posted on April 10, 2004 02:08:46 PM new
Nope, profe, this Bush supporter, supports him for his positions on the issues. There are many who support him for his positions on the issues...not because of his religion. And I am just one of them.
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reamond - I've already said I accept the right of all to believe how they wish. And that while I have chosen my own personal 'road'/faith, I accept that others have chosen differently. It's not my place to judge ....and my post was addressed to other "believers".....
posted on April 10, 2004 03:25:49 PM new
What I have "asserted" is that this nation was founded as a Christian nation. And that anywhere between 75-86% of Americans claim to be Christian.
posted on April 10, 2004 09:00:50 PM new
Since you could not understand my explinations the first time, here they are again:
The Bible doesn't tell us exactly how, when, or why evil came into God's world. What it does tell us, however, is everything we need to know to live hopefully and responsibly in this troubled world. It assures us that God is sovereign, that He is in control, and that He will carry out His loving plans and purposes for us. On the other hand, the Bible tells us that we are moral beings with the power of choice, and that God holds us responsible to make good moral and spiritual decisions. How can both of these statements be true? It seems that they can't be unless we modify either God's sovereignty or human freedom. But the Bible doesn't allow us to take one path over the other.
GOD'S SOVEREIGNTY.
God is all-powerful and so involved with what happens that not even a sparrow falls to the ground apart from His will (Mt. 10:29). He is in control of history. Paul declared that "He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings" (Acts 17:26). He also declared that the rulers of nations, bad as well as good, receive their authority from God (Dan. 4:17; Rom. 13:1). He decides to whom He will show mercy instead of wrath (Ex. 33:19; 34:5-7; Rom. 9:14-24). He has chosen those who will be the redeemed in heaven (Jn. 6:37; Rom. 8:28-29; Eph. 1:4). He was involved when Pharaoh refused to listen to Moses and determined not to release the Israelites from slavery in his land (Ex. 5-14). He was even involved in the treachery of Judas Iscariot in that He provided the circumstances that made it possible for Judas to fulfill his preordained role (Acts 1:15-20).
God is active in history, even when He doesn't seem to be. This theme runs through the whole Bible. The Old Testament story of Joseph is a striking example. Joseph was indulged by his father, hated and abused by his brothers, falsely accused of sexually assaulting his employer's wife, and forgotten in prison. Yet through those dark years, God was quietly moving Joseph into a position to save the founding fathers of Israel from starvation. God gave Joseph the ability to interpret dreams, which put him in favor with the king of Egypt. And because of his God-given administrative ability, Joseph soon became the prime minister of Egypt. In this role, he was able to protect the nation of Egypt as well as his own family from famine.
More than 30 years after being the victim of his brothers' hatred, Joseph quieted their fear of retaliation by saying:
Do not be afraid, for am I in the place of God? But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive (Gen. 50:19-20).
God prospered the descendants of Jacob in Egypt. They multiplied and became a nation of about 2.5 million people. He then allowed their circumstances to change when a new dynasty came into power. He brought Moses into the world, kept him alive, and through a succession of events trained and equipped him for the task of leading the Israelites. He supernaturally delivered them from their bondage from Egypt by sending 10 plagues and destroying Pharaoh's army. He then preserved them miraculously until they entered the Promised Land 40 years later.
God's part in what happens is not always detectable. His actions are often so interwoven with earthly and human factors that we do not know exactly what we can attribute directly to Him. We know that as a holy God who hates sin He never leads anyone to do evil. James declared as an absolute principle that "God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone" (1:13). Yet He works in and through human sin to accomplish His purposes.
He told the Israelites that if they disobeyed Him He would bring a nation against them and that the invaders would be unspeakably cruel (Dt. 28:49-52). The Bible writers repeatedly tell us that God sent the Assyrians and Babylonians against the Israelites. Moses also told the Israelites that God would bring them terrible plagues and sicknesses (vv.58-62).
A number of earthly and human factors were involved in the fulfillment of these threats. The leaders of the nations that attacked the Israelites freely chose to do it. The foreign invaders freely chose to be cruel and insensitive.
Perhaps some of the famines and plagues could be explained as natural events, but the Bible doesn't make these distinctions. God said they would take place in judgment, and He saw to it that they did. Maybe Satan and the kingdom of evil is so malignant that they quickly bring about pestilence and plagues as soon as God removes His restraining hand. Satan was eager to afflict Job and did so with vengeance as soon as God gave him permission. Job, not knowing the full story, attributed his suffering to God. Ultimately, of course, it had God's approval. He could have prevented it if He had chosen to do so.
