Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

[joecct]

It's been all downhill since filioque.

Since we punted the Last Gospel and the Leonine Prayers after Mass.

[Kepler]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

Now this is impressive, even for Christianity.

[burd]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

Now this is impressive, even for Christianity.

I wonder what it does to you over time, gulping down demon seed.

[Kepler]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

I wonder what it does to you over time, gulping down demon seed.

Musical theatre and good abs.

[Kepler]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

More of this sh-t.

Australian sources report that a brother and sister in Tasmania have been ordered to pay over two million Australian dollars after a court rejected their argument that paying income tax “goes against God’s will.” Rembertus Cornelis Beerepoot and Fanny Alida Beerepoot, who should be entitled to a substantial tax credit just because of those names, were charged with refusing to pay at least $930,000 in taxes and other charges. The two Christian missionaries told the court that they had paid taxes before 2011, but a “deepened spiritual relationship” had led them to realize that, in fact, paying taxes was contrary to the law of God.

I’m sure that, like me, the most pressing question you have right now is how the F did a couple of Christian missionaries earn so much money in the first place that they ended up owing over $900k of it in taxes? This may be the cumulative total they owed from 2011 to the present, but still, missionary salaries appear to have skyrocketed since the last time I checked on them (which I admit was never). The report unfortunately does not answer that question, (nor does this more detailed one that was actually trying to answer that question).

The Beerepoots, who are certainly blessed in the name department, told the Tasmanian Supreme Court that they believed God’s law was paramount and that it did not allow the diversion of His revenues to any earthly agency. “We rely on the blessings we receive from God,” Fanny Alida Beerepoot said, “which we give [back?] to him and not to an outside entity such as the tax office.” Requiring people to pay taxes took away their dependence on God, said Rembertus Cornelis Beerepoot, and this explained why Australia is “cursed.”

[joecct]

More of this sh-t.

They won't be the last either. What claim do atheists use when they try to scam the taxman?

[Kepler]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

They won't be the last either. What claim do atheists use when they try to scam the taxman?

We don't have religion as a rationalization so we have to be actually moral.

"Sovereign Citizen" would work but those tend to be Bible Thumpers too.

It's probably some Bezosian Job Creator Mythos.

[MissThundercat]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

One thing I hated growing up: attending church in the suburbs, income (or lack of it) was an issue. If you weren't at least upper middle class, you weren't really welcome. On top of that, preachers would spew a lot of pro-life and anti-LGBT nonsense from the pulpit.

When I started checking churches in the city proper, lack of income wasn't an issue. People would buy coffee or lunch for me, and it wasn't a case of pity. Really helps that my current pastor is a lesbian and views me as a younger sister. Our church doesn't evangelize, instead we go out and DO.

[Kepler]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

One thing I hated growing up: attending church in the suburbs, income (or lack of it) was an issue. If you weren't at least upper middle class, you weren't really welcome. On top of that, preachers would spew a lot of pro-life and anti-LGBT nonsense from the pulpit.

The Catholic church I went to growing up wasn't, thankfully, like this. It was definitely a rich diocese and there were definitely people in the congregation for whom Conspicuous Donation was a status play, but the monseigneur and the priests themselves took their money with a smile and then did good works with it. The church was very welcoming to the poor. Obviously they had their head firmly lodged in their rectum when it came to church dogma on sexual morality but they didn't preach fire and brimstone. If they touched on it at all it was with the polite pseudo-intellectual arguments you still hear from Neo-Thomists and Catholic educators. "Procreation not recreation" and other time-worn rationalizations for homophobia and misogyny.

Parishioners had the same reaction to that as they have to church teachings throughout the entire history of the HMC: the dummies bought it, the smarties excused it as the corporate blather one expects when TPTB are protecting their brand. It's no different from Exxon proclaiming their commitment to the environment, Philip Morris stating with great dignity their concern for all their customers' health, or the GOP talking about racial justice. You just ignore it as self-evident, baked-in institutional hypocrisy, perhaps have a chuckle, and move along.

[MissThundercat]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

Kepler, please pass the microphone, cause it's smoking.

One other thing I hated growing up... when I was a teenager, it was all about marriage. "Save yourself for marriage. Don't have sex until marriage." There was nothing from anyone that said "being single is awesome and you are in no rush to find a partner." Hell, at my last church, if you weren't married, you were really nothing. There were events for married people all the time, but single people were constantly left out. Got so bad we had our own club that the church didn't know about. When I reminded this church you have single people and you need to take care of them too, I was basically laughed at.

In short, I received better dating advice from Motown (Shop Around, You Can't Hurry Love) than I did the church growing up. I also think pressuring kids to get married is the reason my peers got married in their 20s and were divorced by 30.

[Kepler]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

In short, I received better dating advice from Motown (Shop Around, You Can't Hurry Love) than I did the church growing up. I also think pressuring kids to get married is the reason my peers got married in their 20s and were divorced by 30.

"Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? is the definitive song about teenage sex. Everything a teenage girl or boy needs to know is in it.

The idea of using sex as leverage for a ring ("Paradise by the Dashboard Light") captures the transactional moral sickness of so-called "family values" America. That was what teenage girls were raised on in this whole country for at least 40 years (40s, 50s, 60s, 70s) and in the backwards parts for 40 more and counting. There's nothing more loathsome than putting a mindless, craven, cowardly ideology ahead of people's health and happiness.

Whatever else Flyover has going for it, that makes it a hard no for any loved one of mine. We'll stay away from the Derp, thank you. I salute those of you who live with it and deal with it, but life's too short. Come somewhere where the average person has something alive in their mind and soul.

Life doesn't need to be so hard. Your neighbors don't have to be intolerant, insane imbeciles.

[MissThundercat]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

"Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? is the definitive song about teenage sex. Everything a teenage girl or boy needs to know is in it.

The idea of using sex as leverage for a ring ("Paradise by the Dashboard Light") captures the transactional moral sickness of so-called "family values" America. That was what teenage girls were raised on in this whole country for at least 40 years (40s, 50s, 60s, 70s) and in the backwards parts for 40 more and counting. There's nothing more loathsome than putting a mindless, craven, cowardly ideology ahead of people's health and happiness.

Whatever else Flyover has going for it, that makes it a hard no for any loved one of mine. We'll stay away from the Derp, thank you. I salute those of you who live with it and deal with it, but life's too short. Come somewhere where the average person has something alive in their mind and soul.

Life doesn't need to be so hard. Your neighbors don't have to be intolerant, insane imbeciles.

In terms of churches, when I joined the Episcopalians, I went from right to left. Sex isn't a dirty word. It's okay to believe in science. No pushes toward marriage. I was (and still am) welcomed and affirmed and embraced. Women are equal. A lesbian is our rector, and women serve on the vestry! And I went from stupid to these people are very smart.

[MinnesotaNorthStar]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

Should have taken another day off. Today is stupid.

[MissThundercat]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

Should have taken another day off. Today is stupid.

And every day, really.

[MissThundercat]

Re: Religion Thread: We Could Say a Prayer

"Holland Area Churches Reckon with LGBTQ Inclusion." Oh really, you think? When I came out, I thought Grace was the only church down here that would include me, so I went there.