"The Requirement"

OK, Zig, but you are dealing with a specifically Spanish and a specifically Catholic example. As the Theocrats you fear are ovewhelmingly WASP evangelicals, you'd do better to bring up some statement by Calvin. Calvin did approve of the execution of one person named Michael Severitus (sp?) but if you are looking for the kind of forced conversion statistics, you simply won't find it in evangelical history. In its emphasis of a person's relationship and trust in Jesus Christ, the evangelical world knows full well that one cannot militarily bring about someone's eternal life.

SheikBen wrote:OK, Zig, but you are dealing with a specifically Spanish and a specifically Catholic example. As the Theocrats you fear are ovewhelmingly WASP evangelicals, you'd do better to bring up some statement by Calvin. Calvin did approve of the execution of one person named Michael Severitus (sp?) but if you are looking for the kind of forced conversion statistics, you simply won't find it in evangelical history. In its emphasis of a person's relationship and trust in Jesus Christ, the evangelical world knows full well that one cannot militarily bring about someone's eternal life.

You're conveniently forgetting the inhabitants of Salem, MA. They were not Catholic, Michael.

SheikBen wrote:OK, Zig, but you are dealing with a specifically Spanish and a specifically Catholic example. As the Theocrats you fear are ovewhelmingly WASP evangelicals, you'd do better to bring up some statement by Calvin. Calvin did approve of the execution of one person named Michael Severitus (sp?) but if you are looking for the kind of forced conversion statistics, you simply won't find it in evangelical history. In its emphasis of a person's relationship and trust in Jesus Christ, the evangelical world knows full well that one cannot militarily bring about someone's eternal life.

Theocrats? Evangelical history?

"The Requirement" example I cited is about European enslavement of American natives for economic gain. That is what the Spanish were after you know, economic riches, not religious evengelism for the conquered- other than as a symbol of "higher" authority for the control they demanded militarily.

But that you naturally think of Calvinistic evangelism in the context of Spanish economic enslavement speaks volumes- not necessarily about about SheikBen specifically- but about the defenders of religious evangelism in general. You obviosuly "get it" that religion is about power and control- whether over our minds, or over or bodies- but I repeat myself.

Hi Zig and Stephanie,

The folks in Salem are the ancestors of today's United Church of Christ, which is itself on the secular side of the "culture wars." Still, even in Salem, you have, what 22 accused witches who were burned? I spoke with a descendant of Salem who said that within his family witchcraft still existed. This is not some guy I met over a bourbon on a street corner but a former law professor at Duke (OK, maybe the same kind of crowd:) Still, I don't know that a handful of people punished under the effects of property grabbing and tainted water says anything in comparison to the Catholic practices of the Inquisition and the Crusades.

My second thought is that religion, any religion, can be used for power and control, just as any philosophy can. Love of country can be used for control as well. Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot were able to exercise great power and control, and the genocides that came with them, in a context of specifically forbidding religion. Still, there is no doubt that religion can be misused by the unscrupulous, and that would include any religion, including evangelical Christianity.

However, I would be remiss if I didn't offer a couple of theological thoughts and their political implications.

1-Machiavelli liked civil religion because it led to a greater self-policing on the part of the populace. One part of this civil religion was the threat of hellfire for disobedience (punishment in the next world). However, evangelical Christianity emphasizes that someone is made right not in what they do but what in Jesus Christ did on the Cross. As such, the power of the state to compel thoughts of heaven and hell is absent.

2-Martin Luther himself stated that coercion into faith was not possible. To wit: "God's word must do the fighting. If it does not succeed, certainly the temporal power will not succeed either, even if it were to drench the world in blood."

3-The majority of Christian evangelicals, myself included, would argue that Christians cannot be cease to be Christians. The doctrine of "once saved, always saved" comes under condemnation from many, and yet it precisely keeps the government and secular authority in general from having any ability to use religion as a means of power over the individual. While Aquinas would have a good Christian necessarily being a good citizen, heaven and hell for the Christian is not something that is in the hands of the state, or an invading horde, or what have you. Eternal life comes from Jesus Christ and not from the Pope of the Inquisitors, the good deeds of Machiavelli's deceived ones, or from political obedience to a kind of divine right in Robert Filmer's England.

Michael,

I suspect you have never been to Salem. That town is full of witches. Some of them practice the old pagan rituals, some of them are playing a role for the tourists in order to make a buck. However, I have never met a witch who was willing to fool with "black magick" or "cast an evil spell". The ones I have known all belive in karma, and not just any old karma. They believe in "Karma 3-fold".......that whatever they do will come back to them 3 times over.

The victims of the hysteria in Salem were not witches. Many of them were accused of witchcraft as part of a land grab. One man was crushed to death with stones because he refused to confess to witchcraft. They wanted his land, if he confessed they'd take his land and he wanted his children to have it.