Perhaps the relationship between Judas Iscariot and Jesus throws some light on the relationship between God and the evil ones He uses to carry out His plans. Knowing what Judas intended to do, Jesus hid this fact from His other disciples, told Judas to do quickly what he intended to do, and then went to the Garden where the betrayer could sell out for 30 pieces of silver.
The human heart needs no divine assistance to think about and carry out evil. All that is required is opportunity and a lack of restraint. An evil plan doesn't originate from God, but He may allow or even intervene to bring about circumstances favorable to the execution of the plan--as long as it accomplishes His purposes.
We can be certain that nothing can happen to us without passing through God's permissive will, and that He can bring about good through it (Rom. 8:28). With that assurance, we can live trustingly and hopefully, no matter what our circumstances.
When doubts come, we can, like Job, talk to God about them with candor and honesty. As we grow to know Him better, we will see more and more clearly how great and good He is. We will also see how small and sinful we are. Finally, we will end all our complaining and say with Job, "I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees You. Therefore, I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes" (42:5-6).
God is sovereign. He is completely in control at all times. And those who know Him look forward to the day when they will join all the inhabitants of the universe to sing, "Blessing and honor and glory and power be to Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, forever and ever!" (Rev. 5:13).
HUMAN FREEDOM.
Under God's sovereign oversight, we are also free moral agents. We can and do choose between right and wrong, between good and evil. The Bible says that man was created in God's image and therefore possesses abilities and responsibilities not shared by any other earthly creatures.
We have a unique level of understanding.
We have a unique ability to make moral choices.
We have a unique capacity to consciously place the interests of others ahead of our own; to love with the kind of love God has.
Our uniqueness can be seen clearly when we consider our ability to respond to our Lord's summary of the Law and Prophets: to love God above all and to love our neighbor as ourselves (Mt. 22:37-40).
As human beings we can first of all understand what these commands mean. We can evaluate their implications for our daily lives. We do not need much education or intelligence to do this.
Second, as human beings we can choose whether or not we will take these commands seriously. If we make the right choice and find that we cannot do so perfectly, we can choose to seek God's forgiveness and enablement.
Third, we can, with God's help, place the interests of others above our own. People sometimes go to great lengths and personal sacrifice to help those for whom they have no natural affection. Some have even given their lives for enemies. This is not true of the animal world, which has not been made in the likeness of God.
Since human beings are able to understand God's commands, we can choose whether or not to take them seriously. And since we have been given the ability to deliberately place the desires of others before our own, we are responsible when we do things that are ungodly, cruel, immoral, and selfish. Therefore, we have no right to blame God for our sins. Nor can we blame Him when someone wrongs us or perpetrates a terrible crime. Most human suffering is caused by people wronging other people. It is the result of wrong choices by people who could have done better.
Even though God is not surprised by our misuse of freedom, He enters emotionally into our failure. When He confronted Adam and Eve after they had sinned, He reflected disappointment as He called out to them, "Where are you?" (Gen. 3:9). Later He pled with Cain to resist his evil desire to kill Abel (4:6-7), but it was to no avail. A few chapters later, God observed that people had become so terribly wicked that He was "sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart" (6:6).
We ask, "God was sorry? Didn't He know what would happen?" But Moses felt no need to explain. A few thousand years later, about 1500 BC, God was repeatedly grieved and disappointed by the Israelites, a nation of people He had miraculously delivered out of slavery in Egypt. He had great plans for this nation. He told them He wanted to make them a "special treasure," "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation" (Ex. 19:5-6). He promised them that if they would obey Him they would be "blessed above all peoples," and said He would "take away from [them] all sickness" (Dt. 7:12-16). Through the Israelites, God desired to make Himself known to the surrounding pagan nations. But they would not comply with the terms of obedience that would have made them "a light to the Gentiles" (Acts 13:47).
How did God feel when His people disobeyed Him and brought all kinds of trouble on themselves? He was angry (Ps. 95:8-11). He suffered with them and felt sorrow: "In all their affliction He was afflicted . . . . But they rebelled and grieved His Holy Spirit" (Isa. 63:9-10). He felt like a loving husband does when his wife becomes unfaithful and refuses to change her ways until he has no choice but to divorce her: "How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, Israel? . . . My heart churns within Me" (Hos. 11:8). He felt like a kind father does when his children are disrespectful and ungrateful: "A son honors his father . . . . If then I am the Father, where is My honor?" (Mal. 1:6).
