BlockHead Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 Mr Spock So is Christianity blockhead.Semantics. Some of the Jehova Witness beliefs are considered heresy. Cult Indeed, any religion involving unconditional worship and unquestioning obedience to God could be labelled as a cult (using the pejorative connotation of the word), since such a religion would have that high level of dependency, obedience, and unwavering compliance ascribed to cults by definition. Many mainstream religions still require their members to believe in God unquestioningly, to have faith that he is good and that what he does is good (even in light of problems of theodicy that make it reasonable to question this), to consider one's own wants and needs as unimportant while accepting the will of God as paramount. All of these are certainly characteristics commonly attributed to cults, but while it would not be unreasonable to apply this definition of a cult to any dogmatic religion that requires strict compliance with God's word and will as a condition of membership, the notion of applying the word "cult" to Christianity, Islam, Judaism, or any other major world religion today is considered absurd. There are those (e.g., Maltheists) who make this very claim: that those who worship God fit the classic depiction of cult members in their dogmatism, unswerving obedience, and denial of self. This highlights the problematic nature of defining what is and is not a cult. SexKitten this kind of hypocrisy is exactly why i am not religious.The church doesn't really enforce anything. Do you want them to throw the offending party in prison? SexKitten tiki...just out of curiosity, how would you feel about having 10 kids?I'm Catholic and I only have three brothers. I have aunts and uncles with two or three children. I don't see a population explosion. I do see a lot of out of wedlock children. Link to post Share on other sites
Author tiki Posted June 21, 2005 Author Share Posted June 21, 2005 Yeah, just because ya do it, don't necessarily mean you've have eighty babies. Hope not, anyway! Link to post Share on other sites
blind_otter Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 Originally posted by tiki Yeah, just because ya do it, don't necessarily mean you've have eighty babies. Hope not, anyway! Well....before birth control was widely available women sometimes literally died of exhaustion from being pregnant all the time. I think it would be admirable if we could expect the world to act with responsiblity regarding birth control and not having out of wedlock children, but I think that's unrealistic. With an enlightened and educated population, maybe. Not with people today, though. Like my oldest sister really NEEDS to use birth control because having another baby would be dangerous to her body and to any baby she carries. But she refuses to because its against her religion, which sucks. If she gets pregnant again and dies I will be pissed. She doesn't need to be doing this. Link to post Share on other sites
SexKitten Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 Originally posted by Mr Spock It would be hypocrosy if I were religious. To anyone else it's merely a suggestion. i wasn't talking about you personally, just a statement made by you that holds true for many, many people. i just think it's crap. but i didn't mean to insinuate that YOU are crap. Link to post Share on other sites
BlockHead Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 blind_otter before birth control was widely available women sometimes literally died of exhaustion from being pregnant all the time.Current Trends Mortality Patterns -- United States, 1992 In 1992, a total of 318 women were reported to have died from causes associated with pregnancy and childbirth; however, this total consisted of only deaths assigned to complications of pregnancy, childbirth, and the puerperium. The maternal mortality rate was 7.8 deaths per 100,000 live-born infants. The maternal mortality rate for blacks was 4.2 times greater than that for whites.A Childbirth-related death rate of 7.8 per 100,000 births is probably a holocaust by your standards. Safe Motherhood: Promoting Health for Women Before, During, and After Pregnancy In the United States, 2–3 women die of pregnancy complications each day. From 1900 to 1982, deaths from pregnancy complications in the United States declined dramatically. In 1982, deaths began to level off, and there has been no marked decrease since that time. Yet studies indicate that as many as half of all deaths from pregnancy complications could be prevented if women had better access to health care, received better quality of care, and made changes in their health and lifestyle habits. The leading causes of pregnancy-related deaths today are hemorrhage, blood clot, high blood pressure, infection, stroke, amniotic fluid in the bloodstream, and heart muscle disease. Antibiotics and infection control have helped to prevent many pregnancy-related deaths over the past century. http://www.infoforhealth.org/pr/m12/m12table.shtml#table1 <- More maternal death rates Check out the fertility and maternal death rates for Africa. Modern medicine appears to be the main reason why the maternal death rate is so low. Link to post Share on other sites
moimeme Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 Um. BH. Birth control was available long before 1992 ROTFL Link to post Share on other sites
