Religion & Spirituality - 22 February 2007

2007-02-22 14:01:01 · 8 answers · asked by Trumptonboy 4

Big Bang? God? Something else?

2007-02-22 14:00:16 · 16 answers · asked by Jim K 2

2007-02-22 13:54:46 · 7 answers · asked by Anonymous

The term Anti-Christ originated from the bible. And as such, the qualification of the Anti-Christ MUST come from the bible. There is no other authority on this.
According to the bible, the Anti-christ is a lying demon.
Let us see who qualifies to be the Anti-Christ.
1.1 John 2:22 Who is the liar? It is the man who denies that Jesus is the Christ (Messiah). Such a man is the antichrist—he denies the Father (God) and the Son. 23: No one who denies the Son has the Father (God).

2.2 John 1:7
Many deceivers, who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh (from the spirit of God), have gone out into the world. Any such person is the deceiver and the antichrist.

The above qualification points the finger at the one who openly and publicly rejects the deity of Jesus and rejects the God-Son-ship of Jesus.

There is one who qualifies for this:

- MUHAMMAD (PIBUH) OF ISLAM.

2007-02-22 13:54:45 · 21 answers · asked by Anonymous

I sure would. There's nothing like a nice roll in the manure!

2007-02-22 13:52:45 · 10 answers · asked by Anonymous

2007-02-22 13:51:37 · 15 answers · asked by Holy Holly 5

2007-02-22 13:49:40 · 27 answers · asked by Zhukov 1

ok well my bro-in-law is pentecostal and believes that you have to recieve the holy spirit to go to heaven....which i have to argument against.....however he says the only sign of the holy ghost is speaking in tonuges....so he is sayin you have to speak in tonges to enter the kingdom of god....his church will start to pray out loud and speak in tonuges and i dont understand it...help me out with some scripture please about tongues....is there anyone in the new testiment who did not speak tongues and still went to heaven? is there any scripture that says what recieving the holy ghost actually is....and how you know when you have it? please help me out t hanks

2007-02-22 13:49:33 · 25 answers · asked by Landon C 1

Now that I have your attention:

In most wars, one of the first things you do is paint the enemy as not entirely human. They sacrifice babies, they enslave people, they emit flatulence in elevators, that kind of thing. This allows you to treat them in ways that otherwise would be abhorrent.

I've seen the same thing on boards like this across the Internet. People - Christians, Muslims, agnostics and atheists - who are so absolutely certain that they know THE TRUTH that they cannot conceive the possibility that someone who believes differently might be deserving of any kind of rational treatment. We've all seen it here, too. It seems to me that a place like this would be wonderful for gaining some insight into how others think, but with all the shooting going on, it's almost impossible to separate the signal from the noise.

So I guess my question is, why don't we petition Yahoo to change the title of this board to "The Shooting Gallery" and just give it to the trolls?

2007-02-22 13:46:11 · 19 answers · asked by Anonymous

2007-02-22 13:45:24 · 12 answers · asked by STFU Dude 6

atheists who hate me for my questioning, i am extending an olive branch here. join me with jesus on the roof will you?

2007-02-22 13:44:17 · 10 answers · asked by trevir287 1

In Brazil, during a Mass, during the Communion ceremony, the Communion and wine turned to actual flesh and blood. Scientific tests (key word scientific) show that it was real human flesh, and the blood is AB positive. This is scientific evidence, i say again. If anyone does not believe me, look it up, if you want.

2007-02-22 13:43:07 · 27 answers · asked by Toby 1

2007-02-22 13:42:08 · 4 answers · asked by Anonymous

Every religion seems to get established with rules & guidelines. If someone starts a club, they set guidelines. Kids clubs might even have a secret code or a password. Some gangs have certain signs or codes. These are not established by outsiders, right? Well, certain people these days are attempting to say they are in the group called christians, yet they are not within the boundaries of the rules, regulations, descriptions of such, etc. as set forth by the religion. Shall christians dictate Islamic law to muslims? Do muslims dictate the rules of buddhism? No. Isn't it untrue to paint oneself as part of a group that explicitly rejects your ideology? Hey, you know : I've got to write carefully or else those nontolerant folks who cry "Tolerance!" will yell for the media-police to silence the truth just like Hitler. -- Is that where we are going? -- That truth is disregarded...if it doesn't cater to our every whim? Is this nation really getting that spoiled, blind & pathetic?

