Faster than I predicted

[moevillini]

well that de-escalated quickly..

WHO CAN STOP MOEFELD?

 

[babe]

Your ignorance at the meaning of chapel is secondary to my point.

When I predicted government would force "churches" to perform homosexual "marriages" against their will I wasn't talking about brick and mortar buildings I was talking about clergy...you know the ones with the authority to perform weddings.

You worded that really oddly but I'll run with. You said the chapel is for hire, so in other words you are renting time in a building to have your wedding ceremony.

Clergy perform wedding ceremonies at many different venues, some of which are paid venues. This is all in jeopardy now.

I don't think Christians who fell for all the "equality" hogwash really considered the consequences when they caved in to peer pressure.

When Daniel Webster spent years traveling the backwoods of America compiling a lexicon of words, their usages, and meanings, his standard of judgment was what people thought the words mean.

Lawyers, and Lawmakers, are generally guilty of defining words the way they want them to mean, as well. I don't suppose very many people on the Vegas Strip going to those "wedding chapels" where they can get married today are calling them "churches", and the people performing the ceremonies aren't necessarily calling themselves "pastors", either. It's a business deal, for legal convenience.

It would be my contention that whatever they are is irrelevant to people having equal standing under the law. I think the mentality of "professionalization" gets deranged when it's government determining who can be "licensed" to perform any professional service. It's a form of overlordyism, a caste system, being established by the government. The government has no inherent qualifications to determine what is good engineering, good medicine, or good values for society. Government is always a festering cesspool of sychophants, totally moronic politicians, and bureaucrats whose whole claim to validity is having power to impose nonsense on the rest of us.

"government" ranks right up there with "religion" as a crass despot hell-bent on destroying human liberty. It's always been a tool of suppression and abuse for opportunistic sociopaths.

If we really want to have a good life, we have to take responsibility for ourselves and make it damn clear we will make our own personal decisions, and make sure our government is not permitted to grow oppressive. We only tolerate it because sometimes we can make it serve a need with an acceptable level of ethics, accountability, and efficiency. Where ever we can do better without it, we should.

Certainly it's clear that we can do better in our personal life decisions and relationships without it, unless we are somehow degenerates who don't respect the rights of others which we should normally expect for ourselves.

Christians in the past have been guilty of hijacking government as tool for regulating society; progressives today whatever their claims to the contrary, are clearly doing just as much criminal mischief against the clear rights of individuals. The driving force is fascism. . . . the determination of commercial interests to control government and create an advantaged playing field for their enterprises. . . . and racism following in the tradition of Cecil Rhodes and the Council of Foreign Relations, which is the ultimate "white man's club" world wide. Sure they have vocally and publicly taken all the right rhetorical positions, controlling the public dialogue through their ownership of major media. But they are like lawyers. How do you know when a lawyer is lying? When his lips are moving.

What you do is look at what is actually going on. Africa is being depopulated with malaria and other diseases, by one genocidal war after another across decades getting no real public news coverage, and by western-financed "Islamists" who walk, talk and kill like marxists or any of a dozen other political, western-rooted political brands. Under the UN we run out our planes and troops and decimate the populations of nation after nation. Where ever we can't convince people to adopt their own depopulation programs by birth control and limitation programs, we send the damn troops with the bombs our militarists make millions from.

What we call "liberal" and "progressive" just keeps proving itself fascist, and the political system established by Cecil Rhodes just keeps killing millions of humans year after year.

controlling the rhetoric on the GLBT "movement" along the same lines Karl Marx preached over a century ago, the net result is people are not going to be having children, and people are not going to be controlling their own minds either with long-established and beneficial belief systems that have sustained societies for centuries, or with any original or intelligent solutions to the problems we face. Our lives will progressively be reduced to powerlessness over our own lives and continually degrading financial self-sufficiency.

 

[jimmy eat jazz]

https://allenbwest.com/2014/10/christian-persecution-idaho-city-forces-pastors-marry-gays/

As reported by the Washington Times, “Coeur d‘Alene, Idaho, city officials have laid down the law to Christian pastors within their community, telling them bluntly via an ordinance that if they refuse to marry homosexuals, they will face jail time and fines.

So, let me get this straight. We shouldn't try to provide equal protection under the law to all, because some people might take it too far?

