pattygreen

Just to clear up the record here. I believe in tolerence for those who believe differently than I do. It is very important that all mankind chooses for himself whom he will serve. God desires for everyone to make up their own mind and decision on whether they choose to be a part of His family or not. For who would want a family member that doesn't want anything to do with them? I, too, do not judge anyone for their choices. Live and let live. I would love for all to know Jesus as I do, for there is great joy in knowing Him, but I hold no hatred or intolerence for those who choose to believe differently.

Who said anything about "organized religion". I hate organized religion. They make men slaves to their doctrines and hold them captive. Even Jesus had much to say about the hypocrisy of the saducees and the pharasies of his day. Christianity, 'real' Christianity, is a relationship with Jesus. Nothing else required. No High and mighty Pope to adhere to, No Priest telling you the way, No Pastor telling you that you are damned if you don't attend church faithfully, etc. Just a simple relationship through praise, worship, bible reading and prayer with your Creator and the His Son, Jesus, whom he sent to deliver you. Oh, I think it is a good idea to get together on a regular basis with others who believe as you do, because Jesus said to. "Do not forsake the assembling of one another together." He also spoke of the importance of Christian fellowship and praying together as a group and worshipping together. So, church is not a bad thing. Only if you allow it to regulate you.

God is a gentleman. He will not force his way upon anyone of his creation. He desires that all should come to know Him. But, it is each individuals choice to have Him in their life or not.

Or, maybe they believe because: 1. They have experienced His presence among them. 2. They understand that for every painting there is an artist. 3. He has entered into them through His Holy Spirit and communes with them. 4. God has made Himself known to them in some way. 5. They have tasted his goodness. 6. They sought after Him and found Him. 7. When they read His words from the scripture,they asked Jesus to be their Savior as it instructs them to do, and they were 'born again' spiritually. And once that happens, there is NO denying that God is real. Your #7 is actually the opposite of what you say. Knowing God makes you responsible to Him, it doesn't take away your responsibilities. Many people don't want to accept the fact that God is real, because if they did, then they would have to be responsible to Him. And they don't want to be.

I agree wholeheartedly. It is true that sooo many believe in God, and yet so few of them actually nurture their relationship with him. They are busy, or they are caught up with life and all that is happening around them. So, they don't talk to God and read his word. They are missing out on something wonderful. I'm so glad that you're not missing out!:sad: God bless you.

Santa is a fictional charachter that adults made up for their children. When they reach school age, it is figured out that it is fictional fun. God, on the other hand, is very, very real and adults from all over the world, 88% of the people for that matter, (America 95%), believe in Him. You are a minority in this world. I find it facinating that such a huge percentage of people in the world believe in God, yet those who don't, feel that they are the ones with the wisdom, and the rest of us living here are dilusional. How is it that sooooo many of us are duped and you're not??:sad:

Thank you. Join in please!

I don't understand how Mary announcing that all generations will call her blessed is taken to mean that she was sinless, or more important in God's eyes than any of his other children. Or that we should honor and revere her and even worship her as many Catholics do. The bible teaches "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall see God." And "Blessed are the poor in spirit for the kingdom of God belongs to them". And "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God." Yet, many people are merciful, poor in spirit, and peacemakers, and they are not worshipped or revered or prayed to or sinlesss for that matter. They are blessed,just like Mary. The word 'blessed' simply means happy. So, the world will call Mary Happy. So what. 46And Mary said: "My soul glorifies the Lord 47and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, 48for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed, 49for the Mighty One has done great things for me— holy is his name. Every Christians soul glorifies and magnifies the Lord. Every Christians spirit rejoices in God our Savior. She points out that God was mindful of her and used her to carry his Son. And because of that, all generations will call her blessed (happy). For God did great things for her. I just don't see how these verses about Mary say as much as the Catholic teachers claim they say.

I can't say that I have ever told you what or how to think. But if you want to believe that I have, what can I say, except prove it. I don't tell anyone what to think. I don't tell anyone how to think, either. I do tell others what "God" has revealed to me in his words. That is all.

Just want to let you all know that I will be on Vacation in MA and ME for the next 2 weeks. I'll miss ya! can't wait to read up on what I'll miss around here when I get back. And, Cleo'smom, I'll miss you most of all. Love the bantering!!

