Author Topic: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves  (Read 10801 times)

Offline Impish

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'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« on: October 20, 2006, 09:56:04 am »
Another example of the immorality of the extreme Christian Right:

http://www.alternet.org/stories/42881/

Sheesh!
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Marge_Innavera

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #1 on: October 20, 2006, 12:11:40 pm »
Several thoughts on this:

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"There is another way, or other ways, to look at the race issue in America," writes Gerald Schoenewolf, a member of NARTH's Science Advisory Committee. "Africa at the time of slavery was still primarily a jungle… Life there was savage … and those brought to America, and other countries, were in many ways better off."

They were careful not to mention this, but that's very close to one of the religious justifications for slavery in the 19th century: that it was a rescue mission of sorts. Slavery was argued to be a means for "the savages" to attain Christian salvation which they would not otherwise have had if left alone.

Quote
the Schoenewolf essay was erased from NARTH's website the same day as the Focus on the Family conference. Then, on October 6, NARTH posted this statement to its website: "NARTH regrets the comments made by Dr. Schoenwolf about slavery which have been misconstrued by some of our readers. It should go without saying that we do not wish to minimize the suffering of those who have been mistreated because of race, sex, religious beliefs or sexual orientation." The statement makes no mention of the civil rights movement.

Red flags should always go up when an alleged apology is phrased in terms of some obligation not met on the other side; e.g., NARTH not regretting the comments themselves but that readers had "misconstrued" them. In other words, they're not repudiating the comments, and this is essentially a sham apology.

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So what exactly is NARTH's position on equal rights for non-whites? On the NARTH website, the section marked "NARTH and Civil Rights" states: "It is NARTH's position that science, not activism, should inform legal decisions and public policies," a position that could easily be read to support Schoenewolf's hostility towards the civil rights movement.

Aside from the double standards of groups like this being quite comfortable with their own political activism, it's interesting that they make a reference to "science" without coming out and saying what kind of science they think should inform "legal decisions and public policies." Sounds very close to the old canard about nonwhite groups being genetically inferior to whites, although at this point in history they're not going to come out and say that.

Offline delalluvia

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #2 on: October 20, 2006, 08:51:37 pm »
Why would anyone take these guys seriously?   ::)

*sigh*  Sadly people do.  The same sort of people who live in homogenous areas and do not like to educate themselves any further than their own comfort level.

Pathetic.

Offline Bucky

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #3 on: October 22, 2006, 02:28:34 am »
You know I don't know why I think this but it has always seemed to me that extreme right wing Christians and the psychologist who thinks he can change people's sexual orientations are secretly into sado-masochism.  I would love to find out just what some prominent right wing politicans, evangelists and psychologists secret lives are really like.  I bet their secret lives would put the stories in the supermarket tabloids to shame. ;D 

Offline delalluvia

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #4 on: October 22, 2006, 11:38:39 pm »
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Sometimes I say..'think Deliverance...but not that open minded'
  :o  :o

Scary, very scary injest.

You brought up an excellent point, prompted by Becky's post:

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The intense interest in a man's physical suffering, bordering on a passionate thing...which is why when they reenact it (and they DO with great fervor) they call it a Passion Play! There is a church here that on Easter puts a man in rags and makeup and he drags a cross around the loop around the city! Last night there was a pickup in front of me with a huge cross laying in the bed with some 'repent ye' sign on it.

I think they have really strayed from Christ's message...I wonder if some of these people secretly think of this like people who go to see scary movies...that same sick thrill that SOME people get from seeing people hurt...and since they are not allowed to go to the movies or watch TV they have to substitute religion and persecution for their entertainment.

There are a fair number of people who belong to religions such as Christianity for which suffering is a major part of their creed.  You have to suffer.  You have to revel in it.  Somewhere along the way, the religious expression of pagans in pleasurable things was taken to its opposite extreme by early Christians trying to be different.  They found their god in pain and suffering and took pleasure and felt purity and righteous in it.

