(November 18, 2012 at 12:45 am)Daniel Wrote: What reason do I have to lie to you? I hate liars!

A three letter reason..

It's simply never been my experience that this situation pans out the way it's been presented. You're hoping to establish a point in an argument with it, but since it's a story a friend tells you,that you're telling me...I'm fairly comfortable in assuming some liberties have been taken. You know how atheists are when it comes to testimonials.

Quote:I sometimes have people ask me specifically if I'm a Christian from right out of the blue. That's my experience, deal with it.

Just tell them you don't actually want a copy of the watchtower. They'll go away.

Quote:I didn't say it's a requirement. I said we do it. There's an awful lot of stuff we do for the community, and I have a passion for doing more as well. Providing services to the community to address specific needs is something the church at large does very well, and without Christianity Australia would loose a lot of services that we provide, that we fund ourselves, and that we give out of generosity and compassion.

And again, I think the services are wonderful...the religion..not so much.

Quote:Not where Paul is there isn't. Again - how come we didn't prioritize setting up a church of our own denomination there? Explain that to me.

The last honest Anglican in Nepal?

(November 18, 2012 at 1:06 am)Rhythm Wrote: It's simply never been my experience that this situation pans out the way it's been presented.

That's fine, you don't have to experience it.

Quote:You're hoping to establish a point in an argument with it, but since it's a story a friend tells you,that you're telling me...I'm fairly comfortable in assuming some liberties have been taken. You know how atheists are when it comes to testimonials.

You don't need to be so extremely sceptical. I have no reason to lie to you.

Quote:Just tell them you don't actually want a copy of the watchtower. They'll go away.

lol.

Quote:You don't need to be so extremely sceptical. I have no reason to lie to you.

I think this is the main difference between the atheist's attitude and the beliver's. We are skeptical of any account that does not provide enough evidence to be believed. You believe even without evidence, just on the basis of personal feelings.

PS: "I have no reason to lie to you" is not a reason to believe you. Even if you aren't lying, you could still believe something untrue.

(November 18, 2012 at 7:01 am)Daniel Wrote: That's fine, you don't have to experience it.

So I don't have to experience it, and the only evidence offered is your word that some else's word is accurate........my experience, meanwhile...casts a shadow of doubt over the whole affair. It's not an issue of whether you would lie to me or not Dan, I simply don't believe that the particulars are accurate. Appears to be more like a rhetorical device, to me. That's okay though...because in the same way that I don't have to experience it, you don't require my belief to leverage such a device. I think that you could easily have made the argument that your missionary friend does good without ever insinuating that the locals fawn over his faith, that a missionary doesn't intend to, and actively engage in, "spread the word". Has it ever occurred to you that even if we entertain this little gem that what your friend interprets as an invitation to expound upon his faith is actually no such thing?

-Its great weather we're having today
yes it is
-The sky is beautiful isn't, sometimes it just seems like it was made for us to look at
and that rather reminds me of our lord jesus! Have you accepted the lord christ our god into your heart?

Quote:You don't need to be so extremely sceptical. I have no reason to lie to you.

I hope you appreciate the irony of a comment like this in a conversation about missionaries......

Ofcourse I support gay rights 110% and I think this is terrible, but I'd like to say a little in defence of Uganda's people. Because I visited the country a few years ago during college as part of a study program, I did some reading about the country's history. This issue of capital punishment is a minor issue compared to other problems and cannot be solved before other issues are solved.

- There are no civil rights at all in the country.
- The president Museveni is a dictator and ruling the country since 1980's.
- Years and years Joseph Kone's army of the lord was allowed by the president to terrorize northern-uganda. Including child soldiers and all.
- There are many, many tribes, religions (monotheistic and traditional) and cultures in Uganda. The national language is therefor English. It's an artificial unity.
- There's poverty and disease everywhere, life expectations are extremely low.
etc. etc.

Which makes it that much worse that they are focusing their resources on an issue that is so trivial by comparison.