Ok, so let's force them gay people back into the closets where they belong, and once again deny them their equal protection under the law and full slate of civil rights, because some people might overreact. Yep, makes perfect sense to me.

IF and WHEN this becomes a real problem, and not just some isolated anecdotes, then we can deal with it as a serious problem. Discrimination against gays, however, much of it imposed by religious folk, has been a systematic and pervasive problem for millennia.

Fundamental Christianity will survive this just fine and will move on to find new 'out groups' to oppress.

By the way, I would stand with you to defend to the rights of religions and religious folks to practice their religion (provided it does not cross over into abuse, law breaking, etc.).

 

[Harambe]

You should think very carefully about whether you really want to live in a world where the Hobby Lobby ruling is applied broadly.

Don't worry.. I have... and I don't want to live in that world. But none the less, it exists and might could be leveraged, so we HAVE to think about it.

In this case, the owners are a for profit attempting to discriminate against one group of the public. In the Hobby Lobby case, the owners were being required to pay, not accept business, and their refusal applied to every one, not just certain employees. Those are significant differences.

This helps, so thank you.

 

[babe]

All I know is, as soon as they start forcing pastors to marry gay guys and get gay sexy with them, I'm moving to Canada.

Canada is actually a good place to go for proofs of Pearl's prediction.

In Canada, reading the Bible can be legally prosecuted. Ministers have to be careful to skip over a substantial number of Bible stories, like the events transpiring in Jezebel's reign.

While the whole American Experiment is a radical departure from faithful, scripture-based theocracy following the tradition of Solomon, who regulated the religion of the State of Israel, and the Catholicism that ushered in the Dark Ages of medieval times, or the vicious State Religions of England or Germany during the reformation era, a government like ours that's supposed to be responsive to the ordinary people and protect their individual rights and lives and property has always needed a "moral" society adhering to some christian concepts like respecting others and acting on a consistent model of actions following from expectations. . . rather than just "corrupt" politicians controlled by financially interested supporters.

Our fundamentalist religious folks invoke God as a protector of human rights and liberties such as freedom of conscience, and I think the attacks on them are generally just as bigoted and hateful as anything any redneck generally comes up with.

Fundamentalist Christians are correct on one philosophical point, at the very minimum. Once we as a nation, or government, dispense with the notion of accountability to the public, or to God, our laws will no longer be rooted in any principled system of thought, and our nation and government will become the plaything of whoever among us has the most money to buy the system's functionaries.

Whether that devolves to simple bribes passed out to cops on the street, as in Mexico or the Philippines, or remains as we have it now, with policians dependent on major corporate contributors, the result is the same. It means we do not have " rule of law" in fact, but our government has become a negotiable tool that will systematically be used against the interest of the general public.

 

[LogGrad98]

WHO CAN STOP MOEFELD?

That almost deserves a neg. Can I give a neutral rep with a mild reprimand? Hmm.

 

[babe]

a chapel is not necessarily associated with a religion - there is no restriction on the use of the term "chapel"

and just because something may call itself a religion or someone may call themselves a "reverend" or "pastor" does not mean that are associated with an IRS recognized religion. A for-profit business, by it's definition, is NOT a religion. If those two "pastors" don't want to preside over homosexual weddings, they don't have to. But the Hitching Post, as a for-profit business, and NOT a religious institution, cannot discriminate in that fashion.

Plenty of people can preside over weddings who are not affiliated in any way, shape or form with religion.

My neighbor got herself "ordained" so she could legally preside over her son's wedding. I'm not sure exactly what was involved but it was recognized by the state, yet had nothing to do with any religion whatsoever. Another neighbor is a judge (in juvenile court, but that doesn't matter) and has presided over a number of weddings. In some cases, the County Clerk can legally officiate a wedding.


I wish I understood why some of those reading these posts keep ignoring the facts.

Pretty clear you are working with a definition of "religion" that necessarily invokes organizational, legally-established status.

I think the rhetoric OB and other progressives use is pretty tightly engineered to discredit personal convictions invoking God in any way, replacing them with legal technicalities which in effect make even personal beliefs legally prosecutable. It is really intolerance of religious conscience in individuals. People who reject statist rules are the problem. They are systematically reduced by law to criminal status.

