David, it matters not what you believe in terms of an after life.It is the struggle to understand and improve the human condition,whether it be social,intellectual emotional or economic.This is what religion is about.You don't have to believe in God to be religious.Life is about the journey,the moment of joy or enlightenment,under an umbrella of discpline, courage, learning and love.
When a person after 50 yrs of marriage ,fails to recognise their spouse due to alhiezmers,the awful reality of our mortality and limitations strikes us.If you can't remember while you are alive,is death going to be any better?We are but the sum total of the memory of our experiences and are as only good as our last perception.

MJB, I read your post three times without finding a shred of meaning in it. Just another example of someone using another's comments as a peg upon which to hang their own sanctimonious twaddle. "[Y]ou may well be one of those who consider all times between the Greek Classical age and the "dawning of light" of the Enlightenment, as being an age of darkness" Pray, where did I say anything of the sort? And, as is typical of your sort, you state that "[c]hristianity ... has moved through history in alignment with the magnificient unfolding of human consciousness," as if one were the cause of the other. Piffle, sir.

"The age of our human story you have committed to the scrap heap.." - which age, which scrap heap? Are you sure you were referring to something I wrote?

But of course you weren't. You were just gasbagging from your pulpit, weren't you?

And if you think for one moment that the pope would have had any influence on the outcome of the Treaty, you know less about the papacy at that time than you think you do, and a good deal less about what went on at Versailles.

Pericles. With my first post I made an erroneous assumption based on your chosen pen name.

I contributed "sanctimonious twaddle", as you ungenerously labelled it, as your comments offer no proposition with which to argue; you contribute quotes of another then a question or a comment on the form of argument. But I think I understand your underlying position; is it nothingness?

You delivered an answer to your own two questions about what you said, with your own comment " as if one was the cause of the other. Piffle, sir" on the fact of the Gospel message being carried by the Christian peoples, and their emerging social structures, through the last 2000 years being the foundation of all that is good in our western liberal democracies.

This not a matter of looking at life "through the lens of Christianity" as you previously put it.

Christianity is. Followers of Christ are in every age. This is a human story which is threaded with good and evil throughout all of its institutions and their spin offs. But one in which goodness prevails whilst there is a sense of Immanence, that God is amongst us.

Pericles, to avoid becoming another wasted civilisation as your ancient Athens, we need Jesus and his Gospel. Individuals do not have to believe, but there needs to be a critical mass to keep alive the truly egalitarian notion of each of us being born naked and in the Image of God (Imago Dei), with consequential dignity, respect and solidarity.

Those who prefer to deny and disparage this heritage essentially have nothing to say. It has been exhausted in the killing fields of the 20th / 21st century, and reduced to nothingness in the Market, Academia and soulless social policy.

For the rest of us we need to know what the carpenter of 2000 years ago was about, what has happened within his Church to learn of its revelation of Truth as well as its errors, and to bring forth Jesus's message into and for these new times in a direct, loving, liberating and redeeming way.

Pericles, regarding MJB's comments, in which u find little meaning. I have to say I found them quite meaningful. But to your mention of Peters 'generalizations' and your comment about "triumphalism and vindictiveness contained in the Treaty of Versailles" - I did a google on that phrase to see what came up and the only result was your own comment in this forum. Can u point me to some actual source about this argument you are referring to ?

The sections I read from it were very fair I feel. Reparations did not seem too oppressive. The Germans did regard their treaty to respect Belgiums neutrality as a 'scrap of paper' and Britain honoured her treaty obligations when Germany invaded.

Harsh regimes 'are' a product of godlessness, even if they happen to exist under a banner proclaiming God. Because, every prophet called kings and nations back to love and respect and justice. It would be unfair to say 'all' godless regimes are unjust, though many of the just ones are indeed harsh. Regimes which have no 'Divine mandate or Foundation' are subject to the whimsical ideas of the monarch or powers to be. Pol Pot. "This is the year zero, all counter revolutionaries will now be liquidated" and 3 million corpses later-

Peter was making a point about God and Politics, where Political powers need a prophetic restraint. He illustrated this with such examples as Thomas Abecket etc. You can nitpick about some of the examples, but I think that is to miss the point of the article.

Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, u know this, I know this, we all know this. Hence, the need for the prophetic call to bring powerful people back to real justice and Godly living.

MJB >> your comments offer no proposition with which to argue;<<

My proposition was that your remarks are sanctimonious twaddle, but I will leave it to you to decide whether to argue the point.

It does however illustrate a basic problem of communication that we have. You - and a number of your fellow-travellers - believe that simply by repeating the same christian mantra ad nauseam, you are arguing your corner. The reality is that you are merely fulfilling your purpose of evangelizing your faith - which is fine, except that you employ these tactics at the expense of logical and rational argument. The result is exactly that we just experienced... I perceive your ramblings about 2000 years of a sense of immanence to be vacuous tripe, while you take me to task for not buying into your beliefs.

Read this sentence of yours again, but this time try to put yourself in the position of an impartial onlooker:

"Those who prefer to deny and disparage this heritage essentially have nothing to say. It has been exhausted in the killing fields of the 20th / 21st century, and reduced to nothingness in the Market, Academia and soulless social policy."

None of this is factual, all of it depends upon your spiritual leanings, which then proceed to guide your opinion. If I am accused of not offering "propositions with which to argue", you have to accept that neither are yours, however much you wish they were.

Having spent a bit of time sniffing around this site now, I have to say that I agree wholeheartedly with Pericles, and concur with his proposition that much of what the 'godbotherer' contingent posts here is 'sanctimonious twaddle'.

Endless repetition of a false proposition does not make it any truer, and endless repetition of a belief does not elevate it to the status of truth. While I found the sheer preponderance of sanctimonious, misogynist, racist and otherwise bigoted posts very off-putting at first, I'm somewhat heartened that correspondents like Pericles, Grace Pettigrew, Kenny and others have consistently provided intelligent and rational comments since these forums were launched.

While the godbotherers who use this site as pulpit from which to preach their outdated superstitions are undoubtedly entitled to do so, they should be aware that they are not participating in a 'debate' - rather, their persistent 'evangelizing' actively works against both critical thought and rational, polite debate.

On the other hand, maybe that is their object.

Morgan