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Blasphemy

Timble2 said:
ramonmercado said:
...because the history wasn’t there. What you had was a collection of myths, folk tales, saints’ lives and whatever...

You do realise that the people who are organizing the Brigit festival are using these materials the exactly same way that the Catholic Church used them...reinterpreting them for their own purposes?

Well they are religious people. Most of them are RCs. :D
 
All-hail the Great and Wise God Vin-da-loo who fires the heat to the bottom of my world! Yea Verrily!

Sacred is the Na'an and Pickled Lime - lest we forget the writhing of tongues!

All-hail!

:D
 
Two many people fail to acknowledge the great gulf which stretches between "blasphemy" and the "playful irreverence of the Believer," and thus treat both the same.
 
ghostdog19 said:
QuaziWashboard said:
If I was a pagan living in the past, worshiping Brigid in a pagan way, and I was forced by the Church to worship Brigid in a Christian way, would that be 'theft?'
No.
That's what I like to see....well thought out arguments written in an eloquent way. :roll:
 
QuaziWashboard said:
ghostdog19 said:
QuaziWashboard said:
If I was a pagan living in the past, worshiping Brigid in a pagan way, and I was forced by the Church to worship Brigid in a Christian way, would that be 'theft?'
No.
That's what I like to see....well thought out arguments written in an eloquent way. :roll:
Quite.
 
ramonmercado said:
Err, there was nothing new in that. Are you left speechless or just repeating yourself?
Ha! My goodness, you are modest. No. I was laughing so hard I only managed to hit submit. There should have been a :rofl: in there. Funniest bit being "I posted stuff about the Goddess". Oh, bless. That was hilarious.

Word of advice; stick to what you know. ;)
 
ghostdog19 said:
ramonmercado said:
Err, there was nothing new in that. Are you left speechless or just repeating yourself?
Ha! My goodness, you are modest. No. I was laughing so hard I only managed to hit submit. There should have been a :rofl: in there. Funniest bit being "I posted stuff about the Goddess". Oh, bless. That was hilarious.

Word of advice; stick to what you know. ;)

Yes, well I bothered to research the topic. You just blather on determinned to win every argument by wearing your opponents out. Now why don't you consult the other links and book which I referenced?

Have a nice day. :lol:
 
Oh, btw Ghostie. You still haven't referenced the Standing Army of Historians who back up your assertions.

Any chance of us seeing even a fraction of this list? :?
 
ghostdog19 said:
ramonmercado said:
Err, there was nothing new in that. Are you left speechless or just repeating yourself?
Ha! My goodness, you are modest. No. I was laughing so hard I only managed to hit submit. There should have been a :rofl: in there. Funniest bit being "I posted stuff about the Goddess". Oh, bless. That was hilarious.

Word of advice; stick to what you know. ;)

Goodness me! What an insulting post!
If you feel that you know more about the subject than others, then surely it would be a good idea to debate sensibly on the subject in order to try to educate or pass on you're superior knowledge of a subject and try and change the view of the person(s) you are debating with through respect, not to be so condiscending that others wouldn't want to take your posts seriously.
 
Sarcastic? yes. Insulting? Not really, and certainly no worse than some of what he has had flung at him of late in the name of "reasoned debate". To be fair to ghostdog, at least he has attempted to engage in discussion, rather than relentlessly flogging a recurrent agenda that religion, especially certain sub-species thereof, is of itself an evil.

Nonetheless, this thread has veered somewhat into a snipe fest which shall this very moment cease (and as for dragging an argument from one thread and attempting to propogate it on another, that's straightforward bad form and not something we wish to see again.) Any more "I'll thump him if he calls me big-nose again" moments will result in warnings.

The topic at hand is that of BLASPHEMY. Shall we continue like adults, now?
 
There seem to be many Christians who don't believe that God takes blasphemy seriously enough. So they're bouind and determined to take it more to heart than He does.
 
OldTimeRadio said:
There seem to be many Christians who don't believe that God takes blasphemy seriously enough. So they're bouind and determined to take it more to heart than He does.

Good point. If there was an all powerful god then he would hardly be upset by someone cocking a snoop at him. All he would have to do is lie in the long grass and wait...

OTR, you seem to have more knowldge of the Fundies. Now RCC and High Church Anglican Churchs would contain a lot of paintings, sculptures and wood carvings of Jesus, God, Mary etc . Would the fundies regard this as utter idolatory, even blasphemy?
 
