Woppit.. Can you not realise that sometimes you’re just being a rather unpleasant little person, rather than somebody endowed with reason and a purpose

Ooh. I believe I’m being patronised.

And by the way, I do take the same approach at work. In my previous career, it made for an interesting session in HR about the freedom to express opinions. The religious side ended up taking the flack.

In my current job, I work at a much more matter of fact level of society unencumbered by bourgeois politess.

It’s not a problem.

You got anything else?

Be an atheist if you wish, but don’t be unpleasant to those who don’t share your views. I don’t castigate atheists, so why should they castigate those who have a faith?

Lets be honest, Christianity doesn’t exactly have a good reputation for this sort of behaviour though does it? I for one am thankful that we live in slightly more enlightened times where no belief is held to be above crtical analysis. One thing that does grate however is christians trying to portray themeselves as an oppressed minority. It might be the case in some parts of the world but it is certainly not true in the wider world and the UK in particular.

that’s very interesting woppit..

I’m no Christian, but if I was in your workplace and had to put up with watching you gobbing off all the time I’d eventually feel compelled to introduce you to the even more working class concept of a smack in the **** mouf mate 😉

What a big brave boy you are being mean at work and online.. 😆

The timing of Easter is based on the celebration of the Passover in the Jewish lunar-based calendar, so Easter Sunday in the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Spring Equinox. (Passover being the occasion when God killed all the first born Egyptian children, but not the Jewish children.)

Some of the imagery is taken from the pagan Oestre spring celebration, because they happened to coincide.

The actual Easter story of death and resurrection after three days is based on earlier myths, like much of Christianity.

What I object to is Evangelical Christians ‘witnessing’ their faith and demanding special exemptions from the law .

Me too.

Lets be honest, Christianity doesn’t exactly have a good reputation for this sort of behaviour though does it?

Some of the things that have been done in the name of Christianity are utterly appalling and should never have been done.

I say ‘in the name of’ as the acts bear no relation to what I believe Christianity stands for. The so-called Christian minister in the US who burned the Koran did a hateful thing. Anyone who kills in the name of Christianity is as abhorrent as someone who kills in the name of a different faith as far as I’m concerned.

Anyone is entitled to express their opinion but I believe that with the right so to do comes the responsibility to exercise that right with regard for others and their feelings.

As for a little ribbing, I think that you go far beyond that, Mr Woppit. My opinion – others are clearly available…

For the record and whilst not condoning violence in the name of any faith I wasn’t the least bit surprised at what happened to Charlie Hebdoe. I thought that they overstepped the mark by a long way and contributed to events. Of course they have the right to say what they like but they should exercise that right carefully.

Ignore is easier (at least on this topic)

+1 there are ways to express it even you utter dismissal of religion and he oversteps the mark deliberately to offend IMHO. I think he gets a little bit excited by offending folk which is far more risible than believing in a god.

They might be less “forgiving” than STW which takes the ultimate risk here

the only risk [ its a certainty] is listening to you moan about it whilst suggesting [incorrectly] its somehow illegal to be rude to a christian. you dont like it so why do you open the threads ? No one makes you and you know what will happen.

No one likes evangelical types be they SS*, Religious or Vegan

* single speeders

Aren’t Christians meant to be evangelical? No problem with them ‘spreading the word’ surely? Political influence is a different matter.

For the record and whilst not condoning violence in the name of any faith I wasn’t the least bit surprised at what happened to Charlie Hebdoe. I thought that they overstepped the mark by a long way and contributed to events. Of course they have the right to say what they like but they should exercise that right carefully.

I do find that interesting and you certainly are not the first person of faith I have heard say this. I don’t in any way believe you feel it was justified but you can understand the frustration/humiliation/contempt felt by those gunmen because of the ‘ribbing’ Charlie Hebdoe handed out to their religious figures. I think this is where the world fundamentally divides into people of faith(of any flavour) and those without. From your perspective you have have some empathy for the gunmen because you can believe the ‘hurt’ is genuine. From mine a belief in a faith is just gathered up with all other beliefs to be tested and derided and should be given no special reserve because I simply can’t empathise that it is especially important.

I’m no Christian, but if I was in your workplace and had to put up with watching you gobbing off all the time I’d eventually feel compelled to introduce you to the even more working class concept of a smack in the **** mouf mate

What a big brave boy you are being mean at work and online.

I don’t “gob off all the time”. Why on earth do you think that I do? It’s not THAT interesting.

Violence, eh? Nice.

