Lula, you know I have revisited this as an adult, we discussed it and we both know what my conclusions were. The first question was more rhetorical, but I appreciate the time you took to respond nonetheless. 9 out of 10 times, isn’t that a bit of a stretch…? My eternal destiny is not at stake here, only yours is. I am not an expert in anything that I know of, but I am a ‘Jack of all Trades’. If it turns out that there is a soul involved somehow … I will deal with it then. You overestimate my prowess I think because you always misrepresent my views. You look at everything as a personal (cult) attack, but that is just another gross simplification. If you weren’t so busy taking things personally, you could have applied some rational thinking instead of biblical twaddle.
 
Independent religious thinking (IMO) means that none of them are valid and it has nothing specific to do with Catholics. I just read an article where some idiot is trying to use the Koran to explain the universe … same theological nonsense. As far as competency is concerned, I study and I expand my knowledge and I make my decisions after much thought, unlike you who has some book to make the decisions for you. I do not need to seek advice from some person in a dress who babbles about perfection (like you) and is likely to be porking the altar boy on the side. Nope, if humans are involved … then it has nothing to do with God.

I knew you would not be honest on question 2 … I know, you couldn’t help it, go figure.

 # 54

There is empirical scientific data to support the Bible

For example, as we’ve already discussed the Bible teaches the Earth is round…..and empirical science proved it.  The Bible teaches the baby is human life in the womb….and empirical science proved it.

# 83

The Bible teaches that all living things came from a Creator, an Intelligent Design and the science of  biochemistry which reveals the microscopic world of the human cell, has made a positive case for Intelligent Design, new evidence that supports of a Creator.

 “The Cell’s Design, How Chemistry Reveals the Creator’s Artistry, by Fazale Rana, Ph. D is only one book of many books out there which explains how this is.

Beside bio chemistry, scientific research has gained many new insights as a result of an immense amount of new discoveries in the disciplines of molecular biology and genetics. It’s now known with a high degree of certainty that the Creator’s design of DNA will not allow natural macro-evolution to occur.  

Another point …The Bible, the Church and Christianity has always condemned abortion as the shedding of innocent blood. Abortion on demand, the intentional killing of an innocent human being, became the law of the land based on convenient lies. The human life inside the womb is simply "just a blob of tissues" is but one.  What genetic garbage is in the abortuary, is a money bag to those in the selling of baby parts industry. Oh ya, they know it’s a baby in the womb and they get more money the longer the baby is in the womb. But I digress.

The Bible deals with the question of personhood as there are over 100 texts that make it very clear who these “blobs of tissues” are.

From Job, “Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh: thou hast put me together with bones and sinews:”

Isaias, “Thus says the Lord who made and formed you, thy Helper from the womb:”

Jeremias, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I sanctified you:

Psalm 139, “…thou hast protected me from my mother’s womb. I will praise thee for I am fearfully and wonderfully made:…”

 Modern science technology developed ultrasound and they have proven what the Bible and 2,000 years of Church teaching have taught all along namely, the “blob of tissue” is a human being with his own unique DNA.

Another one is the pro-abortion crowd denies human life begins at the moment of conception. Yet, the Church and the medical profession knows that life begins at conception and genetic scientific evidence has conclusively proven it.

The Church and Christianity are not at all enemies of true science and inquiry. Check out the history of science and you’ll find our that the natural sciences, empirical science, and the scientific method grew out of the Christian civilization and culture. Actually, the Church, Christianity and science work quite well together.

Does that mean you were baptized?

No, but I was.

Lula, you just do not get it. You exist in some mystical place where you are completely insulated with your circular logic. You make these silly arguments and then try and bend the 'science' to fit a 2000 year old philosophy ... impossible. It is never going to happen because it is just … impossible. We have spent a lot of time going in circles which of course is all you can do … but not me. But your misquotes and strange interpretations are just further proof of the inadequacy in your theology. If you still feel that after a couple thousand years, the Bible still needs to be ‘interoperated’ differently to suit your arguments, then we are not discussing the truth. If this were not true TTBOMN, then I would not be on the outside of your circle where the real knowledge is maintained … which you are a fool to ignore or to try and bend (science) like you bend your biblical beliefs it fit the subject at hand … any subject mind you.
 
I have tried to talk of the contamination that is inherent whenever dealing with people, but you claim that God was protective of those passing His word so there could be no inadequacies. And now that you forced me to study this nonsense more, I am just further convinced of the inadequacies. It seems that it was a bad idea to quote an author because it allowed you the opportunity to attach all his beliefs (whatever they are) to myself, shame on you. One of my favorite thinkers is Noam Chomsky but I do not take everything he says as gospel as I no longer take anything as gospel. If the world were considered round and one would have to presume your one God would know regardless of what people thought, then there should be no references to a flat earth … and there are many.

