This is a question/observation I've had for many years now. It's almost Back to the Future-esque in its own way, and I'm rather curious what everyone else may think about it.

In the book of Revelation, John visits Heaven and personally witnesses the events of the apocalypse play out, as well as its aftermath. It is clear that he has conversations with at least one angel and is physically present for this occasion. So the question is, will any of us who may be present there for the events written about see John there? And to further the question, would John (after death) see himself (the live version) recording the events?

I do not believe that John would be able to see himself, as you state. His observations were just that, at least to my admitted limited understanding.
Nor do I think that those who endure the tribulation will be able to see john standing around as an observer. If I have it right, he was what could be called on the outside looking in. Seeing things from the perspective of the angels he was with.

A large portion of the "Being poor" article is the writer complaining that his luxuries aren't as luxurious as he would like. It's rather pathetic.

A shirt from the net:

https://img0.etsystatic.com/043/0/88945 ... 6_bgnp.jpg

It isn't really about the shirt. Rather, how do you advertise what you believe?

Good question! How do you advertise what you believe, indeed? Mainly by the way you live your life, should be the most cogent advertisement of what you believe. And that could go well beyond wearing a particular message on a t-shirt, in the case of a Christian. Question is that it might take some courage to wear such a t-shirt at all. The way you live your life is also what the Muslims believe is a good advertisement for your religion, Islam being as proselytising, or even more so, as any Christian sect or denomination. The same might be said of a lot of religions. But even that doesn't always work.

Because in UK, for generations one of the more tolerant of nations where religion is concerned, even parishioners of the Church of England, founded by the children of Henry VIII, to reconcile their nation's Christian beliefs at the time, can now find themselves in hot water in the secular administration of today's UK, so aggressive have some proponents of political and atheistic agendas have become. Although UK, unlike France, hasn't passed laws against the wearing in public of burqas, large crucifixes or other conspicuously religious clothing, such as Jewish yarmulke (or maybe Sikh turbans?), I've heard of women being dismissed from their jobs for wearing discrete cruciform pendants. I expect you have also heard about how a baker was fined or put out of business, for being discriminatory, because he refused to decorate a wedding cake to the specifications of a client because it was against his beliefs.

You do realise that in the rest of the world, even in Australia, there is a push to discredit Christianity as a whole, whatever denomination, and remove it altogether from public cognisance, and from any influence in government, politics and law. There is much in the way Christian schools have been depicted in the press that supports this push. The trouble is, the sins of nominally Christian practitioners, or those working for Christian establishments are not confined there, but are endemic throughout the rest of the community, religious or not. That is not to say that Christians and those Christian establishments affected should not have cleaned up their act, and that they should not in the future practise what they preach in God's name.

And there is much in what Michael Gove said in defence of Christianity. Of simple kindnesses, of the establishment of charities to help the less fortunate, of ensuring that there are schools at all, that actually teach more than prayers. Of the founding and endowment of hospitals in the past to tend to the sick and dying. Remember it was the monks of old who tended to the sick, administered to the poor, and taught the children how to read and write, however they may now be seen. Of willingness to help others, and for a sense of community in which all should be welcomed.

The trouble is that removing religion from daily life won't work either. It merely displaces one religion for another set of beliefs, whose tenets may be a good deal more sinister than what went beforehand. In today's paper I read about a conservative (Hisb-ut Tahrir) public Islamic meeting, held in university facilities, which was under criticism by a journalist. The picture accompanying the article showed how the congregation was redistributed from families sitting together, to men at the front and women at the back, which as this journalist remembered, resembled seating in a bus from segregationalist times in USA. I was tempted to write in and say that traditionally Judaism also separated women from men and still does. But, unlike this particularly anti-Semitic and anti-Christian version of Islam, Judaism does not demand the non-Judaic community should do as they do in the relative privacy of their synagogues. And even in synagogues, liberal Jews are more tolerant of their wives praying besides their husbands even there.

So isn't it a good idea to choose carefully what you want to advertise about your faith?

Remember those seven deadly sins and their accompanying virtues? What do you think of this old song from the musical, Camelot? Otherwise, apologies for the long post.