The New Testament also portrayed God as disappointed, grieved, and frustrated. Jesus "came to His own, and His own did not receive Him" (Jn. 1:11). He repeatedly announced to the Israelites that He was the Messiah promised in the Old Testament. He performed miracles as evidence of the truthfulness of His claims, but He was hated, maligned, rejected, and finally crucified as a blasphemer. Matthew showed us how much this disappointed Jesus Christ, and how grieved He was as He contemplated the judgment that would fall on the generation that rejected Him:
O Jerusalem, Jerusalem . . . ! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! See! Your house is left to you desolate (Mt. 23:37-38).
Luke portrayed Jesus approaching the city near the close of His earthly ministry, weeping over it, and saying:
If you had known . . . the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you when your enemies will . . . surround you . . . and level you, and your children within you, to the ground . . . because you did not know the time of your visitation (Lk. 19:42-44).
Remember, when you see and hear Jesus in the Gospels you are looking at and listening to God. He said, "He who has seen Me has seen the Father" (Jn. 14:9). Think of what this means! Are you heartsick and distressed by the wickedness, injustice, pain, and sorrow around you? So is God! Are you heartbroken because you are being wronged? Do you wonder why God is allowing this grief? If so, be assured that an evil person or evil people are doing this to you. God isn't leading them to do these wrongs. He hates to see you wronged. He feels your grief. He holds the person or people wronging you responsible for what they are doing. And He is able to bring eternal good for you out of this bad experience (Ps. 42). Therefore, quit blaming God. Pray to Him. Trust Him. Take whatever appropriate action is open to you. Then wait for God to prove Himself faithful.
As we confront life with its pleasures and its pains, its beauty and its ugliness, its goodness and its evil, we hold to two truths: (1) our good God is absolutely in control, and (2) we are free moral agents who can choose to accept or reject God's assistance in dealing with right and wrong. All too often we make the wrong choices. When we do, we grieve and disappoint God. But He is never surprised or worried. He is firmly in charge. He can and He does use even the sin of those who rebel against Him to chasten His people when they are disobedient, to punish the wicked, and to accomplish His purposes.
Sometimes God doesn't intervene as we might wish He would. He lets wicked people prosper while allowing godly men and women to suffer. A poet in Israel had this problem, and expressed it in the opening verses of Psalm 73. But he changed his attitude after going to the temple to worship God. There he saw life from the perspective of eternity. Thinking of the prospering wicked, he understood their end. He saw them "in slippery places," confessed his shortsightedness, and affirmed his confidence in God's goodness and power. "You will guide me with Your counsel, and afterward receive me to glory" (v.24).
The prophet Habakkuk was also troubled by God's failure to punish the wicked in Israel. He called the Lord's attention to their wickedness. God told His servant that judgment was coming. The Babylonian armies would soon invade the land. This puzzled the prophet. Why help the Babylonians, a wicked and cruel people more godless and cruel than the Israelites? God then assured the prophet that He would also punish them in His own time. The prophet finally felt so confident about God's goodness and power that he closed his book with a hymn of praise and trust (Hab. 3:17-19).
The prophet Ezekiel, who was among the exiles after Babylon defeated the kingdom of Judah, was God's mouthpiece to tell the Lord's people that though they had "defiled" the land with their sin and "profaned" God's name wherever they went, they would one day repent, be cleansed, receive a new heart, and fulfill their destiny (Ezek. 36:16-38). He assured them that God is completely in charge.
When God came to earth in the person of Jesus Christ and presented Himself as Israel's promised Messiah, He was rejected and crucified. But God was not dismayed. He, of course, had known this would happen. He made Christ's crucifixion and resurrection the means of salvation and eternal glory for all who would believe. A little more than 7 weeks after our Lord's death and resurrection the apostle Peter summed up this amazing truth:
Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a Man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs which God did through Him in your midst, as you yourselves also know--Him, being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death; whom God raised up, having loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that He should be held by it (Acts 2:22-24).
Although people acted freely when they rejected and crucified the Son of God, they were not in charge of the universe. God was, and He used their rebellion to accomplish His goal.
The classic picture of God's sovereignty over man's rebellion is found in Psalm 2. It opens with a confederacy of nations in rebellion against God. They rage against Him and declare that they will break loose from His chains. But the Supreme Ruler does not feel threatened. He laughs in derision at the puny little kings. His laughter quickly turns to anger as He tells these rebels that He has already installed His Son as King. Then, warning these earthly rulers against continued rebellion, He urges them to serve Him with fear and surrender to His Son.
