Ignatius117

I found it very interesting and fun to think about; gravity can be thought of as two objects placing restrictions in movement on each other, sort of like a three-legged race. The absence of gravity is actually more orderly than with; only inertia is a factor, and not an outside force.

It's coming! THE END TIMES ARE UPON US!!!! ...Wait, turns out the Mayans keeled over when they got to 12/21/10, Nostradamus was vague as hell, and Revelations doesn't support 2012 or any other apocalyptic date, and resetting calendars don't mean shit...

Facepalm-worthy, really. I always feel slightly more braindead when fellow Christians assume that belief in God makes one righteous; if God created us the same as He created anyone else, then not only did he instill morals in believers from birth, he instilled morals in ALL HUMANS. There are much better ways to keep a Christian body in a nation and gain converts than making the BS claim that anyone who isn't them is immoral. It's wrong and bigoted on so many levels to think that one is better than another, and to also hold that God created all in His own Image, and that He has written the laws on the hearts of all mankind; woe to the believer who acts with no compassion and is filled only with hate, but blessed be the one who does not believe yet acts righteously. We should be no stranger to the fact that hypocrites do and always have existed in the faith, nor should we plug our ears when one of our number is revealed to be hateful and a liar; we should press him to repent of his ways and be once again upstanding and good before the God he believes in. To those who do not believe and are truly good people regardless, blessed are you, even if you ignore this religious gesture.

Even given choice of words, you know exactly what I mean. Don't try to discredit me, or anyone else holding the same position as I am, over something so trivial as that. My point is, if we separate the religious ceremonies from the legal contracts, then we would have far less problems. Given the current scenario, it is gays walking down the aisle in a church that raises eyebrows, and not necessarily giving gays full legal right (granted, there are some who would object to granting rights as well). In fact, there are occasionally even legal benefits non-married gays living together enjoy over non-married heterosexual couples living together; I remember when insurance for something (unemployment, if memory serves) was denied a friend of my family and their long-time partner because they weren't married, though gays enjoyed the ability to obtain that insurance in what were otherwise the same circumstances. This was in Ohio, JSYK. My point is, if you SEPARATE the LEGAL JOINING OF TWO PERSONS from the RELIGIOUS BINDING OF FLESH AND SOUL, then gays would have a much easier time of it, and this wouldn't be nearly such a political war.

To be honest, I've never seen someone get so upset over minor semantics.

You'd be surprised... I'll just post this link here: http://pewsitter.com/view_news_id_35081.php While I don't agree with gays being married (married in the religious sense, mind you) I see no problem with abolishing government-recognized marriage and instituting civil unions as the legalistic norm for both heterosexual and homosexual couples. Marriage was and is a religious practice, and if we truly want separation of church and state, then marriages should be merely a religious formality, and civil unions would carry the same legal weight we today apply to marriage. It may seem like minor semantics, but it gives gays their rights and doesn't infringe upon a religion's beliefs by forcing them to marry gays. Though, whether gays can be married in the eyes of a church is another matter entirely.

I would like to add to this that, while it may seem incredibly trivial to us, over in the Balkan countries, history is huge to them. Not only for nationalist pride, but to identify themselves as a legitimate country. It is for this reason that many Greeks even go so far as to say that FYROM is a "false country" because historically speaking, according to them, there was never a country called Macedonia in the Baltic region, only a geographic area called Macedonia. I'm not well-versed in this, but it seems to be that this should be looked at from an impartial historical record to identify the legitimacy of either side's claims. I won't say what should happen if it does prove that FYROM's claims are faulty; that is up to the Balkans themselves to decide.

Which is precisely why I'm a Catholic. But, that, however, is beside the point. It is a terrible practice, and that isn't even the worst sort of thing I've heard of. Free will is at once a freedom and a bite in the ass; God does not come down from Heaven and smite these so-called "exorcists" because He is not just. He does not smite them because those exorcists will have to own up to it at the seat of judgement. Whether or not you believe in either God or judgement is out of the question; by their own religion, they are committing a grave sin. "For whatever you do to the least of these, so also you do to Me." It is a shame that so many do not heed those words from the same Gospel they claim to preach.

In other words, regardless of religion (or lack thereof), one can be brutal. We have access to the Greek and Hebrew, so the translations nowadays are much better than the King James Version, I assure you. Or, are you referring to specific parts of the Bible? Tell me, what books were removed? I am aware of the 7 books quite a number of Protestants leave off, but what else? In addition, aside from the Torah, what else was word of mouth for thousands of years? Though, I do agree that using Scripture to prove Scripture is correct or that God exists is in and of itself a self-serving argument.