The solution is fewer people depending on government to solve all their problems and more people willing to get off their butts and take responsibility for their lives. However, like narcotics, government aid becomes addictive. And as narcotics become too expensive for even the wealthiest addicts, so are dependency programs becoming too expensive even for the wealthiest nation in the history of the world. The warning is for the United States to start weaning its government addicts at once, or it wont be long before they're going to have to absorb the far greater shock of going cold turkey!

Why doesn't Obama want Gulf oil spill cleanup to succeed? President Obama does not want the oil cleaned up from the Gulf of Mexico, at least, not anytime soon. If you don't believe that, you have to believe he is a complete idiot. Although he has found time to play golf at least nine times since the spill began, Obama has done nothing to expedite the cleanup and everything to slow it down. Foreign countries with oil-spill experience offered their help. Obama took 53 days to respond and accepted help from only five. Three days after the spill, the Dutch offered four skimmers that together have the capacity to collect 146,000 barrels of oil per day. As of June 9, 64,650 barrels had been recovered. Obama is blocking the construction of sand berms to keep the oil offshore. There are 2,000 oil skimmers in the United States. Only 31 of them are in the Gulf, in case they're needed elsewhere. A giant oil-skimming ship is being tested after sitting idle for two months. It will be refused if it does not return water to the Gulf that is 99.985 percent clean. Obama seems to feel it's better to have 100 percent of the oil in the Gulf than it is to have it 99.1 percent clean. Obama has threatened to use executive orders to cram carbon regulation down our throats if Congress doesn't do his bidding. He could use executive orders to waive the Jones Act and EPA regulations to make the cleanup faster but has refused. A company in Maine has miles of oil-skimming boom Obama refused to use because of phony concerns of quality. Oil-skimming barges were stopped from their work for a week so the Coast Guard could determine whether they had enough life vests and fire extinguishers. Actor Kevin Costner offered centrifuges to clean the water, but they first had to undergo "rigorous EPA testing." Even if they were only 80 percent effective, isn't that better than doing 100 percent of nothing? What has Obama done? He ordered a moratorium on oil drilling over 500-foot depths. That puts more people in the Gulf region out of work and makes us more dependent on foreign oil. Moreover, the rigs are being moved elsewhere. The Obama administration said the moratorium was based on the recommendations of a panel of experts. It was a blatant lie. Eight of them specifically said a moratorium would hurt more than help. Obama also said he approved additional offshore drilling only after being assured it was "absolutely safe." And that, dear readers, is another absolute lie. No one asserts offshore drilling is "absolutely safe." So either the most powerful man in the world is plain stupid or he doesn't want the Gulf cleaned up anytime soon. It's your pick. But before you choose, remember the motto of this administration: "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste." John Kanca III Middlebury

