Crappyboy, I'm not just going by that Pope, I'm also going by experiences and yes, I know what a Protestant is and they are not all that much better either. Look at my mom's Pentecostal church for example, who actually condemns soap operas, movie theaters, going to the beach if there are women in bikinis, making women wear skirts and long hair and no makeup or jewelry, etc. But they are Protestant indeed! And look at Phred Phelps of Westboro Baptist Church who created the infamous site GodHatesFags dot com. They are Protestant indeed! And there are many other churches who may not be this extreme but who are still hypocritical and who are still unfair. So while I may not be a heavy researcher like some people are when it comes to religion, I still know enough not to be a lemming. Organized religion has done nothing but cause so much suicide and mental damage and emotional damage as well. So, tell me this, then, since you seem to defend Christianity so much... why is it that a good percentage of people turn away from such religions and become either Agnostic or Atheist?

I'm sorry but I have yet to find a church who will accept me 100%, even the gay one that I used to go to and they were probably the best one of all the ones I found. I have a very dark mind and I enjoy wearing goth outfits sometimes, but will they accept that? Nope! Why? Because to them anything that relates to darkness is either diabolic and just negative and self-harming. To them, what is the opposite is healthier and I disagree with that. Every single church I have attended (and yes I have attended quite plenty of them) there is always something that does not make me feel welcome, including the gay church that at one point I loved so dearly. Organized religion is just a form of control. It's their way of playing The Sims but even better because you get to control real people instead. How many pastors and priests have humiliated people in front of many because of what those people have done and then go behind their backs and do even worse things? How can none of you realize this? Seriously! It's unfair and uncalled for! So what... because I choose to not be a damn lemming I am suddenly stupid and worthless? I apologize for the generalization in my previous posts, as I didn't mean to generalize, but at the same time, I know for a fact that I am at least a good percentage correct. Then again, I'm not surprised if people are so devout that they defend their church to the fullest. Eh, don't complain when you start seeing your pastor driving a new convertable with all that cash you gave him for offering (i.e., my mother's former pastor, who also had a 5-year affair with a minor). Yes, we are all humans and make mistakes, but at least practice what you preach. And at least I am humble enough to admit that I have contradicted myself and have been a hypocrite many times in the past... whereas most these people can't even do that.

And yes, Davious, I have read the article so please don't make it seem like I am part of that blanket metaphor you used because I have never accused you of anything. If anything, I've been very kind to you what with the major differences you and I have. Now, I hope I am wrong and you weren't thinking of me when you posted that, but it did come across as directly to me because I was the only one who posted the type of message I posted.

No, they are some guys opinion on how the Seven Deadly Sins are violated today.

Ermm....what contribution was that? Also i agree with a post here...its wrong to be rich yet not for the church...hypocrites...

And you're surprised? lol

Okay, now here (well so far as I can tell by the paragraphing) you seem to present yourself a bit better. Still maybe a bit broad brush. But from what I skimmed at least you present some of the whys and wherefores behind that. If I could get this post in a slightly more readable form, maybe I could find some of your points to advance this thread with.

I understand and I try hard not to generalize so much but when debating on a heated topic it can get the best of me, lol. But yeah, I know not all Christians are like that, it's just that I never get to meet many of the tolerable ones who can accept and not reject. Where are they? I guess they are just that minimal to where they seem so transparent. LOL

First of all, try modern art. Most of the great masters from the Renaissance and before were sponsored or hired by the church- including all of the "ninja turtle" artists/Renaissance masters (Leonardo, Raphael, etc.) on whose work some of the most essential techniques in representational art are based. Remember the Sistine Chapel? It's in the Vatican. And it is one of the most celebrated artworks of all time.
Also notable is that religious organizations throughout history have provided most educational resources to scholars (before public schooling became the norm) and many of the scribes who have recorded important bits of history that we retain. The Catholic church during the middle ages and early Renaissance also sponsored many of the astronomers who made breakthroughs during that time period.
Not to mention modern missions work... church organizations provide a huge amount of the foreign aide currently going to third-world nations.

If anyone can think of more, please feel free...

Well, the Islamic empire made a wide variey of contributions.