2007-02-22 13:40:55 · 10 answers · asked by Anonymous

2007-02-22 13:40:05 · 13 answers · asked by abuadam the malay bloke 2

2007-02-22 13:39:44 · 14 answers · asked by Anonymous

Why are we more concerned by Brittany Spear's antics and Anna Nicole's death than we are about the disturbing images of a fanatic group that is quickly taking over one of the world's largest religions. They are vowing to unify and destroy us, they are growing and we are sleeping. The stage is being set for history is set to repeat itself.

2007-02-22 13:37:43 · 11 answers · asked by labragator 1

been going downhill don't you think?
9/11, Afghanistan/Iraq war, Katrina,Anthrax,Bird Flu,West Nile Virus,Mad Cow Disease,Obesity problem, Divorces sky rocket,Low Wages,No Job Growths,Etc Etc

2007-02-22 13:37:26 · 19 answers · asked by Anonymous

is the pope even in the bible?

2007-02-22 13:37:17 · 50 answers · asked by The Angry Stick Man 6

Can you make a comparison between lives with and without belief?
One day a number of bright young people came to me, seeking an effective deterrent to guard themselves against the danger arising from modern worldly life, youth, and animal desires. As I had previously told other young people who sought help from the Risale-i Nur, I also said to them:

Your youth will definitely disappear and if you do not restrict yourselves within the limits of the lawful, it will be lost. Rather than its pleasures, it will bring you suffering and calamities in this world, in the grave, and in the Hereafter. If under the Islamic discipline, you use the blessings of youth in gratitude, chastely and uprightly, and in worship, it will in effect remain perpetually and be the cause of gaining eternal youth.

As for life, if it is without belief, or if belief, because of rebelliousness, is ineffective, it will produce pains, sorrows and grief far exceeding the superficial, fleeting enjoyment and pleasure it brings. As an intelligent, thinking being, man is (in contrast to animals) intrinsically connected to the past and the future, as well as to the present time. He derives both pain and pleasure from them. Whereas, since the animals do not think, neither the sorrows arising from the past nor the fears and anxieties concerning the future, spoil their present pleasure. But if man has fallen into misguidance and heedlessness, sorrows arising from the past and anxieties about the future, mar his particular pleasure, diluting it with pains. Especially if it is an illicit pleasure, then it is like an altogether poisonous honey. This means that, with respect to enjoyments of life, man is a hundred times lower than the animals. In fact, for the misguided, heedless people, their whole life and existence, their whole world, consists in the day in which they find themselves. According to their misguided belief, all of time past and all past worlds have gone to non-existence. Their intellects, which connect them to the past and the future, produce darkness for them. Accordingly with their lack of belief, the future is also non-existent for them. The separations that become eternal because of this non-existence continually darken their lives.

By contrast, if they build their lives upon belief, then through the light of belief, both the past and the future will be illuminated and acquire existence. Like the present time, they provide, through belief, exalted spiritual pleasures and lights of existence for their spirit and heart.

Where does the enjoyment and pleasure of life lie?
So, that is how life is. If you desire the pleasure and enjoyment of life, animate your life with belief, and adorn it with religious obligations. Maintain it by abstaining from sins. As for the fear-some reality of death, which is demonstrated by instances of death every day, in every place and time, I shall explain it to you with a parable in the same way as I explained it to some other youths.

Let us suppose a gallows has been set up here in front of our eyes. Beside it is a lottery office, one which gives tickets for truly high prizes. We are here ten people, and willingly or unwillingly, shall certainly be invited there. They may call us (since the appointed time is unknown) at any moment, and say either, “Come and mount the gallows for execution!” or “A prize ticket worth millions of dollars has come up for you; come and collect it!” While we are waiting for either call, two people suddenly turn up. One of them is a scantily dressed woman, beautiful and alluring. She holds in her hand and offers some apparently very delicious, but in fact poisonous, sweets, which she wants us to eat. The other is an honest, solemn man. He enters behind the woman, and says:

“I have brought you a talisman, a lesson. If you study it, and if you do not eat the sweets, you will be saved from the gallows. With this talisman, you will receive your ticket for the matchless prize. You see with your own eyes that those who eat the sweets inevitably mount the gallows, and furthermore, until they mount them, they suffer dreadful stomach pains from the poison of the sweets. As for those who receive the ticket for the large prize, it seems that they too mount the gallows. But millions of witnesses testify that they are not hanged on the gallows, they use them as a step to enter the prize arena easily. So, look from the windows! The highest officials, the high-ranking persons concerned with this business announce with loud voices, ‘Just as you see clearly with your own eyes those mounting the gallows to be hanged, so also know with utmost certainty that those with the talisman receive the ticket for the prize.’”

