Question to those who do or do not doubt Christianity

You did not understand me...How is it ever gonna fall?? If you do not stand your ground, and advocate for people to stop giving the church money?...It does not have to return, it will always be!

Why?? What good is a monument if all the stuff it stands for was bogus?? Why not just tear it down, and put up a monument for atheism??

http://www.americanbarfoundation.org/research/project/19


Suing Henry Ford: America's First Hate Speech Case
Author: Victoria Saker Woeste

This ongoing project examines a well-known event in the life of Henry Ford -- a 1927 federal libel lawsuit against him and his antisemitic newspaper -- from the perspective of the people who sought to stop him. In the end, Ford did stop publishing the Dearborn Independent, but on terms he controlled: he evaded the efforts of several distinguished lawyers to use law to compel him to take responsibility for what we today call hate speech. Ford was no champion of free speech rights; he managed to avoid losing the lawsuit by engineering a sleight-of-hand that took advantage of the diversity of views, politics, and intellectual loyalties among American Jews that Ford’s newspaper so narrowly caricatured.

In 1924, to regain the public spotlight and burnish his image among American conservatives, Ford directed the Independent to resume an antisemitic campaign that had first begun in 1920 and lasted for two years. Playing on the crushing boom and bust cycles that plagued American agriculture after the war, in this second antisemitic campaign the Independent attacked the agricultural cooperative movement as alien to the individualist spirit of American husbandry. The Independent accused Aaron Sapiro, the movement’s leader, of defrauding American farmers to advance an international Jewish conspiracy. Ford saw himself as the only legitimate champion of rural America; he targeted Sapiro both because he was Jewish and because he was not a farmer.

Determined to silence Ford, Sapiro demanded a retraction. The paper replied with still more defamatory articles. In 1925, Sapiro filed a federal libel suit in Detroit, requesting $1 million in damages. For nearly two years, the defense tried fruitlessly to prove that the articles were true -- the only way a publisher could evade responsibility for libel. Ford’s hired-gun trial lawyer, sitting U.S. Senator James A. Reed (D-Mo.), finally realized before the trial began that he could not defend this case on conventional grounds. He then changed tack, telling the press that the only issue was Sapiro’s professional conduct, not Ford’s antisemitism. Sapiro and his lawyer responded with the broader claim that Ford had libeled all Jews. Suddenly, the central issue of the trial was not individual libel but hate speech. That development was decidedly unwelcome to Louis Marshall, the prominent constitutional lawyer who was also president of the American Jewish Committee. Marshall believed that no individual should recover damages from attacks made on Jews as a group. For years, he had led the nation's leading Jewish defense organization to avoid litigating antisemitism unless it interfered with the civil rights of individual Jews. Mere insults, even published ones, did not meet this standard.

Reed and the Ford lawyers underestimated Sapiro and the strength of his case, and Marshall misjudged its potential for strengthening the civil rights claims of American Jews. Both because of the case’s implications for the newspaper industry and because of the public’s continuing fascination with Ford, editors across the country drew the rapt attention of their readers to each day’s events in Detroit. The month-long trial produced banner headlines and bizarre moments. As the trial careened toward its end, Ford became desperate to end the suit and avoid taking the witness stand. He ordered his bodyguard, Harry Bennett, to secure a mistrial. Bennett planted an interview with a juror in a Detroit newspaper, producing the desired result. Ford then hurriedly dispatched emissaries to meet with Marshall, who agreed not only to mediate the conflict but also secretly to write Ford’s statement of apology. Having criticized Sapiro for bringing litigation that he believed would only reinforce racist stereotypes, Marshall made sure that Ford’s apology was directed not to Sapiro but to the Jewish people. Thus, though American law did not then recognize hate speech as such, Marshall got Ford to sign a public statement that did.