Seven Deadly Virtues lyrics

MORDRED

″The seven deadly virtues, those ghastly little traps
Oh no, my liege, they were not meant for me
Those seven deadly virtues were made for other chaps
Who love a life of failure and ennui
Take courage-now there's a sport
An invitation to the state of rigor mort
And purity-a noble yen
And very restful every now and then
I find humility means to be hurt
It's not the earth the meek inherit, it's the dirt
Honesty is fatal, it should be taboo
Diligence-a fate I would hate
If charity means giving, I give it to you
And fidelity is only for your mate
You'll never find a virtue unstatusing my quo or making my Beelzebubble burst
Let others take the high road, I will take the low
I cannot wait to rush in where angels fear to go
With all those seven deadly virtues free and happy little me has not been cursed"

Originally posted by waggawerewolf27:

How do you advertise what you believe, indeed? Mainly by the way you live your life, should be the most cogent advertisement of what you believe.

I agree. I like the St. Francis quote to "Preach always; and if necessary, use words."

I'm not especially familiar with the U.K.'s political/royal situation, although I have heard that the Queen allegedly is moving away from the designation of Head of the Church of England. It's unclear whether that is with the idea of nudging her heirs not to take that vow in the first place.

As regarding the cake controversies, that's a tough choice. Without going into any details, on the one hand, two groups have opposing beliefs, and the law chose which one it will support today. No doubt fifty years ago it would have made a different choice which one to support. But then on the other hand, the reason we even have this dilemma is that Christians live in a different country now.

Having said that, it seems that Certain Cake Crises are late to the party, having been upstaged by other difficult customers who can't quit the game. (I'm guessing their bakers made two cakes for a few of them, too.)

The trouble is that removing religion from daily life won't work either.

Verily. After all, our Constitution guarantees freedom of religion, not freedom from religion. Sorry I don't have time for more.

I'm not especially familiar with the U.K.'s political/royal situation, although I have heard that the Queen allegedly is moving away from the designation of Head of the Church of England. It's unclear whether that is with the idea of nudging her heirs not to take that vow in the first place.

Not the Queen, whose coronation in 1953 ordained her not only as the Queen Regnant of UK, but also as Defender of the Faith (continuing on Henry VIII's title) and Secular Governor of the Church of England. The Queen as non-political head of state has done her duty meticulously, but is now aged 89. In September, her reign will have exceeded that of Queen Victoria, who for a long time after her husband's death refused to open Parliament or let herself be seen in public. Prince Charles, her heir, commented once that he would prefer to be Defender of Faiths rather than as Defender of The Faith, because of the multiplicity of faiths represented in UK that need defending. For instance, he has spoken up about the persecution of Christians, such as in the Middle East and elsewhere. And he has visited synagogues, mosques, etc , as well as Catholic and Orthodox churches, as part of his royal duties.

As regarding the cake controversies, that's a tough choice. Without going into any details, on the one hand, two groups have opposing beliefs, and the law chose which one it will support today. No doubt fifty years ago it would have made a different choice which one to support. But then on the other hand, the reason we even have this dilemma is that Christians live in a different country now.

Yes, this is a complication of changing the law, and in the case of states of nations like Australia, the national constitution as well. In UK, their Parliament appears to have done just that. As you say, an lot depends on how you define marriage as it is still defined in Australia's constitution, as a union between a man and a woman.

This can be fine if the people affected who want a different definition can keep their unions secularly lawful, such as by going to a marriage registry. But it gets sticky when the change is against the values of a particular church, and its marriage celebrants, usually the ministers. It might be a bit precious of the baker to refuse to decorate a cake according to the views of this particular customer, so long as they didn't demand a stained glass window and cross as part of the cake decoration.

But isn't it also a bit precious of the couple in question if they wanted a religious ceremony before a minister, or similar "cleric", whose religious beliefs and preached values are at odds with what the couple wants?

I just wonder, had, say, a Hindu couple come to these bakers and asked them to bake a cake with "The blessings of Vishnu" (or whoever) "be upon you", would they have refused? After all, idolatry is regarded as the Number One sin in the Bible.

I doubt the situation would ever arise about a cake with Vishnu, or Ganesh depicted on it. Though, even if there was, I'd expect even a religious English baker to be more objective about such a cake, since it is nothing to do with his own personal religious beliefs, and does not specifically involve what he might consider a contradiction, or a mockery of those beliefs, intentional or otherwise. Just as I'd expect a Muslim butcher, who accepted working for our local supermarket, to still serve me with ham, or the bacon I requested for my family dinner, halal or not. On the other hand, I wouldn't front up to a Muslim cake maker or any at all, for that matter, wanting a cake with an image on it that could be construed as offensive to Islam.

