Politics and Contemporary Christianity

[miss fortune]

*plays A Mighty Fortress Is Our God for Peguy...*

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

plays A Mighty Fortress Is Our God for Peguy...

I'm of the opinion that its not OUR God, its EVERYONE's God.

 

[miss fortune]

I'm of the opinion that its not OUR God, its EVERYONE's God.

that would require a seance, as I beleive that Mr Luther has been dead for a good while

 

[Sniffles]

*plays A Mighty Fortress Is Our God for Peguy...*

[youtube="wiRpUtVByxU"]A Mighty Fortress Is Our God [/youtube]

Ironically you can find this in many Catholic hymn books these days.

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

that would require a seance, as I beleive that Mr Luther has been dead for a good while

Lol.

 

[miss fortune]

I feel nerdy admitting that I giggled outloud a bit a while back when it was referred to as the Lutheran fight song on Prarie Home Companion

Though I was rather amused by the Unitarian version of Onward Christian Soldiers on the same program

"onward stalwart persons
fighting for a cause
marching down to Washington
to change our nation's laws"



yeah... I had a staunchly catholic ex who threw out a new hymnal that had A Mighty Fortress Is Our God in it, referring to it as "heathen music"

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

I feel nerdy admitting that I giggled outloud a bit a while back when it was referred to as the Lutheran fight song on Prarie Home Companion

Though I was rather amused by the Unitarian version of Onward Christian Soldiers on the same program

"onward stalwart persons
fighting for a cause
marching down to Washington
to change our nation's laws"



yeah... I had a staunchly catholic ex who threw out a new hymnal that had A Mighty Fortress Is Our God in it, referring to it as "heathen music"

 

[The_Liquid_Laser]

How did this turn into a Luther bashing thread?

 

[bronson]

I was just chatting with my dad about this topic a while back because he was growling about how the local minister in the church that my mother drags him to every sunday is a complete raving lunatic and I wanted to know exactly how raving and lunatical (probably not a word, but perfect for my needs here!)

The dude really does seem to be nuts and have a wish to spread his own crazy, misogynistic and intolerant views to anyone who's willing to subject themselves to his sermons on a weekly basis. Topics of discussion in sermons include, but are not limited to-

*women should submit to thier husbands wishes, and that Paul says that women who don't have kids won't go to heaven
*the Catholic church endorses torture, but protestant religions have never done so
*premarital sex is a one way ticket to hell
*Buddhists worship buddha and the god worshiped by jews and muslims is quite different from that of christianity
*Catholics aren't christians
*Obama is the antichrist
*social justice programs are against what Jesus taught, and those who engage in liberation theology and social assistance programs are influenced by satan's creeping influence to turn everyone into secular humanists

The man is clearly demented, but from what I've heard from asking around in that county his message isn't all that unique. It makes me kind of wonder- is this strand of Contemporary Christianity all that common (apparently it has a cousin in Australia I guess!) and how does ANYONE think that the bible could be the basis of these beleifs?!

Wow I actually have never experienced anything that extreme at all. The only time of heard of anything that extreme was some church in America that protest against homosexuality. And some american church that came over an protested in Melbourne saying that the bushfires we had that killed people where God's punishment for our legislations on abortion.

Yeah, that's all pretty full on.

When I refer to the conservative Christians I've met I don't exactly mean anything that intense. Its more just like the way they understand Jesus and politics - there are quite a few similarities of course in the understanding of Jesus, but its like we then simultaneously hold to certain political ideology and it just doesnt seem to all fit together, on either side.

Bronson, since you're operating from a Protestant perspective, this might interest you concerning the political implications of Karl Barth's theology.

Thanks man that review was pretty interesting.
(Also, random note, (not trying to "hijack" my own thread haha) but has this concept that WWI was a result of the Enlightenment, and all the came with it, been speculated outside of theological circles?)

My experience here in Aus of Church and political stance has kind of been that most Christians vote Liberal (our main free-market, centre right conservative party), and less vote Labor, which is our original centre left, now also centre right party. And any keen leftys boycott institutionalised church and keep their beliefs pure an 'spiritual'.
There's also this whole thing about the Emerging Church in America, and all the conventional, Right-ish churchies in Aus are all suspicious of it, but I don't really know much about it...

