Understanding means being able to restate what a person's idea is. :LOLS: This is certainly the funniest post so far this year! :lol: Coming from the guy who nearly alyays flat-out refuses to restate what Chesterton, Lewis, and the OC say?!? Man, that is beyond priceless! (Now's the part where you ...

You admit that anyone so much as talking about a view other than your own is considered an attack on your faith, and that you intend to always oppose all such discussions. That you do not see the problem with this kind of thing is unfortunate. Wanting a non-pluralist world does not justify not allo...

I think many understand you. It's just that that isn't equal to agreement. If they did, Fist, they would engage the thoughts. Very often the thoughts remain unengaged. Understanding means being able to restate what a person's idea is. Christianity has undergone a progress of increasing fragmentatio...

No need to debate. Even though I don't agree with your rules about who is allowed to be called a Christian, since I don't consider myself to be one, I have no reason to fight about it. But the fact remains that some groups that everyone but you (and, perhaps, Chesterton and the OC) consider to be C...

Ah, but that's a whole new can of worms, Soul! Which Christians think oral sex, vibrators, etc, are forbidden? Thinking carefully about whether to post at all, what to post... In the interests of explanation rather than debate: Just looking at the OP and thinking about the years I've spent here, on...

Having received an administrative warning... If my thoughts are to be muzzled by the rules, which favor a worldview hostile to my own, then the playing field is unequal - the only truly equal playing field is where either side could actually lose - be proven wrong, and there are too many opportuniti...

Ok, hang on guys. I'm going to assume from Rus' last post up there that he's taking a break from the Watch. Rus, I'm going to suggest that you spend any time away from here reconsidering your approach. Familiarise yourself with the board rules, and the guidelines for the sub-forums, and keep them i...

I feel like this phrase of mine got missed and people started interpreting it as mindless acceptance again: that we find reliable, truth-telling. I did say that in the first place. Fair enough. That said, I think that such an authority would be a) impossible or b) pointless. First, reliable is a po...

Hi Rus, I am glad to finally meet you. I have read many of your posts and I find the consistency and firmness with which you articulate your position refreshing and challenging (without necessarily agreeing with everything you say). I appreciate the way you insist on the value of tradition. This is...

hell, we have Christians attacking Christians in the close. being Catholic i am used to that (ever read the Jack Chick tracks?) but it is surprising to be attacked by someone who nominally agrees with you. www.chick.com/default.asp I am thinbking of posting a CHick thread - just not sure where. clo...

Maybe the concept of Hell is not really a burning lake of fire where there will burning and gnashing of teeth? Maybe its a translation problem. Example: In the New Testament Bible Jesus says: If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother...he cannot be my disciple. However I beleive th...

If sin is a disease rather than arbitrary law, then the attitude becomes more important than the actions - But if you have accepted the Authority of your church, whichever one it may be, then you likely don't consider the law to be arbitrary, right? I don't understand why the distinction between di...

When you speak of a list, Dukkha, I think you might be with some justice speaking of the Catholic Church. I have spoken many times of the juridical nature of the Roman Catholic Church's theology, and the "list of actions" would follow to a great degree. It's just so untrue about the Easte...

rus, I'm not arguing that. I'm arguing that there is, indeed, a lake of fire. I don't care who gets there, or how. My point is that it exists. Yes - and what is it? What is its nature? Is it God punishing us for making an unlucky choice in life? Or is it where our focus on worshiping and loving the...

God doesn't put you in Hell. You end up there by choosing against God, which is apparently a side-effect of sin. Blah, blah, blah. I don't understand the sticking point of the burning trash pit. To me, Hell is the absence of God in the afterlife, no matter how it is 'physically represented'. My opi...

It may seem paradoxical but I agree with rus about this. The only difference is that I do not give up my independence to any authority mediated by other people. I am constantly humbled in the face of the unimaginable richness of life. And also baffled, confounded and amazed. I have been led, drawn,...

The only way we could know the truth about souls is to accept an authority higher than us that we find reliable, truth-telling. It may seem paradoxical but I agree with rus about this. The only difference is that I do not give up my independence to any authority mediated by other people. I am const...

I can't do much on the psp. Heh. But I'm not talking about Gehenna being a punishment. I'm talking about the existence of an eternal afterlife that is named after a burning trashpit. This state of being is likely to be more than somewhat unpleasant. Eternally. The podcast you directed me to is my s...

Hi Fist, I appreciate the complement you've made to me by putting this stuff here. It might have been fun, if we hadn't already been around all these blocks and still cannot see eye-to-eye. I'm very tired of debating, I no longer want to debate at all with people that cannot take my ideas and consid...

Holy cow, Ali, You think I do not know the better pagan positions - I am not hereby insulted, even if you say so. Why you think that saying so should be insult - when an active practicing adherent of a religion must defer whenever an unbeliever tell him he does not actually believe what he believes ...