I haven't heard that Hindu marriages involve cutting of the wedding cake, since despite the proliferation of Vietnamese bakeries around our way, cake-making does seem to be a particularly Western practice. I've been to a Hindu wedding a decade or so ago. This particular wedding was held in a hired Serbian community hall, not a Hindu temple, though there are a few of them around, one or two not too far away.

The bride wore a red and gold sari with a matching thick veil over her head. She had her hands painted with henna, and was given away by her brother. The wedding ceremony involved processions around a canopy held over the bride and groom, lighting fires, holding ribbons together, or the bride and grooms hands tied together, similar to what sometimes happens in other sorts of wedding ceremonies, even Christian ones. But I don't remember the bride and groom having to cut a cake together.

There were a lot of speeches as usual, in praise of the bride's and groom's family, and ceremonies where the bridal couple vow not to disgrace their parents. A workmate who understood Hindi translated for us. But the food, some of which seemed typical Indian wedding fare, seemed mainly vegetarian, or at least, non-beef, with naan and pappadums accompanying curries and tandooris. The sorts of sweets were the same as the sweets usually made and distributed for the annual Hindu Diwali festival. If the family concerned aren't in a position to make the food themselves, they might find suitable caterers, such as at Indian restaurants, who would be attuned to what are suitable foods for a Hindu wedding. Although I like cloves, for instance, and find them a useful help for toothache, I've heard that the Hindus consider them unlucky, so I wouldn't use them in front of a Hindu.

I doubt the situation would ever arise about a cake with Vishnu, or Ganesh depicted on it. Though, even if there was, I'd expect even a religious English baker to be more objective about such a cake, since it is nothing to do with his own personal religious beliefs, and does not specifically involve what he might consider a contradiction, or a mockery of those beliefs, intentional or otherwise.

Surely different Christians would have different attitudes to this? I have one friend (who isn't a baker, so wouldn't be baking a cake, but the principle still applies) who is rather fundamentalist in his view and who would indeed consider making something which praised, as he saw it, a false god/idol as the highest form of blasphemy. If he were asked to sign a card saying "Happy Diwali" he would refuse, and be very blunt about it. I have other Christian friends who are perfectly happy to support others in their beliefs, even if they don't agree with them themselves, whether that be worshipping a different deity or same-sex marriage.

My point is that I feel that many Christians can be somewhat hypocritical, picking on certain groups as "un-Christian" and turning a blind eye to others. Suppose a heterosexual couple had come to the bakers, both bride and groom having been married before and divorced - would the bakers have turned them down? Jesus specifically said that if you divorce and re-marry, except because of marital infidelity, you commit adultery.

Another topic: In Australia a kind of debate has started (well the type that starts on a facebook page by ill-informed persons).

So basically many Australian foods have the halal "tick of approval" and these people are saying this is supporting isalmic state. So basically saying that being hala certified leads to threat. Anyway Charlie Pickering is better at explaining the issue than myself, so here is a link to the youtube video

@Erlian There are many Christians who cherry pick the bible, they pick what is suited to there life/ what they agree with. I think the main reason for doing this is to move with modern more secular times. I mean if the bakery refused to serve anyone who was homosexual, divorced etc than they would loose a lot of customers (the divorce rate these days is rather large). Though I am not sure of details of such things since I am not christian myself.

If he were asked to sign a card saying "Happy Diwali" he would refuse, and be very blunt about it.

But that is his personal point of view, and his prerogative. Would your friend be just as insulted if he received a "happy holidays" card, or one saying "season's greetings" at Christmas from someone who was an atheist and who didn't believe in Christianity? Or would he just be grateful he got a greeting card at all?

Yes, a "Happy Diwali" card might offend his sensibilities, if he saw it as idolatrous, but the likelihood is that the picture on it wouldn't be anything of the sort. It might just have candles on it, just like a Christmas card, since, Diwali is a festival of lights, which occurs in many faiths, including Christianity. (Well it did cross my mind the candlestick maker would come into it somehow.) I can see what you mean about the graven image on a wedding cake, but there again, a plainer cake without such a picture on it might be negotiated if the baker wanted the custom. Something like flowers etc, which by the way are easier to do. Or another solution is to ask the couple if they know of a speciality Hindu shop which might do a better job of satisfying their requirements.

Should your friend pick a fight over a Hannukah card, for example? I never saw the Jewish faith as idolatrous, since they, too, worship the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and their religious text is the Old Testament or the Torah and Taanach. And Islam, though I disagree with many of their practices and attitudes, has been known to be rather drastic about pictures and graven images. Do you know there is current restoration going on in Hagia Sophia, whose murals in 1453 were whitewashed over? Also at the Chora museum. These beautiful depictions of Jesus on high looking down at the congregation? The then emperor with him? (Justinian and his empress, Theodora) What's left in Hagia Sophia was enough to make me cry at such vandalism. Even though there were many Christians also in the Byzantine Empire who were so iconoclastic as to see these murals as idolatrous.

