Norman Kember-honourable and brave or a bit of a pompous arse??

[moondog]

I'm plumping for the latter.....

ruty - that is the problem isn't it. All kinds of so-called religious people these days talk hatred and war. It certainly is not what the founders of these religions advocated.

KK - yep. it s a very useful excuse to do all kind of irrational things in 'God told me to do it.'

ruty - is your 18 month old into poltics then ? I think my 21 month old is as well, but he would rather be in the park right now ! Speak later

have the same calling KK!

Christ's teachings are interpreted as a sort of pacifism, but many entirely committed genuine Christians hav felt their fainth includes violence, even to the level of being prepared to die violently in battle.

I can't justify this war in terms of Christianity any more than you can. But that's not the same as saying Bush & Blair can't. A good % of the violence from religions stems from this exact point. People believing that a person must be lying about their faith because you can't see how they believe a particular thing.
Certainly Christianity as I was taught it was very explicit that one has a positive duty to fight evil, and that includes guns.
Saddam fits the bill of an evil to fight. I would have fought him differently, but he wasn't a harmless old man.
Yes Bush comes from a different, dumber version of Christianity.
But let's stop there for a second.
Would you feel comfortable saying that Jews were dumb ?
Why not ?
Is it that it's "OK" to slag off American Christianity but not the beliefs of Jews ?

The UN wasn't "right", nor indeed was it wrong, it just screwed around asa function of the confliciting commercial interests of the great powers.
To me saying the UN is wrong is like saying a shopping mall has the wrong policy because the local Sainsbury's and M&S are trying to win custom off each other.

We are going to have nukes, yes. Little public debate because the BBC and other media work off the "Bloke A says X, here is Bloke B to say it's wrong". In the case of the next generation of weapons, most Brits are keen on themm as am I.

Nuclear energy on the other hand is skewed by the same sort of crap that we get from MMR.
It's a horribly dangerous and polluting source of energy.
But it's the only thing we can build with a long term future that we know can do the job.
A bit of wind is good, as is the fractions for tide etc. But we have an option set of one. This confuses the media whose response is to have greenpeace trotting out garbage that made little sense in the 1970s.
For better of worse Brits see the ongoing oil crisis, and don't want it to happen here.

The problem with Iran is that there is no diplomatic way of saying to a country. "You're a bunch of scary fuckwits who can't be trusted with sharp objects, must less nuclear energy."

as a christian i feel i can criticize aspects of christianity, if i were a jew i would feel i could criticize aspects of judaism, etc. As i've said before DC, i think your schooling gave you a bad impression of christianity - the people there obviously had there own agenda as most of us do, but i think it was a particularly dangerous agenda. Christ being a pacifist is not up for debate I'm afraid - again i don't want to go into too much theological waffling but here's a few examples - when he was in the Garden of Gethsemame and about to be arrested, he stopped Peter defending him and healed Malchus, the man Peter had wounded. in the Beatitudes he said 'Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.' And as a statement of cause and effect he says 'Those who take the sword shall perish by the sword.' ie violence breeds more violence. There are plenty more examples. As KK pointed out, pacifism as part of one's faith is not exclusive to Christianity, but it is a central part of it.

I love the way you keep speaking for the general public DC. 'Most Brits are keen on nukes' Have you done a survey? The last survey I read about was a MORI survey carried out last September which revealed 54% of the British public to be against nuclear weapons. And you must know more than the SDS [which the govt commissioned], who have studied the issue of nuclear power and global warming in detail and have concluded nuclear power is not the solution.

there are many solutions to the oil crisis. I don't quite know which solution you are referring to. I would suggest invading oil rich countries is not the best one. Perhaps you feel we should invade Iran next?

BTW DC i do find it funny that you critize me for finding fault with right wing fundamentalist christians. This from a man who on another thread stated 'Christians see AIDS as God's vengeance' or something like that. I guess you feel you can speak on behalf of all Christians in the same way you can speak on behalf of the British Public.

ruty - go before get personal abuse hurled at you like I did on another thread ! You are far too intelligent and kind for this, if you don't mind me saying so

that's nice of you KK! I'm sure most people will disagree with you though.

