Maybe we can't do much about Islamic Fundamentalism but we certainly can do something about our own home-grown Christian Fundamentalism.

It should also be noted that the words "pagan" and "heretic" are strictly Judeo-Christian terms. The word "heretic" come from the Greek word for "choice" and the word was created at the time that non-believers were summarily put to death by the Christian rulers of the day.

The film "Agora" offers an accurate portrayal of those early years.

They were certainly more militant then and many are probably hoping for a return.

Philo (Friday, 1 April 2011 6:18:08pm)

Proposing God is "the idea of accountability to the moral excellence" and "God is spirit expressed in the perfection and purity of human character" is dishonest, given the lack of verification and the problem that God seems to also be the source of evil. Thus your proposals are immoral.

Jon J,
But if God does will you ascribe it to God?

God put into place natural principles of maaintaining health, if faeces is found in the uretha then infection, viruses and diseases can arise like HIV and AIDS. I recently attended a funeral for a 42 year old once healthy man and an active homosexual. He died a slow and detoriating disease over many months from AIDS. His parents nursed him for months with many tears because of the lifestyle he had chosen. They did not blame God, but the consequence of his choices resulted in his own death from the boundaries God has placed in human behaviour.

But Philo,

Wouldn't it be so much simpler not to make anyone homosexual in the first place? God can do that, right? Why does he -- in your view -- condemn some (small number of) homosexuals to lingering painful deaths when he could 'cure' them all with a wave of his magic omnipotence?

It's almost as if he LIKES to see people suffering, isn't it?

Jon J writes

'It's almost as if he LIKES to see people suffering, isn't it?'

I would say it is the likes of you and me that loves the forbidden rotton fruit that leads to sufferering. No more clearer example than aids. Men and women who keep life long commitments suffer few if any std's. If God loved sufferering so much He would not of warned us what causes it. Our stubborn denial of the obvious shows who is at fault and it ain't God.

Hi Arthur,

interesting point you raise, except that I'm not speaking out against Christian speech, I'm pointing at how some Christians and others use the intent of 'free speech' so to legitimate their own cause for discrimination.That some see no problem in using the cover of 'free speech' so to legitimate a type of speech which in fact is prejudice (and then reinforced by discriminatory employment practices).

Raycom,

you're being a bit defensive arent you? Jon J's initial post has the argument correct. Its not about all Christians, or any other religious person, as I made clear in the article (before you breathlessly rushed in to ignore it). Its about the structures being used by those few who are left within now cavernous spaces. So many of good will, thought and compassion have left — or been forced out — leaving structures in the hands of the zealous and ideological few.