The Church Is God-Made

Jon Meacham Is A Coward (x4),

Hey, why not change your name to "Jon Meacham is a broken record"?

ALL HAIL TO THE FALSE PROPHET, CHARLES COLSON! "Oh the filthiness of your fornication, having in your hand a cup full of abominations, full of blasphemy!"

ALL HAIL TO THE FALSE PROPHET, CHARLES COLSON! "Oh the filthiness of your fornication, having in your hand a cup full of abominations, full of blasphemy!"

ALL HAIL TO THE FALSE PROPHET, CHARLES COLSON! "Oh the filthiness of your fornication, having in your hand a cup full of abominations, full of blasphemy!"

ALL HAIL TO THE FALSE PROPHET, CHARLES COLSON! "Oh the filthiness of your fornication, having in your hand a cup full of abominations, full of blasphemy!"

Analyst

It is not God's problem that man disagrees. Clearly..that is mans problem. Besides, how can an unbeliever intelligently say it is because of something they feel does not exist?

Whether you believe it or not, the bible is clear on why the world is the way it is in our age...all under the umbrella of man thinking he could sucessfully decide what is right and wrong, good and evil and all would agree with each other.

One who doesnt understand this doesnt fully understand human nature.

The time is coming when all of mankind will know what God really intended for all of us. We are on the brink of that, being due to our own lack of intelligence.

GANDHI ON RELIGION

Thus if I could not accept Christianity either as a perfect, or the greatest religion, neither was I then convinced of Hinduism being such. Hindu defects were pressingly visible to me. If untouchability could be a part of Hinduism, it could but be a rotten part or an excrescence. I could not understand the raison d'etre of a multitude of sects and castes. What was the meaning of saying that the Vedas were the inspired Word of God? If they were inspired, why not also the Bible and the Koran? As Christian friends were endeavouring to convert me, so were Muslim friends. Abdullah Sheth had kept on inducing me to study Islam, and of course he had always something to say regarding its beauty." (source: his autobiography)
"As soon as we lose the moral basis, we cease to be religious. There is no such thing as religion over-riding morality. Man, for instance, cannot be untruthful, cruel or incontinent and claim to have God on his side."
"The sayings of Muhammad are a treasure of wisdom, not only for Muslims but for all of mankind."
Later in his life when he was asked whether he was a Hindu, he replied:

"Yes I am. I am also a Christian, a Muslim, a Buddhist and a J

ominonexistentgod!!

Colson writes:
"As someone who’s worked in the prisons for the last thirty years, I have experienced the reality of the Gospel transforming lives of forgotten and irreligious people (and a Christianity practiced closer to the biblical model than that which is practiced in most churches)."

What is a fundamentalist Muslim wrote: "As someone who's worked in the Madrassas for the last thirty years, I've experienced the reality of the Qu'ran transforming the lives of forgotten and irreligious people (and a form of Islam practiced closer to the book that that which is practiced in most mosques.)."

If some of those "transformed" persons happened to be suicide bombers, Colson would be the first to condemn this "indoctrination."

What is the difference between his mumbo jumbo preached to a captive audience in a jail -- with false promises of redemption and forgiveness -- and the fundamentalist who inculcates the notion of violent jihad?

Colson then writes:
"While I would never agree that true religion (which James 1:27 tells us is looking after orphans and widows) is a poison, I can understand why people would resent the false piety, a form of religion that ignores the reality."

"True" as modifying "religion" is the escape clause. So what Colson says is "true" is "true."

Hallelujah Brother! Hallelujah, nutcase!

Finally, Colson sends out this invitation:

"If Mr. Hitchens would like to see the real thing, I ask him not to look at the outward rituals but to visit prison with me. It’s an open invitation."

Considering the Colson made a trip to prison as part of the "real thing" -- a real sentence -- I wonder if Hitchens is likely to be dumb enough to be associated with a guy who asks people to respect him and believe in him when all he has demonstrated is a willingness to declare as true a lot of mumbo jumbo with no empirical proof.

Mr. Colson,

If the Church is "God made", then why can't believers agree on what God wants them to do? You can't even see agreement within the same religion -- let alone the thousands of just Christian sects -- unless there is some "authority figure" ordering everyone what to do. But look at even popes -- they disagree over time. Pope John Paul apologized for the trial of Galileo by an earlier pope.

If God existed, the greatest miracle of all would be if everyone would "know" it was true -- equivalent of seeing it with their own eyes.!

