Unnamed: 0
int64 0
11.3k
| label
stringclasses 20
values | content
stringlengths 6
66.5k
|
|---|---|---|
9,300 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re christianity and repeated lives there is nothing in christianity that precludes the idea of repeated lives on earth there is a paragraph in the new testament which in my opinion clearly makes a positive inference to reincarnation i don t remember which one it is off of the top of my head but it basically goes like this jesus is talking with the apostles and they ask him why the pharisees say that before the messiah can come elijah must first come jesus replies that elijah has come but they did not recognize him it then says that the apostles perceived that he was refering to john the baptist this seems to me to clearly imply reincarnation can anyone offer a reasonable alternative interpretation i would be very interested to hear it
|
9,301 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re satanic tounges in article may geneva rutgers edu marka hcx ssd csd harris com mark ashley writes in article may geneva rutgers edu mmh dcs qmw ac uk matthew huntbach writes i have seen the claims but i don t know if there are any authenticated cases of people making prolonged speeches in real languages they don t know from my observations speaking in tongues in practice has nothing at all do with this i have a simple test i take several people who can speak only one language e g chinese russian german english then i let the gifted one start speaking in toungues the audience should understand the gifted one clearly in their native language however the gifted one can only hear himself speaking in his own language there seem to be many points to the speaking in tongues thing which are problematic it s use as prayer language seems especially troubling to me i understand that when you pray in tongues the spirit is doing the talking and when you pray you pray to god and the spirit is god so the spirit is talking to himself which is why i only go by the pentecost use where it s an actual language moreover the phrase though i speak with the tongues of men and angels used by paul in i cor is misleading out of context some would then assume that there is some angelic tongue and if when they speak it is no known language then it is an angelic tongue hmmm in the old testament story about the tower of babel we see how god punished by giving us different language can we assume then that if angels have their own language at all that they have the same one amongst other angels after all they were not punished in any manner so why do these supposed angelic tongues all sound different from one another it s disturbing to think that some people find ways to justify jabbering but i ll buy the idea that someone could talk in a language never learned trouble is while such stories abound any and all attempts at verification and we are to test the spirit either show that the witness had no real idea of the circumstances or that outright fabrication was involved the brother puka story in a previous post seems like a friend of a friend thing and linguistically a two syllable word hardly qualifies as language inflection or no much as many faith healers have trouble proving their victories since most ailments cured are just plain unprovable and modern day ressurrections have never been validated so is it true that no modern day xenoglossolalia has been proved by clergy or lay
|
9,302 |
soc.religion.christian
|
giving spiritual gifts i just thought i d share a nice experience before my exam today i was walking down the streets on our campus and a beggar came up and asked me for any spare change i might have i had a dollar or so that i gave her and not wanting to give away all my money to strangers i generally give a dollar as that will buy a little food at mcdonalds or something i offered her some spiritual gifts as i called them rather than gifts of money i talked of how great i felt that god had made such a pretty day and how nice it was to give to people she then said she was getting married soon she talked about how she and her husband had very little they may not have even had a house for all i know but that they felt a very special love in the lord an unselfish kind of caring it warmed my heart to know that people can have so little monetarily and realize that spiritually they are indeed very rich a good lesson for all of us who say we want more more more what we really need cannot be counted or sold or bought doug fowler dxf po cwru edu heaven is a great big hug that lasts forever and when that one great scorer comes to mark against your name he writes not whether you ve won or lost but how you played the game grantland rice
|
9,303 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re variants in the nt text cont i wish to echo what d andrew kille wrote i know of no published form in english of the d type recension of acts of course bezae is quite bizarre in the gospels as well only d type texts share bezae s strange readings by the way d stands for codex claromontanus elsewhere frank d
|
9,304 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re satan kicked out of heaven biblical in article may athos rutgers edu easteee wkuvx bitnet writes hello all i have a question about satan i was taught a long time ago that satan was really an angel of god and was kicked out of heaven because he challenged god s authority the problem is i cannot find this in the bible is it in the bible if not where did it originate satan was one of god s highest ranking angels like uriel raphael michael and gabriel in fact his name was satanel he did challenge god s authority and got kicked out of heaven a lot of the mythology of satan he lost the el suffix when he fell comes from the book of enoch and is not found in the bible read the book of enoch available thru bookstores or get the book called angels an endangered species i think steven c salaris we re a lot more dangerous than live crew salaris carcs wustl edu and their stupid use of foul language because we have ideas we have a philosophy geoff tate queensryche
|
9,305 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re why do people become atheists in article may athos rutgers edu mayne nu cs fsu edu writes in article may athos rutgers edu fil sapienza med umich edu fil sapienza writes why are atheists atheists believes it could be the result of brokenness this is condescending at best and a slightly disquised ad hominem attack this attitude on the part of many theists especially the vocal ones is one reason for the hostility you sense how do you like it when atheists say that people turn to religion out of immature emotionalism i agree if you are going to find out anything from people who don t share your beliefs do not attack them or condescend to them and hope to get a neutral picture of them come to them with an open mind i don t believe that atheists are generally any more broken than anybody else any cause and effect is likely to be the other way there is an emotional price to pay for being different hearing one s beliefs or lack thereof condemned and one s motives and character attacked well you do believe in something as i see it even if it is a sort of anti belief no negative connotation meant i mean simply that you believe that god does not exist christians can also feel that sense of difference however when they are associated with those weird televangelists who always talk about satan if you ll excuse the cliched sound of this everyone has to deal with his her differences from other people i can understand how being an atheist could be hard for you being a christian is sometimes hard for me i became an atheist when i got old enough to reason because there was just no good reason to believe the religion i had been taught this was very painful because of the pressure i was placed under by my family and friends i wanted to fit in believe and be accepted i tried but finally the cognitive dissonance was just too great you should not have to repress how you feel you should be able to discuss it without fear i think there are admirable things to learn from any belief which can enrich your own by asking myself the questions that atheists may ask me i can learn the answers and become stronger in my faith if my faith can t support knowing the answers to those questions it is weak and untrue i have sympathy for gays growing up in repressive environments and having to hide and sometimes at first try to deny a part of themselves because i ve been there only in my case it was my rationality instead of sexuality which i was forced to try to repress in some way the pressures were different of course because you chose your beliefs or are you saying that they were not your choice but born of necessity please no flames about whether or not gay people choose their lifestyle that s elsewhere in this newsgroup i must say that i wasn t hurt by my experiences in church any more than some of my friends who didn t become atheists i was just hurt differently i m not sure i understand this sentence could you explain moderator points out that many most atheists aren t hostile they just cease believiing in xiantiy religion true consider also that people like pat robertson and many of the christian extremists in soc religion christianity naturally evoke hostility by their attacks on anyone who disagrees and their attempts to force their views on others you are known by the company you keep christians trying to preach in alt atheism should not be surprised by hostility ouch yes part of being a christian is accepting everyone with an open heart including people of our own camp with whom we completely disagree by the same token i believe that accusation and suspicion are not the best way to reach out to those not of our faith nor is it effective to try to browbeat people into accepting our religion i have a different idea of mission be what i am a christian who is happy in her faith and if others see that and want to know about either the happiness or the religion i ll share what i know without pressure and let them make their own decisions at some point you just have to agree to disagree acceptance of diversity not uniformity is the way to sow peace bill mayne vera noyes i am your clock i bind unto myself today vera noyes i am your religion the strong name of the noye midway uchicago edu i own you trinity no disclaimer what lard st patrick s breastplate is there to disclaim
|
9,306 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re satan kicked out of heaven biblical in article may athos rutgers edu easteee wkuvx bitnet writes hello all i have a question about satan i was taught a long time ago that satan was really an angel of god and was kicked out of heaven because he challenged god s authority the problem is i cannot find this in the bible is it in the bible if not where did it originate i did a workshop on this for an episcopalian student gathering a couple months ago because i wanted to know the answer too as far as i could tell although that story was never specifically told in the bible many references are made to it primarily in the new testament in the old testament there is actually an entirely different view of satan as a excuse the pun devil s advocate for yahweh see the book of job getting back to the fallen angel story there are no references to lucifer in the bible except for a mistranslation of the morning star in the king james version isaiah which probably referred to a babylonian monarch much in the same was as the sun king referred to louis xiv all in all i don t know where the story came from it may have been rolling around for a long time or milton paradise lost may have invented it sorry for the sketchiness of the rest of this but i am in a hurry and need to eat lunch feel free to email me about the other stuff i found out although a lot of it is just the result of a bible concordance program called quickverse it s really lousy by the way don t buy it wondering eddie o western kentucky university easteee wkuvx bitnet hope this helped vera je cherche une ame qui of course i don t agree with pourra m aider mylene farmer s religious views je suis i just think they re interesting d une generation desenchantee vera noyes mylene farmer noye midway uchicago edu
|
9,307 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re monophysites and mike walker in article may geneva rutgers edu db n andrew cmu edu d andrew byler writes mike walker if you are using the standard formula of fully god and fully human that i m not sure why you object to saying that jesus was human i think the usual analysis would be that sin is not part of the basic definition of humanity it s a consequence of the fall jesus is human but not a fallen human clh i differ with our moderator on this i thought the whole idea of god coming down to earth to live as one of us subject to sin and death as one of the consecration prayers in the book of common prayer puts it was that jesus was tempted but did not succumb if sin is not part of the basic definition of humanity then jesus fully human nicea would not be subject to sin but then the resurrection loses some of its meaning because we encounter our humanity most powerfully when we sin to distinguish between human and fallen human makes jesus less like one of us at the time we need him most these issues get mighty subtle when you see people saying different things it s often hard to tell whether they really mean seriously different things or whether they are using different terminology i don t think there s any question that there is a problem with nestorius and i would agree that the saying christ had a human form without a real human nature or will is heretical but i d like to be a bit wary about the copts armenians etc recent discussions suggest that their monophysite position may not be as far from orthodoxy as many had thought nestorius was an extreme representative of one of the two major schools of thought more moderate representatives were regarded as orthodox e g theodore of mopsuestia my impression is that the modern monophysite groups inherit the entire tradition not just nestorius version and that some of them may have a sufficient balanced position to be regarded as orthodox clh first the monophysites inherited none of nestorius s version they were on the opposite end of the spectrum from him second the historical record suggests that the positions attributed to nestorius were not as extreme as his successful opponents who wrote the conventional history claimed mainly nestorius opposed the term theotokos for mary arguing i think correctly that a human could not be called mother of god i mean in the athanasian creed we talk about the son uncreate surely even arians would concede that jesus existed long before mary anyway nestorius s opponents claimed that by saying mary was not theotokos that he claimed that she only gave birth to the human nature of jesus which would require two seperate and distinct natures the argument fails though because mary simply gave birth to jesus who preexisted her either divinely if you accept nestorianism as commonly defined or both natures intertwined a la chalcedon second i am not sure that nestorianism is not a better alternative than the orthodox view after all i find it hard to believe that pre incarnation that jesus s human nature was in heaven likewise post ascension i think rather that god came to earth and took our nature upon him it was a seperate nature capable of being tempted as in gethsemane since i believe the divine nature could never be tempted but in its moments of weakness the divine nature prevailed comments on the above warmly appreciated jason albert there may be differences in what we mean by subject to sin the original complaint was from someone who didn t see how we could call jesus fully human because he didn t sin i completely agree that jesus was subject to temptation i simply object to the idea that by not succumbing he is thereby not fully human i believe that you do not have to sin in order to be human i again apologize for confusing nestorianism and monophysitism i agree with you and have said elsewhere that there s reason to think that not everyone who is associated with heretical positions was in fact heretical there are scholars who maintain that nestorius was not nestorian i have to confess that the first time i read some of the correspondence between nestorius and his opponents i thought he got the better of them however most scholars do believe that the work that eventually led to chalcedon was an advance and that nestorius was at the very least rash and dogmatic as the editor of the christological controversy refers to him in rejecting all approaches other than his own as regular usenet readers know narrowness can be just as much an impediment as being wrong furthermore he did say some things that i think are problematical he responds to a rather mild letter from cyril with a flame worthy of usenet in it he says to attribute also to the logos in the name of the incarnation the characteristics of the flesh that has been conjoined with him is my brother either the work of a mind which truly errs in the fashion of the greeks or that of a mind diseased with the insane heresy of arius and apollinaris and the others those who are thus carried away with the idea of this association are bound because of it to make the divine logos have a part in being fed with milk and participate to some degree in growh and stand in need of angelic assistance because of his fearfulness these things are taken falsely when they are put off on the deity and they become the occasion of just condemnation for us who perpetrate the falsehood it s all well and good to maintain a proper distinction between humanity and divinity but the whole concept of incarnation is based on exactly the idea that the divine logos does in fact have to some degree a part in being born growing up and dying of course it must be understood that there s a certain indirectness in the logos participation in these things but there must be some sort of identification between the divine and human or we don t have an incarnation at all nestorius seemed to think in black and white terms and missed the sorts of nuances one needs to deal with this area you say i find it hard to believe that pre incarnation that jesus s human nature was in heaven i don t think that s required by orthodox doctrine it s the divine logos that is eternal clh
|
9,308 |
soc.religion.christian
|
translations which version of the bible do you consider to be the most accurate translation
|
9,309 |
soc.religion.christian
|
satan and mtv somewhere someone told me that satan was the angel in charge of music in heaven and on top of that he was the most beautiful of the angels isn t it funny that these days how mtv has become the bible of music and beauty these days mtv controls what bands are popular no matter how bad they are in fact it is better to be politically correct like u madonna than to have any musical talent then of course you have this television station that tells us all how to dress think about it who started the retro fashion craze mtv and madonna gag anyway just food for thought it is really my own wierd theory if revelation was to come true today i think mtv would the ever changing waters music and fashion world that the beast would arise from and madonna will be the whore of babylon riding the beast and drinking the blood of the martyrs hmmmm great idea for a book movie steven c salaris we re a lot more dangerous than live crew salaris carcs wustl edu and their stupid use of foul language because we have ideas we have a philosophy geoff tate queensryche
|
9,310 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re satanic tounges in article may athos rutgers edu koberg spot colorado edu allen koberg writes there is dis crepancy even among charismatic organizations as to the proper use of tongues be it revelatory with interpretation for prayer use or for signifying believers which i doubt since any one can do it pentecostals assembly of god church of christ seem to espouse all three neo pentecostals tend to view prayer use and as a sign as the uses speaking in tongues during a service is not usually done by neo pentecostals because for the most part they still attend protestant churches non denominational churches seem to view the use as a sign as merely optional but recommended koberg just a couple of minor corrections here the churches of christ do not usually believe in speaking in tongues in fact many of them are known for being strongly opposed to pentecostal teaching you are probably thinking of church of god in christ the largest african american pentecostal denomination i m not sure what you mean by signifying believers but it should be pointed out that the assemblies of god does not now nor has it ever held that speaking in tongues is the sign that one is a christian the doctrine that traditional pentecostals including the a g maintain is that speaking in tongues is the sign of a second experience after becoming a christian in which one is baptized in the holy spirit that may be what you were referring to but i point this out because pentecostals are frequently labeled as believing that you have to speak in tongues in order to be a christian such a position is only held by some groups and not the majority of pentecostals many pentecostals will quote the passage in mark about these signs following them that believe but they generally do not interpret this as meaning if you don t pactice the signs you aren t saved i know it s hard to summarize the beliefs of a movement that has such diversity but i think you ve made some pretty big generalizations here do neo pentecostals only believe in tongues as a sign and tongues as prayer but not tongues as revelatory with a message i ve never heard of that before in fact i would have characterized them as believing the same as pentecostals except less likely to see tongues as a sign of spirit baptism also while neo pentecostals may not be inclined to speak in tongues in the non pentecostal churches they attend they do have their own meetings and in many cases a whole church will be charismatic ken banner dept of religious studies university of pennsylvania kbanner philae sas upenn edu
|
9,311 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re major views of the trinity ann jackson ajackson cs ubc ca wrote on may in article may geneva rutgers edu jim green writes can t someone describe someone s trinity in simple declarative sentences with words that have common meaning the answer to this question appears to be no i would like to submit the following which helped me enormously if it has already been posted i apologize it seems that during the middle ages it was customary for pastors to explain the trinity to their parishoners by analogy to water water is water but can exist in three forms liquid ice and vapor thus it is possible for one essence to exist in three forms and recently the pastor of my church drew an analogy which i also found useful a woman is often percieved by others in three ways depending on their relationship to her a mother a wife and an employee in a business thus it seems clear to me that the essence of god can subsist in the father son and holy spirit or depending on one s particular need for him carol bocher
|
9,312 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re homosexuality issues in christiani any one who thinks that homosexuality and christianity are compatible should ck out romans i corinthians i timothy jude ii peter gen lev to name a few of the verses that pertain to homosexuality in christ s love bryan whitsell i was waiting for this i think your question should be rephrased the many verses of the bible which condem homosexuality by our beliefs have been shoved down the throats of homosexuals for a long time by well meaning christians the question is how do they interpret these verses any discussion of any issue this or any other issue requires a proof of your case as well as a disproof of the opposing view we are already familiar with those verses and many have proven to themselves that these condem homosexual behaviour we must now establish reasons for not believing this to be true based on the interpretation of these scriptures given by someone who has come to grips with them todd
|
9,313 |
soc.religion.christian
|
apology i responded to a post last week and it carried somewhat of a hostile tone for which i am apologizing for it is not my intent to create contriversy or to piss people off to those who i offend i m sorry
|
9,314 |
soc.religion.christian
|