This victory, though historic, had limits. Marshall hoped to contain the spread of Ford’s antisemitic publications, but no one could hold Ford to his promise to do so after Marshall died in 1929. The articles were published as a pamphlet entitled The International Jew that was widely reprinted around the world during the 1920s and 1930s and is now available on the Internet. Marshall unwittingly enabled Ford to duck responsibility for the damage his newspaper inflicted on Sapiro, Jews, and the nation’s social fabric. Instead of earning a place in civil rights and hate speech history, the Sapiro-Ford trial has been relegated to a footnote in Ford’s life story. This book will argue that the most important fact about Ford’s apology is not what it says. It is that Ford did not write it. No one but Ford, Marshall, and their closest advisers knew the truth. Consequently, the reaction to Ford’s apology focused on its putative author’s obscure motives rather than its implications for legal curbs on hate speech.

The drama of Ford’s published attacks and the subsequent lawsuit forced all the major players out of their life-long roles. On this stage, everyone was miscast: Ford, the technocratic engineer and marketing genius, became a bumbling buffoon; Sapiro, whose professional and personal lives were pockmarked with broken relationships, acted bravely and heroically; and Marshall, the principled and distinguished advocate, handled the end game with surprising ineptitude. In the end, Sapiro v. Ford marked a lost opportunity in what has been the long and tortuous process of defining hate speech in American law.

WHOOOSH!

XXSpadeMasterXX, my dear friend, absolutely not! I wasn't referring to you at all. I wasn't even thinking about you. Please rest assured that I wasn't aiming my comments at you.

I was referring to those professed believers who are grotesquely hypocritical in the way they treat others or are indifferent to the sufferings of others. A rather notorious example, of course, would be the Ku Klux Klan -- as well as the Southern Baptist Conference, who tolerated the KKK, along with lynchings and Jim Crow laws. To repeat myself, in my post I referred to the "Christian" woman who said she had no problem with physical bullying in mandatory P.E. classes. I would expect decent people, regardless of their beliefs (but especially Christians), to be concerned about the sufferings of others. I know when I became a Christian, I became more conscientious about the way I treated others than I had been before I became a Christian. Of course, sometimes while under duress, I've not conducted myself in the best way without losing my temper. Yes, we all make mistakes and no one is without sin; but some people's hypocrisy is particularly egregious.

My intention was not to side with your opponents against you. I wasn't trying to hinder any argument you've been attempting to make in this topic -- which, I admit, I haven't been following closely because I've been dealing with a chronic health problem that affects my alertness. So, I hope these comments will prevent you from becoming discouraged because of any misunderstanding I may have inadvertently caused. I repeat, my post was not referring to you in any way. You seem to be a genuinely nice guy whom I'd enjoy conversing with in person, although perhaps not agreeing with some of your doctrinal stances. So, anyway, I hope you won't feel discouraged by this misunderstanding. Please carry on with your debate without being discouraged.

Still "believe" Christianity is full of smoke??

And is irrelevant...and God is non-existent??

http://ejas.revues.org/3363

Judas betrays Jesus...Ultimate sin....

I guess these angry guys join these groups just because they're angry and want to shoot people and blow stuff up? Not because they are jihadist and want to spread their religion and replace current laws with Sharia law or anything like that. I'm sure their being muslim and joining jihadist movements are all coincidences...that would be a lot of coincidences though seeing as how about 9 out of the top 10 terrorists organizations label themselves as Jihadist or Pan-Islamic or whatever. If their religion had nothing to do with it, why would they label themselves as such?

