Kipp

...Thank God for football; the last bastion of the homophobe apparently. The scaling of these walls will be watched with amused interest. And you should be happy Kipp, I have won you convert (below)!

BP:

...I am pleased to see you “off the fence”.

So Tony, when your literalist version of the words is shown to lead to much the same conclusion as my symbolic version you decide to interpret the text non-literally. And then you compound it by interpreting a part of the bible that Jews of Paul's day, as well as Jews and Christians of our own, generally understand as metaphorical in an offensive way.

You're behaving like a troll, which seems to be typical of many militant atheists who seem to have picked on Christianity as a scape goat for their own inadequacies.

If you really thought it wrong to be harsh you wouldn't write like this.

.

Dear Tony Lavis,

I neglected to thank you for that interesting link to the web article on the enteric nervous system.

Better late than never. Many thanks.

.

Dear diver dan,

.

I'm afraid it was just an optical illusion, my friend. I have no guns to pop off toes with and no fences to sit on. I speak from the hip and (try to) stand tall.

I just happen to be a lazy bugger and think that tossing out a few one syllable words will do. If you prod me enough I toss out a few more until the tally is right.

"So throw the weary pen aside
And let the papers rest,
For we must saddle up and ride
Towards the blue hill's breast;
...
When Clancy took the drover's track
In years of long ago,
He drifted to the outer back
Beyond the Overflow;
By rolling plain and rocky shelf,
With stockwip in his hand,
He reached at last, oh lucky elf,
The Town of Come-and-help-yourself
In Rough-and-ready Land.

And if it be that you would know
The tracks he used to ride,
Then you must saddle up and go
Beyond the Queensland side -
Beyond the reach of rule or law,
To ride the long day through,
In Nature's homestead - filled with awe:
You then might see what Clancy saw
And know what Clancy knew"

.

Its easy to agree with the title of this article, but to completely disagree with its content. Even if Christianity is accepted as a source of awe necessary to assuage the yearnings of the human heart, it is not the only religion which can provide such awe any more than any religion, past or present, is the sole source of awe. I am awestruck by water: every atom of hydrogen in every molecule of water came into existence at the beginning of the universe, and there it is, as old as time, pouring out of a tap, falling from the sky, essential to my existence. To my mind, that sort of awe beats religious awe into a cocked hat, because it needs no intervention or interpretation to be understood: it just IS, an it is amazing.

Candide,

"Water"

I agree. There's more about water, and it's relevance to all aspects of the human condition, than meets the eye.

(IMO)

The fact that water has its maximum density at 4C and that ice is less dense than water insures that rivers don't freeze at the bottom, and life can live under the water. I make a judgment of the skill of an artist by the way she or he depicts the surface of water. The property by which water adheres to surfaces making little round droplets on leafs as surface tension draws the droplet together gives us beauty in the morning. The white noise of surf is soothing. It is wondrous.