“Conclusion - From their geographical and historical context, one would expect the ancient Hebrews to have a flat-earth cosmology. Indeed, from the very beginning, ultra-orthodox Christians have been flat-earthers, arguing that to believe otherwise is to deny the literal truth of the Bible. The flat-earth implications of the Bible were rediscovered and popularized by English-speaking Christians in the mid-19th century. Liberal scriptural scholars later derived the same view. Thus, students with remarkably disparate points of view independently concluded that the ancient Hebrews had a flat-earth cosmology, often deriving this view from scripture alone. Their conclusions were dramatically confirmed by the rediscovery of 1 Enoch.”

http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/febible.htm

Yea, and I have a hundred times that which says no such thing. 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_biology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_(biology)
 
What evidence do you speak of here?
 
Prove this nonsense or state the source of it. The term Macro is used by fundamental Christians as an argument to shy away from the fact that microbiology has proven the theory of evolution and cannot be reasonably or scientifically refuted. And yet, you would use micro science to try and justify your self-proclaimed superior unquestionable knowledge.

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=microbiology+and+evolution&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart

You make this sound reveling somehow but you are just stating the obvious. As you well know, the Bible has numerous references to a flat earth, much more I think (?). Or did you just forget for this argument.You being a mother should know as I do that there has always been an unshakable desire to protect the young and it has nothing to do with theology or the Bible.

Prove this nonsense or state the source of it.

Lula, faith (belief in, devotion to, or trust in somebody or something, especially without logical proof) is no proof of anything except for your complete lack of faith in yourself to even tell the difference between right and wrong. Science on the other hand (the study of the physical and natural world and phenomena, especially by using systematic observation and experiment) is limited only by time as most things will become more apparent eventually. You want the answers NOW but you are looking in the wrong places.

I am not going to play any more unless you can climb down off your perfect cloud and speak for yourself instead of for your church. You know what I think about churches and faith and your Bible and your theology and yet this nonsense is consistent in all your replies and statements. Makes no sense to me, sorry.

BT #138

Lula # 150

BT #151

I gave an honest answer even if you don't think so. Certainly you know that there are Catholic Iraqis, Catholic Chinese, and Catholic Indians. The CC is all over the world; it doesn't matter which country one is born.

My reply would have been slightly different had you asked, "what would you have become if you were born of non-Catholic Iraqi, Chinese or Indian parents"?

First, I'll preface my reply by stating that Atheists are a lot like Protestants when it comes to religions and religious belief.  They tend to lump all religions together as if they were a single undifferentiated phenomenon, when in reality, religions differ from one another just as people do.

There are many religions in the world, but only one religion can be the true supernatural religion for God, the Author of religion, is Truth, and Truth is one and indivisible. This one supernatural religion as contrasted with all the others founded by fallible men, isn't merely an organization, a bunch of buildings around the world, but rather it is a living spiritual organism, one made by Christ (God) that can never die.

As supernatural religion demands that man honor, obey and worship God in the way He prescribed, it follows that a true revelation of God's will demands a divine guarantee of authenticity.

So the person who is born here, there and anywhere has a duty to find the one supernatural religion. Every human being owes it to God to find out the true religion and having found it embrace it. These obligations fall on everyone regardless of where one lives.

The Catholic Church is the only one to claim to have a Divine Origin, and my dear, you and I were baptized in that one, true supernatural religion.

I know Catholicism is the one true supernatural religion revealed by God and that all the other religions, Islam, the thousands of sects within Protestantism, Buddhism, Hinduism, all of the others too, are false. Reason alone can provide sufficient grounds for that. But I know by the gift of divine Faith that the contents (faith and morals) of Catholicism are true with the very truth of God.

I know that the others are convinced of the truth of their various religions merely shows that the human mind is limited and that men are affected by heredity and environment and their prone to to form decided opinions without sufficient knowledge. But that doesn't effect the truth in and of itself and that doesn't make all religions equal.

BT #138

As far as religion, I suppose there would be no one right way for everyone had God not ever given a revelation about religion. But He did. He first revealed Hebraic Judaism, (the acorn) which fulfilled in, through and by Christ,,,, full blossomed into Christianity (the oak tree).

So, it's not possible to believe that there is no one right way for everyone.

I sincerely hope that by the time you figure out who you are, (hint: you were baptized in the CC so that would be a good place to start) it's not too late to deal with your eternal destiny, becasue yes my dear everyone has an eternal destiny....Heaven or Hell and you are no exception. 

