School gets busted for Burqas

[Woods Racing Transmission]

Look at Uganda and their recent attempts at laws. They didn't pass only because of international reactions. Best I recall they're trying to reintroduce the same law only with the removal of the death penalty. How fucked is that? This, of course, is only one example out of many.

A controversial Ugandan bill that strengthens criminal penalties against homosexuality—and originally, in some cases, invoked the death penalty—will soon be put to a vote and is expected to pass.

The bill, first proposed in 2009, has been widely attributed to the influence of American evangelicals; however, CT has reported how American evangelical leaders condemned the bill but Ugandan Christian leaders dismissed this as cultural imperialism.

[Baba Ganoush]

Keep religions out of schools, period. You want to study a religion, pick up a book on your own time.

I'm not religious, and I'm aware of all the black eyes that every religion has, but Islam has the worst crop of CURRENT offenders. Muslims are the enemy of a free world, and if you're part of that religion, you are part of the problem. The line was drawn in the sand at the beginning of this century, now you just have to decide which side you're on.

[Forever_frost]

Because getting burned at the stake, being stoned, or being exiled is so much better than being bashed. Christianity had better be glad those bashing it are better people than the christians of the past. I can assure you, you don't want people to do to christianity what christianity has done to others.

You mean like Islam currently beheading and burning Christians alive? Where today do you see Christians doing any of this to anyone?

[racrguy]

Dude as usual you got this backassward. Its the Christians that are being persecuted and killed in Africa.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j...43148975,d.b2I

So I'm just making this shit up, is that what you're saying? Let's not forget the well known LRA. But then we have christians murdering "witches"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2012/mar/01/witchcraft-curse-africa-kristy-bamu

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/africa/08/25/nigeria.child.witches/index.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/18/african-children-denounce_n_324943.html

Why not just say that two groups of people that believe in a fairy tale world are killing other people because they believe, or the murderers think they believe in the wrong Tinkerbell.

I wasn't aware that Atheist owned people. What would yo consider yourself then?

So far as I know, atheists don't, but you used the possessive "your" instead of the conjunction of "you are." If you're asking me if I'm an atheist, the answer is yes, but I don't see how that's relevant to the topic at hand. Unlike myself, you're only demonizing one shitty religion, I'm just pointing out that one is no better than the other.

A controversial Ugandan bill that strengthens criminal penalties against homosexuality—and originally, in some cases, invoked the death penalty—will soon be put to a vote and is expected to pass.

The bill, first proposed in 2009, has been widely attributed to the influence of American evangelicals; however, CT has reported how American evangelical leaders condemned the bill but Ugandan Christian leaders dismissed this as cultural imperialism.

[citation needed]

[line-em-up]

So I'm just making this shit up, is that what you're saying? Let's not forget the well known LRA. But then we have christians murdering "witches"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2012/mar/01/witchcraft-curse-africa-kristy-bamu

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/africa/08/25/nigeria.child.witches/index.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/18/african-children-denounce_n_324943.html

Why not just say that two groups of people that believe in a fairy tale world are killing other people because they believe, or the murderers think they believe in the wrong Tinkerbell.



So far as I know, atheists don't, but you used the possessive "your" instead of the conjunction of "you are." If you're asking me if I'm an atheist, the answer is yes, but I don't see how that's relevant to the topic at hand. Unlike myself, you're only demonizing one shitty religion, I'm just pointing out that one is no better than the other.


[citation needed]

Just looking at your first example, I see that those "Christians" are not following the New Testament of the Bible. The African preachers are using it to make money and killing or injuring innocent people to do it, much like the scum Televangelists in our backyard. Mainstream Christains don't believe in that crap.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2012/mar/01/witchcraft-curse-africa-kristy-bamu

"In their present form, beliefs in witchcraft are not "traditional" – changes since earlier times are obvious. Modern beliefs see the power of witchcraft as emanating from evil spirits that possess the witch and endow him or her with the power to harm. This belief in possession by evil spirits has been promulgated in Africa by western missionaries of fundamentalist, particularly Pentecostal, Christian beliefs. It has enabled Africans to retain a modified version of their former beliefs in witchcraft, obtaining the approval and support of Satan-hunting Christians whose life is dedicated to the pursuit of evil. New churches, started by Africans with a self-proclaimed "divine mission", have sprung up everywhere.