Human beings are free to oppose or to accept God. But God is completely in control. Nothing can happen unless He permits it. And in the end He will abolish all evil, right every wrong, and give those who trust Him an eternity of unmixed joy. That's comforting!
Here are your answers, reamond.
Now, as to evolution, how can something come from nothing? Everything in the world goes from order to chaos, not the other way around.
I have provided the people here with quite a bit of historical evidence that you seem to want to just dismiss, reamond. It just goes to show how closed minded you really are.
In Christ,
Rick
HE IS RISEN!!!!!
"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I do not accept His claim to be God." That is one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic....or else he would be the devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to."
C.S. Lewis: "Mere Christianity"
I can never remember how to make a link, so you will have to cut and paste it.
In Christ,
Rick
HE IS RISEN!!!
"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I do not accept His claim to be God." That is one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic....or else he would be the devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to."
C.S. Lewis: "Mere Christianity"
posted on April 10, 2004 10:14:28 PM new
Here is some information reamond "forgot" about the foundations of the United States:
WISE AND LEARNED MEN WHO BELIEVED IN A CREATOR
- IMPACT No. 271 January 1996
by Dorothy E. Kreiss Robbins*
What did the wise and learned men who founded the greatest republic in the world (the U.S.A.--the most free and prosperous for over 200 years), believe about the beginning of this universe? Were they evolutionists? Were they theistic evolutionists?
Never has the world seen so many men of such great learning and sagacity engaged in a work over such a long time span (150 years) with such a wide and benevolent influence. These men, whose erudition gained them respect in the courts of the kings of Europe, whose writings have astonished the world, did they believe in a Creator and a creation? Emphatically, yes! They were believers in a Creator: the God of the Bible. The few quotations gathered here must forever refute the proposition that learned men cannot believe in the creation of the universe by a wise, benevolent, and intelligent being: Jehovah God.
Let us begin with the reputed discoverer of this hemisphere, Christopher Columbus (1451-1506). Columbus had great learning in many sciences and was also well acquainted with the Scriptures. In a prayer taken from a letter to the sovereigns of Spain, dated October of 1492, we read: "O Lord, Almighty and everlasting God, by thy holy Word Thou hast created the heaven, and the earth, and the sea. . . ." And later, "(May you) . . . be well received before the eternal Creator, to whom I pray. . . ." (Las Casas' abstract of Columbus' Journal of the First Voyage.)[1]
Kay Brigham says, "The Admiral writes in his letter to the nurse of Prince John (1501): 'My hope in the One who created us all sustains me; . . .' She writes further, '. . . (T)he Holy Scriptures inspired the Discoverer to execute the idea with a sense of mission (and strength). Others had dreamed, but Columbus followed through and realized . . . the discovery of the marvelous Americas (unknowingly) . . . (and) the expansion of Christianity to 'Other Worlds.'"[2]
John Calvin (1509-1564), of whom it was said: "(He) was the founder of the greatest of republics. The 'Pilgrims' . . . were his sons . . . and that American nation which we have seen growing so rapidly boasts as its father the humble reformer on the shores of (Lake) Leman."[3] He, who was one of the greatest intellects that ever lived, whose influence is still felt throughout the world, wrote: ". . . God was pleased that a history of the creation should exist-a history on which the faith of the church might lean without seeking any other God than Him whom Moses sets forth as the Creator and Architect of the world."[4]
The nation God raised up was, indeed, begun by men who knew who He is. William Bradford, the great leader of the Pilgrims (who wrote our founding document, the Mayflower Compact), is the third person in our anthology to whom we turn as proof of the Creator's being honored by those who founded our country.
William Bradford (1590-1657), Governor of the Pilgrims for 37 years, author of the famous history of the beginnings of our country, and learned in several languages, wrote: 'Though I am grown aged, yet I have had a longing desire, to see with my own eyes, something of the most ancient language, and holy tongue, in which the Law, and oracles of God were writ; and in which God, and angels, spoke to the holy patriarchs, of old time; and names were given to things, from the creation."[5]
Skipping hundreds who believed as these did in an Almighty Creator, we come now to those men most immediately influential in the laying of the foundations of our sovereignty as a nation. The following quotations will give us a better idea about our worthy progenitors. Consider first Sir William Blackstone (1723-1780). Mr. Federer tells us, "When scholars examined nearly 15,000 items written by the Founding Fathers from 1760 to 1805 . . . they found that Sir William Blackstone was quoted more than any other author except one," and then quotes Sir William thus: "(M)an, considered as a creature, must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator, for he is entirely a dependent being. . . . (I)t is necessary that he should in all points conform to his Maker's will. . . .[6]
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) (so well known he needs no introduction), said: "I believe in one God, the Creator of the Universe." March 9, 1790, in a letter to Ezra Stiles, p. 250.
