The Inside Assyria Discussion Forum #5

=> an interesting debate...

Posted by pancho (Guest) - Saturday, November 24 2007, 4:58:50 (CET)
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..Not the ones we're having...except for Assyrian Muslim, who's brought some fresh air and guts too. And very likely Jumblat and Muncho aren't as stupid as they like to appear...but for some reason they back away from mature discussion in favor of childish pranks...but that serves us well too.

..I meant a debate I saw on CSPAN between Dinesh D'Souza and Christopher Hitchens...Dinesh has written "What's Wrong With Christianity"...though he is a devout Catholic...he's probably playing devil's advocate with that title...Hitchens wrote, most recently, "God Is Not Great", which I did read...about three weeks ago. Unfortunately I didn't see the debate from the start but caught it during the question and answer period...all of the questions from the audience were directed at Hitchens because he's an out and out athiest who can't stand Christianity or Islam, as religions..he has very little good to say about Jesus or Muhammad.

..What fascinated me was an explanation about the morality and ethics of Christianity...now, no one took shots at Islam in this debate...it was all about the bible and Christian beliefs. Dinesh was born in India of Portuguese stock and he's Catholic because the Portuguese brought it with them to India when THEY came looking to steal and rape and murder.

..He seems to be aware that Christianity took hold in many places to the accompanyment of violence...but he had an interesting take on it; he said he was GLAD Christianity had come..and if the only way his ancestors could have been brought to this "ethical and moral" religion was through the murder of his ancestors, so that he could be born Christian, it was still a good thing. In other words, if Muncho can benefit from the man who rapes his mother...well, that's okay. I found that very interesting...and it just so happens that this plays into exactly what I was talking about; that Christian children are taught to keep their eyes on the goodies they'll get, never mind who has to suffer for it...even Jesus...even their grandparents...even Iraqi children.

..Dinesh also seems to be saying that the end justifies the means...that since Christianity is a good "end"....the violent "means" used to bring it...make it all okay. A very strange sort of ethics and morality...because it can get you into all sorts of bloody and unpleasant situations.

This may also hold the key to understanding why Christianity has been so damn bloody. Take Dinesh's position to its logical conclusion..let's say that after Jews and Muslims have all been killed and their children, now sadly made into orphans, are taken in by the Church and raised as good Christians, they will, in time and like Dinesh, be "glad" it happened, because to be a Christian is such a GOOD end...so never mind how you got to be one.

But what happens next? What happens when Christian turns against Christian...what happens when each "true" form of Christianity decides it must crush heresy...crush other competing sects...as has so often been the bloody case? Doesn't that also become okay? Isn't that just more of what made Dinesh "glad" when Christianity killed his parents...because they were "wrong" and he could now be raised "right"? Can't every Christian sect that comes along take it upon itself, and forgive itself because it is doing a "good" and "glad" thing, and kill those who are "wrong" in order to "save" some other Dinesh? Where will this thing end? With this "gladness" of Dinesh's there is no end in sight....every new or even revived or reborn Christian sect will excuse its own crimes because each believes it's "saving" terribly lost people...and the orphans will be GLAD!?

There was much more food for thought in this discussion...but let's wait for the children to have their say first.

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an interesting debate... pancho - Saturday, November 24 2007, 4:58:50 (CET)
- Re: an interesting debate... AssyrianMuslim - 11/24 15:30

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