Anyone who doesn't respect other people's beliefs (or lifestyles etc for that matter

There is a difference between having beliefs, and being a complete lunatic like Gal/euph is. I don't respect deranged lunatics.

Saint,

People who have faith and most people who are religious are normal people, the ones mentioned by Habib are the extreme who aren't really religious at all

That seems an odd semantic interpretation to me; the point I was trying to make was that the difference is by degree and not by kind; I concede there is plenty of room for debate here though. You make it sound as if there is an extreme/normal dichotomy; I'd argue this is false.

You haven't mentioned any cases where people who turn to the church/religious people in general for help have had their lives improved whether it be through finding faith themselves or peace within themselves or even just counselling and support.

Sorry, I omitted the other half of argument out of laziness and for the sake of brevity. Of course, yes, there are positive effects as well, and plenty of neutral aspects as well. I don't have a problem here - live and let live.

I wasn't trying to say that all religion is bad and is worthy of disrespect; but rather that one can't say that all religious views should be respected. There are some pretty nasty religious views out there that shouldn't be immune from disrespect simply because they are religious views. And there's a grey area once you start moving away from the outer extremes. So I dispute that such a universal statement is really appropriate.

infi,

Stalin committed more attrocities than all those names plus any other god-followers you would care to mention added all together.

The same thing was raised on Q&A the other night; I don't really get this line of argument? The point here is the motivation. Stalin's motive for his atrocities were things like power-lust and paranoia; not an absence of faith. My problem is with death and other suffering caused by religious faith; I can choose different examples to play a scoreboard game of kills but that misses the point.

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

Ok, stand corrected then, thanks. Makes much more sense now.

Needless to say - militant atheistic views are just as worthy of digust and disrespect as their militant theistic counterparts.

last edited by Habib at 01:57:53 10/Mar/10

I wasn't trying to say that all religion is bad and is worthy of disrespect; but rather that one can't say that all religious views should be respected.

Agreed.

Between 1917 and 1940, hundreds of thousands of Orthodox priests, monks and nuns were arrested. In 1918, the Cheka under Felix Dzerzhinsky executed over 3,000 Orthodox clergymen of all ranks.[27] Some were crucified, thrown into cauldrons of boiling tar, scalped, strangled, given Communion with melted lead and drowned in holes in the ice or poured over with cold water in winter until they turned to ice-pillars.

yikes!

yikes!

still think religion is cool ? zing!

Stalin committed more attrocities than all those names plus any other god-followers you would care to mention added all together.

Bulls***. You are clearly forgetting that Hubbard is responsible for Tom Cruise.

Real Christians/followers of Christ aren't suppose to be religious, and if they are they are not doing or being the people God wants them to be. Jesus can't stand religion, tradition, or legalism. If you read the bible - Matthew, Mark, Luke and John - that is shown again and again. He defended women. He told the legalistic and religious what they were doing was wrong.

It is about a relationship with Jesus where you come to know Him and who He is. You don't have to act (ie go to church 200 times) or do anything to have that relationship. You just accept Him as your Lord and Saviour. He won't force Himself on you if you don't want to know Him. When people start putting religious behaviors or rules into your walk you know it is wrong - it is only through fellowship with Jesus that you grow and know Him and His love and then start loving others. Christianity isn't suppose to be about do this or do that - all it is is KNOW CHRIST. People or churches who act outside of love do not know Christ. Jesus said how will you know them? By their fruits. When churches become religious or traditional that stops the working of the Holy Spirit and love. And many people and men do become that way. It is our human nature - to become legalistic, behaviorist and traditionalists instead of continually accepting the free grace and mercy Jesus offers.

that gave me hard-on - love that s***

So Gal, I guess you dont agree with the Catholic Church then?

He won't force Himself on you if you don't want to know Him.

Well that's a relief, I'd have had to scream rape if he forced himself.

It is our human nature - to become legalistic, behaviorist and traditionalists instead of continually accepting the free grace and mercy Jesus offers.

Jesus gave me a free biscuit and some grape juice once. Well, the priest did but he said it was Jesus so I just humoured him.

Well didnt god force himself onto Mary ?
He impregnated her without her knowledge.
Thats criminal Rape.

Matthew, Mark, Luke and John

if the book is so pure why do the main characters have non Hebrew names?

Hi Gumby
Apparently "the Name Matthew is a Hebrew - Jewish name and means "Gift of God" (a form of Matthaeus for those times) - his original name was Levi - which I am pretty sure is a Hebrew name as there was a Levi in the Old testament I think? but I need to check all that up to make sure and it is late and I'm pretty tired but if I get some more time in the next few days I will look it up more. Mark is a Roman name - form of Marcus, Luke is a Greek name form of Loukas, John is Ioannes in Greek "derived from the Hebrew name יוֹחָנ Yochanan" - so maybe when the books of the bible were translated from Greek and Hebrew they were given the English form of their names. Not sure need to check and find out. Again I really should know if they had been given new names to or not and I dont I will need to search - just wanted to make a small attempt at an answer for you.... will see if I can do more later...

Sources
http://www.basicchristian.info/4_gospels.html
http://bible.org/question/how-were-matthew-mark-luke-and-john-named-and-can-you-tell-me-something-about-authors-these
http://groups.google.com/group/Atheism-vs-Christianity/msg/a88f229f59836d36

Again not sure everything I said above is correct! need to check it all out...

You wont ever check it all out. If you ever checked it all out (like you have said in almost every single one of your copy+Pasted posts) you would realise the bulls*** you have been spewing.

Exactly Gal they are all derived names used by Anglo Saxons and not used by the Hebrews of the day, they should of had more Arabic names.

They're greek names. The gospels were written by greeks, not by the middle eastern types, as I've explained in a previous post. The new testament was never written in hebrew or known to anyone from that area. Another reason why it's obviously fake... the people in the area that it is about never even f***en heard of it.

Pretty off topic but it's not like the arguements are going anywhere in this thread like normal heh but every time I read this dude's (wait, chick right?) name I think of Gaahl which kind of makes me giggle.

http://www.freewilliamsburg.com/archives/gaahl-sotra.jpg

so maybe when the books of the bible were translated from Greek and Hebrew they were given the English form of their names.

But i though the translations were exact? Thats what you said earlier? if they can change something as major as the Names of the Charactors in the stories then certain other translations might be slightly different if you read the original?

First ever religion thread on QGL

haha nice OP

they should of had more Arabic names.

While I agree with you 100%, I have to be a linguist jerk and point out that they would have had more Semitic names.

But yeah, if things as simple as names change in the bible, how can we trust the bigger points to be accurate? (Pro tip: they're not).

"Exactly Gal they are all derived names used by Anglo Saxons and not used by the Hebrews of the day"

what a gumby thing to say, you must have a pretty warped sense of history.