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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/4/2008 10:40:37 AM | dreamboat333. There is no announcing of you (did you mean "renouncing"?) from the roof tops. And your sarcasm and patronising attempt to lord it over me is uncalled for. I simply didn't want to assume that what I thought you were saying was what you were saying. A little clarity is always helpful. Clearly you have an elitist view of "your" church. So no stone throwing here. My Christianity includes all who call on the name of Jesus Christ for salvation without regard to any institution or denomination. Yours doesn't. So we disagree. But I don't consider your faith any less than mine. Nor do I consider "your God" any different than "my God". I shall continue to work out my salvation with fear and trembling. What you do is up to you. By your own Master you stand or fall, not by me.
As for me, apparently I'm a "Heretic" according to your Church so I'm not sure if you should be talking to me or not. 
By the way, Hitler was nominally a Roman Catholic, not a Lutheran. Not that it matters anyway, but it's always good to have facts instead of revisionist history in front of you when you attempt to defame a group of "other" Christians. | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/4/2008 11:02:20 AM | abc,
Faith and reason and logic are connected, you are just behind on your reading.
Mr. Someone | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/4/2008 1:49:20 PM | Dear romanticoptimist:
Thank you for putting me straight. I guess, at the end of the long weary day - you told me.
And your sarcasm and patronising attempt to lord it over me is uncalled for. I simply didn't want to assume that what I thought you were saying was what you were saying.
Wait - you lunged at me friend. You have kept in on me, jibing and jabbing and all I have done is politely respond to your inquiries with my proclamation of faith.
Funny how when it is "one of us" speaking up it's "sarcastic and patronizing" and whatever other uppity things you want to lay on us. Whereas when it is you calling us rapists and baby killers, well you are stumbling down off the pinnacle of your mountain top to elevate the minds and souls of all us poor misguided fools.
A little clarity is always helpful. Clearly you have an elitist view of "your" church.
Friend, please try to refrain from making it personal. I don't know you and don't pretend to know what you do or do not think about God or the price of tea in China. But what I do know is that I have given you The Vatican's position on the matter.
Do I accept it as my own - after quite some research, yes I do - so if I am an elitest, then I am prepared to be forgiven for that as well.
{quote]So no stone throwing here.
You have repeated thrown stones over the hull while hiding behind your poxy sense of knowing it all. You insinuated repeatedly that to be a Roman Catholic is to condone molestation of children and to participate in covert efforts at silencing the truth and you should be called on it, again and again.
My Christianity includes all who call on the name of Jesus Christ for salvation without regard to any institution or denomination. Yours doesn't. So we disagree.
Despite how you attempt so painstakingly try to put YOUR WORDS into my mouth - any reader who wants to go back and reread my posts (the ones you haven't had deleted) will find I have never stated anything about who is or is not going to heaven and who is or is not "saved".
I have refraied from making this personal judgement because my understanding of the teaching of my Church is that this is not my place to assess, but only God's.
As for me, apparently I'm a "Heretic" according to your Church so I'm not sure if you should be talking to me or not.
You are a funny, funny guy. First you rail on and on about me and my Roman Catholic Faith - then you accuse through inuendo and insinuation that Catholics are guilty of conducting a clandestine effort at hurting children and hiding the truth - and when defeated you roll over on you back and act as though it is you being kicked.
By the way, Hitler was nominally a Roman Catholic, not a Lutheran. Not that it matters anyway, but it's always good to have facts instead of revisionist history in front of you when you attempt to defame a group of "other" Christians.
The point which I clearly made was that if we were to use the same logic with which you conduct your smear campaign against the Catholic Church then we would damn all Lutherans because Hitler belonged to the Lutheran Church.
I did not attempt to defame, nor as I stated do I consider it defamation (as you do) to say that so and so was a member of such and such church - that was the point I made.
Take you own advice when referring to The Roman Catholic Church friend. Hitler was not Catholic, he is well known to have been brought up in The Lutheran Church.
In Hitler’s words “the heaviest blow that ever struck humanity was the coming of Catholicism” (Hitler, 1953, p. 6). The Jesuits were “swine,” and all of Catholicism was “Jewish Christianity” which was comparable with “Jewish Bolshevism.” Hitler concluded that both were evil and both had to be destroyed (Kershaw, 2000, pp. 330, 488). His reasoning was based on his belief that The Catholic Church was an “illegitimate” Jewish child and, as a Jewish child, was swine like its parent that must be eradicated.
The head of the Catholic Action organization, Dr. Erich Klausner, was murdered by Hitler’s stormtroopers. In an attempt to discredit the Church, monks were brought to trial on immorality charges.