You totally missed the point there. I wasn't refuting your claim that some people act just as insane as some religious nutjob, I was merely refuting the "evangelical" part seeing as how the term "evangelical" specifically references the Christian gospels, an atheist wouldn't preach christian gospels. People like BillRM however, do seem to be the "preaching" type and I've never denied that. I, myself, am not forcefully religious. I may overexaggerate my side here but that's only for arguments sake. While I would like to see all people become non-religious, what I care about more, would be people becoming more understanding and for people to have more a mindset of freedom from religion, rather than freedom of religion. I personally don't care what people do or what they believe so long as it doesn't affect me. When several states in the USA have it in their state constitutions that an atheist cannot be elected to a political position of power solely because they are atheist, I have a problem with that. When people are denied their right to marry whoever they want because some old ass magic book tells people it's wrong, I have a problem with that. If people would act in a logic and realistically moral way, then I wouldn't give a rat's ass. The problem is that, more often than not, religion doesn't promote this. They promote hatred and bigotry to different extents. While everyone may not hate gay people as much as the WBC, a great deal of Christians are negatively biased towards them. When people equate an atheist to a rapist based on that criteria alone, I have a problem with that and these are the type of problems I want to fix.

May I assume that you are specifically refering to Stalin's regime and the people that he murdered? If that's the case, please provide the evidence where I made such a claim where I blame those events on religion. You also really need to get this idea out of your head that I blame religion for everything, because I don't. It's getting rather annoying to have to persistantly deal with your false accusations that are clearly not true and that you have no evidence for what-so-ever. You're just ignorantly guessing based on your dealings with other atheists that you presuppose those ideal's on to me which aren't true and that I have never stated or shown to possess. I'm also not a wallstreet banker type in the slightest nor indacted in anyway that I am, where you would have gotten this from, I have no idea. I see the same problems with them as you however, I simply don't talk about here because this forum is about religion and I choose to stay on topic. Yes there are numerous other problems in the world that have various causes other than religion, but we are talking about religion though so I simply leave the others out because they aren't on topic...try and stay with me here.

First of all, who said I was a preachy christian, this is yet another ignorantly false accusation from you. Truth be told, I actually spoke very little in church and when I had the bible study at my house, it was other people that spoke. I hosted the bible study for about 4 years and in those 4 years I honestly only setup one presentation myself. The rest where done by either my pastors wife, or another member who was going to school to become a minister. I'm also not really familar with where I have shown to be a "preachy atheist" I've discussed from my side but I don't believe I have ever "preached" in such a manner as the WBC or any other extremists. Please stop with all of these false accusations, if you are going to accuse me of something, then at least be able to back it up with evidence, other-wise you just look like an asshole. I'm also not absolutely stating that I haven't been a preachy atheist, I just don't recall ever coming off as such. If you find a post where you believe I acted in a like manner, please link it and we can discuss it further.

I think you are getting a bit carried away Spadie.

You need to remember that had the population of the areas where Jesus played his gigs caught on to his ideas and acted accordingly it is very likely that whatever form of social organisation they had would have degenerated into chaos in short order. Jesus had never seen the sort of temptations we are subjected to.

He did push the authorities into a bit of a corner.

Greetings, Frank! I've never had an exchange with you before here at A2K. Sorry I haven't responded sooner. I did want to acknowledge your reaction. (Incidentally, I wasn't in the best frame of mind when I wrote that post.)

You're right. That generally is what I'm saying here. Actually, this is what I've been saying, beginning with the very first post I submitted in this topic. All I would add, to use a tired chiche, is that those who talk the talk had better walk the walk. But, yes, you're right.

I think that those things do play an important part of the kind of individual one is.

Frank would never dream of cooking a missionary in a cauldron just as a cannibal would never dream of teeing up a golf ball and sending it scuttering 70 yards into the rough.

Unless he was order or told to do so by Jesus as is now being claimed.

Love how this fantasy story is still is being change as times go on.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/04/0406_060406_judas.html

Lost Gospel Revealed; Says Jesus Asked Judas to Betray Him Stefan Lovgren
for National Geographic News

April 6, 2006
He is one of the most reviled men in history.

But was Judas only obeying his master's wishes when he betrayed Jesus with a kiss?

After being lost for nearly 1,700 years, the Gospel of Judas was recently restored, authenticated, and translated. (Get the full, twisting tale of the document's discovery and authentication.)