Is it any wonder the ancient Romans were baffled by the Christians who were executed?  Indeed, some writers of the era didn't think much of their martyrdom, because they did it out of sheer stubborness and not because of any real suffering.

So now, many of these type religious people feel they and everyone around them has to suffer or be put through suffering for them to be really religious.  It's totally bizarre if you think about it.

Many Christians in this country have a persecution complex.  Despite a church being on every street corner, the entire country celebrating a major Christian religious holiday and a born-again Christian in the highest office of the nation, they are on the defense.  Declaring with complete sincerity that Christianity is under attack and they're on the verge of being persecuted and martyred for their religious beliefs.

This from people who are living very free and comfortable existences.  It's as if they feel they have to make up some sort of persecution to avoid Divine Punishment for not suffering during this lifetime.

Very very strange people.

Offline delalluvia

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #5 on: October 22, 2006, 11:55:15 pm »
the church my mother goes to tells the members that they are not to even admire a sunset...because that would mean they were 'in the world' instead of living for God.

I find it hard to believe (and have since childhood) that God (if there is a God) created this spectacular and wonderful planet...and we are supposed to stay on our knees with head bowed ?? How cruel a God are they worshiping? That is such a warped thought...that he created all this beauty to 'test' us.

I had a cousin who was in beauty pageants...won quite a few of them. Very talented and agile. She developed a brain tumor and died. Mother's church passed out a letter to all members saying God had killed the little girl to punish the parents for not going to church enough.

these people are sick. I am afraid of people like this..you can't reason with them. They have been raised from childhood to allow the preacher to think for them.

You are right to be afraid.  Sick sick sick people.

Marge_Innavera

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #6 on: October 23, 2006, 12:21:13 pm »
I was talking to Jeff the other day about the Pentecost...and was telling him that the church I grew up in was obsessed with the Pentecost.

I'm not sure what relevance the Pentecost would have to suffering or sado-masochism; it had to do with a sudden infusion of spiritual energy (the "Holy Spirit") at the Jewish holiday of Shavuot. Are you sure you didn't mean the "Passion"?

Marge_Innavera

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #7 on: October 23, 2006, 12:24:19 pm »
 There are a fair number of people who belong to religions such as Christianity for which suffering is a major part of their creed.  You have to suffer.  You have to revel in it.  Somewhere along the way, the religious expression of pagans in pleasurable things was taken to its opposite extreme by early Christians trying to be different.  They found their god in pain and suffering and took pleasure and felt purity and righteous in it.

Bishop (ret.) Shelby Spong said in A New Christianity For a New World that over the centuries Christianity developed a truly repellent obsession with not only suffering but blood. He cited some hymns in particular that he just couldn't stomach, such as "There Is A Fountain Filled With Blood."

Add that to the disdain for physical matters in general, and you have a pretty good rationale for the abuse of the environment, although that's changing a bit in religious circles, very recently.

Offline Lynne

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #8 on: October 23, 2006, 07:39:56 pm »
Hmmm...my Methodist church growing up taught that the Passion referred to the crucifixion and surrounding events, while the Pentecost is the descension of the Holy Spirit after the resurrection...They hymnals are even ordered by the Christian calendar so that hymns are selected based on the time of the year...Easter, Passion, Pentecost, Advent, etc...

I dunno tho..the whole mess caused me enough stress to mostly chuck it altogether  ::)
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Offline Lumière

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #9 on: October 23, 2006, 07:39:57 pm »
I gu
Another example of the immorality of the extreme Christian Right:

http://www.alternet.org/stories/42881/

Sheesh!

Sad, sad indeed!   What some people will do/say in the name of God and religion .. jeez!  ::)


Offline delalluvia

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #10 on: October 23, 2006, 07:53:39 pm »
Bishop (ret.) Shelby Spong said in A New Christianity For a New World that over the centuries Christianity developed a truly repellent obsession with not only suffering but blood. He cited some hymns in particular that he just couldn't stomach, such as "There Is A Fountain Filled With Blood."