Imagine, Catholics being brought up on charges of immorality - sound familliar? | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/4/2008 4:22:10 PM | Wow! I really never wondered about what church Hitler belonged to - but talk about bad press for the Lutherans...
...kind wierd that both Martin Luther and Hitler were Germans with strong anti Catholic opinnions that frequently interfaced with pro German xenophobia.
I think it's funny that as long as everyone as treating Catholics as symptom bearers we are all in it together - but as soon as someone stands up for the Catholic church all of a sudden we get question implying more than is fair to imply.
Some men will try anything to make up for their sense of inadiquecy.  | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/4/2008 4:32:04 PM |
lashandra777:
...kind wierd that both Martin Luther and Hitler were Germans with strong anti Catholic opinnions that frequently interfaced with pro German xenophobia.
Well, technically, Hitler was an Austrian. I don't think the Nazis considered him the ubermensch (since he was Austrian and dark-haired), but rather, the Herald of the ubermensch, if that makes any sense. That being said, I love Austria and their culture. The last Emperor of Austria, Blessed Karl V, was in my opinion the greatest ruler of the 20th century.
Anti-Roman and anti-Catholic sentiments have been in place in Germany for a long time. I'd add Bismarck, the founder of modern Germany, to that list. His kulturkampf program was, among other things, an attempt to marginalize Catholicism in modern Germany. | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/4/2008 4:45:18 PM | abc writes:
Many scientists I know feel that faith and sience are two fairly independent cognitive processes...
They would seem to be. But as you have pointed out we are limited in our scope so we must remain the student seeking the light.
would be nice to connect them together some day, but then, it would be nice to connect Gravitational, Electromagnetic and other fields together, too.
Doesn't Kabballah shed light on such a marriage of forces?
I believe that whoever comes up wtih the Great Unification Theory will also come very close to proving the existence of God
Albert Einstein commented on The Unified Field Theory which Kabballah terms Asiah?
Of course, this God might turn out to be quite different from all we could imagine..
Doesn't He always. | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/4/2008 6:35:41 PM | | i found him amd the word has saved me.when we all see him we will. | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/4/2008 8:52:47 PM |
Doesn't Kabballah shed light on such a marriage of forces?
Albert Einstein commented on The Unified Field Theory which Kabballah terms Asiah?
You are dealing with two very different worldviews here. Asiah is not really a descriptive of the "unified field theory" but just a term to describe the material realm. It would be a pretty big leap of semantics to say that it specifically implied "the sticky forces that holds all reality together" when there are more specific ideas about that in Kabbalah but that is well beyond the scope of this thread and most of the readers here I dare say.
And really guys, discussions of Hitler's Christianity or lack thereof...talk about regurgitating the "No True Scotsman" fallacy. In any case, this secular site does a much better job of disseminating the history of Hitler's beliefs, warts and all, including a thorough examination of the "Table Talk" references and how this has been misconstrued in discussions of Hitler's beliefs.
http://www.nobeliefs.com/Hitler1.htm
Hitler was born a Catholic and was baptised as such. He was never formally excommunicated, sadly, despite the conference of German bishops excommunicating all Nazis in 1930 and his technical excommunication via breaking canon law. Much of his ideas on anti-Semitism however DID come from Luther's "On The Jews and Their Lies" as I am sure it did for many other Germans and other Europeans, and in general two millenia of general anti-Semetic hatred and blood libel against the Jews for the supposed crime of deicide. Basic hatred of Jews and the blood libelling of them is however a feature of "any" Christian theology so I guess you can both point fingers happily at each other for history's sins...but...
THIS IS WATER UNDER THE BRIDGE Can we all bloody well move past this nonsense now? I don't think there is anyone who can admit to being free of guilt in this regard. It is time to move forward past the bickering. It really really is tiresome, not to mention factually incorrect. But it is well and truly in the past and not worth talking about now is it???
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/5/2008 6:31:39 AM | | I agree. If certain people will stop making rude remarks and trying to bait fights (usually directed at the catholics) we would all be sooooo much happier in our quest to find our Is There A God? | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/5/2008 6:42:18 AM | I am honored to finally be addressed by the one, the only, Plenty of Fish's Preimier Sensation (hows that for an intro) The Mad Fiddler!
Where you wrote:
Doesn't Kabballah shed light on such a marriage of forces? Albert Einstein commented on The Unified Field Theory which Kabballah terms Asiah? - - -
You are dealing with two very different worldviews here. Asiah is not really a descriptive of the "unified field theory" but just a term to describe the material realm.
You are absolutely correct. I realized it once I had posted it -but you can't unring a bell.
I was posting in something of a hurry and mis-stated myself. In fact it was Ain which I was thinking of. And in fact Ain Sof Aur (Limitless Light) was more true the my thought.
