Criticizing Christianity is a lost cause

[john.livingstone@lr]

The best thing about Christianity is that even though it attempts to explain certain events and the beginning of the world, the good book does not attempt to disprove others and their beliefs. The Christian religion is a big group of loving friends, we support God and his message and in the end we are all looking to better our lives through Christ. It makes very little sense to me as to why folks seem to get a kick out of trying to discredit Christianity. The Church is about self improvement, positive self-reflection and love of one another. And with a message this positive, why would an individual attempt to discredit the Bible on the basis of the creation or Noah's Ark or Adam and Eve. These are merely stories with the intent of explaining the progression of man and the Earth. The purpose of Christianity is to improve a person's life through God, not to explain the wonders of the world. And all of the people out there spewing hate about Christianity simply because they heard about why Christianity is unbelievable or how evolution better explains the origins of the world are simply wasting their time because Christians don't care what you have to say if the message isn't positive.

[Flail]

not to mention...graft...slavery...mysoginism...pedophilia...idolatry.

[cnorman18]

Good post, Grumpy. Let me go back a few and add some details:

You're not hearing me; I'm not talking about the direct involvement of the Church. There was none, and I am among those Jews who think Pius X got a bad rap. I'm talking about the history behind the Holocaust that set the stage for it; the teaching of the Church for more than a thousand years that Jews are "Christ-killers," that the Jews wander because we are accursed by God, that Jews are doomed to Hell because Christians took our place, that Jews regularly commit ritual murder of Christian children to drink their blood (the Blood Libel), that Jews are dishonest, grasping, greedy, and hate Christians, that we plan to rule the world through corruption and conspiracy, and on and on and on. Material from a Christian website that still teaches these things today has been presented in this forum within the last few weeks. The church no longer teaches them today, but they became part of European Gentile culture for more than a millenium, and absolutely and without question were the indirect and often direct cause of the deaths of millions of Jews. These Christian teachings made the Holocaust possible. Period, full stop.

If your theory that Christianity was the cause of the Holocaust were true....

You're getting so defensive you aren't listening. I never said that "Christianity was the cause of the Holocaust." I said that the past (and sometimes present, as we have seen here) teachings of the Church made the Holocaust possible.

All those lies I mentioned were once formal teachings of the Church. Like the other doctrines you mentioned, Christians were obligated to listen and believe all those things too, and the only friends we had were those who defied the Church. Do you dispute those facts?

...there would be rampant anti-Semitism in the US, one of the most Christian nations of the West. The US is in fact, a safe haven for Jews. The causative factor in the Holocaust was Hitler and his ideology, not Christianity. If the Inquisition was the pattern Hitler used for the holocaust, why were there a few thousand victims of all races over centuries in the former and millions of victims over a decade with the latter?

You keep trying to make what I am saying into an attack on the present-day Church. It isn't. Again: I never said that Christianity was the "cause," or even a "causative factor," in the Holocaust. I said that some Christian teachings, made the Holocaust possible. That is not the same as "causing" the Holocaust.

You are ignoring church opposition to the reprehensible ideas about Jews that circulated among Christians of the Middle Ages. Pope Innocent III wrote in 1199:

"No Christian shall do the Jews any personal injury, except in executing the judgments of a judge, or deprive them of their possessions, or change the rights and privileges which they have been accustomed to have. During the celebration of their festivals, no one shall disturb them by beating them with clubs or by throwing stones at them. No one shall compel them to render any services except those which they have been accustomed to render. And to prevent the baseness and avarice of wicked men we forbid anyone to deface or damage their cemeteries or to extort money from them by threatening to exhume the bodies of their dead."

Unfortunately, like those who ignored Papal decrees against involvement in slavery and like those today who ignore issues like abortion and sexual immorality, not all Catholics obeyed.

Yes, attempts have been made over the centuries to change those teachings (and so much for Christian doctrines being unchanging and eternal, by the way), but it remains true that the Church taught these things for centuries till the Popes tried to correct them. Corrections wouldn't have been necessary if those teachings hadn't been in place. You yourself just referred to "reprehensible ideas about Jews that circulated among Christians of the Middle Ages." So where did these ideas come from, if not from the Church?

