Does the Pope visit the MURC?

[Elyas]

I am pretty sure this is going somewhere, so bear with me. I'm sure a lot of people on this board have children, or at least are getting to the point where they have thought about the idea of having children. At the very least, all of us once were children and had parents. Why did your parents bring you into this world, knowing all of the trouble you would have to face? Why did they EVER let you leave the house, knowing that there were people out there who would hurt you, and that you experience pain. It's very simple, really. They did it because they love you, and they want you to be free to find your own life and your own loves. They also know that if you look for it the good will easily outweigh the bad in your life. Your parents also don't MAKE you put your hand on the stove, or fail a class, or commit a crime, or anything like that. They usually do whatever they can to help you learn from something bad that happens to you, whether you were at any fault or not. Your parents allow you to be free, and from this freedom comes the ability for you to be hurt. The same is true with God. He isn't allowing you to be hurt. He is allowing you, and others, to be free. This freedom has consequences, often that we cannot see or recognize. We change our world in ways that bring about new diseases, new potentials for harm. God didn't MAKE us create these things, but he did make us free to follow our own path, which allows us to create situations where innocent people get hurt. This also figures into heaven. Heaven is where YOU decide you want to be. The world, with all it's opportunities and dangers offers an excellent forum for developing who you are and what you want.
Well, I think that's enough for now, that scroll bar just keeps getting smaller and smaller on the side of the box, which makes me suspicious that the opposite effect is occuring on the length of this post

[merchant2112]

no no no, you get the goat his or her own bottle.

and no gril dig a pit line it with cinder blocks build up a big fire (hard wood) and let it burn down a bit. (do not use kareasine as a fire starter if you cook on it but go right ahead for other bonfire funtions then when the fire is not too large (and out of control) lay the nicely dreassed (gutted and seasoned) spited goat accross your fire. (this works for pigs, and sides of beef as well !)

keeep fire stoked but not to high as to char the meat. ocatinaly use your most liked sause to keep meat moist.

oh i forgot (consume much booze)

<IMG SRC="http://pages.cthome.net/HackWorks/merchant.jpg" WIDTH="309" HEIGHT="309"

[This message has been edited by merchant2112 (edited 19 May 2000).]

[Aurel]

Why did our parents bring us into this world ?
Unconceus fear of their own mortality, they saw an extenction of their life through us ? Pure couriosity ?
Why would I want to have children at some point ? Hmm... to pass my name on, to leave something behind, maybe.
But why would God need to do such things if He's eternal ?

Edit: That brings me to another question... why would he need to create man ?

From what you wrote above, I get the impression that you percive heaven (God's kingdom) as a cage, if we need to go to Earth to be free to learn from our mistakes, to get out of the house ?
Can't he teach us what he needs to teach us there ? There will still be comunication between many, between ALL on that plane, if we would all remain there (it's not like staying in house only with your relatives, thus a limited type of comunication and a limit to the procces of learning).





[This message has been edited by Aurel (edited 20 May 2000).]

[merchant2112]

you know i had a dog (named lucky) who if you left a drink unatended would suck it dry (hell he would try even if you did not leave it unatended) he was a big old drunk dog.

[paulcs]

"I believe that our Heavenly Father invented man because he was disappointed in the monkey."

- Samuel Langhorne Clemens (Mark Twain)

[paulcs]

"Strange! that you should not have suspected years ago--centuries, ages, eons, ago!--for you have existed, companionless, through all the eternities. Strange, indeed, that you should not have suspected that your universe and its contents were only dreams, visions, fiction! Strange, because they are so frankly and hysterically insane--like all dreams: a God who could make good children as easily as bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave his angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice and invented hell--mouths mercy and invented hell--mouths Golden Rules, and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites this poor, abused slave to worship him!... "

- Samuel Langhorne Clemens (Mark Twain)

[paulcs]

Sorry. Long threads about religion tend to bring Mark Twain to mind.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[Elyas]

I suppose at heart I'm an idealist. I can't believe that a supreme being could not be composed of infinite love. Love is the greatest force in the universe(yes, I know how sappy that sounds, but its true.) Love cannot be directed at yourself. You need something to love, and that love is only truly fulfilling if it is freely returned. The point of the child's existence is to bring more potential for love into the world. Have you ever seen the glow of pure joy and love that surround a newborn? This is also why I find the idea of us all being part of God hard to swallow. If God loves us, and we are really just God, that's kind of weird and circular too. In away I agree with you, all energy, life, love, what have you, comes from God. But he has gifted us with a separate existence

[paulcs]

It's interesting. Mark Twain wrote extensively on the subject of religion. The sugar-coating of Mark Twain started immediately at his death (and continues today). Many people believed, at the time, that he was America's greatest writer, and the idea that he was so violently opposed to religion and patriotism was anathema to the pious and patriotic.