Add that to the disdain for physical matters in general, and you have a pretty good rationale for the abuse of the environment, although that's changing a bit in religious circles, very recently.

Well said.  A friend of mine left the Catholic Church because after a while, she could no longer stand the sight of a carved, larger than life, lovingly painted with true life colors near dead corpse hanging on a ancient world torture device over the altar, staring at her.

She thought it sick, unnerving and masochistic.

Marge_Innavera

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #11 on: October 23, 2006, 10:41:05 pm »
the leaders were not Rhodes scholars...so maybe they were confused.

Yes, they were confused, and it isn't a matter of interpretation.

Here's a summary of Pentecost, from wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentecost

The origins of Pentecost are found in the Jewish holiday of Shavuot, which occurs on the sixth day of the Hebrew month of Sivan (corresponding to late May/early June). It marks the conclusion of the Counting of the Omer and the day the Torah was given at Mount Sinai. This feast provides closure for the festival activities during and following the holiday of Passover.  In ancient times, the grain harvest lasted seven weeks and was a season of gladness. It began with the offering of the barley during Passover and ended with the offering of the wheat at Shavuot. Thus Shavuot was also the concluding festival of the grain harvest. As part of the Festival of First Fruits, the Hebrews would offer grain, bread or the first ripened fruits at the temple. . . .


"When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them. (Acts 2:1-4) "


Pentecost is also known in English, especially in Britain, as Whitsun (Whitsunday), from the Old English.  Not only Pentecostal Christian churches celebrate the day of Pentecost. In the Roman Catholic Church, its Eastern Rites and Anglican churches, the feast of Pentecost Sunday is celebrated with the rank of a Solemnity (the highest liturgical rank for any feast). Most Christians recognise the event of Pentecost as 'the birth of the Church' (the moment when its foundation was completed).

Marge_Innavera

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #12 on: October 23, 2006, 10:43:31 pm »
now...what is this "holy spirit" you speak of?? You heathen!!

*GASP*

You are one of them Holy Trinity-ers!! Aren't you!!

*Jess holding up her fingers in the sign of a cross*

GET THEE BEHIND ME!!!

Actually, I'm a panentheist. Not to be confused with pantheism.  :)

Offline delalluvia

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #13 on: October 24, 2006, 01:07:06 am »
which proves the point I am trying to make...(badly..LOL) that ANYONE can set themselves up as a preacher...no matter how ignorant or downright evil they are..and if they can browbeat enough people to listen to them and raise their kids under their tutelage..well we see everyday what it brings.

and not to argue with you but EVERYTHING that has to do with religion is open to interpretation...that is the whole point of faith...you can't PROVE it.

if you are taught certain things then you have to make a conscious effort to change...most people won't...

example...my mother's church has a huge mural of the garden of eden...with a ray of light coming from Heaven illuminating a KING JAMES BIBLE...so they believe COMPLETELY that in fact, God wrote the Bible, he wrote it in ENGLISH...and the world is only a few thousand years old.

you can talk facts and science til the cows come home...you can quote learned Bible scholars...they won't believe you. Because they have been taught since childhood that the Devil will send people like you to lie and decieve them.

There were never Dinosaurs...no wooly mammoths, no cave men, we did not go to the moon and Jews are the original liars.

Do not underestimate the willingness of the ignorant to STAY ignorant.

These types of people are so dangerous...trouble is, most of them have never read their own bible.  You quote to them from the bible of stupid, contradictory or horrific things said and done and they don't believe you.  You give them chapter and verse and they won't even crack their own bible to check it out.  Ruins their idea of what they think their religion is all about, so they prefer to stick their heads in the sand.

Sad, pathetic and dangerous.

Offline David In Indy

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #14 on: October 24, 2006, 01:42:07 am »
I can't believe I missed this thread. I just now noticed it.

This is disgusting. How can people possibly be thinking like this, in 2006?

