TW what do you think about this?
 

"Religion is best described as wild speculation - or what mankind did many thousands of years ago when philosophy was the only science. When tools of science did not exist. To deny this, others must obfuscate, pervert, confuse, or use Rush Limbaugh propaganda techniques to promote religious rhetoric over logical thought. And yes, so many are so easily perverted by emotion."

I come from the deep south and have wandered SP almost over the world. I was raised baptist. Yuk. Your words would almost start a coffee shop fight in the south.
I talked to a man whom I thought to be above average, was a reporter and a nice smart man. No bs about him. He died a while back at 79. Anyway I asked him once did he think that the muslims were hell bound. He said"yes" because they didn't know the lord. To me that's bull Shit. So I never brought it up again.
I might be hell bound, if such a place exist. But
"Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming: WOW... What a ride!!"

I'm pretty bummed that the Vatican hasn't slapped down the Cardinal who played the intelligent design card recently. The Church had pretty well pulled herself out of the middle ages but now... who knows?

If they slap him down it becomes a media issue and they have to take an overt stance on it.

If they ignore it, it fades into the background noise and they don't have to take an official stance on it.

Which is easier as well as more effective?

(warning wandering mind)

Fine, if it works but there is a growing right wing nut movement in the Church that will only pull back if the Vatican says they are in error. If the Vatican remains silent, they forge ahead with an anti-modernist agenda that while not up to radical islam's standards isn't too enlightened. Some folks think we should harness the nuts for our east-west culture clash but I think the agendas are too similar, anti-science, anti-woman, anti-individualist, while not the last bastion of that kind of thinking (the left has their cluster as well) its really not a product of Western Civilization as I conceive it..

"That means the bible has been replaced repeatedly with better science books."


That's a rather good way of putting it.

It's also a way to have shock troops you can distance yourself from when they screw up.

All they have to do is compare themselves to the ultra radicals and say "look how extreme they were, we're ever so much more tolerant."

If using a condom, one is condemned to sin - according to church doctrine. Medical people in Catholic hospitals cannot even tell a husband how to use a condom to protect himself from his wife who has AIDs. Condoms and their use violate all church doctrine. So when did the Catholic Church - an institution that protected pedophiles and banned "Voice of the Faithful" - ever really pull itself out of the middle ages?

If you donate a kidney to your ailing twin brother, you have committed original sin. Another church decree from the 1950s when this kidney transplant was first performed. Was the doctor's name Dr Galileo?

When Pope John XXIII was my pope, we were told something previously unheard of in the Catholic Church. We should no longer condemn living Jews for what their ancestors did the Jesus. Is that called pulling itself out of the Middle Ages?

Even if your husband beats you, it would be an original sin - for some reason sins get categorized - for you to divorce him. However if you pay the local diocese enough money, then somehow the sacrament of marriage - a sacrament only provided by some Holy Ghost creature - somehow that sacrament can now be annulled by a now wealthier Bishop.

Could the Holy Ghost also provide me with the answers to tests in school - if I offered him enough money? No. Only sacraments can be bought and sold with money.

What day has the Pope scheduled to end the Middle Ages? Still waiting to be excommunicated. And I want it on a big fancy document that I can frame. Even Galileo couldn't get one of those.

If born into an institution you cannot leave, isn't that called slavery? At least a slave could buy his freedom. I can't even get a documented excommunication.

Not to be picky, but I will be anyway ... I think the terms you're looking for are mortal and venial sin.

Isn't there only one original one?

This explains everything. tw was brought up Catholic! No wonder he's so messed up! Welcome to the club, tw. I never took Catholicism seriously and I'm just fine. I think Els and wolf are recovering Catholics, too. They seem ok. You'll eventually get over it.

tw has been unclear about his religous upbringing. We don't really know if he hates Catholics from the inside or hates them from outside. All we know is the hate.

After a 3hour bike ride I think I was a little hard on tw here. I compare his rhetoric with radars. Both have core values that can be respected but neither communicates his positive values without going negative on other peoples respectable core values.

Did I post negative. Or did I post positive? You did not cite specific paragraphs for good reason. You were taking a personal perspective which means reading into the post some emotional aspect. Such emotion requires a personal bias.

Is there anything in my post that even implies an emotional bias or opinion on my part? If you think so, well, I may routinely use incendiary words just so that your emotions lie to you. And I don't care. Adults should never look for implied emotion in posts - especially mine.

The only way you can make a claim that I hate people: quote specific paragraphs as examples. Trying to read into my biases? Not possible because of the perspective I use to write - to intentionally confuse your emotions.

If I look only for the negative, then post specific examples. Without citing support facts and examples, the statement is no different from speculation. IOW I have a problem with Griff's last post because it does what I accuse Rush Limbaugh types of doing.

Well, he said it. What a maroon.

numerous google hits :(

This isn't original with me -- but isn't a Creation that goes entirely of itself a pretty intelligent way to design it? Saves a lot of bother over busting a miracle for each and every species, doesn't it?

If you are a Creator with literally all the time in the universe, to Whom a thousand ages in Thy sight are as an evening gone, do you have any reason whatsoever not to take your time and do it right? The right way seems to be the one of fullest freedom. No constraints on the forms of life.

Indeed. And that's why Intelligent Design as the motive force behind evolution is the most reasonable of the religious Creation stories. The problems only arise when people try to put religious Creation stories into a science class.