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R. S. Refugee
Joined: 29 Sep 2004
Location: Shangra La, ROK
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 Posted: Fri May 20, 2005 8:30 am Post subject: Bush to be rebuked by conservative Christians |
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President's Visit Stirs Dissent
at Conservative Calvin College
by Laura Berman
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0520-27.htm
An Open Letter to the President of the
United States of America, George W. Bush
On May 21, 2005, you will give the commencement address at Calvin College. We, the undersigned, respect your office, and we join the college in welcoming you to our campus. Like you, we recognize the importance of religious commitment in American political life.
We seek open and honest dialogue about the Christian faith and how it is best expressed in the political sphere. While recognizing God as sovereign over individuals and institutions alike, we understand that no single political position should be identified with God's will, and we are conscious that this applies to our own views as well as those of others. At the same time we see conflicts between our understanding of what Christians are called to do and many of the policies of your administration.
As Christians we are called to be peacemakers and to initiate war only as a last resort. We believe your administration has launched an unjust and unjustified war in Iraq.
As Christians we are called to lift up the hungry and impoverished. We believe your administration has taken actions that favor the wealthy of our society and burden the poor.
As Christians we are called to actions characterized by love, gentleness, and concern for the most vulnerable among us. We believe your administration has fostered intolerance and divisiveness and has often failed to listen to those with whom it disagrees.
As Christians we are called to be caretakers of God's good creation. We believe your environmental policies have harmed creation and have not promoted long-term stewardship of our natural environment.
Our passion for these matters arises out of the Christian faith that we share with you. We ask you, Mr. President, to re-examine your policies in light of our God-given duty to pursue justice with mercy, and we pray for wisdom for you and all world leaders.
--Concerned faculty, staff, and emeriti of Calvin College |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Fri May 20, 2005 7:03 pm Post subject: |
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| But 100 members of the faculty and another 40 staff and former faculty members have signed an open letter |
This is a nice development. It's good to hear from other Christians besides the radical ones. However, it's too bad none of the students signed the letter. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Fri May 20, 2005 7:07 pm Post subject: |
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"We are guided by Christian conviction. ... John Calvin wasn't an easy pushover kind of guy, either," says Jelks. "He was a reformer."
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PS:
I thought it was ironic that he didn't mention that Calvin was also a fan of burning people at the stake. |
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R. S. Refugee
Joined: 29 Sep 2004
Location: Shangra La, ROK
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| Posted: Fri May 20, 2005 7:20 pm Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
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"We are guided by Christian conviction. ... John Calvin wasn't an easy pushover kind of guy, either," says Jelks. "He was a reformer."
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PS:
I thought it was ironic that he didn't mention that Calvin was also a fan of burning people at the stake. |
I did say CONSERVATIVE, didn't I? |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Fri May 20, 2005 7:27 pm Post subject: |
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I did say CONSERVATIVE, didn't I?
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Any insight on the conservative view of burning at the stake?
a) Strangle the victim before you light the fire so they don't suffer.
b) Use green wood so the victim suffocates in the smoke before the flames get to him/her.
c) Put the fire out and revive the victim a few times before letting him/her die. |
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R. S. Refugee
Joined: 29 Sep 2004
Location: Shangra La, ROK
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| Posted: Fri May 20, 2005 7:57 pm Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
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I did say CONSERVATIVE, didn't I?
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Any insight on the conservative view of burning at the stake?
a) Strangle the victim before you light the fire so they don't suffer.
b) Use green wood so the victim suffocates in the smoke before the flames get to him/her.
c) Put the fire out and revive the victim a few times before letting him/her die. |
Once the Repulsives overturn the filibuster, so they can approve anyone Dear Leader wants to sit in judgement over us, I guess we'll find out.
I'm sure this judicial nominee could explain it to us in mind-numbing detail.
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Fri May 20, 2005 9:46 pm Post subject: |
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| I thought it was ironic that he didn't mention that Calvin was also a fan of burning people at the stake. |
If someone is preaching heretical teachings, and you truly believe in the truth and the righteousness of yours, then the compassionate thing to do, not only for that person but for those who would be led astray, would be to burn them at the stake.
That being said, heretical teachings also tended to cause schisms and conflict that resulted in bloodshed and divisions that could tear a state apart. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Sat May 21, 2005 7:13 am Post subject: |
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If someone is preaching heretical teachings, and you truly believe in the truth and the righteousness of yours, then the compassionate thing to do, not only for that person but for those who would be led astray, would be to burn them at the stake.
That being said, heretical teachings also tended to cause schisms and conflict that resulted in bloodshed and divisions that could tear a state apart. |
Did you type that with a straight face? |
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R. S. Refugee
Joined: 29 Sep 2004
Location: Shangra La, ROK
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| Posted: Sat May 21, 2005 9:10 am Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
Did you type that with a straight face? |
I believe Kuros types everything with a straight face. He doesn't do humor.    |
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mindmetoo
Joined: 02 Feb 2004
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| Posted: Sat May 21, 2005 4:03 pm Post subject: |
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Ha. Wow gosh when you mix religion and politics you just have to keep being more and more extreme to match the increasingly fundamentalist views of your supporters hepped up on their new political capital, who themselves are anxious to spend it.
