Replies

BTW,

I don’t see posters from my perspective as RC bashers.

We do vigorously attack what we see as

VERY UNBIBLICAL IDOLATRY AND BLASPHEMY.

RC reps hereon seem to have a genetic incapacity to distinguish between their persons as individuals vs those things which they think, believe, hold dear etc.

Products, pontifications, beliefs, thoughts, opinions etc. are not particularly sacred, sacrosanct, above and beyond all question etc. We are sorry ?Mary? did not teach you better. But ridiculous pontifications will be treated as ridiculous pontifications—NOT as holy writ.

AS well we and any Christian should in any Brother’s life.

. . . if they care, that is.

The RC edifice represented hereon seems to have an extremely difficult to impossible attitude toward

ACCEPTING, DEALING WITH, HANDLING REMOTELY WELL

such things as . . . Protty’s conviction based solidly on evidence and Scripture that . . .

1. The RC edifice did NOT begin until about 300-400 years after Christ when the Roman contingent of Christendom had sufficient political power to ‘lord it over’ the rest of Christendom, more or less wholesale.

2. The Maryolatry stuff is outrageously UNBiblical AND OUTRAGEOUSLY hostile to a number of clear Scriptures AND hostile to God’s priorities in such matters as well as God’s requirments and boundaries in such matters.

3. The arrogance of the RC edifice is legendary in a list of ways and persistently demonstrated hereon in the form of thin skinned sensibilities and running to daddy RM at the drop of a hat for the thinnest of excuses. This is the real world. It is not a sheltered cloister nor the pillow on Mary’s lap. It’s the real world. We fiercely disagree based on what we are convinced is SOLID HISTORICAL TRUTH AS WELL AS SOLID BIBLICAL TRUTH. Deal with it—like adults instead of whining 2 year olds.

4. IF the RC edifice represented hereon is determined to post fiercely provocative, idolatrous, blasphemous paeons to Mary in open forum contexts . . . they can expect fierce responses. We owe our Lord and the lurkers that much to stand up for truth against such hideous UNBiblical hogwash.

5. The idolatrous nature of the Maryolatry stuff is obvious to virtually any fair-minded person who’s paid the least bit of attention to the religion forum for most of FR’s existence. The number of lines devoted to Mary vs devoted to Jesus—I think totally—but certainly in the open forum has to be outrageously beyond those devoted exclusively to Jesus. There’s hardly a week that has gone by without that being abundantly true. Still the RC edifice hereon would have us believe that Jesus is first. ACTIONS SPEAK LOUDER THAN WORDS. But actually, hereon, the actions and words concur saying the same idolatrous, blasphemous stuff.

6. PRETENDING that pontifications, thoughts, feelings, sensibilities, preferences, opinions, traditions, dogma etc. are all HOLY OF HOLIES SACROSANCT AND UNTOUCHABLE by any disagreeable comment is childish, idiotic, silly, unrealistic, arrogant . . . on the face of it. The RC reps hereon get ABSOLUTELY FOAMING AT THE MOUTH OUTRAGED IF the Prottys gets remotely close to even hinting of taking such a stance. Great double standard, that.

7. Ridiculous posts and attitudes WARRANT, EARN, DESERVE absurd responses, outrageous responses. What a surprise. Grow up. Expect it. Very often just the title of RC posts hereon is outrageous—outrageously UNBIBLICAL, outrageously provocative; outrageously tweaky . . . etc. Yet when we respond accordingly the indignant affronted response is how dare we think of it as it is. Cute.

8. IF this thread had been titled as a lot of RC threads seem to be deliberately titled . . . it would have carried a title something like: HORRID MEXICAN AND PERUVIAN ROMAN CATHOLIC IDOLATROUS BLASPHEMOUS PRACTICES OBSERVED FIRST HAND. But the poster was more gentle than that.

