Are you saying that the Roman Catholic Church was not one of the majority sects, or that the Roman Catholic Church rejected the teachings of the “established” Churches? It was the established Church (and a majority of Christians still consider it so), and the Inquisition was perpetrated under it’s auspices.
Have you thought that of the Christians you have know here at the Dope? (This is a serious question, not a debating point.)
Speaking for myself, I don’t judge whether someone else is a “real Christian” or not. And, of course I know that horrible things have been done in the name of Christianity – and continue to be done. I believe that when Christians were creating atrocities, even though they claimed that they were doing so in the name of Christ, they were not, in fact, following the teachings and example of the Christ. Most of all he wanted his followers to love each other and be peaceful and nonjudgmental of each other.
Some people (Christians) have corrupted the teachings of Jesus. We all manage to make a mess of it from time to time. The teachings themselves were and are beautiful. There may be an occasional verse or two that doesn’t seem to fit, but I can’t even think of one off the top of my head. Overwhelmingly, the gospels are filled with stories of kindness and mercy.
The key word in that entire sentence is faith. That makes the sentence contradictory, in my opinion. Faith is not a matter of logic.
At this point, you are (deliberately?) ignoring the fact that those pesky laws that they fear were written by overwhelmingly Christian legislatures. If it had been that important for them to kill atheists, that would have been written into the laws.
And, I am afraid, you give yourself far more credit as an irritant than you deserve. I cannot think of a single Christian of my acquaintance who would actually want to see anyone dead simply for their beliefs or lack thereof. Mostly, Christians would fall into the categories of (1) "hoping/praying that you would come to recognize God in your life, (2) not really caring one way or another about your beliefs, or (3) wishing that people with beliefs similar to yours would not try to impose those beliefs on them (while failing to note the irony of that position). I would not even attempt to assign numbers or percentages to those groups, but in my experience, in descending frequency, they would occur in groups 2, 1, and 3. (I do not have a lot of acquaintance with very strongly Fundamentalist Christians; in rural Alabama, it is possible that my number 3 would move up to number 2 or number 1.) Among the 280+ million Christians in the U.S., the number of Christians who would actually wish to see you dead would probably number in the double digits although I suppose that it might reach triple digits when Mr. Newdow is making it into the media.
It is sadly true that far too many (Christian) U.S. citizens have some odd views regarding the ethics and trustworthiness of atheists. That, however, does not translate into an actual desire to see atheists eliminated or killed (as long as they stay away from politics, of course).
Christianity has met and survived generations of extreme persecution by the Romans, and Christian civilization defended itself against invasion by the Vikings (many times), Mongols (many times), Muslims (many times), it has sustained itself while expanding to new places, and it has defended itself against the challenge of modernity. It has also survived internal threats such as the Arian heresy, the split between the Catholic and Orthodox churches, and the Reformation. And many others besides.
(Certain people, after reading the previous paragraph, will already be churning out paragraphs listing other religions that have met some of these challenges. I don’t doubt that some other religions have met some of these challenges, but no other has met all of them, or as many others.)
If a house stands up to extreme weather, earthquakes, and fires, repulses robbers, and outlasts other houses, then its construction must have been based on truth. If a computer operating system successfully defends against hackers, viruses, and other threats and is used on many computers as a result, its programming must have been based on truth. And if a religion stands up to all the storms of human civilization and thrives despite adverse conditions, its dogma must be based on truth.
I’ve been back to reread all my posts and I can’t find any place where I “prove” that Christianity’s social views are false. As for their being “transitory” that’s relative; I actually said that they’re far less transitory than any other set of beliefs. But I’ll answer your question even though you based it on a claim about me saying something that I never said. Anyone who’s read my posts on this board knows that on many social issues my positions are in disagreement with, and in some cases opposite to, those of most major churches.
Consider. If you see weakness whenever an institution changes, then you surely see extreme weakness in every secular institution. And you surely see more strength in religious institutions than in secular ones. In fact, the Church is the oldest institution in the world. The governing structure of the Church has changed much less in the past 1,000 years than the governing structure of the United States (for example) has changed in 233 years.
People do not get sufficiently attached to lies to keep them around, certainly not for 2,000 years through very turbulent circumstances. People do not follow the same philosophies that were followed millenia ago, read the same entertainments that were read 1,000 years ago (except for historical study), or get fooled by the same advertisements they were fooled by 1,000 years ago. Lies collapse; truth is everlasting.
Wow. No, but we would love to see you relax a little.
I am stunned and humbled by the splendiferous inanity of this reasoning. It is positively medieval, a return to trial by ordeal. I don’t think any Atheist could have come up with a parody of religious belief that would be as damning. Nor could Mel Gibson have so utterly insulted so many different ethnic and religious groups that have been slaughtered in the name of one God or another.
Let us put that aside however, and examine the factual claim that The Church has changed less in the last 1,000 years than the structure of the US govt.
