American Heritage Girls

[Merlyn_LeRoy]

 

>As for Christianity, I refer you to Pascal's wager:

 

Pascal's wager is nonsense, as it assumes to know a particular god exists and what it wants.

 

If the Jews are right, Christians are in violation of the 7 laws given to Noah, because worshipping Jesus as a god would constitute idolatry. Jews don't consider atheists to be practicing idolatry, so in this case, atheists do better than Christians.

 

Of course, since there's no restriction on what kind of god(s) could exist, it's easy to posit one that e.g. only likes atheists.

[OldGreyEagle]

Seeing as how Merlyn is an avowed atheist, and will never change his/her views on God, and we who do beleive in God wont change our opinions I bid Merlyn and you all a good week...

[Weekender]

Sorry, Pascal's wager makes no assumptions. It simply states that if atheists are right then it doesn't matter what you beleive. Where as if Christians are right it does. So atheists should not be at all concerned about what Christians beleive. Unfortunately, without God there is only man, and man is inconsistant. With man, right and wrong are not absolute, they are based on feelings and therefore nothing can be judged as wrong...including my beleives. Of course, Hitler, Stalin, Bin Ladin, Arafat, Sir Han Sir Han, Timothy Mcvey were all perfectly justified in what they did because right and wrong is based on personal morality and their view of morality allowed for what they did.

 

If there are no absolutes, there are no absolutes!

[Merlyn_LeRoy]

 

Sorry, like I just pointed out, pascal's wager does make unwarranted assumptions, and it's nonsense. If the Jews are right, it's better to be an atheist than a Christian, since Christians are engaged in idolatry. Whoops, pascal's wager doesn't work in that case.

[Weekender]

What do you base that statement on? I've not once heard a Jew claim Jesus to be an idol.

[NJCubScouter]

Weekender, just out of curiosity, I have a question about this statement:

 

Personally though, I find that the basis for building character MUST be an unchageing, unchangable set of moral standards that do not necessarily conform to societal norms but require an individual to understand that there is absolute truth and that there is right and wrong and that sometimes society is wrong. Short of there being a living God there can be no such standard. If we make the rules at our level then the rules are subject to change and interpretation.

 

My question is this: Do you think that a person who does not believe some or all of the above statements some can still be "reverent" and do his "duty to God" as required by the Scout Oath and Law? In other words, would you exclude from Scouting someone who believes that moral standards do sometimes change; or that on some issues there is no absolute truth, but only differing opinions; or that there is no "living God" but rather that God is a supernatural creative force and higher power that created the Earth, or set its creation in motion at some earlier stage like the Big Bang, and has had no other involvement in the affairs of mankind?

 

And question 2 would be, regardless of what answer you would give to that question, what do you think the BSA's official answer would be?

 

I also have to ask you about this:

 

Just so no one can say that they never knew...Jesus is the son of God, he came to earth to pay for your sins and mine, he died on a cross at Golgotha and on the third day he was raised back to life. He now sits at the right hand of God the Father. Salvation is yours for the asking. Jesus said he is the way the truth and the life and that no one comes to the father except through him. He also said that if you deny Him now he will deny you later.

 

My question here is, do you really think that this forum is the appropriate place to proselytize (had to look that up in an online dictionary, still doesn't look right) for your religion? Isn't there a religion forum somewhere that you can go to say that? This is a Scouting forum, and in Scouting we who do not believe a word of what is quoted above are supposed to be welcomed. Including those of us whose ancestors have spent most of the last thousand-plus years (right down to this century) getting massacred, forcibly converted, inquisitioned (when the "conversion" wasn't good enough), exiled, imprisoned, accused of drinking the blood of Christian children, and massacred a few more times, all because they did not believe what you believe. I do hope it's okay with you if we are in Scouting too. (By the way, nothing against Christians, I am married to a Catholic and have Catholic children, but as you might guess, we do not discuss religious history very often.)

 

Finally, there is this:

 

If I'm wrong...no harm done. If you're wrong it's eternity in the smoking section. Isn't it worth finding out?

 

We're all going to find out. As I have said in the past, although I do not believe in a "final judgment," if there is one, it's quite possible that (among other things you don't even suspect) God made about 5 percent of the population gay as a test for the rest of us to see how we treat that portion of his creation. If so, you may be one of those who finds himself in the smoking section. I wish I could see the look on your soul's face if that happens. At least you'd have plenty of company.

[Merlyn_LeRoy]

 

In Judaism, worshipping something that isn't god as if it were god is idolatry; if the Jews are right, Jesus isn't god. Worshipping him as god is idolatry.

 

And your first mention of pascal's wager included the usual claim that, if you're wrong, you're no worse off. That's wrong; there are gods that punish people who worship the "wrong" gods more than they punish atheists; if you're wrong in this case, you're worse off than an atheist. And, as I pointed out before, I'm free to posit a god that prefers atheists; if such a god exists, it's best to be an atheist.

[NJCubScouter]

Well, well, a discussion of what Jews think about Christianity. I didn't see any of this when I made my post earlier.

 

Merlyn Le Roy, or whoever you are, said:

 

If the Jews are right, Christians are in violation of the 7 laws given to Noah, because worshipping Jesus as a god would constitute idolatry.

 

To which Weekender responds:

 

I've not once heard a Jew claim Jesus to be an idol.