But if your friend, as, say, a worker in W H Smith or in another newsagency chain, was asked to serve a customer who wanted to buy such a card, he couldn't refuse to serve the customer just because he considered such a card as idolatrous. He could, however, point out that the newsagency doesn't stock such cards, that the customer might be interested in those all purpose "happy holidays" cards. Or, again, he could direct the customer to a Hindu speciality store.

Suppose a heterosexual couple had come to the bakers, both bride and groom having been married before and divorced - would the bakers have turned them down? Jesus specifically said that if you divorce and re-marry, except because of marital infidelity, you commit adultery.

How is anyone to know the couple is divorced and remarrying, unless in the course of arranging the marriage the couple divulge that this is the case to the baker? Ilf is quite right, about a high divorce rate, and maybe this is something that is between the couple concerned and the marriage celebrant, who needs to know, in New South Wales, at any rate, that the couple are both of age to marry, that the marriage is consensual and that no law is broken such as the law on bigamy. This is also the duty of a minister or priest at a Christian marriage, however they regard divorce in a religious context. The same legal requirements apply to Imams, Rabbis and other religious marriage celebrants.

I notice that when the very high-profile Prince of Wales remarried in 2005, that he and Camilla Parker-Bowles had their marriage in Windsor Guildhall, a secular arrangement, from which his mother absented herself. They then went to St George's Chapel in an act of contrition, in front of the Queen, to have their union blessed. I expect there was a traditional wedding cake, but I'm sure it didn't have on it anything on it which belaboured the Queen's religious views, as head of the Anglican church, about remarriage. There are still plenty of people who regard their quite legal marriage invalid despite the Prince of Wales' first wife having died in 1997, a result of a car accident.

You also said: Jesus specifically said that if you divorce and re-marry, except because of marital infidelity, you commit adultery. The relevant passages are in Matthew 19. Some Pharisees asked what causes could wives be put away. And Jesus pointed out that Moses permitted divorce for the hardness of their hearts, but that is not the sort of relationship that God intended from the beginning. He said that except for adultery, that men who put away their wives just to marry others were committing adultery, as were those who married the discarded wives. This was and is a sharp difference from the licence usually given men by most societies to discard women who inconveniently are infertile, grow old, ill or are merely disobliging to their every whim.

So basically saying that being hala certified leads to threat

I think it is more a case of who insists on food like Vegemite being certified halal, that is to say, it does not contain pork or any pork products, and that if it contains meat at all, the animals were killed in accordance with Sharia beliefs. I'm sure there is an Islamic association in charge of this licensing agreement to the various companies that arrange our food supply, that money changes hands to see it is done, and that the organisations concerned find it a nice little income earner. The protest might be due to the worry that the charges would be passed on to the customer in the end. I doubt that Christians are the only ones who cherry-pick their scriptures to suit themselves.

I'm more worried that if we fiddle around with our Constitution as it is now, we are going to find ourselves without a leg to stand on if we redefine marriage some other way, and that if we try to get rid of domestic violence, child brides, forced arranged marriages etc., all against the law here, we will find Sharia ideas of marriage being imposed on us, instead. I'm not at all sure that the Koran can't be quoted to support bigamy, child marriage, and much else. The very things we are trying to put a stop to. I've an idea for an Islamic wedding cake. A groom and up to four brides, the maximum the Koran allows them, or so I have heard. Would you consider this wedding cake idea a bit offensive?

Today's topic: Bad advice.

{Note: this is not intended as a swipe at any televangelist or believer in particular. I am just using these two examples because they are egregious and fairly recent. Please feel free either to comment on the examples, or to add your own favorites.}

Example One: Recently an elderly couple who can't afford to get their car repaired asked for advice. They paid tithes, but their medical bills were becoming overwhelming. In the most literal sense, their cost of living (the cost of staying alive) is rising too much. She asked, "what could we be doing wrong?"

The reply was to pray for ideas: to sell belongings, to get a job answering phones, and such like.

Assorted internet replies to this reply have tended toward the impolite at worst, and toward the coldly practical at best. Basically, not all household junk is worthy of the Antiques Roadshow, and not all business desire to hire 80-year-old people who 1) lack up-to-date job skills and 2) might have erratic attendance due to doctor/hospital visits. (At least they are not yet too infirm to be banned from driving altogether.)