The Coptic, or Egyptian Christian, manuscripts were unveiled today at National Geographic Society headquarters in Washington, D.C. (National Geographic News is part of the National Geographic Society.)

What Does It Mean?

Some biblical scholars are calling the Gospel of Judas the most significant archaeological discovery in 60 years.

The only known surviving copy of the gospel was found in a codex, or ancient book, that dates back to the third or fourth century A.D.

The newly revealed gospel document, written in Coptic script, is believed to be a translation of the original, a Greek text written by an early Christian sect sometime before A.D. 180.

The Bible's New Testament Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—depict Judas Iscariot, one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus, as a traitor. In biblical accounts Judas gives up Jesus Christ to his opponents, who later crucify the founder of Christianity.

The Gospel of Judas, however, portrays him as acting at Jesus' request.

"This lost gospel, providing information on Judas Iscariot—considered for 20 centuries and by hundreds of millions of believers as an antichrist of the worst kind—bears witness to something completely different from what was said [about Judas] in the Bible," said Rodolphe Kasser, a clergyman and former professor in the Faculty of Arts at the University of Geneva in Switzerland.

Kasser, who is regarded as one of the world's preeminent Coptic scholars, led the effort to piece together and translate the Gospel of Judas. The National Geographic Society and the Waitt Institute for Historical Discovery funded the project, and it will be profiled in the May 2006 issue of National Geographic magazine.

Scholars say the text not only offers an alternative view of the relationship between Jesus and Judas but also illustrates the diversity of opinion in the early Christian church.


"I expect this gospel to be important mainly for the deeper insight it will give scholars into the thoughts and beliefs of certain Christians in the second century of the Christian era, namely the Gnostics," said Stephen Emmel, a Coptic studies professor at the University of Münster in Germany.

In 1983 Emmel was among the first three known scholars to view the Gospel of Judas, which had been discovered hidden in Egypt in the late 1970s.

Gnostics belonged to pre-Christian and early Christian sects that believed that elusive spiritual knowledge could help them rise above what they saw as the corrupt physical world.

Rehabilitating Judas

Biblical accounts suggest that Jesus foresaw and allowed Judas's betrayal.

As told in the New Testament Gospels, Judas betrayed Jesus for "30 pieces of silver," identifying him with a kiss in front of Roman soldiers. Later the guilt-ridden Judas returns the bribe and commits suicide, according to the Bible.

The Gospel of Judas, however, gives a very different account.

The text begins by announcing that it is the "secret account of the revelation that Jesus spoke in conversation with Judas Iscariot during a week, three days before he celebrated Passover."

It goes on to describe Judas as Jesus' closest friend, someone who understands Christ's true message and is singled out for special status among Jesus' disciples.

In the key passage Jesus tells Judas, "'you will exceed all of them. For you will sacrifice the man that clothes me.'"

Kasser, the translation-project leader, offers an interpretation: "Jesus says it is necessary for someone to free him finally from his human body, and he prefers that this liberation be done by a friend rather than by an enemy.

"So he asks Judas, who is his friend, to sell him out, to betray him. It's treason to the general public, but between Jesus and Judas it's not treachery."

The newfound account challenges one of the most firmly rooted beliefs in Christian tradition.

Bart Ehrman is chair of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

"This gospel," he said, "has a completely different understanding of God, the world, Christ, salvation, human existence—not to mention of Judas himself—than came to be embodied in the Christian creeds and canon."

Early Turmoil

The author of the 26-page Gospel of Judas remains anonymous. But the text reflects themes that scholars regard as being consistent with Gnostic traditions.

Christian Gnostics believed that the way to salvation was through secret knowledge delivered by Jesus to his inner circle. This knowledge, they believed, revealed how people could escape the prisons of their material bodies and return to the spiritual realm from which they came.