From link
Police arrested a Christian woman in Pakistan's central Punjab province for allegedly making a blasphemous statement about the Prophet Mohammed outside a mosque, reports said Saturday.

"We can't allow people to desecrate the name of Holy Prophet," police officer Reza Shah in the Changa Manga area, situated more than 70 kilometres south of Punjab capital Lahore, told the English- language Dawn newspaper.

A local resident backed by two witnesses last month levelled the charge against 40-year-old Martha Bibi, who along with her husband runs a business dealing in building materials.

"The complaint lodged against her (Martha) is true," Shah said, adding that: "Had we not arrested her, the people would have killed her."

According to Martha's husband, the complainant and his wife conspired against Martha when she sought payment for construction material she had sold for the construction of a local mosque.

Dawn said Martha's family went into hiding after the incident while her relatives accused the police of "playing the judge and the jury."

and from:

link


Pakistani Christian woman held on blasphemy charge

Submitted by Tarique on Sat, 2007-02-03 13:47. Muslim World News

Lahore, Feb 3 (IANS) A 40-year-old Christian woman has been charged with blasphemy in Chhanga Manga town in the Punjab after she entered the local mosque to demand payment for the supply of construction material.

Martha Bibi was put under arrest on Friday on a complaint made by Mohammad Dilbar. He named two of his acquaintances - Mohammad Aslam and Mohammad Ramzan - in the FIR (first information report) as witnesses to the alleged crime.

Dilbar accused Martha Bibi of blaspheming the Holy Prophet near the mosque. However, her relatives alleged that police had registered the case without investigation.

The police say she has been detained because local villagers could have killed her.

The incident has come to light even as President Pervez Musharraf has been making renewed efforts to push through a legislation that lighten the severity of the existing law, making all parties accountable in an investigation.

He had abandoned his earlier effort in 2002 following protests from the clergy and the conservatives.

The charge of blasphemy against the religious minorities is commonly used in Pakistan by people to settle scores. The courts generally rule against the accused for fear of public outcry.

Pakistan has been criticized in the West for being harsh on the minorities with such institutionalised arrangements that are guided by public pressures.

Zulfikar Gill, a district councillor in Kasur, told Dawn that he had urged the Kasur Superintendent of Police to carry out a 'thorough investigation' before reaching any conclusion. "But I was told that Martha was arrested to protect her from residents threatening to kill her and set her house on fire," he added.

"We can't allow people to desecrate the name of the Holy Prophet (PBUH). The complaint lodged against her is true," said Chhanga Manga Police Station SHO Reza Shah.

"Had we not arrested her, the people would have killed her."

Martha's relatives accused the police of "playing the judge and the jury". Her family has gone into hiding.


edited by TheQuixote: fixed big links
 
ramonmercado said:
Now RCC and High Church Anglican Churchs would contain a lot of paintings, sculptures and wood carvings of Jesus, God, Mary etc . Would the fundies regard this as utter idolatory, even blasphemy?

Ramon, it's difficult to speak for "all everybody," but my Southern Baptist church had a framed Russian-icon-style print of Mary and the infant Jesus on the wall.

And I've rarely been in any Christian church which didn't have paintings of Jesus.
 
OldTimeRadio said:
my Southern Baptist church had a framed Russian-icon-style print of Mary and the infant Jesus on the wall..
Do you mean the Black Madonna? That reminds me of a story with a slightly 'fortean' angle that sort of ties into Blasphemy in a way, specifically to do with the Black Madonna of Częstochowa (in Poland). There are two scars upon Mary's cheek in the painting, said to have been the marks left by a Hussite* robber's blade. When the robber went to strike the painting a third time he doubled over in agony and died (perhaps his punishment for blasphemy?). Even when the scars on the painting were repaired they would reappear.

*Hussites were a Christian movement that followed the teachings of Jan Hus, the RCC considered Hus a heretic and he was excommunicated and burned at the stake. That may provide an angle on why the story is the way it is.
 
Strictly speaking, "blasphemy" seems to apply only to attacks on God/Jesus.

And iconoclasts, in the literal sense, aren't usually considered blasphemers.

Though that's Christians who destroy representations of the Deity on principle. I don't think it would apply to people who spray-paint them with obscene grafitti.
 