In the same way, though Innocent III and other Popes repeatedly forbade violence against Jews, those very prohibitions are proof that that violence was taking place, and continued to take place for centuries. If it hadn't, those pronouncements and bulls would not have been necessary, again and again and again.

It's also worth noting that we can't just talk about the Papacy. Local bishops and clergy were often far less tolerant of Jews, and when the Pope stepped in to halt violence (which did happen, often enough), it was very often violence instigated, and even directed and led, by the local priests and abbots. The laypeople, of course, were even less tolerant than their priests, and the efforts of the Papacy to stamp out violence against Jews, even among Christians, were remarkably ineffective.

Let's take a look at the REASONS the Popes, and in particular your Innocent III, tried to stop anti-Jewish violence among Catholics:

"The Lord made Cain a wanderer and a fugitive over the earth, but set a mark upon him, making his head to shake, lest anyone finding him should slay him. Thus the Jews, against whom the blood of Christ calls out, although they ought not to be wiped out, nevertheless, as wanderers they must remain upon the earth until their faces are filled with shame and they seek the name of the Lord Jesus Christ." (Innocent III, Epistle to the Count of Nevers)

"The Jews' guilt of the crucifixion of Jesus consigned them to perpetual servitude, and, like Cain, they are to be wanderers and fugitives. The Jews will not dare to raise their necks, bowed under the yoke of perpetual slavery, against the reverence of the Christian faith." (Innocent III, bull of September 15, 1199)

"Crucifiers of Christ ought to be held in continual subjection." (Innocent III: "Epistle to the Hierarchy of France," July 15, 1205, PL 215)

"Because of the Jews' intolerable sin I will be your [Jews'] Lord since imperial authority imposed everlasting servitude on the Jews from ancient times as punishment for the Christ-killing." (Innocent III, Vienna charter of 1237)

This was the doctrine of "Witness," which held that the Jews were not to be killed, but made to continue to exist in a state of perpetual slavery and degradation, as testimony to the truth of the Gospel and the curse that fell upon them for rejecting and murdering Jesus.

Not exactly a formula for encouraging kind treatment, now, is it? Further, the Popes still saw Jews as dangerous enough that they endorsed the idea of separate communities for them, the original "ghettoes." Sorry, but the de facto teachings and actions of the Church throughout the Middle Ages is still something worthy of Christians' acknowledgment and renunciation. Those are facts, not attacks (see if anyone gets that one, too), and if the Church collectively wishes to earn the respect of Jews and others, they ought to be acknowledged, owned up to, and apologized for. Defensive speeches don't change the facts, and describing centuries of brutality at the hands of Christians as "unfortunate harassment" further underlines the point; you are entirely concerned with defending the Church, the facts be damned, and you are NOT listening or trying to understand the Jewish point of view.

The bolded part is contemptible. It's called "blaming the victim."

Just making the point that the Inquisition wasn't about race, as Hitler's program was. "These Jews had no qualms about testifying before the Inquisition courts because as Jews they were exempt from its jurisdiction."

And again, what difference does THAT make? We are TALKING about religious discrimination. I don't see that Hitler's approach was more or less moral than the Inquisition's. They were both transcendently evil.

Didn't you know why the Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492? They were told to become Christians, leave the country, or die.

Of course I know, I've been to Spain more times than I can count. Being told to convert or leave doesn't equate to the torture and murder of millions. How many Jews were there in Europe in the Middle Ages?

Tell you what: let's forget about "millions." That's the same approach that the Holocaust deniers take these days, you know -- "Yes, Jews died, but not millions."

Will you take responsibility on the part of the Church for the murder and torture and oppression and exile and suffering of hundreds of thousands of Jews, then? Can we talk about Christian sins against the Jews to some degree or other, once we get the numbers straight?

Do you understand why a Jew might be enraged at someone "pointing out" the things you have? I have actually heard Christians talk about the fact that Jewish converts to Christianity were gassed along with those who remained Jewish as an especially heinous crime - as if that was worse than murdering the rest, and the Nazis should have allowed Christian Jews, but not Jewish Jews, to live. The same goes for talking about Jews who cooperated with the Inquisition and the Nazis; does that make what our persecutors did OK? If you're talking about rape, do people appreciate anyone saying that "some women ask for it"? The same applies here. I fail to see why anyone would even mention either in this context - both are horribly offensive. If you never knew that before, now you do.