Whereas the Ain Sof Aur or Limitless Light prospoes that the creative element and indeed the creator Himself is exenteded throughout all of creationg (thus a unified or unifying field) it is the Ruach (meaning "spirit", "wind", "breath", or "air". The Greek equivalent is "pneuma" and the Latin is "spiritus" the word used to refer to what sustains the life in a nephesh.) which actively asserts this action.
The challange that believers of all eras have come up against in trying to express their transcendental experiences to others is that these experiences lie beyond the bounds of the rational (and even intuitional) mind on which human written and verbal communication is based. Countless methods have been tried, including allegory, antinomy, poetry and mundane approximation; but all on the fact that transcendental experience cannot be adequately conveyed through sub-transcendental means of communication.
This challange occurs in Kabballism especially in discussions of the higher sefirot on the Tree of Life, and becomes insurmountable in discussing that which lies beyond or above the Tree. The Tree of Life (indeed the floor-plan of the unified field theory) expressed through the sefirot in the Four Worlds is as much as can usefully be conveyed to the human mind through language, and Atziluth and even Briah are really beyond human conception, their "structures" being hinted at through the tangible expressions of the sefirot in the lower worlds.
Ain (nothing)
Ain Sof (limitless nothing)
Ain Sof Aur (limitless light)
To define negative existence clearly is impossible, for when it is distinctly defined it ceases to be negative existence; it is then negative existence passing into static condition. Therefore wisely have the Kabbalists shut out from mortal comprehension the primal Ain, the negatively existent One, and the Ain Soph, the limitless Expansion; while of even the Ain Soph Aur, the illimitable Light, only a dim conception can be formed.
And really guys, discussions of Hitler's Christianity or lack thereof...
I hear you, I hear you loud and clear. I made a passing statement based on factual data and the which I never intended to illustrate more than the fact that religeous tolerance is more that another glib cliche. Then my good brother took hold of it and lost his mind - bless his soul.
Much of his ideas on anti-Semitism however DID come from Luther's "On The Jews and Their Lies" ...THIS IS WATER UNDER THE BRIDGE Can we all bloody well move past this nonsense now? I don't think there is anyone who can admit to being free of guilt in this regard.
As I have stated, re-stated and am stating again, my pointing out Adolf Hitler's active involvement in The Lutheran Church was intended solely to convey the necessity of religeous tolerance. As I stated, nobody would dream of pointing the finger at Lutheran's for the Holocaust simply because Adolf Hitler was a registered, card carrying, Sunday service attending member of the Lutheran Church.
HOWEVER - no good Catholic should ever be expected to have someone make such insulting accusations that by merit of involvement in The Catholic Church we are somehow prone to hurtful behavior or clandestine cover-ups/
The point you refer to would have been dropped immediately, had it not been for my brother's need to further exume the matter for examination in an failed effort at support for his slur on The Roman Catholic Church.
I certainly won't be revisiting it as I am certain there will be bigger fish to fry presently. | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/5/2008 8:48:36 AM | Since reading about it on this site, I have done some reasearch. I have found numerous scholarly sources who enumerate Hitler as being Lutheran as well.
It really is not surprising in light of his litany of damning insults lumping Catholics in with Jews and Gypsies and homosexuals and political dissadents and whomever else he felt like shipping off the the camps.
I did read the Heinrich Himmler was riased Catholic and remained Catholic until it came time to do the dirtiest of the work at which point the strict moral code of Himmler's Jesuit upbringing caused him to reject the Catholic church, along with Hitler and Martin Luther before him - because the deisre of man was stronger than their obediance to the teachings and moral protocol of The Catholic Church.
But really who cares that Hitler was Lutheran, like it has been said - we should not judge Lutherans according to the actions of a man like Hitler and I don't think we should allow the good name of the Catholic church or any church to be demeened based on people who did some bad things.
Especially since the Catholic church is now cleaning house - if anything we should be getting behind this continued effort at protecting people of all ages.
I do think it should be remembered that Hitler, Himmler and all the devils of that band, when it was necessary to their purpose, did wage a war on the Catholic church which included copious false accusations of moral crimes which were later proven to have never taken place. | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/5/2008 11:51:40 PM |
I am honored to finally be addressed by the one, the only, Plenty of Fish's Preimier Sensation (hows that for an intro) The Mad Fiddler!
Now I can't get my head through the forum door...just a second *poke BLAM hisssssss* there we go 
You are absolutely correct. I realized it once I had posted it -but you can't unring a bell.
I was posting in something of a hurry and mis-stated myself. In fact it was Ain which I was thinking of. And in fact Ain Sof Aur (Limitless Light) was more true the my thought.
