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Ask the member of the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church AKA Interrogate the Catholic ;) — Page 7

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Post Praetorian said:

RicOlie_2 said:

DominicCobb said:

When I was a Catholic one of things that always confused me was how much we worship God. Like there's some sort of mindset that you absolutely must worship him and if you don't, you'll be punished. And I just feel this is at odds with how God is portrayed as a benevolent figure. If he loves everyone why should he care if they worship him or not. Narcissists usually aren't very nice. So how do you explain this?

 I would have to look that up...I know there's an explanation, but I can't think of it off the top of my head. Timdiggerm's answer is part of it though.

 If God were infinite love, would anything cause Him to reject a soul into an eternity of suffering?

Alternately, if God were a fact, should anything stop one from worshipping Him fully? For what might be more important than the worship of a being of infinite might?

 The first question is one I can't answer myself, because it's one of mine too. ;)

The second is basically what we believe as Catholics, though most of us do a pretty bad job at making worship such a priority. We believe that our sins can be forgiven in confession if we repent of them, so that is probably part of what causes us to slack off. The other part would be due to a lack of faith in God I guess.

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Post Praetorian said:

Do you consider that God might love every person equally?

 That is what I believe, yes. I don't claim to know how he judges us after we die or how strict he is or how many allowances he makes for those who didn't believe in him on earth.

Catholics do believe in something called a "Baptism of Desire" in which someone who is genuinely searching for the truth can get to heaven, even if they don't believe in God.

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Bingowings said:

Warbler said:

This is one of the reasons I can't get along very well with Bingo.   Not only do we see things very differently but instead of having reasonable debate he has to play devils advocate and post stupid things like the photo above and and nonsense like "The Devil isn't in the Bible either" and lots of other points nonsense that simply can't be understood by most people. 

BUT the Devil isn't in the Bible.

Even the word is cultural vandalism. It was the Gnostic word for the Biblical God of Eden.

He is illustrated looking like Pan and using Poseidon's trident.

It's Medieval Catholicism defaming it's old Gods by retconning all these other characters into one villain which suspiciously looks like other people's Gods.

I got no idea what you point here is and I don't care.  Darth_Ender linked to multiple verses of the Bible the mention the Devil and there are multiple passages that mention Satan.

Bingowings said:

I could say "you are blinded by tradition", "painfully provincial" or "ridiculously literally minded"

I suppose you could argue such.   I am a creature of habit and like traditions.   They are comforting to me.  If you want to end a tradition I very much like, you'll have to give a very good reason for doing so.  Since you are not the only to complain of me taking things to literally, I'd have to say you are probably right about that.    "painfully provincial" not sure exactly what you mean but you may be right about this too.

Bingowings said:

or accuse you of something totally unfounded like being a closeted homosexual.

Now you here you are way off base.   I am not attracted to men and have no desire to have any sort sexual relations with men.  It is that simple.  Also you being a accused of playing devils advocate is not totally unfounded.    It seems like every time I state an opinion on something you have to come in and take the opposite side.  And I am not the only one that thinks you play devils advocate.   

Bingowings said:

That would unfair right?

It is unfair to even slighlty imply that I am a closed homosexual just because I am a virgin and haven't gone on a date yet.   That was just low.  

Bingowings said:

You don't have to agree with me but just shrugging off what I'm saying because you can't be bothered to study the origins of your own religion is rather rude.

am I am so sure you have a done complete exhaustive non-biased  research or my religion instead of only focusing on the things that back up your claims about my religion.  yeah right.  

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RicOlie_2 said:


Catholics do believe in something called a "Baptism of Desire" in which someone who is genuinely searching for the truth can get to heaven, even if they don't believe in God.

 interesting, I did not know that.

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Jaitea said:

I posted this question in the atheist thread also, If God created us perfect and loves us all and has a paradise awaiting for us, why bother sending us to earth where we could be tainted by sin, why not create us and then be with Him?

J

 Well, tradition has it that God did that with the angels and some of them, led by Lucifer, rebelled against him. The main reason though is so that we can grow to love him on earth, and if we love him, then we will get to worship him in heaven. If we don't love him, he won't force us, so we "go to" hell. If we were already in heaven then the point of free will would largely be lost because we would not be able to choose not to worship him if we didn't want to...it's complicated and is something I have yet to wrap my head around.