Obama Economy Sends Americans to Their Mattresses Home mortgage interest rates are the lowest in history, but house sales are plunging. Banks can make money easily because of the Federal Reserve's low interest rates, but they're not making many loans. Major corporations are sitting on something like $2 trillion in cash, but they're not investing. Unemployment is running at 10 percent, rounded off, for the 11th straight month, but few employers are hiring and a million people have stopped looking for work in the last year. Small-business hiring is at a nine-month low, and retail sales are tailing off. Government policies designed to stimulate the economy seem to be having the opposite effect. Consumers aren't buying, businesses aren't hiring, and those fortunate enough to have some cash on hand don't seem to be investing. I call it the mattress economy. People seem to be following this investment strategy. Step one: Go to Mattress Discounters and buy the biggest mattress you can find. Step two: Take it home, and stuff all your money in it. Step three: Lie down, and get some rest. This hurts the economy, but it's a rational response to the Obama Democrats' public policies. And that's not just the view of their political opponents. Consider the plaint of Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg, head of the Business Roundtable, which has been playing footsie with the Obama administration for most of the last 18 months. "By reaching into virtually every sector of economic life," Seidenberg recently wrote, "government is injecting uncertainty into the marketplace and making it harder to raise new capital and create new businesses." Or take a look at Obama backer Nate Silver's fivethirtyeight.com Website. "Why aren't businesses hiring?" asks tax lawyer Hale "Bonddad" Stewart. "Uncertainty: There has been a tremendous amount of change over the last 12 months. Businesses are still trying to figure out what this means for their bottom line. Until there are firm answers, they will freeze hiring." In other words, the Obama Democrats' vast expansion of the size and scope of government — and the threat that they may pass even more such legislation in a lame duck session of Congress after the November election — has chilled the animal spirits that John Maynard Keynes said were the driving force for economic growth. Instead of stimulating the economy, the Obama Democrats' policies have shocked it into immobility. People are lying on their mattresses, waiting for the next shock. At least one is definitely coming: The Bush tax cuts expire at the end of the year, which means that high earners can be sure they will very soon keep less of what they make. Politicians up for re-election are taking notice. Congressional Democratic leaders can't round up the votes for another stimulus package and have not dared to ask their members to vote for a budget resolution. New York Times columnist Paul Krugman keeps beating the drum for even more increases in federal spending. But congressional Democrats are refusing to dance. Democrats can plausibly claim that their 2009 stimulus package, passed less than a month after Barack Obama was sworn in, prevented a 1932-style downward spiral. But it didn't hold unemployment below 8 percent, as they promised it would. They can argue that Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner's stress tests prevented a meltdown of the big banks. The problem is that it didn't get them back into the lending business. And Democrats can claim that the General Motors and Chrysler bailouts are working out better than some of us doomsayers predicted. Unfortunately, the transfer of assets from secured creditors to the United Auto Workers — which I dubbed "gangster government" last year — has undoubtedly deterred investment in similar enterprises. But the brute fact remains that even enormous government spending can't revive an economy when government threatens to take away anything you earn. America has seen this kind of thing before. In the late 1930s, when Franklin Roosevelt raised taxes on high earners, encouraged lawless sit-in strikes by labor unions and took over utility businesses, the response was a "capital strike." Instead of creating jobs, businesses and investors put their money in mattresses. The result was a stagnant economy and double-digit unemployment-and a 75-seat Republican gain in the 1938 off-year elections. Back then, the economy eventually perked up thanks to mobilization for World War II. No such mobilization appears on the horizon today. You may need to get a bigger mattress. Michael Barone

Ahhh! I love you, too.

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Eccleiastes 11:5 As you do not know the path of the wind, or how the body is formed in the mother's womb, so you can not understand the work of God, the Maker of all things.

You are blessed to be able to help out the community in that way. I like how you understand that it is God that you serve.

You are hanging with the wrong Christians. All of them that I know are not like that at all. First of all, how do you know they are"patting themselves on the back" after they leave church? You couldn't possibly. Also, most of the people who volunteer at homeless shelters and nursing homes, etc. are Christians. Christians that I know, and I know many of them, are very loving, caring and giving people, who do alot for their communities and those in need. I was a foster parent for about 20 years and found that the majority of homes were Christian couples who wanted to help children.

How about the fair tax. That sounds better than what we have.

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If that's the way you feel about reading my posts, then you can find someone else to banter with. These conversations are not one sided. I find the time to read all of your posts, but if you feel that you are the only one worthy of having your posts read, then good-bye.