To paraphrase Gore Vidal, “Once again, Norman Mailer yunki runs out of words…” 🙂

Easter is when it is because of the Passover and nothing else. It isn’t in April because of a Pagan feast, even if there are eggs and bunnies at Easter. The Passover was established 3,000 years ago.

hmmmmm.

Jesus in the new testament “becomes” the Lamb slaughtered at Pascha. Hence the resurrection story being made at the end of Exodus celebrations. Bede gave a translation of The month of Eostre as Paschal Month as they both fell in April. Both the Pagan and Hebrew calendars were Lunisolar. It was noted even at the time that most cultures had a festival based in Spring, and celebrating new life. Some of those observations pre-date Jewish celebrations by several thousand years, There is archaeological evidence that most European cultures were well aware and traded with the peoples of the Levant and the Etruscans as long ago as 3800-4000BC.

Same festival, celebrated by more or less the same groups of folk going back well into prehistory.

you’re a card woppit..

one minute you’re all like ‘yeah I’m earthy and that, I gob off at work all day long, being ‘orrible to religious people’ and the next you’re offended by a punch in the face 😀

make yer mind up Gandalph

Junkyard – lazarus

Easter is when it is because of the Passover and nothing else.

No easter is where it is because this is the time that [christians believe] the Romans killed jesus.

They are totally different festivals and events that occurred a thousand years apart and celebrate/remember completely different things. The only thing they share is the date they celebrate NOT The reasons nor causes.

Easter is the only Christian feast designed to deliberately coincide with a Jewish feast. The reason it is when it is, is because it needs to fit in with the first Hebrew month, the time when the Passover was said to occur 3,000 years ago. If the first Hebrew month was in July then Easter would also be in July. The reason the date is variable around March/April is because the Jewish Calender, which is about 5,000 years old, is lunisolar and the months are lunar months.

But you carry on believing that it’s all based on an Anglo-Saxon feast if that’s important to you, I can see that your faith is strong 🙂

I gob off at work all day long, being ‘orrible to religious people’ and the next you’re offended by a punch in the face

Nope. Never said that – you just claimed it.

You didn’t punch me in the face. You threatened it on an internet forum and I didn’t say I was offended. Your free interpretation of text is a wonder, though. This surprises me because I thought the thrust of your co-argumentatists was that doing this rather than in real four-dimensional space/time face to face, was a cowardly act.

*insert obligatory pot/kettle image of your choice*

no, no..

the thrust of my argument is that you often come across as quite a malicious little fellow who takes pleasure in taunting people about their beliefs, perhaps deriving even more pleasure from provoking an angry reaction..

some of the subtext is historical perhaps but I think you’ve proved the point 🙂

Religion is a philosophy, an ideology, and as such may be questioned, criticised and even mocked like any other ideology be it social, political or religious.
If we cannot criticise and mock, then we cannot speak of it at all. If we ( the questioners) cannot speak then it follows that you (the believer) cannot speak of it either.
So tear down your churches, close up your religious schools, take off your crosses and never speak of your faith outside your front door again.

The freedom to worship, the freedom to build your places of worship, the freedom to publically state your faith and attempt to reach converts are EXACTLY the same freedoms that allow us to question and mock your faith.
Its all or nothing, religious people dont get to decide what can be said and what cannot about religion.

Edit to my above post :

nickc – Member

Jesus in the new testament “becomes” the Lamb slaughtered at Pascha.

Exactly. The Last Supper was the Passover meal but instead of the lamb sacrifice JC was sacrificing himself. Good Friday is as important to Christians as Easter Sunday. Good Friday HAS to coincide with the Passover.

The freedom to worship, the freedom to build your places of worship, the freedom to publically state your faith and attempt to reach converts are EXACTLY the same freedoms that allow us to question and mock your faith.
Its all or nothing, religious people dont get to decide what can be said and what cannot about religion.

Quite

There are however different ways of putting a point across.

the thrust of my argument is that you often come across as quite a malicious little fellow who takes pleasure in taunting people about their beliefs, perhaps deriving even more pleasure from provoking an angry reaction..

some of the subtext is historical perhaps but I think you’ve proved the point

I have my own picture of you, of course.

Would you like an autographed one..? 🙂

I just wonder if you would be so brusque if you were questioning a Hindu family picnicking in a city centre park on a sunny afternoon, or a lone middle class Muslim lady in a busy airport in Sudan..?

JulianA – Member
Julian – not a very good Christian……

Don’t worry.
I’m a very sloppy Pagan.
I didn’t even sacrifice my own lunch yesterday.

I was mindful about the billions of years of natural evolution that had led to the perfection of gravy though.