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Bingowings said:

FauxRic said : I am saying they are both abnormal types of sexuality, however one is far worse than the other, and they are different types of abnormalities.

What you are saying is anything that isn't a normal is wrong and some abnormalities are just more wrong. Ergo my Godwin warning.

Homosexuality is my normal sexuality and almost everyone else I know isn't remotely interested in it because it's so day to day and commonplace the only perception of wrongness comes from people such as yourself and your clerics.

Opinions, opinions. You can't try to change my mind with your narrow-minded opinions. Sure, what I say may be narrow-minded too, and it could be considered opinion, but what makes my opinion less valid than yours? Because it is held by the minority?

FauxRic said :That is an opinion. The problem I see with personal belief as opposed to religion is that at least their is general consensus within a religion, but if everyone decides for themselves, who's to say that Johny can't live by the rule "survival of the fittest" and eliminate members of society he deems useless while Bob thinks there is nothing wrong with running around in the nude because that's how he was born? And why should dog being god in reverse give me pause for thought? That makes no sense.

Well of course it's an opinion. I thought about the subject, after reading around and through it and considering experience I formed a personal view of it. I didn't read an old book, watch a conjuring trick every Sunday and listen to what an old guy in a dress told me to think. You do realise Darwinian Evolution isn't a political movement and it doesn't work like that? 'Survival of the fittest" isn't a commandment it's an observation that in a certain environment organisms that have favourably adapted to it tend to pass on their genetic material more than those who don't. The massacre of all those Gnostics really did work you guys didn't it.

I said nothing about Darwin. I used the same term, but not the same way. Just because I have beliefs that you think are stupid doesn't mean that I am entirely stupid. I know what Darwinian evolution is, and what "survival of the fittest" means when it is used in that context. It may surprise you, but not all my religious beliefs are entirely based on the Bible or the Catholic Church. Many of them are supported by other evidence as well.

FauxRic said You have some good points there, but of course, being religious, I don't think those are the only reasons. I think that if there is a reason other than "God said so" or "its in the Bible", etc. then that sexual act is more wrong than it would be if it was only stated in the Bible or by the Church.

The Bible says selling your children and raping people if God tells you to is not just okay but a requirement. You have to obey God even when what he is telling you goes against the disgust response and the law. It's a nebulous, sometimes fun,collection of contradicting stories about a group of bronze age desert people. Some of which comes from older oral traditions which have nothing to do with those people. Expecting it to make practical sense in the modern context is bizarre.

Most of the rules he made for that bronze age people were due to their unwillingness to follow the truth, so God made many rules that don't apply today. We have moved beyond that now, but God had to make a stepping stone which was far more moral than other tribes' beliefs and rules before giving us a better law.

FauxRic said :Again, that is assuming that God doesn't exist and I don't think he can be conclusively proven to be real or unreal, unless through a supernatural experience. Even then it is only proven to that person and not everyone, so believe what you will, but hopefully you (and I think you do) realize that their isn't enough evidence against God that you can come in with your "superior intellect" and disprove him conclusively.

No it doesn't.

No what doesn't what?

Even if your model of God is 100% correct the book that conclusion is based on is written by bronze age people channeling their personal revelation about what he is telling them. It was then amended and edited and translated multiple times. It requires faith that those authors were telling the truth, that they were not insane, that their text hasn't been altered so much over time that no longer has the same meaning to derive that supposed truth from that data (even if it's true).

I don't need to make a leap of faith to see that consenting adults rubbing their genitals for pleasure in private is nothing at all like raping a child.

It was translated and I don't believe there aren't translational errors, but that is why I believe the Catholic Church is necessary, being an authority higher than the Bible.

Again, the only reason I was comparing pedophilia with homosexual sex acts, masturbation, etc. was because I believe they are all morally wrong sex acts, not because I believe there is the same degree of immorality between them.

FauxRic says : I was not comparing stealing cars to homosexuality, but rather making a point that it is possible, as Warbler mentioned, to love the sinner and not the sin. I was defending the fact that it is possible for Catholics to not hate homosexuals, but love them, and accept only their homosexual acts as wrong....

