Yes. Click on the cartoon image to read some really KEWL "Godless Communism" comix (great educational tool for kids).
Posted on 06/28/2005 9:19:57 AM PDT by voletti
THIS week, for the fourth year in a row, President George Bush broke from affairs of state to address the Southern Baptist Convention. He promised the strict evangelical group, which has 16m members, that he would work hard to ban gay marriage and abortion, and that their “family values” were his values, too.
In the 1960s, many liberal Americans thought they had banned religion from the public square for good. Yet nowadays the president, the secretary of state and the House speaker accept the evangelical label. A packed prayer breakfast takes place every Thursday in Congress. And liberals regularly contend that one of America's two great parties is bent on creating a theocracy—backed by a solid core of somewhere between a quarter and a third of the population.
Why is the religious right as powerful as it is? The question puzzles even Americans. Their country, as a whole, is not getting more religious. The gap between it and European countries has increased, but largely because of Europe's growing godlessness. Most Americans say that religion is very important (60%) or fairly important (26%) in their lives, but Karlyn Bowman, a polling analyst at the American Enterprise Institute, points out that the figures were 75% and 20% in 1952.
What has changed is, first, the make-up of Protestant America and, second, the realignment of religious America's politics. The generally liberal mainline churches have declined, while harder outfits like the Southern Baptists have spurted forward. White evangelicals, who see the Bible as the literal truth (or darned close to it), now make up 26% of the population.
It is not just a matter of numbers but of confidence. Born-again Christians are no longer rural hicks; they are richer and better educated than the average American.
(Excerpt) Read more at economist.com ...
Even I draw the line at the college kids who use funnels and tubes to pour gin or vodka down their gut. That is painful to watch. Plus it is not even ENJOYABLE drinking. That is more like acting as mere alcohol receptacles. I ENJOY fine drinking which means I AVOID Budweiser or Blue Nun wine. But drinking good beer, wine, or hard liquor is VERY enjoyable. I recently got into drinking Flor de Cana aged rum. That stuff is incredible!!! But drinking regular Bacardi. That stuff is so horrible that even I agree it has to be a sin.
"Europe's growing godlessness"
This choice of words is interesting. Rememebr the "Godless Communists"? A great deal of the 'Godlessness' was due to the Communist party's persecution of religious people within Soviet borders.
TheEuropean "Godlessness" the author speaks of may be a dilution of the population as a whole, a immigration brings a more diverse population to European countries. The author's own religious beliefs aren't hard to discern. He seems to be in the group who believes anyone not ultra right-wing borderline snake- handling Christian is "Godless".
"At the last election Mr Bush won the Catholic vote by snaring 72% of self-styled traditionalist Catholics. Private polls also suggest that he won significant numbers of Orthodox Jews. Rather than being split between the parties, religious people of all faiths are now pretty anchored in the Republican Party. A Zogby poll last November put the national figure for “religious traditionalists” at 29%, but they accounted for 58% of Republicans."
Voters go for issues. Just ask. The majority of people will tell you who they voted for and why. Few have a laundry list, but are specific. "Significant numbers of Orthodox Jews". That is obviously a pro-Israel vote, not necessarily a pro-Evengelical nod.
You are a wise individual.
In Spanish, vino and jugo de uvas are two different things. However, I do enjoy making grape juice with my juicer. MUCH better than the chemically enhanced Welch's grape juice.
Vino, vin or some derivation thereof is one of the most common names for fermented grape juice. Except for maybe a few arcane examples, nobody would use vino, vin or wine to describe anything other than fermented grape juice.
Yes. Click on the cartoon image to read some really KEWL "Godless Communism" comix (great educational tool for kids).
Only a minority of evangelicals are against alcohol, tobacco, and gambling, or opose them very strongly.
The only major religion that specifically prohibits the use of alcohol is Muslim. So check out Saudi Arabia. The place is a hot desert and the first impulse of anyone visiting there is to have a cold beer. However, since those folks are prohibited from doing so, no wonder so many of them are NUTS. I say that in a lot of situations, having a cold beer is actually a GOOD thing. Maybe if they were allowed to drink cold beer in the Middle East, a lot of problems could be solved merely by people just chilling out.
That was great. I love how the USA got conquered by communist forces and that family was still clueless as to what communism was about. You mean, you didn't learn about communism while the Soviet and Chinese hordes were marching through the Great Plains?
Oops. "Finer parts." I meant "Finer points."
Much of what passes for "Christian behavior" is cultural. There's nothing wrong with refraining from coffee drinking in Columbia if it enhances one's testimony. Paul refused to eat meat sacrificed to idols if it might have caused a weaker brother to stumble (but among stronger brethren, he ate the meat). I knew a woman who believed that it was an absolute teaching of the Bible that women cover their heads in church, and yet how many women wear hats to church nowadays? The thing is that the message of hope that we present in our testimony is a message of eternal truths -- about man's condition, about God's character and His remedy for our condition, and about faith in Christ. Once saved, there is a process of maturity that begins, and with it a lot of previous behavior changes. But there's also a lot of stuff that Christians think are absolutely essential that are only cultural relativities. Whole denominations have been built on extra-biblical imperatives.
Verily.
In Cromwell's time, the Puritans were forbidden from watching Shakespearean plays. As a result, the presentation of Shakespeare pretty much died out in the latter 17th century. Few people of that time knew much about Shakespeare until the middle 18th century when Samuel Johnson renewed that interest with his critiques.
And neither is your grammar. ;-)
I adore God because He's a God of grace, and because He's settled the sin problem in me once and for all. I stumble, sometimes intentionally when I know better (and anyone here who claims they don't is a liar, and I have the apostle John to back me up on that), but that's not what gives me my identity. I feel sorry for people who think that having once accepted God's gift of salvation by grace through faith, they now need to stay in God's good graces by legalism through works. I think that's a more deadly teaching than whether one drinks, smokes, or gambles.
Outstanding comment. I still oppose gay marriage, but your points are well-taken.
LOL. Either Hillary OR her policies start looking good to you.
We have a winner! (Post of the Thread)
I'll tell my wife. :)
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