Christian Nation? Okay, Say You Got Your Wish. Now What?

[MrsSmith]

20score  (1000+ posts)        Sun Apr-12-09 08:22 PM
Original message
 
Christian Nation? Okay, Say You Got Your Wish. Now What?
 
 For those that learn their history in church or current events from right wing radio, using a meaningless phrase printed on our money to prove we are a Christian nation must seem logical...remaining OP demonstrates typical complete ignorance.

ayeshahaqqiqa  (1000+ posts)        Sun Apr-12-09 08:43 PM
Response to Original message
5. It would only work if only one type of Christianity was allowed
 all dissenters would be tried, convicted, and exiled or executed, much like what happened in the Puritan Massachusetts Bay Colony. And, after a while, those "godly" people would start turning on themselves, claiming there were those amongst them who were witches. And we know what happened when that started.

Let me keep my secular state, thank you kindly. 

And yet, strangely enough, those "godly" people did manage to build the most tolerant nation on earth...based on the Biblical principles they all understood.

Any bets that Aye has no clue how many preachers and ministers signed the Declaration?

zeemike  (1000+ posts)      Sun Apr-12-09 08:52 PM
Response to Original message
12. Although your premise is correct your use of the OT is not
 a good argument. Why? because the christians will just point out that Jesus did away with all that even though that too is incorrect to some extent.
The best argument is the words of Jesus himself and if they are used the christians claims fall apart quickly.
First for example when the Pharisees ask Jesus if they should pat taxes to the government (Rome) Jesus said "Render to Cesar the things that are Cesar's" a clear example of separation of church and state.
Second on the question of public prayer he said "do not do like the hypocrites do and pray in public but lock your selves in the closet and pray in secret" and that makes the churches in clear violation of the commandments of Jesus their Christ.
Then there is that whole Sermon on the Mount thing that is completely ignored by Christians.
And then there is the "what you do to the least among you you do to me" which through cold watter on their positron on welfair...
And I could go on and on but I think you get my point.

But there is one part of the OT that Jesus did tell them to follow and that is the ten commandments and we clearly do not as a nation or as christians follow one of them and that is "Remember the Sabbath and keep it holey"
Because the remembering of the Sabbath was not about going to church one day a week but about a day of rest for all men. And there is more.
The land must keep a Sabbath one out of every seven years and given a rest. And every 7x7 years or on the 50th year all debts were to be forgiven...that is the big one...
So so called Christians should be careful what they wish for.

 
 
Zee mike!  Zee mike type!  Zee mike fail spelling...and grammar...and theology.   

[TheSarge]

20score  (1000+ posts)        Sun Apr-12-09 08:22 PM
Original message
 
Christian Nation? Okay, Say You Got Your Wish. Now What?

Actually IMHO not much would change.  Which isn't to say that some "hot button" issues like gay marriage and abortion wouldn't be dealt with and this whole "separation of church and state" thing would be laid to rest...but on the whole most regular people wouldn't notice any difference in how their life is today.

[Chris_]

And then there is the "what you do to the least among you you do to me" which through cold watter on their positron on welfair...

I don't have a "positron" on "welfair". Is a "positron" anything like an electron? I also don't have a "cold watter". Is that some sort of electrical term? The Bible, however, does have a position on welfare. It says: if any would not work, neither should he eat.

Sounds like a bunch of DUmmies would go hungry.

Edited to add...
When Jesus was saying "what you do to the least among you you do to me" He was talking about stuff along the lines killing innocent unborn babies.

[Vagabond]

I don't have a "positron" on "welfair". Is a "positron" anything like an electron? I also don't have a "cold watter". Is that some sort of electrical term? The Bible, however, does have a position on welfare. It says: if any would not work, neither should he eat.

Sounds like a bunch of DUmmies would go hungry.

Edited to add...
When Jesus was saying "what you do to the least among you you do to me" He was talking about stuff along the lines killing innocent unborn babies.

Listening to a DUmmie talk about Jesus or the bible is about the same as listening to them talk about wealth creation.  They don't posess aby knowledge of either one.