"If God has spoken, why is the universe not convinced?" --Percy Bysshe Shelley

Until then, I say religion is like what Dorothy said when in the throne room of Oz -- "who is that little man behind the curtain" who is pulling the levers?

Mr. Colson,

If the Church is "God made", then why can't believers agree on what God wants them to do? You can't even see agreement within the same religion -- let alone the thousands of just Christian sects -- unless there is some "authority figure" ordering everyone what to do. But look at even popes -- they disagree over time. Pope John Paul apologized for the trial of Galileo by an earlier pope.

If God existed, the greatest miracle of all would be if everyone would "know" it was true -- equivalent of seeing it with their own eyes.!

"If God has spoken, why is the universe not convinced?" --Percy Bysshe Shelley

Until then, I say religion is like what Dorothy said when in the throne room of Oz -- "who is that little man behind the curtain" who is pulling the levers?

In fact, I think that asserting that an 'omnibenevolent father' would treat skeptical 'kids' with abandonment and/or torture is a mirror of much of abuse rampant in our 'religious' societies.

I live in a bigger perceptual universe than that. If it makes me seem a bit smaller, I can live with that. :)

"You wouldn't believe how much I believe."

No, not really, Gary. :)

If "The Bible is true," about the universe, it'd seem there'd have to be a lot of room in it for different and even contradictory opinions. :)

Certainly I don't think I have to make some bargain to stay out of a Hell, or even to have a spirit, just cause the same book that says I must obey it *claims* there *is* one.

Heck, I don't have a 'soul' cause that *book* says I do, either. You seem to be laboring under the assumption that *without* that book, or a particular god, that we of course wouldn't have souls.

Not a very reasonable assertion at all.

PAGANPLACE,do you find it a reasonable assertion that if the bible is true and your spirit lives forever,that the GOD who revealed these truths to his prophets to reveal to us would leave the spirits who rejected him, alone, as they left HIM alone?

Yeah, Jacob, can be interesting, especially when it seems a certain form of religion's apparently going out of its way to socially-select itself for anti-intellectuals, then wondering why, apart from being *told so,* the rest of the world seems 'elitist.' :)

" gary:
i still made the world a better place by following JESUS. if he does exist,GOD help you."

Well, if you did, good job, ...but out of the infinite possibilities of the universe, I find it an unreasonable assertion that if 'anything' exists, it'll be a particular humanlike intelligence that's first and foremost concerned with punishing those who don't 'believe' in a specific depiction of 'him.'

The implied threat is both unimpressive to me spiritually, and logically-unconvincing.

And, yeah, people who *don't* follow your Bible actually tend to be *more* literate about it than most Christians: questioning things *takes* a certain amount of effort, whereas blind or indifferent following really doesn't.

you people who say you don't believe in GOD keep telling the rest of us to read these books that supposedly proove HE doesn't exist. i wonder how many of you have really studied the bible . like i said before,if HE doesn't exist, i still made the world a better place by following JESUS. if he does exist,GOD help you.

" B-man:

Jozevz et al:

You speak the language of superstrings."

As we understand them, commonly, yeah, they certainly do. Nothing like a little exuberant superconnection. 'Branes' is the current refinement on the theory, though I still like to think of them as 'musical.' A Song's not a bad place to live, and, the dancing's pretty neat, too. ;)

Still not sure where Mitt Romney comes into it, but I like these Eclati folks, wherever they came from, apart from consciousness, of course. :)

And, hey, Jacob, thanks for the compliment, means a lot to me & certain ancestors. :)

The being in the ball of fire Moses got his orders from is the devil, therefore. All religions are institutions of and either directly or indirectly through agents like Moses were founded by the devil. Moses is the devil's first agent.

It's worse than that. All religions violate the first commandment, "no strange gods" which is the most grievious of sins possible. Name a stranger god than man-on-fire god.

Lost and cannot be saved is the condition of all who have accepted any religion based upon the god of Moses. God does NOT forgive sins. Jesus is the son of the being in the fire and forgives because sins, violations of the first commandment in particular leads to the realm of his father the devil, hell. So it's too late, like stopping smoking after contracting lung cancer.

In spite of the fact that those who lead the most to the devil are rewarded with great wealth, they are unable to enjoy those rewards. Mr Colson, like rev Haggard are frustrated with the wealth and no way to enjoy it. Thus is the way of the devil.

If you get that "good warm" feeling in church, have been saved, stood and shouted your faith then you are beyond the point of no return. That warmth comes from the fires of hell. It's hell and no way out for you. And the devil, already having bagged you will only torture you in this life as he awaits your entry into his kingdom.

Sorry about that.

