Posted on 08/18/2011 7:18:16 AM PDT by marshmallow
ROFL!!!!
There are some very strange people on this forum.
I almost made a new thread out of it.
We shall call you Shirley Spartacus from this day forward..:)
We will never know what you privately communicated, but we can see the public actions. Did you condemn the practice and the offender or did you giggle quietly and give tacit approval?
ORIGIN late Middle English (originally applying only to Christianity): from French théologie, from Latin theologia, from Greek, from theos god + -logia. "The study of the nature of God and religious belief."
Reading and believing the bible is not theology...
The beliefs you have about the nature of God and Christian beliefs are your theology. You are posting your theology and critiquing other's theology. As you say, atheists have a theology, and so do you.
Your religion's theology is steeped in philosophy...Like questioning what does place, and physical mean?
Philosophy is usually limited to the sphere of reason and logic. Theology encompasses philosophy and transcends it. It also encompasses and transcends physics (hence metaphysics).
And like the others in this discussion - and atheists too - you also have a philosophy.
For example, physics would study the nature of cause and effect for material objects; philosophy would discuss, for example, the First Cause Argument; theology would discuss the nature and attributes of the First Cause.
"Reading and believing the Bible" has resulted over the centuries in a variety of differing beliefs - all from reading the same Bible. This is to be expected. No two people get the same thing from reading anything of any depth. They bring themselves to it, they bring their influences and the judgement of those they believe to have authority or credence into it also.
Discussing those differences necessarily means discussing differences in theology, philosophy and sometimes even physics; each sphere encompassing and transcending the smaller spheres.
BEAST
God was kind to me. If I had been abandoned to klutzes such as you had, who knows where I'd be?
Um, Don’t call me SURELY?
You and yer alligators made a nice post. Thanks.
We all got it a long time ago. The difference is, we didn't blame the Church for the sins of its members. Is that really your problem? You think that because the Church is composed of fallible people who offended your precious self, you should just walk away in a huff?
It was my evil twin, I SWEAR!
I think, just for that, I'll refuse to ever attend a protestand church again. Obviously, they don't believe the Bible, or they'd know better.
Maybe they just didn't let play Mary in the Christmas play or maybe the Priest didn't let her edit the homily every week or rewrite the Catechism.......
Nope...I think that gift and the others are recognized by other Christians...If I had the gift of teaching, many others would confirm it...
I just read a little bible and pass on what I read...
Whatever Sister Mary Sadistica did to her, she deserved it. Spitwads spread disease.
BTW, an evangelical Christian lady in the grocery store told me, last Saturday, that the reason I wasn’t healed of rheumatoid arthritis was because I didn’t want to be. (former friend). She told me that if I believed the Bible, I would throw away my cane. She was serious. Fortunately, I am adult enough to know that she isn’t typical of evangelical Christians. Most are much worse.
I didn't approve nor did I giggle...I chuckled a little tho...
I think this was much more than "offense," and I think all who love Jesus and his Church are wounded when such perversions of the Gospel and of Life in Christ take place.
In, gosh, ALL my adult life I have met with people who were seriously wounded by abusive Christians. I think they are one of the enemy's most effective weapons.
It's not just non-Catholics, it's non-Christians or atheists. It is UNBELIEVABLY hard to persuade someone who saw spousal abuse justified by perverted interpretations of scripture that there could possible be a NON-perverted way to read the Bible.
It's incredibly difficult even to gain a hearing with people who have had a twisted pseudo-Gospel inflicted on them. The well has been effectively poisoned, and I don't know where to find Elisha's salt to make it sweet for them again.
Do I wish metmom had stayed with us? Of course! But I am glad she goes to any church at all, that she loves Jesus and seeks to live in that love.
When I hung out more with Buddhists I knew many who had been through similar experiences and, as a result, they renounced Christianity and wouldn't hear a word about it.
It was we, in our brethren, who hurt metmom. I will not rebuke her for being hurt.
Not me. I'm glad she's not Catholic. To think, I might have to work with her in the kitchen, feeding the poor people at our Wednesday luncheons. All that "poor precious me" might throw someone into a diabetic coma.
I am hurt by this! Maybe I’m a wuss, but this is painful.
Metmom suffered at the hands of those who had a divine call to preach the Gospel of Love to her. That’s a terrible thing. Our Lord saved his harshest words for those who caused his little ones to stumble.
Parents who use Jesus as a threat or a guilt machine, clergy and religious who are abusive and cruel and who only care about the behavior, not the souls, of the children in their care ...
I am the only Christian among my parent’s 5 children. It was entirely by God’s grace, mediated by one priest and maybe three lay-people that I never could turn my back on Jesus. It’s not so much my Dad’s fault because he didn’t profess Christianity for the first decade of my life. But my mother was a devout worshipper of the demanding God of English Christian Socialism and love didn’t really figure too much in her theology.
I will not participate in piling on someone victimized by those who presented themselves as authoritative Christians.
That’s so compassionate of you.
Thanks again for reinforcing my conviction that walking away was the right thing to do.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.