 

Weekender, it does not surprise me that you have not heard a Jew claim that; generally we do not go around saying things like that, partly to be polite and partly to try to avoid the massacres and stuff that I mentioned earlier. To be slightly more theological about it, sometime in the last millenium or the one before that, Jews adopted a prohibition against proselytizing to non-Jews, and there is definite historical evidence that this was done not so much as a matter of religious doctrine, but as a common-sense effort at self-preservation. For most modern Jews, this common sense generally means that you don't discuss what you think about Jesus Christ. This is not just an abstraction. I was brought up to not discuss religion except with other Jews. And it does not single out Jesus Christ, it would apply equally to a Jew living in a Muslim country -- and even more so at this moment in history, though the number of Jews left in Muslim countries is a tiny fraction of what it was just 50 years ago.

 

However, the fact is that Jews do not believe that Jesus is God or the son of God. Belief that he is, would in a sense violate the commandment that "thou shalt have no other Gods before me," and a painting or sculpture of Jesus (or indeed of God himself) would consitute idolatry. However, as I have suggested above, "we" would not claim that Christians are "violating" the commandments because we do not apply our own relgious beliefs to others -- a courtesy that, sadly, has not always been returned.

[Weekender]

Question #1: No, I do not and yes I would.

 

Question #2: The same. The BSA does not ask for reverence to no "living God" but rather that God is a supernatural creative force and higher power that created the Earth, or set its creation in motion at some earlier stage like the Big Bang, and has had no other involvement in the affairs of mankind? (Talk about needing blind faith!!) The BSA requires Reverence to God.

 

 

Question #3: I think you have mis-defined the word. I am not trying to convert you or anyone else to Christianity. I am simply telling you the truth (no, not MY truth). Whether or not you choose to seek the Lord is up to you. Jesus will knock at your door (maybe he's knocking now) but he won't come in without your permission.

 

As I have said in the past, although I do not believe in a "final judgment," if there is one,

 

Sorry, you can't have it both ways. If you are right then there is no final judgement. Therefore there is no reason for me to have any compassion for homosexuals. Their fate is whatever any other person chooses to do to them and no one can say it is wrong. If I'm right then they are committing a sin and need to be told.

 

NJ, You're welcome to be an atheist, that is your choice, but I would ask that you be a consistent atheist...No stealing lumber from the Christian pile to support your house. Either there is a final judgement or there is not. Each "possibility" has serious ramifications but you can't mix and match.

 

If I have a soul (which we all do), It's safe. If I don't, what difference does it make?

 

 

 

[Weekender]

My apologies to our forum regulars for the poor formating of my last post. I could not get it to preview and thought that perhaps the problem was in the HTML coding for italics. I changed it to bold and while it still did not preview it did post.

 

The bolded sections are quotes from NJ.

[sctmom]

Religions other than Christianity also have strong moral values.

 

Sorry Weekender but your posting is trying to convert others and it is YOUR truth. It may be the only truth for you but not for everyone, including some Christians and including others who worship God but not as Christians.

 

 

[Rooster7]

NJ,

 

The difference between Weekender (or me, for that matter) and yourself, is - We don't want to see the look on your face when you find out. We'd rather see you spared that unfortunate surprise. This brings us back to proselytizing. If we truly believe what we say, and the stakes are as high as we claim them to be, what kind of men would be if we didn't tell you the truth (regardless of the forum)?

 

That being said, it is not my intent to go further with this conversion...er, I mean conversation . I merely want to point out that you may be picking a fight with a man, who's only motive is to see the best possible outcome for you and/or your family. I find it highly ironic that you would wish him ill will.

 

As for Pascal's wagerI prefer the power and the promise of the Gospel, than a faith purely based on God's wrath and the probability (as measured by others, I stand convinced) of his existence. Pascal's intentions may have been pure, but his wager focuses on God's righteousness to the exclusion of God's love. God is both.

 

As for it being a courtesy to not share one's faith, how can that be? If you truly believe you know the way to God's heart and eternal salvation, how can you not share it? How can you allow others to pass through your life, and never let them know anything? Doesn't your heart cry out to share the truth with people you love and care about?

 

In my church, I was taught that idolatry could take many forms. It doesn't have to be an object. It's anything that you place above God. It could be a religious artifact (i.e., praying to a statue), a person you love (i.e., a refusal to recognize God for fear of it's ramifications for a loved one), or a vice (i.e., sexual sin).

 

Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God-- the gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures regarding his Son, who as to his human nature was a descendant of David, and who through the Spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord. Through him and for his name's sake, we received grace and apostleship to call people from among all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith. And you also are among those who are called to belong to Jesus Christ. ROMANS 1:1-6

(This message has been edited by Rooster7)

[Weekender]

So sctmom, are you saying that truth is nothing more than what each person believes? That there is no absolute, transendant truth in the universe but that everyone gets to pick what is true and what is not?

 

And, if that is what you are saying, can we ever say anything is wrong? Or is everything acceptable as long as at least one person wants to do it?

[sctmom]

Weekender, how can you say that YOUR religion is the one and only TRUE religion and millions of people throughout centuries of this world are wrong? The only difference in what you believe and what they believe is that Jesus is the way to salvation.

 

There are truths. Christianity is a "belief system". I can believe in God, morality and all that is right without worshiping Jesus.

 

[Weekender]

Rooster7,

 

Thanks. You have captured what I was struggling with.

 

If I have offended anyone, my apologies. God is Real. It is my sincere hope that those of you who have hardened your hearts toward Him will come to know Him before it is too late. Eternity is a long time.