OldTimeRadio said:
Strictly speaking, "blasphemy" seems to apply only to attacks on God/Jesus.
Jesus is in the painting too, hence the rather tenuous link to "blasphemy".
OldTimeRadio said:
And iconoclasts, in the literal sense, aren't usually considered blasphemers.
I'm not certain that the Hussites were Iconoclasts specifically, so I think in this case the term is figurative.
 
whoa! Think I opened a great big can o' worms there.
Maybe 'take the piss' wasnt quite the right phrase. Pillaged, raped and plundered from other religions may have been more apt.... ;) :madeyes:

and cue the onslaught...!
:wow:
 
OldTimeRadio said:
Ramon, it's difficult to speak for "all everybody," but my Southern Baptist church had a framed Russian-icon-style print of Mary and the infant Jesus on the wall.

And I've rarely been in any Christian church which didn't have paintings of Jesus.

I find that very surprising. Most of the Methodist churces I have attended have not had any images at all in them! "Low" Anglican churches can be even more spartan. When I was at University in Scotland the Minister told us that there were people who would even consider the plain wooden cross we had on the alter to be an idol!
I suppose this means Southern Baptists are quite different from Joyless Scottish Calvinists.
By the way, ministers in "high" Anglican churches can get into real trouble if they intoduce images into a church without getting proper permission.
 
Really? I always thought that 'high Anglicanism' had very little difference from Catholicism with regards to the use of decoration and statues in churches.
 
rjmrjmrjm said:
Really? I always thought that 'high Anglicanism' had very little difference from Catholicism with regards to the use of decoration and statues in churches.

It depends on the statues and paintings. There have been fights over graven images of "Our Lady" being installed when the said "images" do not also include a live infant, adult or dead Jesus.
 
Austen, Ramon didn't author the quotation you attribute to him. I did. Since Ramon and I have very different ideas on religious issues, this is quite misleading.
 
I get into an upscale Cincinnati Methodist church quite regularly which has paintings of Christ on the walls.

Maybe this is one of those things which differ across the Pond? We never had a RELIGION-based Civil War - might some British religious perceptions still be hold-overs from the conflicts of the 1640s and 1650s?

There's STILL anti-Catholic feeling in France remaining from the persecutions of the Hugonots in the 1590s.
 
rjmrjmrjm said:
Really? I always thought that 'high Anglicanism' had very little difference from Catholicism with regards to the use of decoration and statues in churches.

A nun back in grade school told me a story about two nun friends of hers who'd accidentally attended an Anglican Mass in London, without knowing of their error until being informed of it later.

And isn't one of the hallmarks of an "ultramontane" Anglican church supposed to be a "Mary chapel"?
 
OldTimeRadio said:
rjmrjmrjm said:
Really? I always thought that 'high Anglicanism' had very little difference from Catholicism with regards to the use of decoration and statues in churches.

A nun back in grade school told me a story about two nun friends of hers who'd accidentally attended an Anglican Mass in London, without knowing of their error until being informed of it later.

And isn't one of the hallmarks of an "ultramontane" Anglican church supposed to be a "Mary chapel"?

I've heard of people attending CoI services for several months without noticing the difference. but this was foaf.
 
The 'Mary Chapel' you speak of, more often called a 'Lady Chapel' cannot be taken as a sign of ultramontanism. Liverpool cathedral, Anglican built in 1905 has a Lady Chapel dispite it being very firmly Anglican.

The problem derives from the evangelical revival of the 17-1800s as far as I can see. It's then when you get anglicanism being split and re-split to include many calvinist and lutherian beliefs.

Until then Anglicanism was basically RC without the Pope.

I know this is a gross simplification but this is my basic understanding.
 
OldTimeRadio said:
Austen, Ramon didn't author the quotation you attribute to him. I did. Since Ramon and I have very different ideas on religious issues, this is quite misleading.

Sorry about that - a html tag has gone a stray in my previous post.
 
austen27 said:
OldTimeRadio said:
Austen, Ramon didn't author the quotation you attribute to him. I did. Since Ramon and I have very different ideas on religious issues, this is quite misleading.

Sorry about that - a html tag has gone a stray in my previous post.

In the name of Darwin, Dawkins and Turing I forgive you for your transgression.
 
OldTimeRadio said:
Maybe this is one of those things which differ across the Pond? We never had a RELIGION-based Civil War - might some British religious perceptions still be hold-overs from the conflicts of the 1640s and 1650s?

I think the other effect of the Civil War was to discourage political debate on the subject of religion.
 
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