national repentance concerning christians praying for coporate forgiveness of national sins michael covington claims the following of c s lewis c s lewis made the same point in an essay after world war ii when some christian leaders in britain were urging national repentance for the horrors sins of world war ii michael a covington associate research scientist artificial intelligence programs mcovingt ai uga edu the university of georgia phone athens georgia u s a amateur radio n tmi i was surprised when i heard this same kind of remark from a fellow grad student i know especially since he had seminary training i have read the same essay and do not find lewis making any such claim rather lewis is condemning the use of such coporate prayer efforts as platforms to make political jabs at opponents feigned as confessions of guilt ie lord please forgive us for allowing insert political issue idea platform to exist in our country it is wrong and we ask your forgiveness i would be interested in knowing what part of the essay you feel condemns national repentance please quote jonathan waugh graduate research associate pulmonary medicine div the ohio state university samp rm perry st columbus oh jwaugh magnus acs ohio state edu
|
9,315 |
soc.religion.christian
|
mary s assumption a few points about mary s being taken into heaven at the end of her life on earth one piece of evidence for mary s assumption into heaven is the fact that no christian church ever claimed to be the sight where she was buried some christian churches claimed to be located at the final resting places of peter mark and other saints but no one ever claimed to possess the body of mary the greatest of the saints why because everyone knew that she had been taken up into heaven although there is no definitive scriptural proof for the assumption of mary some passages seem suggestive like the passage in revelation that describes a woman giving birth to a son and later being crowned in the heavens of course the woman in this passage has other interpretations she can also be taken a symbol for the church the assumption of mary makes sense because of her relationship to christ jesus perfect god and perfect man fulfilled the requirements of the law perfectly under the law god gave to us we are to honor our mother and father and christ s act of taking his mother into heaven is part of his fulfillment of that law also he took his flesh from her so it seems appropriate that he decide not to allow her flesh to rot in the grave one last point an ex catholic attempted to explain catholic doctrine on the assumption by asserting it is connected to a belief that mary did not die this is not a correct summary of what catholics believe the dogma of the assumption was carefully phrased to avoid saying whether mary did or did not die in fact the consensus among catholic theologians seems to be that mary in fact did die this would make sense christ died and his mother who waited at the foot of the cross would want to share in his death brian finnerty
|
9,316 |
soc.religion.christian
|
should christians fight justifiable war i posted this a couple of weeks ago and it doesn t seem to have appeared on the newsgroup and i haven t had a reply from the moderator we were having intermittent problems with our mail at the time please excuse me if you have seen this before should christians fight last week alastair posted some questions about fighting and whether there are such things as justifiable wars i have started looking into these things and have jotted down my findings as i go i haven t answered all his questions yet and i know what i have here is on a slightly different tack but possibly i ll be able to get into it more deeply later and post some more info soon our duty to our neighbour do good to all men gal love our neighbour as ourselves matt act the part of the good samaritan luke toward any who may be in trouble we will therefore render every possible assistance to an injured man and therefore should not be part of any organisation which causes people harm even medical corps of the army etc christians are by faith citizens of the commonwealth of israel ephesians and also recognise that god rules in the kingdoms of men and therefore we should not be taking part in any of the struggles of those nations which we are not part of due to our faith we are to be strangers and pilgrims amongst the nations so we are just passing through and not part of any nation or any national aspirations this can also be applied to politics etc but that s another story we are not supposed to strive or resist evil even suffer yourselves to be defrauded it is therefore incosistent for us to strive to assist in preserving a state which christ will destroy when he returns to set up god s kingdom our duty to the state render therefore unto caesar the things which be caesar s and unto god the things which be god s luke let every soul be subject unto the higher powers for there is no power but of god the powers that be are ordained of god whosoever resisteth the power resisteth the ordinance of god rom submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the lord s sake whether it be to king as supreme for so is the will of god that with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men pet these scriptures make it clear that submission to the powers that be is a divine command but it is equally clear from acts that when any ordinance of man runs counter to god s law we must refuse submission to it the reason for this is that we are god s bond servants and his service is our life s task an example of the type of thing is in col where bondservants were to work heartily as unto the lord so also we should work as if our boss was god i e pressed down shaken together and running over oops a bit of a side track there in the contests between the nations we are on god s side a side that is not fighting in the battle but is testifying to the truth when we believe in god and embrace his promises we become fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of god and are no longer interested in associations of the world think of this in relation to unions etc as well paul tells us to lay aside every weight that we may run the race that is set before us and if we are wise we will discard any association which would retard our progress thou therefore endure hardness as a good soldier of jesus christ no man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier tim one of these entanglements he warns about is be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers one of the obvious applications of this is marriage with unbelievers but it also covers things like business partnerships and any other position where we may form a close association with any person or persons not believing the truth about god in this case the army the principle comes from deut remember that as well as them being different animals of different strengths one was clean and one unclean under the law these ideas are strongly stressed in cor i suggest you read this the yoking also has another aspect that of servitude and jesus says take my yoke upon you so we are then yoked with christ and cannot be yoked with unbelievers we have already seen that we are bondservants of christ and paul says become not ye the bondservants of men cor rv an example from the old testament the question is asked in chr shouldest thou help the ungodly the situation here is a good example of what happens when you are yoked together with unbelievers jehoshaphat was lucky to escape with his life here are the facts he had made an affinity with ahab who had sold himself to work wickedness before the lord kings when asked by ahab to form a military alliance he had agreed and said i am as thou art my people as thy people kings an unequal yoking he sttod firm in refusing the advice of the false prophets and insisted on hearing the prophet of the lord trying to do the right thing he found that he was yoked and therefore couldn t break away from the evil association he had made god says to us come out from among them and be ye separate and touch not the unclean thing and i will receive you and ye shall be my sons and daughters cor this is more or less what i have found out so far i m still looking into it as i don t think i ve answered all the questions raised by alastair yet heres a summary and a few things to think about the christian in under command obedience to this command is an essential factor in his relationship with christ john total dedication to this course of action is required romans disobedience compromises the close relationship between christ and his followers pet we are to be separated to god rom this involves a master servant relationship rom no man can serve two masters matt all that is in the kosmos is lust and pride quite opposed to gos john christs kingdom is not of this world i e not worldly in nature if it was his servants would fight to deliver him if christ is our master and he was not delivered by his servants because his kingdom was not of this world then his servants cannot possibly fight for another master strangers and pilgrims have no rights and we cannot swear allegiance to anyone but god the servant of the lord must not war but be gentle to all tim this does not just apply to war but also to avoiding strife throughout our lives there is a war to be waged not with man s weapons cor but with god s armour eph i ll probably post some more when i ve had time to look into things a bit further gideon king phone university of otago fax department of computer science e mail gideon farli otago ac nz p o box dunedin next mail preferred new zealand
|
9,317 |
soc.religion.christian
|
st maria goretti heres the life of st maria goretti posted with kind permission of the editor of the australian catholic magazine morning star hope you like it put up with anything to prevent sin st maria goretti maria was born on october th to luigi and assunta goretti the eldest daughter in the family of seven she was a cheerful girl always imitating her parents she had but one disire but one wish to receive our lord in the blessed sacrament the date was finally set for little maria to receive our lord on the feast of corpus christi for maria time seemed like an eter nity as she slowly neared the great day when it finally arrived fr jerome the priest who was to celebrate the mass and give the children their first holy communion delivered a sermon on the immense love of jesus christ for them and the great love we should have in return for him he then warmly urged them to die rather than commit a mortal sin maria humbly approached the altar of god and received the holy eucharist her only sadness was the thought of her father s absence who died some time beforehand as for the rest of the day maria remained under the spell of the divine visit that is until her thoughts changed to when she could go next to holy communion thus ended the happiest day of maria s life over the next twelve months maria had changed from a giggling little girl into a quiet young lady with responsibilities as her mother went out into the fields in place of her husband maria took on the ironing cooking washing and other motherly duties she was doing this not only for her own family but also for the serenellis a father and son who lived with the goretti s owning a share in the farm although maria was poorer than all the other children she by far surpassed them in virtue in all thi ngs she did the holy will of god during the month of june alessandro serenelli the son twice made advances upon maria when he chanced to be alone with her on both occasions maria managed to struggle free of alessandro s strong grip but on the second he threatened to kill her if she even uttered a word to her mother from this day on maria lived in terror fearing lest alessandro attack again on july th alessandro left work in the fields to get a handkerchief as he claimed he went to the storeroom beneath the house where maria who was outside on the landing with the baby could hear him fumbling about in with tools she wondered what he was doing it was later learned that he was sharpening a blade he went to the house and called for maria she told him she wouldn t go to him unless she knew why she was needed he stormed out to the landing and dragged her up to her room mar ia instantly realized what he was up to no no no do not touch me it is a sin you will go to hell at this point alessandro held the knife over maria s chest who was now on the floor will you or will you not maria gathered all her energy no i will not alessandro no she had chosen her martyrdom over sin god over satan overcome with rage alessandro plunged the knife into maria s breast fourteen times finally he came to his senses and thought maria was dead frantically he threw the knife behind a closet and locked himself in his room the crying of the baby teresa on the landing brought the attention to assunta and the father of alessandro as the baby was unattended and was in danger of falling off they ran to the house to find maria who covered in blood was dragging herself to the door when asked what happened she said alessandro stabbed her he wanted to make me do wrong and i would not the ambulance arrived then the police who took alessandro away as the ambulance carried maria to the hospital a large crowd followed on foot the doctors at the hospital held no hope for poor little maria the same fr jerome who gave maria her first communion came to administer the last rites and to give her holy viaticum he asked maria if she would forgive her murderer yes for the love of jesus i forgive him i wish for him to one day join me in paradise may god forgive him for i alread y have maria died at about three o clock alessandro was tried and found guilty of maria s death but because of his age he was sentenced to only thirty years in prison after eight years of being a violent prisoner and show ing no regret for his crime he saw in a dream in the midst of a field of flowers maria holding out a bunch of white lilies to him soon later he wrote to the local bishop begging god s par don for the grave sin he had committed he later gave testimony in maria s beatification in less than three years later on ju ne th maria was canonised assunta goretti was the first mother ever to be present at her daughter s canonisation may st maria goretti help us to be pure and grant us the strength to die rather than commit a mortal sin saint maria goretti pray for us by brendan arthur internet simon giaeb cc monash edu au viva cristo rey long live christ the king
|
9,318 |
soc.religion.christian
|
mormon beliefs about bastards could anyone enlighten me on how the mormon church views children born out of wedlock in particular i m interested to know if any stigma is attached to the children as opposed to the parents i m especially keen to learn if there is or is not any prohibition in the mormon faith on bastards entering heaven or having their names entered in the big genealogical book the mormons keep in salt lake city if this is an issue on which the official position has changed over time i m interested in learning both old and new beliefs e mail or posting is fine all information or pointers are appreciated elliotte rusty harold department of mathematics elharo shiva njit edu new jersey institute of technology erh tesla njit edu newark nj
|
9,319 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re national repentance mcovingt aisun ai uga edu michael covington writes i heard on the radio today about a christian student conference where christians were called to repent of america s national sins such as sexual promiscuity how can i repent of someone else s sin i can t and when i claim to repent of someone else s sin am i not in fact judging him jesus equipped us to judge activities but warned us not to judge people judge not that ye be not judged strictly speaking you re right we can t repent for somebody else for what they ve done i guess i don t think it s out of line to talk about a generalized repentence for our contribution to or participation in the sins of society or for our tacit approval by our silence of sinful attitudes or practices it may be that we re also just plain begging for mercy hoping god will withhold his hand of judgement on our whole country for the sake of a few much as abraham sought to do for the sake of lot hmmm the results there were pretty cautionary a few times lately when i ve observed some either out and out sinful activity or just some self destructive activity i ve gotten a strong impression that many folks really don t know any better christ s pity on the crowds as being like sheep without a shepherd rings true to me if these folks don t have a clue do i bear any responsibility for my not having communicated a better way worse still have i expressed judgement and disgust at their doings and thus alienated them from any positive relationship whereby i might pass along anything positive i know i ve got something to repent about on that score anyway it s a real interesting question paul marxhausen university of nebraska lincoln grace happens
|
9,320 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re why do people become atheists in article may athos rutgers edu muirm argon gas organpipe uug arizona edu maxwell c muir writes in all candor i would be happy to be proven wrong about believing in atheism problem is i will have to be proven wrong in mentioning some nonsense about psychology and atheism bob muir asks the following question do i sound broken to you i answer in the affirmative now this answer might sound a little intellectually dishonest to bob but i think i have been accused before of that heinous crime and am man enough to take it what thinking person has not at one time or other been accused of it is it politically correct for christians to be the only besieged group permitted the luxury of arrogance now i have a question for bob why in the world would any self respecting atheist want to subscribe to a christian news group i have a difficult enough time keeping up with it and i think i know something about the subject bob reminds me of my roommate in order to disbelieve atheism he says he will need to be proven wrong about it well i don t even waste my time trying i tell him that he ll just have to take my word for it in response he tells me he will say an atheist s prayer for me good luck bob and best regards randal lee nicholas mandock catechist gt b prism gatech edu
|
9,321 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re satan kicked out of heaven biblical easteee wkuvx bitnet writes hello all i have a question about satan i was taught a long time ago that satan was really an angel of god and was kicked out of heaven because he challenged god s authority the problem is i cannot find this in the bible is it in the bible if not where did it originate wondering eddie the quick answer revelation and there was war in heaven michael and his angels fought against the dragon and his angels who fought back but he the dragon was not strong enough and they lost their place in heaven the great dragon was hurled down that ancient serpent called the devil and satan who leads the whole world astray he was hurled down to the earth and his angels with him the earlier part of chapter deals very symbolically with why satan rose up in battle against michael and the good angels in the first place hope this clears it up mike walker
|
9,322 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re the doctrine of original sin just a quick reminder the way you are interpreting those passages is your opinion you make it sound as if your opinion is somehow an undisputable fact many would interpret the passages you cite very differently many have several of the great theologians you mentioned do that very thing these were people who had much more expertise in the interpretation of scripture than you or me or probably anyone reading this newsgroup to say that all of them are wrong and you are right is in my opinion notice those last three words coming pretty darn close to the sin of pride in the future i would suggest you not be so absolutist in your interpretations especially when contradicting highly respected doctors of christianity mike walker mdw uxa cso uiuc edu univ of illinois
|
9,323 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re homosexuality issues in christianity in may athos rutgers edu whitsebd nextwork rose hulman edu bryan whitsell writes any one who thinks that homosexuality and christianity are compatible should check out romans i corinthians i timothy jude ii peter gen lev to name a few of the verses that pertain to homosexuality homosexual christians have indeed checked out these verses some of them are used against us only through incredibly perverse interpretations others simply do not address the issues you would seem to be more in need of a careful and spirit led course in exegesis than most of the gay christians i know i suggest that you stop proof texting about things you know nothing about michael l siemon i say you are gods sons of the mls panix com most high all of you nevertheless or you shall die like men and fall mls ulysses att com like any prince psalm
|
9,324 |
soc.religion.christian
|
divorce i deleted much of the following article in order to discuss the specific issue of whether it is acceptable to divorce in article may athos rutgers edu crs carson u washington edu cliff slaughterbeck writes along the way she was married happily to a wonderful and supportive husband and gave birth to two sons still everything was not perfect for jane since she could never open up the deepest part of her soul to her husband she always found that she could be much closer to her women friends than to her husband as good and loing as a husband as he might be she struggled very much with this until at the age of she decided that she was a lesbian when she came home to announce this understanding of herself her husband told her that he had come to the same understanding several years before and was waiting for her to come to that realization in her own time her children ages and at the time were also extremely supportive of her as the youngest put it that just means that you love people very much jane and her husband agreed to divorce but remain friends and still consider each other as part of the extended family to this day one of the interesting things that jane said in this whole discussion was homosexuality is not about what goes on in the bedroom she found that she was much more able to have a deep committed relationship with a woman than a man sex in her mind is only a part of the whole relationship the key thing is how one interconnects with other people she made a specific point to say that it was not that she had never met a good man since she was married to a wonderful man for a dozen years take a few seconds and honestly ponder that thought and it s implications i have thought about the implications and it is scary we have a whole generation of families broken up because some men have decided that is is okay to leave their wives and children for the thrill of a younger more attractive woman if we accept that it is legitimate for jane to have divorced how can we not accept anyone s decision to divorce because he has found someone with whom he can have a more deep committed relationship marriage is not a state of being it is a mutual journey in life love is not a passive feeling it must be actively willed is it acceptable for an older executive to dump his wife of many years who stayed home to care for the children because he can t be happy sexually unless he is with a beautiful young blonde the real solution for both in the couple to make a renewed effort hold fast to the faith has not the lord repeatedly compared his relation to his people as a faithful and enduring husband we learn something very deep and very mystical when we marry and remain faithful through times of trial my spouse has a brain tumor that has left her partially paralyzed if it were to resume growing it is in remission thanks be to god then perhaps the time would come when we could not have sexual relations that s life the lord would certainly not give me permission to seek someone else to satisfy my needs the idea that it is alright to divorce if a couple grows apart seems to me to lead to such a monstrous destruction of the meaning of marriage that i feel we must make every effort to avoid any hint of compromise we have become so petty and small minded that some husbands are threatening to divorce their wives unless the wives lose weight i praise the lord for guiding me to marry my wife she married me anyway despite the possibility that i could have a terrible illness and it turned out that she was the one with the brain tumor but had i known i wouldn t have cared either and maybe i ll be in a car accident tomorrow and become paralyzed from the neck down a married couple should deal with these situations with the help of the lord not divorce and run away from them
|
9,325 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re mormon temples i was wondering if anyone knew any changes to the temple ceremony within the last fifty years also why do you think they were made revelation assimilation to mainstream christianity etc i know that the god makers was published quite a while ago could rituals have been changed since then i am also very interested in the influence of freemasonry on early mormonism especially in the smith family and in the nauvoo settlement info on any new studies would be appreciated thanks freddie eaton llcoolj athena mit edu
|