....Again, that is an opinion. I do not condemn you for opinions of yours I find very offensive, so please don't condemn me for my beliefs even if they seem outrageous.

I do not lump all sex acts I believe wrong into one. There are varying degrees of seriousness between them, and child rape is not the same thing as homosexuality or sex outside of marriage, as the latter two are much less serious (serious nonetheless in my opinion, but much less serious just as stealing a car is serious but is still far less worse than murder).

Again yes it is. It's a discussion board not a lab. You are doing it again. You are using the examples first of child rape and then car theft (you have later added murder in the name of Darwin and streaking to the mix) to equate with the wrongness you perceive in consenting adults rubbing their genitals in private for pleasure and then denying it. Really think about what you are typing, is this really the message you are trying send the readers of this thread? A person wishes to buy a car doesn't necessarily buy a car. A car owner is known by ownership of cars alone. So by saying you don't dislike the homosexual but don't like the homosexual acts that define them as homosexual is a logical paradox. If they didn't do those acts they wouldn't be homosexual. What you are saying is you don't want them to be homosexual, further you want them to conform to your standards and be Catholics and anything else is wrong.

First of all, you are completely missing the point of my analogies, and maybe take some time to think about my points, rather than repeating yourself over and over again so that I have to repeat myself as well. Really Bingowings, you are smarter than this. All you are doing is playing the devil's advocate and messing up my thread and I bet you aren't even trying to see the point of my analogies.

Also, I did not compare the "survival of the fittest" analogy to anything, so I am beginning to wonder if you are reading my posts before accusing me of things I didn't do. I was also not using that term in connection with Darwin, though that was not clear.

Homosexuals have tendencies to be attracted to their own gender, but they have not engaged in a homosexual act until they (a) have sex with someone of their gender, (b) marry someone of their gender, or (c) engage in some other "sex act" with someone of their gender. You can't say I'm not straight until I have sex with a girl because that would be ridiculous. Homosexuals can be homosexual WITHOUT ENGAGING IN HOMOSEXUAL SEX ACTS! Is that such a hard concept for you?! I'm fine with them being homosexual. God made them that way. However, I don't think they should engage in homosexual sex acts because they are homosexual. Just because I am physically able to have sex and am sexually attracted to women, doesn't mean I should go and try to have sex with every attractive woman I see. (I know you're terrible with analogies, so I'll explain that for you. What I mean is that just because you have a desire doesn't mean that you should follow through with it.)

Faux Ric said :The members of the Catholic Church are not perfect, and Church leaders (Popes, Bishops, et al.) have made mistakes--serious mistakes--in the past and present. That shouldn't be enough to discredit our religion though if that is what you believe.

I posted that in response to you saying the Church isn't a den of thieves.

Crime is a major part of what they do. It is my OPINION it is the major impulse behind the whole organisation and has been since medieval times. It has inspired and produced astonishing cultural artifacts. So did the British Empire but I'm glad it's not around much anymore.

Crime is a major part of what they do? Seriously Bingowings, just because there have been bad Church leaders doesn't mean that crime is a major part of their lives. I think that is a little bit of a generalization there, and perhaps you should stop being so judgmental when you criticize my religion and me for being judgmental of homosexuals et al.

Faux Ric said : It also isn't sustainable for older generations to have greater populations than younger generations (unless you kill off all the old people which is an acceptable solution for some people, but I would beg to differ).

Old people die eventually without any assistance, the planet doesn't get noticeably bigger though does it...? but every sperm is sacred.

 Not every sperm is sacred and that is not what we believe. On its own a sperm cell or an egg cell is just another cell. I believe that preventing them from combining to form a human life is wrong. Natural family planning is the alternative presented by the Catholic Church and others. This means that you control the number of children you have just as effectively (i.e. it has approximately the same failure rate as contraceptives like the pill) as you would be able to by using the pill or other popular contraceptives. Natural family planning involves abstaining from sex during the time the woman is fertile.

Just because Catholics believe that procreation of the human species is the primary purpose of sex doesn't mean that we believe that sex can never be for enjoyment or that it cannot be done when one partner isn't fertile. However, preventing sperm from reaching the egg is considered wrong. Again, I'm terrible at explaining some things, so maybe that doesn't make sense to you or you don't see the difference, but don't think that Catholics think everyone should produce the maximum number of children they can with their spouses.

