Ad-Hoc Religion Forum Committee Discussion - Thread 2

3/26/02 | angelo

[malakhi]

Okay, I've crunched through all of the suggestions on the first thread, and I've distilled them down to a rough draft of a topic list. I reviewed every suggestion people posted, and tried to group together duplicate suggestions. I sought to strike a balance between those who want a few general topics, and those who want lots of topics. Please give me your feedback. Be brutal! ;o) This is your forum.

General Topics	Topic Name	Description
	Activism	Opportunities to make your voice heard.
	Announcements
	Apologetics	Defense of doctrine.
	Calvinism	Free will vs. the omnipotence of God, salvation of the elect by grace alone.
	Current Events	Religion or religion-related news of the day.
	Ecumenism	Promotion of cooperation and understanding among denominations.
	History	History of religion, religion and secular history.
	Humor	If at first you don't succeed, don't skydive.
	Ministry/Outreach	Pastoral issues, proselytization, missions.
	Moral Issues	Abortion, divorce, sexuality, social justice, ethics.
	Prayer	Requests for prayer, articles about prayer.
	Religion & Culture	Religious critique of secular culture, influence of religion on culture.
	Religion & Politics	Church/state issues, legislation, court cases, 1st amendment, the political process.
	Religion & Science	Creation vs. evolution, ethical issues posed by scientific advances.
	Sacred Texts	Old Testament, New Testament, Talmud, Koran, Book of Mormon etc.
	Spirituality	Holy Spirit, spiritual gifts, spiritual fruit, growing in God.
	Theology	Nature of God and religious truth, rational inquiry into religious questions.
	Tradition	Religious custom and precepts, nature and role of tradition.
	Worship	Methods of worship, liturgy, communal prayer.
Denominational Topics	This is not intended to be a complete list,	but rather to establish broad categories.
	Charismatic Christian	Assemblies of God, pentacostalism, charismatic movement.
	Eastern Religions	Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, New Age.
	Evangelical Christian	Sola scriptura, non-denominational, independent fundamentalist Bible believers.
	Islam	Sunni, Shiite, Sufi, Wahhabi.
	Judaism	Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist, Karaite.
	Mainline Protestant	Anglican, Episcopalian, Lutheran, Methodist, Presbyterian, Unitarian, UCC.
	New Religious Movements/Other
	Orthodox Christian	Eastern, Greek, Russian, Antiochian etc.
	Roman Catholic	Latin rite, Eastern rites.
	Sabbatarian/Messianic Christian	7th Day Adventist, Churches of God, Jewish Christians.

[malakhi]

PING!

[malakhi]

Mom, if you could work your bump list magic here, I'd appreciate it!

[malakhi]

FYI, a preliminary list.

[father_elijah]

You are a brilliant weaver of ideas! I do think you need one category to deal with Religious Persecution. I've also been thinking that we could use a category called Relgion & the Constitution.

[Ward Smythe]

Good work.

I would argue however, that Calvinism belongs either under Apologetics or under the Demominational category grouped with other Reformed traditions. I'm sure there are those who will disagree.

And wouldn't moral issues fit with Religion and Culture and/or Religion and Politics? Maybe not.

[L,TOWM]

One suggestion; a "questions" topic for seekers, skeptics, and OWK [ ;-) ] so that we have a shot at doing some online evangelism for lurkers and forum members. This would also be a place for newer believers to get a wide range of godly counsel and equipping. One other thing. Where is the Prayer Request topic?

[Gophack]

I agree with Mr. Smythe on his suggestions.

However, I think that there are too many categories. If there is any way to combine some of them ...

Thanks for all your hard work on this. I think that this will be a great forum site.

[Mr. Lucky]

Perhaps conservative Lutherans don't fit in at all, but the Missouri Synod and the Wisconsin Synod have virtually nothing in common with the other churches catagorized as "Mainline Protestant".

[Khepera]

Great list.

[PeteF]

What about christian prophesy?

