I'm in a snarky mood today, we had to put our chief cat to sleep on Sunday, it's cold outside and what I really want to do is kick someone until he's down and then kick him again. What a lovely person I am sometimes... bleh. Forgive me if I get rude here:
The Church grew up. I am the same person I was 40 years ago but I do things I could not do then, I don't look like what I looked like then, I understand things in ways I didn't understand them then... I grew up. In the same way there are many things about our own nation that are different than they were 200 years ago, many things people would like to change and while we may say "This is not the America I grew up in" that doesn't mean there's some other America somewhere else or that we can divorce ourselves from our country and go start another one while claiming to be "real America"(tm).
People complain "oh, the early Church did this or the early Church did that"... well, yeah, and I used to need a diaper and I used to need training wheels and I used to need permission to cross the street and on and on and on. That certainly doesn't mean that the early Church was defective and now we've arrived anymore than it means that there was something wrong with me when I was two or three or nine or fifteen... It just means I did what was appropriate to my own development.
The Church has to develop, always under the direction of God. Should we bust up large congregations and meet in secret because conditions dictated that for the early Church? Should each town only have one congregation because that's the way they did it then? I don't know how you reconcile the two ways of doing things to current conditions though...
But beyond that: when you're the only game in town you refer to yourself (and others refer to you) in a generic sense. In a small town, "he's the doctor". When an herbalist moves into town and starts saying "I'm a doctor too" people may well say "no, he is the Doctor, we don't know what the heck you are... witch." "Call the Doctor" becomes a definite distinction meant to exclude the new guy. "doc" may still be "doc" to his friends but whenever the new-age guru enters the conversation "doc" becomes "Doctor Smith... (and not the freaky hippie)".
Yeah, well don't get too comfortable. It won't be that long before you need all of those things again.....
Sorry to heat about your cat ,dear friend. I had one of those kind of nights last night when my 3 year Springer Spaniel- who thinks every small animal is a squirrel got blasted by a skunk at midnight when I let her out.I thus spent my night washing her outside in cold upstate NY to the wee hours of the morning .
I'm not hanging out on FR tonight for sure.
****I’m in a snarky mood today, we had to put our chief cat to sleep on Sunday, it’s cold outside and what I really want to do is kick someone until he’s down and then kick him again. What a lovely person I am sometimes..****
ohhh I am so sorry, we had an 18 year old cat die a few years ago, and he is still in my heart.. It is especially hard when we have to make the decision .. I have had to do that as well
There are many Christians that believe our pets will meet us in heaven
Christian scholars Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Wesley, Dr. Andrew Linzey, St. Francis of Assisi, Dr. Albert Schweitzer , the late Pope John Paul 11 and many others, support the belief that animals have souls and a place in Heaven.
“Be thou comforted, little dog, Thou too in Resurrection shall have a little golden tail,” –Martin Luther
Pope John Paul II loved all animals, being the first pope
to proclaim that “the animals possess a soul and men
must love and feel solidarity with our smaller brethren”,
and that animals are “fruit of the creative action of the
Holy Spirit and merit respect” and are “as near to God
as men are”.
Pure baloney.
I’m very sorry your cat died. I hope your kids are taking it well. I pray the Lord will comfort and console y’all. These critters latch unto our hearts and losing one is like losing a part of our own family.