The church does not object to rights (already established in California) regarding hospitalization and medical care, fair housing and employment rights, or probate rights, so long as these do not infringe on the integrity of the family or the constitutional rights of churches and their adherents to administer and practice their religion free from government interference. (italics are mine)
My first and last thought is: I don't object to your rights to practice your religion, so long as your practice does not infringe on my rights or the constitutional rights of the government to operate free from religious interference.
Friday, August 14, 2009
Religions' Interference in Government
Richard Packham has a post on his site about the California Prop 8. Okay I know it's old news but I was struck by one of the responses from the church.
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16 comments:
Interested said
My first and last thought is: I don't object to your rights to practice your religion, so long as your practice does not infringe on my rights or the constitutional rights of the government to operate free from religious interference.
You might be honest in saying that, but it annoys me to no end how Atheists, or Government or schools or who ever tells the Christians, leave us alone and let us do what we want.
But then these same people come and tell us what to do or how to run our church. The Government went in California to a private persons house and said are you doing Bible studys, they said yes, so government said then your a church and must pay thousands in taxes.
You guys cannot have it both ways, Either shut up and leave us alone or let us bother you also. Many times government imposes their will upon churchs.
Take homosexuals for example, they cry Tolerance yet they are the most intolerant of all. They hate Christians yet they go to court and fight to be allowed to serve in various roles in our churchs and then fight to try and change our statements of faith.
Why is this? If they hate us that much and their very vocal about it, why not start their own church, noooooo instead they fight to get into ours then sue us to change they way things are done.
Interested you might be alone in being the only one who does not do this, but your also wrong in that it is done to us, not just you. Rick b
O but Rick we do leave you alone. We(the government) allow you to operate and pay no taxes. We allow you to use your bully pulpit to encourage and often coherse your members to vote in accordance with your belief, never mind that 15 to 17 percent of the nation does not even believe in god.
This nation was founded on the principles that church and state should be separate and yet for some reason you and your kind continue to claim this is a so called "Christian nation"...not even close.
I don't know what you are talking about when you mention the church in California. If the government said it was a church then wouldn't they be exempt from taxes? Somehow that does not make sense.
Homosexuals hate Christians? I know many, many homosexuals and all but one are Christian.. how can you say they hate Christians? I do think they hate those who CLAIM to be Christian and spout hell fire and brimstone to others who hold differing beliefs.
Rick it has been a while since we sparred but I have spent the time well. I have been reading the bible and trying to find something to believe in. I found it just as disappointing this time around...in fact this time I found it even more ridiculous that the first time around.
You have a very dangerous habit of calling others wrong and I worry that you have not really read your bible like you should.
I won't fall into the trap that many do in quotinf Mat. 7 but I will say that it seems terribly unkind to throw such stones at people. If you want one to take a certain road and be happy with the decision show him why it is good. Threats rarely work.
I can make Judgments and be just in it, your misquoting Scripture or only read what you want to and ignore the rest.
If your going to quote the Bible then you better read it better, read this,
Mat 7:15 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.
Mat 7:16 Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?
Mat 7:17 Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit.
Mat 7:19 Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.
Mat 7:20 Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.
Mat 7:21 Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
Mat 7:22 Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
Mat 7:23 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.
Many people say, you cannot Judge, Well Jesus just said BEWARE WOLVES IN SHEEPS CLOTHING.
Let me ask you something? How do I know if a person is a wolf? I need to judge how they act and what they say.
Then you said Many homosexual are Christan, Did you not read the Bible? Jesus said Homosexuals will NOT ENTER THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN.
Then Jesus said many will say to me on that day, Lord Lord and I will say, I never knew you.
Many people think they know Him, but does He know you?
And despite the few gays you know, Many do hate Christans.
Check out this website if you think we were not a nation of believers at one time. www.wallbuilders.org
Rick b
I beg your pardon, I did not quote the bible in fact I specifically said I would not profer that claim used by many against Christians. I think that one of the problems we have is the way in which we read the bible. I do not see it as divinely inspired. It holds no more intrinsic value than many other much older ancient writings. It does have some interesting stories and some good lessons of morality but it is also filled with wicked, violent and vulgar tellings. Your quote:
"Mat 7:15 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves." is some good advice. The problem is that we do not agree on who is the wolf.