9. I’m used to being personally bashed for a long list of reasons—some rational and some less so. Kind of goes with being me. However, I learned a long time ago as a Pentecostal—folks were either wrong or they were right or they were a mixture of right AND wrong about Pentecostalism in general and particularly about my specific expression of it. If they were wrong wholesale—it was their problem—all the more so if I tried to set them right and they insisted on a wrong perspective.

10. IF they were both wrong AND right, I tried to learn as much as I could just as I did even when they were wholesale wrong. If they were right, I tried to learn as much as I could. I learned to avoid treating every whiff of displeasure about Pentecostalism as a personal insult—EVEN WHEN IT WAS INTENDED AS A PERSONAL INSULT. Pentecostalism is my belief system. It’s not my identity in any exclusively personal essence sense.

11. My God is bigger even than Pentecostalism. My relationship with God is bigger than Pentecostalism. My worth to God is bigger than Pentecostalism. God is CERTAINLY bigger than assaults on me over Pentecostalism.

12. SURE I COULD get all bent out of shape every time I turned around because folks didn’t realize that Pentecostalism is the most accurate reading of Scripture and Christian life in a long list of ways. So what. What would that prove? That I had thin skin; needed to obsessively jump to conclusions in relentless knee jerk fashion and run around like chicken little delcaring that Christianity was falling because everyone didn’t believe exactly like me? Grow up, Quix, big deal.

13. This is a rare opportunity to share time and space hereon. All the rarer to have a diversity of Christianity represented hereon with shared conservative values. We do not NEED to relentlessly shoot each other with Bible verses or magicsterical pontifications or twisted histories or any other nonsense. Doing so can’t be all that blessed to God. Nor to Mary, for that matter, IF she is allowed to know anything about any such mortal nonsense in her period of rest.

14. It is reasonable for us to use one another as foils to some degree as we write to the lurkers. That’s too big a mission field for any serious Christian of any flavor to pass up if they are thinking and caring for the lost, confused, undecided . . . at all. But to demand an exclusive perch on the highest obelisk from which to talk down to all others of the slightest difference in persuasion and perspective . . . . . in the haughtiest, most self-righteous tones. . . . is to make of one’s self an outrageously pontifical piggish prig—and deserves to be treated accordingly. .

15. It’s not so reasonable to treat the other side as scum of the earth BECAUSE they don’t construe reality exactly as we do or because they won’t talk to us as we demand to be addressed. THEY, are the THEY. WE are ourselves. Clones we ain’t and aren’t going to be. Get over it. Grow up. Deal with it.

16. As to being worth the effort of trying to dialogue seriously . . . any human being was worth Christ’s horrid death. I suspect He expects us to treat folks as worth more than haughty disdain, as well—loving our enemies kind of requires some level of that, somehow.

17. In any case, I suspect many on my side will continue to “BASH” what we perceive, observe, construe as idolatry and blasphemy. RC’s can mistakenly pretend that we are BASHING THEIR PERSONS, THEIR ESSENCE, THEIR INDIVIDUAL IDENTITIES . . . and wail and whine accordingly. But that won’t impress us in the least.

18. If the RC edifice, dogmas, sensibilities, preferences, constructions on reality are so fragile and so easily woundable . . . so seemingly devastatingly . . . then they weren’t worth much in the first place. If such beliefs and practices are worth anything, then I’d think that they would be worth at least holding somewhat maturely, somehat loosely in terms of dialogue with others who see the world differently.

19. Failure to hold opinions, debatable constructions on reality etc. at least somewhat loosely . . . is itself evidence of idolatry. None of us has an absolute corner on reality, truth, righteousness . . . acting otherwise is outrageous arrogance.

20. The choice resides with each of us. We can be even fierce proponents of our perspectives. But if we wish to act like 4 year old school yard bullies with a huge chip on our shoulders . . . then we can expect that sooner or later, some sharp words, swords or arrows will pierce the chip or knock it off and deservedly so.