in regards to the government actions against religion by europe - i would state the following. when south africa was creating it's constitution in 1996 (under the ANC) - it was forced to omit 'in humble submission to the Almighty God' - even though at the time 70% of the population was christian. the UN and EU powers prefer these 'world conferences on religion and peace' that promote no religion at all so that no religion will take precidence. it works against itself and deletes God entirely. a trick, so to speak.
"Susan exposes herself" (if you'll all pardon the expression). What is so profoundly unacceptable and distasteful about the stance from which you write as you do here is its deliberate, shameless and unwelcome lack of true religious foundation; as in so many other instances that I have observed with such dismay as I can barely express to you, you once again prioritise one sector of the Christian religion (or a specific interpretation thereof, whichever way you or anyone else wants to take the manner in which you choose to express it) not only over atheism and agnosticism in all its forms and manifestations but also over all other religions wheresoever found, as though the only possible and credible God is the Christian one. Even as a non-Christian, I take the liberty to believe that Christ himself would have considered this narrow-minded fundamentalist viewpoint to be - er - remarkably un-Christian as well as deeply offensive and lacking in compossion toward all humanity INCLUDING devout Christians.
in place of laws that were once based on a biblical premise
...which existed only in that relatively small geographical area of the world where such premises originated and were for a short time manifest many years ago in an utterly different set of circumstances to those which pertain anywhere today...
(such as murder with cain and abel)
You make it sound like a television game show...
we are moving fast towards ALL humanistic laws. that means humans decide what is good and evil. so, that is why we have anti-biblical principles set up as law and protected:
Leaving aside the extent to which Biblical laws were ever intended to apply either to people outside the areas in which they were designed or to anyone anywhere in eras far removed from Biblical times, why, logically speaking, would the decisions of human lawmakers necessarily be by definition "anti-Biblical"? - after all, do not forget that some of these human lawmakers are Christians...
abortion, pornography, videotaping people without knowledge, wire-tapping, homosexual marriages, gambling, etc.
Now we're being very conveniently selective here, are we not?! - not to mention at the same time severing all conceivable reality-based connection with anything that can credibly be described as "Biblical law"; videotaping and wire-tapping aren't mentioned in the Bible, gambling is a relative term in the sense that most of us who undertake honest and legitimate work in the hope of being paid for it are gamblers to some degree, pornography as currently understood would be largely incomprehensible to people in the Middle East in Biblical times and I'm not sure that the Bible is especially proscriptive about abortion (in legal terms of what is and is not acceptable or for what reason or to what deadlines) or homosexual marriages (which, in any case, are not yet legalised in all countries in Europe, let alone globally).
now, i realize that this sets people off
So it does - although not so much as it seems to set YOU off first...
but truly - if you have one standard for law and then switch to another - basically - you are saying the old is obsolete.
So - do you advocate immutable laws for all at all times and for all time, then? - for, if you do, your stance is tantamount to implying that all human develoment is evil and a contravention of such laws; in such circumstances, were they to pertain universally, we'd never have any pianos...
we are entering a 'new age.' is it the 'age of aquarius'... or the age of satan? i think satan.
Well, you would, because you cannot seem to - or just won't - step outside this depressingly narrow fundamentalist Biblical mindset to which you adhere as if somehow superglued thereto.
from the bible we are told that 'he (the world government or beast power) will be fighting Jesus Christ at his return. 'these will wage war with the LAmb, and the Lamb will overcome them, because He is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those who are with Him are called and chosen and faithful....'
You just refuse, do you not, to recognise poetical imagery for what it is, as though it has become a habit of yours (which of course it long since has)...
didn't mendelssohn write 'why do the nations rage...and the people imagine a vain thing?'
No, he didn't; he set those words to music but he didn't compose them. One thing he did compose, however, was his magnificent String Quartet in F minor, Op. 80 - surely his greatest work of all - which is about as far from the glutinous sentimentalitarian posturings of his
Elijah and other similar cod-religious stuff that he (of Jewish origin, please note) turned out with ease and undeniable technical brilliance as crowd-pleasers for revoltingly complacent establishment-"Christian"-English Victorian stick-in-the-muds as it was possible to get in those far-off days; almost his final work, it was written not so much in sorrow as in anger at the death of his beloved sister and it has a raw emotional power and energy that, whilst obviously owing no small debt to the example of Beethoven's Op. 95 Quartet in the same key, was perhaps never to be encountered in string quartet writing again until Bartók.
this is the times that we live - being fulfilled, imo. the 'mark of the beast' is one of the signs of worshipping this world system. and, if you don't worship it - you will not be able to buy or sell. revelations 13:7 'and it was given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them; adn authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him. and all who dwell on the earth will WORSHIP him, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the earth in the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain....'
i have no idea if this mark is buying and selling through the computer - but, it is a way that the world system can be one. i'm not saying to junk the computer - but to think about how you can avoid the mark in your 'hand and forehead' that you will either be able to buy or sell with - or avoid and then be stuck with some consquences that faith can help you out of. the name of the beast or number of his name will be used. (rev 13:17) sounds like a password and a willingness to give up national sovereignty and identity for a new one that is worldwide.
btw, i believe the lands of britain and usa have already been 'parceled' so to speak. i just can't prove it. we have a lot of foreign spies that set their sights on many pieces of property. the un - for instance - already has access to many military facilities doesn't it?
Susan, may I remind you once more (for what I despairingly fear will be of no use whatsoever) that this thread is about PATRIOTISM?
i'm agree with you, alistair, about being careful to use the word 'proud' in the right context - and frankly i can understand the canadians preference to stay in canada. although the usa is still the place for me. i suppose i'll stay here and wait for the signal 'one if by land, two if by sea' and shoot any invading people in the kneecaps. after all, just because some of us are christians doesn't mean we are sitting ducks.
I've no idea what that "signal" of which you write is supoposed to mean, but I'll bear in mind that since you, as an American, have the right to arm bears (as our these days almost always absent "ada" would put it), I'll probably give PA as wide a berth as I can, since even though my kneecaps are not physically essential to my work at the composition desk, I would still prefer to preserve them intact, if it's all the same to you...
Best,
Alistair
Topic: How patriotic are you?