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| Author | Topic: "Thuglicans" and the Tea "Federation Party" | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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GDR Member  Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.2
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Buzsaw writes: I was four years in the USAF perhaps before you were born, defending the US from the ambitious determination of the USSR and Red China to impose atheistic communism on the planet. Nobody is a military dodger in an era when the military is totally voluntary as a career preference. I was in during the days of draft when you either volunteered or got drafted. After the draft, many went in for the personal benefits it afforded such as education, etc or the lack of another profession. I hope you're enjoying your benefits. People like enterprising rich Rush are paying their share on behalf of us vets. People like Rush and Beck are sentinels sounding the alarm of impending threats to our freedoms, doing a whole lot more than you or I could have in order to preserve the unique freedoms afforded in America. Hi Buz I'm probably at least as old as you. I was an officer in the Canadian forces and flew a Herc into Saigon during the Viet Nam war to supply the people that we had there who were in non-combat roles. My Christianity is central to my life. My wife is still an American citizen and one of my sons is now an American and as a result 4 out of 8 grand-kids are Americans. I love the US and would usually vote Republican if I could vote down there. My point is that we are very similar in background. Somehow though we seem to interpret our faith differently. Jesus lived in a country that was overrun by the Romans. How did he tell his fellow downtrodden countrymen that they were to overcome the Romans? He said that they were to love them; that they were to go the extra mile and turn the other cheek. He told them that if they continued to fight them militarily that they would be crushed and the temple destroyed which is exactly what happened in the war of 70AD. Jesus said that we are to love God and love our neighbour. In the "Good Samaritan" Jesus told his fellow Jews that they were to love and respect those whose religious views differed from their own. I have a hunch that message still applies today. The point is that we might win battles here and there by dropping bombs on people but the only way to win a war is by changing people's hearts. Just look at the 2 world wars in the last century. After WW I Germany was put under the thumb of the victors. Peace didn't last and as a result we had the rise of Nazism and WW II. After WW II the victors, and most specifically the US, helped in the rebuilding of Germany and Japan and as a result we are now allies. By branding all Muslims as terrorists I would suggest that Jesus would give the same message to us that he gave to first century Jews, which if we keep going down this road our societies will pay a heavy price. BY isolating moderate Muslims we make them more vulnerable to the sales pitch of the extremists. People are naturally tribal and everyone wants to feel that they belong to one tribe or another. Islamic extremism is a huge threat to our societies in my view as well, and as in 9/11 it only takes a small few to do incredible damage. Frankly the extremists are winning. Just look at what you have to go through to get on an airplane. The wars are bankrupting the western world. The best and most effective weapon we have against Islamic extremists is the moderate Muslim. There have been terrorist threats that have been thwarted in both Canada and Britain by the fact that moderate Muslims informed authorities of the impending threats. I wonder how these same moderates will react next time if they are isolated from main stream society, and been the object of racism. Maybe next time they will say nothing and just maybe some of the young hot heads will view Islamic extremism as a righteous cause. The prophet Micah tells us that what God wants of us is to love kindness, do justice and to walk humbly with our God. I think that is how we should live as individuals and that it should also be the basis of the foreign policy of our governments.JMHO Everybody is entitled to my opinion. 
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.2 |
Hi Buz
Buzsaw writes: I was in the USAF in the 1950s and now an old geeser at 75, by God's grace. Well, I guess you do have me beat. I’m just a kid of 67. I suppose now I have to call you Mr. Buz.
Buzsaw writes: Mmm, somehow I missed that opposition of Jesus to the military in the Olivet Discourse of Matthew 24, Mark 13 and Luke 21. Is there a reference to it elsewhere? All of the other messianic movements from the Maccabees, to Judas the Galilean right up to Simon bar Kokhba in 135 AD were seen as military leaders that were there to overthrow their oppressors, establish God as King and rebuild the temple. Read Josephus amongst all sorts of other books and you’ll get the idea. The book of Maccabees is a story with one battle after another. Jesus declares himself as Messiah but with a very different message such as this from Matthew 5.
quote:Jesus consistently preached that the way to peace is to love your enemy into submission. Paul understood it completely as we can see in this quote from Ephesians 6. quote:Or in Matthew 26 when he tells Peter in the garden that all those who take up the sword shall perish by the sword. Or when he say to render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s. In Luke 19 he foretells the destruction of Jerusalem because they would not recognize Him and His message. quote: Read over the sermon on the mount. Blessed are the meek and the peacemakers etc. Frankly it is the heart of the whole gospel message. Jesus loved his enemies, went the extra mile and turned the other cheek on the cross, and through that came out the other side of death thereby defeating it.