Samuel Adams (1722-1803), "Father of the American Revolution," author of The Rights of the Colonists (the most systematic presentation of the American cause ever written and by whose suggestion Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence), stated: "In the supposed state of nature, all men are equally bound . . . by the laws of the Creator. . . ." He, Lieutenant Governor, was addressing the Massachusetts state legislature, 1794, p. 24.
John Quincy Adams (1767-1848), sixth President of the U.S.A. (so well educated he was only a boy of 14 when made secretary to the ambassador to Russia), said: "I see Him (Jesus Christ) explicitly and repeatedly announced, not only as having existed before the worlds, but as the Creator of the worlds without beginning of days or end of years." Written from London, December 24, 1814, p. 17.
Noah Webster (1758-1843), lexicographer and "Father of American Education," mastered 26 (!) languages to produce his American Dictionary of the English Language, therein defining creation and creature thus: "Creation . . . especially, the act of bringing this world into existence, Romans I. . . . Creature, . . . Every being besides the Creator, . . . "[7]
Edmund Burke (1729-1794), outstanding orator, author, and leader in Great Britain, defended the colonies in Parlament. "There is but one law for all, namely, that law which governs all law, the law of our Creator." p. 82.
Alexander Hamilton (1757-1804), signer of the Constitution and author of 51 of the Federalist Papers. "(L)iberty is a gift of the beneficent Creator."
Patrick Henry (1736-1799), five-time Governor of Virginia, whose "Give me liberty or give me death" speech has made him immortal, said: "It cannot be emphasized too strongly" nor too often that this great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions, but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. . . . " He defined religion, like many others of our Founders, thus: 'That religion, or duty which we owe to our Creator, and the manner of discharging it. . . ." pp. 288-289.
John Jay (1746-1829), first Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court: "We (by the Bible) enable (people) to learn that man was originally created and placed in a state of happiness, but, becoming disobedient, was subjected to the degradation and evils which he and his posterity have since experienced. The Bible will also inform them that our gracious Creator has provided for us a Redeemer, in whom all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. . . . "From an address as President of the American Bible Society, May 13, 1824, p. 318.
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), third President of the U.S.A., chosen to write the Declaration of Independence, said: "I have little doubt that the whole country will soon be rallied to the unity of our Creator, and, I hope, to the pure doctrines of Jesus also." He, too, recognized that it was the God of the Bible who founded our country when he said in his inaugural address in 1805: "I shall need, too, the favor of that Being in whose hands we are, who led our forefathers, as Israel of old, from their native land and planted them in (this) country." p. 323, 327, 332.
William Samuel Johnson (1727-1819), lawyer, signer of our Constitution, President of Columbia College for 13 years, in remarks to the graduating class of that college, said: "You have . . . received a public education . . . the better to serve your Creator and your country. . . . Your first great duties, . . . are those you owe to Heaven, to your Creator and Redeemer."
James Madison (1751-1836), our fourth President, was known as the "Chief Architect of the Constitution," and the original author and promoter of the Bill of Rights. In the Constitutional Convention he spoke 161 times. Madison said: "It is the duty of every man to render to the Creator . . . homage. . . ." and defined "religion" thus: "Religion ... the duty we owe our Creator." p. 410.
George Mason (1725-1792), the richest man in Virginia, American Revolutionary statesman, and member House of Burgesses, was the author of the Virginia Constitution and Virginia Bill of Rights. The first ten amendments to the Constitution "are practically his." He too stated that religion is "the Duty which we owe our Creator." "In his Last Will and Testament, (he) wrote: '. . . My soul, I resign into the hands of my Almighty Creator, whose tender mercies are over all His works. . . .'" p. 424.
Andrew Jackson (1767-1845), seventh President, lawyer, Congressman, U.S. Senator, Judge of Tennessee Supreme Court (in a letter to a couple on the bereavement of a child): "This charming babe was only given you from your Creator and benefactor. . . . We have one consolation that this babe is now in the bosom of its Savior." p. 309.
Not only individuals, but whole bodies of people capable of establishing a nation such as ours, were believers in the Creator and a creation.
The authors of the Declaration of Independence: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. That they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights. . . ." July 2, 1776. (Emphasis added.)