Cleosmom, I know this article is a long read, but the author truly says it best, and I hope you will read it and get my view on the government stealing issue. Government Theft by David Servant You shall not steal....You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet...anything that belongs to your neighbor (Ex. 20:15, 16). Most people, Christians and non-Christians alike, agree that it is wrong to take what belongs to someone else. Every nation and culture has laws against theft. The God-given conscience of every human resonates with a built-in knowledge that stealing is ethically wrong. God is so deeply opposed to theft that when He chose Ten Commandments among potentially hundreds that He could have written with His finger on tablets of stone, "Thou shalt not steal" was listed there as number eight. The sin of coveting, which is always a precursor to theft, is also found in that same list of ten essentials. God is deeply opposed to even the desire to possess what belongs to someone else. In essence He is telling us, "Don't even entertain the idea of taking what isn't yours." Under the Mosaic Law, thieves who were caught had to repay their victims anywhere from two to five times what they had stolen (see Ex. 22:1-7), an obvious divine commentary on the gravity of the sin of theft. The New Testament underscores the fundamental evil of theft by teaching that it is a transgression against the second greatest commandment. If I love my neighbor, I will not steal from him: For this, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet," and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Rom. 13:9, emphasis added). Similarly, theft violates the Golden Rule. I don't want anyone to steal from me, so I should not steal from anyone else. Theft is so grievous to God that He warns that no thief will inherit His kingdom (1 Cor. 6:9-10). Heaven's doors are closed tight to thieves. All of this is to say that the fundamental ethical evil of theft is well established. No one has any excuse to claim ignorance in this regard. Obviously, if it is wrong for one person to steal from another person, it is wrong for two people, or three people, or three thousand people to covet what belongs to someone else and steal it from him. Group theft is just as ethically wrong as individual theft. And this leads me to my topic. Governments can be guilty of theft, and they frequently are. Before you think I'm about to advocate that taxation is theft, let me clarify. Human governments have the God-given right to tax their citizens in order to provide services that governments can best provide for the good of all its citizens, such as protection from foreign enemies, a system of courts, public roads, and more. Scripture instructs Christians to pay their taxes and honor those in authority (Matt. 22:21; Rom. 13:1-7; 1 Pet. 2:17). When governments cross the line, however, from providing services for the benefit of all its citizens to exploiting its citizens for the benefit of government officials or taxing some of its citizens for the benefit of others, that amounts to theft. We generally abhor the world's dictators and regimes who steal from the citizens they should be serving. Yet we've grown quite accustomed to our government "spreading the wealth"---so much so that very few of us even identify it as being theft. Consider this: Any modern-day Robin Hood, if apprehended, would be prosecuted as a criminal by any government regardless of how noble his motives might be. Yet many of those same governments play the part of Robin Hood all the time, taking money from some and redistributing it to others in the form of special benefits. Once a representative government adopts a policy of "spreading the wealth," its citizens are set at war against each other, as everyone clamors to get his or her slice of the national pie. When does it end? One hundred years ago the U.S. government spent only 8% of our gross national product. Last year it spent 43%. You've probably heard the famous quote attributed to Alexander Fraser Tytler: A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the majority discovers it can vote itself largess out of the public treasury. After that, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits with the result the democracy collapses because of the loose fiscal policy ensuing, always to be followed by a dictatorship. Former Prime Minister of Great Britain Margaret Thatcher is often attributed to a similar bit of wisdom: The only problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money. Let's consider some specific cases of theft by the U.S. government. Although most of us don't mind paying taxes to help provide for those who are genuinely disadvantaged, to forcibly take money by taxation in order to take care of the disadvantaged is theft. Again, if any individual forcibly took money from someone and gave it to someone else who was disadvantaged, he would be prosecuted as a thief. So how is such an act made right if a government does it? I am, of course, not arguing against helping the disadvantaged. All of us have a God-given responsibility to voluntarily help the disadvantaged (without encouraging irresponsibility, as do government welfare programs). But the key word is "voluntarily." And if governments got out of the charity business, taxes could be lowered, and everyone would have more money to voluntarily give to disadvantaged people or to organizations that serve the disadvantaged. Of course, it could be argued that, unless our government forced us to be charitable through tax revenues that are distributed to the disadvantaged, the disadvantaged would remain in peril. Perhaps that is so, but on the other hand, I wonder how many people justify their personal uncharitableness with the excuse, "The government takes care of the disadvantaged, so there is no need for me to be burdened with helping them." Regardless, when governments take money from some and give it to others, it is theft. One "disadvantaged" group that the U.S. government assists are the elderly. (I put the word "disadvantaged" in quotes because not all elderly people are in that category. If you don't believe me, visit Florida sometime.) The largest expenditure of the U.S. government revolves around caring for our