Hi, I'm a cultural Christian

[scroyle]

Your honor, I'd like to enter into evidence exhibit A, one Merriam-Websters Dictionary. Prosecution rests.

Look you wanna call yourself a christian? Knock yourself out. You can call yourself the god damn pope of Indiana for all I care. But if you want me or anyone else to  consider anything you say to be credible, well that's a different matter entirely. If you to be taken seriously, then you need to live by the same dictionary as everyone else.

Think of it this way. Lets say you go to work tomorrow and one of your coworkers walks in holding an orange traffic cone. You ask what's with the traffic cone and your coworker looks at you like your an idiot and says what traffic cone? You can THAT traffic cone, the one you're holding in your hand right now. Your coworker says what this? This isn't a traffic cone, its my new pencil. Ah a pencil you say. Does it write you ask? Well no, it doesn't write your coworker replies. Then its a traffic cone you say. Well maybe you like to define it as a traffic cone, but I choose to define it as a pencil. At that point any rational person would recommend that this particular coworker seek psychiatric help immediately. Can you understand why that would be?

Your example is way off. You won't find the Archbishop or any priest calling a traffic cone a pencil. It's a wrong analogy. You still don't want to address the issue. Who's the expert witness on what a Christian is? The Archbishop who crowns monarchs and who sits in the House of Lords or an atheist from Indiana? Even an American judge can't be all that loony. Since you like dictionaries and definitions, here's one:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_Christian

[PickelledEggs]

Your example is way off. You won't find the Archbishop or any priest calling a traffic cone a pencil. It's a wrong analogy. You still don't want to address the issue. Who's the expert witness on what a Christian is? The Archbishop who crowns monarchs and who sits in the House of Lords or an atheist from Indiana? Even an American judge can't be all that loony. Since you like dictionaries and definitions, here's one:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_Christian

Let me ask you a question, buddy. As a member of your church, do you give donations at offering time/give your church ANY money?

[Johan]

Your example is way off. You won't find the Archbishop or any priest calling a traffic cone a pencil. It's a wrong analogy. You still don't want to address the issue. Who's the expert witness on what a Christian is? The Archbishop who crowns monarchs and who sits in the House of Lords or an atheist from Indiana? Even an American judge can't be all that loony. Since you like dictionaries and definitions, here's one:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_Christian

Umm... you do know that the link you posted defines casual christians as deists right? You do know that deists believe in god right?

So again, you want to call yourself a cultural christian? Go for it. So you're a christian who doesn't believe in god or dictionaries apparently. Great. Good for you. Nice to meet you. Now what?

[Sargon The Grape]

You still don't want to address the issue. Who's the expert witness on what a Christian is? The Archbishop who crowns monarchs and who sits in the House of Lords or an atheist from Indiana?

Let me sum up what everyone outside the Anglican Church thinks of your Archbishop:



That includes the vast majority of Christians, mind you. And in any case, we don't care what an atheist from Indiana thinks about the issue. Your own Bible is quite clear that a Christian is someone who accepts Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. That statement makes no sense without the surrounding mythology; ergo, if you don't believe in the mythology then you cannot "accept Jesus Christ" in any way that makes logical sense, and you are thus not a Christian.


If you were a Christian Atheist, that's a different story because they're an actual thing. But you don't strike me as someone who has ever heard of the Jefferson Bible, much less read it, not to mention the fact that no self-respecting Christian Atheist would ever join a theistic church.

[PickelledEggs]

I have a feeling this guy's archbishop is just telling him whatever he wants to hear just so he keeps giving donations. Goes to show that just because you're an atheist, doesn't mean you can't be gullible.

[DunkleSeele]

Scroyle, just out of curiosity: how old are you? Because you sound very young to me.

[scroyle]

Let me ask you a question, buddy. As a member of your church, do you give donations at offering time/give your church ANY money?

No, I don't. The offering bag doesn't come to me because I'm in the choir stalls. Besides, I'm a student and I haven't got money.