blind_otter Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 You know, ironically, April 7 was World Health Day. This year's theme was "Make Every Mother and Child Count," and the focus was on reducing maternal and infant mortality rates around the world. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), every minute of every day a woman dies from complications of pregnancy. Pregnancy-related complications also lead to the deaths of at least 1.5 million infants in their first week of life. According to WHO, nearly 80 million unintended pregnancies occur globally every year. In many countries, including Kenya, Nepal, and Peru, women have an average of one to two more children than they would like. In sub-Saharan Africa, fewer than one in five women use contraception. Link to post Share on other sites
blind_otter Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 Originally posted by moimeme Um. BH. Birth control was available long before 1992 ROTFL Oh did BH say something about that? I have him on ignore for a reason. snark. Link to post Share on other sites
Author tiki Posted June 21, 2005 Author Share Posted June 21, 2005 Otter, have you talked to your sis about her situation? It amazes me how people can put their life up for grabs like that. Is she that religious in all aspects of her life, or does she just choose to follow that one by the book? Everything has it's limits. With pregnancy, if my bod were to be in danger, it seems asinine to not be able to take care of the kids I have already. No way, man! Link to post Share on other sites
BlockHead Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 moimeme Um. BH. Birth control was available long before 1992 ROTFLYou are a little slow today. I'll the information gestate for a while.Do you seriously believe that abortion is preventing most of the maternal deaths? Birth control pills don't factor into those stats. blind_otter According to WHO, nearly 80 million unintended pregnancies occur globally every year. In many countries, including Kenya, Nepal, and Peru, women have an average of one to two more children than they would like. In sub-Saharan Africa, fewer than one in five women use contraception.How many of these deaths are related to disease, parasites, and bad medicine? I'm trying to imagine anesthesia administered with a mallat. How about incisions made with rusty knives? How about cuts or wounds washed with dirty water? How many have access to antibiotics? tiki Reproduction appears to be extremely dangerous. Without birth control, our women would drop like flies. Link to post Share on other sites
Author tiki Posted June 21, 2005 Author Share Posted June 21, 2005 Originally posted by BlockHead tiki Reproduction appears to be extremely dangerous. Without birth control, our women would drop like flies. Thank you for your time and references, BH. I think I'll stay on my BC. Link to post Share on other sites
blind_otter Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 Originally posted by tiki Otter, have you talked to your sis about her situation? It amazes me how people can put their life up for grabs like that. Is she that religious in all aspects of her life, or does she just choose to follow that one by the book? Everything has it's limits. With pregnancy, if my bod were to be in danger, it seems asinine to not be able to take care of the kids I have already. No way, man! She's uber-religious and tells me it's God's will, so I've given up. If it's God's will in her mind, then that is her reality. I love her to death but we fight like cats and dogs. Oh wait, we're sisters. That's not unusual at all. Well, gotta love her anyways. BH can <nevermind>. Link to post Share on other sites
TUDOR Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 I think this is where religion is taking too literally but that is just my take on it. I don't believe there is divine intervention in our lives from God. The greatest gift we have been giving is the gift of free will. So why then say to hell with free will and live a life exactly how the bible or any other biblicle how to book says is the way to live your life. Free will means you are giving the opportunity to no only make the right decisions but responsible decisions. To say that I one can just take what ever action they think is right and that they put the out come in Gods hands is not being responsible. Birth control is no more morally wrong than chemo therapy is for a cancer patient in my opinion. Even if you are married and choose not to use any birth control and put the out come of having children in God's hands, it is not God that is there clean up your mess when you do have 10 kids. Unless God is also known as well fare. But you don't even have to have 10 kids to see the irresponsibleness of having more kids than you can provide for. If you want 2 children and know that you can provide for that many kids and give them the life and love they deserve then by all means. But to allow yourself to put in a position where you could end up with 5, 6, 7..10 kids then that is not the will of God. That is one's choice to do that because that is what God gave you the choice to have or not to have more kids than you want. There is no one right way to live by one's faith. It is an individual journey that each of must travel on our own. But IMO I think it is absurd to say that God does not allow or approve of BC. Link to post Share on other sites
Mr Spock Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 Originally posted by SexKitten i wasn't talking about you personally, just a statement made by you that holds true for many, many people. i just think it's crap. but i didn't mean to insinuate that YOU are crap. I know you didn't, just others might not PS-Who said abortion?? Let's not open that can of worms..... Link to post Share on other sites
moimeme Posted June 21, 2005 Share Posted June 21, 2005 Who said abortion Oh it's another foray far from the original topic - tossed in there, as usual, as a red herring to derail the discussion. Link to post Share on other sites
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