"We, . . . the people of Massachusetts (establish this Constitution [of Massachusetts, 1780. . . . ] Part I, Article II It is the right, as well as the duty, of all men in society, and at stated seasons, to worship the Supreme Being, the Great Creator and Preserver of the Universe." p. 429.
In closing this list of quotations (which is just a small sample of those that could be given), we come to one by that great Christian man, George Washington, found in his little book of personal prayers: "WEDNESDAY MORNING . . . Almighty and eternal Lord God, the great Creator of heaven and earth, and the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ; look down from heaven . . . in pity and compassion upon Thy servant, who humbly prostrate myself before thee, sensible of thy mercy and my own misery . . . take me unto thy protection this day, keep me in perfect peace, which I ask in the name and for the sake of Jesus. Amen." p. 659.
Can any honest and reasonable person now doubt that, not only have we progenitors whose faith in the Almighty Creator was very real, but that these same men had no compunction about acknowledging the same. Shall we do less?
*Dorothy E. Kreiss Robbins is the author of several books on the Christian History of the American Constitution, most recently You, Your Child, and the Constitution.
-- REFERENCES --
All quotations (noted thus: 'p.'), unless otherwise noted, are from America's God and Country Encyclopedia of Quotations, William J. Federer, Fame Publishers, Inc., 820 S. McArthur Blvd., Suite 150-220, Coppell, Texas, 75019-4214, 1994.
Kay Brigham, Christopher Columbus, Libros Clie, Galvani, 113, 08224 TERRASSA (Barcelona) Spain, 1990, p. 78.
Merle D'Aubigne, The History of the Reformation in Europe, quoted in Slater, Teaching and Learning America's Christian History, p. 172.
Calvins' Institutes (Beveridge), vol. 1, Eerdmans, 1953, p. 153.
William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation, edited by Samuel Eliot Morison, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1952, p. XXVIII.
Sir William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England, (1775), Philadelphia, J. P. Lippincott and Company, 1879, vol. 1, p. 39.
Webster's 1828 Dictionary.
"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I do not accept His claim to be God." That is one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic....or else he would be the devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to."
C.S. Lewis: "Mere Christianity"
posted on April 10, 2004 11:33:31 PM new
christiancoffee...look at your post above, and count how many quotes refer to a "creator" rather than "God"...most of them, and at how many refer to Jesus. Very few. You don't make a very good case that many of these were "Christian" by any normal definition...Now do some real research, and find out how many were Freemasons. Most were.
Linda: so then, you would not agree with the idea that those who are not Christian among us have "gone astray", correct?
___________________________________
[ edited by profe51 on Apr 10, 2004 11:50 PM ]
posted on April 11, 2004 10:27:29 AM new
Profe, I will research the free mason angle you are speaking of, but if you know anything about history, you would know when Creator is capitalized, is is normally in reference to the Christian God of the Bible.
But I will do as you say, and research in my old history books (I collect antiquarian books and ephemra, so I have quite a few references from the 1600's to the 1900's) and get back to you with what I discover.
Just what I needed, another assignment from a professor on top of my nursing classes and writing classes....lol.
In Christ,
Rick
Mark 16
"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I do not accept His claim to be God." That is one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic....or else he would be the devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to."
C.S. Lewis: "Mere Christianity"
posted on April 11, 2004 01:40:35 PM newProfe, I will research the free mason angle you are speaking of, but if you know anything about history, you would know when Creator is capitalized, is is normally in reference to the Christian God of the Bible.
I know a bit about history christiancoffee. Please don't presume to tell me what I should know. I am endlessly impressed with your collection of old books. Does your collection include any written by non-christians? If not, then I'd say your "research" will be somewhat biased. So far, although you've given us many quotes in threads like this one, I haven't seen you post much that comes from secular sources. Maybe while you're researching, you can come up with an answer to this question: If all the founders in your post really meant a Christian Creator, why did so few of them specify it?
John Adams
"Twenty times in the course of my late reading, have I been upon the point of breaking out, "This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it!"
Thomas Jefferson
The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter.
James Madison
Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise.
During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution.
As a student of history, I'm sure you're aware that "In God We Trust" did not appear on US Federal Currency until 1956, right after "under God" was added to the pledge. Those wonderful McCarthy years, when everybody was looking under their beds to see if a godless commie was hiding there.
Also, as a student of history, I'm sure you're aware that The Treaty of Tripoli, enacted by the Senate in 1797, said, in part:
The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion.
