I call bullshit. What about the last 15 centuries where Christians tortured or oppressed non-Christians? - the Crusades, Inquisition, the pro-life movement, the discrimination against gays and women, slavery, the Christian War on Science, etc...

Let me guess - you're one of those "evolution is just a theory, not a fact" types? Seriously, stem cell vetoes, intelligent design, anti-abortion laws, anti-gay laws, and you say Christianity ISN'T fucking up America?

Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against MOST Christians - the "live and let live" types. I'm from a big Catholic family.

My problem lies not with the "live and let live" Christians, but with the ones I call "jesusfags" - the ones who try to force Christianity down everyone else's throats. My family members and the general majority of Christians on this board aren't "jesusfags". People like Chimpy McFlightsuit, Michael Behe, the ID camp, some of the people who say America is a "Christian Nation", bevets from Fark, Christians with a persecution complex and Apotheon are "jesusfags". To them I say, believe what you want, just let me do the same!

I know I used ad hominem. I am sorry, but I just cannot find a term more polite than "jesusfag". Those folks are just plain hard gay for Jesus. Apologies to homosexuals, I have nothing against you.

The reason the Christians crusades took place is because of power. The leaders thought non-Christians would undermine their authority it would have happened regardless of their Christianity or lack there off.   

Yeah, evolution is "only a theory." so is gravity.

Thanks for responding to my inquiry.  I think I asked you to defend a statement that you made "off the cuff".  I see you've already backed off that statement somewhat.

From what I see in your response, though, I feel that you are once again either posting haste or are defending a position you really haven't thought through. 

Let me begin by responding to some historical conclusions you seem to have drawn that don't quite seem to make snse to me.  Then If I have time, I'l  address some of the theological issues you raise.

"Mass murder" was the standard for ancient tribal warfare, much like the vendetta type gang warfare prevalent in Sicily in the 17th-early 20th century.  The theory behind the two is remarkably similar.  If you wipe out everybody of the opposing tribe, nobody's goning to survive to feel honor bound to come back and wipe out your people.  This was the surest way of protecting yout tribe from the threat of constant warfare, and extinction at the hands of a resurgent enemy.  A bit cruel to us "enlightened", modern folks, bu perfectly acceptable in its day.

With the rise of Hellenic civilization and other city-states, man came to realize the economic value of opposing populations as slaves, which became more the fashion for defeated enemy populations.  Even so, into and through Roman Imperial history, wholesale slaughter was still quite common in warfare.  By this time though, slaughters of populations were usually conducted as a punishment or warning as opposed to being conducted a preventive step against revenge.

Oddly enough, and perhaps coincidentally (although I think not) it is with the acceptance and rise of Christian thought in Europe that a certain codification of warfare begins to take place.  From the rise of chivalry and knighthood, through the promulgation of the just war theory by St Thomas Aquinas, through the customs of war in the 17th through 19th century (although with notable exceptions) the rights of non-combatants, prisoners, the sick and injured, were recognized more and more.  In the early 20th century, these realizations reached theri zenith with the laws of war outlined in the Geneva and Hague Conventions.

It is also interesting to note that, perhaps again coincidentally (but again I think not), as Christian thought wanes and is superseded by humanist philosophies in the West civilian populations once again find themselves the legitimate targets of war.

I think I know what you mean here, but I must ask you to document this fierce opposition which Christianity mounted against its oppressors.  Christians went to their deaths in droves for the sake of their faith and the religion not only survived, but continued to grow.  I know of no Christian uprising that threatened the Roman Empire, or any province of it.  I've read of no rebellion by Christians which forced the emperor to say "these Christians must be done away with before the destroy us".  While I hesitate to use the word miraculous on an atheist website, the survival of Christianity through a period of persecution lasting nearly three hundred years, with no physical resistance on the part of the oppressed certainly is counter-intuitive to say the least.

The second observation I would make is really a question.  Would not the Christians, faced by such persecution, have been perfectly justified if they had taken arms against it?

An old Irish Republican motto goes "where there is oppression, there is resistance".  Are not truly oppressed people justified in taking arms in their own defense? 

I mean, I have this picture in my head of Sam Adams and Benjamin Franklin sitting over a pitcher of some of Sam's fine brew in Boston having this conversation:

Sam:  Boy, Ben, those Brits are really oppressive.  This taxation without representation sure sucks.

Ben:  You sure have that right.

Sam:  It seems they'll stop at nothing.

Ben:  Well...since they'll stop at nothing, perhaps we should do nothing, and they will stop.

