We Don't Discriminate

Until recently, if a Mississippi shop-keeper refused to serve somebody, then the shop-keeper could be prosecuted and forced to pay damages to the victim.

Well the Mississippi Christians hated that idea. They said that every Christian had the right to discriminate against whomsoever they pleased, and the State should not have the right to stop them.

Governor Phil Bryant counted up the number of Christians screaming for the right to discriminate and realised there were enough of them to have a serious effect on his chances to win the next election - so he jumped onto their bandwagon. 

He signed a religious freedom law that prevents police from  

placing a burden on a person’s right to the exercise of religion.

That's lawyer talk for,

Christians can discriminate against anyone they please and the cops can't touch them!

But some shop-keepers decided to invite the persecuted groups into their stores with this sign in their shop windows:

Well the Christians went berserk!

In an interview with One News Now on Monday, American Family Association Executive Vice President Buddy Smith suggested that the decals were an assault on Christian freedoms.

“It’s not really a buying campaign, but it’s a bully campaign,” he asserted. “And it’s being carried out by radical xxxxxx activists who intend to trample the freedom of Christians to live according to the dictates of scripture.”

“They don’t want to hear that xxxxxx is sinful behavior – and they wish to silence Christians and the church who dare to believe this truth.”

Smith warned that businesses that agreed to display the non-discrimination sticker were complicit in taking away the rights of Christians.

“If you do that, you are agreeing with these businesses that Christians no longer have the freedom to live out the dictates of their Christian faith and conscience,” he insisted.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/04/29

What Would Jesus Do? 

He would agree with the bigots: 

Whoever is not with me is against me 

(Matthew 12:30)

And what does Jesus say should happen
to anyone who disagrees with him?

It would be better for them to have a 

large millstone hung around their neck 

and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.

(Matthew 18:6)

-----

Added one month later (May 30th, 2014)
At the Barbwire website, Gina Miller explains that shopkeepers displaying the anti-discrimination signs in their windows are "homofascist bullies" who  have launched a campaign against all Christians. It is not the Christians who are being discriminatory says Gina Miller:

The truth of the matter is the exact opposite of how the Left portrays it. Christians are not refusing to serve homosexuals, but homosexuals are targeting Christian-owned businesses with demands that would force the owners to participate in the desecration of marriage, in direct violation of their conscience. (link)

So now you know.

Religion Is A Protection Racket

You've heard the stories of the protection rackets run by the mafia. A couple of tough looking gangsters confront the owner of a small business and say, "Nice little shop you've got here. It would be a shame if anything happened to it." The message is clear: "Pay us protection money or we'll come back and trash the place."

Religion got started in exactly the same way!

When you take a census of the Israelites to count them, each one must pay the LORD a ransom for his life at the time he is counted. Then no plague will come on them when you number them. (Exodus 30:12)

Modern Christians don't even try to make excuses for the criminal nature of the offer: Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers merely verifies that those who do not pay will probably end up dead!

If a man did not feel his need of “ransom,” and gladly pay the small sum at which the ransom was fixed, he would show himself so proud and presumptuous that he might well provoke a Divine “plague,” or punishment.
http://biblehub.com/commentaries/exodus/30-12.htm

But notice how Ellicot attempts to minimize the situation by pointing out that the ransom was a "small sum" and then goes on to blame the victim; suggesting that the victim is "proud and presumptuous" and therefore deserves his fate!

More recently, on April 25th, 2014, at a forum held by an American religious group called The Family Leader, Bob Vander Plaats, preached the same basic message: Join the Christians in their attempt to gain control of the government - or you will be made suffer.

A Description Of God

First consider the dictionary definition of these words:

ineffable: cannot to be described with words

incomprehensible: cannot be understood

With those definitions in mind, take a look at the 1968 National Catholic Almanac which lists the following attributes of God: 

almighty, eternal, holy, immortal, immense, immutable, incomprehensible, ineffable, infinite, invisible, just, loving, merciful, most high, most wise, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, patient, perfect, provident, supreme, true.

Source: 1968 National Catholic Almanac, edited by Felician A. Foy, O. F. M. (Paterson: St. Anthony’s Guild, 1968), p. 360.

The authors have managed to comprehend the incomprehensible and used words to describe the ineffable. Clever little Christians, or silly little buggers? What do you think?

Almost - Billy Barrix (1957)

One of my favourite rockabilly songs from the 1950s

The delicious drivel that was 1950s Rockabilly 

(I guess you had to be there)

Almost - Billy Barrix

(Lyrics)

Well-well, almost you broke my heart in two
Well-well, almost you left me sad and blue
Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh

Everybody cries the day you walk by
But I wouldn't believe it was you-ou

Well-well almost I went for your blue eyes
Well-well almost I went for your sweet lies
But everybody's talkin', I might as well be dead
My heart wouldn't listen to my head

Well-well, almost I went for your blue eyes
Well-well, almost I went for your sweet lies
But everybody's talkin', I might as well be dead
My heart wouldn't listen to my head

Well-well, almost I heard the church bells ring
Well-well, almost I heard the angels sing
Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh
Then one day I found, that you were runnin' around
And now I believe everything

Well-well, almost I heard the church bells ring
Well-well, almost I heard the angels sing
Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh
Then one day I found, that you were runnin' around
And now I believe everything
A-almost, almost, almost, almost
Baby almost...

