Saturday, January 21, 2006

opening a can of worms?

Ok, first of all I consider myself a Christian.
I was looking at the "Church of the flying spagetti monster" website and I thought it was hillarious. To me it is a joke, I was not offended. http://www.venganza.org/ I´m curious, are you guys offended? I read some of the hatemail the site has gotten and I just can´t belive that some of those people call themselfs Christians.
I was thinking that maybe I was not offended because the ID theory stuff has not been an issue here in Iceland.
The seperation of Church and State is not a fact here. When I was little just about everyone I knew belonged to the national church. Still today when you are born you automatically belong to it unless your mother belongs to a diffrent religion. When I met Rus in 1990 I had never met a person that I knew to belong to a diffrent church then me, although in theory I knew they existed. (and I guess I had already met alot of people that did not, seeing that I was in Canada at the time, I had just never discussed it with anyone)
When I was in elementary school we had Christianity as one of the subjects and I don´t remember ever having been educated in any other religion in school although I´m sure we must have talked about them at some point. (Now Icelandic schools don´t have christianity but sociology and teach about all the major religions, someone must have complained)
When I was prepering for my confirmation when I was 14, I remember my priest getting very upset when we asked him about darwin and creation. We where studying evoluton in biology at the same time and my biology teacher told us his belive which I realize today was very simular to intelligent design theory. I remember being facinated and I think we all where at the time because we (my whole class) was prepering for confirmation at church. My priest could not handle those questions and banned them from our studies. I think it probably did more damage to our faith than not.
So what am I missing here? Should I be offended and am I just a bad Christian.

6 comments:

aisy said...

I see nothing wrong in enjoying humor for humor sake. My theory is that people that make a big deal out of these sort of things are not strong in their faith... or are so insecure that it will destroy the faith of others. I mean, if one joking website pokes fun at creation, does that shake your belief? It shouldn't, so what harm is there in it?

Obviously there are some things I consider "sacred" and would be offended if it was belittled, but having a laugh at the whole "intelligent design vs. evolution" etc isn't one of them.

Too many people get their knickers in a knot over these type of things, and I say "focus on your own faith and your own beliefs." So no, I don't think you're a bad christian

Anonymous said...

the Landover baptist site kills me, as did http://www.rageagainsttheright.com/becomerepublican.swf
so, you're as bad as i am :)
I'm glad that you brought this up, I've been kicking around writing some stuff on this topic for a while.
We talked about ID before on Dear Diahorrea and I concluded that there was a lack of faith involved with those that are so vehement about it being taught in public school.
recently, I saw a clip on iflm called "killing in the name of jesus" for a documentary called "The God That Wasn't There".
Pat Robertson, George Bush, etc. - these people call themselves Christians? (Mat 7:22 Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? Mat 7:23 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.")
I don't believe that "God hates fags" or in the death penalty. i think that gay marriage is an argument of semantics and that we have an obligation to take care of the planet and everything on it far better than we have.
in my own church i sometimes wonder whatever happened to: "We claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may."

Anonymous said...

i think freedom of belief needs to include being aware of the beliefs of others. if i can understand what and why other people believe what they do, they i can understand and accept and cherish them(still it is on my own terms) as children of god who are intelligent enough to think for themselves. this is because God gave us all such wonderful minds. it is sorrowful to me when i see people wasting their god given gifts and freedoms with pesimism, critisism or cruelty. i am sure i have been guilty of intolerance, so i try even harder to be a peacemaker when i can. i see the humour in pastafarianism, but i also see the irony.

Anonymous said...

I just heard a great quote by Gallileo: "the Bible is about how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go."

Dagga said...

that´s a good one Rus I like it,
wasn´t Galileo burned for herasy.

Dagga said...

thanks for the input people you all have good points, and it is really good to be able to bounce your thoughts of of people who give intelligent answares.