Hatred hurled from the left towards Christians, why?

Now the Catholic church and it congregation to the literal meaning of the Bible for long periods throught history. Crusades, whitch hunting/ Burning, Inquisition, to name a few. All carried out in the name of god, inspired by the literal meaning the Bible. Do we agree on my last statement?

At what point in history did the Catholic church decide the bible was indeed not fact and not to be taken literally as Mr Pino has indicated?

Who sanctioned this shift and by who's authority?

Plus i have another.

Why was this shift in 'policy' taken?

Sorry Pino, throwing your career at this doesn't fix such a simple, yet massive blunder. Social Darwinism was never a popular idea and was denounced shortly after its conception. Yeah, worked great for Hittie, but you need to be careful about throwing around the word Darwin, just as you want people to be careful about throwing around the word Christianity.

By this argument, Hitler was a Christian. Unless of course you want to correct yourself

Not willing to answer my questions or are you unable to? it is rather weak that you take the stance by saying you are 'not here to educate me'. Then why post if your intention is not express a view which you intend the reader to learn from.

Lets at least try to keeep this between you and I, for I am able to post with out resorting to cheap remarks about your upbringing. I understand we have different views, however they are not necessarily the result of our upbringing and more about our life experience. For someone who works with kids I thought this would be apparent, or does that only work for Christians?

My society was one of love from two parents, to take each person as you meet them and not to judge based on their beliefs, ideas or actions until you had the opportunity to understand them. Is that a difficult ideology for you to understand or are you happy pigeon holing 1 Billion people in the same pen as Osama? or is it Guantanamo bay these days?

Back on track, when did the Catholic church stop taking the Bible literally and why?

Patriotic does not = Christian/ Catholic

Nope. Like it or not, 'Social Darwinism' is a popular concept and term. I'm as free to use it as anyone else. It was my choice of terms, not necessarily Hitler's, although I wouldn't be surprised if he did quote Darwin in that context (can't remember. Haven't read primary sources on or from Hitler in decades). That's how I described what he believed. Hitler was a brilliant politician and demogogue, but he wasn't an academician. What he said got analyzed, categorized and discussed by academicians ever since his rise and fall. The way he described his mission, his views on race, eugenics, sociology, etc., etc., I CHARACTERIZE AS EXTREME SOCIAL DARWINISM. And for the record, so does Ben Stein.

So, you can throw your piddling understanding of Darwin and Spencer at me all you want. I'll use whatever terms I feel apply. YOOZ AIN'T DA BOSS OF ME.:no:

Societal necessities, Bible or no, would have happened anyway in some way, shape or formed, unless somehow someone managed to give everyone at the time a 21st century outlook. Besides were the Crusades, for example, all that bad overall?

I really can't think of any instance where anyone said "Let's not take the Bible literally" but if you want modernization, Second Vatican Council works well enough. Just get to your point.

Breathe, Nump. Breathe. What I meant was that your teachers, in all probability, TRIED to teach you about Scholasticism, as part of your World History education in high school. Whether you paid attention was up to you, your parents, as supporters of your secondary education, and your struggling teachers. It saddens me you have to ask when and how Catholicism stopped basing its theology on a literal interpretation of the Bible.:no:

Well two things really, firstly I am guessing the thousands of people of the time who were killed, raped and pillaged in the onslaught of trying to 'convert' the Mulsims to Christianity may think it were bad, you don't think?

Also I am thinking, and this is my own interpretation, we may not be in the situation we find ourselves in today with all this Middle East stuff still going on a millenia later

At what point in history did the Catholic church decide the bible was indeed not fact and not to be taken literally as Mr Pino has indicated?

Who sanctioned this shift and by who's authority?

Why was this shift in 'policy' taken?

The Crusades were brought about because Turkish expansionism was threatening Christian Europe and interfering with Christian pilgrimages.

The Crusades were brought about because Turkish expansionism was threatening Christian Europe and interfering with Christian pilgrimages.



Fair point, we'd be Muslims or dhimmi.



Okay, never, as far as I know. I hope you're happy.

Once this happens the religion then becomes splintered, disorganised and the cracks begin to show. Interpretation of the book becomes a piont of debate at every verse and chapter and the slow and unavoidable disintergration of the relgion begins.

Which one? There are many crusades, most of then were fought to take control of the 'Holy City' (AKA. Jerusalem), an offensive measure.

often involving the defense and continuation of the Christian kingdoms

It's not really about me being happy, more about understanding why religion still dominates a world when so much of all the religous books have been shown not to be fact.

My point, and again I base this on what I know and how I understand the word we live in and is not a deliberate attempt to inflame religous people fo the sake of getting a rise out of someone.

The Bible (insert any religous book) and God are intertwined in such away that what is written in the Bible is said to written by man with god having a hand in it, inspiring the scholars to write the word of God and all that he/ she is, stands for and srives for, there can be no speration between the two in an organised religion. What the Holy book says goes basically, this is what was intended by the authors of the time. What is written there in, is fact and must be interpreted so and preached/ taught to the followers that this is Gods work, it is just and it is right, if you follow these giude lines and belive what is written is true you will meet your God in the kingdom of heaven.

In a small paragraph this would be my understanding of how religion and the Bible are interlaced and you can not have one without the other.

Now if this is so, which human or group of humans had the authority to pick and choose which parts of the Bible where not to be taken a literal teachings and other parts where?

As soon as this happens the whole validity of the Bible comes into question, thus plunging the authority of God as infallable also into question. You cannot have a book that states that God did this, this and that one moment and in the next,...well actually only this and this are true, that isn't. God has been questioned by his followers, the followers say it is not true because it has been proved not to be correct by what ever means, science, logic, historical evidence too name a few. If God is questioned and proved to be infallable how can God exist in the first place, is he/ she not the creator, the one true constant. For me it is a non starter; Infallable God = No God.


Once this happens the religion then becomes splintered, disorganised and the cracks begin to show. Interpretation of the book becomes a piont of debate at every verse and chapter and the slow and unavoidable disintergration of the relgion begins.


So Catholics once believed the Bible was the literal meaning by which one understood the meaning of God and the teachings. Now they don't, how can they be believers of their God when the literal word is not taken as fact?

Simply they can't, based on this interpretation of mine.

No response necessary, quote speaks for itself.

Yes a response is necessary, what is the problem?

To clarify, not all of those arose from Biblical disputes, most notably the Great Schism.

No, not really. It does speak for itself. The defense and continuation of the Christian kingdoms.

As if the Wars of the Cross were about anything else...

I will however point out that you left out the words "expansion" and "control".

And the Muslims just came across all these uninhabited lands and decided hey, wouldn't it be nice to populate these places with good, peaceful Muslims, right?

Then some ***s with crosses came along and ruined it all.

Independent Christian kingdoms were established, yes, what the hell else would you expect them to do, let Muslim armies come back and have the same problems all over again?

Kinda like... Israel and its settling, which seems to be drawing some, pardon the pun, fire. However everyone's cool with that... except of course the Palestinians.

That particular part of the story started around 470AD, but you guys did that to yourselves