Posted on 08/27/2006 6:45:59 AM PDT by jdm
Thank goodness they're free, but it was a deal with the devil in more ways than one. I don't know if I can ever trust one of Centanni's reports from the middle east again, for one thing. That's aside from renouncing Christianity (which one would have to do to accept Islam) and all that follows.
If you have never been in a situation like this, I can assure you, you do not yet know how you would act, only how you think you might, or wish you might. And it's not the thought of death that would be the biggest motivator to your body's reactions to events, I suspect, but pain avoidance and the anxiety caused by the unknown and probable sensory deprevation.
It is really not fair to judge a person on their reactions in situations like this. And especially since so many people in the west aren't very faith motivated anymore, anyway, even if they are professing members of one group or another...
But those PC-minded who think so highly about the freedom-fighter status of these types of people better look carefully at what they did to these two reporters...there may be a time when the relativists are put under the same pressure...convert or pay the consequences.
In the West, as a rule, it has long been the assumption that conversion under duress is not true conversion....but some places under the sun they would hold you to that word, no mater what....an object lesson here, I believe.
I would be very angry if my husband were in this situation and refused to do something to save his life.
It's all phony anyway and a little sanctimony goes a long way, and I've seen way too much on threads about this.
It shows how stupid Hamas and the Palestineans in general think we are. These people are bandits and thugs and need to be treated as such.
"it is not really fair to judge a person on their reactions in situations like this"
Isn't that pretty much the left reaction to all situations? Hmm, goes something like--the rest of my life will be ruined if I can't get an abortion? I deserve to be an ILLEGAL because I must send money home to Mexico? Because I am in jail for the rest of my life because I took someones life, I am a human being and therefor deserve the best medical care this country can provide, including organ transplant? Where does one draw the line and "judge" a "life threatening" situatiom for any other person?
No it's not the same.
The fact is being tied up, threatened with guns pointing at you, abused mentally and physically, underfed, probably light deprived, talked around in languages you don't know, and threatened with the very real possibility of death and pain is in an entirely different level of situation than a girl talking herself, or letting her boyfriend talk her into an abortion.
Shame on anybody that would imply that being a kidnapvictim in a situation like this is equivalent.
You stare down the barrel of the gun being held by someone who has just smacked you upside of the head because they hate your white non-Islamic guts just because and tell me that again.
When death is at the door, the flesh fears it, it takes the Spirit of God to overcome that fear. Stephen did not die peacefully on his own, the Spirit helped him overcome his fear and face that death with peace.
His proclamation at the end of his life came from the Spirit, not the natural man in the flesh.
Acts 7:54-60
54When they heard this, they were furious and gnashed their teeth at him. 55But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. 56"Look," he said, "I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God."
57At this they covered their ears and, yelling at the top of their voices, they all rushed at him, 58dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul.
59While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." 60Then he fell on his knees and cried out, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them." When he had said this, he fell asleep.
Christian martyrdom is very much different than Islamic martyrdom in that Christian's get martyred as a result of persecution, whereas Muslims get "martyred" in an act of vengence. I might suggest that that is not truely martyrdom, but stupidity.
Gaza needs to be dealt with a la "The Cask of Amantillado."
I'm with you there. ;-)
Anyway, thanks for extrapolating.
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