9,326 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re homosexuality issues in christianity can someone cite biblical references to homosexuality being immoral other than leviticus so far when i ask around here i get the verses from leviticus spouted at me but the whole rest of that book tends to be ignored by christians haven t seen any stonings in a long time later max bob muir the list was posted not long ago as i recall aside from lev commonly cited passages are the story of sodom note however that this was a homosexual rape and there s no disagreement that that is wrong i take an intermediate position on this note that sodom is referred to elsewhere in the bible for its sinfulness it doesn t seem to have been known specifically for homosexuality rather i think it was considered a cesspool of all sins however from what we know of jewish attitudes homosexuality would have contributed to the horror of the action described it almost seems to have been contrived to combine about as many forms of evil in one act as possible homosexual rape of guests who were actually angels but this story is not specifically about homosexuality in the nt the clear references are all from paul s letters in rom there is a passage that presupposes that homosexuality is an evil note that the passage isn t about homosexuality it s about idolatry homosexuality is visited on people as a punishment or at least result of idolatry there are a number of arguments over this passage it does not use the word homosexuality and it is referring to people who are by nature heterosexual practicing homosexuality so it s not what i d call an explicit teaching against all homosexuality but it does seem to support what would be a natural assumption anyway that paul shares the general negative jewish attitude towards homosexuality the other passages occur in lists of sins in i cor and i tim unfortunately it s not entirely clear what the words used here mean there have been suggestions that one has a broader meaning such as wanton and that another may be specifically male prostitute again we don t have here a precise teaching about homosexuality but it is at least weak supportive evidence that paul shared the ot s negative judgement on homosexuality jude is sometimes cited however it s probably not relevant the context in jude involves angels since those who were almost raped in sodom were angels it seems likely that strange flesh refers to intercourse with angels as you can see the nt evidence is such that people s conclusion is determined by their approach to the bible conservatives note that the passages from paul s letters imply that he accepted the ot prohibition this is enough for them to regard it as having nt endorsement liberals note that there s no specific teaching and no clear definition of what is being prohibited or why is the concern in rom the connection of homosexuality to pagan worship what exactly do the words in the lists of sins mean thus some believe it is legitimate to regard this as a attitude paul took with him from his background and not a specific teaching of the gospel this is an explosive topic which tends to result in long dissertations on the exact meaning of various greek words but it s clear to me that that s mostly irrelevant what it really comes down to is whether people are looking to the bible for law or whether they believe that such as approach is inconsistent with the gospel this appears to depend upon one s reaction to the message of the bible as a whole as well as one s perception of the needs of the church today this is a difference of approach at least as serious as the difference between protestant and catholic in the th cent and one where both sides believe that the bible is so obviously on their side that they keep thinking all they have to do is quote a few more passages and the other side will finally come to their senses that makes things very frustrating for a moderator who realizes that such an optimistic outcome is not very likely clh
|
9,327 |
soc.religion.christian
|
god morality and massacres a listmember d andrew killie i think wrote in response to the suggestion that genocide may sometimes be the will of god any god who works that way is indescribably evil and unworthy of my worship or faith nobuya higgy higashiyama replied as in substance did others where is your source of moral standards by which you judge god s behavior it is often argued that we have no standing by which to judge god s actions who is the clay to talk back to the potter but we find a contrary view in scripture when god proposes to destroy the city of sodom genesis abraham says suppose that there are some good men in the city will you destroy the righteous along with the wicked far be it from you lord to do such a thing shall not the judge of all the earth do right i am told that the hebrew is actually a bit stronger than this and can perhaps be better rendered dynamic equivalence as shame on you lord if you do such a thing there are those who say that the definition of good is whatever god happens to want but if that is so then the statement that god is good has no meaning it simply says that god does what he wants that being the case no one can either love or obey god because he is good the only motive left for obeying him is that he is powerful just as it makes sense to obey a dictator even when he tells you to round up all jews and exterminate them because if you defy him you might end up in the gas chamber yourself so it makes sense to obey god because he has the power to punish you if you don t this ethical theory i take to be in radical contradiction to genesis and to christianity in general any theory that makes our moral judgements worthless makes any further discussion of morality or of the goodness of god meaningless however it does not follow that our moral judgements are always infallible in particular cases still less our judgements in particular cases about the course of action most likely to achieve a good result when i read the scriptural accounts of the actions of god in history those actions often seem to me very different from what i might expect of a god who loves us and desires what is best for us moreover leaving the scriptures aside and considering the natural world i find that nature is often very different from what i might expect if it were the work of a benevolent deity origen said those who believe that the author of nature is also the author of the scriptures must expect to find in the scriptures the same sort of difficulties that they find in nature now that some such difficulties should exist is not in itself an argument against the existence power wisdom and goodness of god on the contrary their absence would be such an argument suppose that i am watching bobby fisher play chess and suppose that every time he makes a move i find myself nodding and saying good move just what i was expecting him to do same move i would have made if i were playing that would be a sign that fisher is no better a chess player than myself given that he is better i expect that at least some of his moves will have me thinking now what do suppose induced him to do that or even boy that was a real slip he s just thrown the game away similarly if god understands the workings of the universe better than i do it is to be expected that sometimes it will look to me as if he has made a mistake one difference between fisher at the chessboard and god at the controls of the universe is that i can see the end of the chess game if fisher wins i revise my earlier inference that it was carelessness that made him lose his queen moves earlier however if he loses and particularly if i can see that there was a time when he had an opportunity for a checkmate in two moves and did not take it then i know that he is not as good a player as i had thought with god on the other hand i shall not in this life see the total result of some of his actions therefore my grounds for judging that i have seen a bad move on his part must always be far shakier than my grounds for making a similar judgement about fisher in the book of genesis we read that joseph s ten older brothers who with good reason found him insufferable conspired to sell him into slavery in egypt there he eventually became viceroy and when there was a famine in canaan he was able to provide for his family when his brothers nervously apologized he told them do not worry you meant to do me evil but god turned it into good i once heard a rabbi speak on this text he said the history of the jews is largely a history of events that look like catastrophes that threaten the continued survival of the religion or the people or both but amazingly those events turn out to be the saving of the jews and of judaism the sale of joseph by his brothers looked like the breakup of the family but in fact it ended with a reconciliation of the quarrel between them the famine that drove the family out of canaan looked like a misfortune for them but in fact if they had stayed in canaan they would almost certainly have intermarried with the canaanites and been assimilated into their culture their oppression by the egyptians a few generations after their arrival in egypt again looked like a disaster but god used it to bring them out of egypt and into the promised land here the people built a temple and regularly offered sacrifices but the babylonians captured jerusalem and judea destroyed temple and city and countryside and deported most of the people to babylon you might have thought that that would be the end of the people and the religion but it was not living in canaan the people had been under constant danger of assimilation again and again they had turned from the worship of the lord to the worship of the canaanite fertility cults with their ritual prostitution and ritual human sacrifice the babylonian captivity put a stop to that never again did the jews show any interest in polytheism or idolatry neither the worship of the canaanites mor that of the babylonians ever again had a foothold among them nor is that all judaism had been in danger of becoming simply a system of sacrifices and temple observances the only prescribed acts of worship consisted of coming to jerusalem every so often and offering a sacrifice during the captivity with the temple gone the jews invented the synagogue a place of meeting for reading and study and discussion of the scriptures they came to realize clearly what they were in danger of forgetting while they continued to live in judea that god is not simply a local or tribal deity not just the controller of the land of canaan or the patron of the jewish people but the creator of the world and the ruler and judge of all humans everywhere time passed and the babylonian empire was replaced by that of the persians and then that of the greeks or rather the macedonians the ruler antiochus epiphanes was determined to stamp out judaism and to this end he made the reading and the study of the torah punishable by death again one might think that this would be the end of judaism but it was not the people met for worship and instead of reading the torah portion appointed for the day they would read some passage from the prophets that had a similar theme and then discuss that before this time the torah the so called five books of moses genesis exodus leviticus numbers and deuteronomy were the only books read and studied in the synagogue if it had not been for antiochus the books of the prophets would probably have been forgotten altogether his hatred for judaism saved them other examples here omitted for brevity s sake some of you may remember that julie andrews first became famous as eliza doolittle in the stage production of my fair lady when warner brothers undertook to make a movie of it everyone expected that julie who had been so magnificent on stage would play the same role in the movie instead the studio decided to go with an established screen star and cast audrey hepburn julie andrews was naturally crushed but she later realized that if she had played the screen role she would have been type cast for life as an elize doolittle type it would have been a disaster for her as it was walt disney offered her the role of mary poppins and she won an oscar for it at the presentation she stood there smiling and looking at walt disney she said and now my special thanks to the man who made all this possible jack warner it was the most memorable line of the evening in a similar spirit we jews might thank the men who in the providence of god have preserved judaism and kept it alive to this day beginning with joseph s brothers and continuing with two pharaohs with nebuchadnezzar with antiochus epiphanes after the formal meeting had broken up one woman came up to him privately and said you were talking about the holocaust weren t you he answered if that is an example that came to your mind then you are right i was talking about it to you but i would not talk about it to everyone for not everyone can bear it i assume that he meant that without the holocaust there would have been no state of israel someone hearing the rabbi s lecture might leap to the conclusion that god is dependent on the wickedness of men to accomplish his purposes or at least that the rabbi thought so he might then go on to suppose that the wickedness is in fact god s doing that he stirred up joseph s brothers to a murderous hate against him and that when the israelites were in egypt god hardened pharaoh s heart so that he oppressed the people and would not let them go and this raises questions about how an action can be considered wicked and at the same time be considered something that god has brought about i suggest another way of looking at it consider a sculptor who has a log of wood from which he proposes to carve a statue but the log instead of having a smooth even grain throughout has a large knot that spoils the appearance of the surface the sculptor considers the wood for a while and then carves a statue that features the knot that makes that particular interruption in the grain and color of the wood correspond to some feature of the statue so that observers will say how fortunate the sculptor was in finding a piece of wood with a knot like that in just the right place its presence is the crowning touch the thing that makes the statue a great work of art in reality the knot far from being what the sculptor was looking for was a challenge to his skill if the wood had not contained that flaw he would still have made a great work of art but a different one so if joseph s brothers had not sold him god would still have brought about his purposes for the jewish people but he would have done so in another manner if judas had not betrayed jesus if caiaphas and his fellow leaders had not rejected jesus but had rather acknowledged him as the annointed of god if pilate had followed his conscience rather than his fears and had set jesus free it might appear that there would have been no crucifixion and therefore no redemption and therefore no salvation not so god did not need judas sin to redeem us if judas had done right then god in christ would still have reconciled the world to himself we do not know how just as we do not know how michelangelo would have painted the sistine chapel if its interior had instead been shaped like grand central station and just as we do not know how bobby fisher would have won his fourth game agianst spassky if spassky had refused the exchange of bishops and had attacked fisher s knight instead don t bother to look up the game in question i am making up this example but the point is none the less valid thus we may say both that god used say the cowardice of pilate to accomplish his purposes and that the said cowardice was not god s doing and that pilate would not have thwarted god s plans by behaving justly and courageously what then are we to make of the place where god says to moses i will harden pharaoh s heart so that he will not let the people go some christians have taken this to mean that pharaoh was a puppet with god pulling the strings and that his stubbornness and cruelty were not his own work but the work of god in him i suppose rather that what god was telling moses was something like this if you see that pharaoh is not willing to let the people go do not be discouraged or suppose that the situation is out of my control my purposes will not be thwarted if pharaoh chooses to hear you and let the people go well and good if he does not i will fit his resistance into my plans and fit it so perfectly that future historians and theologians will suppose that i would have been thrown for a loss if pharaoh had obeyed me to return to the question that started this all off is it possible that the serbs in slaughtering the moslems of bosnia are instruments of god s will first point what they are doing is wrong just as what joseph s brothers did was wrong just as what judas did was wrong they intend it for evil if god somehow brings good out of it that does not make them any less subject to just condemnation and punishment second point of course god will bring good out of it but not the same good that he would have brought if the serbians had refrained from the sins of robbery and rape and murder nor does the good he purposes excuse us from the duty of doing what is right yours james kiefer
|
9,328 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re question from an agnostic hi damon no matter what system or explanation of creation you wish to accept you always have to start with one of two premises creation from nothing or creation from something there are no other alternatives and if we accept one or the other of those two premises then again there are two alternatives either creation was random or was according to some plan if it was random i am unable to accept that the complex nature of our world with interrelated interdependent organisms and creatures could exist as they do therefore i am left with creation under the control of an intelligence capable of devising such a scheme i call that intelligence god i also prefer the creatio ex nihilo rather than from chaos as it is cleaner there is obviously no way to prove either or neither we are and we must have come from somewhere choose whatever explanation you feel most comfortable with damon you are the one who has to live with your choice shalom len howard
|
9,329 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re christianity and repeated lives in article may athos rutgers edu danc procom com daniel cossack writes jek cu nih gov writes the apostle paul romans points out that god chose jacob rather than esau if we admit the possibility that they had lived previous lives and that in accordance with the asiatic idea of karma and following romans to as it is written jacob have i loved but esau have i hated how could god have loved and hated in the past tense those that are not yet born neither having done good or evil woah the context is about god s calling out a special people the jews to carry the promise to read the meaning as literal people is to miss paul s entire point i d be glad to send anyone more detailed explanations of this passage if interested ted kalivoda tedr athena cs uga edu university of georgia athens institute of higher ed
|
9,330 |
soc.religion.christian
|
deuterocanonicals esp sirach dave davis writes let my state my point as provocatively as possible after going through several study bibles i m leaning heavily towards the assertion that sirach the wisdom of ben sira or ecclesiasticus is directly referenced by james in fact i think sirach is more directly referenced by james than job or ruth is referenced in any nt verse i ve seen good point the new testament does not quote ezra nehemiah esther ruth job ecclesiastes or song of songs just as it does not quote from the deuterocanon but if the non quotation of the former does not disqualify them neither does the non quotation of the later and the wisodm of solomon was quite clearly an influence on st paul especially in the letter to the romans cf especially romans and wisdom stuff deleted i think everyone would agree that principles that cannot be consistently applied are not very useful as principles so if we are to exclude them not accord them the authority of scripture we would appear to require other reasons what might these reasons be tradition always a fav with episcop tradition is equivocal on this subject sirach i believe is in vaticanus sinaiticus i don t know if it is listed in the muratorian canon the oldest list i know of sirach and the others are discussed by the fathers as scripture but not unanimously true not all accepted them as scripture though niether were all the books of the new testament so accepted which puts to the lie the whole argument of the books being excluded because they were debated and not universally accepted hebrews the apocalypse peter esther and others were debated at various times but eventually retained as for the codexes you mention both vaticanus and sinaitcus include the deuterocanon bothe of the new and old testaments and vaticanus i think inlcudes clement the shepard of hermas and the epistle of baranabas as for the muratorian canon it deals with the new testament only though it is very valuable in its witness to those books my interim conclusion is that protestant exclusion of at least one of these writings is one of those traditions of men one hears of so often they were excluded during the reformation and that appears to be the reason many people continue to exclude them any takers i can be reasonable if all else fails show me where i m wrong you re not wrong it is a tradition of men to exlcude them as i will explain below that nothing be read in the church under the nmae of divine scripture except the canonical scriptures and the canoncial scriptures are genesis exodus leviticus numbers deuteronomy joshua judges ruth four books of kingdoms being samuel and kings two books of paralpomenon being chronicles job the psalter of david the five books of solomon being proverbs ecclesiastes song of songs wisdom of solomon and misatributed to him the wisdom of jesus son of sirach the books of the twelve minor prophets isaiah jeremiah being jeremiah the lamentations baruch and the letter all of which were formerly counted as one ezekiel daniel tobit judith esther two books of ezra being ezra and nehemiah two books of maccabees and of the new testament four books of the gospel one book of the acts of the apostles thirteen letters of paul the apostle one letter of the same to the hebrews two of peter the apostle three of john one of the apostle jude one of the apostle james one book of the apocalypse of john council of hippo statute ad this same list was promulgated again at the third council of carthage ad and at the sixth council of carthage ad at which council the same list was enumerated with the words because we have recieved from the fathers that these are the books to be read in the church which ought to quiet those who assert in the name of holy scripture we do understand those books of whose authority there was never any doubt in the church as the episcopal church does in removing the deuterocanon from the realm of scripture though the episcopalians hold them in high regard and read them in the church they are not counted as scripture by them and may not be used to prove dogma the lutherans hold out similarly earlier mention of the so called apocrypha as divine scripture can also be found and below i inlcude only a portion of the quotes calling it divine scripture that could be found among the writings of the fathers and this is the reason why the law of the old testament is reckoned as consisting of twenty two books so that they may correspond to the number of letters in the hebrew alphabet it is to be noted also that by adding to these tobias and judith there are twenty four books corresponding to the number of letters used by the greeks st hillary of poitiers commentaries on the psalms prologue ad the twenty two books according to the hebrews are jeremiah with lamentations and the letter reckoned as one and also there is maccabees origen commentaries on the psalms psalm ad divine scripture addressing itself to those who love themselves and to the boastful says most excellently baruch follows st clement of alexandria the instuctor of children ad i learned accurately the books of the old testament proverbs of solomon and also wisdom st melito of sardes fragment found in eusebius history of the church and dating from crica ad book it is likewise decreed now indeed we must treat of the divine scriptures what the universal catholic church accepts and what she must shun the list of the old testament wisdom one book ecclesiasticus one book tobit one book judith one book of maccabees two books st damasus i pope the decree of damsus section ad i would think this enough though more can be shown that the church has always accepted the deutero canon though parts have been disputed by various persons for if disputes involving the new testament deutero canon does not disqulaify those books i e hebrews james peter john jude revelation in protestant eyes than neither should it disqulaify the old testament books and i must point out that the jews only drew up their canon in ad years after the founding of the christian religion upon the cross why should we adhere to a canon that was drawn up by the faithless in reaction to the chrsitian use of the greek septuagint which includes the deutero canon as early as ad st justin had already accused the jews of mutilating the canon of scripture by their removal of certain books protestants apparently prefer to think that god s revelation was limited by a decree of the jews in the ordering of their the jews faithless canon and that he could not use other people like the apostles in drawing up the canon the apostles were most certain users of the septuagint as some of the old testament quotes use the wording of the septuagint and not the hebrew and the septuagint includes the deuterocanon