And I'm not a fake Ric. :( I'm just a later version of him, and maybe not as good. But I'm not fake! *sniff*

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Bingowings said:

RicOlie_2 said:

The chances of sentient life existing elsewhere in the universe are pretty low. Even the universe has limits.

http://voices.yahoo.com/what-chances-intelligent-life-elsewhere-2295217.html

If the universe has limits the only ones we know about are the ones we can detect (the visible universe is almost certainly not all of it and it's accelerating away from us).

Organic material is everywhere. It coats comets, it's found inside meteors, it drifts between Galaxies in clouds bigger than our solar system it can be made very easily on any world where the conditions are right ("Billions and Billions" so sayeth the St Sagan).

Life elsewhere is almost a certainty.

The Church you belong to entertains this high probability.

Add deep time and the scale of the universe the chances of sentient life existing only on Earth are so low as to be barely worth considering. Though the chances of it existing on Earth are pretty low when I'm not here.

The word from Geneva is that distances between planets with advanced civilisations (digital watches etc) are so vaste that meeting them would be unlikely.

 My Church does not entertain a high probability of intelligent, extra-terrestrial life, but rather a possibility of such life existing. More recently, the scientific community seems to be leaning in favour of an only 0.01% chance of sentient extra-terrestrial life existing (as far as I am aware, anyway and I linked to an article earlier which stated that).

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So God makes people homosexual and then says, oh you can't have sex by the way.

Ludicrous.

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Bingowings said:

It's in those Bibles written after the Devil was made up because that's how they were translated.

Originally you have a talking snake, the Angel Satan, The Beast, The Tempter, The Great Dragon, The Abomination, The False Prophet etc but they weren't the same personage and they didn't look like this :

The devil doesn't have a body, so his physical appearance is irrelevant. Of course he doesn't/didn't look like that, so why bring that up?

What, or who, do you think references to the "Tempter", "Beast", "Serpent", "Abomination", etc. refer to? Who does the tempting if not a devil? By definition, Satan is an adversary or one who tempts. In certain books, such as the book of Job, Satan is portrayed as an individual. The story is a work of fiction, but it at least indicates that Satan was thought of as a person of some sort before Medieval or Renaissance times.

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TV's Frink said:

So God makes people homosexual and then says, oh you can't have sex by the way.

Ludicrous.

 *SPOILER ALERT*

Catholics don't believe that life is about sex.

*END SPOILER ALERT*

Since we believe in an eternal paradise after this world, what is eighty years without sex?

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I apologize for being a bit irritable in this thread today, but please understand that I face the same criticisms all over the internet and in person, and all people seem to be able to do is repeat themselves, ignore the point of the analogies I make, impress on me the idea that they know so much better than me and I am just an intolerant, self-righteous, stupid jerk. Maybe there's something in that, but do you really think I am going to ever see your point of view in a different light if the people who support homosexuality are so condescending, insulting, and spiteful in their tone? Even if I am doing the same (which I don't intend to if that is the case), don't you think you should prove to me how much better you are instead of degrading yourselves with the use of insults, condescension, and profanity?

Sorry for the rant and I apologize for my behaviour if I sound like a grump today.

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I don't think you need to apologize.  It's what I'm talking about.  Instead of "Ask[ing] the member of the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church," too many are telling you that you are wrong for believing what you do.  I wish I could find my reply to this, as I know I made one somewhere.  I talked about why we believe that sex is intended to be between man and woman.  It was concise but well put, IMHO, and I think I said it in such a way that it was understood not to be hateful but rather logical.  I feel there is far too much criticism being put in the wrong threads.  Duracell created a thread to debate the merits of such beliefs, and I think such would be best discussed there.

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Thanks darth_ender. :)

I agree that further discussion on the topic should take place between Duracell's thread, so as of now, only QUESTIONS about what I believe on the topic. No debates, criticisms, insults, etc. Thank you.

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RicOlie_2 said:

Post Praetorian said:

Do you consider that God might love every person equally?

 That is what I believe, yes. I don't claim to know how he judges us after we die or how strict he is or how many allowances he makes for those who didn't believe in him on earth.