This is my point. Very few Christians ever think about these things from a Jewish perspective, to the extent that they don't even understand how these references can be offensive. These lessons will only be learned when Christians actually examine their thinking about Jews and change it.

If I can make a general observation, IMHO some of what is called anti-Jewish sentiment is the idea that Jews, like everybody else, are sinners in need of redemption through Jesus Christ. This is what I believe, as well as many Messianic Jews. That we believe Jewish theology to be wrong doesn't make us anti-Jewish any more than the fact Jews believe us to be wrong about Jesus makes them anti-Christian.

Sorry, I'm not interested in complaints about Christians being persecuted for their beliefs, which is what you're trying to change the subject to now. I'm sure that happens, but you know and I know that that's not what we're talking about. We're not even talking about present-day Christian teachings, or at least the most normative and mainstream ones, at all.

Will you admit that Christians, and early Christian teachings, are responsible for the oppression, torture, exile, and murder of a very great many Jews over the centuries? Would you admit that those teachings, which began with the Church, set the stage for the murder, with impunity, of millions of Jews in the Holocaust? Would you admit that the doctrine of "Witness," which the Church has abandoned, by the way (so much, again, for unchanging Christian teachings), was a pernicious and evil teaching?

Do Christians, and the Christian Church, have any historic responsibility for Jew-hatred and the history of anti-Jewish discrimination, brutality, and murder? At any time in history?

If so, why is expecting an acknowledgment and renunciation of those false teachings an attack on the Church? Shouldn't the Church confess and repent of its OWN collective sins? Is it either true, or Christian, to claim that it doesn't have any?

[JoeyKnothead]

From Post 87:

Notice the absence of any concern for that whole "or die" part cnorman18 referenced.

I'm not denying many Jews were killed, my quibble is with the 'millions' (i.e., 2,000,000+) part that is thrown around here without any documentation. In 1391 the entire Jewish population of Seville was estimated at 7,000 families. It's been estimated that in the Jewish expulsion of 1492 about 20,000 died en route.

Fair 'nuff. I do note you didn't mention this objection in the initial reply.

It is my contention such dismissal of the worst part of that whole "deal" is a product of a religion that must dismiss so much in order to maintain belief.

Not sure what you mean here.

Being a relatively paranoid and suspicious person, I saw your previous reply as "glossing over", or completely omitting the most important part of what cnorman18 had to say.

Who cares if the Jews got run out of town, it is the killing of them that most would find so objectionable. Only when this was mentioned did you address that part.

I will agree East of Eden likely had no nefarious intent.

No nefarious intent.

That is beside the point. It is the reading cnorman18's response, and not attempting to condemn the killing of Jews. One Jew, or a 'bazillion' Jews, there was seemingly no concern over the Jews being killed, but whether there were sufficient numbers of Jews to even be concerned.

To heck with who's guilty. To heck with their motives - whether atheist, Christian, or whatever. When I read of the death of an otherwise peaceful group I condemn it. I don't concern myself so much with who's to blame, so much as I concern myself with condemning them with as much force and gusto as I can muster.

"Well Stalin was an atheist and he killed folks".

I don't so much care about Stalin's atheism, or whether I should defend it - I care about his killing folks. That is the part that most upsets me.

[Goat]

j After 1882 there were few pogroms until 1903, when there was an extremely violent three-day pogrom at Chisinau resulting in the death of 45 Jews.

From my personal family history, I would say things are not quite that 'few'. My great grandfathers 5 sisters will killed in pogroms in the 1890's. That is the reason he left Russia.

[Cephus]

Doesn't the fact that it is history indicate some sort of desire for self-improvement from the church itself?

Absolutely not as those changes have never been initiated by the church, but in response to reality finally forcing change upon the church. It took the RCC hundreds of years to finally admit that what it did to Galileo was wrong and that wasn't something it was sincere about, it was one of many, many black marks on the church's history that it finally wanted to do away with. The church never changes until it becomes painfully obvious that it's wrong and the church's position makes it a laughing stock. It's a political move, not a search for factual reality.