[happy1ga]

Well, I hope all you hear had a HOLEY SABBATH and a HOPPY EASTERN today!

[Chris]

*groan* 

[BlueStateSaint]

Well, I hope all you hear had a HOLEY SABBATH and a HOPPY EASTERN today!

H5 for the "yus of there spelin" in your response.

[jinxmchue]

But our money did not form or structure our government.

The government is not the nation, you boob.  We'd still be a nation even with a different or no government.

That was the Constitution, which does not mention God or a creator.

"Done in Convention by the Unanimous Consent of the States present the Seventeenth Day of September in the Year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and Eighty seven..."

That actually meant something back then.

Oh, yes - let's not forget about the state constitutions:

http://shockandblog.blogspot.com/2005/09/pledges-and-constitutions-long-post.html

The fact that the Constitutional Convention went on for weeks and the founders just forgot to include God or Christianity in setting up a Christian nation, seems like quite the oversight.

Here's something that explains why:

http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel06.html

"When the Constitution was submitted to the American public, "many pious people" complained that the document had slighted God, for it contained "no recognition of his mercies to us . . . or even of his existence." The Constitution was reticent about religion for two reasons: first, many delegates were committed federalists, who believed that the power to legislate on religion, if it existed at all, lay within the domain of the state, not the national, governments; second, the delegates believed that it would be a tactical mistake to introduce such a politically controversial issue as religion into the Constitution. The only "religious clause" in the document--the proscription of religious tests as qualifications for federal office in Article Six--was intended to defuse controversy by disarming potential critics who might claim religious discrimination in eligibility for public office.

"That religion was not otherwise addressed in the Constitution did not make it an "irreligious" document any more than the Articles of Confederation was an "irreligious" document. The Constitution dealt with the church precisely as the Articles had, thereby maintaining, at the national level, the religious status quo. In neither document did the people yield any explicit power to act in the field of religion. But the absence of expressed powers did not prevent either the Continental-Confederation Congress or the Congress under the Constitution from sponsoring a program to support general, nonsectarian religion. "

I and many other Christians like me agree 100% with that.

To say we are a nation made up of mostly Christians is true, but that does not translate into being a “Christian nation.”

*facepalm*

But if tomorrow morning, say at 9 AM EST we did become a real Christian nation, what would be our first order of business?

Dealing with ignorant twits like yourself who will flip out.

We now have to figure out what religions we will allow to exist

All of them.

and which will be outlawed.

None of them.

Lets say that we are open minded enough to allow all Christian denominations and also the Jewish faith. The others faiths and the non-believers will have to convert right away

Why?  What part of "Christian nation" means everyone has to convert to Christianity?

Now, since church will be compulsory

Why?

and disobeying the Sabbath laws will be punishable,

Why?  Seems you are advocating Pharisaism, not Christianity.

what do we do with Seventh Day Adventists and people of the Jewish faith?

Um...  Nothing?

And here’s where it really gets tricky. Since even people within the same religion, lets use Catholics, disagree strongly within the church itself on which rules to follow, who will decide which rules we will apply?

Denominations will decide for themselves.

Everyone, and I mean everyone who claims to follow the Bible picks and chooses which rules/laws they will follow.

In some areas, that is allowable.  There are secondary doctrinal issues in the Bible that are debatable, but do not have any bearing on the natures of God and salvation, which are primary doctrinal issues and non-debatable.  The vast majority of Christians agree 100% on the primary doctrinal issues.

Obviously for you the easy rules are no more abortions and no homosexual behavior. But what about slavery? Is that okay again?

Why should it be?

Selling your daughter? I mean she is yours.

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/qnoslave.html

Should stoning be brought back to punish adulterers and people who blaspheme?

Sure, as soon as we find a single person who is without sin.

What about eating shellfish and wearing two different types of clothes?

Why are these the only two Levitical laws that these dipwads know?

And these questions cannot be blown off.

They're incredibly stupid and ignorant, so yes, they actually can.

Life will change.

Yes, hopefully it will and American society will return to the Christian roots that made this country great 200 years ago.

