[same old Christ vs Christianiy rant]You put priest in quotes as if the priests you and I know for the most part advocate following Christ's Commands and Directives, and not some dogmatic spin on them that allows the opposite behaviours to manifest. The former would force you to ignore your so-called priest or to abandon support of this war and this President in terms of allocation of federal resources. The latter allows for 'just wars,' and for children to go hungry in America while Americans allow the spending of over $400 billion every 365 days upon systems that hurt people and break things worldwide. No, sadly, the priest who confirms and empowers love, of any sort, is closer to the Greatest Commandments and Sermon Directives of Christ than ANY "priest" who embraces this administration under any of the current circumstances. When you can find that part of the Bible that supercedes Christ's clear Directives on the Mount and affirms the "priestly" notion of scriptural equivalency with the same clarity wtih which Christ detonates that very notion by establishing the primacy and hierarchy of HIS laws of Loving with the Great Commandments ("on these two Commandments hang all the law and the prophets"), you will be the first ever to do so. In focusing upon a refutation of one take on love and loving, and allowing this president (or any president) to kill and claim guidance from God is to CHOOSE... To choose Christianity (that is, what sensibilities surrounding Christ have become, and the primacy of the litany of facts - born of a virgin, suffered, died, rose again - as expressed weekly in a Creed NOT expressed by Christ) over Christ (who DID CLEARLY COMMAND all of us to Love God, Love Everyone we Come Across, Love Our Enemy, Turn the Other Cheek, and Get into Meaningful, Loving Relationship with Our Enemy). In doing so, you've chosen a mode and modus that allows for faith to be "backed up" with M-16s; that is to say, no faith at all, while that same dogma has the energy to worry about gays LOVING. Why? Why? Why does the dogma worry about gays in loving relationship, and stands relatively silent at the clear hate of Christ's COmmands and Directives expressed by murderous nations? A little murder, a litte defecation on Christ's Great Commands is okay, then? Ah, I get it; the dogma also says that deathbed abdications and conversions get us into Heaven as well. SO we do what we want, faithless, and hope to get a chance to fix it all on the back end... A TEST of faith would be doing what Christ COMMANDED (why aren't what CHRIST said were the Greatest Commandments, things that require us to ACT, something to which we express weekly commitment, but the other stuff things that only require us to believe, and tithe - we do? Why? Who is empowered by a weekly commitment to love God and love everyone else, and who is empowered by the dogma, created by Paul, centering around an INTERPRETATION of the phrase "noone may come to the father but by me?" Maybe that means "Heaven is open to those who do what I've COMMANDED!!!"), and letting the chips fall where they may. But Americans IN PARTICULAR find no joy in that kind of faith, a faith that says "just love. JUST LOVE, and Christ will take care of everything else." No we like to have all kinds of exceptions to the Great Commandments, to the nonviolent Directives of the Sermon, to justify NOT faith in Christ, but rather, simply, our own deisre to both do whatever we want, and come close to some sort of conditional faith from which we might springboard into Heaven if we get a chance, deathbed-wise, to REALLY commit to Christ in that last dying breath. But we've got time to distance ourselves from priests (sorry, "preists") who affirm and confirm their witness to love and loving. Sick. Our current general take on Christ, as twisted into Christianity, is sick. And, in fact, it's getting people all over the world killed. I wonder if death brings you closer to God, and God, being infinite truth, to truth? I wonder if by simply being closer to God you understand, perfectly, more of what happened in your life, and in the lives of others, with a state of being wehere no maks, illusions or lies can assault that truth, that awareness... If that's the case, I'd bet that, looking back/down upon us all from Heaven, close to truth, souls by the decatillions are hoping we get it right, and know we've got it so, so wrong. "Preists," indeed. The very fact that you contribute in an illuminating fashion often to these boards but spring clearly from the dogma is exemplary of the condition, the disease, with which America is, right now, afflicted. We think we can shoot our way to Jesus, and only the dogma teaches that. There is NOTHING in the life of Christ, who as born, lived and died in nonviolence, nothing in the ACTUAL WORDS of Christ, that taught - AND COMMANDED, and DIRECTED - loving nonviolence, that allows for ANYTHING America, and most of the world, currently does. Nothing. No, Americans have an Old