What are the protocols in there? Can they wander around so long as they have access or are they restricted to certain sections? Because if they have full access I really do think it’s more “keeping out the rabble” than “deliberate calculated obfuscation of the truth.” And it would be just as easy to get some letters misrepresenting your intentions and look for the UFO stuff instead of “the history of the Vatican” or whatever you said you were researching.
ETA: That’s not to say if the protocols are restrictive they’re hiding something, just idle musings.
God is too short (3 letters), the board doesn’t index it, Jesus, Religion, or Creationism would be better search terms.
I think that the “qualified Researchers from institutions of Higher Education” requirement is a good filter that would prevent a UFO researcher from getting in.
Because if they let the ET nutters in, then they’d open the floodgates to the Kennedy assassination nutters, the hollow earth nutters, the moon landing hoax nutters, the “9/11 was an inside job” nutters, the New World Order nutters, the Illuminati nutters, and the mole people nutters. Does the Vatican really want:
A. thousands of these woo-woos pawing through their historical documents?
B. To have their name associated with these people?
Although God has everything to do with life, He rarely interferes with the natural order of things. The Bible says “There is none good but God”. So if there is none good but God, and according to the Bible everyone commits sin (except Jesus), then we’re all bad people. For the sake of argument, however, a good person and a bad person can both go to the same college, take the same course, get the same degree, and be equally successful. Or, a good person and a bad person can go to the same college, take the same courses, but the good person has a personal crisis and drops out of school while the bad person goes on to earn a degree, and ten years later the bad person has become more successful then the good person (or vice versa). The point being a lot of “bad” people have a wonderful life because they worked for it.
I’ve heard that “Earth is the closest an anti-Christ will get to Heaven and the closest a Christan will get to Hell”. With that said, it would only seem to make sense that so many “bad” people have a great life. God pities them because He knows they will never choose Him or His plan of salvation, so He allows them to live a “good” life in this life because they chose Hell. God grants men the desires of their heart. God is a loving Father, and like any dad He wants to give His children what they truly deeply want. In some cases, God being a strict and caring Father, will say “No” because He has bigger and better plans for the individual. In some cases, God being the proud Father of His child, will grant special blessing to an individual. In some cases, God being the compassionate and understanding Father, will give special blessing to an individual out of pity. This is the same for “good” and “bad” people, because we’re all God’s creation, and whether someone believes or not God still loves His creation and wants to show them that love.
That is correct. No God, so he can’t be blamed. The tsunami came from purely natural forces of course. But if you do believe in God, you might wonder why he saw fit to kill that many people.
Nah, some professors believe some nutty, nutty things (or at the very least being, say, an astrophysicist doesn’t automatically make you immune to conspiracy groupthink). I’m sure there’s a qualified theological historian out there SOMEWHERE that’s both qualified for entry and into UFOs. But in general, I agree.
Your crystal ball is a little fuzzy there, Lacunas. I am thinking no such thing. But I am thinking you (nor any UFO researchers) have no idea what is in the Vatican archives, so you are just filling in the blanks from your own over-stimulated imagination, much the way your religion has perpetuated itself all these years. You rush to fill any gaps in human knowledge with fanciful fiction that has no foundation other than, “god told me so”.
Because Christian dogma is a house of cards, and they don’t want it exposed for what it is?
[QUOTE]
Originally Posted by kanicbird
It is God’s job to prove himself to the person, in that respect it’s not my job, nor Lacunas Quell’s.
Not so much. I believe it is the responsibility of an individual to believe in God through faith, and then God will prove Himself to the person.
If someone has true faith, they don’t need God to reveal Himself to them, they believe no matter what. God may test that person’s faith, and allow bad things to happen to that person, but when the individual has pure faith in God, He will show Himself to that person. Read the book of Job. The entire book is about this subject. Book of Job
There’s also another point to be made about the archives. If there’s anything the Vatican wants kept secret - and I’m sure there is - they could hide it from anyone searching the archives by the simple expedient of not putting it in the archives. So, as far as Lacunas Quell’s idea that if they won’t let some UFO guy rummage through their stuff, they must be hiding something - if they ARE hiding something like that it’s more likely in a locked room marked JANITOR somewhere than in the archives. They are much more likely afraid that he’ll make them look bad or damage something.
In other words, faith is a pretty word for insanity or foolishness. Faith isn’t admirable; it’s a defect, a serious one. Faith is the crippling of the mind.
It’s not really like that. Documents are sealed (generally) for 75 years, and so assuming the document isn’t sealed, the researcher requests the document he or she wants and it’s brought to them.
I think I described this earlier. It’s ass-backwards.
I know the story of Job, thanks. God makes a bet with Satan and decides to test a guy’s faith by ruining his life and murdering his family. Wonderful, life affirming story about what a great thing it is to have faith in a monster who cares more about proving a point to his “adversary” than the lives of the creations he puportedly loves. I was going to compare this god to Ike Turner and Job to Tina, but that’s actually unfair to Ike.
See, this is the thing that bothers me about movies where the main theme is about the Evil Scary Guys Who Hide Stuff. If something is really serious, really hot stuff, really will cause an upheaval, then why archive it or hide it? JUST DESTROY IT. I know, that would be too simple and obvious.
Before the creation of man, human spirits were inhabiting the bodies of a highly developed form of ape. These spirits didn’t inhabit the body, per say, but the spirits stayed close to their chosen individual. Have you seen or read The Golden Compass. It was a relationship similar to that but not on a personal level. This is why I believe some humans alive today could have evolved from a type of ape. I believe in reincarnation, even though it doesn’t matter if you are reincarnated because the life you are living is this one. Who cares if you were Cleopatra in another life? In this life you’re just Bob. Deal with it. Be happy with your can of pork and beans and make the best with what you have. Life is the gift, not your wealth or possessions. So because I believe in reincarnation I believe that some who are alive this very day were once the guiding force of a type of ape.
There is a missing link because humans did not evolve directly from an ape ancestor. God created a body for the human spirits and created that body from the dust of the Earth. The human spirits had their own bodies to control, and from Adam and Eve all humankind has been brought forth.
Vatican Priest 1: Hey take a loot at this!
Vatican Priest 2: Holy ^#^%^& that’s some scary stuff.
Vatican Priest 1: Yeah, this could cause the end of civilization, a new Dark Ages, and toss us all out of work.
Vatican Priest 2: I know, but AIN’T IT COOL!