Some of the most important contributions that Muslims made were to medical science. They studied the work of famous Greek physicians Hippocrates and Galen. Then they added to what the Greeks had done. Scientific advances that the early Islamic Civilization made involving the development and preperation of pharmacuetical drugs are still in use today. In some cases, techniques such as distillation that were first used by Muslim scientists to prepare mediacal drugs are also followed by today's manufacturers. They also pioneered new ideas concerning hygenie, established the first school of pharmacy and wrote the first illustrated surgical textbook.

Being traders, the Muslims made some of teh most accurate maps of the time. They also improved greatly on the astrolobe which were used throughout Europe and the Muslim Empire.

Then there are the arts which you mentioned. Many fantastic geometric designs were made.

A new number system was developed.....

I can't really think of anything else.

Sad to say but it's totally understandable. You've been browbeaten by the worst elements of Christianity and it has colored your perspective. Would be kind of surprised if it hadn't. Used to know this guy online that had presented himself to me as a girl for three years. And one of the major faults that he had was that he had a racist streak. But he's from Jacksonville and he'd had gotten savagely hassled by the local blacks. So I forgave his racism in him because of the negativity he'd gotten from the black folk around him.




I'm not really in the habit for speaking for "good percentages of people". There are probably as many reasons as people who have made these moves.

But the reason I defend Christianity is because I've seen so very much of it. Both the positive and the negative. When I was growing up, the pastor of our church was one of the most regular visitors to the house and was a dear family friend. After I got out of grade school, I went to a private Christian school for junior and senior high. So I learned religious and secular history alongside each other.

So while studying the medieval period I'd get Martin Luther and John Calvin alongside the Battle of Hastings and feudalism. I read Jonathan Edwards and his legendary, doubled-edged sermon "Sinners In The Hands of an Angry God." I saw before me how things could go wrong while at the same time learned how they were intended to be and how divisions of the two had fueled men like Calvin and Gutenberg and the Wesley brothers.

I served as assistant coach for the Bible Quiz team and saw one of student advisors get savaged by some for wearing an ankh to one of the meets and others appreciate what she'd been thinking. And when my family left that church, we returned to the local church of our roots. By that time one of the sons of the former pastor we'd loved so much when I was a boy had taken the pulpit there. And they were such a loving Godly family. A point I credit in part because Johnny, the other Joyce brother, was mentally retarded and they had to learn so much love and acceptance dealing with his condition.

In short I defend Christianity because I've seen it from so many different perspectives. Even though I do have my own issues with it at times and have backslidden a good bit, I know Christianity can be so much better than many people see. It's not just the false prophets like the Fred Phelps and Pat Robertsons of the world. They do exist and sadly always will. But true loving souls like the Joyces exist in Christendom too and it just really bugs me to see them lumped in with the bad apples who get the attention.

Also why can't genetic experimentation happen? I'm against cloning...but research and experementation to help fatal diseases and disbalities? Are they condemming someone that could be hjelped by this to a difficult and sometimes painful life...when something to help them could be done?

I think the guy really didn't think this one through. Genetic experimentation goes back as far as just breeding plants- ironically enough, Gregor Mendel, the man who's considered the father of modern genetics, was a Catholic monk! The man whose opinion this is probably didn't even consider anything more primitive than stem-cell research.

It has more to do with Genetic experimentation on people.

Ah, okay. That is a more ambiguous topic.

Crappyboy, I totally understand and agree with your previous post. It's just if you only knew how damaged my brain has been by such traumatizing experiences of Christianity, and I'm not saying this to be a drama queen or anything, it really is true. Otherwise why would I even waste my time badmouthing Christians for no apparent reason. I know there are good Christians out there, but it's who and where that is the question. I am so afraid to take the risk because of the scar from the past that I have. I feel like no matter what church I would ever go to, I could easily be influenced and/or brainwashed and not even know it.

Every sperm is sacred! Thou shalt not spill seed!!!
(in reference to the poor little stem cells)

LOL, tell me about it!

I hear you, Frankie. Because of my broad base of experience with things Christian, I don't know I could ever fully know how it is to walk in your shoes. But I've seen enough of Christianity's toxic side I can imagine how you got there. What's really funny I found is that the churches where I most often heard such classic church mots like "You should be in the world. But not of the world" or "Hate the sin but love the sinner" were the churches that seemed to practice these ideals the least.