Are you familiar with the story of Roger Williams? While the Puritans didn't kill multitudes, they certainly were not kind to anyone unable or unwilling to live their lives to the letter of their rules. They practiced some pretty humiliating and/or brutal manners of punishment. My point is, I think you're glossing over the outrageous behavior committed by them in the name of their religion.

SheikBen wrote:Hi Zig and Stephanie,

The folks in Salem are the ancestors of today's United Church of Christ, which is itself on the secular side of the "culture wars." Still, even in Salem, you have, what 22 accused witches who were burned? I spoke with a descendant of Salem who said that within his family witchcraft still existed.

And is that a problem for anyone. Why?

This is not some guy I met over a bourbon on a street corner but a former law professor at Duke (OK, maybe the same kind of crowd:) Still, I don't know that a handful of people punished under the effects of property grabbing and tainted water says anything in comparison to the Catholic practices of the Inquisition and the Crusades.

Whether it's Catholic Inquisitions, or Puritan witch hunts, or Christian Fundamentalists at Dayton Tennessee, it's religion that's the tool of the oppressor. Infinitely more souls have been extinguished by and in the name of supernatural religions that ever have or will be saved by any supernatural religion.

Hi again y'all,

This is getting interesting. Let me hasten to say that I do not approve of stoning witches, even if they are in fact witches. My point is that the average person assumes (quite unconsciously) that the extent of the injustice in Salem is greater than it really was.

I find Zig's above lumping together of Catholic Inquisitions (in which a great many people were tortured or killed) with Dayton, Tennessee, in which a man named Scopes was fined a hundred bucks.

Surely you see the difference, don't ya Zig?

I'm not suggesting that Christian fundamentalists always act the right manner. Fred Phelps is a dumbass. I don't think telling people that God hates them is particularly effective.

However, the great impact of evangelicalism in the United States has not been anything like the Crusades or the Inquisition or whatever other event is brought up by secularists afraid of organized religion. My faith informs the way that I live and the choices that I make both political and paternal; at the same time, you'll find that my neighbors do not fear my lobbying this town into a theocracy. I'd favor a theocracy except I wouldn't trust humans with one.

SheikBen wrote:Hi again y'all,

This is getting interesting. Let me hasten to say that I do not approve of stoning witches, even if they are in fact witches. My point is that the average person assumes (quite unconsciously) that the extent of the injustice in Salem is greater than it really was.

How is the injustice in Salem less than the "average person" assumes?

I find Zig's above lumping together of Catholic Inquisitions (in which a great many people were tortured or killed) with Dayton, Tennessee, in which a man named Scopes was fined a hundred bucks.
Surely you see the difference, don't ya Zig?

The difference in only one of degree. Either way religion is a few theological elitists demanding conformity by the masses.

I'd favor a theocracy except I wouldn't trust humans with one.

Then why would you favor a theocracy? Theocracies are an invention of humans, you know.

The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.: Gilbert Chesterton (1874 - 1936)

Hi Zig,

I agree with Chesterton. I assume that Chesterton would reject the Witch Trials, the Crusades, and the Inquisition as far from the Christian ideal.

Incidentally, Zig, I wager that 90% of the people who rightly criticize the Inquisition have no idea the magnitude of the people affected, and are assuming that an exponentially greater number of people suffered than actually did.

When you compare "Christian" history with the work of the 20th century atheistic communists, there's a great chasm indeed.

ziggy wrote:The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.: Gilbert Chesterton (1874 - 1936)

If the "Christian ideal has not been tried" ........ then just how in hell could it have been found to be difficult?

The above Chesterton quote reads like a CYA excuse for one to sit on their ass and do nothing to improve their "lot in life".

.

SheikBen wrote:When you compare "Christian" history with the work of the 20th century atheistic communists, there's a great chasm indeed.

Now Mike, your inference is that the 20th Century was worse.

But Mike, ......... not population percentage wise, ...... would there be such a great chasm, ...... now would there?

Now 500+- years of inquisitions, 12th Century thru the 16th Century is a pretty damn "wide n' deep" chasm as compared to less than 100 years of "atheistic communism".

.

SheikBen wrote:When you compare "Christian" history with the work of the 20th century atheistic communists, there's a great chasm indeed.

It depends on what you call "Christian history".

From a century before Columbus and for centuries after Columbus there was a white European genocide against western "Indian" culture and populations that far eclipses even Stalin and his "atheistic" cohorts.

The duration of "Christian" conquest and inquisition is irrelevant to it's magnitude, just as the present unpleasantness in Iraq (with 4000 troops having died) is not to be equated with Vietnam (with 58000 troops having died) just because it's been long. I'm not saying that this makes the war justified (and certainly it doesn't justify the way in which the war is being carried out), I'm just saying that just because some event is long does not make it of the same magnitude as a much more horrible, yet more brief, event.

