Double Standard?

[Sparko]

Besides, he's obviously putting you on the back burner till he finishes the reply to me and Mountain Man.

[Epoetker]

And you'll continue to wait until you learn either to ask more interesting and engaging questions or at least learn a bit of decorum. Being rude and boring is not a winning combination for GTD.

Besides, he's obviously putting you on the back burner till he finishes the reply to me and Mountain Man.

[Sparko]

And you'll continue to wait until you learn either to ask more interesting and engaging questions or at least learn a bit of decorum. Being rude and boring is not a winning combination for GTD.

All I asked you was to support your claim that the constitution says you can't force others to publish someone else's speech.

I guess you can't so you are avoiding admitting you are wrong and trying to toss the "blame" back on me by saying I am boring and rude.

That answers my question right there. Thanks.

[Bill the Cat]

The Colorado folks aren't the only ones...

Source: http://www.clickorlando.com/news/central-florida-baker-death-threats-anti-gay-cake-request/32184060

LONGWOOD, Fla. -
A Central Florida baker said she is getting death threats after refusing to make a cake with a message against gay marriage. The man who placed the order recorded it and then posted it online.

Since then, Cut the Cake off U.S. Highway 17-92 in Longwood has been fielding calls from angry people across the country. The man who made the request is Joshua Feuerstein, a former pastor and social media personality.

"I need a sheet cake and I need it to say, 'We do not support gay marriage' [silence]," said Feuerstein in the video posted to his Facebook page earlier this week [full video below].

"He wanted us to put a hateful message on a cake and I said, 'We're not going to do that,'" Sharon Haller, owner of Cut the Cake, told Local 6.

© Copyright Original Source

[Sam]

PS, Sam you never answered my last post to you. Still waiting

And you'll continue to wait until you learn either to ask more interesting and engaging questions or at least learn a bit of decorum. Being rude and boring is not a winning combination for GTD.

[Sam]

I don't really see how Luke 22:37 changes the fact that Jesus told his disciples to arm himself. He was "numbered with transgressors" from the very moment he challenged the authority of the pharisees and not because his disciples had swords.

On to your second point, Jesus accommodated tax collector but also told them to collect taxes honestly (this suggests that collecting taxes is not a sin in and of itself). It's also quite a stretch to suggest that Jesus recognized the need of the state to use armed forced to police its citizens and territories but did not also recognize the need for citizens to defend themselves from personal violence, especially when he explicitly told his disciples to acquire swords.

And, no, defending this position does not require an extra-biblical understanding. As I said, Paul listed military exploits among his examples of great faith.

Let me ask you this: you're walking down the street, and someone is getting beaten within an inch of their life. Does your understanding of scripture compel you to stand idly by and allow the beating to continue, or are you morally obligated to place yourself in harm's way by coming the man's aid, even if doing so requires violence on your part?

So, in your scenario, why would Jesus say "It is enough" when the disciples said that they had two swords in the group? If His intent was to have the disciples prepared to defend themselves, 1) why were only two swords considered sufficient and 2) why did He rebuke Peter for engaging in self defense?

[Sparko]

It begs the question: How many Christians would knowingly sell a gun to a murderer?

On a related note, I honestly can't tell if that image is trying to present a sincere argument or if it's a satirical takedown of liberalism. It's often impossible to tell the difference. I even visited the website and I still can't tell!

It is definitely meant to be serious. It comes from a liberal facebook page and a bunch of liberals are going "yeah!!" and not even realizing the meme not only bombs their own arguments against gun control, but actually doesn't even make sense, since someone selling or even giving a gun to someone when they know they will use it to murder someone would make them a participant in the murder.

[hamster]

That might be a valid comparison if someone walked into a shop and just ordered a wedding cake without mentioning any details, but yeah that's a pretty bad argument

[Mountain Man]

It begs the question: How many Christians would knowingly sell a gun to a murderer?

On a related note, I honestly can't tell if that image is trying to present a sincere argument or if it's a satirical takedown of liberalism. It's often impossible to tell the difference. I even visited the website and I still can't tell! It's like somebody said, "Let's make up the dumbest, most vapid soundbites we can think of and then post them to a website called 'Being Liberal'."