|
9,331 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re deuterocanonicals esp sirach wagner grace math uh edu david wagner writes the deutero canonical books were added much later in the church s history they do not have the same spiritual quality as the rest of scripture i do not believe the church that added these books was guided by the spirit in so doing and that is where this sort of discussion ultimately ends david h wagner a confessional lutheran now thank we all our god whoah whoah whoah whoah what that last paragraph just about killed me the deuterocanonicals have always been accepted as inspired scripture by the catholic church which has existed much longer than any protestant church out there it was martin luther who began hacking up the bible and deciding to remove certain books not the fact that the catholic church decided to add some much later that is the reason for the difference between catholic and protestant bibles sorry for the tone but that comment really irked me mike walker mdw uxa cso uiuc edu univ of illinois
|
9,332 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re should christians fight justifiable war in article gideon otago ac nz gideon king writes i posted this a couple of weeks ago and it doesn t seem to have appeared on the newsgroup and i haven t had a reply from the moderator we were having intermittent problems with our mail at the time please excuse me if you have seen this before should christians fight last week alastair posted some questions about fighting and whether there are such things as justifiable wars i have started looking into these things and have jotted down my findings as i go i haven t answered all his questions yet and i know what i have here is on a slightly different tack but possibly i ll be able to get into it more deeply later and post some more info soon may i suggest the book ethics by dr norm geisler of dallas theological seminary in it he goes over all the arguments pro and con and in between and comes up with a very reasonable answer if i have time and there is enough interest i may post his position jon noring charter member infj club if you re dying to know what infj means be brave e mail me i ll send info jon noring noring netcom com jkn international ip fred s gourmet chocolate carlton place phone chips world s best livermore ca v mail who are you read alt psychology personality that s where the action is
|
9,333 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re is ot valid peir yuan yeh asks i wonder if the ot is not exactly like jewish history are they the same or part of them are the same how about torah are the first five books of ot as the same as torah yes yes and yes jewish history as recorded in the old testament and as shown by archaeology are the same kings revivals temples and all the torah as far as i know is the five books of moses then come the prophets all the prophets plus joshua judges samuel kings and the writings psalms proverbs lamentations ruth esther ezra nehemiah ecclesiates song of songs chronicles job and the veracity of isaiah which you quoted to your moslem friend is quite well known a complete manuscript exists that dates back to past bc and is kept in a museum in israel it was found among the dead sea scrolls which greatly enhanced our knowledge of the veracity of the old testament as they date back to around the time of christ whereas before the oldest complete manuscript in hebrew was from around ad your moslem friend is sorely mistaken but understandably so if jesus was crucified and atoned for our sins he must have been god for only the death of god could atone for the sins of all humanity and as isaiah predicts the messiah will be called the mighty god and if he was god then he must have rose for as st paul wrote it was not possible that death could hold him and if jesus rose from the dead your moslem friend would have little reason to be a moslem which is why he denies the authenticity of the old testament andy byler
|
9,334 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re revelations babylon rex rexlex fnal fnal gov writes it is also of interest to note that in on the occasion of a jubilee pope leo the th had a medallion cast with his own image on one side and on the other side the church of rome symbolized as a woman holding in her left hand a cross and in her right a cup with legend around her sedet super universum the whole world is her seat you read more into the medal than it is worth the woman is the church catholics have always called our church holy mother church and our mother an example would be from st cyprian of carthage who wrote in ad can anyone have god for his father who does not have the church for his mother hence the image of the church as a woman holding a cross and a cup which tell of the crucifxition of our lord and of the power of his blood the grail legend but also more significantly it shows that this is the cup of the new covenant in my blood which shall be shed for you and for many luke the cup represents the new covenant and holds the blood of redemption the fact that the woman is holding both and is said to have the whole world for her seat is that the catholic church is catholic that is universal and is found throughout the world and the church shows the crucifixtion and applies the blood of redemption to all mankind by this spread of hers thorugh which the holy sacrafice of the mass can be said and celebrated in all the nations as malachi predicted in malachi from the rising of the sun to its setting my name is great among the gentiles and everywhere there is sacrafice and there is offered to my name a clean oblation for my name is great among the gentiles says the lord of hosts and so we acknowledge what st paul wrote for as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup you show the lord s death until he comes corinthians you are quite right about the identification of babylon the great mother of all harlots with rome i think we simply disagree as to what time period of rome the apostle john is talking about andy byler
|
9,335 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re revelations babylon hal heydt writes that was only the fall of the western empire the eastern empire continued for another years and a key element in it s fall was the christian sack of constantinople note that i said the fall of rome not of the empire the roman empire lasted until with its transfered capital in constantinople the main reason for it s fall was not so much the sack of constantinople by the men of the th crusade who were not christians they had been excommunicated down to the last man after attacking the christian city of zara in croatia but rather the disastorous defeat in the battle of mazinkert after the turks breached the frontier it was only a matter of time before the empire fell the inability of the empire to hold onto the rim of anatolia with the ottomans and rum seljuks in the middle should be quite obvious to any student of history the sack of constantinople only hastened the inevitable along for if the greeks had wanted to save their empire why would they not cooperate with the crusaders when they came to do battle with the saracens in the st rd crusades because of their obstinacy over cooperating with people they considered heretics even though those heretics were fighting for the cause of the empire and christendom in doing battle with the turkish hordes in anatolia edessa lebanon palastine and syria the some hordes who were to later sack constantinople and overrun a third of europe the balkans hungary the ukraine the caucasus etc andy byler
|
9,336 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re translations in article may athos rutgers edu ab z virginia edu andi beyer writes which version of the bible do you consider to be the most accurate translation well knowing greek and hebrew i m probably not as picky about translations as i would be if english translations were my only source of information but any verse that comes out substantially different in different trans lations is almost certainly unclear in the original it is very bad practice to shop for a translation that fits your own doctrinal positions personally i still like the rsv nrsv and nasv are also very good i have a strong preference for editions that do not indent the beginning of each verse as if verses were paragraphs the verse numbering is a relatively modern addition and should not be given undue prominence michael a covington associate research scientist artificial intelligence programs mcovingt ai uga edu the university of georgia phone athens georgia u s a amateur radio n tmi
|
9,337 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re the doctrine of original sin but haven t all sinned and come short of the glory of god romans those that cite this scripture to claim that even babes require baptism neglect that sin is not imputed when there is no law romans therefore until someone is capable of comprehending god s laws they are not accountable for living them they are in the book of life and are not removed until they can make a conscious decision to disobey god a idler if babies are not supposed to be baptised then why doesn t the bible ever say so it never comes right and says only people that know right from wrong or who are taught can be baptised what christ did say was i solemly assure you no one can enter god s kingdom without being born of water and spirit do not be surprised that i tell you you must all be begotten from above could this be because everyone is born with original sin mike
|
9,338 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re monophysites and mike walker nabil ayoub writes as a final note the oriental orthodox and eastren orthodox did sign a common statement of christology in which the heresey of monophysitism was condemned so the coptic orthodox church does not believe in monophysitism sorry what does the coptic church believe about the will and energy of christ were there one or were there two i e human and divine wills and energies in him also what is the objection ot the copts with the pope of rome i e why is there a coptic catholic church do you reject the supreme jurisdiction of the rd sucessor of st peter who blessed st john mark bishop of alexandria was translator for and his predecessors or his infallibility or what other things perhaps andy byler
|
9,339 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re serbian genocide work of god vera shanti noyes writes this is what indicates to me that you may believe in predestination am i correct i do not believe in predestination i believe we all choose whether or not we will accept god s gift of salvation to us again fundamental difference which can t really be resolved of course i believe in predestination it s a very biblical doctrine as romans shows among other passages furthermore the church has always taught predestination from the very beginning but to say that i believe in predestination does not mean i do not believe in free will men freely choose the course of their life which is also affected by the grace of god however unlike the calvinists and jansenists i hold that grace is resistable otherwise you end up with the idiocy of denying the universal saving will of god timothy for god must give enough grace to all to be saved but only the elect who he foreknew are predestined and receive the grace of final perserverance which guarantees heaven this does not mean that those without that grace can t be saved it just means that god foreknew their obstinacy and chose not to give it to them knowing they would not need it as they had freely chosen hell people who are saved are saved by the grace of god and not by their own effort for it was god who disposed them to himself and predestined them to become saints but those who perish in everlasting fire perish because they hardened their heart and chose to perish thus they were deserving of god s punishment as they had rejected their creator and sinned against the working of the holy spirit yes it is up to god to judge but he will only mete out that punishment at the last judgement well i would hold that as god most certainly gives everybody some blessing for what good they have done even if it was only a little for those he can t bless in the next life he blesses in this one and those he will not punish in the next life will be chastised in this one or in purgatory for their sins every sin incurs some temporal punishment thus god will punish it unless satisfaction is made for it cf samuel david s sin of adultery and murder were forgiven but he was still punished with the death of his child and i need not point out the idea of punishment because of god s judgement is quite prevelant in the bible sodom and gommorrah moses barred from the holy land the slaughter of the cannanites annias and saphira jerusalem in ad etc if jesus stopped the stoning of an adulterous woman perhaps this is not a good parallel but i m going to go with it anyway why should we not stop the murder and violation of people who may or may not be more innocent we should stop the slaughter of the innocent cf proverbs but does that mean that christians should support a war in bosnia with the u s or even the u n involved i do not think so but i am an isolationist and disagree with foreign adventures in general but in the case of bosnia i frankly see no excuse for us getting militarily involved it would not be a just war blessed after all are the peacemakers was what our lord said not the interventionists our actions in bosnia must be for peace and not for a war which is unrelated to anything to justify it for us andy byler
|
9,340 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re the doctrine of original sin eugene bigelow writes doesn t the bible say that god is a fair god sic if this is true how can this possibly be fair to the infants what do you mean fair god is just giving to everyone what they deserve as all infants are in sin from the time of conception cf romans psalm they cannot possibly merit heaven and as purgatory is for the purging of temporal punishment and venial sins it is impossible that origianl sin can be forgiven hence the unbaptized infants are cut off from the god against whom they with the whole of the human race except mary have sinned which is why jesus said truly truly i say to you no one can enter the kingdom of god unless he is born of water and spirit which is the true meaning of born again john thus as infants are in sin it is very fair for them to be cut off from god and exlcuded from heaven as st augustine said i did not invent original sin which the catholic faith holds from ancient time but you who deny it without a doubt are a follower of a new heresy de nuptiis lib c andy byler
|
9,341 |
soc.religion.christian
|
re the obvious isn t politically correct the last state church was in massachusetts sam adams the patriot brewmaster during his tenure as governor after the revolutionary war got it passed i believe it was eliminated around dan
|
9,342 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news hambidge bms com wrote in article c psog c magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes rate per capita rate the uk is more dangerous though you may be less likely to be killed by a handgun the average individual citizen in the uk is twice as likely to be killed by whatever means as the average swiss would you feel any better about being killed by means other than a handgun i wouldn t what an absurd argument switzerland is one fifth the size of the uk with one eigth as many people therefore at any given point on swiss soil you are more likely to be crow bait more importantly you are x as likely to be killed by the next stranger approaching you on a swiss street than in the uk you are betraying your lack of understanding about rate versus total number rates are expressed often as population therefore if a place had deaths and a population of the rate would be a place that had deaths and a population of would hav a rate of the former has a higher rate the latter a higher total you are less likely to die in the latter simple enuff for chrissakes take out your calculator and work out the numbers here i ve preformatted them for you to make it easier handgun homicides population switzerland uk and then tell me again how switzerland is safer with a more liberal handgun law than the uk is without by rate or total number your choice stephen manes manes magpie linknet com manes and associates new york ny usa o o
|
9,343 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news jim de arras jmd cube handheld com wrote last year the us suffered almost wrongful or accidental deaths by handguns alone fbi statistics in the same year the uk suffered such deaths scotland yard statistics the population of the uk is about that of the us weighted for population the us has x as many handgun related deaths as the uk and no the brits don t make up for this by murdering x as many people with baseball bats you just can t compare this way all homicides must be shown per capita not just handguns the availability of them in the usa makes them the preferred murder weapon but ban them and some other weapon will step in as the favorite as a favorite sure as lethal not likely a study of violence in chicago produced this table percentage of reported gun and knife attacks resulting in death weapon deaths as percentage of attacks knives total attacks guns total attacks source firearms and violence in american life it might be contended that if gun murderers were deprived of guns that they would find a way to kill as often with knives if this were so knife attacks in cities where guns were widely used in homicide would be expected to show a low fatality rate and knife attacks in cities where guns were not so widely used like vancouver would show a higher fatality rate but the nat l commission on the causes and prevention of violence task force analyzed the data and found this not to be the case it appeared to them that as the number of knife attacks increased in relation to the number of firearms attacks which presumably happened where guns were less available to assailants the proportion of fatal knife attacks did not increase relative to the proportion of gun attacks in fact the reverse was true what was found was that most homicides did not show a determination on the part of the assailant to kill fatalities caused by knife tended to show a single mindedness on the part of the assailant to do grave physical injury multiple stabs wounds wounds concentrated about the head neck and chest etc most gun homicides did not show this pattern rather more fatal attacks were committed during a moment of rage and not the focused intent to kill the victim source report on firearms and violence then since england usa my ancestors left because of the oppression you must compare england before strict gun laws to england after strict gun laws to be able to draw any meaning at all england has essentially legalized drugs so there are no drug gangs battling for turf etc there if you drop out the drug related killings here the usa would look a whole lot more peaceful there are a lot of factors which make a difference actually i m not fond of making any kind of social parallels between europeans and americans there are more cultural beahvioral and economic differences between us than similarities i just sort of found myself backed into that corner over the last couple of weeks i don t think we could ever attain the low levels of european violent crime here in the us whether we banned guns or required every law abiding citizen to carry a loaded uzi on the other hand we can draw lessons from neighbors who are more culturally similar namely the canadians in fact an exhaustive seven year study has already been done of the respective crime rates of vancouver british columbia and seattle washington cities with roughly the same population urban economy geography and crime but with decidedly different approaches to gun control in seattle handguns may be purchased legally for self defense after a day waiting period a permit can be obtained to carry a concealed weapon the recreational use of handguns is minimally restricted in vancouver self defense is not considered a valid or legal reason to purchase a handgun concealed weapons are not permitted recreational uses of handguns target shooting collecting are regulated by the province purchase of a handgun requires a restricted weapons permit a permit to carry may be obtained in order to transport the weapon to licensed shooting clubs handguns transported by vehicle must be stored in the trunk in a locked box in short gun control but not unreasonably so both cities aggressively enforce their gun laws convictions for gun related offenses carry similar penalties the researchers studied all cases of robbery assault simple and aggravated burglary and homicides occurring in seattle and vancouver from to in defining the cases they used the same standard the fbi s unified crime report results during the seven year study the annual rate of robbery in seattle was found to be only slightly higher than that in vancouver burglaries occurred at nearly identical rates assaults were recorded in seattle versus in vancouver the risk of being a victim of a simple assault in seattle was found to be only slightly higher than vancouver and the risk of aggravated assault was also slightly higher however when aggravated assaults were subdivided by weapon and the mechanism of assault a clear pattern emerged although both cities reported nearly identical rates of aggravated assault involving knives and other dangerous weapons firearms were far more likely to be used in seattle in fact times as often over the seven year study homicides occurred in seattle per vs homicides in vancouver per after adjustment for differences in age and sex among the populations the relative risk of being a victim of homicide in seattle as compared to vancouver was found to be when homicides were subdivided by the mechanism of death the rate of homicide by knives and other weapons excluding firearms in seattle was found to be almost identical to that in vancouver virtually all of the increased risk of death in seattle was due to a more than fivefold higher rate of homicide by firearms handguns accounted for roughly of homicides involving firearms handguns were times more likely to be used in homicides in seattle than in vancouver the authors of the report also investigated legally justifiable homicides self defense only such homicides occurred during the seven year study of which were committed by police only cases of civilians acting in self defense occurrred in seattle and in vancouver only involved firearms after excluding these cases there was virtually no impact on these earlier findings this is i feel a very fair report one might even make the argument that it is biased against canada as a whole because vancouver reports annual rates of homicide two to three times that of ottawa calgary and toronto while seattle reports annual homicide rates only half to two thirds that of nyc chicago los angeles and houston critics of handgun control always argue that limited legal access to handguns will have little effect on the rates of homicide because persons intent on killing others will only try harder to acquire a gun or will kill by other means this report shows differently if the rate of homicide in a community were influenced more by the strength of intent than by the availability of weapons we could expect the rate of homicides by weapons other than guns to be higher in vancouver than in seattle however during the study interval vancouver s rate of homicide by weapons other than guns was not significantly higher than that in seattle suggesting that few would be assailants switched to homicide by other methods as well ready access to handguns for self defense by law abiding citizens was not endorsed in this report although seattle did experience a higher rate of firearm death for self defense these cases accounted for less than of the homicides in both cities during the course of the study period and as was reported seattle apparently didn t enjoy relief from any crime category over vancouver because citizens may legally arm themselves for self defense heavily quoted source handgun regulation crime assaults and homicide a tale of two cities john h sloan arthur l kellerman donald t reay james a ferris thomas koepsall frederick p rivara charles rice laurel gray and james logerfo stephen manes manes magpie linknet com manes and associates new york ny usa o o