OB might not have that intent, and might actually believe he is advocating a reasoned sort of society operating on better principles, but I am looking at what the net effect long-term will be if we have governments prosecuting individuals or business owners for not performing services they may deem objectionable on the level of their own personal conscience.

We have civil alternatives. . . . publicly-paid judges of various descriptions, widely available in all legal jurisdictions, who will perform legal weddings. The government does not need to regulate individuals on their own enterprise of serving any category of clientele in this manner. Nobody should have to do things they consider wrong. We even let some men called up for military service make a statement of conscientious objection so they won't need to kill people. Or at least we should, if we don't do this anymore.

 

[babe]

WHO CAN STOP MOEFELD?

thanks for injecting some humor in this thread. badly needed.

I've got to go laugh at myself now.

 

[jimmy eat jazz]

Canada is actually a good place to go for proofs of Pearl's prediction.

In Canada, reading the Bible can be legally prosecuted. Ministers have to be careful to skip over a substantial number of Bible stories, like the events transpiring in Jezebel's reign.

Canada is not the US. It has a totally different set of traditions respecting religious freedom. While perhaps instructive, your example has limited relevance, I think.

While the whole American Experiment is a radical departure from faithful, scripture-based theocracy following the tradition of Solomon, who regulated the religion of the State of Israel, and the Catholicism that ushered in the Dark Ages of medieval times, or the vicious State Religions of England or Germany during the reformation era, a government like ours that's supposed to be responsive to the ordinary people and protect their individual rights and lives and property has always needed a "moral" society adhering to some christian concepts like respecting others and acting on a consistent model of actions following from expectations. . . rather than just "corrupt" politicians controlled by financially interested supporters.

Morality DOES NOT come from God. It is inherent to the human species and existed long before humans got around to codifying moral rules within the context of organized religion. The extent to which a society is 'moral' depends largely on how one defines morality. If it is defined by creating more 'just' societies (and not largely sexual terms, such as is the case among fundies and evangelicals), then the those countries that are the most non-sectarian (e.g., Northern Europe), are arguably among the most moral. Any suggestion that religion is a pre-requisite for morality is, to put is simply, BS.

[/QUOTE]Our fundamentalist religious folks invoke God as a protector of human rights and liberties such as freedom of conscience, and I think the attacks on them are generally just as bigoted and hateful as anything any redneck generally comes up with.[/QUOTE]

Yes, true. Some many on them are bigoted, but many are principled attacks on the ideas espoused by religious folk, many of which are just plain bad. The problem is that people conflate the former with the latter and any 'attack' on Christian ideas/beliefs are construed as bigoted attacks on Christianity in general.

Christians have been dishing up the hate for millennia now, and they are surprised that there's finally some pushback now that their power is diminished?

[/QUOTE]Fundamentalist Christians are correct on one philosophical point, at the very minimum. Once we as a nation, or government, dispense with the notion of accountability to the public, or to God, our laws will no longer be rooted in any principled system of thought, and our nation and government will become the plaything of whoever among us has the most money to buy the system's functionaries.[/QUOTE]

We don't need God to have a principled system of thought.

Besides, I'd argue that Western society today is far, far more moral than its ever been, at the same time it's become LESS not more religious. The extension of civil rights, liberties, equal protection under the law, and the respect for the dignity of the person that underpins the progressive political, social and economic reforms of Western Society over the past few decades has been the single greatest expression of human morality in the history of the world.

 

[LogGrad98]

So, let me get this straight. We shouldn't try to provide equal protection under the law to all, because some people might take it too far?

Ok, so let's force them gay people back into the closets where they belong, and once again deny them their equal protection under the law and full slate of civil rights, because some people might overreact. Yep, makes perfect sense to me.

IF and WHEN this becomes a real problem, and not just some isolated anecdotes, then we can deal with it as a serious problem. Discrimination against gays, however, much of it imposed by religious folk, has been a systematic and pervasive problem for millennia.

Fundamental Christianity will survive this just fine and will move on to find new 'out groups' to oppress.

By the way, I would stand with you to defend to the rights of religions and religious folks to practice their religion (provided it does not cross over into abuse, law breaking, etc.).