Example Two: A grieving mother asked why her 3-year-old child had to die. In a reply reminiscent of Godwin's Law, she was told that since God sees all (which is true), perhaps God saw an evil end for this child and so took the child's life.

Theodicy is hard. We know that. We also know that God loves our children even more than we ever could. And yes, we know Isaiah 57:1. But we also know Romans 12:15 and John 11:35.

But a response like the one listed above has provoked remarks that (after I clean up and translate the unprintable parts) compare God and His ways to Goldilocks theology: "two Hitlers is too many; zero, not enough; but one is just right!" There seems to be no shortage of "bad babies" who didn't get whacked as children and grew up to be the tyrants and killers we all know and read about today. This in turns suggests Police theology: "So what if everyone else was speeding? You were the only one I could catch."

What are some examples of Really Bad Advice that believers have given to you?

Yes. It's something that's said a lot in evangelical circles and appears to be backed up by a few Scriptures, but I'm now convinced that it's a false interpretation of those passages. It is this: "God has a plan for your life". It sounds attractive - it suggests you're special to God and your life has a purpose. It's easy to say when more things in your life are going right than going wrong; and when you encounter a few minor problems, well of course this is God teaching you some valuable life lesson. But it totally screwed me up, and made me resentful of God, because far more has gone wrong in my life than has gone right. I didn't become stronger through all of it, quite the reverse. Little good and more harm came from these catastrophic life events. If this was God's plan for my life, than God is a vicious bully.

Recently I found myself challenging this long-held belief that this was God's plan for me. Although I'd always known it in theory, I realised at a deeper level that God really does give us free will - otherwise the whole of Christianity becomes meaningless. If God had planned everything that had happened to me so that I had had no choice, then yes, God would be a bully and salvation would be a sick joke. But he didn't. Yes, I know that God knows all of time and space so he knows what will happen, and I can accept that there may be things he might like me to do, but that's not the same thing at all as saying he's planned it all. Some of the bad things that have happened are inevitable and unavoidable, such as bereavement (since we can't live for ever in this world); others, such as career choices, have been my choice; and when I've failed to get my dream job, it may not be because God was deliberately blocking me, it could simply be that there was a better candidate, or that I messed up the interview by saying something I shouldn't have. In other words, God has allowed me control over my life.

I'm aware that some people on this list will disagree with this strongly. God is sovereign, and so everything that happens must be in accordance with his will. But I don't believe, for instance, that a 17-year-old Islamic State suicide bomber blew himself up today because that was God's will for him. Not everything that happens in the world is God's will. But that's the price we pay, and God pays, for us having free will - for God allowing us to be real people and not robots. What I do believe is true is that God is with us through all the crap, and that he will make everything right one day.

Originally posted by King Erlian:

"God has a plan for your life"

Yes. God's permissive will and God's ultimate will aren't always the same. Yet there is no shortage of people who believe that God micromanages their lives to the point that a good parking space is perceived as a specific sign of divine favor, as opposed to the general favor of finance to purchase an alarm clock, education to comprehend it, and the free will to choose to arrive on time. A few such souls also seem to give the evil one power to foul up their day -- ("Satan tried to stop me from going to church by taking all the parking spaces!") -- instead of admitting their own agency, choices, and tardiness. How they survive genuine calamity, I do not know. How you survive genuine calamity, they cannot imagine.

Anyhow, the examples above struck me as interesting because of the apparent indifference they embodied. Even the online tithing site disagrees. Really, really disagrees.

The advice also suggests the lack of a pastor or body of believers at the scene. Telling 80-year-olds to get off their arthritic fannies and get a job? Wouldn't most churches (cf. Isaiah 1:17, James 1:27) just help the widow and orphan instead?

Then there's the "God's plan for you life includes deleting your kid." When it comes to kids, these aren't the only comforters-of-Job.

Consider the notion that parents of disabled children should be complimented for being so good that God chose them as the parents. (If it doesn't link, it's from The Ten Commandments of Character by Joseph Telushkin.) However kindly it is meant, it is unkind to tell a parent, "God gave you disabled children because He knew how good you are." Telushkin's response was, "You imply that if only I were less good/nice/holy, I would have had a normal, healthy baby." Also, the speaker would realize how shocking it is if the recipient responded in kind: "You seem like such a nice person that I pray God will reward by causing you to have babies with special needs."

Any other examples?