|
9,344 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news steve kao k hprnd rose hp com wrote frank crary posted sure but the difference in per capita crime rates predates the gun control laws the homicide rate in england was a tenth that of america back when anyone in england could buy a gun without any paperwork at all steve manes asks got a citation for this colin greenwood from scotland yard did a study that showed that gun control has had no effect on crime or murder rates in the uk his book firearms controls has been published in london by keegan paul name may be misspelled others dispute that like richard hofstadter america as a gun culture and newton and zimring s firearms and violence in american life but again statistics between too dissimilar cultures are difficult to quantify i don t know how anyone can state that gun control could have no effect on homicide rates there were over accidental handgun homicides in america in most with licensed weapons more american children accidentally shot other children last year than all the handgun homicides in great britain source national safety council please no dictionary arguments about rates vs total numbers okay they re offered for emphasis not comparison if mr greenwood believes that brits are much too sober and coordinated to make such mistakes i d like to introduce him to my friend amanda from brighton i used to have some pretty nice crystal in my place until she moved in i ve gotten used to the snide comments from guests about the clown motif on my rubber wine glasses stephen manes manes magpie linknet com manes and associates new york ny usa o o
|
9,345 |
talk.politics.guns
|
vancouver seattle study critiques open letter by dr paul h blackman research coordinator for nra ila nra official journal dear sir by now we are used to the new england journal of medicine s publication of small scale studies related to firearms from which conclusions are drawn which are quantum leaps from the data followed by announcements of momentus scientific findings these are regularly released to the press without the caveats which riddle the conclusory paragraphs and often accompanied by an editorial calling attention to the findings generally while they at least present a few interesting data however meaningless the studies misinterpret statistics and ignore or belittle serious studies by criminologists the latest effort handgun regulations crime assaults and homicide a tale of two cities by j h sloan et al with the accompanying editorial firearms injuries a call for science by two employees of the centers for disease control november however is an insult to the intelligence of any serious scholar in any field and have so few data and so many flaws that i feel compelled to write at some length to call attention to various major and minor failings in no particular order the authors misleadingly cite wright et al ref to support the statement that some have argued that restricting access to handguns could substantially reduce our annual rate of homicide wright et al in fact studied and rejected that contention the authors pretended that vancouver and seattle are very similar cities with similar economic circumstances histories demographic characteristics and the like in fact the cities are very different with very different demographic characteristics which appear to explain completely the higher homicide rate in seattle both cities are over three forths non hispanic white and the non hispanic white homicide rates are reported to be the same in seattle and vancouver it is the different back grounds problems circumstances and behaviors of the various ethnic minorities which explain the difference in homicide the authors pretend they are evaluating canada s gun law compared to washington state s but they do not examine at all the situation in vancouver prior to the gun law taking effect in as it happens in the three years prior to that vancouver averaged homicides per year one eighth involving handguns ref and in the seven years of the nejm article there were homicides per year one eigth involving handguns surely even the medical profession recognizes that one must look to see the prior situation was before concluding that a change made a difference would a physician conclude that a patient was benefiting from eating oat bran muffin each day for seven years because his cholesterol level was without at least seeing if it was before he started the regimen the authors pick two medium sized cities to evaluate a national gun law nothing can be learned from such a tiny and arbitrarily selected sample seattle appears to have been selected because it was convienient for the authors rather than for any scientific reason would physicians call something a scientific study which involved one experimental subject and one dissimilar control had different arbitrarily selected cities been chosen opposite scientific conclusions would follow vancouver s homicide rate exceeds that of such wild west cities in texas as el paso corpus christi austen and in colorado colorado springs ref the authors fail to clearly demonstrate that firearms or handguns are far more commonly owned in seattle than in vancouver they use two surrogate approaches in pretending to study the availability of firearms handguns the first is an apples and oranges effort to compare the number of carry permits in seattle to the number of registered handguns in vancouver but the number clearly understates the number of handguns in seattle and counts primarily protective handgun owners the second however tells nothing about the number of handguns in vancouver and counts non protective handguns for the most part where is it difficult to obtain handguns legally for protection registration figures are meaningless there are registered handguns in new york city new york daily news sept comparing the two that method suggests about handguns per population in new york city compared to in vancouver meaning vancouver has a greater prevalence of weapons than new york city the second method of measuring gun density is cook s gun prevalence index a previously validated measure of intercity differences but the validation was by cook of his own theory ref normally second opinions are sought from a different doctor more significantly the cook index is based on the average of the percentage of firearms involvement in suicide and homicide so the authors are basically taking a measure of misuse unsurprisingly gun misuse in homicide in seattle in vancouver is related to gun misuse in homicide plus suicide divided by two in seattle in vancouver the authors are not measuring the relative avail ability of firearms or of handguns in seattle and vancouver the authors misstate the laws of both washington and canada they neglect to mention the significant fact that washington has a waiting period and background check prior to the purchase of a handgun and that provisions exist in canadian law for owning and carrying handguns for personal protection the authors also make it appear that it is more difficult to get a handgun legally in canada than is actually the case the authors ignore all other factors which might explain the differences in crime rate beyond some vague mention of the penalities provided by law and the roughest of estimates of clearence for one particular offense homicide involving a firearm there is no measure of the differences in the number of law enforcement officers their aggressiveness in making arrests for gun law violations in the two jurisdictions arrest rates for other offenses conviction rates actual sentences imposed for gun related crimes violent crimes without guns or gun law violations or incarceration rates whereas social scientists would attempt to measure and hold for such differences the authors of the nejm tale of two cities fail even to mention most factors related to crime control the authors dismiss claims that handguns are an effective means for protection unless the criminal is killed such is not the case criminologists ref have found that almost americans annually use handguns for protection from criminals and that using a gun for protection reduces the liklihood that a crime rape robbery assault will be completed by the criminal and reduces the likelihood of injury to the victim it is interesting nonetheless that the authors reported the same number four of civilian justifiable homicides without firearms in each city but that less restrictive seattle accounted for of the reported civilian justifiable homicides involving firearms the centers for disease control which funded the study editorially praised the paper ref saying it applied scientific methods to examine a focus of contention betweeb advocates of stricter regulation of firearms particularly handguns there is nothing in the paper which could possibly be mistaken for scientific methods by a sociologists or criminologists the vancouver seattle study is the equivolent of testing an experimental drug to control hypertension by finding two ordinary looking middle class white males one aged and the other and without first taking their vital signs administering the experimental drug to the year old while giving the year old a placebo then taking their blood pressure and on finding the younger man had a lower blood pressure announcing in a special article a new medical breakthrough it would be nice to think that such a study would neither be funded by the cdc or printed by the nejm since the longstanding anti gun biases of the nejm and the cdc make them willing to present shoddy research as scientific breakthroughs in special articles and editorials relating to firearms we are obligated to correct the record by notifying the news media and those with congressional and executive oversight over the activities of the centers for disease control about the distortions contained in handgun regulations crime assaults and homicides a tale of two cities and firearm injuries a call for science clearly all scientific standards go by the wayside whenever the cdc and the new england journal of medicine seize an opportunity to attack firearms ownership in america references wright jd et al weapons crime and violence in america a literature review and research agenda washington d c department of justice scarff e evaluation of the canadian gun control legislation final report ottawa ministry of the solicitor general of canada p department of justice federal bureau of investigation crime in the united states uniform crime reports washington d c government printing office cook pj the role of firearms in violent crime in wolfgang m weiner na eds criminal violence beverly hills calif sage pp kleck g crime control through the private use of armed force social problems ziegenhagen ea brosnan d victim responses to robbery and crime control policy criminology lizotte aj determinants of completeing rape and assault journal of quantitative criminology sayles sl kleck g rape and resistance paper at the american society of criminology convention chicago mercy ja houk vn firearm injuries a call for science nejm guns and sputter by james d wright from july issue of reason free minds free markets someone once wrote statistics are like a bikini what they real is suggestive but what they conceal is vital the problem is demonstrated by the most recent entry in a long line of scientific research purporting to show a causal link between gun availability and homicide funded by the federal government and published last year in the new england journal of medicine the study compared homicide rates in seattle and vancouver and suggested that a handgun ban may reduce the rate of homicide in a community the nine medical doctors who published handgun regulations crime assaults and homicide essentially reasoned in three steps despite many historical social and demographic similarities vancouver has a markedly lower homicide rate because its stricter gun regulations make guns less available the second step in their reasoning seems indisputable the overall homicide rate in seattle for the period was per popuation compared with in vancouver homicide is definitely more common in seattle the question then becomes why the authors present a believable although not entirely accurate case to support the notion as claimed in the third step of their reasoning that vancouver s handgun regulations are much more stringent but their evidence on the difference in gun availabilty is indirect and unpersuasive indeed they acknowledge that direct evidence on the point does not exist they offer two fragments of inferential data in support of the claim that guns are more available in seattle but for all anybody knows as a matter of empirical fact the opposite could be true we are therefore being asked at the conclusion of the study to believe that a difference in gun availability explains the difference in homicide rates when a difference in gun availability has not itself been established indeed the situation is even more troublesome the first of the two indirect bits of evidence is a difference between the number of concealed weapons permits issued in seattle and the number of restricted weapons permits issued in vancouver differences between the two cities in the permit regulations render these two numbers strictly noncomparable the second bit of evidence is cook s gun prevalence index which stands at percent for seattle but only percent for vancouver cook s index however does not measure the relative prevalence of gun ownership in various cities it measures gun misuse it is an average of the percentage of homicides and suicides involving firearms in the present case the index shows only that in homicides and suicides firearms are more likely to be used in seatte than in vancouver to take cook s index as a measure of general firearms availability it must be assumed that the proportional involvement of guns in homicides and suicides is directly related to their relative availability in the general population but this is exactly what the authors are seeking to prove to assume what one is seeking to prove then to prove it on the basis of that assumption does ot constitute scientific evidence for anything even if we were to grant on the basis of no compelling evidence that guns are less common in vancouver we might still question what causes what the authors attribute seattle s higher crime rate to a higher rate of gun ownership but it might well be argued that low crime or homicide rates reduce the motivation for average citizens to obtain guns in other words that crime rates explain the variation in gun ownership not vice versa in fact it was once commonly argued that great britain s low rate of violent crime was a function of that nation s strict gun laws and the consequent low rate of gun ownership until british researcher colin greenwood found that great britain had enjoyed low rates of violent crime for many decades before strict firearms controls were enacted to invoke an ancient methodological saw correlation is not cause nor do the problems with this study end with its lack of direct data on gun ownership the authors say seattle and vancouver are similar in many ways implying that they differ mainly in gun availability gun law stringency and crime rates this is an evident attempt to establish the ceteris paribus condition of a sound scientific analysis that all else is equal among things being compared clearly the two cities are similar in some ways but a closer look reveals differences in ways that are relevant to their respective crime or homicide rates the cities are closely matched in what percentage of their population is white percent and percent but seattle is about percent black while vancouver is less than percent vancouver s minority population is overwhelmingly asian so although the authors show that th two cities are approximately comparable on a half dozen readily available demographic indicators they have not shown that all potentially relevant sources of variation have been ruled out in fact the differences in racial compositions of the two cities is particularly relevant in light of the study s breakdown of homicide rates according to the race of the victim for the white majority the homicide rates are nearly identical per in seattle in vancouver the differing overall homicide rates in the two cities are therefore due entirely to vastly different rates among racial minorities for blacks the observed difference in homicide rate is to and for hispanics to methodoligical complexities render the asian comparison problematic but it too is higher in seattle than in vancouver racial minorities are much more likely to be the victims of homicide in seattle than in vancouver the white majority is equally likely to be slain in either city since the nearly initial difference in homicide reates between the cities is due exclusively to or differences between minority groups it is fair to ask why postulated difference in gun availability or gun law strigency would matter so dramatically to minorities but not matter at all to whites can differential gun availability explain why blacks and hispanics but not whites are so much more likely to be killed in seattle than in vancouver studies in the united states incidentally do not show large or consistent racial differences in gun ownership or are other explanations more plausible could the disparity between canadian and american rates of poverty among racial minorities have anything to do with it what are the relative rates of drug or alcohol abuse of homelessness among each cty s minority population the city of seattle runs the largest shelter for homeless men west of the mississippi unemployment among young central city nonwhite men in the united states usually exceeds percent what is the comparable canadian percentage the crucial point is that canada and the united states differ in many ways as do cities and population subgroups with the two countries absent more detailed analysis nearly any of these many ways might explain part or all of the difference in homicide rates in gross comparisons such as those between seattle and vancouver all else is not equal the authors of this study acknowledge that racial patterns in homicide result in a complex picture they do not acknowledge that the ensuing complexities seriously undercut the main thrust of their argument they also acknowledge that socio economic status is probably an important confounding factor in our comparison remarking further that blacks in vancouver had a slightly higher mean income in than the rest of vancouver s population given the evidence presented in the article it is possible that all of the difference in homicide rates between seattle and vancouver results from greater proverty among seattle s racial minorities but the authors pay no further attention to this possibility since detailed information about household incomes according to race is not available for vancouver the largely insurmountable methodological difficulties confronted in gross comparative studies of this sort can be illustrated with as simple example if one were to take all u s couties and compare them in terms of pervalence of gun ownership and crime or homicide rates one would find an astonishing pattern counties with more guns have less crime would one conclude from this evidence alone that guns actually reduce crime or would one insist that other variables also be taken into account in this example the hidden variable is city size guns are more common in small towns and rural areas whereas crime is a big city problem if researchers failed to anticipate this variable or lacked the appropriate data to examine its possible consequences they coud be very seriously misled in the study at hand the authors matched two cities for size but not for minority poverty rates or other hidden variables and their results are impossible to interpret in the editorial firearm injuries a call for science accompanying the study two officials from the centers for disease control lauded the authors for applying scientific methods to a problem of grave public heath significance but in attempting to draw causal conclusions from nonexperimental research the essence of scientific method is to anticipate plausible alternative explanations for the results and try to rule them out absent such effort the results may well seem scientific but are little more than polemics masquerading as serious research that this study is but one of a number of recent efforts all employing practical identical research designs and published in leading scientific journals is cause for further concern james d wright is professor of sociology at tulane university he has researched extensively on the relationship of firearms and crime reason published monthly except combined august september issue by the reason foundation a nonprofit tax exempt organization subscription rate per year reason foundation ocean park blvd suite santa monica ca
|
9,346 |
talk.politics.guns
|
waco dates are these coincidental the atf agent interviewed on street stories reported that the raid was ill planned and went ahead even when they the bd s knew the atf was coming why i believe this raid was ill planned because they only had days to plan it and it was continued when failure was obvious because it had a bit part in the much larger political agenda of president clinton i would even suggest that the loss of atf agents is inconsequential in this the context of his political agenda it might even be beneficial to his agenda as it helps point up just how evil these assualt weapons are further proof might be that the atf denied their agents street stories report requests for sufficient fire power important dates feb th nj assembly votes to overturn assault weapon ban feb th compound in waco attacked on feb th the new jersey assembly voted to overturn the assault weapon ban in that state it looked like it might be a tight vote but the senate in n j was going to vote to overturn the ban it would not sit well to have an eastern state overturn an assault weapon ban given clintons stated agenda on gun control i suspect clinton gave the order to get someone or some group with assualt weapons and have the press present they were initially at the incident in waco to record the event for the tv audience the agent on street stories reported that a supervisor was urging them all to get ready fast as they know we are coming i believe this attack continued even tho the probablility of failure was high because it came from the top down after the n j assembly vote the atf had a limited amount of time to come up with something and the wackos in waco fit the bill nicely rich
|
9,347 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gov t break ins re minutes aj cleveland freenet edu pat weber writes ever notice that people in these cases are always described by clever handles such as eccentric religious wackos gun nuts cultists survivalists etc so the general public will not identify with them the san jose mercury news described him as a year old retired chemical engineer john nagle
|
9,348 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes hambidge bms com wrote in article c psog c magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes rate per capita rate the uk is more dangerous though you may be less likely to be killed by a handgun the average individual citizen in the uk is twice as likely to be killed by whatever means as the average swiss would you feel any better about being killed by means other than a handgun i wouldn t what an absurd argument switzerland is one fifth the size of the uk with one eigth as many people therefore at any given point on swiss soil you are more likely to be crow bait more importantly you are x as likely to be killed by the next stranger approaching you on a swiss street than in the uk killed by handgun or killed if i m dead i don t much care if it was by being shot or stabbed to death you are betraying your lack of understanding about rate versus total number rates are expressed often as population therefore if a place had deaths and a population of the rate would be a place that had deaths and a population of would hav a rate of the former has a higher rate the latter a higher total you are less likely to die in the latter simple enuff for chrissakes take out your calculator and work out the numbers here i ve preformatted them for you to make it easier handgun homicides population switzerland uk and then tell me again how switzerland is safer with a more liberal handgun law than the uk is without by rate or total number your choice stephen manes manes magpie linknet com manes and associates new york ny usa o o i don t think you can get an accurate indicator of how safe england is compared to switzerland by concentrating only on handgun murders and completely ignoring murders by other weapons not to mention the rate of other violent crimes if there are more guns in circulation if follows that more people will be killed with them cause they are available to the person intent on committing a crime regardless of whether they have to do it with a gun knife or bare hands the gun control lobby doesn t seem to understand this point if people are intent on committing a crime they will do it with whatever means are available to them aaron arc cco caltech edu