This posthumous sugar-coating is doubly ironic, because he arranged for his most scathing attacks on religion and patriotism to be published at the time of his death. People just didn't want to deal with it. The New York Times' review of The Mysterious Stranger, which I excerpted above (the novella, not the review), claimed that the book must have been a joke.

Here are the opening paragraphs from an essay on Mark Twain written by H.L. Mancken
for The New York Evening Mail in 1917:

"When Mark Twain died, in 1910, one of the magnificos who paid public tribute to him was William H. Taft, then President of the United States. "Mark Twain," said Dr. Taft, "gave real intellectual enjoyment to millions, and his works will continue to give such pleasure to millions yet to come. He never wrote a line that a father could not read to a daughter."

"The usual polite flubdub and not to be exposed, perhaps, to critical analysis. But it was, in a sense, typical of the general view at that time, and so it deserves to be remembered for the fatuous inaccuracy of the judgment in it. For Mark Twain dead is beginning to show far different and more brilliant colors than those he seemed to wear during life, and the one thing no sane critic would say of him to-day is that he was the harmless fireside jester, the mellow chautauquan, the amiable old grandpa of letters that he was once so widely thought to be.

"The truth is that Mark was almost exactly the reverse. Instead of being a mere entertainer of the mob, he was in fact a literary artist of the very highest skill and sophistication, and, in all save his superficial aspect, quite unintelligible to Dr. Taft's millions. And instead of being a sort of Dr. Frank Crane in cap and bells, laboriously devoted to the obvious and the uplifting, he was a destructive satirist of the utmost pungency and relentlessness, and the most bitter critic of American platitude and delusion, whether social, political or religious, that ever lived."

It's interesting to note that presidents then were every bit the disingenuous liars they are today.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[This message has been edited by paulcs (edited 20 May 2000).]

[Jorden]

A thought about who wrote the Bible, the Koran (sp?), and all the other Holy Books. Any idea, anyone?

We won't find the name of the author or publisher on the exterior, but for in later years (1980 onwards), when people rewrite these books in their own words and want to be proud of it.

Still a lot of enigma's going on in the Bible, for instance, who can explain how Noah could be 600 years old and build his Ark? And where did he get all those animals from?

Jorden

[HedsSpaz]

Who wrote the Bible... hmmm... thats a mighty good question. Personally, I don't have much of a concern for it. Mostly it was writting down by various prophets and transcribed by monks and such through the middle ages. Some of the books of the old testament were written down by Abraham, Moses, Aaron, and other Isrealitish preists from the early Jewish church. For me though, it's enough to trust that those who did write the books were divinely inspired by God and so the books of the Bible have Gods truth contained within them.

For the Noah story there is something I have to point out about the Bible. IF you look at the book of Genesis, there seem to be a fairly high number of such seeming inconsistencies. However, they are all within the first eleven chapters. Creation, Adam & Eve, Cain & Able, and Noah.
However, in chapter 12 there is an abrupt change were the story of Abraham begins. My personal belief is that the first eleven chapters are fables as it were. They contain within them God's truth just as does the rest of the Bible, but they are not historically accurate.

So theres my take Jord.
As for the stuff from yesterday... I'll get to it eventually I hope, I've been trying(albeit unsuccesfuly for the most part)to force myself to get my work done. I just took a break for dinner and thought I'd quick check what was going on in here.

Anyway,
Later all
Ian

[HollyBerri]

Wow...! I had no idea that Twain had written much (or anything) about religion, though upon reflection it's no surprise.

Gets a bit bitter in tone at points, but I do appreciate his generally rational viewpoint.

Nice analogy between human parenting and supernatural parenting, Elyas. One of the things I like best about this universe is the way our little lives are a microcosm of our presumed greater spiritual lives....

But doesn't the whole setup as you and Aurel have put it seem somewhat circular, as paulcs's quote illustrates? That's what's made it kind of difficult for me to accept traditional models of God, quite frankly....

After all, if you take the parental metaphor again, there is no point to a child's existence (from the child's POV) but that the parents, for whatever reason, "decided" to have him/her, will they or nil they.

But you would think that Life in general, as created by God, would be more... errrr, relevant.... perhaps not.

But then we get into the territory of some of the more bitter and depressive philosophers....

-------------
Holly

[HollyBerri]

Why can't love be directed at oneself, Elyas?

Doesn't charity begin at home... and love as well?

-------------------
Holly

[Jorden]

Love like that, you won't fimd in any Holy Book, Holly

Not if I read inbetween the lines... hmmmm

Jord.

[Elyas]

You can love yourself, but even in a non-sexual sort of way I think love of someone else is a much greater than a love of yourself.