You know what? Gay people have a LOOOOOOOOONG way to go if some in this country are still thinking like this.

How can ANYONE say someone would be better off as a slave?

This makes me sick.  :P   >:(
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Marge_Innavera

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #15 on: October 24, 2006, 02:20:51 am »
LOL!!

Do you know what panentheism is?

injest

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #16 on: October 24, 2006, 07:34:20 am »
Do you know what panentheism is?

no Marge I am an idiot. Please accept my apology, I won't post in here anymore. Maybe I can find some thread for dummies.

injest

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #17 on: October 24, 2006, 08:35:41 am »
and this particular comment was directed to Lynne and meant to be funny...it obviously wasn't and I am sorry I posted it. Please accept my apology.

now...what is this "holy spirit" you speak of?? You heathen!!

*GASP*

You are one of them Holy Trinity-ers!! Aren't you!!

*Jess holding up her fingers in the sign of a cross*

GET THEE BEHIND ME!!!

Offline Lynne

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #18 on: October 24, 2006, 08:48:08 am »
and this particular comment was directed to Lynne and meant to be funny...it obviously wasn't and I am sorry I posted it. Please accept my apology.

now...what is this "holy spirit" you speak of?? You heathen!!

*GASP*

You are one of them Holy Trinity-ers!! Aren't you!!

*Jess holding up her fingers in the sign of a cross*

GET THEE BEHIND ME!!!


((((Jess))))

 :D

You have nothing to fear from me...I'm either agnostic or atheist depending on the mood of the day ;)  I got your joke, sweetie...my apologies for the belated reply...go check my blog and give me some input on my letter-to-the-editor...I've just been tilting at a different windmill for a coupla days.

 :D
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Marge_Innavera

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #19 on: October 24, 2006, 09:35:04 am »
no Marge I am an idiot. Please accept my apology, I won't post in here anymore. Maybe I can find some thread for dummies.

I assume that was intended to be sarcastic, but in the remote event that someone here is actually interested, there are a number of Internet sites about panentheism. Two of them:

http://www.websyte.com/alan/under.htm

http://www.cliftonunitarian.com/toddstalks/greeningofgod.htm

Generally, panentheism teaches that wholes are greater than the sums of their parts but that those parts retain their essential nature. In human religion, that translates into a belief that we are all part of God, but that retain our individual souls and are never just absorbed into some monistic Whole after death. It doesn't specifically teach reincarnation but is consistent with it, and implies that all of the Universe is meaningful and value-producing - and therefore everything has a certain holiness. A long way from a belief in divine human sacrifice, an ego-obssessed god who creates human beings imperfect and then despises them for it, or the aforementioned fountains filled with blood.


Marge_Innavera

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #20 on: October 24, 2006, 09:44:09 am »
Well said.  A friend of mine left the Catholic Church because after a while, she could no longer stand the sight of a carved, larger than life, lovingly painted with true life colors near dead corpse hanging on a ancient world torture device over the altar, staring at her.

She thought it sick, unnerving and masochistic.

My Religious Science teacher, not famous for respecting ideas that made no sense, once speculated on what sacred art would look like if the Romans had used the electric chair. He wondered what making the 'sign of the electric chair' while praying would look like, and said that "It would have to be something sort of spastic - wouldn't go down well with some of our more pious folk, you know; it might be mistaken for dancing."

Offline delalluvia

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #21 on: October 24, 2006, 08:24:51 pm »
My Religious Science teacher, not famous for respecting ideas that made no sense, once speculated on what sacred art would look like if the Romans had used the electric chair. He wondered what making the 'sign of the electric chair' while praying would look like, and said that "It would have to be something sort of spastic - wouldn't go down well with some of our more pious folk, you know; it might be mistaken for dancing."