|
9,349 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re waco the militia assembles dumb move the smart move would be to sneak in someone with a tv camera and video transmitter john nagle
|
9,350 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun nuts and holly silva in article c tsd va news cso uiuc edu irvine uxh cso uiuc edu brent irvine writes in article apr mnemosyne cs du edu rcanders nyx cs du edu mr nice guy writes both the gun nuts and the gays are aggressively defensive and quite hostile to any one trying to deprive them of their rights just like any group trying to protect their rights the fallacy of this whole thing is that your rights are not in jeapardy by these posts how can you say that i presume that you mean that talking about restricting rights is not the same as restricting those rights well arguing for those restrictions may lead to implementation much the same way as assault can lead to battery legal definitions most t p g people and the homosexual groups won t even discuss the subject at all in a polite form the mere raising of a question as to why the rights are there or what exactly the right encompasses bring shrill posts and angry hostile traffic well i can t speak for the homosexuals but i ve seen alot of polite discussion on t p g please everyone don t take this guy s word or mine for that matter on it read t p g for a while and try to determine from which direction most of the flameage originates if you post without flamebait you will generally receive reasoned responses true there are those who tend to lose their tempers quickly as there are on all newsgroups but they really do feel their rights are in jeopardy oh and neat trick talking derisively about another newsgroup while not crossposting to allow them to defend themselves i think a lot of t p g people have very thin skin when it comes to discussing these subjects methinks you doth protest too much dave schabel dave schabel opinions and comments contained herein are mine and schabel calspan com do not necessarilly reflect those of calspan corp or located in western ny its customers
|
9,351 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re aclu was re waco shootout jmd cube handheld com jim de arras writes in article mar news cs indiana edu paul hager hagerp cs indiana edu writes as an old post of mine came up in a collection of posts about the aclu s position on gun control i would like to note that my own position has been evolving but i m still not sure how to answer the question does the nd allow me to have my own nuclear device the second amendment does not prohibit it but it can probably be argued that there is no way you can operate one without severely impacting on the safety and rights of others and so might not be permitted on that basis the existence of the weapon in and of itself and this is also true for biologics and chemical weapons but for slightly different reasons poses a threat to living critters can you say neutron and other radiation flux due to radioactive decay boys and girls aaron arc cco caltech edu
|
9,352 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re important holly silva information in article pkojminnmuq cae cad gatech edu vincent cad gatech edu vincent fox writes in a separate post over on soc culture usa she explicitly said that while she cross posts to t p g and sets follow ups to there she does not read talk politics guns if you think about it it s a clever way of keeping some of the politer respondents who will edit their newsgoup line or properly use the follow up from being heard over there it also makes it easier for her to claim all she ever sees is squeaky weasels so if you want her to see your insiteful analysis e mail it if you want to point out her flaws in public make sure your newsgroup line includes soc culture usa to keep from flooding s c u i e mailed it however i agree that it s quite the sneaky trick no more than i would expect however cdt rocket sw stratus com if you believe that i speak for my company or cdt vos stratus com write today for my special investors packet
|
9,353 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re atf suspects drug lab in compound in article mar mnemosyne cs du edu rcanders nyx cs du edu mr nice guy writes a associated press news story reports in other developments saturday david troy intelligence chief for the atf confirmed reports that authorities suspected the cult had a methamphetamine lab he said evidence of possible drug activity surfaced late in the atf investigation of the cult s gun dealings wow the scope of the mission of the atf continues to expand besides alcohol tobacco and firearms they now seem to be involded in child protective services drug enforcement and tax evasion they look to be on the road to being the nations boys in blue no knock in one hand m in the other zeik heil lance lance w bledsoe lwb im u cs utexas edu ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free
|
9,354 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re threatening gun owners in article blue cis pitt edu gswst cislabs pitt edu gary s wachs writes hello i m writing a story on the future of gun control there are a few points i would welcome your opinion on it s wonderful having a resource like this newsgroup to take advantage of and i thank you in advance for your feedback what do you believe are the most serious threats to gun owners in the future the government liberals batf fbi dea etc see are you concerned that the nd ammendment could be reinterpreted to apply to the armed forces only barring civilians from owning arms of any kind well contributions taxes abortion elimination of fetal tissue clinton president faggot spouse it could happen if you did have control over what types of arms people would be allowed to buy which types would you feel compelled to restrict to military uses only ie bazooka m grenade atomic bomb etc hydrogen bomb perhaps would you describe hci and all other gun control activists as being determined to make it illegal for a civilian to own or use a firearm yep have you personally read the brady bill in its entirety yep thank again gary lance w bledsoe lwb im u cs utexas edu ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free
|
9,355 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re waco shootout highlights total irresponsibility of the in a previous article irvine uxh cso uiuc edu brent irvine says come on guys looks like its time to move that juvenile public post either to e mail or to a different newsgroup alt sex bondage holly silva no brent that would be alt sex bondage holly silva goofy anti semite if you were smarter you d have these opinions
|
9,356 |
talk.politics.guns
|
tx senator bob krueger rtkba statement for those of you interested i just finished talking with a representative of senator bob krueger s reelection campaign about his position on the rtkba krueger was appointed by the democratic governor of texas to complete lloyd bentsen s unexpired term the representative said that senator krueger did not have a position and would only comment on specific legislation that was pending no comment was available on the various versions of the brady bill be warned and vote accordingly
|
9,357 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re govs florio wilder hit airwaves in support of brady bill in article apr r node hub org ndallen r node hub org nigel allen writes here is a press release from handgun control inc it is ironic that jim and i are observing this march in a country that finds america s level of gun violence not only unacceptable but unbelievable said mrs brady chair of handgun control inc so where was she and would she consider staying there cdt rocket sw stratus com if you believe that i speak for my company or cdt vos stratus com write today for my special investors packet
|
9,358 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re i believe in gun control in article apr news duc auburn edu bixledn eng auburn edu writes in article cbnews cb att com lvc cbnews cb att com larry cipriani writes no you haven t read it very closely it says you may answer no if your civil rights have been restored that can be done either by the feds or a a state i think the feds stopped doing this for those convicted of violent felonies at least a dozen states still restore a felons civil rights some immediately upon release some after a waiting period i will post a list of the states later a quick question then larry if a person s civil rights have been restored then are they still considered a felon good question i don t know what the law considers them imo if rights have been restored then it makes sense to me that the record of the felony and everything else has been purged and the person in question is no longer a felon i believe this is what happens in some states larry cipriani l v cipriani att com
|
9,359 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re lavishly funded gun epidemic propaganda campaign to commence in article c txek fcq magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes morris the cat rats cbnewsc cb att com wrote well as neal knox of the firearms coalition points out the full force of the anti gun ruling class their multi millions their polling organizations their schools their news media their entertainment media the entertainment media a force of the anti gun ruling class is this the same media that s made billions producing films and television that glorify guns and gun users or is that another anti gun media you ve got to be kidding by this do you mean that you consider it absolutely impossible for the media to be guilty of hypocrisy note that the film industry in california traded their political support for an assault weapon ban in the state for an amendment to the bill exempting the entertainment industry from that very ban note that the very issue of the batman comic book seduction of the gun that was produced as a tool for gun control organizations carries a back page ad for a terminator ii video game extolling the numerous and varied sophisticated weapons available to the player note that arthur ochs sulzberger publisher of the ny times one of the oldest and most incessant gun control grinders himself carries a concealed handgun still you find it completely incredible that these folks live by the aphorism do as i say and not as i do cdt rocket sw stratus com if you believe that i speak for my company or cdt vos stratus com write today for my special investors packet
|
9,360 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re govs florio wilder hit airwaves in support of brady bill in article apr ucsu colorado edu fcrary ucsu colorado edu frank crary writes in article apr msc cornell edu srussell msc cornell edu stephen russell writes obguns i m moving to arizona everyone carries guns there if i don t what are the approximate probabilities that i ll get shot by the end of six months under in assuming fbi statistics are meaningfull of course if you re a criminal or hang around with criminals or flash large wads of cash in the wilder parts of town or utter verbal bigotry in the right public places your chances of being shot are much higher avoiding these behaviors on the other hand decreases your chances of being shot something like of all murders are criminals killing criminals over of murders are committed by people with a prior known history of violence simplistic moral suitable for my three year old and most inane posters bad people do bad things repeatedly kirk hays nra life seventh generation the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing edmund burke
|
9,361 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re waco dates are these coincidental richard cower cower csli stanford edu wrote i believe this raid was ill planned because they only had days to plan it and it was continued when failure was obvious because it had a bit part in the much larger political agenda of president clinton i would even suggest that the loss of atf agents is inconsequential in this the context of his political agenda it might even be beneficial to his agenda as it helps point up just how evil these assualt weapons are further proof might be that the atf denied their agents street stories report requests for sufficient fire power important dates feb th nj assembly votes to overturn assault weapon ban feb th compound in waco attacked on feb th the new jersey assembly voted to overturn the assault weapon ban in that state it looked like it might be a tight vote but the senate in n j was going to vote to overturn the ban it would not sit well to have an eastern state overturn an assault weapon ban given clintons stated agenda on gun control i suspect clinton gave the order to get someone or some group with assualt weapons and have the press present they were initially at the incident in waco to record the event for the tv audience the agent on street stories reported that a supervisor was urging them all to get ready fast as they know we are coming i believe this attack continued even tho the probablility of failure was high because it came from the top down after the n j assembly vote the atf had a limited amount of time to come up with something and the wackos in waco fit the bill nicely rich i don t know rich last year when the congress was debating the bushmans crime bill the incident at lubys cafe occured most of the anti gun crap was amended out of the bill anyway could a president order go find some assault weapons and bring the media i hope not frankly the toon meister scares me of course having a democratic majority in congress doesn t help apologies to all demos who support rkba definition toon meister a characatureic name for the current president of the u s clinton aka clintoon aka toon meister rob p
|
9,362 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re nra fucks up bigtime in article apr cbnewse cb att com doctor cbnewse cb att com patrick b hailey writes in article slagle mar sgi msd lmsc lockheed com slagle lmsc lockheed com writes in article xw twyl dixie com jgd dixie com john de armond writes no actually i m a lot more familiar with the libbers than i care to be i m a bit hesitant to continue this thread because it brings back horrible memories of my first encounter with the libbers in the larouche branch i made the mistake of buying a any connection between lyndon larouche and the libertarian party is a pure product of your own fertile imagination naw perhaps he reads time magazine it s a fair stretch of anyone s imagination to expect them to attach any credibility to anything written in time magazine in the past twenty years i d imagine the enquirer at least gets the names attached to the right body parts mark mark e slagle po box slagle lmsc lockheed com sunnyvale ca usa
|
9,363 |
talk.politics.guns
|
ffl gunsmithing questions i have a few questions i d like to ask first how would someone me be able to get a dealers license and second besides dear old departed gramp s where would i find a good place to learn gunsmithing all replies appreciated john
|
9,364 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news in article c tr m eqw magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes on the other hand we can draw lessons from neighbors who are more culturally similar namely the canadians i don t think such a canada is any more culturally similar to the united states than england in terms of laws regarding individual rights restrictions on police searches etc all closely related to crime canadian laws parallel england s and differ greatly from those of the united states in fact an exhaustive seven year study has already been done of the respective crime rates of vancouver british columbia and seattle washington cities with roughly the same population urban economy geography and crime but with decidedly different approaches to gun control actually they do not have roughly the same urban economy and extremely different ethnic composition over the seven year study homicides occurred in seattle per vs homicides in vancouver per after adjustment for differences in age and sex among the populations the relative risk of being a victim of homicide in seattle as compared to vancouver was found to be however if you account for economic and ethnic differences the difference disappears completely seattle s minorities are predominatly poor while vancouver s are middle or upper class the rates for whites in both cities were found to be identicle while the rate for poor seattle minorities was almost three times as great as for the well to do minorities of vancouver the pattern seems to be one of poverty and race relations not one of gun control the authors of the report also investigated legally justifiable homicides self defense only such homicides occurred during the seven year study of which were committed by police only cases of civilians acting in self defense occurrred that is a gross distortion self defense does not mean killing the attacker there were cases of civilians killing their attacker in self defence but such cases represent less that of the crimes prevented by armed self defence for every case you cite there were over other cases of self defence where the crime was prevented but the attacker was not killed by the way is the most conservative possible figure based on the national crime survey s estimate of crimes prevented by armed self defence each year most other studies on the subject put the figure at to those figures would imply less than of sucessful self defences involve killing the attacker so more correctly there over possibly as many as cases of civilians acting in self defence only of which resulted in the death of the attacker this is a significant factor in comparison to the homicides if memory serves homicides make up approximately of the violent crimes the study considered so the fair comparison would be homicides prevented and homicides clearly the study can not be close to accurate since it ignored these cases of self defence frank crary cu boulder
|
9,365 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re bill blame america first clinton strikes again jeddi next pg wam umd edu anheuser busch writes this argument sounds very stupid if the ability to make guns from simple metalworking was easy then drug dealers would make their own wouldn t they why spend hundreds of dollars buying a gun that somebody else made cheap and is selling it to you at an exorbitant markup the simple truth of the matter is that regardless of how easy it is to make guns banning guns will reduce the the number of new guns and seriuosly impede the efforts of a killer intent on buying a weapon to show why the tools argument is the silliest i have ever seen take an analogy from computer science almost every computer science major can write a wordprocessor yet we comp sci majors would willingly pay to bucks for a professional software like wordperfect why don t we just all write our own software because it is highly inconvinient same with guns secondly how does one get this gunpowder for the home made gun take a quick trip to the local eleven if guns were really that simple to make the bosnian muslims would be very happy people or is it the case that metalworking tools are banned in bosnia deep sarcasm well this is my two cents i will now resume reading all these ridiculus post from people who must make their living doing stand up comedy end of forwarded material and so the rubber spheroid arced beneath the brilliant lights headed for a hoop of dreams he d dreamt of all those nights the crowd gasped as the ball descended would it grant their fondest wish there was no doubt in casey s mind he knew it was a swish
|
9,366 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re fwd free nra membership offer andy sail stanford edu andy freeman writes the nra supports anyone who s pro gun and has a chance of winning election regardless of their other positions is it their fault that some drug legalizers are anti gun is it their fault that the drug legalizers who are pro gun can t get elected it s not the nra s fault but it is something to consider if you are considering contributing to the nra if candidate b is a complete asshole whose only saving grace is that he opposes unnecessary restrictions on firearms i wouldn t want my membership dues funding efforts to get him re elected i have other problems with the nra as an organization the individual members i ve met have been loyal trustworthy honest brave etc especially my boss who probably reads this newsgroup b they are definitely pro hunting and i recall seeing a pro desert storm nra bumper sticker sometimes they come on too strong in the political arena which contributes to their reputation as bad guys amoung many people tom swiss tms cs umd edu born to die keep your laws off my brain what s so funny bout peace love and understanding nick lowe this sig contains no animal products and was not tested on animals i would feel more optimistic about a bright future for man if he spent less time proving that he can outwit nature and more time tasting her sweetness and respecting her seniority e b white
|
9,367 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re the usual kendall lds loral com colin kendall writes i just heard some anti gun control people giving the usual arguments it s everyone s right to bear arms and the way to solve the problem of people getting killed by guns is better law enforcement it strikes me that this argument could be logically extended as follows a nuclear weapon is an arm hence anyone has a right to have nuclear weapons and if someone uses his nuclear weapons to blow up new york l a and chicago that s okay as long as we have a good police force capable of finding him and putting him in jail which will serve as a deterrent to others do any anti gun control people disagree with this and if so why yes i am pro gun and yes i do disagree with this statement nuclear weapons in and of themselves are dangerous radioactive decay of plutonium and uranium as well as the tritium in the weapon tends to be somewhat dangerous to living things can you say neutron flux plus these things have no self defense purposes it s kinda hard to justify their use as a militia weapon when at best they are meant for battlefield use low yield weapons or at worst for industrial target obliteration translation cities and population centers not to mention that for it to be used as a militia weapon and expect the user to live requires some sort of launch vehicle aaron arc cco caltech edu
|
9,368 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news in article c tshu ew magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes that s all very well and good but i was refering to all homocides not just ones involving handguns what is this fixation on death by shooting as if it were somehow worse than death by stabbing what relevance are all homicides in this debate the issue is guns not baseball bats no the issue is reducing crime not guns if gun control doesn t lower crime overall then is doesn t address the issue even a simpleton knows that he stands a better chance of surviving an attack with a baseball bat does that matter if assaults with a baseball bat become much more common muggers using a gun rely primarily on the threat of the gun and rarely shoot their victim a mugger using a knife is much more likely to start by stabbing his victim in an effort incapacitate him so while a knif may not be as deadly as a gun criminals are more likely to actually use the knife as opposed to threatening the victim with it it isn t at all clear that replacing the criminal s gun with a knife would reduce murders stabbings might just become more common that s why it is important to look at the overall not the with gun homicide rate it avoids the issue of substitution different criminal techinques of using different weapons etc and measures what we want to prevent murders as for knives see my earlier post i d much rather face a knife than a gun thanks face possibly however facing knife welding attackers isn t too common stabbing without warning and by supprise is the usual tactic very few criminals shoot from cover it attracts to much attention and they don t have a chance to go through your pockets overall i d much rather be threatened with a gun than actually stabbed with a knife fortunately the best defense against a knife isn t another knife anyone trained in unarmed self defense won t have much of a problem disarming a knife assailant untrained in knife assault which probably means of knife assailants actually the exact same statement is true of guns training in unarmed self defence will let you disarm an untrained gunman without much problem you also ignore the criminal s reaction the national crime survey clearly shows that criminals unarmed armed with a knife gun or whatever are unwilling to risk their lives in a confrontation if faced with a serious threat almost all prefer to leave and find an easier target therefore using or threatening to use as is much more commonly the case a weapon is the best defence against an attacker regardless of how he is armed knives however are much less effective than guns criminals don t consider knifes as a serious threat nearly as often as they do guns frank crary cu boulder