In 1054, 953 years ago, there was the Great Schism that split The Church into eastern and western sects; each with separate Popes. It’s as though the civil war ended with the south still separate. In the 16th century Protestantism began to take hold. They rejected the authority of the Pope. Over time Protestants have created a mind boggling number of sects, with new ones created on a regular basis. In the 17th century the Church of England split from Roman Catholicism and passed the leadership of The Church from the Pope to the Monarch of England, who to this day is the head of the Church of England.
To complete the analogy with the US, it is as though New England (Eastern Orthodox), California (Roman Catholic), and Oregon/Washington (Church of England) are their own country, each of which thinks they are the true lineage of The US. Meanwhile the rest of the country (Protestants) are Anarchists that reject the whole idea of centralized authority.
I guess that does pale in comparison to having Senators elected rather than appointed and letting women vote.
I would not bother showing counter examples. I would find it more appropriate to ask you to support your own thesis by demonstrating that you actually have some clue as to the issues that Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Confucianism have faced. You make the sweeping claim that only Christianity has faced serious challenges while providing no demonstration that you are even aware of challenges faced by other societies. It is easy to make statements grounded in the typical European-centric education system of the U.S. as though your lack of knowledge regarding other societies is a demonstration that they have not suffered events of which you are aware, but that hardly demonstrates an actual point of discussion.
You also include some rather silly claims in your thesis. “Christianity” was never “attacked” by Vikings. Population pressures in Scandinavia prompted a rather limited wave of raids on Northwestern Europe (with a few Vikings carrying out a miniscule number of raids farther afield), but there was never any danger that the limited number of people in Scandinavia would actually ever overwhelm the huge numbers of people in Spain, Southern France, Italy, the Danube Valley, or the Byzantine Empire. Even the raids on Northwest Europe, terrifying as they were, were never a danger to the majority of peoples, there, and certainly not to their beliefs as the Vikings made no effort to proselytize their own religion or seek converts to it. You have confused a rather small number of booty raids with an actual attack on a system of religious belief.
Schisms? Reformation? Do you actually have any idea how many schisms or reform movements have occurred in Islam, Buddhism, or Hinduism? Can you name any? Then how do you know that Christianity has survived more? (And you havew notably ignored the issue of Judaism.)
Your argument reads like a recital put together for a Sunday school class rather than an actual scholarly examination of history.
What? What does that even mean?
For the third time, how about providing the facts that support the assertion that most atheists were brainwashed as children. Or renounce it.
or why atheists weren’t brainwashed into their atheism, for that matter.
I believe you’re considerably overestimating some of those challenges, and considerably underplaying the challenges faced by other religions (as you predict).
Ah, but here’s the problem; when it comes to religion, its survivability depends on the faith of the believers, not the truth of the religion. A person who believes wholeheartedly in something false will react exactly the same way as a person who believes wholeheartedly in something that is actually true would. If your position on Christianity’s overcoming challenges were correct, it still would not tell us anything about truth.
It was your arguments that the core beliefs of Christianity have not changed whilst the “minor” social issues have. Your position is that what survives is truth. Thus, given precedence, the societal norms of today’s Christianity are just as likely false too.
That’s lovely. Is it on all social issues? And, indeed, on all issues unrelated to the “core beliefs” of Christianity?
I do see weakness in many secular institutions - and I see strength, for example in democracy, a secular concept that has existed longer than Christianity. I’m afraid I don’t see much strength in religious institutions, because as I said before they have been forced to conform and abandon particular beliefs in order to keep up. How do we know that those you deem core beliefs won’t be the next thrown out of the balloon?
Excepting of course for other religions and atheism. Perhaps you mean there’s a set amount of turbulence that lies can exist through?
That’s some excellent witnessing there. Alas, that it also speaks about faith and interest, mortal pursuits, and not truth.
I believe i’ve thought of a logical flaw in your argument regarding survivability and success, if you’re interested. Let’s use amount of worshippers as an example. According to Wikipedia, There are 2.1 billion Christians in the world. If indeed (as you suggest) success is a measure of truth, Christianity can be said to be the truest religion. But are all of those 2.1 billion believers a result of truth?
Islam has 1.3 billion adherents. If Christianity is the one true faith, then Islam, logically, is not. So it is possible that 1.3 billion people could be fooled by lies, or the success of the faith can be attributed to context and luck.
But if 1.3 billion people can be fooled, how do we know that 1.3 billion Christians aren’t fooled, or are the result of context as opposed to truth? That would mean that there are only 0.7 billion Christians genuinely convinced as a result of the truth of the religion. But hang on - if truth might only account for 0.7 billion believers, then Islam could be the one true faith, or Hinduism. Or the athiests could be right.
To expand; in general, if Christianity is truth, then the entire success and survivability of other religions can be put down to luck, or earthly matters, or lies. Thus that percentage of success can be taken out of Christianity, since it is possible that that much of it is also based on luck, etc. This brings the amount of success caused by truth down considerably - and means that faiths and nonfaiths other than Christianity may be truth.
