Jesus and Easter

Originally Posted by Bri w

And if you lived in a country where the majority of schools were totally funded by the church would you choose ignorance over education? Don't forget, that education would also give you the intelligence to decide if God existed or not.

You confuse knowledge and intelligence. Knowledge is facts, intelligence is the ability to sift through all the information that enters your head and pick out the facts and discard the dross, then use those facts to solve problems. We are born with intelligence, we pick up the knowledge as we go.

Anyone can learn knowledge, anyone can teach it even if they do it badly. Some teachers are good at giving the facts in a manner that will be remembered and be useful, others not so good. You simply can't teach intelligence.

Originally Posted by Bri w

Or would you choose the "open minded scientists" who also believe in God(from your earlier post)?

And if you lived in a country whose hospitals were totally funded by the church would you sooner die than be treated by a Doctor that was also a monk?

I'm intelligent enough to realise that it would be foolish of me to leave this country to live in any that was in this kind of situation. Malta is my second home and I am seriously considering moving there permanently, but only because the church has far less of a say in how things are run nowadays. Religion is still a big deal over there, but it's now at a level I could bear without going completely postal.

Originally Posted by Lozzo

I'll let this pass because I know that you're not aware that I lived with a woman for 8 years who was a parochial church councillor, was actively involved in her church and took our three kids to that church every Sunday, from where I'd collect them afterwards - she's still one of my best friends. The church people were lovely and soon realised that trying to get me within the doors was a waste of time. I never attacked their beliefs, I accepted they have theirs and I have mine and any views I've expressed within this thread have been done face to face with them. It's when religion spills over into things that should not bother them that I start to get annoyed.
.

Please don`t let anything pass Lozzo..... I`ve been on this forum long enough to know you as someone who can be quite antagonistic.

If the above is true then you`re actually quite a hypocrite too!! you went to church every Sunday to collect the kids? The church people were lovely and you never attacked their beliefs?? So what gives you the right to attack the beliefs of those who have faith on this forum???

I`d say that makes you extremely hypocritical and conveniently selective. How brave of you to put people down and criticise their beliefs from behind a computer screen yet face to face "you never attacked their beliefs, and accepted they have theirs and I have mine"

I`d say not just hypocritical but a tad cowardly too????

Originally Posted by Speedy Claire

Please don`t let anything pass Lozzo..... I`ve been on this forum long enough to know you as someone who can be quite antagonistic.

If the above is true then you`re actually quite a hypocrite too!! you went to church every Sunday to collect the kids? The church people were lovely and you never attacked their beliefs?? So what gives you the right to attack the beliefs of those who have faith on this forum???

I`d say that makes you extremely hypocritical and conveniently selective. How brave of you to put people down and criticise their beliefs from behind a computer screen yet face to face "you never attacked their beliefs, and accepted they have theirs and I have mine"

I`d say not just hypocritical but a tad cowardly too????

What part of "I accepted they have theirs and I have mine and any views I've expressed within this thread have been done face to face with them. " didn't you understand?

[Bibio]

how many non believers have read the bible from start to finish.. don't be smart and say which one.. lol

i have read most of it a long time ago and come to the conclusion that you would have to be completely barking mad to believe anything contained within it's pages. it's a fascinating read though.

i don't dislike faith in fact i think it's good to have a belief in something but i loathe organised religions.

btw. almost all major Christian festivity's at based around pagan festivity's as it was the only way crisyianity could make it easier for people to come to terms with it.

Originally Posted by Bibio

i don't dislike faith in fact i think it's good to have a belief in something but i loathe organised religions.

+1

Oh and Neeja, I agree with yours posts. But small point of fact, Gaius Julius Caesar was never Emperor. He was at various times, Dictator of Rome, Consul and most decorated General with the largest number of troops personally loyal to him in roman history apart from the Emperors, but the first Emperor was Augustus, is adopted nephew.