Catholics do believe in something called a "Baptism of Desire" in which someone who is genuinely searching for the truth can get to heaven, even if they don't believe in God.

 Do you believe that God is unchanging in this love for all persons? To clarify: do you believe there might come a time when God might no longer love all living persons equally?

Additionally, is it your belief that God's love for an individual might change upon said individual's death? Or would it remain consistent regardless of physical state?

I was once…but now I’m not… Further: zyzzogeton

“It wasn’t the flood that destroyed the pantry…”

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RicOlie_2 said:

Post Praetorian said:

RicOlie_2 said:

DominicCobb said:

When I was a Catholic one of things that always confused me was how much we worship God. Like there's some sort of mindset that you absolutely must worship him and if you don't, you'll be punished. And I just feel this is at odds with how God is portrayed as a benevolent figure. If he loves everyone why should he care if they worship him or not. Narcissists usually aren't very nice. So how do you explain this?

 I would have to look that up...I know there's an explanation, but I can't think of it off the top of my head. Timdiggerm's answer is part of it though.

 If God were infinite love, would anything cause Him to reject a soul into an eternity of suffering?

Alternately, if God were a fact, should anything stop one from worshipping Him fully? For what might be more important than the worship of a being of infinite might?

 The first question is one I can't answer myself, because it's one of mine too. ;)

The second is basically what we believe as Catholics, though most of us do a pretty bad job at making worship such a priority. We believe that our sins can be forgiven in confession if we repent of them, so that is probably part of what causes us to slack off. The other part would be due to a lack of faith in God I guess.

Would worshipping a being of infinite might to the fullest extent possible necessarily allow one any respite from the task? Would not such worship fairly be required to be equally infinite in duration?

I was once…but now I’m not… Further: zyzzogeton

“It wasn’t the flood that destroyed the pantry…”

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 (Edited)

Secret origin.

Satan is an angel. He is the court prosecutor in heaven. He knows when you have been naughty and nice. He brings man to book and shows God our failings.

Michael is an angel. He is the court defense attorney in heaven. He brings man's virtues to God and they are weighed in the balance.

God has no adversary, he is all powerful.

These things were retconned over time to explain why bad things happen in medieval times.

Jews don't need such explanations.

God is all powerful if bad things happen God wants the bad things to happen.

They are only bad from our perspective not from God's.

All the other beings associated with Satan were never originally Satan.

Lucifer for example is literally the Morning Star (the Planet Venus) the light of which is banished by the Sun. It was a Roman pagan religious ornament woven into the early Christian church like the whole Osiris worship bag you guys have over Mary/Diana/Ishtar.

It's mashed up and recombined space opera.

It's Paganism the special edition.

The Devil isn't in the Bible. Totally separate things are labelled Devil which is a word that doesn't exist in the original text.

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darth_ender said:

I don't think you need to apologize.  It's what I'm talking about.  Instead of "Ask[ing] the member of the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church," too many are telling you that you are wrong for believing what you do.  I wish I could find my reply to this, as I know I made one somewhere.  I talked about why we believe that sex is intended to be between man and woman.  It was concise but well put, IMHO, and I think I said it in such a way that it was understood not to be hateful but rather logical.  I feel there is far too much criticism being put in the wrong threads.  Duracell created a thread to debate the merits of such beliefs, and I think such would be best discussed there.

Maybe if in answering he didn't make astonishing comparisons between my poor sexuality and criminal behaviour or made up bullshit like it can be cured (if indeed it should be) he wouldn't get any such posts from me.

But he is wrong and when he is so astonishingly wrong in the context of talking about such a troubled organisation as the one he starts a thread to proclaim about I will not sit on my hands.

I can see why you stick together though.

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RicOlie_2 said:

I apologize for being a bit irritable in this thread today, but please understand that I face the same criticisms all over the internet and in person, and all people seem to be able to do is repeat themselves, ignore the point of the analogies I make, impress on me the idea that they know so much better than me and I am just an intolerant, self-righteous, stupid jerk. Maybe there's something in that, but do you really think I am going to ever see your point of view in a different light if the people who support homosexuality are so condescending, insulting, and spiteful in their tone? Even if I am doing the same (which I don't intend to if that is the case), don't you think you should prove to me how much better you are instead of degrading yourselves with the use of insults, condescension, and profanity?

