Although having said that, I do agree with this bit - "The Vatican said women who choose to be full-time mothers should not be stigmatized, but at the same time, it appealed to governments to make it easier for mothers to hold outside jobs without "relinquishing their family life." " although I think that should also be true for fathers.

//What is the single most destructive invention in history?

I blame everything on apposable thumbs. They're the reason people are so goddamn uppity.

//you want a better example of sexism/misogyny why not start with Islam?

I didn't put the article out there as an example of anything. I just thought it would spark some discussion. I work closely with two very different Islamic people in my department; one of them rules his wife as if he owns her, the other says, "I don't know what religion he belongs to, but it's not mine." The tenets and practices of Islam are just as varied and differently interpreted as Christianity. It's only the part that doesn't match up with what's right in our cultural view that we come in contact with through the media. Go out and meet some people who practice Islam. I'm sure you'll find there are as many different ways of practicing it as there are practitioners.

// since no one is forced to be catholic.

Anymore, which is in part thanks to

//people who claim to be christian tyring to change a church from within,

//And sure I hear you say "but that's the extreme form of islam" and it is but even the most fundamentalist christian churches do not retrict the lives of women to any where near this.

Some extreme christian groups are hardly known for their charity toward women. Hell, there was even a small sect in canterbury which moved to the west coast where the women were pretty much slaves. I was there to see their environmental prowess (they fermented their crap, then separated the CO2 from the hydrocarbon gases. They used the hydrocarbons to run their vehicles. The CO2 was bubbled under the ground to increase the growth rate of the canes they grew for the women to weave into baskets. They had a 13 year old (boy) running their deer farming unit). Oh yeah, and the leader was convicted after taking sex ed classes with a wooden plank ...

//rdor: no one is forced to be catholic.
//heather: it's not mandatory membership.

I think that does a fairly big disservice to people born into staunchly catholic families. People who convert as adults get full choice, and typically have some ability to shop around. However, if your parents and grandparents are all catholic, and send you to a catholic school, I think it's hard to argue that their not forced to at least appear catholic. Some people will decide to whole-heartedly follow catholic doctrine, others will decide christianity is not for them (and probably have a fairly awkward relationship with their family. Others will feel that they mostly like catholicism, but wonder why their church is so backward compared to the other main old-school christian religions (Anglicans, Presbyterians, Methodists etc.), and wonder why catholics tend to give women a rough deal.

having religious beliefs is a matter of faith which, in strong contrast to a scientific perspective, are required to be neither logical, rational or consistent...

//Being a christian does not necessarily constrain a person to believing that a foetus has a soul.//

I think it has to if to be honest. Yes I do have a checklist, but it's a fairly short one. Believing in an external god would be one thing, believing that humans have souls would be another. And sure those who don't believe these things have the 'right' to call themselves christian if they want, but like being a meat eating Huri Krisna (however you spell it) -why would you want to? If a Foetus doesn't have a soul, but those born do, when exactly does a foetus become human? 12 weeks? Can you tell me?

i guess if you're a staunch anti abortion christian, you're more likely than not one of those die hard purists labouring under the opinion that the world is really fucked up, so maybe it's better that soul went straight to heaven than having to live for a long period in a world that condones abortion.

//abortion or whatever//

that's more of a debatable one, since no matter what god you believe in god is suposed to give every life a value. I'd really question a pro abortion christian perspective. But yeah catholicism is perhaps a bad example, christianity in generally a less legalistic religion than Islam though, those crazy laws of levitcus were basically done away with in the new testament. In general the new test. places emphasis on personal salvation, morality as a choice, rather than some prescriptive legalism than doesn't tolerate the existence of non believers, or variation in belief, although it has been used that way of course for centuries...

//no matter what god you believe in god is suposed to give every life a value. I'd really question a pro abortion christian perspective

Nobody is ever "pro" abortion, they just see it as the lesser of two evils. If a christian is tolerant and forgiving, and believes that only God is allowed to do the judging, then being christian doesn't mean you have to be anti-abortion. Following your kind of argument would suggest that christians would have nothing to do with the so-called dregs of society, and yet the opposite is true (generally).

ans your saying that a christian can't be tolerant and forgiving while being anti abortion, that in order to forgive those involved they must support abortion as a legal choice.

It just seems silly to believe that god gives everyone a soul but support the right to terminate those souls as a form of contraception

A somewhat relevant digression to the abortion debate. I believe in the situation where a 14 year old was raped and became pregnant, the catholic church's official stance is still anti-abortion. Other christian groups might be more open to abortion in this circumstance. Thus it's possible to not be anti-abortion, but that doesn't necessitate condoning 16,000 a year.