Nae bother! And some good information on the Kabbalah which hopefully will spur others to at least give it a look. It is, imho, one way that people have tried to puzzle out the Great Mystery by overlaying it with a deep symbolic framework. When I first began to study it, I had no idea how thick the brush was...now of course I have hit the first roadblock which is not knowing Hebrew.
Now there's a bit of work to get at... | |
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| Is there a mod?
Posted: 6/6/2008 9:23:30 PM | | Well sir, that was a seus of a comment if I ever saw one myself.. | |
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| Is there a mod?
Posted: 6/6/2008 9:44:38 PM |
Well sir, that was a seus of a comment if I ever saw one myself..
Seus?? I'm gonna regret it but....what is a seus? Here it comes...LOL | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/7/2008 12:43:03 AM | Is there a god?
Hmmm... Yea, I'm pretty sure that I exist. How else could I ponder that question. | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/7/2008 8:14:23 AM | [abc: how can we meaningfully postulate if God is one or many]
Easily, check out the first two Ten Commandments. Consult your rabbi if necessary. | |
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| Is there a mod?
Posted: 6/7/2008 1:12:37 PM | | no worries, seus = code name for dawg... lol | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/9/2008 1:10:05 PM |
[abc: how can we meaningfully postulate if God is one or many]
Easily, check out the first two Ten Commandments. Consult your rabbi if necessary.
That's why I followed with a disclaimer that if your faith tells you God is one, then it's true for you. My rabbi says posters should maybe try reading before they write!  | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/9/2008 2:44:52 PM | Of course, ALL of this comes down to what definition of "god" people are using.
Some would say: God is THE Christian god. No if, ands or buts and if you worship any other, my God will torture you for eternity so it's better to play it safe.
Others would say: If you don't follow the Kor'an you are NEVER getting to heaven and are worshiping in the WRONG way.
If you want to say that the Planck Scale is "god", then I'm a 100% believer (although still not a worshiper).
Others would say that All of these definitions of "god" are a infinitesimally small part of the real... such a small part as to all be WRONG. The truth is so far beyond our comprehension it's like pre-school age children pretending they understand the mathematical formulas of quantum physics.
"Is there a god" is like asking "does the number 12 drive better than the number 2".
James, Seattle, WAshington, USA, Earth | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/9/2008 4:55:27 PM | [a disclaimer that if your faith tells you God is one, then it's true for you}
Is your disclaimer saying what I think it is, "If you believe it, it is real for you meaning there is no absolute truth." My experience with skeptics in Jewish circles is that statement is pretty much where they land on this issue. | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/9/2008 5:29:00 PM | | My beliefs mirror those of gnosticsm, i believe the creator god is a flawed egomanic, the Demiurge, who kept the truth from man by denying us our true spiritual natures. The All Father (the true god) gives us His light and we have to turn to that light through a lifetime of knowledge seeking (gnosis). | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/9/2008 6:31:07 PM | First of all, the world's greatest philosophers have ponder this for centuries - and you think you can solve this in a POF forum. Well, you never know.
First of all how can you prove something doesn't exist. You can't. Basically you have to educate yourself on all possible angles and questions - all religions - past and present, science and myth. Only then you can convince yourself of one or the other. It still doens't prove anything, but at least you're educated and can make an informed decision. | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/9/2008 6:32:21 PM | "Random chance would not bring that about."
There is nothing random about anything... It's millions of years of evolution. | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/9/2008 8:58:11 PM | I can't resist! (shooting her hand in the air)
Others would say: If you don't follow the Kor'an you are NEVER getting to heaven and are worshiping in the WRONG way.
Not to nit pick, but - I recall Koran says that righteous Christians and Jews go to paradize. Just a side note... does not change the main thought.
Others would say that All of these definitions of "god" are a infinitesimally small part of the real... such a small part as to all be WRONG. The truth is so far beyond our comprehension it's like pre-school age children pretending they understand the mathematical formulas of quantum physics.
I think a lot of very religious people will agree with that statement, truly yours (though not very religious by any means) included... as one rabbi had said, God begins where our understanding of Him ends...
"Is there a god" is like asking "does the number 12 drive better than the number 2".
as is reducing the concept of God to traditional interpretations of Chritian, Muslim or Jewish God. The majority of the religious people just don't fit this mold I think. | |
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| Is there a god?
Posted: 6/9/2008 10:26:53 PM | God begins where our understanding of Him ends...
Why call our lack of understanding "God"? The pursuit to know God, which occupies so many, seems to me to be the doG chasing it's tail. I include myself in the group of those who acknowledge the inability to know the source but rather than spinning intellectual and spiritual circles it makes more sense to me to come to peace with the ambiguity and the paradox. | |
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