religious transvestites?

[Sharky]

Tigger-

AMEN BROTHER!

[Bassman]

Tigerman please ignore the top of this post and go directly to reading the bottom - don't want to double post

Bassman,

If your above posts were written by the evil alter-ego who swiped your computer than I apologize for coming down hard on you.

But if you wrote them yourself, then I will pray for you. When I asked whether all non-Christians will burn in Hell, you replied, "And the problem with this belief is.....?????" indicating your concurrence.

No, I wrote these posts, can't you tell???

My "And the problem with this belief is .....????" was meant in the belief in Jesus Christ and going to heaven context. I went on to clearly explain the concept of Hell and going there, as has been discussed in the "mormon" thread.

I hope that this will be the end of this little discussion as I am quite interested to see what develops with Tigermans' new Beer religion. Perhaps we can add some kind of snack food into this religion, for example ice- cream or chocolate, just for the ladies.

[headhonchoII]

Quote Hartzell

Do you burn spirit money and incense to honor the dead at any time during the year?

I often laugh at this and think how superstitious. Then I think about the all the customs in Ireland which have been intermingled with Christianity.

The first christians in ireland borrowed everything that they saw around them, so much so that the leading monks and missionaries in Europe (which happened to be from Ireland in the 10th century) also wrote books about sea monsters etc. The monks wrote the famous book of kells, gospels of st. John. If you look at the book of kells it's full of images from the superstitions and mythology of the ancient kells, it's really a wondrous sight.

Now to more modern traditions adhered to by many roman catholics at home. We have All Saints days which incorporates Halloween. Halloween is the night of the undead in Ireland and the bonfires we burn are to scare away the bad spirits. We also have the fireworks and general mayhem to go with it. There are still many fairy rings (bronze age forts) in fields where God fearing farmers would never disturb the earth!
There is also the legend of the shamrock and the belief that St. Patrick (supposedly the first christian in ireland drove out the snakes as being representatives of the devil). You can also see St Brigid's Cross which is like a swastika shaped cross , St Brigid was an ancient Celtic deity. My grandmother half believes in the BanShee but she's being going to church all her life. To many people Christianity is a code of life but it doesn't cover all the parts of our cultures or the richness of our own traditions. Plus there is nothing in the bible that says monsters and fairies and other types of beings don't exist, as far as I know. My guess is the bible used to contain a lot more of that stuff but it probably got edited out along the way.

This is just Ireland. If you go to any other country in the world local christians will intermingle their customs and beliefs quite happily with the belief of an omnipresent being. I guess if you grow up in this environment it is easier to understand and totally acceptable. Each to their own.

[redwagon]

About the beer and whiskey mentioned below - yeah , all you can drink and you never get drunk and look like a fool in front of ya mates

Where's the fun in that then?

[Tigerman]

I am quite interested to see what develops with Tigermans' new Beer religion. Perhaps we can add some kind of snack food into this religion, for example ice- cream or chocolate, just for the ladies.

1. It is not a new religion for me. I first drank beer in 1976 (well, not the first time, but the first time in volumes sufficient to get drunk) and liked it plenty well enough. But I soon became very interested in the many varieties of recreational pharmaceuticals and chemicals available... I think it was a combination of the vast variety of drugs (compared to the limited beers available then in the US) and the slinky girls that were into the drug culture that attracted me... In an attempt (ultimately successful) to bring me back to the beer religion, my mother took me to Europe to re-introduce me to beer... good beer (this was back in the days before the microbrew explosion in the US). Ireland and Germany! Stouts, Ales, Alts, Bocks, Weissbiers and Hefeweissens ... then onto the land of pilsners and the real Budweiser, and later in life, bitters in the UK and Belgian ales and Abbey-styles and Trappist nectors... My cup now overfloweth!

Ma and I got so drunk in Munich and I had to pee so bad on the way back to the hotel that I couldn't wait... peed on a poster of Helmut Kohl right in the street... good thing it was 3:00 am!

2. Girls should drink beer. Kaiser Wilhelm is oft quoted as saying, "give me a woman who drinks beer and I'll conquer the world".

[Spack]

MT: while you are praying for bassman and myself, the rest of us will be praying that you will stop telling other posters to fuck off if u don't like what they say.

What a hypocrite - telling people to fuck off and then praying for them!

[Mother Theresa]

I forgive you Spack. Now can we be friends?

[Spack]

And I, in turn, forgive you and would like to be your friend.

I am sure that Bassman forgives you and is willing to make friends too.

[Bassman]

And I, in turn, forgive you and would like to be your friend.

I am sure that Bassman forgives you and is willing to make friends too.

Not a problem - Group hug anyone
We can all laugh about it later over a few internet virtual beers, cos the Spack and I aint in Taipei.

[Acintyabedhabedhananda]

A few corrections.

The thing about the "eye of the needle" being the name of a gate? Medieval legend. I think the original probably read "easier to pass a camel *hair* [used in tentmaking] through the eye of a needle..."

Generally speaking, Freemasons are not evil. (Can't speak for George Bush Jr., though.) They do a lot of charity work. Don't believe all the conspiracy b.s. that's out there.

Contrary to popular misconception, Christians *don't* all believe followers of other religions will go to hell. The church fathers even had lists of arguable categories: the virtuous pagans, unbaptized babies, the prophets who lived before Christ, etc. A list of denominations which in general, do not teach that only Christians are saved would include Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and most mainline Protestant churches. That's already well over half the Christian population. Even the Baptists are divided over this issue. (See the book "No Other Name?")

Now, for the "Christian" questionaire. I doubt that there are *any* beliefs which all Christians and only Christians share. (Some Christians deny monotheism, or the divinity of Christ, for example.) So in order to pass judgment on the Taiwanese, you have to first figuratively "excommunicate" a number of ethnic Christians by defining the term "Christian" more narrowly. Hopefully you will not make it so narrow as to exclude most of the people we normally call Christians.