The treaty was written during the Washington administration, and passed during the Adams administration. It was read aloud in the Senate, and everybody recieved a printed copy. It was published in full in at least three known newspapers. There is no record of public outcry over this statement, nor is there any record of dissension or debate over the treaty. It passed unanimously.
Sorry, there just isn't a case to be made that all of the founders were clearly christian.
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[ edited by profe51 on Apr 11, 2004 01:41 PM ]
posted on April 11, 2004 03:40:42 PM new
a couple more....
Thomas Paine
"I would not dare to so dishonor my Creator God by attaching His name to that book (the Bible)." -- Thomas Paine
"Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and tortuous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness with
which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we call it the word of a demon than the word of God. It is a history of
wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize [hu]mankind." -- Thomas Paine, _The_Age_of_Reason_
"Of all the tyrannies that affect mankind, tyranny in religion is the worst."--Thomas Paine
George Washington
"The United States of America should have a foundation free from the influence of clergy."--George Washington,_2000_Years_of_Disbelief_, James A. Haught
misc.
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."--First Amendment to the U.S.A. Constitution
"One of the embarrassing problems for the early nineteenth-century champions of the Christian faith was that not one of the first six Presidents of the United States was an orthodox Christian"--The Encyclopedia Brittanica, 1968, p. 420
posted on April 12, 2004 09:17:34 AM new
Well it looks as though ChristianCoffee has a contradicted god. His god knows all, yet we have free will. So somehow, we can make a choice, yet his god has known what that "choice" would be through all eternity.
Again, either your god is not what you say he is, or we do not have free will.
Now, as to evolution, how can something come from nothing? Everything in the world goes from order to chaos, not the other way around.
Have you ever studies physics ? How can energy come from matter and how could matter come from energy ?
I have provided the people here with quite a bit of historical evidence that you seem to want to just dismiss, reamond. It just goes to show how closed minded you really are.
I have only dismissed your contradictions, baseless religious tracts, and miscontrued notions.
If you could provide historical and factual information about god, then in over 2000 years, you'd be the first.
posted on April 12, 2004 09:39:57 AM new
I wonder why christians have never wondered why god does not perform miracles anymore ?
I also wonder why these christian faith healers on TV are always "curing" people in the audience, but these healers somehow never get around to going into hospitals to heal everyone or anybody for that matter. Does it also mean that those who are not faith healed died were bad people and are going to hell ?
I also wonder why the christian religion, which is so attuned to god and the spirit world needs so much money. Why doesn't their god just take care of things. Wouldn't you think that an all powerful god would have provided for the material needs of his church a long time ago ? Isn't there some sort of annuity that god could have created so that they didn't need so much money ? Then it seems that the christians could spend more time doing the work of god instead of collecting money.
posted on April 12, 2004 09:55:25 AM new
I wonder why any faith healers are bald, they surely can correct their own baldness, considering the power they possess. Instead of continuing on with their ridiculous comb-overs.
posted on April 12, 2004 04:02:44 PM new
A readers response to The Federalists Easter Edition article:
"I could have very well done without this Easter edition, as a confirmed Diest, as was many 'Founding Fathers.' The greatness of this country does not lie in it's practice of the 'revealed' religion of Christianity, or any other organized religion, but in the resolve of the people to let Providence lead the way. Our Constitution is our 'Ten Commandments'."
Editor's Reply: Of those who wrote and signed the Constitution, twenty-nine were Episcopalians, nine Presbyterians, seven Congregationalists, two Lutherans, two Dutch Reformed, two Methodists, two Roman Catholics, one Quaker and one Deist - Dr. Benjamin Franklin, who stated during the debates at the Constitutional Convention, June of 1787: "We have been assured, Sir, in the Sacred Writings, that 'except the Lord build the House, they labor in vain that build it.' I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without his concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better than the Builders of Babel."
posted on April 12, 2004 04:27:49 PM new
Ok I found it, I think
The biggest box office numbers came from the movie Titanic, and this one was written a month ago:
Posted on Tue, Mar. 16, 2004
'Passion' rising toward box-office history
BY CARRIE RICKEY
Inquirer Movie Critic
The Passion of the Christ, the movie personally financed by Mel Gibson because no studio thought it commercially viable, could become the highest-grossing film in history.
By the end of business Sunday, the subtitled story of Jesus' final hours had grossed $264.5 million in the United States and Canada. The film opened Feb. 25.