Like I remember this one time in ninth grade when some of the other teens and I were debating the best and worst of secular music. And this one girl decides to go off on You Gotta Fight For Your Right To Party by The Beastie Boys. A perfectly understandable choice if you listen to it lyrically. Songs don't get much more worldly and sinful than that. But she was so far removed from the world she couldn't even get the title right. She had it more as You've Got The Right To Fight and Party. I politely corrected her and continued on with the topic. But after seeing just how insular her world was, I never put as much weight in her opinion of societial matters again. I was doing so much better a job of being in the world but not of it than she was.

About ten years later, I'm coaching Bible Quiz and on the way back from one of the meets, the group's describing some of their greatest long-term prayers. The team captain expresses his wish to fall for and go steady with a fine Christian young lady. But the song he wishes to share with her as "their song" isn't a Flesh Of My Flesh or some hymn. His song to share with his lady love is I Cross My Heart by George Strait. A secular country song. Showing he gets the notion of in the world but not of the world even though that line isn't mentioned anywhere near as often in this church as the high school example.

I guess it'll always be a struggle and a battle.

I never said I wasn't a hypocrite and did you NOT just read my previous posts about understanding that not all Christians are that way. All you did was ignore those and choose this post just to start a fight and I don't appreciate that very much. That makes YOU disrespectful and hypocritical, so I guess we're in the same boat now, huh? Actually, YOU'RE in a boat, I'm in a yacht.



Whatever, you're just acting like a monger. The Bible DOES NOT apply to me whatever because I AM NOT a Christian so please cut it out with your false accusations. They go nowhere! I have every right to be my own person (or God if that's what you want to call it) so please quit accusing me of being "prideful." That doesn't even make sense! And how the hell am I even being self-rightous if I am being my own person? I don't choose to be the way I am just so that I can be "free of sin." That's nonsense! Just because I don't happen to worship a book that I believe man created does not make me any of those things. I guess I should apologize for thinking for myself and not actually being a follower of what could easily be a fable... BUT I WON'T, sorry.

Again... read my previous posts so that we can stop fighting because I really am not in the mood to fight with you anymore. Ugh, the headache!

Noodlesoothe, maybe you should read the rest of the dialogue between Frankie and Cappyboy before being so quick to judge a man you do not even know. If you're a "true Christian" by your own definition, you'll remember that Jesus said this:

"Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
"Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye."

And Frankie, it's amusing that you keep calling him Crappyboy, but it's wrong and don't worry too much about judgmental people.

LOL, I just now realized it's Cappyboy! I'm so sorry for calling you Crappyboy! I swear I must have dislexia at times. *blushes*

Thank you, endersgirl07, I appreciate that and you are right because in my Bible it does say the same thing. That is one thing I admired about Jesus (I do believe He did exist just like any historical character) and that's that he was loving and caring and accepting. Noodlesoothe is currently acting like a Pharisee! Shame, shame! LOL

And I'm still enjoying my yacht.

*genetic experimentation
Nope

*tampering with the order of nature
Nope

*pollution
Probably

*social injustice
Nope

*causing poverty
Nope

*accumulating excessive wealth
Nope, sadly

*drug abuse
Nope

So I'm good ^_^
Though I find the Vatican rather pretentious so it wouldn't matter anyway...

Ha! I love it!


... and why are we all so surprised? This is what they've been doing from the beginning. 'Interpreting God's word'. I'll interpret for myself thanks. God and I are like this .:crosses fingers:.

No worries, mate. It's casual. I recognize this is a common typo and I've come to let it roll off my back. Actually even find it amusing at times.



And good use of the Pharisee reference, Frankie. I had actually intended to mention them when referencing the false prophets. I'm sure Noodlesoothe means well enough. But even so, it's not coming out right. He/she may want to double-check ensuing posts for clarity before sending.

I'm reading through these posts, and maybe I'm wrong, but I'm still under the impression that everyone is debating the wrong thing. This is not a list from the Vatican--it's a list from someone who works in the Vatican.