Testament God-complex (******** with me, We'll drown your ass in rivers of blood, kill your firstborns, and curse your people!!!!), while claiming the Christ. It's the way we can break breath worrying about gays loving, and affirming love, while killing around the world and in our own communities. I await the day when America says, in FAITH, no more, puts down ALL it's weapons, and operates Christ-like, in nonviolent loving-kindness, around the world. Others might harm us? They might. Did Christ ask you to worry about that, or did Christ COMMAND you to love, nonviolently, and allow him to handle the rest. The difference between faith and hedging your spiritual bet. Americans go to Church all the time, but have no real faith in what they've been told to do. Thus, the dogma gets us to expend energy on gays in loving relationship, because our LACK of faith is Jack Nicholson shouting over the protestations of Christ "You want me on that wall, you NEED me on that wall!" FaithLESSness, in the clutch. That...is where we fail; ourselves, and the entire world.[/same old Christ vs Christianiy rant]
I grew up in the liberal northeast and now live in the conservative south. Ignorance and selfishness exists in both places. The religious right scares me but so does the secular left. Are Americans voting more conservative today? They sure are and it is a reaction to the '60's and '70's. The pendulum(sp) will start swinging the liberals way soon enough.
Re: Fvck the South Part DEUX Oh, they definitely hate Yankees, no doubt. But that's not why they don't want to change racist language in their state constitution.
Yes, there is still a lot of ignorance in the South. But like it was stated earlier, it's more about not wanting Yanks or whoever intruding on their way of life and telling them how to live it. Ex: My father just had his girlfriend from upstate NY come down to northern Fl to live with him. She's had a very hard time feeling comfortable and fitting in because she feels like southerners are very "clique-ish". And they are. It's almost like a club. If you don't walk the walk and talk the talk, it can be very hard to break through that barrier. And that includes education and values and such. I also agree with whoever said that each region could learn from the other. Though sometimes it is hard to break through that wall, once you do, you realize that Southerners as a hole are very friendly, gracious, do-anything-for-you kind of people. You wouldn't believe all the help I got planning my wedding from these amazing women at church. And when something bad happens to one of their own (and sometimes when they aren't) they really band together like a giant family to help out. And they are quite generous, even if they don't have a whole lot to spare. It is getting better. Most of my friends aren't nearly as prejudiced as their parents and grandparents were. The South will get better. It'll just take longer than the rest of the country.
Re: Fvck the South Part DEUX While I'll admit there is a large population that's racist in the South, you can find racists everywhere. I think i've met more racist people in our lovely state of Ohio than in some parts of the South. Racism isn't confined to a region, darling. Although I think the west coast is the least racist place I've lived.
You seem to be mighty fired up these days about a region that hasn't shown itself to be particularly tolerant on any day. Look- I'm as disappointed to see another four years of the Shrub as anyone on this site, but we all knew the Southern states weren't going for Kerry waaaay before this election was ever held. That Alabama voted to keep its racist language in its constitution doesn't surprise me, and it shouldn't surprise you, either. A Dem isn't going to win any states here unless he's a charismatic guy like Clinton or a Dixiecrat Zell Miller type. The South is what it is. But why aren't you coming down on the states that you might have expected to vote Dem? I'm not defending anything this region has ever done (this election will affect Southerners of color much more than it will ever affect some guy living in NorCal, especially if a Bush Supreme Court can figure out a way to send Brown back to the states. You're quite safe by comparison)- I just wanna know why you've chosen to stay focused on this region when you could just as easily write it off (as I have) and deal with the other states that seem to have contracted the disease of idiocy that was always at epidemic proportions around here. I'm curious.
Dude, you gotta chill out on the "cut & paste." (perhaps length of post is the lefty-activist-kiosk way of compensating for a small penis?)
An excellent question. I'll give it some thought and fire up a new thread when I get some things sorted out. In the meantime, picking on the south just feels so right. Like when I see James Dobson carrying on.
Folks, this is what Alabama fans have to say about their own neighbors: http://home.hiwaay.net/~pcasteel/aubfamily.html