These churches do not "control" witchcraft beliefs, although they encourage and profit from them. Nor is it true to say that it is only as witchcraft escapes from the control of the church that it becomes evil; witchcraft is evil from the beginning. Some people may feel protective of Christianity, but Christianity is at fault here. The pastors of independent African churches may identify children as witches (for a fee) and are prepared to "cure" them (for a further fee) by exorcising the evil spirits. Such exorcisms are often violent; beating and the use of cold water to cleanse and purify the possessed being is common in many Congolese churches and elsewhere in Africa, too."

My belief is that the Old Testament was superceded by the New Testament after Jesus died on the cross. We no longer need to make sacrifices of animals and people.

Here are some references from the Bible regarding witches. I seperated the old and new Testaments.

http://www.openbible.info/topics/witches

Old Testament

Exodus 22:18 ESV / 52 helpful votes
“You shall not permit a sorceress to live.

Leviticus 19:31 ESV / 19 helpful votes
“Do not turn to mediums or necromancers; do not seek them out, and so make yourselves unclean by them: I am the Lord your God.

Deuteronomy 18:9-14 ESV / 16 helpful votes
“When you come into the land that the Lord your God is giving you, you shall not learn to follow the abominable practices of those nations. There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, anyone who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens, or a sorcerer or a charmer or a medium or a necromancer or one who inquires of the dead, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord. And because of these abominations the Lord your God is driving them out before you. You shall be blameless before the Lord your God, ...

Leviticus 20:27 ESV / 10 helpful votes
“A man or a woman who is a medium or a necromancer shall surely be put to death. They shall be stoned with stones; their blood shall be upon them.”

Leviticus 19:26 ESV / 9 helpful votes
“You shall not eat any flesh with the blood in it. You shall not interpret omens or tell fortunes.

Micah 5:12 ESV / 8 helpful votes
And I will cut off sorceries from your hand, and you shall have no more tellers of fortunes;

1 Samuel 28:7 ESV / 8 helpful votes
Then Saul said to his servants, “Seek out for me a woman who is a medium, that I may go to her and inquire of her.” And his servants said to him, “Behold, there is a medium at En-dor.”

Isaiah 8:19 ESV / 7 helpful votes
And when they say to you, “Inquire of the mediums and the necromancers who chirp and mutter,” should not a people inquire of their God? Should they inquire of the dead on behalf of the living?

2 Kings 21:6 ESV / 7 helpful votes
And he burned his son as an offering and used fortune-telling and omens and dealt with mediums and with necromancers. He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger.

Daniel 2:27 ESV / 6 helpful votes
Daniel answered the king and said, “No wise men, enchanters, magicians, or astrologers can show to the king the mystery that the king has asked,

1 Chronicles 10:13 ESV / 6 helpful votes
So Saul died for his breach of faith. He broke faith with the Lord in that he did not keep the command of the Lord, and also consulted a medium, seeking guidance.

2 Kings 9:22 ESV / 5 helpful votes
And when Joram saw Jehu, he said, “Is it peace, Jehu?” He answered, “What peace can there be, so long as the whorings and the sorceries of your mother Jezebel are so many?”

Deuteronomy 18:11 ESV / 5 helpful votes
Or a charmer or a medium or a necromancer or one who inquires of the dead,

Galatians 5:20 ESV / 4 helpful votes
Idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions,

Isaiah 19:3 ESV / 4 helpful votes
And the spirit of the Egyptians within them will be emptied out, and I will confound their counsel; and they will inquire of the idols and the sorcerers, and the mediums and the necromancers;

2 Chronicles 33:6 ESV / 4 helpful votes
And he burned his sons as an offering in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, and used fortune-telling and omens and sorcery, and dealt with mediums and with necromancers. He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger.