Your religious teacher is not alone.  Pagan critics of early Christianity had the same thought:

"These same Christians never tire of speaking of the "Tree of Life" and of the resurrection of the flesh made possible by the tree - the symbolism being obvious if we accept their story that their master was nailed to a tree and was a carpenter by trade.  I suspect that had he been thrown off a cliff or pushed into a pit or strangled - or had he been instead of a carpenter a cobbler, stonemason or blacksmith, we would find them telling tales of a cliff of life in the heavens, or a pit of the resurrection, or a rope of immortality or a blessed stone, or the smelter of love or the holy hide of leather..."

Celsus "On the True Doctine" ca. 260 c.e.

I find this extremely funny because it's very likely exactly what would have happened.  I've read this to several very religious friends and without fail, they all get very offended.

Marge_Innavera

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #22 on: October 25, 2006, 12:33:35 pm »
. . . . we would find them telling tales of a cliff of life in the heavens, or a pit of the resurrection, or a rope of immortality or a blessed stone, or the smelter of love or the holy hide of leather..."

Celsus "On the True Doctine" ca. 260 c.e.

I find this extremely funny because it's very likely exactly what would have happened.  I've read this to several very religious friends and without fail, they all get very offended.

The 'holy hide of leather' - couldn't help but guffaw over that.

IMO part of the taking-offense stems from the fact that these things have become sanitized over time. People wear finely crafted crosses as jewelry, and churches do endless variations on it as art, and people don't even realize anymore what the reality of crucifixion was. It was one of the methods of execution that the Romans and others used specifically to horrify witnesses.  The Passion of the Christ has been criticized for its gruesomeness and the implied sadism of its maker; but at least it didn't shrink from the reality.

What's a more significant aspect of this, IMO, is the schizoid image of a deity as both the ultimate Creator and a curiously limited being.  It posits a god who created a being with free will but apparently wasn't aware of what any human parent knows: that a being with the ability to make choices is inevitably going to make some bad choices. The Christian view of the necessity for a glorified human sacrifice is that "God's eyes are too pure to look upon sin" (making God significantly more wussy than your average cop or paramedic) and that nothing but total perfection will satisfy him, therefore no matter how hard a person tries, they need a rescuer from an outside source in order to be acceptable.

But you can't have the ability to make moral choices without being able to make the wrong ones. Moreover, the idea that human beings do have a choice to "choose Jesus or choose sin" is bogus if the penalty for the wrong 'choice' is so horrific that no sane person would really see any option. It makes the Creator of the Universe a sibling under the skin to an armed robber who claims that he gave that convenience store clerk a choice: "he could give me everything in the cash register or get shot in the head, so I have him a choice."

Believers often justify moral imperatives, whether they make any actual sense or not, as God's loving attempt to save us from the consequences; e.g., monogamy for both partners will effectively protect them from sexually-transmitted diseases. But this is supposed to be the same god who set the whole thing up in the first place; it implies that there is some more powerful deity who did that and the god that the believer is worshipping is a lesser being engaged in damage control. If your house catches on fire because lightning strikes it and then a cloudburst of rain puts the fire out, it makes little sense to say that God sent the rain: who sent the lightning to begin with?

IMO, the impossible contradictions set up can make believers very crazy.
« Last Edit: October 25, 2006, 12:37:56 pm by Marge_Innavera »

Offline Kelpersmek

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #23 on: October 25, 2006, 05:23:55 pm »
Quote
I've read this to several very religious friends and without fail, they all get very offended.

I find it seems to be a general rule that a lot of religious people without fail get very offended.
It's been a long time since I have seen a headline with the word "Muslims" that does not also have the word "Outraged".

But then, if you believe in absolutes it must be very disconceting to be shown a shade of grey.  I can't speak for all religions, but the ones I know best aren't big on thinking too deeply about the tricky parts of their faith.

Any psychologist who seeks to "cure" someone of a disease that does not exist should have their title removed.  It's plain bad-science, based on bigorty and mumbo-jumbo, and nothing to do with real psychology.
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Offline delalluvia

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #24 on: October 25, 2006, 08:01:38 pm »
The 'holy hide of leather' - couldn't help but guffaw over that.