Buzsaw writes: Mmm, but Jesus was not nice to the very religious Pharisees whose religious views differed from his. He drove them out of the Temple and called them to their face, snakes. He debated them on their religious views. Nevertheless, he loved them in that he died for their sins and suffered at their hands without resisting, asking God to forgive them, knowing not what they were doing. He debated with the Pharisees and sometimes forcefully making his point. He never argued with a sword but only with words. Look at how he changed the heart of Joseph of Arimethea, and later Paul for that matter. The people he drove out of the temple were the money changers and it wasn’t because of their religious views.
Buzsaw writes: I've never branded all Muslims as terrorists. I've done what Jesus did by citing the fallacies of their religion. Having become knowledgeable about the Koran, the Haddith and the Sunnahs, I've argued that the terrorism comes from their scriptures which, unlike the admonition of Jesus to love one's enemies, Mohammed and his apostles admonished to fight the infidels until Islam rules the planet. Citing that is not equivalent to hatred of Muslims. It is about citing the source of the terroristic practices, systemic to the religion. It would be easy to cherry pick parts of the Bible that would justify all sorts of things that neither of us would agree to including what we were discussing in that other thread. People understand terrorism and realize that a number of atrocities have been committed in the name of Islam. We also have to recognize that regardless of what you perceive the Quran as being, the vast majority of Muslims are not violent.As I said, if we alienate this majority group they will start to more and more sympathize with the extremists. As Christians we are called to love them into the Kingdom. We are not called to drop bombs on them which only drives them further away in increasing numbers. I’m not obviously suggesting that we don’t attempt to apprehend, and if necessary kill the actual perpetrators of these heinous acts of terrorism, but that is far different than dropping bombs on Iraq which had nothing to do with 9/11. Buzsaw writes: Your implication seems to be that Buz does not love because Buz warns of the dangers of ignorance to the ultimate plans of Islam. That is not the case. It's actually the ones who fail to warn of impending danger who unwittingly endanger others. Jesus, prince of peace was the one who said he came not to bring peace, but a sword, meaning that his gospel of ultimate peace would first (abe: draw much bloodshed from violent ones who hate it). You took my post as an attack on you and I apologise for that. I was referring to your support of Rush and Beck and what I perceive to be their labelling and stereotyping of the Islamic faith. (I hope I’m wrong in that.)There are parts of the Quran that I find offensive but I contend that the Islamic faith is more than just the Quran, just as the Christian faith is more than just the Bible. The Islamic faith today is vastly different from the Islamic faith of the time the Quran was written just as the Christian faith is very different now than it was when the Bible was put together.I go back to what I said before, which is if we are going to defeat terrorism we are going to have to win the hearts of the Islamic peoples. We have been given the tools to be able to do that as Paul outlines in the quote above from Ephesians. Everybody is entitled to my opinion.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.2
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Buzsaw writes: That's partly why Apocrypha books are not in the canonized scriptures. They are counter to the Old Testament prophets. Jesus alone, fit's the ticket for the messianic prophecies. You asked the following question'"Mmm, somehow I missed that opposition of Jesus to the military in the Olivet Discourse of Matthew 24, Mark 13 and Luke 21. Is there a reference to it elsewhere? " I make one opening remark and then give you several scriptures answering your question. You then respond to the only part that wasn't from scripture. I find it odd that you want to take the Bible literally up to the point that you don't agree with it. It does however make my point. There were many messianic movements between the years of the Maccabees and lastly Simon bar Kokhba in 135 AD. In every case, including Jesus of course, the would be messiahs were executed and always cruelly. In every case but Jesus these messianic wannabes were following the standard belief that the messiah would lead the people in battle against their oppressors, lead them to freedom, establish the rule of God and rebuild the temple. Jesus said no. The way to defeat your enemy is through the weapons of truth, mercy, justice, love, forgiveness etc. After initially abandoning the movement the disciples later became zealous in their mission after encountering a resurrected Jesus. They didn’t talk about defeating the Romans but went all over preaching Christ's message of love etc even to Rome itself. I agree absolutely that Jesus is the one true Messiah but that isn't the point. The point is what he wants of us.