1 Chronicles 10:13-14 ESV / 4 helpful votes
So Saul died for his breach of faith. He broke faith with the Lord in that he did not keep the command of the Lord, and also consulted a medium, seeking guidance. He did not seek guidance from the Lord. Therefore the Lord put him to death and turned the kingdom over to David the son of Jesse.

Deuteronomy 18:10 ESV / 4 helpful votes
There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, anyone who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens, or a sorcerer

Exodus 8:18 ESV / 4 helpful votes
The magicians tried by their secret arts to produce gnats, but they could not. So there were gnats on man and beast.

Exodus 7:12 ESV / 4 helpful votes
For each man cast down his staff, and they became serpents. But Aaron's staff swallowed up their staffs.

1 Samuel 15:23 ESV / 3 helpful votes
For rebellion is as the sin of divination, and presumption is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has also rejected you from being king.”

Exodus 7:11 ESV / 2 helpful votes
Then Pharaoh summoned the wise men and the sorcerers, and they, the magicians of Egypt, also did the same by their secret arts.

2 Kings 23:24 ESV / 1 helpful vote
Moreover, Josiah put away the mediums and the necromancers and the household gods and the idols and all the abominations that were seen in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem, that he might establish the words of the law that were written in the book that Hilkiah the priest found in the house of the Lord.

Leviticus 20:13 ESV / 1 helpful vote
If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.

[line-em-up]

New Testament
1 John 4:1 ESV / 19 helpful votes
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world.

Revelation 21:8 ESV / 16 helpful votes
But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

Galatians 5:19-21 ESV / 16 helpful votes
Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Acts 13:8-10 ESV / 12 helpful votes
But Elymas the magician (for that is the meaning of his name) opposed them, seeking to turn the proconsul away from the faith. But Saul, who was also called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, looked intently at him and said, “You son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, full of all deceit and villainy, will you not stop making crooked the straight paths of the Lord?

1 John 4:4 ESV / 10 helpful votes
Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.

1 Peter 5:8 ESV / 7 helpful votes
Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.

James 2:19 ESV / 7 helpful votes
You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder!

Acts 19:18-20 ESV / 6 helpful votes
Also many of those who were now believers came, confessing and divulging their practices. And a number of those who had practiced magic arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all. And they counted the value of them and found it came to fifty thousand pieces of silver. So the word of the Lord continued to increase and prevail mightily.

Luke 8:2 ESV / 6 helpful votes
And also some women who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities: Mary, called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out,

Revelation 22:15 ESV / 5 helpful votes
Outside are the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.

2 Corinthians 11:14 ESV / 5 helpful votes
And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.

Acts 16:16 ESV / 5 helpful votes
As we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a slave girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners much gain by fortune-telling.

1 John 4:18 ESV / 3 helpful votes
There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.

[Maddhattter]

So, do you believe in witchcraft?

[line-em-up]

So, do you believe in witchcraft?

I've never given it a lot of thought. It may exist, but have never seen it.

[Maddhattter]

I've never given it a lot of thought. It may exist, but have never seen it.

So, you don't trust the bible enough to believe in witchcraft, but you'll trust it enough to believe in lichs and zombies?

[YALE]

I've never given it a lot of thought. It may exist, but have never seen it.

You've just summarized my view of Christianity.

[line-em-up]

You've just summarized my view of Christianity.

I undertand. As i was typing my response i figured i would get sort of reply. A christian would say that you can believe what you feel. As for a muslim, it may be a different story.

[racrguy]

I undertand. As i was typing my response i figured i would get sort of reply. A christian would say that you can believe what you feel. As for a muslim, it may be a different story.

You gonna answer this question?

So, you don't trust the bible enough to believe in witchcraft, but you'll trust it enough to believe in lichs and zombies?

[line-em-up]

You gonna answer this question?

I did in post #68.

[racrguy]

I did in post #68.

So your response is the same then, because they're two different questions?

[Forever_frost]

I believe in witchcraft. Still exists. Still have fortune tellers and astrologers so I'll be up front and say I believe in it