Re: God vs. Darwin
Posted: Sun Mar 22, 2020 9:24 am
Apparently the on-fire for Jesus reverend was victim of a misunderstanding. He was self-immolating.
have fun, relax, but above all ARGUE!
http://www.theplanbforum.com/forum/
http://www.theplanbforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=20331
Marriage equality is responsible for coronavirus according to Christian pastor
In a Tuesday night prayer meeting, Tennessee Christian conservative pastor Perry Stone blamed the spread of coronavirus on marriage equality, abortion access, and the Democratic Party.
Stone told those in attendance that the pandemic is part of a “reckoning.”
“There’s a reckoning because the courts of the land passed a law to take an infant’s life, that it was okay, and for marriage, that we have known it, to be changed into something we’ve never known,” Stone said.
“Both of their laws – biblically in Leviticus and Deuteronomy – are what God calls an abomination[….] There will be a time when the Lord says, ‘Enough is enough.'”
Stone’s beliefs are outlandish for a number of obvious reasons, but it’s worth noting that same-sex marriage is not even legal in China, Italy, or Iran — the three countries that have been hit hardest by coronavirus.
Stone also said he believed it was no coincidence that some of the areas in the United States hit hardest by the virus are the California districts of Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D) and Rep. Adam Schiff (D), as well as the state of New York, the home state of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D).
He continued, “We know coronavirus will go to West Virginia sooner or later… but isn’t it strange that the state that voted Trump in by 68%, the biggest state that voted in him, has no virus.”
Imitating the nasal voice he thinks his critics sound like, he said, “You say, ‘Preacher, you’re getting way out there, you’re getting weird.'”
“No,” he responded to this imaginary critic. “I’m prophetic and prophetic people are strange.”
Shortly after Stone made this claim, West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice (R) announced the first confirmed case of coronavirus in West Virginia. It is generally believed that the only reason it has taken this long for West Virginia to report a case is due to lack of testing.
As of Monday, Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) told CNN, there had only been 84 tests conducted in the state, and he has asked the Trump administration to increase West Virginia’s access to testing.
“I have over 720,000 elderly,” he said. “I’ve got over 220,000 that are critically ill under 60 years of age.”
“If you put all this together, of the 1,800,000 people [who live in West Virginia], I have over a million that could be absolutely, totally devastated by this virus if it hits.”
You honestly think he was not? How many times did he say the equivalent of "do ye likewise"? His ministry lasted a lot longer than his last week (or even from Easter to Pentecost), and he provided many examples and teachings on how people are supposed to act, living that way himself. Recall how he told Nicodemus to give up all and follow me for the path to salvation. Recall how he practiced nonviolence (even at his final arrest when he told the disciples to "put away your swords" and nonviolently submitted to arrest). Recall at the sermon on the mount when he showed people how to pray. The list can go on and on. He clearly did provide an example during his ministry.Jesus however, was not "providing an example"
There you have the reason why I cannot take religion seriously.MajGenl.Meade wrote: ↑Mon Mar 23, 2020 2:11 pmThe purpose of the incarnation was to bring salvation to humankind.
Well that's certainly the opinion of many; but my point is that he had a 3 year ministry and his teachings covered much more than his resurrection/being the sacrifice for redemption. Whether incarnation took place "to be a good example" is pretty immaterial, the world would be a better place if people followed that example. Will it lead to salvation? I imagine you will say no, but I am content to leave that to the grace of god.He was not incarnated to "be a good example". He was one, of course. All that you say is correct. The purpose of the incarnation was to bring salvation to humankind. That is not achieved by humans doing good or being a good example. Following all of his commands should be the consequence of salvation.
And from this atheist: Amen to that.One doesn't need to be a weatherman to know the world would be a better place if people followed the commands of Jesus.
History, and Religious stupidity, really does repeat itself. During the pneumonic plague people crowded together in churches which guaranteed much more loss of life. Proving that science is always better than religion.
... proving that science is better than bonds.On September 28, 1918, a Liberty Loan parade in Philadelphia prompts a huge outbreak of Spanish flu in the city.
Soldiers drafted in to help Spain tackle the coronavirus pandemic by disinfecting and running residential homes have found a number of elderly people abandoned and dead in their beds, according to the country’s defence minister.
News of the grim discoveries came as Spain experienced a further rise in the number of coronavirus deaths and cases, and as health authorities set about distributing almost 650,000 rapid testing kits.
On Monday, the country’s defence minister, Margarita Robles, said that members of the specialist Military Emergencies Unit had found the corpses as they carried out their duties.
“During some of its visits, the army has seen some totally abandoned elderly people – even some who were dead in their beds,” Robles told the Ana Rosa TV programme.
Robles said such inhumane treatment would not be tolerated and that anyone ignoring their responsibilities would be prosecuted.