I am not going to try to defend Spanish imperialism or even American "manifest destiny," but the genocide of which you speak--were not more indigenous killed by disease than by the sword of the Spaniards? Additionally, there is a great deal of indigenous ancestry throughout this hemisphere. Zig is speaking strictly within the borders of the United States.

Zig is speaking strictly within the borders of the United States.

No, Zig is speaking about the western hemisphere overall.

If you are speaking throughout the western hemisphere, then your comparisons fall short. Indigenous or Mestizo populations still predominate the Western Hemisphere with the exception of the United States, Canada, Argentina, and Chile.

I am not going to try to defend Spanish imperialism or even American "manifest destiny," but the genocide of which you speak--were not more indigenous killed by disease than by the sword of the Spaniards?

Whether the native population was killed more by forced labor in the mines- forced at sword point to produce gold that didn't exist as in the Bahamas under Columbus-, or by mass murder out of frustration and envy as in Virginia in by about 1620, or by diseases imported by their conquerers, is of little social difference. In that regard, diseases were convenient to the conquerors' purpose of acquiring the resources of the natives. Each native that died of disease was one less that their conquerors' did not have to expend the energy to kill by the sword.

Additionally, there is a great deal of indigenous ancestry throughout this hemisphere.

Really? How much- compared to let's say in the year 1400?

Zig,

I'm influenced. I have not considered well that period of time, although let me hasten to say that the Spanish imperialism and indigenous exploitation was done by Catholics and religion seemed only to be a tertiary concern in working miners to death. It was a priest who advocated for merely a 20 hour workday, as he explained that even the natives had souls.

But, Zig, let me grant you that Spanish imperialism can be likened in magnitude to 20th century genocide. You win that round, Mister Zig. Well done.

Let me say, however, that if the Christian religion were the cause of such misdeeds, then we could have expected the atheists of the 20th century to have done better than they did, and that certainly is not what happened.

Let me say, however, that if the Christian religion were the cause of such misdeeds, then we could have expected the atheists of the 20th century to have done better than they did, and that certainly is not what happened.

Michael,

Could you please explain what you mean by that?

SheikBen wrote:Let me say, however, that if the Christian religion were the cause of such misdeeds, ................

I didn't say that religion was the cause of these particular misdeeds. Greed and related barbaric unconcern about the welfare of others of humanity was the cause. But religion provided the moral, godly authority for it. When you're doin' the Lord's work of killin' and plunderin' instead of the Devil's, you can both sleep better tonight and face your brothers and sisters in the Lord tomorrow, right? Plus, if you can make the natives believe that it's all for the glory of the Lord, then they'll love you for it anyway.

Any anyway, after all, western hemisphere natives were but un-churched heathens anyway- and so were no more deserving of life than a herd of unsaved buffalo.

.................. then we could have expected the atheists of the 20th century to have done better than they did, and that certainly is not what happened.

Nah, those invading Christians will keep on doin' anything or killin' anyone for their Gods- especially if it enrichens their worldly treasure chests. But atheists, well, they soon just get tired of it and quit- when they finally realize there ain't nothin' it in for 'em anyway.

Steph,

I meant that Pol Pot, Mao Zedong and Josef Stalin were all guilty of the kinds of misdeeds regularly attributed to religion, and if religion were really as a corrupting force as it is claimed to be, then one would have expected such atheists to act in a different manner.

Can evil people use religion to justify their malevolence? Clearly so. Is religion itself to blame? No.

Can evil people use religion to justify their malevolence? Clearly so. Is religion itself to blame? No.

Then tell, us, Sheik, since you realize that supernatural religion can and has been used as cover for horrendous human acts, just what actual GOOD has supernatural religion ever done?

Ziggy,

It depends on your definition of "religion." Jesus Christ and my faith in Him have certainly not only given me eternal life but I am truly a different creature than I was before becoming a Christian. I can tell you that I am more pleasant, less angry, more charitable towards others, and much more honest than I was before. I also truly love other people, desiring their good, and that was not something that would have described me before becoming a Christian.

Beyond my own personal experience, however, consider how many hospitals have been built by Catholics, Methodists, and Baptists in the United States, and by Catholics and Hindus in India. Missionaries have brought not only food but medical care to people living in horrible circumstances. Street children in Uganda are being fed and clothed by evangelical Christians, and hungry and cold people in Chicago are being fed and sheltered by the Pacific Garden Mission (and no, Zig, they do not need to be Christians to be fed, although they do hear the Gospel).

How many hospitals have been set up by the ethical humanists? Any atheist "missions" feeding people in Africa in the name of "ethical atheism?"