|
9,369 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news in article c u x fw magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes i don t know how anyone can state that gun control could have no effect on homicide rates i don t think anyone is arguing that there would be no effect but there would be no net positive effect you also have to consider the negative side law abiding citizens armed with fireamrs pistols for the most part prevent between national crime survey and dr kleck crimes each year those are the extremes most studies find the number to be to about of those crimes are homicides so private ownership of firearms saves approximately lives each year there are roughly criminal homicides and fatal accidents involving guns each year for there to be any net benefit you would have to show that gun control measures would disarm over of the criminals currently using guns that would be very hard to do according the the federal batf only of criminals buy their guns over the counter since gun control laws by their very nature only effect legal sales such a law would remove all the benefits of armed law abiding citizens while having only a minimal effect on armed criminals who by and large get their guns illegally that doesn t sound like a net benefit to me there were over accidental handgun homicides in america in most with licensed weapons since most were with licensed weapons i assume you are not supporting reasonable laws i e waiting periods background checks licenses etc since only a complete ban would alter the statistic you refer to i assume that s what you are supporting by the way people dies in from falling down stairs accidental handgun deaths isn t significant next to other household accidents more american children accidentally shot other children last year than all the handgun homicides in great britain children under the age of died by drowning from drinking poisonous household chemicals like drano from falls if the real goal is to reduce the tragic accidental deaths of children wouldn t a ban on drain cleaners be a better palce to start or perhaps restricting ownership to professionals like plumbers please no dictionary arguments about rates vs total numbers okay they re offered for emphasis not comparison while you might call it emphasis refering to completely two statistics in the same sentence implies a comparison if it isn t valid and you put the numbers together to convince people you are right the kindest thing i could call it is propaganda frank crary cu boulder
|
9,370 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news in article c tm h ecf magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes you are betraying your lack of understanding about rate versus total number rates are expressed often as population therefore if a place had deaths and a population of the rate would be a place that had deaths and a population of would hav a rate of the former has a higher rate the latter a higher total you are less likely to die in the latter simple enuff for chrissakes take out your calculator and work out the numbers here i ve preformatted them for you to make it easier handgun homicides population switzerland uk and then tell me again how switzerland is safer with a more liberal handgun law than the uk is without by rate or total number your choice because there are about homicides total i e using guns knives tire irons baseball bats bare hands etc in switzerland each year and homicides total in england that s three times worse per capita in england than in switzerland since dead is dead it really doesn t matter that of the switz murders involved a gun or that only of the english murderers do frank crary cu boulder
|
9,371 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re bill blame america first clinton strikes again in article news duke edu eyc acpub duke edu emil chuck writes this argument sounds very stupid if the ability to make guns from simple metalworking was easy then drug dealers would make their own wouldn t they they do according the the los angeles police department illegal manufacture is one the three primary sources of machine guns and submachine guns used in crimes sumggling and theft from the police and military being the other two washington d c police have stated that if i m remembering the figure correctly of the guns they conficate were illegally built why spend hundreds of dollars buying a gun that somebody else made cheap and is selling it to you at an exorbitant markup it takes about hours and a few tools to make one at least one of reasonable quality unless the drug dealer enjoyes messing around on a lathe say as a hobby he s going to have to pay someone anyway materials plus six hours of a machinist s time for something legal would run about the blackmarket prices for guns are usually in the to range at least those few i ve seen cited in newspaper articles were the simple truth of the matter is that regardless of how easy it is to make guns banning guns will reduce the the number of new guns and seriuosly impede the efforts of a killer intent on buying a weapon washington d c has a total ban on handguns and prohibits assembled rifles within city limits it s homicide rate is almost ten times the national average it is also illegal for a d c resident to drive to the virginia or maryland suburbs and buy a gun dealers are required by federal law to check ids and make sure the buyer isn t from another state so the ban can not be easily side stepped to show why the tools argument is the silliest i have ever seen take an analogy from computer science almost every computer science major can write a wordprocessor yet we comp sci majors would willingly pay to bucks for a professional software like wordperfect why don t we just all write our own software because it is highly inconvinient sure but it you couldn t buy one you would write your own in fact people did write their own years ago more likely you would find a friend who was a particularly good programer and get him give you a copy of his software is a very bad example for your case how many people do you know with illegal copies of word processors if people want something and it isn t available or affordable legally they will usually get it illegally same with guns quite secondly how does one get this gunpowder for the home made gun the formula has been around for half a million years or are you going to restrict sales of sulpher charcoal and saltpeter that s alot cruder than modern smokless powder but it works very well the only real problems are a reduction in energy so a magnum would only be as deadly as a mm and it makes alot more smoke of course a smart black marketeer could just make the gun in mm and steal the ammunition from the police the police are often corruptable and things are known to disappear from police evidence rooms and armories and reappear on the streets if guns were really that simple to make the bosnian muslims would be very happy people or is it the case that metalworking tools are banned in bosnia deep sarcasm perhaps you weren t watching the news two years ago but the serbs also tried to invade slovinia they were driven out after a few weeks by partisans armed with home made anti tank weapons the afghan rebels frequently made their own rifles frank crary cu boulder
|
9,372 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gov t break ins re minutes on a los angeles radio station last weekend the lawyers for the family of the murdered rancher said that the los angeles sheriff s department had an assessment done of the rancher s property before the raid this strongly implies that the sheriff s department wanted the property any drugs which were not found were only an excuse in viet nam lt calley was tried and convicted of murder because his troops in a war setting deliberately killed innocent people it is time that the domestic law enforcement agencies in this country adhere to standards at least as moral as the military s greed killed the rancher possibly greed killed the davidian children government greed it is time to prosecute the leaders who perform these invasions fred franceschi these are my own opinions
|
9,373 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news j spencer j m spencer newcastle ac uk wrote manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes jim de arras jmd cube handheld com wrote last year the us suffered almost wrongful or accidental deaths by handguns alone fbi statistics in the same year the uk suffered such deaths scotland yard statistics the population of the uk is about that of the us weighted for population the us has x as many handgun related deaths as the uk and no the brits don t make up for this by murdering x as many people with baseball bats snip if you examine the figures they do stabbing is favourite closely followed by striking punching kicking many more people are burnt to death in britain as are shot to death take at look and you ll see for yourself it means that very few people are shot to death in great britain stephen manes manes magpie linknet com manes and associates new york ny usa o o
|
9,374 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news jim de arras jmd cube handheld com wrote in article c u x fw magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes i don t know how anyone can state that gun control could have no effect on homicide rates there were over accidental handgun homicides in america in most with licensed weapons more american children accidentally shot other children last year than all the handgun homicides in great britain source national safety council please no dictionary arguments about rates vs total numbers okay they re offered for emphasis not comparison you re a great debater you chose your sources of information claim them to be superior i ve made no such claim please direct my attention towards any posting of mine where i claimed superior sources of information it s probably because i bothered to post any references at all while others seem content to post numbers pulled from the ozone that you ve confused it with fact twisting if so i apologize then take those twisted numbers and twist them further by trying well then here s fair opportunity for you to prove that i ve twisted numbers on what grounds do you contradict those references do you have any citations any sources of your own that i can take similar gratuitous shots at to compare absolute numbers between two countries that have major population differences the usa and gb and then whine that you are afraid someone might attack your process and so claim the numbers are for emphasis not comparison emphasis of what nitpicking and scolding is a whiney debating style jim anything else is blowing smoke you seddit brudda stephen manes manes magpie linknet com manes and associates new york ny usa o o
|
9,375 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re a universal right to bear arms not nathan laplace biology yale edu nathan f janette writes in article apr a cs okstate edu kennejs a cs okstate edu kennedy james scot writes gary ke zv uucp gary coffman writes in article apr cs yale edu nathan laplace biology yale edu writes in article c sk w lsr ms uky edu miles ms uky edu stephen d grant writes nathan laplace biology yale edu nathan f janette writes i suppose that s true if you maintain that ak s and ar s are hunting weapons i think they are fun to plink cans targets random vc with but not suitable for real hunting wrong both are legal to hunt with here in kentucky i have a picture of a friend with a nice point buck which he shot with his ar rifle i don t think many deer hunters would condone your friends choice of rifle i must agree with nathan as a deer hunter i find it inhumane to use underpowered weapons for deer hunting to kill cleanly with the little requires extremely good marksmanship most hunting situations don t allow for perfect shots hunters should use sufficiently powerful weapons to drop the deer with a single hit to the chest the x from the aks or sks is adequate to this task having similar ballistics to the familiar but the little is very marginal in the hands of the expert or the lucky it will do but hunters really should have more respect for their quarry gary i ll agree that the popular gr loading for rem is too small for deer sized game however if you use a gr semi spritzer or the sierra gr semi pointed bullet this would be suitable like any round you keep your shots within a reasonable range it would still be on the lower end of what i d consider acceptable performance especially those long distance shots out west hunting monster mule deer the rem has been declared legal for deer hunting in oklahoma the is excellent for varmit hunting and pest control the ar in particular is well suited given its heavy barrel and heat shielded foregrip add a high power scope and you re in dog heaven however i don t think nathan janette was refering to the specific chambering of the rifle in question maybe he thinks self loading rifles have no place in deer hunting that may or may not be his opinion but many sportsmen do use self loading rifles and shotguns wrongo nra man i was definitely referring to the round not the auto loading aspect of the rifle i have no problem with responsible hunting that doesn t include machine guns from choppers but a semi is fine my uncle has bagged several deer with gauge slugs i would prefer that a hunter use as much of the catch as possible and i don t condone hunting for sport only imho of course two questions you asserted that both the ar and ak are not suitable for real hunting if you have no problem with hunting or using self loading rifles for hunting why did you say this if not for deer then what about other smaller game when did i get the nickname nra man notice i have never referred to you as janette which you don t seem to like do i get any super powers like spider man or powdered toast man scott kennedy brewer patriot and now nra man defender of truth justice and the nd amendment kennejs a cs okstate edu
|
9,376 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gov t break ins re minutes in article apr pasadena dc bofa com franceschi pasadena dc bofa com writes on a los angeles radio station last weekend the lawyers for the family of the murdered rancher said that the los angeles sheriff s department had an assessment done of the rancher s property before the raid the briefing documents for the raid had a notation on them about a similar local property which had sold for prior to the raid if recent tv coverage can be believed this strongly implies that the sheriff s department wanted the property any drugs which were not found were only an excuse the ventura county da came to the same conclusion in the report he released which lambasted the sheriff s office too bad the old man was nearly blind and didn t take a few goose stepping drug warriors tm with him kirk hays nra life seventh generation the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing edmund burke
|
9,377 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re a universal right to bear arms not rats cbnewsc cb att com morris the cat writes wrong again but if you want proof turn on your tv and look for a show starring chuck connors it was called the rifleman time how fast he can fire that old lever action rifle believe it or not i remember seeing an advertisement for someone selling one of these apparently winchester produced a bunch of these commercially to commemorate the television show i believe it was being sold as a handgun because of the barrel length and lack of a stock i might be mistaking the above weapon for the gun used by steve mcqueen in wanted dead or alive if so sorry did winchester make any commemorative models of the rifle used by chuck connors in the movie chuck connors was an nra member before he died recently i don t know for sure if winchester made any commemeratives if i recall correctly the rifle itself was a model with an oversized loop lever i don t think winchester makes this rifle any more rossi make a model look alike in special and magnum aaron arc cco caltech edu
|
9,378 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re aclu was re waco shootout paul hager hagerp cs indiana edu writes the nd amendment does say keep and bear if bear is defined to mean carry then most people are physically unable to carry a several hundred pound nuclear device as i understand it sub kiloton nuclear demolitions are man portable and carried in a backpack as i recall in the s the kennedy administration had sub kiloton nuclear weapons withdrawn from europe and destroyed they were man portable and made for use in shoulder mount rocket launchers the smallest nuclear test i ve seen data for was a yes one tenth kiloton weapon tested either in the late s or early s aaron arc cco caltech edu
|
9,379 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gov t break ins re minutes in article apr pasadena dc bofa com franceschi pasadena dc bofa com writes in viet nam lt calley was tried and convicted of murder because his troops in a war setting deliberately killed innocent people it is time that the domestic law enforcement agencies in this country adhere to standards at least as moral as the military s no lt calley was later acquitted his troops killed people including kids elderly and women i sure don t want to see the domestic law enforcement agencies in this country adhere to those military standards if they did we re all in big trouble the my lai massacre was covered up by high ranking officials and all who were involved were acquitted minh minh lang software engineer jet propulsion laboratory instrumentation systems group instrumentation section note my employer has nothing to do with what i said here
|
9,380 |
talk.politics.guns
|
none in article apr dosgate nigel allen canrem com nigel allen writes here is a press release from handgun control inc sarah brady calls on governor to veto nra bill bayh urged to follow clinton s lead to state desk contact cheryl brolin of handgun control inc washington april in a letter today to indiana gov evan bayh sarah brady wife of former white house press secretary james brady and chair of handgun control inc called on the governor to veto nra backed preemption legislation s b which would wipe out existing local gun laws and prohibit localities from enacting future regulations governing the sale possession or transfer of firearms i m counting on gov bayh to show the same kind of political courage president clinton showed as governor of arkansas when he twice vetoed this type of special interest legislation mrs brady said referring to clinton s veto of nra backed preemption bills in and i knew that cutie would sell us out full blooded democrat he is seriously folks if it can happen here remember we all got gun racks on our x s it can happen anywhere now to get that letter ready dear cutie as one who didn t vote for you i can sincerely say i am unhappy nigel allen toronto ontario canada nigel allen canrem com canada remote systems toronto ontario those who know what s best for us must try to save us from ourselves rush jason alley the opinions expressed were given to me earlham college richmond in by aliens living in my pancreas alleyja yang earlham edu the empire never ended
|
9,381 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re the usual hollombe polymath tti com the polymath writes the possession of nuclear arms actually weapons grade fissionables is currently regulated only by market forces i e to own them you have to either make them buy them or steal them the only thing that stops you is the staggering cost more than most nations can afford the fact that no one who has them wants to sell to you and the tight security maintained on existing stocks just ask saddam hussein i was under the impression that to obtain fissionable materials i e plutonium or reactor weapons grade uranium one was required to obtain a federal permit to own such materials given a source of fissionables you can build a bomb in your garage with parts from hardware stores and electronic junk supplies you might have to engage in some shady dealings to get the explosive charge but that s trivial compared to getting the plutonium the basic information on the design was declassified years ago and can be dug out of any technical library by a physics grad student actually why bother looking it up from the material we covered last term in weeks of ge ch nuclear chemistry i could derive what it would take to build a bomb and as far as the explosive charge i as a chemist could synthesize a variety of explosives from commonly available chemicals in the garage if i felt like the electronics behind the detonator and the shaped charges are a little trickier however but not impossible using a few tricks of the trade and if i really wanted to be nasty i could include a core of hydrogen and deuterium of course the hardest part is getting the fissionable material to start with and living long enough to put a bomb together plutonium has some nasty properties the polymath aka jerry hollombe m a cdp aka hollombe polymath tti com head robot wrangler at citicorp laws define crime ocean park blvd x police enforce laws santa monica ca citizens prevent crime aaron arc cco caltech edu
|
9,382 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re another nytimes yellow sheet editorial feustel netcom com david feustel writes other uninformed purposefully ignorant gun control ranting deleted thanks to the n r a the a t f is prohibited from researching the effectiveness of using taggants in explosives taggants are a cheap and technologically feasible microscopic additive that would help investigators at crime scenes like the world trade center bombing trace the explosives involved i want this man to tell me how in the hell you can take the explosives used in the wtc bombing considering that the consensus seems to be that the explosive was a fertilizer based one ammonium nitrate to be exact of which about tons disappears per year if i recall the stat correctly i don t have it here just one more disregarding of reality to push a point more bunk deleted aaron arc cco caltech edu
|
9,383 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re waco dates are these coincidental i do not think it is at all unlikely that clinton ro his policy wonk facilitators arranged the waco raid as a display piece for the gun war on the constitution look at what the bush administration did to get material for the drug war on the constitution remember that baggie of crack george waved at the cameras they took a dealer from the ghetto and brought him to the white house so they could say drugs had been dealt onb the white house lawn and i don t think anybody could honestly think clinton would have any moral qualms about the raid the only really worrisome thing is that the bd s heroic defense of their ranch will make clinton s gun war on the constitution more successfull exactly as he wanted the media and politicians will filter this so that the general public will think the bd s are bad guys don t help them stand up for the bd s with your friends and family adnd in public anytime you can their supposed moral qualms are not important to the issue they are heroes in the fight against oppressive government it could just as well have been you watkins earth eecs uic edu brian e watkins
|
9,384 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control proud to be a canuck does anyone really believe the swiss have had no war within their borders because every adult male owns a rifle i m a great admirer of the swiss but years of peace on their turf has zilch to do with gun ownership can you picture hitler with panzers and focke wulfs poised on the border losing sleep over a few thousand expert rifleman sure hitler stayed out of switzerland because the swiss run the money in this world we d do well to emulate them on that and forget about getting more rifles on the street let s disband the nra and start a national investment banking association replete with red and black sticker for the back window of bubba s mercedes we could fire charlton heston and get paul volcker for a spokesman
|
9,385 |
talk.politics.guns
|
