Anyone non-religious here? Please be nice!

[EweSheep]

Remember the Salem's witch trials.....another disturbing facts about fear monging of the people. Oh the humanity of all those innocent lives being put to death.

As for the Aztecs and Mayans, human sacrifice was the norm for them and yet the Spaniards changed their way of life.....does it serve the Mayan a purpose to kill a person? I do not think so or it really did benefit anyone but culture and sociality was so different than us.

I remember seeing that program with Ollie and his friend meeting the Brazilian tribe who never saw white men, in so much in killing them as intruders or tresspassers. Fear was paramount on both sides until both sides saw the humanity on each other, respecting one another, tolerated their ceremonies and partake the strange drugs to see their gods.....the whole issue that I saw in that tribe was the same....treat your neighbor like you want to be treated. If you eat or take a plant off from the farmer's field without asking permission, you would be in big trouble and you must pay. The shame in the tribe was awful for Ollie and his friend. They do not like to be "rejected" from the tribe and trying to make amends to their leader. However they do have a soft heart toward those white men. So Christianity was unknown for them...they do not know who God/Jesus was, or how the earth started with God, etc. etc. It was totally uknown to them and yet they existed after all those years. They are still alive and no "evil" befallen them when they are "ignorant" about our religion.

I do not think they would openly be receptive to change their religion, their way of life, their customs and missionaries really do not serve the purpose for them if they see that it is compatible with their culture whether we like it or not.

Personally in my opinion, missionaries should not go there or any other country to change their ways and their cultures because all in the name of God or use God as a "bait" to support their livehood like building wells...if they change or convert to the missionaries' religion, they will get the well and water they needed for their villages. If they do not follow, they don't get it at all. See what I am saying?

 

[deb1]

mom'sfolly :

I once got into a very heated discussion, on a thread to thank pagans for various inventions, about the comparison between the Aztecs and the same sort of things going on in the Christian church and countries at the same time. The Inquisition and Columbus were contemporaries, and Vlad the Impaler was also a contemporary of the Aztecs. This person went on to tell me that because these people weren't real Christians because this wasn't from the Bible. But these were Christians who perpetuated the inquisitions, the killing of witches, impaling and other things that the modern world would consider atrocities. They did so with the blessing of their church.

Mexico City (I can't even begin to spell the Aztec version) was bigger than London, Paris and Madrid. There is no doubt that the practiced human sacrifice, but it might be argued that there Christian contemporaries in Europe did the same thing, even if they didn't call it that.

The term Real or True Christian is used to explain away any evil that a person does in the name of their religion. The thinking is that a real member of their faith would not commit atrocities because the changes that occur once you are saved would prevent you from doing anything truly evil. If a person does something immoral or evil that is proof that their inital salvation experience wasn't real.​

 

[deb1]

Ewesheep, our priest(who is actually a pretty nice guy) was talking about Christians who are martyred in other countries. He said to pray for them. While I feel for these unknown people's plight, I wonder at the missionaries, who must have known how dangerous it was for these people to convert and went ahead and converted them anyway. Isn't that unethical?

 

[Prettiest Frog]

Quote:
One of the reasons I stopped donating to a lot of charities was the requirement that to receive their aid you must convert. Since these charities accept donations from non-Christians, I felt that unfair, especially as they aren't upfront about that particular practice.

 

[redhen]

Quote:
One of the reasons I stopped donating to a lot of charities was the requirement that to receive their aid you must convert. Since these charities accept donations from non-Christians, I felt that unfair, especially as they aren't upfront about that particular practice.

yup..thats pretty sad that they do that...

 

[EweSheep]

Yep, very unethical in my opinion. Just rubs me the wrong way. Why force them if they are happy the way they are for thousands of years? Has their religion HURT the missionaries any??? Perhaps not.

 

[michickenwrangler]

Quote:
This may be a little grotesque, but a college professor of mine used to live in Port Moresby, Papua-New Guinea and said that a popular bumper sticker there says "We Had First Taste of Missionaries" (something to that effect).

I grew up in Metro Detroit and attended a school with a large Muslim and Middle Eastern population. Many Muslims at my school were Albanian, Pakistani, India-Indian, Iranian or Turks. Many of Arab descent were actually Christian. Now I live in a largely rural area where people equate Muslim = Arab and vice versa so I often have to correct misconceptions (not that the locals really care). A good friend of mine growing up was a Coptic/Orthodox Christian from Egypt and attended Catholic school as it was the closest thing to Orthodox. A number of students that I went to school were with Iraqi Christians whose parents had fled from there because of persecution.

 

[EweSheep]

Quote:
This may be a little grotesque, but a college professor of mine used to live in Port Moresby, Papua-New Guinea and said that a popular bumper sticker there says "We Had First Taste of Missionaries" (something to that effect).

I grew up in Metro Detroit and attended a school with a large Muslim and Middle Eastern population. Many Muslims at my school were Albanian, Pakistani, India-Indian, Iranian or Turks. Many of Arab descent were actually Christian. Now I live in a largely rural area where people equate Muslim = Arab and vice versa so I often have to correct misconceptions (not that the locals really care). A good friend of mine growing up was a Coptic/Orthodox Christian from Egypt and attended Catholic school as it was the closest thing to Orthodox. A number of students that I went to school were with Iraqi Christians whose parents had fled from there because of persecution.

Persecution still around????????!!!!!!!!!! Haven't we learned from the Hitler/Holocast era? If the Muslim religion is what they want, they should have it...after all, we are one BIG melting pot of religion and non religion!

 

[deb1]

I still get up early on Sunday because I feel bad for my husband if he attends church alone. The thought of him sitting by himself in the pew makes me free sorry for him. LOL Some of you that listed sleeping in late on Sunday as an advantage of being nonreligious have made me so jealous.

 

[deb1]

Quote:
This may be a little grotesque, but a college professor of mine used to live in Port Moresby, Papua-New Guinea and said that a popular bumper sticker there says "We Had First Taste of Missionaries" (something to that effect).

I grew up in Metro Detroit and attended a school with a large Muslim and Middle Eastern population. Many Muslims at my school were Albanian, Pakistani, India-Indian, Iranian or Turks. Many of Arab descent were actually Christian. Now I live in a largely rural area where people equate Muslim = Arab and vice versa so I often have to correct misconceptions (not that the locals really care). A good friend of mine growing up was a Coptic/Orthodox Christian from Egypt and attended Catholic school as it was the closest thing to Orthodox. A number of students that I went to school were with Iraqi Christians whose parents had fled from there because of persecution.

Persecution still around????????!!!!!!!!!! Haven't we learned from the Hitler/Holocast era? If the Muslim religion is what they want, they should have it...after all, we are one BIG melting pot of religion and non religion!

I think that she meant that some Christians in Muslim countries are persecuted.