I had the good fortune, in retrospect, to get an introduction to a Japanese religious cult. I declined to exit at that station and continued on my journey still in possession of the immaculate pendant.
Now that is true.MajGenl.Meade wrote: ↑Tue Mar 24, 2020 7:00 amHistory, and Religious stupidity, really does repeat itself. During the pneumonic plague people crowded together in churches which guaranteed much more loss of life. Proving that science is always better than religion.... proving that science is better than bonds.On September 28, 1918, a Liberty Loan parade in Philadelphia prompts a huge outbreak of Spanish flu in the city.Of course, neither proves either and our resident expert on history probably refers to the Black Death which some believe had its origins in the pneumonic form of plague. We may note that science was as stupid as priests in the 1300sOnly apt if the people were at the parade to protect them from fluPastors today have no excuse whatsoeverScience got better while priests and ministers have learned nothing.
Their Money or Your Life (The Price of Pro-Life, Christian Capitalism)
MARCH 24, 2020 / JOHN PAVLOVITZ
Love is powerful.
It will make human beings do almost anything.
We’re seeing that right now.
Some people adore capitalism so much, they’re willing to sell their souls to support it.
They’re willing to spend other people lives in service of it.
In the middle of a brutal sprawling pandemic, on a day when 100 Americans died and our confirmed cases topped 43,000, Republican lieutenant governor of Texas, Dan Patrick, went on Fox News and said that older Americans would and should be willing to die in order to preserve the economy; that the elderly are the acceptable collateral damage of boosting the Stock Market and getting businesses rolling. He essentially served up grandparents and great aunts and Nanas and neighbors as seed money for Trump’s reelection campaign and as a temporary recession stay.
Not coincidentally, this unthinkably macabre theory came on the same day that Donald Trump began suggesting he will send people back to work next week—even as doctors and scientists have been begging people to take self-isolation guidelines seriously because the virus is approaching uncontainable levels; even as school systems are announcing shutdowns until at least May; even while test kits are still unavailable to hundreds of thousands, even as people are stockpiling toilet paper and rice and guns; even as our health care workers are pushed to the brink of collapse.
It also came on the same day when Republicans are trying to ram a slush-fund trojan hose disguised as economic crisis aid through the Senate; one that pads the already heavily buffered nest eggs of corporations and does little more for day laborers and the working poor, than give them the cheap buss of a one-time token gift.
This is the repugnant sham of pro-life Christianity revealed in all its grotesque ugliness.
This is what the Religious Right really thinks about human life: if the price is right, it is all expendable.
This is the economy of soul capitalism: their money is worth your life.
Other’s supply can meet their greedy demand.
For all their tearful, showy displays of phony religion, all their impassioned pleas about embryos in the womb being sacred—they will let sentient human beings with grandchildren and spouses and decades of wisdom, die on the altar of their 401Ks.
They’re actually lobbying to send millions of people back into the swirling chaos of an infectious disease even before the peak of its spread—because their identity and the President’s base is so beholden to a group of numbers and a ledger ending up in the black, that it sees no value in sick, elderly, and vulnerable human beings, for whom relaunching business as usual would be a certain death sentence.
Jesus said you cannot serve both God and money.
I never see these pro-life Christian Republicans wearing that verse on their chests or plastering it on their bumpers or brazenly broadcasting on social media, because then they’d be forced to face their fraudulence, they’d be forced to admit their hypocrisy—and they’d have to confess that the teachings of Jesus and the sanctity of life aren’t all that critical when there’s a buck to be made or a bailout to be brokered.
Call me strange, but I don’t think the sick or the elderly are expendable just so Republicans can hold the presidency or so some already wealthy people can become even wealthier.
I don’t see my mother or your grandfather or your next-door neighbor or your co-worker’s spouse as the acceptable collateral damage of temporarily boosting the Dow or nudging Donald Trump’s poll numbers or providing a one-day national emotional placebo that allows a virus to keep killing. I don’t believe older people’s lives are chips for someone else to cash in.
Maybe I’m not a proper, card-carrying Evangelical “pro-life” Christian—just a decent human being who takes the teachings of Jesus seriously; one who values elderly and sick and vulnerable people who are living here right now, who deserve to be here as long as anyone else.
I don’t give a damn about the economy if it costs us humanity.
I’ll be okay with that balance in my ledger.
I can look myself in the mirror.
I can sleep at night.
If I'm not mistaken, it goes back to the early Egyptian times as well. Byt physicians and surgeons were taught by their senior physcians, and later by medical schools to do this; and it carried well forward into the 19th century. We may argue whether the practice of medicine is rooted in science, but at the very least "science" did very little to discourage this, and I have seen "scientific" papers defending/promoting this practice from the late 18th century. Respected doctors and surgeons made this a regular part of their practices. It was not just a folk superstition.