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"The Pope and Natural Law"

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Tue 02/02/10 at 13:59
Moderator
"possibly impossible"
Posts: 24,985
As you may have seen, the current Pope, Benedict XVI, is taking what many see as a bit of a step backward in declaring the UK's potential law on Equality to be against the Church's best interests.

While he's not slamming the law itself, he has accused it of making the Catholic church unable to continue without accepting gay people and women into the positions it has previously maintained that they shouldn't be in.

Now it's important to understand the history of this before going straight for the throat and accusing the Pope of sexism, it's pretty important to the Church historically not to have women priests and they've only really just come around to accepting gay people.

Not that it comes from the bible anyway, but then a lot of the things in the bible have been mis-translated (having 3 kings at the crib for instance, there is no mention of number or of royalty) including gay relationships (which were around at the time and no-where in the bible explicitly says anything against them).

Does it surprise me? No. The current Pope (and most of the Vatican it seems) is very old fashioned and believes that this point of view will save the church rather than anything more forward thinking.

So, thoughts, comments? Does he have any point at all or is Pope Benedict just going with the current consensus of the Vatican?
Fri 05/02/10 at 16:50
Regular
Posts: 9,995
pb wrote:

> The Old Testament has 3 small bits in the whole of the scriptures
> that say something about it being immoral (and that's if you
> translate it one way instead of another) and there are an equal
> amount of them eluding to homosexual relationships that are
> fine.

I think the whole abomination thing is pretty clear enough to sum up God's feelings on the subject. It's also quite funny that you elude to alledged homosexual relationships as if their status as gay relationships is as unequivocal as the written view on homosexuality.

> The main problem is not picking or choosing bits from the bible,
> it's translating from the ancient Hebrew or Greek, with some
> phrases being unclear.

Although every time it is translated, that bit of scripture seems to be translated into something extremely similiar?
Wed 03/02/10 at 15:59
Regular
"How Ironic"
Posts: 4,312
The greatest question that i want answered is where did it all start, and where will it finish? You don't have to be religious to contemplate why we're here, so any suggestions?
Wed 03/02/10 at 10:19
Regular
Posts: 19,415
Unfortunately even if aliens could tell us they've evolved over millions of years, christians still wouldn't accept it. That leaves us with two impossible options. Have another god tell us we're doing it wrong or invent a time machine and go back and see for ourselves.

There is a third option though and that is to just accept that many thousands of years before Jesus, man was already creating religions and beliefs in every single civilization around the world.
Wed 03/02/10 at 09:38
Moderator
"possibly impossible"
Posts: 24,985
But nowhere in the Bible does it mention other planets with life-forms not existing.

Surely the biggest clue to the existence/non-existence of a specific God would be to compare notes with the aliens (assuming they don't shoot first and ask questions later)
Wed 03/02/10 at 09:09
Regular
Posts: 19,415
In alien invading movies, why do they show people turning to god? As far as he is concerned they don't exist. So if we ever get invaded in the future, I better not catch you praying in church Jason. I want you in the first suicide air strike. Just fly into the centre of the mothership, that's where they keep their shield generator.
Wed 03/02/10 at 09:01
Moderator
"possibly impossible"
Posts: 24,985
Ghosts go hand in hand with Religion, you only need to read Hamlet to see this.

In fact, the C of E have a big spiritualist following. Certainly makes sense if you think about some of the ideas of what ghosts are, if they're trapped spirits waiting to pass over to the afterlife then there has to be an afterlife and that implies that there is a God, likewise the Catholic Church is still actively carrying out Exorcisms and there are Catholic priests in the UK who are registered Exorcists.

The other thing to consider is to separate out 'Church' and Religion, where Church is taken to mean the body of people who run the current Church. You can be religious and follow the bible without following the 'Church'. And if you look at all the popular western religions they all stem from the same set of scriptures originally, with different interpretations splitting them, sometimes even the smallest of ideas causing splits.

Monty Python's Life of Brian is a very clever film for showing how this worked in a very simple way and I think it's probably this that the Archbishop of the time was most scared of. I mean, if they were to ban it then it just shows how little faith the Church puts in the followers own faith and ability to separate a parody from what they consider to be the real story. Beside this, the film raises some very good points of discussion and I believe this is healthy.

and Machie - yes, I remember the debate, I thought this topic might raise some more and encourage people to post, hence posting it now.
Wed 03/02/10 at 08:41
Regular
"@optometrytweet"
Posts: 4,686
I am pretty much agnostic - although hold many Christian values.

I don't go to church, although sometimes feel a draw to it (albeit that I would only be attending a C of E church). With my "Ghostie Stuff" as many like to poke fun at, how can I fully believe everything in the Bible, or what Christianity teaches.

Religions should be allowed to evolve, but at the same time I don't believe it should be bullied. Sexist as they may be (or have been) the Church have their own age old rules and traditions. If you don't like their values and feel it is wrong, perhaps it is not the denomination of that religion for you.

The Government/Society will pick on the church rather than any other religion in the UK because generally they concede. As Jimmy Carr says, "what's the worse they'd do, hold a fete?". If the government narked off Muslims for instance, our relationship with them is already tempermental across the country and wouldn't dare forcing them to open up.

I recently bought a Bible, so may give it a read soon!
Tue 02/02/10 at 23:39
Regular
Posts: 19,415
Some of you are too young to remember that Christianity thread on SR, boy that was one hell of a debate.

I'm a fan of science fiction so I'm not religious. I share Gene Roddenberrys vision of the future, where we are all atheist/agnostic and shops open on a sunday.

I don't really know what to say about this topic though. I mean are religions allowed to evolve? Will the pope of the future finally accept evolution, Harry Potter and the first alien priest?
Tue 02/02/10 at 22:03
Regular
"How Ironic"
Posts: 4,312
A very very commonly misplaced point is that the bible did not actually come directly from God's mouth. The bible is made up of books, originally of which there were hundreds. A few were selected, and formed the bible which we know today. So what did those other books say? Where other books that were left out exposing truth that people wouldn't like to hear? Are the books that were chosen actually true to the word of God? Another thing you have to question is the reliability of these books. These were written by people, chosen people at that, but still people. Biased could easily have found it's way into the foundation of christianity. There are too many factors to include, and it makes it a complicated subject to conclude on.

Way I look at it is, let people get on with their own lives. If god is going to punish homosexuals, then let them be. You can't preach at someone or punish someone if they don't follow your religion. There's a difference between understanding a religion, and actually following it. A-Level RE is great for this sort of stuff ;)
Tue 02/02/10 at 20:26
Moderator
"possibly impossible"
Posts: 24,985
Not really.

The Old Testament has 3 small bits in the whole of the scriptures that say something about it being immoral (and that's if you translate it one way instead of another) and there are an equal amount of them eluding to homosexual relationships that are fine.

The New Testament has nothing at all on the subject, and this is considered as the guide for Christianity, surpassing anything earlier.

The main problem is not picking or choosing bits from the bible, it's translating from the ancient Hebrew or Greek, with some phrases being unclear.

And if every Christian took the Old Testament as the law then all males would be circumcisd too. Now that's something to wince over!

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