Thursday, July 26, 2007

Max Blumenthal at Christians United for Israel Conference

This is kind of spooky.

My question for Senator Joe Leiberman: So when are you announcing your conversion to Christianity?

UPDATE: Oh, I almost forgot, what really disturbed me was the one lady who said that the way to identify the anti-christ is that he will be a charismatic man who will be a peacemaker! See how demented these people are? It's built into their religious belief that any charismatic person who tries to work towards bringing about peaceful resolutions to world conflicts is really evil.

8 comments:

Baconeater said...

That is real scary stuff. They basically want to make a huge middle east war a self fulfilling prophecy.

This is why governments need to stay secular.

Stardust said...

charismatic man who will be a peacemaker!

Gawd forbid that we should strive for peace. The God of Abraham hates peace. Look what happens to every good person in the Bible who is trying to be peaceful...they get made to endure hardship, lose their children, told to sacrifice their sons, and even nailed to a cross.

Nope...God of Abraham is a warmonger...Peaceful Christianity is as big of an oxymoron as Peaceful Islam. Just read their books.

Anonymous said...

He will "come as" a peacemaker, but of course will be anything but. In that context it makes sense.

In any case that lets that filty old war mongering, power grabbing George Bush out.

Right?

The Jolly Nihilist said...

Anybody who wants to create war, strife and conflict in order to fulfill idiotic, Iron Age prophecies ought to be thrown into the asylum where their idiocy cannot harm others.

Anonymous said...

Indeed.

It's good to know this group hates Islamic fascism even more than they do George Bush.

Tommykey said...

Where do you see Bush hatred on this blog Bedrock?

I will condemn him when I feel he deserves it and give him kudos when I feel he has earned them.

Anonymous said...

OK, Tommy, just say it loud:

"I'm an atheist and I'm proud"!!

It looks like you've created quite a haven here for atheists who want to escape the nasty old Christian world where 90% of the people in this country believe in a higher power.

Fine by me, as we've discussed several times I'm a pseudo agnostic, poor excuse for a Christian-if I ever made any pretenses at all about it.

But what gets me is why atheists seem to feel the need to apologize for, constantly reinforce and defend their non beliefs by spending their time devouring books, films and other paraphenalia that pound on the "evils" of Christianity and trying to nit pick the Bible and the Christian religion apart piece by piece. It's like some kind of obsessive "Malkin Watch".

All the futile falderal however misses the basic point for most Christians I know , which is a matter of simple faith that no amount of atheist nit picking is going to undermine. Not so much faith in this passage or that passage of the Bible-which is why pointing out contradictions or historical inaccuracies is a waste of perfectly good atheist Bible bashing time-but faith in a higher power unfettered by the constrictions of general human ineptitude in matters of the heart and spirit.

And why do you folks want to do something like that in the first place? After all your friends at the ACLU have just about stripped every vestige of this country's religious heritage from the public arena.

What's left, leveling churches or burning Christians in the square as witches?

If you'll allow me to post something that's been on my website for quite awhile I'd at least like to put up another side to the question.

"Pascal's wager....."

Pascal argues that since reason cannot decide the matter we should look at the trade offs.  Christianity (specifically Catholicism) offers eternal happiness for believers and eternal misery for non-believers, while atheism offers only the satisfaction of being rational and free time on Sunday mornings.  Since Christ promises a better payout, we should play His game.  "Let us weigh the gain and the loss in wagering that God is,"

Pascal instructs us. "If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager, then, without hesitation that He is...."

jack*'s post brought to mind my encounter with a person who had essentially based his entire life on Pascal's wager although I didn't know what to call it at the time.

It's really not very pleasant to recall the incident since I was definitely committed to my questioning, probing, challenging "smartass" position concerning religion at the time.

One of the people I admired and respected greatly in my home town was a gentleman named Bob Herlong, a highly successful businessman and, as I learned that day, a committed Christian.

Everyone in our little luncheon group knew that Bob was dying of leukemia and only had a year or so to live. Everyone, that is, but me.

I'd never thought of Bob as sickly. He was energetic, almost effervescent, with a permanent smile and a quick grin. He was also highly intelligent and I guess this fact this had something to do with my little smart assed statement to him that day as he spoke quietly to me of his commitment to Christ.

I said something like, "Bob, you're an intelligent man, a lot smarter than me-how can you possibly believe some of the things you read in the Bible"? I had no idea that I might be undermining the faith of a dying man and it bothers me every time I think about it.

But I needn't have worried. Bob smiled and said "John we all have choices to make in life. And one of them is whether or not to believe in God and the personal redemption of Christ.

Whether I'm right or wrong, my belief has given me peace of mind and my life and my family's life have been the better for it.

It's going to be leukemia that kills me, John-not ulcers."

Were those the words the result of some kind of battlefield conversion in the face of death?

I found out later that Bob's father had been a Methodist minister and that Bob himself had been a leader in his own church for many years.

Almost as long as I'd been a smart ass...

Tommykey said...

Shorter Bedrock:

"Atheists should just keep their mouths shut and be invisible."

Am I missing anything Bedrock?

But you have inspired me to write a post that I encourage the other atheists who frequent here and join in to give you a response.