Do you know what a millennium is? It is 1000 years. Not even 2000 years ago the Romans ruled most of the modern world and they embraced many forms of sexuality. Homosexuality has not always been viewed as deviant. It is a relatively new social construct, although of course there have been societies at different points in time with differing view on the subject, but the current state of most of the world following suit is relatively new.

 

[jimmy eat jazz]

Do you know what a millennium is? It is 1000 years. Not even 2000 years ago the Romans ruled most of the modern world and they embraced many forms of sexuality. Homosexuality has not always been viewed as deviant. It is a relatively new social construct, although of course there have been societies at different points in time with differing view on the subject, but the current state of most of the world following suit is relatively new.

Yes, I know what a millennium is. Christianity, and its restrictive view of human sexuality, has been ascendent in the West for around 1,500 years. That's 1000+ years, if my math is correct. That qualifies as millennia (plural), right?

I'd say 1,500 years (give or take) of teachings on the evils of homosexuality within the Christian sexual ethos qualifies for 'longstanding' as opposed to 'relatively new.'

This doesn't even consider Islam.

Also, I'd add, don't confuse the more and behaviors of the elites with that of the common folk. Elites have frequently tended toward more licentious sexual more and practices. It's not clear to me, for example, that the practice of pederastry among the ancient Greek elites (not to be confused with homosexuality) equates with tolerance/acceptance of homosexuality among the common folk. It may have, I don't know.

 

[babe]

@jimmy

I appreciate the high level of intellect demonstrated in your response. Right up there with OB who has won the rank of a master in my book of political thinkers. I don't really care to argue against the factual parts of what you say, just with what I see as the long-run consequences of it.

Not that I think we have actually done well up to now.

I just don't think the human herd is benefited from even modern management. We face complex risks as a species, as a world. . . . which have been successfully coped with historically. . . in my opinion. . . . by a human species that has responded individually better than it has responded organizationally.

We don't really do better with a top-down world.

 

[One Brow]

I believe the Catholic Church has/does...especially in the case of divorced couples.

Churches have and will continue to be able to refuse to perform any marriages they choose, in addition to making some pretty good chicken. That's not changing.

 

[One Brow]

I wish I understood why some of those reading these posts keep ignoring the facts.

Facts have a liberal bias.

 

[Stoked]

Facts have a liberal bias.

Hahahaha, you make me smile.

 

[LogGrad98]

a chapel is not necessarily associated with a religion - there is no restriction on the use of the term "chapel"

and just because something may call itself a religion or someone may call themselves a "reverend" or "pastor" does not mean that are associated with an IRS recognized religion. A for-profit business, by it's definition, is NOT a religion. If those two "pastors" don't want to preside over homosexual weddings, they don't have to. But the Hitching Post, as a for-profit business, and NOT a religious institution, cannot discriminate in that fashion.

Plenty of people can preside over weddings who are not affiliated in any way, shape or form with religion.

My neighbor got herself "ordained" so she could legally preside over her son's wedding. I'm not sure exactly what was involved but it was recognized by the state, yet had nothing to do with any religion whatsoever. Another neighbor is a judge (in juvenile court, but that doesn't matter) and has presided over a number of weddings. In some cases, the County Clerk can legally officiate a wedding.


I wish I understood why some of those reading these posts keep ignoring the facts.

But the ACLU of Idaho states that "religious businesses" are exempt. Not sure what that definition is, but this one could fall under that definition.

 

[LogGrad98]

Facts that have a bias aren't facts.

Fixed that for you.

 

[One Brow]

IF and WHEN this becomes a real problem, and not just some isolated anecdotes, ...

Even one religious organization being forced by the government to marry gays would be a real problem, however isolated the anecdote, as far as I am concerned.

 

[LogGrad98]

Even one religious organization being forced by the government to marry gays would be a real problem, however isolated the anecdote, as far as I am concerned.

This. The other comment is akin to saying that we won't treat the cancer until it has infiltrated enough of the body that death is imminent.

 

[One Brow]

...but I am looking at what the net effect long-term will be if we have governments prosecuting individuals or business owners for not performing services they may deem objectionable on the level of their own personal conscience.

I am completely in favor of that, but would recommend, in addition, looking at the contrast with what the net effect long-term will be (and was) if we have governments not prosecuting individuals or business owners for not performing services they may deem objectionable on the level of their own personal conscience.