Godless

New York Times ^ | 11 June 2008 | Timothy Eagan

[shrinkermd]

This Father’s Day, one of most popular pastors in America will open his megachurch to homosexual dads, an event that would usually signal an extreme weather alert from old guard Republican evangelical leaders.

Rick Warren. (Credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images for Meet the Press)But by welcoming gay fathers into his Southern California flock, Rick Warren, author of the “The Purpose Driven Life,” is not just living up to the highest standards of Christian fellowship, he’s turning the page on a particularly embarrassing part of our politics.

Just to refresh: it was televangelist Pat Robertson who predicted “earthquakes, tornadoes and possibly even a meteor” would hit Orlando for inviting gays to Disney World, and Rev. John Hagee who blamed Hurricane Katrina on a vengeful God angered over a gay pride parade in New Orleans. And they did this even without Doppler radar

...Joel Osteen, the feel-good Texas optimist who is perhaps the nation’s most popular minister, and Warren have both disavowed politics this year. They will not endorse a candidate, allow politics in the service, or issue thinly disguised election “guidelines,” hint, hint.

Bless ‘em.

[shrinkermd]

What the author fails to mention is "liberalism" should be spelled with a capital "L" since it is the reigning faith in America.

People metaphysically create an answer to the questions of life including purpose and meaning. They then defend their faith as best they can.

[svcw]

The man has lost his mind/way.
He appears he now worships at the feet of baal.

[PetroniusMaximus]

more...

http://kimolsen.wordpress.com/2008/06/07/rick-warrens-latest-gay-fathers-day/

[pnh102]

Just to refresh: it was televangelist Pat Robertson who predicted “earthquakes, tornadoes and possibly even a meteor” would hit Orlando for inviting gays to Disney World, and Rev. John Hagee who blamed Hurricane Katrina on a vengeful God angered over a gay pride parade in New Orleans.

If these things are true (it is the Al Qaeda Times, after all) then it illustrates that people who believe that homosexuality is wrong need to take a different approach. For thousands of years, people have predicted all sorts of calamities if God's will is ignored, and most, if not all, of those predictions turned out to be false. All they did was simply take away credibility from religion.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Barf alert?

[mkjessup]

Sodom and Gomorrah were real cities, with real homosexuals (and heterosexuals) whose depravities condemned them, and a Righteous God annihilated them from the face of the Earth.

Warren and his ilk will be in their pulpits, preaching this false god of liberal situational-ethics, feel-good ‘values’ when fire and brimstone once again falls from the heavens, and they will join their spiritual brethren in the hereafter, and they’ll look around and wonder why there it’s so dark and smoky in ‘Heaven’.

Guess what Rick? You ain’t in Heaven.

[Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus]

One can't help but note that N'awlins was destroyed by a hurricane. exactly at the time the city was to host a huge, in-your-face gay pride march.....

[Strategerist]

I noticed the “God’s punishment!” folks were noticeably absent on the Boy Scout Camp getting hit by a tornado thread.

[Strategerist]

The area where the parade took place and where decadence occurs continuously, the French Quarter, was barely damaged at all.

The areas destroyed were an assortment of suburbs.

[gracesdad]

“One can’t help but note that N’awlins was destroyed by a hurricane. exactly at the time the city was to host a huge, in-your-face gay pride march.....”

It was badly damaged but far from “destroyed.”

On the other hand, small and fairly conservative towns in Mississippi and Louisiana that weren’t having gay parades WERE destroyed by Katrina. Same with Hurricane Rita. Your explanation?

[Strategerist]

On the other hand, small and fairly conservative towns in Mississippi and Louisiana that weren’t having gay parades WERE destroyed by Katrina. Same with Hurricane Rita. Your explanation?

Not to mention severe damage to a variety of military bases and important naval shipyards.

[megatherium]

I remember reading a book, The End of the World: A History. The author described those eras when people thought the end of the world was at hand, such as the end of the Roman Empire or the Black Death of the 14th century. One of the chapters dealt with the 1755 earthquake in Lisbon. This was a terrible event with catastrophic loss of life. Lisbon was a devout Roman Catholic city, and no one could discern why Lisbon deserved such cruel punishment. As a result, European intellectuals abandoned the notion that God uses natural disasters to punish cities or nations.

[Lucky Dog]

The church doors should be open to all sinners (all of us have fallen short). However, the expectation should never be that sin will be condoned among a gathering of believers.

The idea, rather, should be that sinners invited into the church would be convicted of their sins, repent, confess and believe on Christ as their savior. Their repentance implies a turning away from their sins and that they would in the words of Christ: "Go and sin no more."

If Rev Osteen has opened the doors of his church to homosexuals based upon the above principles, more power to him and his congregation. If, on the other hand, he opened the doors of his church to homosexuals with the idea that he is implying that their sins should be ignored, then he is committing a grave error of, both, judgement and faith.

[Earthdweller]

The NYTs praises this preacher while ignoring this...

Deafening Silence (Mark Steyn and and others being prosecuted for their opinions) http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2029956/posts

Fair and balanced they are not. They will slowly reduce all religion to bendable options making your chosen faith and opinion irrelevant.

[Strategerist]

As a result, European intellectuals abandoned the notion that God uses natural disasters to punish cities or nations.

Though amazingly this is still clung to (selectively) by a lot of people on FR.

[gracesdad]

“I noticed the “God’s punishment!” folks were noticeably absent on the Boy Scout Camp getting hit by a tornado thread.”

Well you see these things are God’s punishment only when “they” decide they are.

[twigs]

Because it’s true. However, there are also a lot of natural disasters that are a consequence of living in a fallen world and the good are affected along with the evil. I cannot tell the difference between natural disasters and God’s direct use of them, not being God. I respect both and live in awe of a powerful God.

[Sybeck1]

I sure miss Adrian Rogers.

[Strategerist]

Because it’s true. However, there are also a lot of natural disasters that are a consequence of living in a fallen world and the good are affected along with the evil.

Natural disasters seem to be caused by physics.

And all the natural disasters we experience now were clearly experienced in the world, often on far larger scales, hundreds of millions of years ago, when there were no sentient life-forms on earth to be "fallen" in the first place.

[Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus]

You guys need some reading comprehension lessons, I think. Notice, I merely pointed out the timing of Katrina, and implied that it gives the impression of some correlation. I didn't say that it necessarily was a specific act of God's judgment. It might have been, or it might have been simply another act of nature. However, your arguments are extremely shallow and insufficient, as they stand. Regardless of the status of the French Quarter, the city WAS rendered ineffective (and still is much so), and the FQ is a shadow of its former self to this day. As for other towns around the area, and the military bases - who knows? If it were an act of God's judgment, due to the universality of sin, there was enough going on in even these conservative areas to warrant judgment, so that their "innocence" as "collateral damage" would not actually be so.

So tell me - why do you think the destruction of military bases necessarily negates the possibility of judgment? Do you think the US military is on God's A-list or something?