Sorry for the rant and I apologize for my behaviour if I sound like a grump today.

 Consider only a contrast that might assist in clarifying the tone derived by others on this subject:

Should you, as a good and loving Catholic, encounter an entity that might suggest you to be neither good, nor loving--based solely on the evidence of your Catholic leanings (teachings which have been with you since your earliest memory)--would you be capable of agreeing with said entity regardless of its kind rationale?

In essence, would not the suggestion that homosexuality might be considered aberrant to an infinite being (punishable by an eternal torment) while at the same time considering said being to be one's own personal protector and comfort create any response other than that of antipathy?

To clarify, were one here to call out a belief that all Catholics necessarily must be ashamed and expect an infinitude of just torment in a future realm--while at the same time seemingly showing little concern for such necessary eventualities--could one such as yourself resist the temptation to clarify your own position on the matter? Would not a silence on your part serve as an affirmation of the statement?

Kindly do not take offense at my interjection as it is my purpose to learn your thoughts and not to belittle them. It is merely my hope that an understanding and a peace might be brokered on this issue that might better reflect the seemingly kind intentions of the majority here on both sides. Rarely have such opposing philosophies been debated so respectfully on an internet forum. I appreciate the effort this takes and hope that it may remain such.

I was once…but now I’m not… Further: zyzzogeton

“It wasn’t the flood that destroyed the pantry…”

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Bingowings said:

Secret origin.

Satan is an angel. He is the court prosecutor in heaven. He knows when you have been naughty and nice. He brings man to book and shows God our failings.

Michael is an angel. He is the court defense attorney in heaven. He brings man's virtues to God and they are weighed in the balance.

God has no adversary, he is all powerful.

These things were retconned over time to explain why bad things happen in medieval times.

Jews don't need such explanations.

God is all powerful if bad things happen God wants the bad things to happen.

They are only bad from our perspective not from God's.

All the other beings associated with Satan were never originally Satan.

Lucifer for example is literally the Morning Star (the Planet Venus) the light of which is banished by the Sun. It was a Roman pagan religious ornament woven into the early Christian church like the whole Osiris worship bag you guys have over Mary/Diana/Ishtar.

It's mashed up and recombined space opera.

It's Paganism the special edition.

The Devil isn't in the Bible. Totally separate things are labelled Devil which is a word that doesn't exist in the original text.

 Clearly you have well researched this topic. Might I inquire after your own (present or former) religious convictions?

I was once…but now I’m not… Further: zyzzogeton

“It wasn’t the flood that destroyed the pantry…”

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TV's Frink said:

So God makes people homosexual and then says, oh you can't have sex by the way.

Ludicrous.

 Why might you consider so?

Is it not purportedly the same god that might allow an individual to be born without sight or hearing? Would such a being necessarily consider foremost the frustrations such limitations might impose upon an individual who might prefer a less tortured existence?

Further, are there not still others born who might be unable to engage in sex of any sort? Might it not be considered that sex might be less important to a god than to a man?

I was once…but now I’m not… Further: zyzzogeton

“It wasn’t the flood that destroyed the pantry…”

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RicOlie_2 said:

Bingowings said:

RicOlie_2 said:

The chances of sentient life existing elsewhere in the universe are pretty low. Even the universe has limits.

http://voices.yahoo.com/what-chances-intelligent-life-elsewhere-2295217.html

If the universe has limits the only ones we know about are the ones we can detect (the visible universe is almost certainly not all of it and it's accelerating away from us).

Organic material is everywhere. It coats comets, it's found inside meteors, it drifts between Galaxies in clouds bigger than our solar system it can be made very easily on any world where the conditions are right ("Billions and Billions" so sayeth the St Sagan).

Life elsewhere is almost a certainty.

The Church you belong to entertains this high probability.

Add deep time and the scale of the universe the chances of sentient life existing only on Earth are so low as to be barely worth considering. Though the chances of it existing on Earth are pretty low when I'm not here.

The word from Geneva is that distances between planets with advanced civilisations (digital watches etc) are so vaste that meeting them would be unlikely.