Justin, you say, "An old drunk like Christopher Hitchens not believing in God is good enough for me."

Nor should it be. Read the God delusion, read Hitchens book, read about humanism http://www.americanhumanist.org/humanism/

Then you'll be in a better position to consider whether or not to believe in a supernatural God.

Jozevz et al:

You speak the language of superstrings.

Yikes,

An old drunk like Christopher Hitchens not believing in God is good enough for me.

All non-believers run around and complain of how judgmental Christians are. These people need to look at themselves in the mirror.
It might be hackneyed but: Civil Rights Movement? Enlightenment? War against Poverty? Abolitionism? all founded within the religious movement.
For every bad example of what religion has done there is a good example as well.

Yikes,

An old drunk like Christopher Hitchens not believing in God is good enough for me.

All non-believers run around and complain of how judgmental Christians are. These people need to look at themselves in the mirror.
It might be hackneyed but: Civil Rights Movement? Enlightenment? War against Poverty? Abolitionism? all founded within the religious movement.
For every bad example of what religion has done there is a good example as well.

Remember what Bush said about the condemned prisoners in Texas that had been "saved"? That just about sums up my feelings for Colson's and Bush's Christianity.

This charlatan and huckerster writes:

"This is not man-made; this is God-made. So the technical answer to the question is that religion can sometimes refer to something man-made, but the Church with Christ as the head is the work of God Himself."

No need to comment further on this jibberish, is there?

Thank you!

Bob

I mean, hey, as a species we're capable of thinking we're fallen beings at the mercy of some invisible someone who doesn't want us to jill off,

Or, we could be, umm, something expressed like packets of wave-and-photonlike heuristic (learning-capable) vectors experiencing something like life might seem to be at the velocity 'c' if there are no privileged reference points. :)

(He's saying 'shards of the divine,' that Jacob, you know. Probably wasn't voted 'Most Likely To Breed,' but worth paying attention to. :) )

We have not yet begun to primate-out. :) Or, umm, let there be light or something. :)

I mean, who else in Nature is obsessed with controlling all the sex and breeding he can see or imagine around him, until he gets too much poop thrown at him or leads his tribe to disaster?

The 'Alpha Monkey.'

Through human intelligence, it's been possible to pretend the Ultimate Unquestionable Will of The Entire Universe just happens to be concerned with... Alpha monkey concerns.

Many things, though, are clearly made to this end.

That doesn't mean the choice is 'Obey and deny it,' or 'Insist there's Nothing More Noble About Monkeys, Especially The Monkeys Not Controlling Breeding Right Now,'

but...

Claiming we're disconnected judging minds isn't the way to make us 'better monkeys,' whatever that may be. We're both. :)

There's a lot to learn from dogs.

That's why there's that room for them in our lives.

Well, I'm fond of the canine metaphors, myself, Cordelia, though not in a negative way, I suppose.

I'm always joking that a lot of evangelicals get so indignant about how they can't accept we come from "monkeys" cause they're terrified someone will notice the manifest resemblance. :)

Frankly, people don't just act like 'monkeys,' they tend to act like *abused* 'monkeys.'

Could be something we could look at instead of letting it be exploited, ...instead of saying different versions of "Bad monkey!" *smack.*

Why do people in prison find religion?
Why do Americans find Christianity?
Why do Arabs find Islam?
Why do Japanese find Shinto? Indians Hindu?
Mongolians Budhism?
Why else? That's what each in turn has been exposed to, now and throughout history.

Where is the truth? Few appear to care as long as they believe what the people around them believe. The very existence of this discusion encourages me believe that collectively we are opening our eyes.

Why demand evidence of all religions but one? What's one more?

How did religion evolve? It's instinctive. The same instinct that makes lesser dogs subservient to the alpha dog is also in humans. Every person depends instinctively on an alpha, usually Daddy or Mommy. Daddy or Mommy introduce us to THEIR alpha, God, whose story we youngsters understand as a narrative, similar to Santa or Peter Pan's. But this same instinct in an animal can be excised with a scalpel because instinct is something physiological, and evolution changes the physiology of beings. This is how evolution molds our perception of God.

Then, as teens, our hormones call and we separate naturally from our alpha to become adults. That is why so many people, in a natural quest for independence, lose their religiosity when in their teens and college years. But when they themselves become adults and parents, and instinctively no longer desire to rely on their parent alphas, they head back to church where their own parents had first introduced them to the narrative alpha, God. Usually, this return to church occurs when the new parent's own children start to question WHY. Why is not something the alpha explains well. He's pretty good at HOW (how to hunt, how to kill, how to vacuum, how to study) but not WHY. The alpha's answer to his child's why question is usually, "Because God says so," or "I said so." Which "said so" most motivates the child? Baby Jesus's? Or Daddy's?

