Posted on 12/16/2007 11:15:52 PM PST by Mobile Vulgus
That is what I thought until he wrote one of his regular columns in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction shortly before his death in which he made his position abundantly clear. I remember being disappointed in him for reaching such a conclusion based on pride alone.
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The U.S. Constitution says that you can't have a religious test as a qualification for office. It does NOT say that individual citizens can't have religious tests for their votes!
If I want to vote only for Scientologists, or 95th degree Masons, or bisexual Slavic poets, I am perfecdtly entitled to do so. And if I DON'T want to vote for Mormons or Methodists or those untrustworthy, scheming, no-good Bahai Faith people, that's entirely within my rights as well.
This is like when people say we have to give O.J. Simpson or this guy Drew Peterson, or Terri Schiavo's husband the presumption of innocence. NO...the JURY has to give them the presumption of innocence. The JUDGE has to give them the presumption of innocence. I have to do no such thing!
Hank
Thanks for clearing that up. I think using a verse written hundreds of years before Jesus was born backed up by an eliptical reference reminiscent of Nostradamus seals the deal.
I am not herein arguing that the Mormons can't be right. I am making descriptive rather than prescriptive arguments. My point in this case is not what is true, but rather what is Christian. A Christian is one who accepts the Nicene Creed. By this argument, the LDS might be true, but it would not be Christian.
So your definition of "Christian" is Roman Catholic exclusively?
I think you mean "science" alone.
Not exactly. 'The Nicene Creed is an ecumenical Christian statement of faith accepted in the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, Oriental Orthodoxy, the Assyrian, the Anglican Communion, Lutheranism, the Reformed churches, Methodism, and many other forms of Protestantism.' - wikipedia. This is well over 90% of all who consider themselves Christian
“And I believe one holy Catholic and Apostolic Church;”
Isn’t this part of the Creed?
Poppycock! [Acts 11:26] And when he had found him, he brought him unto Antioch. And it came to pass, that a whole year they assembled themselves with the church, and taught much people. And the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch.
This predates Nicaea by 300 years....and what came out of that council bore no resemblance to first century Christianity!
Not exactly proof, but an indication. The younger may not have been fatehred by Joseph for we do not actually know when Joseph died or if Mary was married after Joseph to someone who already had children thus these siblings wound be ‘half-brothers and sisters’. We just don’t know.
“It’s likely that we can even do a better job of devising such standards than the iron-age desert dwellers who created the major religions of the West.”
Yeah ...OK ...Good luck with that.....we are doing a great job so far
Mel
Not exactly. 'The Nicene Creed is an ecumenical Christian statement of faith accepted in the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, Oriental Orthodoxy, the Assyrian, the Anglican Communion, Lutheranism, the Reformed churches, Methodism, and many other forms of Protestantism.' - wikipedia. This is well over 90% of all who consider themselves Christian
Whoopie! Hitler was elected by the popular vote! I guess you think that makes him right also?
Read your Bible before you decide what is and is not Christian.
The Four Marks of the Church, sometimes referred to as the Marks of the Church or the Marks of the True Church, are a group of four adjectives describing the true Church as established by Jesus Christ. They are commonly acknowledged by most Christian denominations, as they are included in many of their creeds. The marks are often listed as follows: one, holy, catholic, and apostolic. They refer to four aspects that are intrinsic to the true Church: unity, sanctity, catholicism (or universality), and apostolicity.
You’re going to have to simplify your vocabulary for Old Mountain man, he can’t understand the difference in words like prescriptive and descriptive ... “I am making descriptive rather than prescriptive arguments.” LCS
The New Testament is what the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church said it was, no more and no less.
Read it sometime.
Folks have posted links to OMm which can teach him how the particualr books in the New Testament were decided, but he prefers ignorance so he can plead innocent as he denigrates the Bible, all very stealthily by his reckoning don’tchaknow.
My arguments here generally have not been about what is right and true, but what factually describes Christians. Membership in a church that accepts the Nicene Creed is true of virtually all Christians. This of course is no argument that it is the truth, if one is not a Christian.
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