A parting thought; the largest religion in the world is Christian, true. But the majority of the world is non-Christian. By your own argument, the truth of the world must be that it is not a Christian world.
I’m sorry. I don’t understand. Can you elaborate?
Gee, people don’t attend Greek plays still? Coulda fooled me. I’m reading Roman plays from 2200 years ago for entertainment right now. “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum” was based on some of these, by the way.
People don’t follow religions from 1,000 years ago also. Even if you are a Catholic, lots of things have changed. If you’re not, then you don’t have a leg to stand on.
Moslems did convert the lands they conquered - but guess who they learned that trick from?
And do you want to respond showing how a few heresies and raids were worse than the Diaspora and Holcaust?
Since you called it, perhaps you can name the liberal Christian who said this and provide a quote to prove they said. The quote you lifted from me certainly doesn’t qualify; all I did was say “yes” and point to the Bible, by which I referenced the fact that in the OT God addresses only the Israelites, while in the NT he addresses everybody. This really isn’t rocket science; I don’t see why it’s so hard to understand.
Einstein was one of many working on the principles of relativity early in the 20th century; those who study the history of science, including David Bloor and Sal Restivo, have demonstrated this at great length. Darwin was not the only one who knew about evolution at any point, since it was first introduced by the ancient Greeks and was believed by many long before Darwin was born. In fact, even Darwin’s grandfather once wrote a defense of evolution. It’s mighty funny that you furiously accuse me of being “in the outer darkness” and having “ignorance of science”, yet right here you’ve demonstrated beyond any doubt that you know absolutely nothing about the birth of the two most important scientific developments of all history. I’d say that’s about par for an angry, teenage atheist.
I am an instructor at a top university in a technical field and I’ve published in scientific journals. If I’m “ignorant” as you say, then apparently science hands the pen to ignorant people.
I cannot stop doing something that I never started doing. (That’s more basic logic.)
It means exactly what it says. If one attempted to build a house using false math, false material analysis, or false engineering principles, it wouldn’t last long against destructive forces.
So here you assert that neither the Catholic Chruch nor any other current religion existed 1,000 years ago. Oddly enough, several other atheists have piled on in this thread to tell me about all the people who do follow religions from 1,000 years ago; either you’re wrong or they are, and I think it’s you.
[Looks down at lower body.] That’s right; I have two legs to stand on.
The only person who’s asserted that a few raids and heresies were worse than the Diaspora and the Holocaust was you. (See post 99) Therefore it seems to me that you should be the one showing it. I realize that atheists have a rather skewed approach to logic, but asking your opponent in a debate to provide evidence backing up your own absurd statement seems rather ridiculous.
I will politely ignore your nasty insults directed at me. However, if you wish to make the claim that I’ve insulted “ethnic and religious groups”, you should be able to back that up. If you can point out where I did so, I’ll apologize for it. If not, you should apologize to me.
Now in response to the rest of your post, let me clarify: when I said “the Church” I mean the Catholic Church, not Christianity as a whole. Everyone knows perfectly well that there have been splits within Christianity. But the debate going on was whether Christianity has held a coherent theology and philosophy together over a great length of time. It has. The duty of a priest today is to run the parish, administer the sacraments, counsel and provide support for the people and assist in other community activities. Those duties are what they have always been.
Now compare that to the government. Of the literally millions of people working for the government today, how many are doing a job that even existed at the founding? Or that existed even a century ago?
So which has changed more?
Let me begin by saying that I appreciate the highly civil tone of your post, which makes a marked contrast to certain others who will remain unnamed. Nevertheless, I’d appreciate it more if you read carefully to correctly process what I say. I did not claim that “only Christianity has faced serious challenges”; in my first post on this page I devote paragraph to specifically making it clear that I’m not saying that. I’m saying that Christianity has proven itself to be the most adaptable system, not the only adaptable system.
Now on to the Vikings. At their height, Vikings kingdoms controlled almost all of Britain, large chunks of France, and various outposts even deep into the Mediterranean. They may not have been menacing every inch of land in the Christian world, but I don’t see how you can deny that they were a serious threat to Christian Eurpoe. History is a clash of cultures; if Christianity had not had the strength to fight back against Viking incursion, then Viking culture would have settled permanently into those parts of Europe. Instead, Christianity defeated the attackers in some places, converted them in others.
The Mongols are an even clearer example. They wiped out large portions of the population wherever they conquered, so one can hardly say they weren’t a serious menace. At various times in history, they conquered into Germany and Italy, and yet every time, Christian civilization met the challenge and threw them back.
Now Islamic civilization had its Mongol problem too. Twice in fact, Genghis Khan invaded Persia in the 12th century and Tamerlane again late in the 14th century. Islamic civilization survived. But it did not do what Christian civilization did, which is to recover from the Mongol invasions and rebuild itself to its former glory. Therein lies the difference.