 

[Sniffles]

(Also, random note, (not trying to "hijack" my own thread haha) but has this concept that WWI was a result of the Enlightenment, and all the came with it, been speculated outside of theological circles?)

Yes it's been dealt with in many historical and philosophical studies as well.

 

[Mole]

My experience here in Aus of Church and political stance has kind of been that most Christians vote Liberal (our main free-market, centre right conservative party), and less vote Labor.

Our experience in the Capital of Australia is that we overwhelming vote Labor.

The Canberra Labor party preaches and practises the doctrine of Social Justice.

And further the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, of the Australian Labor Party, every Sunday attends and worships at the Anglican Church. And he puts time aside to personally attend to the needs of the poor.

And it was the Australian Labor Party that courageously moved Australia into the global free market which has been a great success for the Australian economy.

And every year the Australian taxpayers give 45 billion dollars to religion out of Gross National Product of about 800 billion dollars per year.

And indeed there are a large group of parliamentarians who have formed themselves into a christian group.

And the simple fact is that Roman Catholics founded the Australian Labor Party which is now supported by christians of many denominations.

And as you may have noticed the Australian Labor Party is the most popular Party in Australia at the present time, and indeed holds office.

So at the present time the Australian Labor party is the most popular Party with christians. And our Prime Minister is a practising christian.

 

[Mole]

WWI was a result of the Enlightenment,

WW I was the result of nationalism. That is why the European Union has abolished nationalism.

The Europeans were horrified by the unthinking belief in nationalism and its mass killing and have embraced the Enlightenment.

The European Union is the result of the Enlightenment, as is science and liberal democracy.

And indeed Australia was founded by the English and Scottish Enlightenment and as a result we gained our independence without killing anyone and we also united a whole Continent without killing anyone.

Australia is a successful example of a model Enlightenment State.

Unfortunately we have in Australia people trying to kill us in large numbers in order to impose on us their unreasonable religious belief. But to date the Australian Federal Police have caught them before they could commit mass murder and brought them before our Criminal Courts where they have been convicted and sentenced to long jail terms.

The choice before is is stark. We choose the Enlightenment or mass murder.

 

[Mole]

The Enlightenment or MBTI?

The choice before us here is also clear. We can choose the Enlightenment or we can continue to believe in astrology and MBTI without evidence.

And belief without evidence is blind faith. And blind faith has led us down the blind alleys of theocracy, nationalism, astrology and MBTI.

Perhaps it is time to open our eyes to reason.

Perhaps it is time to subject our faith to reason.

Faith and reason make a good marriage. While faith without reason leads to horror. And reason without faith leaves us homeless.

So let us build our home on faith and reason.

 

[bronson]

Our experience in the Capital of Australia is that we overwhelming vote Labor.

The Canberra Labor party preaches and practises the doctrine of Social Justice.

And further the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, of the Australian Labor Party, every Sunday attends and worships at the Anglican Church. And he puts time aside to personally attend to the needs of the poor.

And it was the Australian Labor Party that courageously moved Australia into the global free market which has been a great success for the Australian economy.

And every year the Australian taxpayers give 45 billion dollars to religion out of Gross National Product of about 800 billion dollars per year.

And indeed there are a large group of parliamentarians who have formed themselves into a christian group.

And the simple fact is that Roman Catholics founded the Australian Labor Party which is now supported by christians of many denominations.

And as you may have noticed the Australian Labor Party is the most popular Party in Australia at the present time, and indeed holds office.

So at the present time the Australian Labor party is the most popular Party with christians. And our Prime Minister is a practising christian.

And the Labor party is now on the centre right anyway since the hijack, despite factions. I think also living in an electorate with a Liberal safe seat might be warping my understanding a little. But yes there has been a strong Catholic support of the ALP, not as strong at the DLP of course.

 

[Mole]

And the Labor party is now on the centre right anyway since the hijack, despite factions. I think also living in an electorate with a Liberal safe seat might be warping my understanding a little. But yes there has been a strong Catholic support of the ALP, not as strong at the DLP of course.

Yes, and as you know the DLP split from the ALP over communist influence.

And the DLP kept Labor out of power for about a quarter of a century.

But the DLP is no more. And the communist influence is no more.

And this is probably reflected in our Prime Minister who is a christian as well as a soft social democrat.

So it seems the great ideological battles between catholicism and communism in the ALP are over. But now we face a new propaganda battle with Islamists which I suspect will go on for a long time.