Sam:  Great idea, Ben.  I knew there was a reason you're the foremost American thinker of our time.

Ludicrous to you, miraculous proof to me and rather surprising, you must admit.

 Matt, science is an ever developing field of study. It would be arrogant to assume we have currently reached the height of scientific knowledge. The problem with evolutionary theorists, is that they want us to stop thinking. Evolution theory is our current paradigm of scientific thought. Even as the flat earth theorists once was. The problem with evolution is that there is no evidence for it. But we have been indoctrinated into believing there is.

Susan, the only way I can prove it is to refer you to the monks themselves. Elder Joseph of Athos is now deceased, but he had daily battles with demons. They would materialize in his cell as pigs, monkeys or humanoid beings and physically assault him. This type of thing is very common in the lives of holy people.

Maybe you atheists have brought it on yourself by opposing the opposition to your opposition.

The Crusades were but one episode in an ongoing war started by the conquests carried out by Islam throughout the 7-11th centuries.  Islamic expansion had, at one point even overrun the southern part of France.  By the mid 11th century Islam retained only a toehold in southern Spain, Christendom resurgent, and having survived the Norse raids from Scandinavia, Mongol incursions from the east, now attempted to retake those areas lost to Islam in the Levant.

The Crusades were nothing more than the Middle Ages' equivalent of the WWII Normandy landings without the happy ending. 

Well, since he killed Jews, then killing Christians is alright, I guess.  If you're gonna be a mass mmurderer, be an equal opportunity mass murderer. Although I think Apotheon figures are way too high.  Estimates of deaths during Stalin's regime range from 20-30 million. 

Who's your candidate for this honor?

Sorry your thread was derailed by the deranged. I'm amazed that people actually believe some of this crappola, then I remember that I did, too, at one time. At one time I even thought I saw demons and did "spiritual warfare" against them.   There's irrational and then there's deranged.  I (and some posting in this thread) fit the latter category.  Some can be helped, but others...well...????

Apotheon, I see you found the forums. Congratulations. If you want to debate people as you claim, you need to prove some of your wild assertions. I don't blame Rook for not bothering with you. Anyone who believes in the devil, the Shroud of Turin and demons is seriously disconnected from reality. I used to believe in that shit and yes, I admit it. I was disconnected from reality. If you want to prove me wrong, you're going to have to offer some seriously compelling evidence, which I rather doubt is forthcoming.

Good luck.

Indeed.

I can't disagree with what you're saying, but I can point out that these things came from god(ie, destruction of egypt), not man(at least according to the christians and the bible). Supposedly the ultimate authority of morality. Has gods morality changed in the last two thousand years like ours has? If so, then how can morality be absolute when it can change? Seems self contradictory to me. Even worse, one would think a supremely wise being would have made a book that would be equatable with all time periods, or at least help man on it's way to becoming more enlightened, not stick it in the dark ages to boil over.

Ah, but how do you know these things wouldn't have happened anyway? What proof is there that it's only because of the christian faith that these things came to pass? When I look at societal progress, I see movement towards such a state even without the christian religion. If I recall correctly, there were movements in Rome and Greece that had similar leanings long before christianity was widely established. Even as far away as China. Worse, as I recall, cultures in the Americas that never even saw christianity had come further than the christians did by the same time period.

I think you're putting religion before politics here. Most of the problems in the middle east that the west is having to deal with now can be traced back to the cold war, and the unethical steps taken by both the United States and the Soviet Union at the time(exception being Israel and Palestine, which trace back a bit further to the conclusion of WWII). Now the US and Russia are reaping the seeds they sowed decades ago.

Well the christians did seek to replace age old gods with one new god, which is the exactly kind of thing that fuels conflict. Even if one side is pacifist. There needs be no decree from an empire for the people of that empire to seek to preserve their own beliefs and culture in the face of claims that they are a lie.

I will note that I did not say the words fierce or oppression in the statement you are referring to here. Merely opposition, which I don't think you can deny in any way, even if it were not opposition in the form of violence.

That's a tricky question that would require me to have more knowledge of the time than I do to answer to my satisfaction. In a general sense, yes people are justified in taking arms for self defense. But are people justified for taking arms in self defense when they created the very scenario that they must defend against? If the U.S. creates economic havoc in Australia, then gets bombed by Australia because of it, is the US really morally justified in bombing them back after starting the whole thing in the first place? I don't think so. Starting conflicts just so you can declare you're defending yourself is immoral in my view. Now I'm no expert historian on the time period, I just have bits and pieces of knowledge of the day, so I may be misrepresenting the scenario a bit. But I don't think I'm off by all that much.