As in the parable, the dissolute, religiously forbidden pleasures of youth, which are like poisonous sweets, are the cause of losing belief—and belief is the ticket to an eternal treasury and a document for everlasting happiness. Those who indulge in them are subject to death, which is like the gallows, and to the tribulations of the grave, which is the door to eternal darkness. The appointed hour of death is unknown, therefore, its executioner, not differentiating between young and old, may come at any time to cut off your head. Give up the religiously forbidden pleasures (which are like the poisonous sweets) and acquire the Qur’anic talisman (belief and performing religious obligations). One hundred and twenty-four thousand Prophets, upon them be peace, together with innumerable saints, have proclaimed that you will get to the treasury of eternal happiness if you do so. They have also shown the signs and evidences of it.

Youth spent in indulgences
In short: Youth will pass. If it is wasted in indulgences, it results in thousands of misfortunes and pains both in this world and the next. Perhaps you want to understand how such youths end up in hospitals with mental and physical diseases, mainly because of their abuse, and in prisons or hostels for the destitute as a result of their excesses, and in bars because of the distress provoked by their spiritual unease. Then, go and inquire at the hospitals, prisons and cemeteries.

For sure you will hear from most of the hospitals the moans and groans of those ill from dissipation and debauchery resulting from the appetites of youth. Also you will hear from the prisons the regretful sighs of unhappy wretches, suffering for illicit actions mostly resulting from the excesses of their youth. Again, you will come to know this truth as testified by the saints who can discern the life of the grave, and affirmed by exacting scholars of truth. Most of the torments of the grave—that Intermediate Realm the doors of which continuously open and shut for those who enter it—are the result of misspent youth.

Also, ask the old and the sick, who form the majority of mankind. Most certainly the great majority of them will answer you with grief and regret, “Alas! We wasted our youth in frivolities, indeed harmfully. Be careful, never do as we did!” A man subjects himself, for the sake of the illicit pleasures of a short period of youth, to years of grief and sorrow in this world, torment and harm in the Intermediate Realm, and the severe punishment of Hell in the Hereafter. Despite being in a most pitiable situation, he does not deserve pity. For one who freely consents to indulge in harmful actions is not worthy of pity.

May Almighty God save us and you from the alluring temptations of this age and preserve us against them. Amen.

2007-02-22 13:35:58 · 8 answers · asked by Anonymous

Ok so you know yesterday was ash Wednesday. So what are you giving up for 40 days?

2007-02-22 13:35:31 · 7 answers · asked by soccer_crzy 3

2007-02-22 13:35:00 · 25 answers · asked by Anonymous

If you wish to understand how to enjoy, through belief, great contentment and blessing, how to experience fulfillment and ease, then listen to the following parable.

A parable to understand how belief gives contentment and brings blessing
Two men set off together on a journey for both pleasure and business. One of them who is arrogant, self-serving, goes off in one direction, the other, who is God-serving, goes off in the other direction.

Since the self-serving one is both conceited and pessimistic, he ends up in what seemed to him to be a most wicked country because of his pessimism. There he finds himself everywhere surrounded by poor and hopeless people who are tormented at the hands of bullies and their lives ruined. Wherever he goes, he sees the same scene. Everyone in that land is suffering the same misery. Then he decides to forget all such events by becoming a drunk. Everyone then seems to him like a stranger or an enemy. He has awful visions of dead bodies and orphaned children. His soul is plunged in torment.

The other man, by contrast, who is God-serving, decent of conduct and fair-minded, goes to a country which is, in his view, very excellent. This good man sees a universal festival. In every corner there is joy and happiness, and a house for the remembrance of God overflowing with rapture. He also sees the festive celebrations of a general discharge from duties accompanied by cries of good wishes and thanks. And he also hears the sound of a drum and band for the enlistment of soldiers with happy calls of ‘God is the Greatest!’ and ‘There is no deity but God!’ In contrast to the other man, who suffers on account of both himself and all the people, this good-natured man becomes happy at both his own joy and that of all the people. Moreover, he enjoys a comfortable trade and offers thanks to God.