Sitting in church, then, with their little childen beside them waiting to go downstairs to make cottonball lambs in Sunday School, the new parents pray to that old alpha who somehow evolves into a totally new being, one that molds itself to the deeper understanding that living longer brings.

And so the same canine trait that makes our dogs "adore" us evolves into the adoration of deity. Unfortunately, despite our supposedly being higher thinkers than dogs, our "adoration" is often not terribly different from the dog's. The dog adores his alpha instinctively to survive. In our adoration, we ask for money, love, health, world peace, all of which affect our survival.

CRH

Athena nailed it in the first post above.

To paraphrase The Who:
Meet the new god
Same as the old god

Merriam-Webster says regarding the definition of religion: Etymology: Middle English religioun, from Anglo-French religiun, Latin religion-, religio supernatural constraint, sanction, religious practice, perhaps from religare to restrain, tie back.

Sounds like an antonym to freedom to me.

colson is almost as big a fraud as falwell, et al. "save" prisoners? sure. do anything about the social conditions, unjust laws, etc., etc., that put millions of people in prison in this country? NEVER.

here's colson on watergate (paraphrasing): it was at that time i realized i was a sinner with my pride before a holy god.

no apologies for watergate, subverting the constitution, aiding and abetting a criminal government, etc., etc. but "pride." now he's making his buck$ fleecing prisoners....

I think that's a very real concern, Ghostbuster: more so, often the hurt is more than 'offense,' really.

Somewhat-wanderey thoughts below:

Actually, there are a *lot* of people who've been badly hurt by a religion, ...and what a lot of 'evangelizers' don't understand is that, calling people 'unforgiving' for not 'drinking' what's been made *poison* for them and then trying to redefine what one's actually doing when trying to subject them to more, *does create justifiable and ongoing resentment.*

Certainly a lot of them don't understand that stuffing certain words and symbols in your face so *they* can feel 'justified and forgiven' might simply not be categorically 'good' or even 'fair.'

*They* don't know what you may have been through.

I certainly like to understand the people around me, ..in my own terms, respect their struggles and sorrows and joys, but you can't make the facts go away by insistence.

And it's not fair to push it on people you don't know, or what effects it may cause. (maybe especially 'captive audiences') To pick an utterly random image, you may have a neighbor who's an obsessive, energetic, and severely tunnel-visioned raker of leaves who believes swinging rakes really high is the "Only Way To Do It," and go, "Ok, this doesn't make him a bad person," but that doesn't mean you think a rake in the face everywhere you go is a good thing.

Not, in my turn, to diminish the very real abuses and abusive dynamics that are endemic to certain religious ideas that have built-in-blinders like, "This must be of God.."

I see too many of the results of these things around.

Certainly, I think that too often the 'faith vs reason' debate is a product mostly of *certain* religious ideas and claims that artificially set these parts of ourselves and our society at *odds* : ...maybe it does embitter a lot of atheists who along with the hurt absorbed the idea that one must accept the abuse, if not even just the toxic images, to have any spirituality at all, ...but I think that's a religious idea, too, that all too often goes unexamined because our culture tends to *teach* directly or indirectly that one must *see* these things in terms of *justifying belief or disbelief in a certain god.*

There's plenty of folks out there who'd be content to *walk away* if these things weren't increasingly intruding into our public life and discourse, ...the idea that we must only be represented by people who profess these beliefs isn't just a bad idea for many practical reasons, but it also essentially *devalues* those who believe otherwise, or don't particularly see the need to believe *anything* religious in particular.

Certainly we can see through these prison programs that the religious idea that swearing to *certain* creeds will give one a pass on punishments for past actions is one of those things making this all too apparent.

Then you get to people saying that they don't want to see anything *but* their form of belief in the world, like that'll make it 'all right:' and trying to impose this further on the world we've got to share, so they come out and try to put it everywhere: when they meet resistance they can't even understand, they'll scream at you, "You're attacking my religion! (by not professing it) I don't care what nonsense you believe, keep it out of my face!"

My response to that is usually, "Dude, you're standing on my lawn."

I think prison itself makes too-ready a microcosm of Christian belief as regards things like sin and purgatory and various Hieronymous Bosch depictions of the Christian Hell: not surprisingly, because the institution sort of started that way.