Thought you might like this, even if you do not agree with it.
RELIGION IS JUST A PATSY
Religion is often blamed for the miseries of the world. An "Imagine No Religion" billboard has just gone up in St. Louis, and most people get the point even if they disagree with it. If it were not for religion, after all, there would have been no Spanish Inquisition, no Taliban, no World Trade Center bombing, no human sacrifices to various and sundry gods. Religious wars would be conspicuously absent from world history and nobody would follow cult leaders in sipping down toxic Kool-Aid. Richard Dawkins' book The God Delusion spends the first page of the Preface going through the evils that have been done in the name of religion. Yet, while atheists love to blame zealous believers for the world’s sufferings, they have missed the true problem. Yes, much earthly evil has been done in the name of one deity or another, but religion isn’t the real problem. The real problem is …. human nature.
Religion is a convenient scapegoat for the atheist, who wants to justify himself in a world of believers. The atheist has a serious problem in blaming the evils of the world on religion, though. For every complaint against religious people, there are plenty of complaints to be made against the faithless.
Have people been slaughtered in the name of religion? Certainly. Yet, the Crusades are a drop in the bucket compared to the massive death toll caused by atheistic regimes. The leaders of the French Revolution shoved God out of their social justice crusade, and the result was a blood bath. Stalin is responsible for the deaths of at least 20 million of his own people, and Mao Zedong's death toll runs upwards of 40-70 million. From Pol Pot in Cambodia to the Kims in North Korea, governments freed of "religion" – those utopias of atheistic communism - have murdered millions upon millions of people. People of various religions continue to fight all around the world, but, anti-God governments streamline human death. Any time people get starry-eyed about imagining "no religion too" they need a little history lesson.
The problem isn’t religion or even lack thereof. The problem is humanity. Human beings have this propensity for violence and greed, for self aggrandizement and selfish laziness. We struggle – and sometimes succeed - to overcome these things, but they are there inside us. As Paul writes in Romans 7:21-24:
"I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?"
We all have that destructive sin nature inside us by birth. It’s there, and we spend our lives fighting it. If we were naturally good, it would be easy to be good and kind, generous and patient. If we were naturally good, it would be a heavy effort to be rotten. But, we find that we are just the opposite, always struggling to do what is right and constantly falling into that corruption that most people want so desperately to avoid.
Even the atheist wants to avoid the corruption, as far as his own conscience dictates. Atheists have consciences too, after all. Paul writes:
"For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another;" -Rom 2:14-15
Cont.
Cont,
Atheists and humanists are quite capable of morality and moral decision making. Yet, in rejecting the True God, atheists and humanists make themselves their own gods, and because they have no greater yardstick to measure by, it often happens that they reject one evil only to turn around and embrace something far worse. The poor in France had good reason for anger against the spoiled aristocracy and opulent church in the late 18th century. But, having only man’s reasoning to depend on, and hearts full of vengeance, thousands of innocent people were murdered. The atheist has nobody but himself and the local legal system to help him do the good he wants to do, and that can lead easily into gross error. Humankind has excellent thinking ability, but we can easily use that brainpower to justify doing the evil we want to do rather than the good we should.
Yet, the atheist is not too far off when he looks at the religions of the world and feels massively unimpressed. Religion is not the salvation of the world. Religion can be useful in that it provides a framework in which to live, and gives people rules of right and wrong outside themselves. Yet, religion itself cannot change the human heart or free humans of their natural destructive tendencies. In fact, some religious sects actually promote violence and destruction.
Paul didn’t find the answer to his dilemma in religion. He found the answer in the person of Jesus Christ. He found his answer in the Spirit of God, working in human lives to cleanse and free and make new. And the Spirit of God is real, and He is powerful, and He continues to change millions of lives today. If more atheists were truly aware of the reality of God's Spirit to heal and to transform, Richard Dawkins would sell fewer books.