Who gets to pick which rules from the Bible the country will follow? Should we set up a council of elders and religious leaders like Iran to set up our new laws? Or, how about we go back to the experts for guidance, look to medieval times when they really knew how to mix church and state?

Or, you know, if anything like you're fantasizing about happens, maybe we should continue to be a country of the people, by the people and for the people.  What a radical concept!

Theocrats, explain.

Oh, damn.  I'm not one of those, so ignore everything I just said.  And hey, even if I were one, I wouldn't be allowed on the DUmp, so you couldn't see my explanation anyway.

Dumbass.

[Toastedturningtidelegs]

And then there is the "what you do to the least among you you do to me" which through cold watter on their positron on welfair...
And I could go on and on but I think you get my point.

Not even gonna point out the irony of a liberal democrat posting that considering they would have aborted Christ to begin with!

[jukin]

Great secular nations, their leaders, and their deeds in the twentieth century:

Mao Ze-Dong (China, 1958-61 and 1966-69, Tibet 1949-50) 49-78,000,000
Jozef Stalin (USSR, 1932-39) 23,000,000 (the purges plus Ukraine's famine)
Adolf Hitler (Germany, 1939-1945) 12,000,000 (concentration camps and civilians WWII)
Hideki Tojo (Japan, 1941-44) 5,000,000 (civilians in WWII)
Ismail Enver (Turkey, 1915-20) 1,200,000 Armenians (1915) + 350,000 Greek Pontians and 480,000 Anatolian Greeks (1916-22) + 500,000 Assyrians (1915-20)
Pol Pot (Cambodia, 1975-79) 1,700,000
Kim Il Sung (North Korea, 1948-94) 1.6 million (purges and concentration camps)
Menghistu (Ethiopia, 1975-78) 1,500,000
Yakubu Gowon (Biafra, 1967-1970) 1,000,000
Leonid Brezhnev (Afghanistan, 1979-1982) 900,000
Jean Kambanda (Rwanda, 1994) 800,000
Suharto (East Timor, West Papua, Communists, 1966-98) 800,000
Saddam Hussein (Iran 1980-1990 and Kurdistan 1987-88) 600,000
Tito (Yugoslavia, 1945-1987) 570,000
Fumimaro Konoe (Japan, 1937-39) 500,000? (Chinese civilians)
Jonas Savimbi (Angola, 1975-2002) 400,000

I should have warned any lurking DUchebags about the acidity of this post.

[Chris_]

“Render to Cesar the things that are Cesar's" a clear example of separation of church and state.

Who is this Cesar person?  Is he a Latino comedian on late-night comedy shows?

"Remember the Sabbath and keep it holey"

Holey???  What?

[delilahmused]

But there is one part of the OT that Jesus did tell them to follow and that is the ten commandments and we clearly do not as a nation or as christians follow one of them and that is "Remember the Sabbath and keep it holey"
Because the remembering of the Sabbath was not about going to church one day a week but about a day of rest for all men. And there is more.

Okay, can someone show me where Jesus appears in the OT? I can't seem to find the book. But, being biblical scholars over there I'm sure they could quote chapter and verse.

Cindie

[Toastedturningtidelegs]

Who is this Cesar person?  Is he a Latino comedian on late-night comedy shows?

Holey???  What?

Drill holes! Cmon lug you know damn well we are supposed to drill holes on The Sabbath!

[Karin]

I never heard about forgiving all debts every 50 years.  Ummm where did he get that from? 

That super paranoid rant up there was so over the top.  Where do they get THAT stuff from? 

positron....welfair...watter...holey... :-)What a mouth-breather. 

[MrsSmith]

I never heard about forgiving all debts every 50 years.  Ummm where did he get that from? 

That super paranoid rant up there was so over the top.  Where do they get THAT stuff from? 

positron....welfair...watter...holey... :-)What a mouth-breather. 

Actually, that is OT Biblical.  Every 50 years, all debts were forgiven, all land returned to the proper tribe, all slaves released, etc.  It was the Jubilee year.  Even DUmmies occasionally get things partially correct. 

I bet the DUmmies were popular people in any class that graded on a curve.