 My Church does not entertain a high probability of intelligent, extra-terrestrial life, but rather a possibility of such life existing. More recently, the scientific community seems to be leaning in favour of an only 0.01% chance of sentient extra-terrestrial life existing (as far as I am aware, anyway and I linked to an article earlier which stated that).

 Kindly note only that said article, having been written in 2008, was initiated prior to a time when the scientific community was to witness the wholesale cache of worlds latently discovered over the course of the past 4 years: a spectacle that has proven far more optomistic than most had previously considered possible.

I was once…but now I’m not… Further: zyzzogeton

“It wasn’t the flood that destroyed the pantry…”

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Warbler said:

Bingowings said:

or accuse you of something totally unfounded like being a closeted homosexual.

Now you here you are way off base.   I am not attracted to men and have no desire to have any sort sexual relations with men.  It is that simple.  Also you being a accused of playing devils advocate is not totally unfounded.    It seems like every time I state an opinion on something you have to come in and take the opposite side.  And I am not the only one that thinks you play devils advocate.   

Bingowings said:

That would unfair right?

It is unfair to even slighlty imply that I am a closed homosexual just because I am a virgin and haven't gone on a date yet.   That was just low.  

Bingowings said:

You don't have to agree with me but just shrugging off what I'm saying because you can't be bothered to study the origins of your own religion is rather rude.

am I am so sure you have a done complete exhaustive non-biased  research or my religion instead of only focusing on the things that back up your claims about my religion.  yeah right.  

But I didn't accuse of being homosexual. I accused you of not bothering to investigate what you believe in (which you went on to confirm with the quoted statement) and my research was initially as unbiased as probable because when when I was a child I used to believe the Christian myth entirely. Investigation removed that certainty.

My mother still does partially believe.

She doesn't believe all gay people are dirty and will burn in hell and all epileptic people are possessed by demons anymore after her son had to conclude he was both.

If I have a bias now maybe that's were it comes from.

She hopes to see my late father again in heaven something I don't have any desire to pull down but knowing the history of the formation of the Biblical texts and a basic understanding of science I can't believe in them as the literal truth.

You have to be blinkered to believe them literally.

As metaphor they send mixed signals.

It's the reason for the old truism about not talking about religion or politics.

The text can and has been interpreted in a myriad of ways to justify almost anything (most of which has been in my view and experience evil).

It's so nebulous and contradictory that it inevitably provokes division and sectarianism.

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RicOlie_2 said:

TV's Frink said:

So God makes people homosexual and then says, oh you can't have sex by the way.

Ludicrous.

 *SPOILER ALERT*

Catholics don't believe that life is about sex.

*END SPOILER ALERT*

Since we believe in an eternal paradise after this world, what is eighty years without sex?

 How convenient that you are allowed to have sex but others aren't.

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Post Praetorian said:

TV's Frink said:

So God makes people homosexual and then says, oh you can't have sex by the way.

Ludicrous.

 Why might you consider so?

Is it not purportedly the same god that might allow an individual to be born without sight or hearing? Would such a being necessarily consider foremost the frustrations such limitations might impose upon an individual who might prefer a less tortured existence?

Further, are there not still others born who might be unable to engage in sex of any sort? Might it not be considered that sex might be less important to a god than to a man?

 I do not believe that there is a god that does these things.  I am challenging the beliefs of others.

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Post Praetorian said:

RicOlie_2 said:

Post Praetorian said:

Do you consider that God might love every person equally?

 That is what I believe, yes. I don't claim to know how he judges us after we die or how strict he is or how many allowances he makes for those who didn't believe in him on earth.

Catholics do believe in something called a "Baptism of Desire" in which someone who is genuinely searching for the truth can get to heaven, even if they don't believe in God.

 Do you believe that God is unchanging in this love for all persons? To clarify: do you believe there might come a time when God might no longer love all living persons equally?

Additionally, is it your belief that God's love for an individual might change upon said individual's death? Or would it remain consistent regardless of physical state?

 I believe that God has, and always will love everyone equally, no matter what. That is why I believe that non-Catholics who are searching for the truth can get to heaven. I don't believe God changes because God is in every point of time at once, so he can't change over time.