[Bump in the night]

This religion forum needs to have moderators that will remove poisonous material. Those who are willing to post this poisonous stuff of course do not see the need for removing anything. But if the moderators let the bashers bash away, the bashers will quickly drown out reasoned, respectful, and cordial discussion. It is like thieves wishing there were no police, or arsonists wishing there were no firefighters, or Al Qaeda wishing there was no immigration enforcement or airport security.

Thank you White Mountain! You just said, beautifully, what I've been struggling to spit out.

For those that think there should be no moderators... I am not talking about blocking "discussions" about religion or between religions... even lively ones! LOL. I'm talking about when someone posts a religious thread or places remarks on a thread, that are filled with hateful lies about a religion and then preceeds to put up link after link "proving" those lies.

Doing this is bad enough when the posts are about a well-known religion such as Christianity. But at least Christianity IS well know. People have some sort of reality on what Christianity is about. They are not so likely to believe the lies.

But when one is ignorant about a subject and really has no real knowledge on that subject, you get what I call the "vacuum effect". When someone gives you information (knowledge), even if the information is a lie, that information is quickly sucked in to fill the void of ignorance on the subject.

People are more likely to believe lies about something in which they know nothing about. A person who is ignorant, is easy to fool. You see how that would be true?

That's really the essence of Free Republic isn't it? If the masses are kept in the dark, kept stupid, kept ignorant... then they will believe anything and can easily be controled. Give them knowledge. Give them truth. Open their eyes and allow them to see what has been right infront of them the entire time... and they will know for themselves what truth is.

We at FR are supposed to open peoples eyes and let them see truth. Not blind them from it.

[Bump in the night]

I would just like to reiterate that the topics and categories we are hashing out here will NOT be seperate forums. They are a means by which we can classify and search for articles.

Ahhhhh. Right. Duh. LOL Thanks for the clarification!

[FourtySeven]

Good work angelo! It has my stamp of approval!

[FourtySeven]

When someone gives you information (knowledge), even if the information is a lie, that information is quickly sucked in to fill the void of ignorance on the subject.

Interesting point. It may be debatable, at least in the case of dis-interest of a person (if someone is simply not interested in a subject, they will be perfectly happy to know nothing about it), however, I believe you are generally correct.

[Matchett-PI]

I don't think I've ever seen a post that gave so many examples of cognitive dissonance in one place in my life. It's quite informative that it all makes sense to you. :D

[DouglasKC]

Nice work Angelo!

Can I make a suggestion for another general topic? Perhaps a Prophecy related topic would be in order that could contain debate about prophecy, current events pertaining to prophecy, etc.

[Bump in the night]

He who chooses to deliberately come onto a thread that is clearly marked with the caveat: "For The Emotionally Mature ONLY", will know ahead of time that it is unacceptable to hit the abuse button and try to get a thread pulled if he gets his *feelings* hurt or thinks he has been made to look like an idiot merely because he can't legitimately/logically defend what he wants to believe.

So you think that religion bashing and spreading hateful lies about a religion is just fine? Then why is it that if I were to post an anti-Christian thread, it would get pulled in 30 seconds by JimRob? Does that mean that HE is "emotionally insecure"? Maybe we should all gang up on him, bash him, and call him a sissy because he gets his "feeling hurt" by such threads. (/sarcasm)

Hey! Now I've got a great idea! For all the people that are insecure about their religions, and therefore feel the need to bash others religions... Why don't we make a special little forum for them. They can all just go there and bash away at eachother. How fun would that be! (more /sarcasm)

[malakhi]

I do think you need one category to deal with Religious Persecution.

I had that on my first list. My thought in removing it was that historical persecution would be covered by the History topic, while present-day persecution would be covered by Current Events. I know that some will think I have kept too many topics, so I tried to strike a balance.

I've also been thinking that we could use a category called Relgion & the Constitution.

On the list above, that would fall under Religion & Politics. I mentioned the 1st amendment in the description.

[Notwithstanding]

I suggest "Catholic" is more fitting than "Roman Catholic".