That happy little sigh of contentment you give before sitting down for a meal with your family is universal, no matter what we believe.
🙂

Ernie, I get what you’re saying now, You’re saying that Easter “As a Christian Festival” is where it is because of Passover. Yes Agree with you.

Spring festivals of renewal and based on lunisolar calenders are probably Mesolithic. Predating Pagan, and Abrahamic faiths by several millennia.

both are correct really.

This is probably an old-fashioned view….

Believers or non-believers of any stripe should have thought their arguments out to the extent that a good old-fashioned debate is a possibility. This goes without saying I guess, but being able to defend a viewpoint from a well-considered stance is a must, and so is being able to accept alternative viewpoints.

However, as my old Mum used to say: mocking’s catching.

Jeez a bit of religion an everyone gets fired up..

Some views are so obviously bonkers though, that mockery really is the only way forward.
Creationists are a case in point.

Believers or non-believers of any stripe should have thought their arguments out to the extent that a good old-fashioned debate is a possibility.

That would be nice, but it gets ruined when one side is more concerned about trying very hard to cause offence “because they can”

muddydwarf – Member
Some views are so obviously bonkers though, that mockery really is the only way forward.
Creationists are a case in point.

And unicyclists.

Oh definitely, dont want those heretical single wheelers around here!

Gradations of bonkery, huh?

Erm, I mean…

Believers or non-believers of any stripe should have thought their arguments out to the extent that a good old-fashioned debate is a possibility.

Actually no. And this is why I don’t get involved in debating the “big questions” any more. Believers get to a point in the argument where faith is required to hold everything together, in the absence of proof. It is therefore not possible to debate the arguments without disappearing down two very separate roads (faith and the supernatural down one, science and the empirical down the other). You can only agree to disagree really.

Not in all cases…

http://clergyproject.org/

In nearly all cases I’d say. Those who turn away from religion do it because they come to that realization themselves. Not because some atheist converted them or they were sick of having the piss took. Both of those things tends to make their belief stronger.

I don’t believe that. Or the number that do will be vanishingly small.
I don’t think penguins get a mention in biblical texts.

you carry on believing that it’s all based on an Anglo-Saxon feast if that’s important to you,

Nowhere on this thread have I said this or even commented on it 🙄
If you must throw your sarcastic mud could it at least be based on what I said?

What i have said is that this is untrue

Easter is when it is because of the Passover and nothing else.

The two happened at the same time a thousand years apart and easter is where it is because that was when [ they believe] Jesus was killed.
I said it was untrue because it is untrue.

The two happened at the same time a thousand years apart and easter is where it is because that was when [ they believe] Jesus was killed

OK you obviously don’t know what you’re talking about, which is fair enough I suppose – there’s no reason why you should have any great insight into Christian feasts. Of course if you did you would know that the Last Supper was the Passover meal, and that’s not a just coincidence it’s actually vital to the plot.

Easter Sunday is just one day in what is termed Holy Week, also included in Holy Week are Maundy Thursday and Good Friday. The Last Supper and the Crucifixion are as important as Easter Sunday – the Last Supper/Passover Meal lays the whole foundation for Christian religious services, Holy Communion, often referred to as a sacrifice – the connection with Passover Meal/sacrifice is obvious.

The connection between Easter and the Jewish Passover feast is inseparable.

OK you obviously don’t know what you’re talking about

Thankfully I have a carpenter to fill me in and remove my ignorance.
Bless you for trully the lord does work in mysterious ways

And you were moaning at THM for patronising folk 🙂

Well it wasn’t meant as an insult but you can take it as one if you want.

You generally have a problem with people who disagree with you so I kind of expected you to.

EDIT : And btw if you didn’t understand the connection between the Passover/the Last Supper/Easter, and that JC was a Jew who did Jewish stuff and was sometimes referred to as a rabbi by his followers, as you obviously didn’t, then it sort of makes my point that you didn’t know what you were talking about.

Can’t you two get a room? I’m trying to get an answer to the original question.

I’m trying to get an answer to the original question.

Thegreatape gave you the answer in the second post of the thread.

ernie_lynch – Member
then it sort of makes my point that you didn’t know what you were talking about.

Annoying when that happens isn’t it (especially when followed up by the patronizing accusation) 😉

Impressive historical knowledge here Ernie (and you were probably teasing about Josephus). Done Pitt, so now for Passover story A level revision. Do you do revision notes ? 😉 let’s see if the student’s knowledge is as good now! Thank goodness for 2 hour run this morning, revision supervision gets tiring!