Posts Made By: Doug Matulis

Dave Snope said:

The 15 year change is shocking.

http://igloo.atmos.uiuc.edu/cgi-bin/test/print.sh?fm=04&fd=13&fy=1996&sm=04&sd=13&sy=2011

H/T Steven Goddard

John Agnew said:

A Happy Easter to all my Christian friends.
As a former Christian, I can appreciate the importance of this holy day to you, so I hope your Easter is fulfilling, and that the sense of hope on this day spreads to the rest of your life and experience.

John Agnew said:

The White House has released Obama's long form birth certificate, showing that he was born in Honolulu. Add to that birth announcements in Honolulu newspapers in 1961, and I don't see where the Birthers have much of an argument:
http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/04/27/obama.birth.certificate/

This is too bad for the Democrats, because it made a large portion of the Republican party and the Tea Party look pretty foolish...a major advantage for the Dems in gaining the moderate vote in the next election.

Andreas Saldivar said:

I am, and I think the rest of the country is, tired of us wasting our lives, money, and time in Afghanistan. 10 years and it feels like we've accomplished nothing. Here's just another reason why we need to leave there and, IMO, Iraq and Libya too. I also hope we please don't start anything in Yemen or Syria.

Andreas

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/as_afghanistan

William Paolini said:

We always have talk about the differences, what about the common grounds? In balance don't the similarities far far outweigh any differences?

As example, reported today on the "Express", a commuter paper by the Washington Post in an article titled, "Church a Refuge for Storm Victims", it went to say the major role that local churches are playing in the devestation in the US from tornados across the south. How people are going to the churches after services just to give thanks. How the churches are the organization points for relief and as community centers.

Also nice to see how the different faiths have no barriers: "Macolee Muhammed accepted the prayer of a relief worker who stopped by what was left of her Birmingham home. It didn't matter that she was Muslim and he was Southern Baptist. 'If you came here to help, the only person who sent you was God.' she said"

So while the debate in the forums here at times makes one think there is this great divide and great disharmony, in reality and in the real world when it is faithful meeting faithful, the vast majority of time there is only acceptance and harmony.

When I cross paths with others of other religions, all I generally focus on is what we have in common, belief in God, love of God, and being part of an organization that does so much good in the local community and well beyond. That has always been an effective rallying point.

William Paolini said:

I will be policing this forum. Not going to quote the TOS as everyone can read. If I perceive that you've violated the TOS, or the spirit of the TOS, then will delete your post with no warning. If you want to know why then PM me. If you plan to discuss any moderation action in this forum space those posts will be removed as well. You can discuss that via PM, or someplace else. If you want to complain, PM the appropriate AMart powers.

I'm not in here all the time, so will not be monitoring 24x7, but when I come in may review and take action as needed. Apologies in advance for the heavy hand, but too much of the past time here others have been heavy handed with their comments with no regard or respect. All things change, it's the way of things.

As a reminder, intolerance to deities, religions, or adherents to any religion is against TOS. So if you bad mouth (directly, indirectly, inuendo, etc.) a religion, its dieties, its practices, or any of that religion's followers past or present, it is discrimination. Note, bad mouthing and disagreeing are different things.

As a second reminder, this forum space is about religion and topics in religion. If you intend on taking an anti-religion or anti-deity position and want to argue that position, then you need to do that in the Non-Religion forum or the No Holds Barred forum, so any such post here will be removed since it is not in accordance with the split into the three forum spaces we have now.

If you want to have a respectful and safe interchange of ideas regarding religion, without fear of you, or your religion's followers, or your religion's beliefs/dogma being ridiculed or belittled, then that is what this space is for. If you want to ridicule/belittle, or argue a non-religion non-diety postion take it to the No Holds Barred forum as these posts will be removed here.

Special note - there are several people who have been permanently barred from the Religion forum. You know who you are as Herb has informed you. Under no circumstance can you post here. But good news, you always have the Non-Religion and No-Holds-Barred forums to post whatever you wanted to post here and everyone will be glad to join there that is interested.

Finally, mispelling will be welcombed and tolerated.

Robert Provin said:

About 41 percent of Americans think that Jesus will return before 2050, according to a 2010 poll by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press. And at the moment we have this specific prediction: http://www.ebiblefellowship.com/may21/

The question is, what do you all think of this?

Thank you,
Robert

William Paolini said:

In the Movie Contact the question is asked if we are alone in the universe, to which the reply is, "If it's just us, it seems like an awful waste of space."

Question, let's assume that except for Earth and the Human race, that the universe is indeed devoid of any other intelligent life, maybe any other life at all. Would you then consider God's work, His creation, as essentially a waste of space if in all the vastness it was only us who inhabited it?

The movie obviously had religious overtones. From a religious standpoint, and in the context of the movie, it does seem appropriate to Jodie Foster's character as non-religious to think this, but does it seem appropriate to Matthew McConaughey's character as a religious person?

William Paolini said:

For the three major religions we usually deal with, Islam, Christianity, and Judaism, are the characteristics of God as described in the scriptures from each of these religions, different in any way?

So does any passage in texts from the Islamic scriptures/sacred texts, as example, protray God differently in any fundamental way how scriptures/sacred texts portray God in Christianity, or in Judaisms?

These three religions are supposed to be referencing the same God, so do any of them portray God differently in some fundamental way? If not a fundamental way then in some minor way? If you don't have the references to back up your points, or if the points you provide are your understanding based on what you've come to know about the religions that are not yours, would appreciate that you make that fact clear so we don't have any misunderstandings. IMO it is also valuable to voice what we might have as an understanding based on media or discussion, then hopefully someone who practices the said religion can set us straight one way or the other and give us some references.

For me, I don't have any understanding that the God of Judaism and the God of Christianity are any different in character, motive, or action from each other at all. I don't feel as firmly about Islam though, not based on any evidence from their texts, but just the way the popular American media and culture reacts most of the time makes one feel there must be some fundamental differences -- I certainly don't see any differences based on what I observe from my family members who are Muslims as they paint quite a different picture than th media/popular culture does. So not talking the practices of the adherents to the religion, but talking the source texts which define the religion. Are there any differences to be found there?

William Paolini said:

What's everyone's thoughts on this...

"Moralistic Therapeutic Deism," a belief system articulated by researchers Christian Smith and Melinda Denton.
-- A god exists who created and ordered the world and watches over it.
[COLOR="Red"]One God exists who created and ordered the world and rules over it.[/COLOR]
-- God wants people to be good, nice and fair to one another, as taught in most religions.
[COLOR="Red"]God wants people to love and and other people.[/COLOR]
-- The goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about oneself.
[COLOR="Red"]The goal in life is to glority God and enjoy Him forever and deny oneself and put others first.[/COLOR]
-- God gets involved when we have problems we need solved.
[COLOR="Red"]God is involved in all the affairs of man include raise rulers and bringing them down, raise nations and bringing them down[/COLOR]
-- Good people go to heaven.
[COLOR="Red"]Good people go to hell, people of faith in Christ go to heaven.[/COLOR]

So God is in there, somewhere, along with love, grace, kindness, tears, empathy, consolation, compassion, self-acceptance. A non-threatening faith that perhaps is more akin to generalized faith or spirituality rather than religion?

[COLOR="Red"]Sounds like a human centered kitchen sink set of hog-wash beliefs based on nothing credible.[/COLOR]

Here's more depth on it: http://www.christianpost.com/news/moralistic-therapeutic-deism-the-new-american-religion-6266/pageall.html