[scroyle]

Scroyle, just out of curiosity: how old are you? Because you sound very young to me.

Age is immaterial. It doesn't matter if I'm 10, 40 or 100. We discuss ideas. I've said the Church defines me as a Christian and I'm asking people who has the locus standi to decide on who is or is not a Christian? The Church or atheists. You know what the inescapable answer must be and you are avoiding it and going on personal and irrelevant details such as my age. That's neither here nor there.

[PickelledEggs]

Age is immaterial. It doesn't matter if I'm 10, 40 or 100. We discuss ideas. I've said the Church defines me as a Christian and I'm asking people who has the locus standi to decide on who is or is not a Christian? The Church or atheists. You know what the inescapable answer must be and you are avoiding it and going on personal and irrelevant details such as my age. That's neither here nor there.

it really doesn't matter what the church says. Since when does the church have any validity anyway? I wouldn't put too much weight in to anything the church classifies you as if I were you.

Sent via Internet Explorer

[scroyle]

it really doesn't matter what the church says. Since when does the church have any validity anyway? I wouldn't put too much weight in to anything the church classifies you as if I were you.

Sent via Internet Explorer

You may argue that the church's views on lots of things lack validity. That's a legitimate argument. But what's not legitimate is to say that the church's view on who is or is not a Christian is invalid. Think about it. I think objectively that must be wrong. You people are not seeing it only because you want to win your argument. Whether someone is a member of a club must depend on what the top folks in the club say. It depends on the Club Membership Register. The Church says I'm a Christian and I'm on its Communicants' Register.

[PickelledEggs]

But what's not legitimate is to say that the church's view on who is or is not a Christian is invalid.

Funny that you mention that.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBKIyCbppfs

[scroyle]

Funny that you mention that.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBKIyCbppfs

Hehe, that's funny.

[Mr.Obvious]

Still waiting for an answer here. And getting slightly tired of asking.
You've said once that secular charity organizations are not atheïst organizations (I think in an attempt to disprove my claim that atheïst organizations can do quite well and that you only need the structure and not the bathwater or 'religiousness') and at another time told someone secular charity organizations arer atheist organizations.
Which is it?

[La Dolce Vita]

He specifically calls himself a cultural christian. Sure he doesn't fit the actual, normal definition of a christian "accepting Jesus Chris as your personal lord and savior and believing in the theistic god Yahweh as an actual agent" - but he placed "cultural" in front of it, which means that he doesn't believe in the magical aspects but takes part in christian culture and identifies as a christian. Though he tries to get away from the atheist label for reasons I don't understand, he can't deny he is one if he wants to operate by any existing and accepted definition - I will just say that he is a cultural christian by definition. There's nothing to argue about here. When he adds "cultural" in front of it, it's ok definition wise.

His ridiculous and repeated court room analogy is quite a bit like what you could expect from a poe though.

[scroyle]

Still waiting for an answer here. And getting slightly tired of asking.
You've said once that secular charity organizations are not atheïst organizations (I think in an attempt to disprove my claim that atheïst organizations can do quite well and that you only need the structure and not the bathwater or 'religiousness') and at another time told someone secular charity organizations arer atheist organizations.
Which is it?

I don't think I can recall saying that secular charity is atheistic. I recall saying that you can't lump secular charities as atheistic because there are all kinds of people serving in it including Christians. But as you know, I answer about a thousand people and I might have said something erroneously. You should quote precisely what I did say and I'll probably know the context. It can also be that I typed something erroneous but I think people got the drift that I don't accept secular charities as atheistic. Someone did argue with me on that and his argument was a charity shouldn't be atheistic but that doesn't answer my point - that the church has done a damned good job and it's replaceable. Someone else suggested government charities but that's a different thing. As far as private enterprises go, the church is unparallelled.

I really can't remember ever saying secular charities are atheistic. You might have misread what I wrote. I think I could have suggested that Secular Humanist is atheistic.