Other societies tended to have other ideas based on direct restitution (which also can give you slavery and torture and execution and class-privilege, partly cause there weren't resources to tend and feed captives with bars and buildings and guards, so that's problematic to us, anyway, but it's not like the current system is really protection from these things, anyway.) ...but at least it's not surprising it's a tempting target for evangelizers.

Does the 'redemption clause' in beliefs about what prison *does* make it work any better?

Maybe not.

Maybe it makes people just *repeat the myth* cause they were told that's 'their place' in the world as sinners. Maybe it just makes them more convinced that the kind of thinking that got them there is to be embraced, this time with a different part in the same recurring plot.

Does it sanctify evangelists in there with exclusive rights and state-sponsored perks to hand out? Probably not, but it's maybe a conceptual way out of being 'damned,' ..if, unfortunately, the 'price' is calling *other* people 'damned,' (outside that mysterious 'God-made' thread in only-Christian-not-other community.)

I think it's generally a more-compelling argument for a less-simply-*punitive* view of what-to-do-with-criminals, ...but at the same time, it excludes other possibilities.

People often do get more spiritual or religious when pulled out of the 'regular' world for one reason or another: that's an archetype that it'd seem to me all cultures share.

Too often, these ideas about whether *one particular* path is 'God-made and healing/redemptive' lead to other bad effects.

Like cutting people of other faiths off from the clergy they might need most: maybe Wiccans don't have the same view of what prison or the life outside *is,* but we do hear a lot about some inmates reading about it and sounding a lot like they're going, 'Hey, in this religion, you get a *knife!* I should have a knife in prison!'

If you put one religion over another, you can't get enough Wiccan clergy in there to say, "Ok. Here's what all that stuff really *means.* For one, if this were a 'Wiccan' prison, you *still* wouldn't get a knife, ...do you see me carrying one in here? ...And here's why, apart from the obvious.' Never mind counsel someone that's been suspended outside the world in some grey place, maybe that did some serious harm somewhere.

Same goes for all the sorta-Heathens in there we hear about that a lot of *their* clergy might want to tell some things not involving racism and swords.

So I think the idea of 'prison ministry' itself needs to be examined. You don't know what this stuff means to someone.

But the *real* reason for prisons to exist, themselves, not to mention *what they actually are* needs to be considered.

I think there's *supposed* to be an idea of re-establishing a balance between wrongdoers and the *world,* but I'm not sure you get that if you simply see it in terms of *one* perhaps- rationalized idea of religion as *by definition* that 'world.'

I'd say that if you believe there's an unseen web between us all, then you might consider that more than one way of 'reconnecting' to it might exist, rather than saying, "Well, if I redefine religion with an abstraction to *say* the 'package' I'm selling *is* made by One God, that means I have the right to act as though my 'product' is The One Package."

Pardon if I don't think that's the point of a prison.

The reason evangelical ministries, including Colson's ministry, seems to work in prison is because often, only evangelical ministries are allowed in prison. As a prisoner, you want better conditions and a better chance at parol? Play along with the prison's proselytizing ministry. If you are not willing to convert or fake it, then you can rot in jail.

So, the record of evangelical prison ministries, cited by Colson, is no support for the transforming nature of evangelical christianity or for the concept of God-made religion. If you want to help widows and orphans, then you don't need to believe in God to do that.

Why is it that so many people find religion in prison?

Why don't we hear about successful intelligent people with everything they could ever want finding god?

Because religion is for the weak, the desparate, and the "afraid to get raped in the shower" sect. Remember those days Chuck?

"As strange as it may sound, the Bible often agrees with one of Hitchens' premises: religion as often practiced can be a poison."

I haven't had a chance to read Hitchens' new book yet but I agree that the bible backs up the premise that religion can be a poison.

In my own experiences and interactions with those who have been badly burned by the religion they practiced, the hurt person has usually been justifiable offended by someone or something that they closely associate with their own particular religious beliefs. The offense varies in degrees of course. In egregious cases, the hurt or disenfranchised person sets out to free him/herself from the heavy burden of religion, in some cases renouncing everything.

Unfortunately, the poison that was their religion is often replaced by another type of equally oppressive bondage, that being unforgiveness which leads to bitterness.

A very diplomatic and loving and true response Mr. Colson. Thank you for your honesty and humility.

"Jesus came to cut through the hypocritical, self-righteous piety of the Pharisees and Saducees."

Yes, and it's too bad that many of his followers took up where the Pharisees and Saducees left off.

Sorry, Rev. Coulson, but you walked yourself right into that one.