Buzsaw writes: The scriptures of both religions articulate the fundamentals of each. The fundamentalists are the ones who ascribe to the fundamentals. Mohammed, his Quran and his apostles who wrote the Haddith and the Sunnahs, which articulate the fundamentals were all violent. Thus the fundamentalist Muslims today are the advocates of war and violence against the infidels. Jesus, on the other hand was non-violent, as were his apostles and as are the fundamentalist Christians today. If we only all agreed on the fundamentals. We had Christian leaders in both the USA and Britain who seemed to have felt called to go to war in Iraq, and that God's methods weren’t either quick enough or right enough to fill the bill. Go figure. I think we should just let God be the judge of who it is that embraces the path of peace, love and forgiveness, and get on with our own mission. By the way, what is a cowboy, a horse and a coyote doing on the avitar of a guy from New York? Everybody is entitled to my opinion.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.2 |
Buzsaw writes: I'm still waiting for one example of violent actions that the NT advocates for Christians against anyone.Coragyps writes: Matthew 10:34? - "Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword." The J-guy alledgedly said that, Buz. This is a good example of how we have to be very careful in our reading of ancient holy texts. Both the Bible and the Quran are culturally conditioned. They were written to a specific audience centuries ago. We live in a very different culture and when we read these books it is critical that we keep that in mind. The message that Jesus brought was very counter-cultural which accounts for the fact that the message was usually couched in very cryptic language. In the case of this quote Jesus is referring back to the Jewish scriptures. (Micah 7:1-7) He is essentially saying that when his followers take the path of peace that he is proposing that it will bring serious opposition. It will bring actual physical attack and it will even separate families. I suggest that someone from the Islamic faith would not understand what Jesus was saying in that verse and so I personally would be careful in taking an Islamic text and definitively saying this is what is meant by it. I think that we have to look at the fact that the vast majority of Muslims want to live in harmony with their neighbours of other faiths. As Christians I suggest that the message is very clear. We are to reach out to them in love, realizing that it isn't always clear what that is going to look like, as we live in a world where the right thing is often ambiguous. (Take the current action in Libya for example.) JMHO for what it's worth. Everybody is entitled to my opinion.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.2 |
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.2 |
Buzsaw writes: AS FOR MAKING YOUR POINT, I DIDN'T. THE UNBELIEVER IS GOING TO TAKE EVERYTHING WRONG, NOT UNDERSTANDING THE THINGS OF THE SPIRIT OF GOD OR HIS WORD. THE UNBELIEVER WHO IS NOT OBJECTIVE AT HEART IS GOING TO SKEW ALL SCRIPTURE TO THEIR LIKING AND TO ACCOMMODATE THEIR LIFE STYLE, RENDERING THE PLAIN WRITTEN WORDS AS METAPHORICAL IN WHATEVER MANNER SUITS THEIR IDEOLOGY. But Buz.... you are the unbeliever when it comes to the Quran. You are not objective at heart and therefore likely to skew that text to your liking as well. Essentially what you are saying though is that nobody reads any text objectively. We ALL come to these books with our subjective views. You would say though that the Bible is different and I would agree, (with my subjective view). I agree that the writers were inspired to write it but that also doesn't mean that their subjective views did not enter into the writing of it. Yes, I believe that we are to study the Bible and to discern what its message is for us, but if you have noticed even among fundamentalists there are all sorts of disagreements about what the plain written words mean. Do all women keep their heads covered in your church? Do women speak in your church? I'm sure that you would agree that those words were written for a specific situation in a specific church nearly 2000 years ago, but if you are to take the "plain written words" as they stand then you aren't following the scriptures. (I know of at least one church that does follow those rules.) Everybody is entitled to my opinion.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.2 |
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.2
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