"If The Passion continues on this trajectory, it's possible for it to surpass Star Wars [$461 million] and even Titanic [$600.8 million] as the domestic box-office champion of all time," said Paul Dergarabedian of Exhibitor Relations Inc., which tracks film revenue.
Hollywood's historic rankings are tabulated in non-inflation-adjusted dollars.
posted on April 12, 2004 05:33:03 PM newOf those who wrote and signed the Constitution
Nearly all he has listed were Deists. There was no Deist sect or church, these men may have attended any number of christian churches, but their beliefs as evidenced by their writings was that of Deists.
Jefferson attended a christian church every Sunday, but he denied the divinity of Jesus.
By the "editor's definition" of christianity, Jefferson was a christian, which by any standard, he was surely not.
Do note that the the American Taliban editor of the Federalist doesn't go beyond what sect these men were members of, he merely tries to misled the gullible religious right by listing the churches these men belonged to.
It is the same as those who go to Catholic services every Sunday but are divorced, practice birth control, are pro choice, and don't believe the Pope is infallible.
The editor of the Federalist will call them "Catholics", but in reality they are not.
edited to add-- and don't forget all the atheists that go to church every Sunday because they own the local car dealership, or real estate brokerage, or are an elected official.
posted on April 12, 2004 09:28:44 PM newIt is the same as those who go to Catholic services every Sunday but are divorced, practice birth control, are pro choice, and don't believe the Pope is infallible
OMG, your the closest I've come to that is an actual Remote Viewer (newest buzz word for psycic)
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"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known."- Carl Sagan
posted on April 13, 2004 06:21:07 AM new
Regarding the religious affiliation of the founders:
When I die, somewhere it will be recorded that I was baptized in the Roman Catholic Church. My objections to the church's silly dogma, and my rejection of the divinity of Jesus won't necessarily be remembered anywhere. Anybody who wants to make me out a good Cat'lick will be able to.
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posted on April 15, 2004 10:37:23 AM new
Prof, my book mix is about 60-40 in favor of religion. Why would it matter if I used religious sources as opposed to secular? Or are secular sources non-biased?
The book I am using now was first published in 1819, and I have the 2nd edition from 1823. It is titled "The Lives and History of the Signers of the decleration of Independence", published in Boston by phillips and Sampson.
reamond, your views continue to get stranger and stranger. You ask me for absolute proof, and yet you provide none yourself to dispute anything I have written. The Lord is not "a contradicted god" as you seem to contend. He is only contridicted in your silly mindset. It never ceases to amaze me how you will yet again try to use your vocabulary to confuse issues, when proof is right in front of your eyes.
As to God performing miracles, i see it quite often. I have only to look to my son to understand God's grace and willingness to answer the cries of His children.
Faith healers, the references must be to Benny Hinn, Kenneth Copeland, et al who are not preaching the Gosple of Christ: they have decided to twist and turn God's Word for their own ends, and it is a sad thing. When you hear Copeland say stupid things like "I could've died on the Cross", you know he is nothing more then a sick man. However, God does say that this will happen.
Read the parables in Matthew 13. That is a good place to start.
Gotta go to work again. be back on tonight, I hope.
In Christ,
Rick
Romans 5:8
"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I do not accept His claim to be God." That is one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic....or else he would be the devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to."
C.S. Lewis: "Mere Christianity"
posted on April 16, 2004 10:44:29 AM newYou ask me for absolute proof, and yet you provide none yourself to dispute anything I have written.
I am not the one making the assertion of gods and fairy tales. I have not asked for "absolute" proof. But I have asked for sound and rational expalnations for the stated contradictions about your god. You have offered no sound or even close to reasonable explanation of how it could ever be possible that we have free will and yet your god knows all.
The Lord is not "a contradicted god" as you seem to contend.
Not only is your god severely contradicted, but there is no sound and reasonable evidence that he even exists.
He is only contridicted in your silly mindset. It never ceases to amaze me how you will yet again try to use your vocabulary to confuse issues, when proof is right in front of your eyes.
It is not my "vocabulary". It is the honest and essential questions that have been asked and unanswered for centuries. You have offered no explanations, only silly allegories for the bible.
BTW and to repeat, these questions I have asked are not "mine", nor is the "vacabulary" mine. These questions I ask were first asked centuries ago by preachers of the gospel. They were intellectually honest enough to ask these questions.
The answer they received from the "faithful of christ" was to be murdered and anyone muttering these questions or harboring writtings about these questions was to be murdered by their fellow "christians" too.
The world be flat and the Sun do go 'round it !
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[ edited by profe51 on Apr 10, 2004 11:50 PM ]