Gnostic sects looked to their gospels—among them the Gospel of Mary, newly famous for its role in the best-seller The Da Vinci Code—to authenticate their distinctive beliefs and practices. (See "Da Vinci Code Spurs Debate: Who Was Mary Magdalene?")

Contradicting the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, these texts were later denounced by orthodox Christian leaders and refused entry into the Bible. Scholars believe that followers of the texts hid copies of them for preservation. (See our interactive "Lost Gospel" time line and map.)

Scholars knew of the existence of the Gospel of Judas because of references to it in other ancient texts as early as A.D. 180.

To today's biblical scholars, the Gospel of Judas illustrates the multitude of opinions and beliefs in the early Christian church.

"This ancient text helps the modern world rediscover something that the early Christians knew firsthand," said Reverend Donald Senior, president of the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, Illinois.

"In the early centuries of the Christian era there were multiple sacred texts resulting from communities in various parts of the Mediterranean world trying to come to grips with the meaning of Jesus Christ for their lives."

What do you think? Share your thoughts in National Geographic magazine's "Lost Gospel" online forum.

Brian Handwerk contributed to this report.

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I'm quite happy to put our argument to bed. I don't really want to spend time arguing with you, in truth I did put you in the same (preachy) category as BillRM, and if I'm wrong in doing that I apologise.

My problems with him go across a number of threads, he seems to regard viewing child pornography as something that shouldn't be punished, only the makers of such material. He supports Zimmerman, the man who gunned down a black teenager, he always takes the side of the rapist in rape allegations, and has taken the side of a drunk driver who killed a cyclist. In short he only seems concerned with his own pleasures, and when someone like that claims the moral high ground, I get very angry.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not accusing you of any of that, just the preachy bit. When FS told you about her spiritual experiences your response was to ask her to watch a video that gave a rational explanation for such experiences. That sounds a bit preachy to me. Then again if you think it's just debate I'll give you the benefit of the doubt.



On this we will have to disagree. Language is not a fixed thing, it changes. Evangelical may once have specifically referenced Christian gospels, but now it can be used in a wider context. I'm not the only person to use the phrase 'evangelical atheist,' and even if I was, I'm a writer. We do this sort of thing all the time, that's part of what writing is.

With regard to your comments on Islam and terrorism, you may be interested in the following.



http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/25/magazine/25tetouan-t.html?pagewanted=all

I saw an interview on Al Jazeera with someone who had made a particular study of Al Qaida inspired terrorism. (Sorry I can't find it, I have been looking.) He said that the religious types don't fall for the Al Qaida line, there are people in the Mosques that look out for it. It tends to be people like Ahmidan, angry men, looking for some way to vent their anger. In any event I'm sure you'll agree he doesn't sound like a religious fundamentalist.

In any event, I would like to draw a line under the name calling, and discuss things with you in a more civil manner.

Are you taking a new medication or something? What ever it is you may want to take note and start applying it more often.

If our minds are different Chights, then we are going to think differently about religion and that can be, "your God" and how you see him represented to you, or that your culture adds into the equation of this belief. Ultimately, there may be 36,000 different denominations but like I said, ultimately, there is one belief. "Belief in a God, or Non-belief in a God".

LOL I do not knock on people doors on the weekends or approach people with religion tracks in public places.

But perhaps we atheists should do so................

Or gods a whole whole lot of gods as in Hindu religion with somewhere in the order of 900 millions followers worldwide.

You've not met many Hindu's I suppose. When I was invited to a meal at our local Vedic centre, they were at pains to tell me they were all separate aspects of one god.

Sounds as though we are on the same wave length.

Hope there are many of us here!

We'll talk in other threads, I am sure.

Thanks a lot bud!...Sorry I jumped the gun! Thanks for the words of encouragement!...And I hope the best for your health!! You can talk with me thru pm if you would like too...I am sure you already got my last one!!

Yes! The trinity, of Brahman, Shiva, and Vishnu....

I do not understand why they would label these other gods, Gods...If they feel this way...But I understand you...