Stubby wrote:Great. What about your pro-theist sensibilities, what why you being an "old testament type of guy".Diogenes wrote:Stubby wrote:So you would pray to Buddha or Allah in a such a situation.?
How about everyone else here? Could you pray to a 'pagan' god?
Would you want to have your family exposed to 'pagan' rituals and prayers?
I can stand there quietly and let everyone else do it. There is no obligation for me to participate actively, but if it comes to that, I wouldn't much care one way or the other.
I can mouth meaningless (to me) phrases just as well as the next person. It offends my agnostic sensibilities not at all.
Yeah? So? Hawaii had developed what was for them a workable system. It fills their needs. I'm not suggesting that a society has to have a specific theistic system, they just need one that works. I personally think the Judeo-Christian system is the one which works best for any society, but I see no requirement to preclude a system that works good enough to suit a functional society.
Stubby wrote: The old testament is pretty explicit and graphic as to what happens to heretics, pagans and such.
Such people are diluting or weakening the meme. Not a good thing if it is the meme that is keeping your society alive. During older times when the margin for error was not so large, it could mean life or death to some people or even groups of people if they deviated from the meme. The Georgian period of England is an example of this.
Stubby wrote: The real problem is that most evangelicals like Mr. Christenot would not. They would be incensed to hear 'pagan' prayers. And most of them are not as rational as Mr. Christenot.
He gets it.
He gets the simple argument. I doubt he even has an inkling of the more complex argument. Many people simply don't recognize that there is a bigger picture.