God says to us, "I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Choose therefore, life."

Gobbledygook as usual, go figure. I believe life and death were well established before Christianity was pronounceable let alone conceivable ... well before the world existed for sure. Blessing and cursing … have a good day or have a bad day, geeze. I just watched a good movie although it was almost all in a Spanish dialect with subs. It’s called “Even the Rain. It takes place in Bolivia, making a film about the European landing over 500 years ago. This took place during the water dynasty the US corporations. There was a scene where the natives (actors) were being burned at the stake (you never talk the good old days of Christianity, why). They were approached by a pious bishop who told them the only way to escape hell was to declare their faith on the one God; then he would baptize them so they would go to heaven after they were killed. The only difference between now and then is that most of your swords of justice have been taken away, that’s all. No thanks Lula, you keep your righteous CC and religion and do with them as you please. But do not foist your irrational behavior on me.

Silly girl, if your ‘one God’ was to be believed by all, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the need to tell a few more people about the secret. Especially the part about claiming dominion over everything and everyone, you think. And even the universe now that you know there is one…

Well. I try. Reminds me of the saying about the one who leads the horse to water but can't make him drink.

Re; the first part of your statement. We agree that life and death were well established before Christianity. Human life and death goes all the way back to Adam and Eve. Almighty God created them and gave them life, (a soul).  He also gave them supernatural gifts one of which was an immortal body. They were gifted with free will and had to undergo a probation. God gave them a command by means of which they could freely choose either side with Him or against Him. If they disobeyed, the penalty would be death, that is, become mortal and eventually die. 

Natural religion--- which is knowing God and your obligation to Him by reason alone--- followed for centuries. But natural religion was not wholly sufficient. God had given to mankind a supernatural destiny higher than natural destiny, and so God revealed supernatural truths beyond the requirement of merely natural religion.  

He established ancient Hebraic Judaism whereby these truths concerning life and death would be revealed. And that's where this Old Testament passage, "......I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Choose therefore, life." comes from.

What Almighty God has set here is eternal life (blessings with Him while on earth and in Heaven) and eternal death (cursing with Satan while on earth and in Hell).

....................................

Re: the second part of your statement. There was no life or death before the world existed  unless one believes the fantasy "science" of Darwinian Evolution.

...........................

I haven't seen the movie, but let's get beyond using the 'burning at the stake" as a handy stick with which to engage in condemning the entire Church.  All religious persecution is bad, but if you really understood the history you'd find that the Protestants were the aggressors and most instances of burning at the stake came from within the hundreds of various hostile Protestant sects persecuting each other.

But I'm interested with the part of the movie in which you say, They were approached by a pious bishop who told them the only way to escape hell was to declare their faith on the one God; then he would baptize them so they would go to heaven after they were killed.

This goes to the importance of Baptism, repentance and the forgiveness of all sins.

It was Christ Who gave us the baptismal formula. Just before Christ ascended into Heaven, He gave His disciples His authority, mission and command. Christ said, "All authority is given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore, teach all nations; baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and behold, I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world."

Christ appointed St.Peter as His first bishop and head of the Church and so all Catholic bishops are lawful successors to him.  And while in Jerusalem, one of the first things St.Peter did in carrying out Christ's mission was to teach the Jews. Afterward he said to them, "Repent and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."

The following is a true story.

Baptism on the Beach

 

BT, you aren't the first and won't be the last one to deny the sublime truth of Almighty God, His Church, holy religion and the reality of the four last things....death, judgment, Hell or Heaven. 

Your charge of "irrational behavior" gives me a good opportunity to put natural reason and the virtue of Faith together.

On these pages, I have demonstrated by reason alone that the one Almighty God in whom I believe exists. In the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas, the demonstration starts with sensible things existent in the real natural world and finds that these things are caused by Some Being that is existence itself.  

This demonstration reaches subsistent existence first, and then finds this existence identified with the One, Holy God of Christian belief. The procedure takes for granted that the world in front of people is evident and admitted.

 

And one doesn't have to be a theologian to understand this even if he never read the opening words of Sacred Scripture. "In the beginning God created" .....the universe and all that's in it including life, plant, animal and human life.

This answers the questions who made the world..who made us...with the answer God made the world and God made us. God is presented as the Supreme Being infinitely perfect Who made all things and keeps them in existence.

The world and the people had to be made the reasoning follows and its Maker is God. This process is easy enough to understand even for a child. A child knows that his building block castles have himself as their builder. He sees his meals made, houses being built, of things being assembled. Without his own activity his castle would not have come about, without the activity of others, the things would not have been made.

