of a human’s actions! Let me quote a couple of things, with proper attribution of course:
Come on, expert! What better thing do you have to do than follow what you say God said?
Here’s a novel idea: preach about your faith and cease and desist parroting others’ condemnations of faiths that neither they nor you have a clue about.
Addressing the OP of this thread: Here’s why I think those Fundamentalists want to go preach in Iraq: it’s not to spread the Gospel message but to try and prevent the message of Dar al-Islam being preached. The Fundamentalists who want to go there are afraid that the message of Muhammed (PBUH) just might be right.