[MD] Dawkins a Materialist (is watching?)

[pholden at davtv.com]

Quoting Case <Case at iSpots.com>:

> [Platt]
> Where in the Bible does it say Jesus advocated slavery?
> 
> [Case]
> Jesus made scant reference to slaves but Paul picked up the slack. "Slaves,
> obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, not with eyeservice,
> as men-pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fearing the Lord."
> 
> Paul had several version of this sort of thing and compared man's slavery to
> sin to the freedom obtained with becoming a slave to the Lord. Southerns in
> the 1800's had little trouble justifying slavery on Biblical grounds.

True. And those who fought slavery justified it on Biblical grounds. If your
argument is that the Bible can justify most anything, you're right. But
on balance, Christianity has provided a worthy ethic, one that it largely
still followed today in the U.S. Recall that in the past whenever I 
brought up the question of what is the basis of social morality, most 
responded with some version of Christian ethic, such as exhibited by
Martin Luther King, a minister of God.

> [Platt] 
> (In reference to Christian communists in the first century)
> Where did the put the gulags?
> 
> [Case]
> Gulags to not a communist make. Having them does rather make one a
> totalitarian, though. The fact remains that what Jesus preached and what his
> first followers practiced was a form of communism.

Can there be communism without a totalitarian government? History answers
with a resounding, "No." 

> > [Case]
> > Image my shock when not so long ago you argued forcefully and 
> > repeatedly that these rights could legitimately be taken away with no 
> > justification whatsoever.
> 
> [Platt]
> I did? Got a post you can refer to?
> 
> [Case]
> This was a recurring theme in our Sin Part 1 discussion a couple of months
> ago. It would seem that gulag is in the eye of the beholder.

If I ever argued that life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness could
legitimately be taken away by force, other than in defense of those rights, I
hereby take it back. However, I can't imagine that I ever argued for sending
people to gulags "for no justification whatsoever." A bit of hyperbole on 
your part?



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