[Cephus]

The gay marriage referendum lost by 52% in CA. There aren't enough evangelical Christians there to do that.

No but it isn't necessarily numbers that decides elections but money. There were millions of dollars pumped into the California election on the side of religion, especially the Mormon church, which put together TV and radio commercials that outright lied about the effects of Proposition 8. There were really two factors that led to Prop 8 passing, the misleading advertising and the fact that so many traditionally conservative voters came out of the woodwork to vote for Obama, people who otherwise have probably never voted in their lives. Hispanics and blacks are traditionally very religious and therefore, very susceptible to the outright lies being aired in those commercials.

When you lie to people and use those lies to appeal to people who are susceptible to believe them, you get people voting for the most absurd things.

[Cephus]

And Hitler used Darwin to justify genocide.

That's absolutely untrue, as others have already pointed out to you. However, Hitler absolutely did use Christianity to justify his genocide of the Jews.

Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord. "Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)

"My feelings as a Christian points me to my Lord and Savior as a fighter. It points me to the man who once in loneliness, surrounded by a few followers, recognized these Jews for what they were and summoned men to fight against them and who, Gods truth! was greatest not as a sufferer but as a fighter. In boundless love as a Christian and as a man I read through the passage which tells us how the Lord at last rose in His might and seized the scourge to drive out of the Temple the brood of vipers and adders. How terrific was His fight for the world against the Jewish poison. To-day, after two thousand years, with deepest emotion I recognize more profoundly than ever before the fact that it was for this that He had to shed His blood upon the Cross. As a Christian I have no duty to allow my self to be cheated, but I have the duty to be a fighter for truth and justice And if there is anything which could demonstrate that we are acting rightly it is the distress that daily grows . For as a Christian I have also a duty to my own people." "Adolf Hitler, in a speech on 12 April 1922

[DeBunkem]

US-style Fundamentalism is relentless and insidious, having the power of corporate coffers, the GOP, the media and mindless religiosity to back it. Criticising it is an act of defense for the Enlightenment principles that the Constitution was founded upon.

[East of Eden]

That's absolutely untrue, as others have already pointed out to you.

I thing you're wrong.

However, Hitler absolutely did use Christianity to justify his genocide of the Jews.

Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord. "Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)

"My feelings as a Christian points me to my Lord and Savior as a fighter. It points me to the man who once in loneliness, surrounded by a few followers, recognized these Jews for what they were and summoned men to fight against them and who, Gods truth!

Uh, actually Jesus told Peter to put his sword away against the Jews.

was greatest not as a sufferer but as a fighter. In boundless love as a Christian and as a man I read through the passage which tells us how the Lord at last rose in His might and seized the scourge to drive out of the Temple the brood of vipers and adders.

Not because of their race.

How terrific was His fight for the world against the Jewish poison. To-day, after two thousand years, with deepest emotion I recognize more profoundly than ever before the fact that it was for this that He had to shed His blood upon the Cross. As a Christian I have no duty to allow my self to be cheated, but I have the duty to be a fighter for truth and justice And if there is anything which could demonstrate that we are acting rightly it is the distress that daily grows . For as a Christian I have also a duty to my own people." "Adolf Hitler, in a speech on 12 April 1922

We've been over this ad nauseum, your quotes were from his time of trying to gain power. His actions and words later show he wasn't a Christian.

[East of Eden]

The gay marriage referendum lost by 52% in CA. There aren't enough evangelical Christians there to do that.

No but it isn't necessarily numbers that decides elections but money. There were millions of dollars pumped into the California election on the side of religion, especially the Mormon church, which put together TV and radio commercials that outright lied about the effects of Proposition 8. There were really two factors that led to Prop 8 passing, the misleading advertising and the fact that so many traditionally conservative voters came out of the woodwork to vote for Obama, people who otherwise have probably never voted in their lives. Hispanics and blacks are traditionally very religious and therefore, very susceptible to the outright lies being aired in those commercials.

When you lie to people and use those lies to appeal to people who are susceptible to believe them, you get people voting for the most absurd things.

What were the alleged 'lies'? Do Mormons not have the right to participate in the political process, or is it only atheists and gay activists who do?