My schooling did indeed give me a view of Christianity, but the bit about fighting evil seems to me reasonable.
One may say that permitting evil is equivalent to doing it yourself. If so then the question is what to do about it. One's actions are bounded by finite capabilities and thus if you have bombers they may be the right way. That's not to say one should bomb all bad people, but that it is not something you should rule out either.

I wasn't arguing your view of the life of Christ, merely pointing out that many people do honestly disagree with our viewpoint. Also the Old Testament doesn't have such a pacifist perspective.
As for surveys, that's the one commissioned by Greenpeace ?

with 'our' viewpoint DC? I'm guessing that's a typo.

Of course there are people who disagree with this viewpoint. But they would have a hard time justifying war and violence in terms of Christ's teachings.

Yes it was a Greenpeace poll. Do you have another? And who commissioned that one?

I think it's wrong to say Christianity is pacifist full stop. There are bits in the gospels where Jesus is quite clearly not a pacifist - like when he throws the money lenders out of the temple with some violence, and when his disciples turn up armed with swords. Those little bits of the earlier gospels sneaked in without anyone noticing and taking them out.

And only certain strands of christians (eg Quakers) would argue that it was wrong to fight the Nazis.

as far as i know Caligula, the only time in the bible when the disciples turn up with swords is in the Garden of Gethsamane, when Christ forbade them to use them, and healed the soldier Peter injured. AS far as the temple incident goes, Christ was angry but didn't whip out a sword or anything - because that section of the temple was reserved for Gentiles to pray in - in effect it was a temple for all religions, and the Gentiles couldn't pray there because the money lenders and sellers [selling animal for sacrifice at incredibly high prices] had taken up residence.

The 2nd World War was a product of the 1st World War. A madman like Hitler could never have taken hold of the German people if they had not been so badly served by the Treaty of Versailles, which sparked a terrible period of depression in Germany, as you probably know. So again, violence begets violence, as Christ forsaw.

For the first three centuries Christianity was seen as a dangerous subversive sect. They were firmly pacifist at the time. It was not until Constantine converted to Christianity and started to claim the victory of his battles to Christ that Christianity grew to include the idea of just war. St Augustine developed a theory on the Just war, which Thomas Aquinas later developed, stating seven conditions for a Just War. These conditions include one that only soldier should be targeted in war, and innocent people should be protected. another condition is that there should be only military targets, no 'collateral damage' as we call it. Obviously the Iraq war does not fall in line with these conditions.

claim the victory of his battles for Christ...

Invading a country on bogus, made up charges and stopping the rise of fascism are rather different things.

Well of course Koolkat. But that's why lots of Christians would not have opposed the latter.

Ruty, Christians in the fourth century had all sorts of positions that Christianity nowaday doesn't have. I don't know enough about it to argue with you, if you say they were pacifist I believe you, but just because those Christians were, doesn't mean that's representative of Christianity. Augustine, Aquinas etc. aren't add-ons, they're an intrinsic part of the development of that particular Western (dominant) strand of the religion.

Indeed ruty - to some extent the concept of a "Just War" was enshrined in the League of Nations and the United Nations and many international treaties.

Probably Caligula - but the Iraq war doesn't fulfil the criteria for seven conditions for a Just War as set out by Thomas Aquinas, so I find it difficult to understand how anyone could justify this war in terms of their Christian Faith.

Yes Caligula - that's what I meant. I can totally understand why a deeply religious individual would consider taking up arms against Hitler as totally in line with his religious beliefs.

Ah yes well, some of the versions of christian faith makes Torquemada's version look reasonable.

George Bush and Torquemada would probably have lots in common..

the difference being of course that GB gets others to do his dirty work for him.

Torture has apparently been routinely used by the US since Vietnam (I got this interesting fact off the Commondreams website, run by Americans who dont subscribe to the current White House philosophy). The reason they are all so cross with GB, is that he forgot you have to keep it a secret.

NN - yes GWB should have told the Marines it helps not to take photos of yourself grinning ear to ear while you pose with those being tortured - like you are on some summer camp