//Thus it's possible to not be anti-abortion, but that doesn't necessitate condoning 16,000 a year//

The difference is just in numbers. Abortion denies human individuality for political reasons, women have children men don't etc. The whole idea that humans gain a soul at some arbitrary point in development is ridiculous. What exact moment? How many cells exactly? Is it about self awareness - cause by that logic I could argue that a new born baby isn't yet human. The short answer is we don't knowdon't care and are quite prepared to take away anothers entire existence anyway.

//So is there some arbitrary point in the scale of living beings where some things have souls and some don't??//

fudging it, Foetuses don't need to die for us to eat and survive. Plants are living too, maybe they are 'beings'. That's where perhaps a christian might say that humans have souls, but animals don't - . There's plenty to say to say that animals don't have souls or conciousemess anyway , only chimps display any form of self awareness - they recognise their own refelection as them, not another chimp, but only humans have any real awareness of themselves, the future, how they fit into the world,. who they or who they would like to be. Whether or not the soul actually exists metaphysically or not doesn't bother me, we have a future which is worth something. Anyway I don't think convenience is a good enough reason, call me a christian if you want.

//I don't know how you could draw that conclusion. " only god can do the judging" yeah but we don't tolerate murder on that premise.

It depends on how you interpret Matthew 7:1-5
"Judge not, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. And why do you look at the speck in your brother's eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, 'Let me remove the speck from your eye'; and look, a plank is in your own eye? Hypocrite! First remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye."
Broadly speaking, there are at least two schools of though on this. One is that this means that the judging is to be left up to god. These folk are likely to be of a more liberal persuasion, and explains the presence of religious people in penal reform groups and the like.
A contrasting interpretation, generally espoused by more conservative fundamentalist christians, is that they've removed the plank from their eye, so they're all up for some judging and ass-whooping (or the death penalty or whatever).

So there, within the broad confines of christianity you have two groups reading the same words in the bible, one supporting restorative justice, and the other arguing for the death penalty.
In the same way, some christians will argue that a foetus doesn't have a soul, whereas others strongly will.
And in each of these cases, the people on the extreme ends are probably claiming the people on the other end aren't real christians.

//I could just as easily say only god should do the killing.
And so of course, there are christians who believe precisely this. Take just about any supposed "christian point-of-view" and you'll find other people who hold the opposite.
Some christians believe Mary wasn't a virgin (that 'virgin' is a bad translation), that the darkness after Jesus died was an eclipse (there was a total eclipse around that time according to some astronomers). Other christians will view this as blatant heresy. Who is right? God knows! (heheh)

Oh, and so like Catholics believe the bread and wine has a real physical transformation into Jesus's body and blood, whereas there are other churches who use Ribena. Dilemma!

//I think that does a fairly big disservice to people born into staunchly catholic families.

Not at all, I think you're splitting hairs. Of course children are going to be brought up in the belief system of their parents, that's true for catholics, protestants, tories, liberals, hippies, yuppies, you name it, and if a child chooses a different path to their parents it'll cause conflict. I know it's more difficult for some children to break free (if that's what they wish to do) than for others, but it's entirely beside the point.

As for catholics that don't like the doctrines of their church it's entirely up to them whether they want to leave, or to stay and try to change the church from the inside. I have no problem with that; I know I had heaps of issues with the church when I attended, and I chose to leave. The problem that rdor has raised, and with which I agree, is with non-catholics and non-christians trying to label the church as a Bad Thing, purely based on a different set of ethics. Maybe the church is misguided in marginalising or alienating particular demographics, but just like the church can no longer impose their moral beliefs on the state, unless the state has a very clear argument showing that the beliefs of the church are damaging society, then it's really not their business.

What I think, is if a liberal agnostic tries to convince a catholic to leave the church because they believe it's a bad place, they're evangelising. I don't really have a problem with that I guess, just as long as that liberal agnostic is aware that that's what they're doing.

I agree that anyone who chooses to go against the belief system of their parents will face difficulty. However, I think catholics are in a particularly uncomfortable position. Catholic doctrine is much more rigid, in that it is centrally decided and controlled. Other established church groupings have more variation. For example, with in presbyterians or anglicans or whatever, you can stick with that religion more-or-less regardless of your position on contraception, evolution, homosexuality, abortion or whatever. Granted there are catholics who disagree with certain doctrines, but in some other church groupings, that same sort of variation of belief is acceptable. The only reason for the existence for most other christian churches is that they got sick of the rigidity of Catholicism. Henry the 8th didn't buy the no-divorce rule. Lutherans left catholics over belief in the truth of the bible over the pope etc.

And I would argue that evangelising would be only if someone was trying to dissuage the belief in god, not merely leaving a formal christian grouping. Usually atheists are more evangelical (and annoying) than agnostics.

Well, if you want to dissect my sentences...

there's quite a nice discussion here. I have no idea as to it's veracity

[ external link ]

// Churchill used to flash the V in the classic 'up yours' manner regularly

The pic is not exactly conclusive as to his intended meaning.