Dear OUG,

I have already mentioned some of the evidence for evolution in this thread. I’d rather not repeat myself.

Science does not say that everything started from nothing with a “huge bang”. The Big Bang was not an explosion but an expansion of spacetime.

As I have said to you before though, I do not have the time to sit here and correct you all day long. You can believe that I am too afraid to “challenge” you all you like. It makes no difference to me. But if you want to know the main reason why I’d prefer not to discuss this with you, then please, see a psychiatrist.

BB and Webby,

I don't want to be seen to be taking any particular stands on this subject as it has developed.

Webby hasn't been here to interact but I reiterate that really, this is as much of a semantic problem as anything else.

BB:- you are referring to the period in which the Catholic Church (at that time the only Church) had total control, yes?

Webby:- This period covers from about the 6th century until around the time Henry Tudor officially broke away from the Catholic Church in the Sixteenth century.

At this time he began the dissolving of the monasteries - which was completed in the mid-Seventeenth century by Oliver Cromwell – which broke down the Monastic system.

O.K. - there was a scientific "revolution". Revolution here means that many old ideas (flat earth, the five humours of the body, the properties of minerals etc.) were revolved: turned on their heads, as it were.

This "revolution" The Enlightenment, happened following the Renaissance, at the end of the Seventeenth and during the Eighteenth century . This more than a hundred years after the Monastic period ended.

Of course many Scientists (Bacon et.al) and philosophers (Locke et. al) were Christians as BB allowed, but generally, as I pointed out, the Monastic period is celebrated as the flowering of culture rather than science.

Yes, there were some monastic scientists but, generally speaking, their science was flawed or disproved during the Englightenment.

Um..and yes, actually, people like Bacon and even DaVinci were regarded as Heretics or wizards by the Church for their scientific work. It really was in the Far and Middle East that science and maths flourished during the European monastic period. Sorry.

(And now I'll take off my cap and gown!)

Webby,

How selective is your history. There were great works of mainly religious flavoured art and wonderful cathedrals built by the peasantry who lived in hovels. Some of this paid for by indulgences which turned into a wide-spread scam.

Interestingly enough, the materialistic grandeur did not carry over to making the lives of people any better. One reason for this was that Freethought writing nearly ceased from around the 2nd century CE until about the 16th when appeared Montaigne. Read, Human Anthology by Margaret Knight. It’s educational.

The priestly class were mainly afforded an education and one would expect them to be involved with fledgling science. (As long as they kept it ‘fledgling’, for the sake of their lives and property) We all know the well known examples of scientific detractors and their fates.

You think it noteworthy that religious people were scientists. Or you are trying to cause a deception. Everyone was religious and to not be was outright dangerous. One example of the fear of the time is recorded in the book, My Testament by Abbe Meslier, a French priest and social reformer in which he contemptuously denounced Christianity. . His parishioners discovered the book after his death. He hid it because, as he said, “I did not wish to burn until after my death.”

You even use a hackneyed version of recent history with the 20th Century atrocities. Despotic ideologically driven tyrants committed these. Stalin, for instance, trained as a priest and took control in a country of Tsarist oppressed religious people. Hitler was a Catholic and Germany a Christian nation. The motto of the belt buckle of Wehrmacht (German Armed Forces and not the Waffen SS) was, “Gott mit uns” (God With Us). The dictators you mention killed anyone in opposition to their power and not under the name of Atheism.

You show your ignorance in not knowing these things and you demonstrate you are just parroting propagandist rubbish for effect. Your ideas on abortion are naïve and dangerous. That is one reason why we must be eternally vigilant of you and your kind.

David

Dear David,

How wrong is your history. In fact it isn't even selective as what you think are choice pickings are actually wrong. For example "peasantry living in hovels" is wrong. It was artisans, tradesman as members of guilds, NOT living in hovels, who built the cathedrals. Indulgences do not account for ALL of the periods of cathedral building. Indulgences exist today MINUS the MISUSE. In fact indulgences are part of practice in the Archdiocese of Sydney; there is no money to have an indulgence by the way. Also it is not to absolve any sins; never was. It is for the lessening and remission of the temporal punishment due to sins. If anyone refuses to confess their sins with prefarably true sorow at having offended God or at the least for fear of Hell ( imperfect but sufficient in the Confessional)the indulgence has nil effect. That is Catholic teaching.

Dear David,

Yes it was dangerous as you say to be anti or irreligious or non religious. For those non religious( very few of them existed then) who didn't attempt the sort of liberal and libertine revolutions we have experienced in the twientieth century eg no fault divorce, lowering of the age of consent for males and females so as to make them prey to the lusts of adult perverts who devalue the unity and goodness of marriage etc. No decption David. I hold that the Church was right to plce qualifications on imprudent or offensive irreligious people ( not the self controlled and respectful non-religious...a big difference). I say this because God has rights over man and the Church through the successors to His appointed Apostles have spiritual jurisdiction over all mankind.
Abbe Meslier's parishiones obviosly didn't share his loss of faith in God.
Stalin trained as a priest. Yes but so what? Hitler was baptised a Catholic but once again, so what?! You've lost the argument for trying to make out that their former religion, in Stalin's case Russian Orthodoxy and in Hitler's the Catholic Faith , meant anything to them. How silly David. These guys rejected Christ and His teachings; they went on to behave in total opposition to all that Christ is and all that Christ teaches through the Church.
What happened if these dictators had been true Christians? If they had not murdered or taken power by murder, torture and had been social democrats instead according to Catholic social teaching. You would have even less of a case.

Webby,

Where do you think the rock came from and by whom and who did the labouring, the levelling of the ground and digging, the scaffolding, the mixing of mortar and all the hard yakka involved in such huge enterprises. Your rosy eyed view of history is disturbingly simplistic. The records are not too good considering the indulgences were a scam so the real facts will never be known. Try guessing intelligently! Even those purporting to be genuine were and are a scam. Money to lessen ‘spiritual’ suffering? That is hogwash.

I noticed you steered well away from my comments about the wrongness of indoctrination, having the correct religion, how you consider other religions wrong, what Atheism is really about, lack of Freethought writing, etc etc.

I don’t even think it has dawned on you that the overt religious on this Forum have views that are not compatible. The reason they have this variance is because of their specific indoctrination, just the same as other cultures imprint a different range of religious beliefs.

Your last post is what is known as empty rhetoric. There are more people in Australia now who ‘reject the Christ’ than there ever has been per country in all of history. The figure is somewhere around 50%. No this in not from the Census and any clear thinking person knows those figures are botched. Leading question, 20% of children or 4 million under 14 years old parroting parents beliefs, answering with religion of Baptism not of present status etc.

Can you name a religious country where most people are religious, where you would rather live? There isn’t one so don’t answer. You somewhat annoy me and I suspect other Atheists, that you reap the benefits from a secular society with its multitude of freedoms not allowed in religious regimes and you would change it and impose your personal religious views given the chance.

I think I will have to place you in the basket with ‘one under god’. I do not intend to waste time dodging around your prejudices. I have better things to do.

David