The notion that everything requires a maker makes a Maker who can do everything or is Almighty is not difficult for him to grasp. The whole visible world and all its wonders, the universe, and life itself accordingly does not appear as an exception to his notion that visible things require a maker. ON the authority of his parents and instructors, he has no hesitation in accepting the identity of its maker under the name of God.

Nothing more is required for awakening the supernatural virtue of Faith which is a gift from God.  Reasonably, the child  believes those who teach him. A sufficient and satisfactory condition is present for allowing the grace of Faith to become operative and to give its firm certitude to the child's belief.

Earlier you said faith comes first. Yet, a person's understanding of God's existence comes immediately and directly by use of human reasoning.

 

Human reasoning, natural reason, natural religion and natural destiny – right, hehehe, just words for dissecting is all. Grouped in this manor they are meaningless and I expect all came from that book of yours that I do not believe in. The striking definition of natural for me was “relating to the physical rather than the spiritual world”. At no place in my humble dictionary was natural used in reference to religious supernatural beliefs. Reason bears no need to define and the others I do not care about.
 
Nice story, too bad the guy died though.

Even a simple movie is an attack on you, wow. I didn’t write the script and the death at the stakes had no peculiar meaning for me as it was just one method used … but it seems you take exception, humm… There were of course the typical maiming, the removal of limbs and testicles, the branding, rapes and murder and being worked to death to name a few. It is always the same though … it’s always the other guys. The aggressors were the Christians with all their armament and European ways and diseases being unwashed people still. It only displays your view of something important but was meaningless on the indigenous population. This took place all throughout North and South America … the European Christian expansion and millions of people were slaughtered so you guys can claim to be doing God’s work and feel happy about whatever conversions you managed during the genocides.

WTH woman, these people had their own gods and they cherished them for thousands of years and you expect to walk up to them, tell them they and their people are just a bunch of idiots and that they now have to pay homage to your chosen pagan god as they are being enslaved. I know, your one God told you it was ok to be the asshole of the world as long as you were being asses in his good name. The truth of the matter is you offer nothing besides death to any who will not convert … just as in Islam … convert or die. Two peas in the same pod…

BT,

I opened this blog in response to a question you had asked me:

I answered that in my first response and I have built on that response throughout this discussion.

I started by defining what I mean by religion: Theologically, philosophically, or metaphysically speaking, religion is an act of homage by which we render to God both privately as individuals and publicly as social beings, the honor, gratitude, worship and obedience due Him and in the way prescribed by Him.

Religion, in the way prescribed by Him, indicates revealed religion by God Himself. Based on that, I would say that there are so many different paths and religions due either to the ignorance or perversity of people.

People are by nature religiously inclined and ....invented religions for themselves— religions which differed even as the outlook differed of those who originated them.

Catholic Christianity came into existence in 33AD when Christ founded a Church upon Simon renamed Peter, her first Pope and promised to be with her until the end of the world. Modern Judaism was developed by various Rabbis after 70AD. Islam was developed by Mohammed in 650.  The thousands of various sects that developed within Protestantism began with Martin Luther in 1517.

They all believe in God yet they are four distinct religions with different doctrines and different belief systems. Reason tells us that since there is but One God, it is impossible to believe that God, Supreme Truth Himself, revealed such contrary doctrines, teachings and worship. So long as man arranges for himself what he will believe making a great act of faith in his own powers of discernment,  there will inevitably be different churches, different paths, and thus different religions.

 

Lula post # 157

Lula posts:

But evidently none of this sunk in for now you post:

Bundling Islam in the same pod as Catholicism is a mistake. Catholicism is as far away from Islam as the East is from the West.

Throughout this discussion, I've offered an explanation of the difference between truth and deception. Truth being God revealed religion, Christianity--conversion by hearing the Church, the pillar and ground of truth.  Deception being man-made religion, Islam--conversion by the sword.

..........................

The Catholic Church is the Mystical Body of Christ, the Kingdom of God, present in the midst of men, available, open, the Ark of salvation for all should they choose. The Catholic Chruch knows she carries Christ's heritage of rejection and is not accepted by the world. Christ said, "If the world hates you, know that it hated me before it hated you." 

Even so, the Church, ever ancient, yet new presses forward announcing the Cross and Death of our Lord and  preaching repentance and Baptism until He comes again.

As for the only one true God revealed religion, don't take my word for the truth of the Catholic Church. It can be proved historically that Christ lived, that He was God, and that He founded an imperishable Church which was to be one, holy catholic and apostolic. Find that Church and you will have the true religion of God.

 

 

It's back!

Yes indeed!  I'm all smiles!  There is a lot of territory covered on this one and I didn't want to lose it.