Why can't Bush take the simple lesson and pants down spanking he's getting in the middle east and apply it to America? |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Sat May 21, 2005 10:45 pm Post subject: |
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| R.S.Refugee wrote: |
Ya-ta Boy wrote:
Did you type that with a straight face?
I believe Kuros types everything with a straight face. He doesn't do humor. |
That's the worst thing anyone has said about me on this forum to date. 
I typed that rather with a wry grin. I would never condone burning heretics, as I am against the death penalty. However, in European history, there were rarely any cases of inquisitions or burnings that weren't used for political or private advantage, so one would be hard pressed to point out an actual case where someone was driven by compassion to burn someone. |
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flakfizer
Joined: 12 Nov 2004
Location: scaling the Cliffs of Insanity with a frayed rope.
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| Posted: Sat May 21, 2005 11:35 pm Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
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"We are guided by Christian conviction. ... John Calvin wasn't an easy pushover kind of guy, either," says Jelks. "He was a reformer."
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PS:
I thought it was ironic that he didn't mention that Calvin was also a fan of burning people at the stake. |
I hadn't heard that before. Could you link me to that documentation, please? |
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mindmetoo
Joined: 02 Feb 2004
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| Posted: Sun May 22, 2005 12:39 am Post subject: |
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| flakfizer wrote: |
| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| Quote: |
"We are guided by Christian conviction. ... John Calvin wasn't an easy pushover kind of guy, either," says Jelks. "He was a reformer."
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PS:
I thought it was ironic that he didn't mention that Calvin was also a fan of burning people at the stake. |
I hadn't heard that before. Could you link me to that documentation, please? |
http://www.evangelicaloutreach.org/ashes.htm#1 |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Sun May 22, 2005 2:05 am Post subject: |
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From Wikipedia:
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When Pierre Ameaux complained about this practice, Calvin took it as an attack on his authority as a minister, and he persuaded the city council to require Ameaux to walk through the town dressed in a hair shirt and begging for mercy in the public squares. Jacques Gruet sided with some of the old Genevan families, who resented the power and methods of the Consistory. He was implicated in an incident in which someone had placed a placard in one of the city's churches, reading: "When too much has been endured revenge is taken." Calvin consented to the torture and beheading of Gruet, who was accused of colluding in a French plot to invade the city.
In 1553, Calvin approved of the execution by burning of Michael Servetus for heresy
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I also checked out the Michael Servetus blurb:
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In 1553 he published another religious work with Arian views entitled Christianismi restitutio. He had a copy sent to John Calvin, initiating a correspondence between the two. Calvin wrote to Servetus, "I neither hate you nor despise you; nor do I wish to persecute you; but I would be as hard as iron when I behold you insulting sound doctrine with so great audacity."
[edit]
Imprisonment and execution
On 4 April 1553 he was convicted of heresy by the Roman Catholic authorities, and imprisoned in Vienne. He escaped from prison on 17 June 1553. Meaning to flee to Italy, Servetus stopped in at Geneva, where Calvin and his Reformers had denounced him. On 13 August 1553 he attended a sermon by Calvin at Geneva. He was immediately recognized and arrested after the service (The Heretics, p. 326.) and was again imprisoned and had all his property confiscated.
Unfortunately for Servetus, at this time Calvin was fighting to maintain his weakening power in Geneva. Calvin's opponents used Servetus as a pretext for attacking the Geneva Reformer's theocratic government. It became a matter of prestige for Calvin to assert his power in this respect. He was forced to push the condemnation of Servetus with all the means at his command." (The Heretics, p. 326.)
At his trial, Michael Servetus was condemned on two counts, for spreading and preaching anti-Trinitarian and anti-paedobaptism (infant baptism). (Roland H. Bainton, Hunted Heretic The Beacon Press, 1953, p. 207.) paedobaptism, Michael Servetus had said, "It is an invention of the devil, an infernal falsity for the destruction of all Christianity" (Ibid., p. 186.)
On 27 October 1553 he was burned at the stake just outside Geneva. Calvin had supported Servetus execution (in accordance with the common practice of the day), as on February 13, 1546 (seven years prior to Servetus being arrested in Geneva) Calvin had written his friend, Farel: "If he [Servetus] comes [to Geneva], I shall never let him go out alive if my authority has weight." (Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge (Baker Book House, 1950), p. 371.) And during Servetus' heresy trial, Calvin also wrote: "I hope that the verdict will call for the death penalty." (Walter Nigg, The Heretics (Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1962), p. 328.) However, Calvin still pleaded with the Geneva City Council to execute him by means of decapitation because it was more humane than burning at the stake, but the council rejected this plea.
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It kind of makes me nostalgic for the good old days of the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre, the Wars of Religion in France, and the granddaddy of 'em all, the Thirty Years War. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Sun May 22, 2005 2:44 am Post subject: |
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| PS: You might also enjoy reading up on how Puritan Massachusetts (Calvin's spiritual descendants) treated Quakers and Baptists. It wasn't pretty. |
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