Yes. But one must look at all sides of the equation.

Lol. This is a bit more complicated than presented though. It was after all the Brits that established the colony and supplied it in the first place(not to mention warring to keep it safe). According to the capitalist economy we live under, they were fully justified in taxing the colony to get their investment back. The Brits happened to go way overboard in the process, risking the very viability of the colonies with their overtaxation.

I don't find it all that surprising actually. Because we are a moral species, martyrs tend to get quite a bit of recognition and sympathy. No matter the time period. It would seem to me that the best way to go from a small regional cult or religion to a full fledged global religion would be to throw bunches of your followers into the face of death, keeping enough of them out of harms way to continue the teachings. That's basically what the muslims are doing today.

Iraq and Afghanistan come to mind as far as the muslims are concerned. And there are christian terrorist groups throughout the middle east that for some reason don't get as much attention as muslim and to a fair bit lesser extent jewish terrorists. There's a few of them in the States too, though they mostly concentrate on secular institutions and the "liberal threat" whatever that is supposed to be.

You're going to have to be a lot more specific for me to know what specifically you're talking about. I just spent an hour skimming through the history of all the Russian Revolutions from the late 1800's to the 1920's and found no mention of the christians being massacred in such numbers. So you're now going to have to prove that 60-100 million christians were killed in Russia in a massacre.

The title of that book is quite amusing, considering it was the UN who effectively founded the Israel of today after Hitler was already dead. Obviously it has little or no credibility.

I expected this. It's an interesting theory, except that atheism never made any attempts to spread until very recently. It was merely a personal viewpoint someone could hold, never an organization like christianity. Christians and other religions have forced atheism to organize for self defense, since individuals holding a lack of belief which needs no teaching to sustain have been singled out for millenia.

You speak as if you are speaking fact, when you are not. I've never seen a single person before you claim that the crusades started because of muslim conquests centuries previous. Every scholar or history text I've ever read says the crusades started long after. Most of the muslim conquests didn't even ocurr against christian targets. I've seen plenty of christians try to shake off the most disgusting acts in christian history before, but never in this way. It does not make you any more successful than they were.

It was not my intention to imply that it's ok, merely that he was acting as if the christians were the only target of Soviet Russia, which is one of the more laughable claims in this topic.

The crusades. Not because of numbers, but because of ratios. 30 million people out of 2.3 billion(estimated global population in 1940) compared to 9 million people out of 432 million(upper estimate of global population of 1300). Translates to 1 out of 77 people on the planet killed in Russia compared to 1 out of 48 for the crusades. Approximately of course, and taking your upper estimate of christian casualties in Russia instead of your lower one. Which of course assumes even your numbers are accurate, and I haven't seen anything to indicate such is true.

When one considers that one of the crusades sacked that very empire, it stretches the claims of muslim responsibility for the entire crusades into oblivion.

I'm a fair bit outside my element here, but I have no real problem continuing since I really got myself into it. However, it would be best if a moderator simply moved our posts into a new topic, perhaps starting at the point you recommend. Susan? Iruka?

How could he be psychotic when these things are witnessed by multiple people? Anyone who denies the existance of the devil and demons, has obviously never stood up against them. I gurantee you that if you resist Satan, he will make his presence very real in your life. Try living a spiritual life, and Satan will go after you. Elder Joseph and others were very holy people. Satan hates those kind of people. He loves people that don't serve God and never bothers to assault them because they pose no threat to him. Satan doesn't want you to believe in him, because if you believe in him, then logically you must believe in God. That's the last thing he wants and he will go out of his way to make sure you never experience his presence. I know this sounds silly to materialistic and self-serving country of America, but these things are very real. There is alot more to the world and reality that atheists are aware of. Belive me.

 I find it amusing that this thread went from "let's prove that the legend of Christ is a true story" to "let's prove that Christians were the most oppressed", because as we all know...the most oppressed religion must be the truest [/sarcasm]

Apotheon - Do you agree with Origen that the OT may be entirely allegorical? And if so, why do you attack my position that the NT is entirely allegorical? As I've stated and want to make clear, I am not anti-Jesus. My Christ is a symbol of elevation of the soul and of everlasting hope, not a man who died 2000 years ago. My Christ has "lived" in the hearts and minds of men since the dawn of mankind.

My reading of the NT is that it is an anthropomorphization and an allegorization of the Christ symbol. It is a wonderful book. But it is not history.