questions to ponder the libertarian second amendment caucus in fort collins colorado submitted this as a questionnaire to the city council candidates in the upcoming election as expected very few of the candidates of responded but they know we re watching feel free to use any and all of these questions that strike your fancy or use them as inspiration for your own would you be willing to state in writing that if you are publicly demonstrated to have violated your oath of office you would resign and never run for office again under what circumstances do the rights of the group come before the rights of the individual would you support a city charter amendment prohibiting the city government its officials agents and employees from initiating force against any human being for any reason please put the following list in order of precedence from lowest to highest a city ordinance b city resolution c state law d federal statute e u s constitution f state constitution do you believe that it s appropriate for any city official or employee to be paid more than his or her average private sector constituent do you believe that involuntary contributions are a legitimate means of funding council programs would you support a program recognizing the right of taxpayers to earmark their taxes either as must be used or must not be used for specific programs in the event that the candidate none of the above were to win a city election which option do you believe most appropriate a the candidate with the next highest vote total fills the office b a special election is held to fill the office with none of the previous candidates eligible to run again c let the office remain unfilled and unfunded until the next election d abolish the office please return your questionnaire to address of your choice a signature and date line were added here thank you for taking the time to fill out this questionnaire the questionnaires were sent with self addressed stamped envelopes p s one person did get a perfect score on the questionnaire and no he didn t help write it cathy smith my opinions are of course my own
|
9,386 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control proud to be a canuck in article pqsruinniae hp col col hp com dduff col hp com dave duff writes does anyone really believe the swiss have had no war within their borders because every adult male owns a rifle i m a great admirer of the swiss but years of peace on their turf has zilch to do with gun ownership can you picture hitler with panzers and focke wulfs poised on the border losing sleep over a few thousand expert rifleman sure the swiss population is and well was far larger than that i think your question should be losing sleep over a million expert riflemen certainly he could have conquered switzerland but a million armed militiamen especially in a mountainous area where tanks effectiveness is limited would have made it a real pain the question a conqueror would ask is is it worth the trouble the more difficult an invasion is the more likely the answer would be no certainly a million riflemen as opposed to a professional army of only ten or twenty thousand the best a country the size of switzerland could support makes invasions more difficult hitler stayed out of switzerland because the swiss run the money in this world really in i m not even sure you could prove that today despite the steriotype certainly the swiss bankers were not essential to the german war time economy frank crary cu boulder
|
9,387 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re the usual arc cco caltech edu aaron ray clements writes yes i am pro gun and yes i do disagree with this statement nuclear weapons in and of themselves are dangerous radioactive decay of plutonium and uranium as well as the tritium in the weapon tends to be somewhat dangerous to living things can you say neutron flux can you say i get more background radiation from living in denver or having an office in a limestone building than i do standing next to a power reactor at full power or standing next to a nuclear warhead that is armed look up shielding in your dictionary you don t need six feet of lead to make decent shielding your dead skin cell layer does an excellent job on alpha particles and neutrons are slowed by mere water what do you think of you is plus these things have no self defense purposes it s kinda hard to justify their use as a militia weapon when at best they are meant for battlefield use low yield weapons or at worst for industrial target obliteration translation cities and population centers if the militia has as its job the overthrow of an illegal government they are indeed useful weapons to the militia they won t be too useful in certain areas but leveling the pentagon would be a good thing for said overthrow and it s likely one man carrying a backpack would stand a better chance than one thousand armed with colt peacemakers don t let self defense become the only reason you can have a gun and your sole means of justification myself i won t overthrow my government until it ceases to be my legal government but if i need to i want every weapon i can get one can just as easily say no rifle larger than a is needed to kill a human being they are right when that human being is wearing armor and riding in an apc things get a bit different i don t see where the weapon is a problem it s not only the manner of use is in contention here not to mention that for it to be used as a militia weapon and expect the user to live requires some sort of launch vehicle i guess you either don t have an alarm clock or have never heard the terms timer or martyr either don t forget remote detonation devices that cb radio in the pickup next to you can easily transmit ten miles in decent weather that s out of the blast radius of many portable nuclear devices just what is it about radioactive decay that has you worried dan sorenson dod z dan exnet iastate edu viking iastate edu isu only censors what i read not what i say don t blame them usenet post to exotic distant machines meet exciting unusual people and flame them
|
9,388 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re the usual arc cco caltech edu aaron ray clements writes i was under the impression that to obtain fissionable materials i e plutonium or reactor weapons grade uranium one was required to obtain a federal permit to own such materials no you merely have to start working on yellowcake or else devise a system to get it from other sources btw the doe handles reactor fuel and merely leases it to reactors the nrc certifies these reactors the military have their own sources a private citizen has none of these official sources actually why bother looking it up from the material we covered last term in weeks of ge ch nuclear chemistry i could derive what it would take to build a bomb that s freshman level chemistry big deal can you make it work that s phd level physics big difference and as far as the explosive charge i as a chemist could synthesize a variety of explosives from commonly available chemicals in the garage if i felt like the electronics behind the detonator and the shaped charges are a little trickier however but not impossible using a few tricks of the trade and if i really wanted to be nasty i could include a core of hydrogen and deuterium so you admit that there s no law that could stop you physics aside could you make one if you had the funds and time the answer is yes so do we lock you up now because of this surely you can see where the comparison with anti gun laws comes into play here of course the hardest part is getting the fissionable material to start with and living long enough to put a bomb together plutonium has some nasty properties precisely why it s not as readily utilized as you seem to have been lead to believe btw u is far better for home made bombs than trying to use plutonium the laws of physics make the creation of a device without serious manufacturing facilities very low in probability dan sorenson dod z dan exnet iastate edu viking iastate edu isu only censors what i read not what i say don t blame them usenet post to exotic distant machines meet exciting unusual people and flame them
|
9,389 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re waco shootout highlights total irresponsibility of the in article apr gtephx uucp forda gtephx uucp andrew ford agcs phoenix arizona writes in article pdmgainn f kitty ksu ksu edu strat kitty ksu ksu edu steve davis writes cdt sw stratus com c d tavares writes if she needs a gun right now why doesn t she already have one you are the victim of a cut and run purse snatcher he makes off with your purse containing your id your house keys and your gun so you re saying she can run right into a store buy a gun run back outside and shoot the guy in the back as he runs off this doesn t no he s saying she just lost her gun and she wants to buy another so that as she sits home alone tonight she s not a sitting duck to any bastard who wants to break in in fact the situation is more grim that that even the purse snatcher now has her home address if the woman lives alone she is in great personal danger
|
9,390 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re washington state in article mar synapse bms com hambidge bms com writes in article u uicvm uic edu u uicvm uic edu writes what is a ccw acronym for concealed carrying of weapon basically a permit to carry a concealed pistol or revolver i phoned licensing division in washington state to ask for an application for a ccw instead they promptly sent me an applicationfor becoming a firearms dealer in washington they even sent me a firearms safety pamphlet case kim
|
9,391 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gov t break ins re minutes in article apr pasadena dc bofa com franceschi pasadena dc bofa com writes in viet nam lt calley was tried and convicted of murder because his troops in a war setting deliberately killed innocent people it is time that the domestic law enforcement agencies in this country adhere to standards at least as moral as the military s here here but any call for responsibility and accountability from police is invariably interpreted as being soft on crime being tough on crime and building more prisons and seizing more property is the politically astute thing to do these days greed killed the rancher possibly greed killed the davidian children government greed and citizen complacency it is time to prosecute the leaders who perform these invasions don t forget the politicians that write the laws that make it easy for the police agencies to become corrupt the war on some drugs brought us this corruption and only an end to it legalization will stop the corruption smg
|
9,392 |
talk.politics.guns
|
thanks to poster of ny times article on atf in texas good job to whoever posted the article i d been saving that nytimes edition for a while planning to ytpe it in myself but now i don t have to for all of those people who were worried about whether or not the media would even question the raid we owe it to the ny times despite their rabidly anti gun editorials for being willing to talk to these batf agents case kim
|
9,393 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re rkba on nyc radio station actually the real reason that stern was getting a bigger rating share was that he was new in d c not because of the quality if you can call it that of his show after the fine was issued he started to get better ratings because of the curious individuals who wanted to see how bad he actually was since he came to d c he has had a greater turn over of listeners than the grease has in other words more people get sick of him sooner than they do of the grease after all saying vagina or penis on the air is hilarious at first the second time it is still a little funny but when you do it all the time and at the same time think you are the greatest man on the planet and tell everyone so than you are going to get old really quick give it up mark you are wrong excuse me but if you really new what the show was about you d know that he doesn t just say vagina and penis and that is how he get s his ratings he also addresss real issues as well as being outrageous i don t hear any of these other idiots doing a funny show and getting into some serious topics at the same time he get s people to think and entertains them at the same time so try listening to his show a little closer before you tell them that they are wrong and by the way if he is such a flash in the pan why do his ratings sustain so well hmm greg w lazar greg puck webo dg com j e t s jets jets jets
|
9,394 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re founding father questions arc cco caltech edu aaron ray clements writes wasn t she the one making the comment in about george being born with a silver foot in his mouth sounds like another damn politician to me ain t like the old days in texas anymore the politicians may have been corrupt then but at least they d take a stand my apologies to a few exceptions i can think of news now is that the house may already have a two thirds majority so her opposition out of her concern for image she s even said this publicly may not matter do people expect the texans congressmen to act as the n j republicans did steve podleski phone nasa lewis research center cleveland ohio email pspod gonzo lerc nasa gov
|
9,395 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news in article c mt apq magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes jim de arras jmd cube handheld com wrote in article c u x fw magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes i don t know how anyone can state that gun control could have no effect on homicide rates there were over accidental handgun homicides in america in most with licensed weapons more american children accidentally shot other children last year than all the handgun homicides in great britain source national safety council please no dictionary arguments about rates vs total numbers okay they re offered for emphasis not comparison you re a great debater you chose your sources of information claim them to be superior i m not aware of using any numbers from the ozone unless you consider those i got from you to be such i ve made no such claim please direct my attention towards any posting of mine where i claimed superior sources of information it s probably because i bothered to post any references at all while others seem content to post numbers pulled from the ozone that you ve confused it with fact twisting if so i apologize yes you state the reference and then you claim it s a good or fair treatment then take those twisted numbers and twist them further by trying well then here s fair opportunity for you to prove that i ve twisted numbers on what grounds do you contradict those references do you have any citations any sources of your own that i can take similar gratuitous shots at you fail to see the differences between absolute numbers and rates to compare absolute numbers between two countries that have major population differences the usa and gb and then whine that you are afraid someone might attack your process and so claim the numbers are for emphasis not comparison emphasis of what nitpicking and scolding is a whiney debating style jim no you just miss the point by your methods i can prove gun control to be a total failure new york s total homocide count with it s strict gun control is much higher than rhode island s with it s less strict gun control far more folks are killed in new york than rhode island therefore according to mane logic tm gun control has made new york a much more dangerous place than rhode island remember it s nitpicking and a whiney debating style to point out the differences between new york and rhode island that might defeat my argument anything else is blowing smoke you seddit brudda now you agree wow a break through stephen manes manes magpie linknet com manes and associates new york ny usa o o jim
|
9,396 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news in article c b amf magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes last year the us suffered almost wrongful or accidental deaths by handguns alone fbi statistics in the same year the uk suffered such deaths scotland yard statistics the population of the uk is about that of the us weighted for population the us has x as many handgun related deaths as the uk and no the brits don t make up for this by murdering x as many people with baseball bats if you examine the figures they do stabbing is favourite closely followed by striking punching kicking many more people are burnt to death in britain as are shot to death take at look and you ll see for yourself it means that very few people are shot to death in great britain and i m sure that is a great comfort to the widows and children of those stabbed beaten and burned to death the real question is did the crime rate in england go down after they enacted gun control laws if you look at the rates before and after their first such law in you will see no effect frank crary cu boulder
|
9,397 |
talk.politics.guns
|
armed citizen april the armed citizen mere presence of a firearm without a shot being fired prevents crime in many instances as shown by news reports sent to the armed citizen shooting usually can be justified only where crime constitutes an immediate imminent threat to life or limb or in some circumstances property the accounts below are from clippings sent in by nra members anyone is free to quote or reproduce them retired las vegas deputy police chief larry bolden initially tried to defend himself with a steering wheel bar lock when a criminal attacked him in his car but then the intruder wrestled it from him bolden pulled his pistol and fired several times wounding his attacker and stopping the incident he was just a citizen defending himself a police official said the review journal las vegas nev a pair of teenaged robbers armed with a sawed off shotgun and handguns took the day s receipts from brooklyn bodega owner hector martinez as they made their getaway martinez grabbed his registered gauge shotgun and gave chase when one fired martinez returned three blasts slightly wounding his assailants they fled but were apprehended when they sought medical attention newsday long island n y a sign posted on the door of roman paras shop reads the owners of this property are armed and highly skilled to protect life liberty and property from criminal attack apparently a pair of robbers didn t pause to read it as they threatened paras wife in their oxnard calif convenience store hearing her scream paras grabbed his ran to the front of the store and shot it out with the masked and armed men killing one criminal the times los angeles calif anne marie sullivan was showering in her portland oreg home one morning when she heard the front door crash in she jumped out of the shower in time to see a man entering the home running to the bedroom sullivan retrieved her boyfriend s pistol and fired two shots mortally wounding the intruder the dead man had a lengthy police and prison record the oregonian portland oreg mike baranelli would have let two robbers who burst into a birmingham ala barber shop keep his money but the year old retired teacher was unwilling to surrender his life when the intruders ordered baranelli the shop owner and another man to lie on the floor baranelli pulled his pistol and shot both men in the head killing one i felt sure there was going to be three dead people in there i think i had some divine help baranelli said the sunday advertiser montgomery ala believing an elderly harvey ill couple would again be easy prey a knife wielding home invader instead met death when the year old homeowner loosed three rounds from a semi automatic pistol police said the dead man had been charged several times for thefts from the couple s home the star chicago heights ill the criminal s profile was scheduled to appear on america s most wanted but his shot at fame was abruptly canceled by a hallandale fla service station clerk the michigan prison escapee walked into the station and announced a robbery instead of cash he got bullets in the head and chest from station clerk gary mcvey police said mcvey acted in self defense and would not face charges the sun sentinel ft lauderdale fla a bridgeport conn oil delivery man handed over the few dollars he had but the thug apparently unsatisfied with his take turned his gun on his victim and demanded more money instead of more cash the deliveryman instead pulled his own pistol and fired mortally wounding the robber police said the dead man had held up a nearby market just before the fatal incident the courant hartford conn after repeated burglaries at her san marcos calif home joan vessel was ready with a and a cordless phone when she heard glass breaking one afternoon when she found two teenagers attempting to get into her woodshed vessel fired a warning shot over their heads marched them into the front yard and called police the times advocate escondido calif angry that his auto insurance had been canceled a client used brass knuckles to take it out on brandon fla agent steven taylor when his assailant walked out of the office taylor grabbed a pistol kept there and held the former client at gun point until police arrived the tribune tampa fla dozing one evening at his exeter pa office jim pisano was awakened by the barking of his dog sitting in stunned amazement he watched as two men smashed out his office window reached in and grabbed one of his hunting rifles reaching a pistol on his desk pisano fired several shots apparently wounding one of the burglars and putting them to flight the times leader wilkes barre pa trying on a pair of shoes was just an act for a criminal who then pulled a knife and demanded money when the man advanced the flint mich shoestore owner drew his pistol and fired critically wounding the would be robber the journal flint mich disarmed and pistol whipped after struggling with a pair of shotgun toting thugs brooklyn n y pharmacist soel melero continued fighting and managed to retrieve a second also licensed hidden pistol firing three times the druggist killed one of his assailants the other fled empty handed the daily news new york n y ron phillips crphilli hound dazixca ingr com senior customer engineer intergraph electronics east evelyn avenue voice mountain view ca fax
|
9,398 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re founding father questions in article apr eagle lerc nasa gov pspod bigbird lerc nasa gov steve podleski writes arc cco caltech edu aaron ray clements writes wasn t she the one making the comment in about george being born with a silver foot in his mouth sounds like another damn politician to me ain t like the old days in texas anymore the politicians may have been corrupt then but at least they d take a stand my apologies to a few exceptions i can think of news now is that the house may already have a two thirds majority so her opposition out of her concern for image she s even said this publicly may not matter do people expect the texans congressmen to act as the n j republicans did there is a likely veto proof majority in the house the senate unfortunately is a different story the lt gov has vowed that the bill will not be voted on and he has the power to do it in addition the senate is a much smaller and more readily manipulated body on ther other hand the semi automatic ban will likely not live as at least fifty per cent of the house currently opposes it and it is very far down in the bill order in the senate i believe it will be addressed after the ccw bill and i thought my tx political science class was a waste of time dillon pyron the opinions expressed are those of the ti dseg lewisville vax support sender unless otherwise stated when i m here when i m home god gave us weather so we wouldn t complain pyron skndiv dseg ti com about other things padi dm
|
9,399 |
talk.politics.guns
|
re gun control was re we re mad as hell at the tv news in article c tm h ecf magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes hambidge bms com wrote in article c psog c magpie linknet com manes magpie linknet com steve manes writes rate per capita rate the uk is more dangerous though you may be less likely to be killed by a handgun the average individual citizen in the uk is twice as likely to be killed by whatever means as the average swiss would you feel any better about being killed by means other than a handgun i wouldn t what an absurd argument switzerland is one fifth the size of the uk with one eigth as many people therefore at any given point on swiss soil you are more likely to be crow bait more importantly you are x as likely to be killed by the next stranger approaching you on a swiss street than in the uk you are betraying your lack of understanding about rate versus total number rates are expressed often as population therefore if a place had deaths and a population of the rate would be a place that had deaths and a population of would hav a rate of the former has a higher rate the latter a higher total you are less likely to die in the latter simple enuff for chrissakes take out your calculator and work out the numbers here i ve preformatted them for you to make it easier handgun homicides population switzerland uk and then tell me again how switzerland is safer with a more liberal handgun law than the uk is without by rate or total number your choice if you want to talk less likely to get killed with a handgun you d have a point safer includes other things than simply handguns and you can t conclude safer by ignoring them now if somebody s got the total homicide rates david veal univ of tenn div of cont education info services group pa utkvm utk edu mail to veal utkvm utk edu will bounce taxes are not levied for the benefit of the taxed lazarus long
|
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.