[Sparko]

Came across a picture on FB today that was shaky logic but on the right track. It compared baking a cake for a same-sex couple with selling a gun to a murderer. Obviously, very few people would sell someone a gun knowing that it could be used for murder and those who did wouldn't cut a sympathetic figure. But it does end up being pretty devastating if slightly tweaked.

I saw that meme on Dee Dee's facbook page and there were some pretty good comments on it.

liberalidiot.jpg

1. If you did sell a gun to someone knowing that it was going to be used to murder someone, you most definitely WOULD be considered an accomplice. So utter fail right there.

2. Liberals have been using the "reasoning" that selling guns to citizens leads to more murders and that means we should eliminate guns and gun sales. So liberals already believe that selling a gun that is used in a murder makes the seller an accomplice.


PS, Sam you never answered my last post to you. Still waiting

[Mountain Man]

Yes. I would say it's almost patently obvious that Christ's teachings, taken in total, at least very strongly discourage lethal violence even in the case of self-defense. Luke 22:36, for instance, has to be read in the context of the immediate next verse:

"For I tell you that this which is written must be fulfilled in Me, 'AND HE WAS NUMBERED WITH TRANSGRESSORS'; for that which refers to Me has its fulfillment."

Even people skeptical of Christian pacifism have to acknowledge that such a reading lends itself to Jesus creating the appearance of an armed rebellion to facilitate his being "numbered with transgressors" (rebels).

That Christ did not tell soldiers to abandon their profession may mean that He condoned their violence but it's at least equally likely that He either 1) accommodated them as He accommodated tax collectors or 2) condoned the general power of the State to police its citizens and occupied territories.

The argument that one must fight evil with lethal force is valid (and espoused by the Christian realist Reinhold Neibuhr in the last century) but it necessitates an extra-biblical understanding of Christian doctrine that immediately chips away at the literalist foundation necessary to defend such behavior as not selling a wedding cake to a same-sex couple. Probably not the way y'all want to go.

I don't really see how Luke 22:37 changes the fact that Jesus told his disciples to arm himself. He was "numbered with transgressors" from the very moment he challenged the authority of the pharisees and not because his disciples had swords.

On to your second point, Jesus accommodated tax collector but also told them to collect taxes honestly (this suggests that collecting taxes is not a sin in and of itself). It's also quite a stretch to suggest that Jesus recognized the need of the state to use armed forced to police its citizens and territories but did not also recognize the need for citizens to defend themselves from personal violence, especially when he explicitly told his disciples to acquire swords.

And, no, defending this position does not require an extra-biblical understanding. As I said, Paul listed military exploits among his examples of great faith.

Let me ask you this: you're walking down the street, and someone is getting beaten within an inch of their life. Does your understanding of scripture compel you to stand idly by and allow the beating to continue, or are you morally obligated to place yourself in harm's way by coming the man's aid, even if doing so requires violence on your part?

[Sam]

I apologize for derailing, but I (speaking as a staunch Christian realist) wonder how much of a systematic view of pacifism we can conclude from the NT, because all of the NT was written from the perspective of a politically powerless people (unlike much of the OT).

Maybe this can all be discussed in another thread.

Definitely an interesting conversation to have (though I haven't picked up my Yoder or Neibuhr books in many years).

[KingsGambit]

I apologize for derailing, but I (speaking as a staunch Christian realist) wonder how much of a systematic view of pacifism we can conclude from the NT, because all of the NT was written from the perspective of a politically powerless people (unlike much of the OT).

Maybe this can all be discussed in another thread.

[Sam]

I didn't mean just lethal self defense, although I do find it odd that you apparently only use the Gospels to reach this conclusion.

Non-lethal self defense is acceptable under the pacifist standard, though martyrdom that doesn't involve being killed is also valued under certain circumstances.

The Christian pacifist framework doesn't use only the Gospels to reach its conclusion, though the Gospels should be considered sufficient for anyone trying to frame the same-sex marriage issue around purely biblical strictures.

[Zymologist]

Lethal self defense?

On general philosophical principle? No.

As licensed for Christians? Yes. I can't read the Gospels in a way that ends up condoning such behavior, as radical as that may be.

(I am much more sympathetic to Christian realism today than in the past, however.)

I didn't mean just lethal self defense, although I do find it odd that you apparently only use the Gospels to reach this conclusion.