elderly population through Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid. Together, they account for about 40% of the federal budget. If you are of the age to benefit from those programs, I'm sure you appreciate them. If you are employed, you may think that about 7.5% of your earnings are taken from each paycheck for Social Security and Medicare. Your employer, however, is required to match that amount, paying approximately another 7.5%. So all 15% could (and should) be yours if it wasn't taken in taxes. You probably realize that 15% is not invested to wait for you to reach retirement. It is distributed to current retirees. Of course, most of those retirees paid Social Security and Medicare taxes themselves, and they feel as if they have a right to the benefits. And those of us who are still in the work force don't mind paying those taxes now as long as future workers will be forced to fund our retirement years. For that reason, few of us consider the entire program to be theft, taking money from one person and giving it to another. The system will continue to work as long as workers significantly outnumber retirees. But with the current changing ratio of workers to retirees, it seems inevitable that Social Security taxes will go up and/or benefits for retirees will go down. It won't seem fair then, especially if you ultimately don't receive as much as you paid into the system. It will seem like government theft, which it has been from the beginning. The very first recipient of monthly Social Security benefits paid in a total of $22.54 over three years and collected a total of $22,889 before she died. The government took other people's money and gave it to her. I am, of course, not advocating not caring for the elderly. Everyone should of course voluntarily care for their elderly parents if there is a need (like just about everyone in the U.S. did before 1940, and the majority of world still does), and if they have the means should help other elderly folks if such folks have a valid need. Think about it: If your income increased by 15% for the rest of your working life, I'll bet you could not only better prepare for your own old age, but you could also do something to care for some elderly folks right now as well. How many people in their twenties and thirties, if given the choice, would prefer to have the government take 15% of their earnings for Social Security and Medicare or to invest that 15% themselves for their own retirement and to have something they could use to care for elderly parents who need assistance? What is abhorrent to most all taxpayers is the thought of the government taking their money via taxation and redistributing it to those who are not deserving in the least, such as people who should be paying taxes themselves, but aren't, or deceptive people who could work, but don't. It feels like theft when the government bails people out of their self-inflicted problems using the taxes paid by people who have acted responsibly. Again, those same governments would prosecute any individual who did what they are doing. I've occasionally heard Christians argue that our government should be "spreading the wealth" on the basis of what Jesus taught about caring for the poor. But Jesus was not speaking to governments when He preached about caring for the poor; He was speaking to individuals. Voluntary sharing is what Jesus had in mind. Keep in mind that Jesus is also the one who inspired Paul to write, "If anyone is not willing to work, then he is not to eat, either" (2 Th. 3:10). God does not want governments, or Christians for that matter, to reward laziness or immorality. How about another example? It could be argued that graduated tax rates are a form of theft. When the rich pay a greater percentage of their earnings in taxes, it benefits those of us who pay not only less taxes, but a lesser percentage. It is just another form of "spreading the wealth." Just for the record, I'm writing, not as an angry rich person, but as a lower-income person who benefits every day from the taxes paid by the wealthy. Similarly, and on a more local scale, wealthy people who can afford bigger homes pay more in school property taxes than those with smaller homes, effectively helping to provide a better education for the children of less wealthy families. That is also a form of government theft, or "spreading the wealth," taking from some and giving it to others. The entire system of school property taxes is grossly unfair to those who never have children and home-schoolers, who receive no benefit from their property taxes yet help pay for the education of everyone else's children. The many "pork barrel" earmarks that are attached to so much of the legislation that pass through our congress are yet another example of government theft. Why should every taxpayer in the U.S. pay for special projects that only benefit very limited numbers of people? How is that any different than theft? Perhaps the grandest example of government theft is the government's borrowing trillions of dollars, a debt that will either be repaid with dollars that are worth less because so many more have been "printed"---which amounts to stealing from the government's creditors---or a debt that will be passed on to future generations, which amounts to stealing from our children and grandchildren. That enormous debt is the ultimate "spreading of the wealth," as the future earnings of our unborn grandchildren are spread to us. It illustrates the worst form of greed imaginable---to knowingly borrow money which benefits one generation with the full knowledge that the debts incurred will be paid by future generations. Currently, every U.S. taxpayer's share of the national debt is $113,000. What are the chances of you paying off, through tax legislation, your share of that debt before you die? Incidentally, as long as we continue to cast our votes to keep thieves in office, we're complicit in stealing from our grandchildren. OK, I've transgressed two cardinal rules by bringing up both religion and politics! Thanks for letting me get this off my chest. I invite your feedback. Please be kind. I hope to publish varied excerpts from your feedback next month. If you wish to remain anonymous, please let me know. ©2010 David Servant