Other Emperors took the name Caeser, but it wasn't the title. The title was Imperator (emperor). Caesar has subsequently become the word for ruler or emperor (Kaiser, Tsar being two localisations for it)

Originally Posted by Neeja

Point 1 is completely incorrect. The bible has been rewritten and translated so many times it's amazing that it's still coherent. Additionally, the content of the bible was written by people - not God - very often hundreds of years after the fact. This content has been selectively reproduced (see the existence of the apocrypha), and the final selection of content was only completed in the 14-1500s with the councils of Florence and Trent.
By comparison, the Qu'ran is much more accurate - although it still has plenty of inaccuracies, contradictions and creation accounts that defy scientific reasoning, the entire thing is accepted to be the word of God, via an angel, via man. Additionally, it is much more historically accurate because the bits concerning history rather than theology were written as the events actually happened.

Point 2 is a completely nonsensical statement. Firstly, what other kind of evidence is there other than "physical evidence"? Secondly, who is Caesar? Caesar is a Roman title referring to the emperor. If you are speaking specifically of Gaius Julius Caesar, then you're also wrong.

The evidence for the historical Jesus mostly centres around the fact that he was alive, and he was baptised (by John the Baptist) and crucified (by Pontius Pilate). Anything other than these facts do not have strong evidence, and most "evidence" trotted out usually comes from the bible. However, when examining history, you basically have to ignore the bible, as otherwise it becomes self-referential - "the Bible is the word of God because the Bible says that the Bible is the word of God" etc..

By contrast, almost the entirety of Julius Caesar's family tree is known and can be proven, the extent of his military campaigns are known and can be proven, his rebellion against Rome and instigation of a civil war is known and can be proven, that he became Emperor is certain (particularly since every subsequent emperor took the title Caesar - where else did that come from?), and, in fact, nearly every aspect of his life was known. This is because Julius Caesar was far more important than Jesus. While this is no longer the case, who do you think had more scribes writing their history - a carpenter's son, or one of Rome's greatest generals and eventual emperor?

While I appreciate that you have your faith, please back your claims up with valid points when it comes to historical evidence.

[N.B., re: your point on theological research, I have quite broad knowledge myself, but my girlfriend has a degree in theology and corrected/amended parts of this reply].

Neeja

Apologies for not backing up my stance when I wrote the reply, I did so in a hurry and didn't have any texts to hand etc. I will review when I get home tonight if a get 20 minutes.

I disagree with you on the second point but again We can go through that later when I put my hands on the links etc.

theological debates always interest me and neither of us will "win" so should be honest and interesting

and hey, if you have a good theological education then you dont need to worry about my comment

Originally Posted by muzza_sv

i have a 1 word question about the bible..... dinosaur... christians believe that the world is 3000 years old on the theory that they took all the ages of every generation in the bible and added them together to get this number, now you would think that if dinosaurs existed which there IS evidence of and that they existed in this time that they would have been mentioned in the bible at some point "oh and jesus and the deciples walked to nasserath but their trail was blocked by a giant brontosaurus.... with a splinter in his paw, and oh the desiples did run a shriek and what a big ****ing lizard lord. but jesus was unafraid, he took the splinter from the brontosaurus paw and the big lizard became his friend and he sent him to scotland to live in a loch for oh so many years where he lived happily ever after. the end haha

with out being rude.. what are you on about?

Christians don't believe (generally speaking) that the world is 3000 years old at all... Its well acknowledged that the earth is millions of years old.

We we believe is that there was recorded a time in the bible BC (before christ) and after Christ (AD) after death 2013 years and counting, we would be here for years discussing the creation theory / story but we dont have time.

But rest assured we don't think its 3000 years old.

[Bibio]

the biggest thing that bothers me about Christianity is the fact that 'god' did not exist before it.

all cultures have believed in an afterlife as it's human nature to be inquisitive so try to explain the unknown which in turn brought about 'religions'.

Originally Posted by Bibio

how many non believers have read the bible from start to finish.. don't be smart and say which one.. lol
.

I have. Only once in order though.

Question you SHOULD ask is how many believers have.