Jesus Appalled By Americans?
POSTED BY: Mavourneen
UPDATED: Monday, April 9, 2007 23:32
VIEWED: 11915
PAGE 4 of 15
So Auraptor, How do you feel about a politician saying that God is behind his run for the Presidency?
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Reality sucks. Especially when it contradicts our cherished ideas.
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Such Hubris, ya?
Facts are as they stand; none of us can ever remember being dead, so I'll hazard a guess that we DON'T know what Jesus would say.
YES, America is going down the proverbial tubes. Has been for a while now, come to think.
YES, We spend more money proclaiming our faith than actualy practicing it, and,
YES, we could and SHOULD, very much, help others more. But, Facts as is, we DON'T.
Deal.
We could be better. We should be better. But, we are American's. We choose what's convenient over what is right more than we should. Problem is, we're a reactive society; we need someone to shove something in our faces, take us by the neck, shake us, and scream "Here it is!!!!" in our respective ears until we understand.
Don't tell people what to do. Show them what is wrong. Then, let 'em decide. Odds are, a good half of them will do something out of social need, a quarter because they want to, and a quarter will do nothing. Show people what's wrong, then hope for the best. In the end, that's all you can do.
As to prayers... well, you got recess, ya? That'll do. As it is, I only have two religious friends, Jon, who is Jewish, and Richardo, who is Colombian. Them's it; rest don't go to Church or whatnot (Neither do I).
-Danny
Our Idols lay in Ruins,
We'd have saved them if we Could,
But we still chose to Worship,
The Places where our Idols STOOD!!!
THRICE RULES!!!!!!!!!
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I draw different conclusions about the dichotomy between the message of love, forgiveness, and redemption and the message of social Darwninism:
No matter how revolutionary the original message, it will eventually be twisted to suit the needs of the powerful.
The underlying message of today's elite: Because humans are "naturally" greedy and violent there is no point in setting an unnatural moral code. Rather, it is more effective to allow our "real" motives to come into play, and this will "eventually" create a stronger population. Greed is good Or maybe "Greed is god" There are no victims, only losers.
Americans are caught between these two fundamentally incompatible messages. Americans (who are the most religious people in the developed world) are bombarded day after day with messages of consumerism/ greed, violence, and individualism. If following the religious message of love gets you fucked over time after time, eventually the message of love loses.
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Reality sucks. Especially when it contradicts our cherished ideas.
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In a serendipitous event of cosmic proportions, while checking some of the facts in Ann Coulter's book "Godless" I found that Mr. Edwards started his channelling long before he contacted Christ this year.
Quote:
In 1985, a 31-year-old North Carolina lawyer named John Edwards stood before a jury and channeled the words of an unborn baby girl.
Referring to an hour-by-hour record of a fetal heartbeat monitor, Mr. Edwards told the jury: ''She said at 3, 'I'm fine.' She said at 4, 'I'm having a little trouble, but I'm doing O.K.' Five, she said, 'I'm having problems.' At 5:30, she said, 'I need out.' ''
But the obstetrician, he argued in an artful blend of science and passion, failed to heed the call. By waiting 90 more minutes to perform a breech delivery, rather than immediately performing a Caesarean section, Mr. Edwards said, the doctor permanently damaged the girl's brain.
''She speaks to you through me,'' the lawyer went on in his closing argument. ''And I have to tell you right now -- I didn't plan to talk about this -- right now I feel her. I feel her presence. She's inside me, and she's talking to you.''
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=health&res=9501E3DD1F38
F932A05752C0A9629C8B63
BTW, Ms. Coulter's cite was accurate.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
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Well, you know that trial law is part theater, which is what I see in Edwards' performance. And the word "channeling" is hyperbole used to "punch up" the story intro. I seriously doubt that Edwards believes in voices from beyond and I don't think you believe that either. And since I'm SURE you're not seriously saying that Edwards is an occult practioner, your point would be.....?
Quite frankly, I wish Edwards had been on my side when we brought a complaint against Kaiser. At the time it was all the rage to have "natural" births, and this particular birth was attended by a midwife not a doctor. But if they had done a Caesarian instead of letting our daughter slog thru 20 hours of labor she would not have suffered a gade IV intraventricular hemorrhage (brain bleed) at birth, and would now not be disabled. But they did and she did and so here she is, dealing with... and paying for... a preventable tragedy that we had no hand in creating.
Quote:
Thrombocytopenic infants who were delivered vaginally had the highest incidence of intraventricular hemorrhage (63.4% vs 37.5% for cesarean section, P = .005). Vaginal delivery and platelets < 50x109/L on day 1 were independent risk factors for intraventricular hemorrhage ... Extra-axial hemorrhages, intraventricular hemorrhage, acute parenchymal hemorrhage and neuronal migrational disorder occurred with varying frequency
http://www.ajnr.org/cgi/content/full/23/9/1457
Quote:www.emedicine.com/med/topic987.htm
The affected infant may have intracranial hemorrhage, and the disorder is associated with a relatively high mortality rate.