God Will Take Care Of You

Sometime he doesn't help.

But hey, he can't be everywhere at once.

Oh, Wait.

Easter (Part #4)

Links:
Easter (Part #1)
Easter (Part #2)
Easter (Part #3)
Easter (Part #4) <<< You are here

When the Pharisees asked Jesus for a sign that he was the messiah,

He answered, “A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. (Matthew 12:38-40)

Three days and three nights. Couldn't be any clearer could it?

Eventually Jesus was crucified and it was about three-o-clock on Friday afternoon when he cried out,

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? (Matthew 27:46)

Somebody gave him a drink of vinegar and then the crowd sat around and waited to see what might happen next:

Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to save him. (Matthew 27:49)

At some later time (after three-o-clock on Friday afternoon) Jesus cried out again, and then he died.

And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit. (Matthew 27:50)

With Jesus still hanging on the cross, Joseph of Arimathea went back into town to ask Pilate for Jesus' body:

Going to Pilate, he asked for Jesus’ body. (Luke 23:52)

With permission granted, Joseph of Arimathea went back to the cross, took the body down and carried it off to a tomb that had been cut into the rock:

Then he took it down, wrapped it in linen cloth and placed it in a tomb cut in the rock, one in which no one had yet been laid. (Luke 23:53)

And by the time he had finished doing that,

The Sabbath was about to begin (Luke 23:54)

So Jesus is in the tomb at about 6pm on Friday night, just as "the Sabbath was about to begin," and now we can count off the three days and three nights:

• Friday night
• Saturday
• Saturday night
• Sunday
• Sunday night
• Monday

So the resurrection (according to the prophecy made by Jesus himself) was set to occur sometime on Monday, right? Probably in the late afternoon. It couldn't be much earlier than that because Jesus had promised that he would spend a full three days and three nights in the grave. That was the sign - the ONLY sign - that he was prepared to give.

But then we turn to the gospel of John and find the women at the tomb,

Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark (John 20:1)

And Jesus was gone!

They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don't know where they have put him. (John 20:2)

So Jesus was in the tomb for less than one day and two nights. He was gone before the sun rose on Sunday morning. 

The ONLY prophecy he made regarding his messiah-ship and he got it wrong! What a silly old messiah. 

Easter (Part #3)

Links:
Easter (Part #1)
Easter (Part #2) 
Easter (Part #3) <<< You are here
Easter (Part #4)


The Death of Jesus. Here's how the story is told by the preacher in the pulpit:

• Darkness covered the land from noon until three-o-clock in the afternoon.
• Then Jesus cried out "My god, my god, why hast thou forsaken me?"
• Some people thought was calling out to Elijah (but they were mistaken).
• Somebody tried to give Jesus some vinegar to drink
• Then Jesus died (He gave up the spirit)
• And next came a huge earthquake.
• The rocks split and the curtain in the Temple was torn apart.
• It was like a sign from God
• And suddenly everybody understood that Jesus was, indeed, the Messiah.
• Even the Roman soldier was moved to say, "Truly, he was the Son of God."
• And all of these events were witnessed by the women who were watching from afar.

Here's how the story is told in Matthew 27:45-56 (New International Version):

45 From noon until three in the afternoon darkness came over all the land.
46 About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”).
47 When some of those standing there heard this, they said, “He’s calling Elijah.”
48 Immediately one of them ran and got a sponge. He filled it with wine vinegar, put it on a staff, and offered it to Jesus to drink.
49 The rest said, “Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to save him.”
50 And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit.
51 At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split
52 and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life.
53 They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people.
54 When the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that had happened, they were terrified, and exclaimed, “Surely he was the Son of God!”
55 Many women were there, watching from a distance. They had followed Jesus from Galilee to care for his needs.
56 Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of Zebedee’s sons.

Did you see the bits the preacher missed out? Yep, verses 52 and 53 are nearly always skipped over because these days nobody believes in zombies. Two thousand years ago the mugs in the pews were dumb enough to fall for the idea that dead people climbed out of their graves and walked around Jerusalem but not anymore. Today's slightly more enlightened Christians will quite happily go for one resurrection at a time, 

•  Daughter of Jairus.[Mark 5:21-43]
• The Young Man from Nain.[Luke 7:11-17]
• The Raising of Lazarus.[John 11:1-44]
• And Jesus of course

But the idea of mass resurrections, with zombies roaming free on the city streets, well that is too much for most 21st century Christians - so the preachers go out of their way to keep that nonsensical story well hidden.