1

If a preacher praises Bush for standing up for "the culture of life" because he didn't approve stem cell research legislation-reject the preacher. He doesn't have the ability to see the big picture or is dishonest.

2

How sad that your satire hits so close to the mark with respect to professing Christians within today's ecumenical churches of deceit.

3

Very funny [and true] post Joe.

4

Coram Deo,

Perhaps you could expand upon your thoughts in Post #2?

I was not being satirical. I recently moved and had been searching for a new church and left a church I attended for about a month for the reasons I stated. I decided to leave the church the Sunday the minister spent the whole sermon talking about abortion and the culture of life. The minister praised Bush for his defense of the "culture of life" because he vetoed the stem cell research bill. FYI, I don't support abortion, but I found it outrageous for someone to praise Bush for his standing up for "the culture of life" and not recognize what is going on in Iraq. What about the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi families who have had love ones killed, injured, and tortured for no good reason? I am glad he was speaking up for the unborn, but what about the people that have been born already. And what about the increased militarization of our country? It would seem to be at odds with the "culture of life".

If a minister can spend his whole sermon talking about "the culture of life" and not even mention the devastating loss of life in Iraq, he is either ignorant or intellectually dishonest.

I started attending a local Presbyterian church-one of those deceitful mainline churches that had enough integrity to not support the unjust invasion and occupation of Iraq and to show some empathy for the people suffering from it.

5

JohnW,

I think he was talking to Joe.

Joe,

Very funny stuff. If we Christians could get such entertainment from radio, television and the movies like this, we'd be in a much better place right now. How is it that you can write so well and yet not display nudity, use hate filled language or encite us all to violence?

Must be some sort of trickery!

6

Hey, Baggi, I think you're right. Whoops. Should have paid more attention before going off on a rant.

Nevermind, Coram.

7

Yes, my comment was in response to Joe's post. My apologies for the lack of clarity.

JohnW (a.k.a. JohnWq?),

Good luck with your search for a home church that preaches the whole counsel of God and is more interested in the eternal things of God Almighty than the temporal things of sinful man.

There's certainly a body of believers with whom you can fellowship and glorify your Creator and Judge, however difficult it may be to locate.

8

Actually, it is probably more important to choose a good church than a good preacher, although a good preacher most certainly is part of a good church.

I would look for a church that has
- strong biblical preaching
- an emphasis on small group membership
- some emphasis on serving the local community
- maybe a good children's ministry (not essential, but good)
- dynamic worship

You might want to read How to identify bad preaching.

9

JohnW:

You wonder why Iraq was not mentioned? Perhaps because the pastor knew the difference between the deliberate killing of innocent life and the accidental killing of innocents as an unfortunate by-product of war?

Maybe if you give it some thought, you'll see the difference, too.

jared

10

Seeker,
Consider al
- quality adult education ministry

Enjoy. Go Badgers!

11

Coram,

[JohnWq was a typo]

You were not being unclear, I was not paying attention and went off on a tirade.

I appreciate your thoughts and I should focus my mind on God's word and my faith. I should not focus so much on short-comings of our political system-although I think it's reasonable to recognize what is going on and speak out against what I think is wrong.

jared, The iraq war was not necessary and was not a just war, therefore I would say the killings of civilians is deliberate and evil. To think otherwise is to really have your head in the sand. Those Iraqi lives are every bit as precious as the unborn.

12

John W,

"Not necessary?" To what do you attribute the fact that we have not been attacked on our soil since 9/11?

13

Marie,

Why no terrorist attacks since 911? Simple: There are almost no terrorists in our country and few living abroad that have the means to hit us from abroad. The threat has been hyped by the government and most of the media. Just because they say "we are fighting them over there, so we won't have to fight them over here", doesn't make it so. Also, our invasion and occupation of Iraq is creating more terrorists. If you have hundreds of thousands of people who have had family members needlessly kill, injured, or tortured, there is a good chance this may result in increased hatred of our country. They are not all hating us because "they hate our freedoms"...it might be something more concrete like a loss of a loved one.

For a better answer to your question about why there have been no attacks, I would like to refer you to an article by John Mueller in Foreign Affairs from September 2006 entitled "Is There Still a Terrorist Threat? The Myth of the Omnipresent Enemy" (it's available on the internet).

14

Collin wrote:
Consider also quality adult education ministry

You know, that's kind of a Baptist thing, and none of the Charismatic/Pentecostal churches I have attended have had adult education ministries.

What are they for? Are they like extra classes in Christianity? Are the run by the pastor or as a lay ministry? How do they support the work of the church? I am not against them, just not sure how they should be included as an essential ministry of the church.

15

Seeker,

In the Presbyterian circles, we have adult Sunday School right at the same time as Children's Sunday School. Also, Bible Study weekly.

John W,

"There are almost no terrorists in our country. . "

I'd like some of what you've been smokin'.

16

Marie,

Personally, I don't care if you call me a "pot-head" or crazy. A wise person tries to gather information from a variety of sources and reaches his own conclusions.

Tell me, where are all the terrorists? You'd think the FBI would be able to uncover some terrorist cells if there were so many of them. The few so called terrorist plots that have allegedly been foiled turn out to be some stupid nonsense upon further scrutiny.

I like to invite you to read that Foreign Affairs article I mentioned, so you can get a different perspective on the "war on terror". You can't get a realistic perspective from TV news anymore-they are too busy reporting on Ann Nicole's death and Britney Spears cutting her hair and getting a tatoo.

17

John, I don't think you are a pothead. My smokin' comment meant to say, you are out of touch with reality on this one.

There have been several individual terrorists and terrorist groups broken up in the US since 9/11. One was near me in the Sierra foothills, a Pakistani ice cream man and his son. They went and trained in Afghanistan, etc. etc., were all set to kill. I won't bother to google it for you. If you think about it I am sure you can recall several instances of arrested terrorist cells right here in the U.S. over the past few years. Experience teaches us, just like if you find one mouse you have several: if you arrest several terrorist cells/individuals, you have many.

18

I am not worried about a terrorist attack. Am more worried about the increased militarization of our society and drifting away from democracy.

19

BTW, I found another very relevant piece I wrote entitled Ten Principles of Church Membership which I think answers some of your questions about pastors.

20

Our preacher works a 40 hour week job. He gets an extra $800 for preaching to us. It's a small, local non-denominational church. It could easily die out but we just don't think it's time yet. We were impressed by one of the members. The son of the founders of the church, he was in his 80s when we met him and suffering from Alzheimers. Church members helped him stay in his house until the end.

We just went through a bit of nasty church politics. Those of us on the pastor's side seem to have won as the troublemaker is moving on to another church. We have no piano player and sing without accompliment. By any criteria you might choose, this is not likely the church you would join. We hope to be members until we die.