I work closely with people who within the past couple of months have had to fight HMOs to get medical care. One was dx as being "depressed" when she had a pituitary tumor. One was dx as having "arthritis" and told to take ibuprofin when he had a spinal tumor that reached from his neck to the middle of his back. Looking at the Kaiser kidney transplant fiasco and other large-scale medical fiascos, IMHO if it takes a multimillion-dollar lawsuit to get them to wake up and smell the money, great. Otherwise they will continue to provide the cheapest, shoddiest care they can get away with.
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Reality sucks. Especially when it contradicts our cherished ideas.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
So Auraptor, How do you feel about a politician saying that God is behind his run for the Presidency?
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Reality sucks. Especially when it contradicts our cherished ideas.
That sort of talk doesn't wash with me to much. Why do you ask ?
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Well, you know that trial law is part theater, which is what I see in Edwards' performance. And the word "channeling" is hyperbole used to "punch up" the story intro. I seriously doubt that Edwards believes in voices from beyond and I don't think you believe that either. And since I'm SURE you're not seriously saying that Edwards is an occult practioner, your point would be.....?
Politics, especially the fund raising part, is at least as much theater as trial law. Putting words in either Jesus' mouth or a dead child's mouth to convince someone you're in the right seems manipulative and somewhat dishonest to me, and Mr. Edwards seems to have used it more than once. As noted above, you can't ask Jesus, or the child, for verification. And yes, "manipulative and somewhat dishonest" includes Mr. Bush's "God wants me to run" line as well.
As for Edwards - protector of the weak vs. ambulance chaser, I got no dog in that fight.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
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Hi SignyM...
Firstly, allow me to say that I'm sorry about what happened with your daughter. My brother had a brain hemmorage when he was 6 due to his premature birth, which was assumed to be due to my mother's bulimea. Nasty situation that is. He suffered multiple strokes and spend over 3 months in a coma and another year in the hospital afterwards. They said he'd never walk or talk again but he did within a year, albeit with a lot of work and self-sacrafice that my Father put into his recovery. He's proving everybody wrong everyday.
Now... something you said earlier rubbed me wrong. I notice you like to throw links out there that prove your stance on something, which I think everyone would agree is a great way to validate your points. The comment you made, which I believe was made only based on your feelings rather than truth... the one I feel needs the most justification and that warrants the most backup you can muster has nothing at all to validate it. I sincerely suspect that it is because no such evidence will be found anywhere.
When ShinyEd said "America is THE MOST GENEROUS nation on the planet....Americans donate more money to charity than ALL THE OTHER NATIONS on Earth combined!" he was absolutely right, regardless of your opinion of the matter here. I would like to see any proof otherwise.
Let's forget completley about all of the charitable contributions that America gives the world and just talk about "Tax Freedom Day" here in America. It won't be until nearly the beginning of May that the average American will have made enough money to pay off their tax burden. What does our government waste all of this money on (besides the war which I am 100% against with every fiber of my being)? That's right..... all of the social programs that we never had a chance to vote on and which oftentimes fail due to lack of planning and foresight. All of the wealth re-distribution aimed at eliminating the middle class. We do have one of the most Communistic non-Comunist countries on the globe.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_Freedom_Day
I'll stop now before you label me Pirate News too.... but I have a sneaking suspicion that I'm already too late for that.
"A government is a body of people, usually notably ungoverned." http://www.myspace.com/6ixstringjack
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6string, I don't want to butt into your discussion with SignyM, but I'm not quite clear on what you're saying so I thought I'd ask. Are you saying government-implemented social programs are a form of charity?
The best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter.
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6Six- hold please ... 
Huh. You think that we're generous because we pay our taxes? Because our government redistributes wealth? If that's your measure of generosity then we've got a long way to go, baby, before we reach Euro proportions. And by any measure of health, education, and happiness, whatever "charitable" amount of giving (or tax-paying) that we do for our own is either remarkly stingy or unconceivably ineffective because we're pretty far down at the bottom of the list in those measure too. If that's not your point, better clarify.
What about humanitarian aid? Well sicne the USA has a large land mass, population, and economy it stands to reason that in raw dollars the USA would be a big donor. It would hardly be fair to place Sweden (for example) on the same absolute scale as the USA. But in more meaningful terms, here it is the rankning for humatitarian aid per capita (per person)
1. Norway 21.04
2. Sweden 11.81
3. Denmark 5.95
4. Switzerland 5.85
5. Netherlands 5.15
6. Belgium 2.94
7. United Kingdom 2.58
8. Finland 2.38
9. United States 2.34
10. France 2.17
11. Canada 2.10
12. Australia 1.93
13. Ireland 1.83
14. Austria 1.23
15. New Zealand 1.18
16. Spain 0.61
17. Germany 0.61
18. Italy 0.42
19. Greece 0.27
20. Japan 0.06
21. Portugal 0.03
www.danieldrezner.com/archives/001805.html
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Reality sucks. Especially when it contradicts our cherished ideas.
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