IMO part of the taking-offense stems from the fact that these things have become sanitized over time. People wear finely crafted crosses as jewelry, and churches do endless variations on it as art, and people don't even realize anymore what the reality of crucifixion was. It was one of the methods of execution that the Romans and others used specifically to horrify witnesses.  The Passion of the Christ has been criticized for its gruesomeness and the implied sadism of its maker; but at least it didn't shrink from the reality.

What's a more significant aspect of this, IMO, is the schizoid image of a deity as both the ultimate Creator and a curiously limited being.  It posits a god who created a being with free will but apparently wasn't aware of what any human parent knows: that a being with the ability to make choices is inevitably going to make some bad choices. The Christian view of the necessity for a glorified human sacrifice is that "God's eyes are too pure to look upon sin" (making God significantly more wussy than your average cop or paramedic) and that nothing but total perfection will satisfy him, therefore no matter how hard a person tries, they need a rescuer from an outside source in order to be acceptable.

But you can't have the ability to make moral choices without being able to make the wrong ones. Moreover, the idea that human beings do have a choice to "choose Jesus or choose sin" is bogus if the penalty for the wrong 'choice' is so horrific that no sane person would really see any option. It makes the Creator of the Universe a sibling under the skin to an armed robber who claims that he gave that convenience store clerk a choice: "he could give me everything in the cash register or get shot in the head, so I have him a choice."

Believers often justify moral imperatives, whether they make any actual sense or not, as God's loving attempt to save us from the consequences; e.g., monogamy for both partners will effectively protect them from sexually-transmitted diseases. But this is supposed to be the same god who set the whole thing up in the first place; it implies that there is some more powerful deity who did that and the god that the believer is worshipping is a lesser being engaged in damage control. If your house catches on fire because lightning strikes it and then a cloudburst of rain puts the fire out, it makes little sense to say that God sent the rain: who sent the lightning to begin with?

IMO, the impossible contradictions set up can make believers very crazy.

Well said Marge.  I agree completely.  The 'free choice' I remember being offered when I was a Christian I had a hard time differentiating from extortion.  If people do read the fine and not-so-fine print of their respective religions, the excesses, emotional blackmail and out and out 'setup' of the Fall would become all too clear.

This is why people don't look deeply into their religion.  It will tell them something they don't want to hear/see/do.  Same reason churches and sermons always preach the same material over and over again.  I have a hard time seeing how a pastor/minister/etc. would break with tradition and preach a sermon on the butchery in the Hebrew Bible.  He would be unable to justify the murder of men, women, children, old people and pregnant women at the word of god just because they wouldn't convert.

And yes Kelper, I imagine that the many 'outraged' Muslims I read about is akin to the 'outraged' Christians in this country.  A very loud minority.  Or at least I hope so.  On another board, one wag commented that it would be a much shorter list to make of things that DON'T make a Muslim outraged than what does.

Marge_Innavera

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Re: 'Gay Curer' Psychologist Claims Africans 'Better Off' As Slaves
« Reply #25 on: October 26, 2006, 12:28:55 pm »
This is why people don't look deeply into their religion.  It will tell them something they don't want to hear/see/do.  Same reason churches and sermons always preach the same material over and over again.  I have a hard time seeing how a pastor/minister/etc. would break with tradition and preach a sermon on the butchery in the Hebrew Bible.  He would be unable to justify the murder of men, women, children, old people and pregnant women at the word of god just because they wouldn't convert.

That's part of the static nature of so many traditional religions that have the notion of God making certain statements to select people, or in some cases via book publishing,  ::)  which purported events took place thousands of years ago when people didn't even know what drove weather patterns or how contagious disease spread.  The notion that the creator of Universe being so obsessed with the doings of one dominant species on one planet might not have been hard for educated people to buy into centuries ago - though they would have done well to wonder why God's earthly doings were confined to the Middle East and the Mediterranean region - but today it's something many people try to accept without looking at it too closely.