"This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. And they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit." - Gal 5:16,22-25
Life on this planet is hard, and Jesus never promised us anything different. He said we would have many troubles in this world, but he also said he had overcome the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. If we are filled with the Spirit, walking hand-in-hand with our King and Savior, His light is going to shine out of us to the lost and the dying. And if, in the midst of our own struggles and suffering, the reality of Christ is alive and well in us, anybody who is watching will see the difference between the truth and the false religions that have caused so much grief through the years. If people can see Christ in us, they won't want to imagine a world without him.
"For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body." - 2Cr 4:6-10
Rick that is an interesting article. Can you cite the author and publication?
It was email to me, but you can go to www.khouse.org
If you cannot find it right away, try using their search engine and type in,
RELIGION IS JUST A PATSY
If that does not work, let me know and I will try and find it for you. Rick b
Thanks Rick. I found it posted in a number of places but I can't determine who the actual author is. It is one of those articles I'd like to archive and keep.
On the website They should list all sources. If for some reason they did not or do not you can write them and ask them about it. I've written them before and they do reply. Rick b
I frankly do not think that Jesus will bring homosexuals to hell to get roast forever.
Counting sheep,
Think what you want,but the Bible says otherwise.
Counting sheep said I frankly do not think that Jesus will bring homosexuals to hell to get roast forever.
I wanted to add another thought, I find it funny people like Counting, Beast, interested and others claim, we dont believe God exists, We dont believe God would do this or that.
Thats fine, believe what you want, but why would God in the Bible say, People are going to hell, or Homosexuals will not enter Heaven, or say many other things.
But then you guys come along and say, I dont believe God would do this or that. First off, how can you say, you dont believe God would do this or that, you deny He even exists, so why do you care what He would do or not do.
Then it's not us Believers saying, God will do this or that, It's God Himself saying He will do this or that. I find it funny, for people who do not believe God exists, you sure seem to know what He will or will not do, and even go so far as to call a God you dont believe exists, a liar.
Thats like me saying, Interested is really a 50 year old man, she spoke, said this is who I am, but then I come along and say, nope, your lying, your really a 50 year old man. Rick b
Blah, blah, blah. Irrelevant ad infity. God doesn't have any control over OUR free will. YOU, sweetheart, may choose to go to the Abyss of Misery forever at death's hour. Does God have any say? Betchur ass He doesn't. YOU wanna commit suicide? He'll letchoo. YOU wanna commit heinous crimes? He'll letchoo. Wanna become a 33rd degree Mason, have sex all day and do meth so your teeth fall out? He'll letchoo. All God wants is our love; all God wants is our FREEDOM to choose the higher good, the Trinity, not the passing world run by the Liar who wants U.S. to suffer for eternity. That's EXACTLY where FREE WILL comes in: God totally forgave U.S. at baptizzzm (HeeHee), but then, thars an open-door at 7-yrs-old entitled OUR EXISTENCE which the MoFo world pushes U.S. through and God has absolutely no control over YOU anymore once YOU step through that threshold. Alla the angels, saints, and your dear grandma are praying fervently, but it all comes down to ONE person: YOU. Whotcha gonna choose? The R path, leading Upstairs fulla rocky stones, narrow trail that YOU can't see too well at times OR the L, broad avenue, fulla hunks, chunks, and crime but it'll lead YOU down to the pit. Whotcha gonna choose? However, when you're all done with thy Finite Existence, the King of Kings greets YOU, God invites YOU in, and puts a heavy, warm robe on YOU (very cold in the world: cold stares, cold attitudes, cold people - brrr!) My choice? I choose the NarrowPath. Why? Our Finite Existence. 'Nuff sed? Get it? Don'tcha lose it, toots. After all is sedNdone, and YOU make Heaven, we'll have a Big Beer down at the local pub. God bless.
Rick! Calm down. All controlled by the Illuminati/One-World-Bankers/our Prez who's controlled by strings from above... and, thus, once this weee, lifelong demise is over, like a spekOsand by the Mediterranean (which is HUGE, not to mention all sand on the planet, not to mention all the FREEkin' atoms on earth), you're going to Heaven, right? Don't worry about it, Rick. Some live eternally, some perish forever. God bless.
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