When he meets with the other man, he understands his situation, and says to him, ‘You’ve become a crazy man. All the bad things and the ugliness you see come from, and reflect, your inner world. Because of this, you imagine laughter to be weeping, and the discharge from duties to be sack and pillage. Come to your senses, clean your heart so that this inauspicious veil is raised from your eyes and you may see the truth. For, this is an orderly country, prosperous and civilized, belonging to a powerful, compassionate and just king. So things cannot be as you see or suppose them to be.’ Then the other man comes to his senses, and is full of regrets: ‘Yes, I’ve really lost my mind on ac-count of what I have drunk. Thank you. May God be pleased with you for rescuing me from such a hellish state.’

O my soul! Know that the once arrogant man represents an unbeliever or a heedless sinner. This world means for him a general mourning. All living things appear as weeping orphans because of the hurt of separation and decay. Human beings and animals alike appear to be lonely, uncivilized creatures cut down by death. The great masses such as mountains and oceans appear in his vision as a terrible corpse without soul. His visions arising from his unbelief and misguidance breed such anxieties in his mind which torture him.

But the other man is a believer. He believes in God Almighty and affirms Him. To his way of seeing, this world is a place where people praise Him, a sort of practice arena for human beings and animals, a sort of examination hall for human beings and jinn. All kinds of animals and mankind en-joy a demobilization—that is, those who finish their duty of life travel in spiritual enjoyment to the other eternal world. This is quite simple to understand—the world needs a new generation to people it and to work in it. All kinds of animals and human beings have entered the world to carry on some particular business. All living things are as soldiers or even officers happy with the business appointed for them. And the sounds that are heard are the sounds of their praise and glorifying as they begin, or of pleasure as they work, or of thanksgiving as they finish. In the view of the believer, all things are the obedient servants, or friendly officers, or a lovable book of his Most Generous Master and All-Compassionate Owner. Many more beautiful, sublime and pleasurable truths like these arise from his belief.

This is because faith bears the seed of what is in effect a Tuba tree of Paradise. Whereas un-belief contains the seed of a Zakkum tree of Hell.

Safety and well-being are only to be found in Islam and belief. Therefore, we should continually return thanks to God, saying, ‘Praise be to God for the religion of Islam and perfect belief.’

2007-02-22 13:34:16 · 6 answers · asked by Anonymous

Let's track the rise, growth, and spread of Christianity. Originating in the Roman Empire, let's say it officially starts at 0 A.D. Interestingly enough, at it's weakest point, Rome was the strongest nation in the world. As it grew stronger it grew weaker. Seems corrosive. Oops, Roman Empire collapses. What replaces it? The "Dark Ages." This is only in Europe;for example India was thriving at the time(of course India's always thriving). The Dark Ages saw the epoch of Christianity. It also saw a period of very dumb peasants and warlike knights rule Europe. At the time when Christianity was at it's strongest, Europe was at it lowest. Then, look, the Renaissance and Enlightenment, as well as the Scientific revolution, drive religion back. And then Europe conquers the world. Interesting. In the last 100 years of religous freedom we have done far more than the 1000 of chaos during which Christianity reigned. Oh, this is a question, right..."what does this say about Christianity?"

2007-02-22 13:34:06 · 16 answers · asked by Jedi 4

cat worshippers?

2007-02-22 13:33:34 · 4 answers · asked by Anonymous

OK in ancient greece there were buildings called Oracles that were places where Divine advice and Prophecy could be purchised.

but i have recently been told that Oracle is the name of twins that have the power to see the future???

i'm wondering if you know where the Oracle twins thing came from?

Thanks!

2007-02-22 13:33:29 · 2 answers · asked by Bobby 3

2007-02-22 13:32:01 · 25 answers · asked by Anonymous

2007-02-22 13:31:59 · 15 answers · asked by DBA GODZY 3

God makes Himself known to each and everyone of us. His proof of Himself is all around you.He explains everything clearly in His Word. How can you not believe in Him? How can you read the Bible, and not feel moved and touched by the presense of the All Knowing omnipresent perfect creator of the heavens and earth? With all the prophesy that is being fufilled right before our very eyes, how can anyone not be in awe; how can anyone doubt that Jesus is real; that the scriptures are God's message to us; the teaching and instruction? If you do not believe in God, have you based this desicion on knowledge? Have you even read the Bible? I want to know why so many people are blind to what is going on in the world today and how it is the fufillment of the word of God. If you do not believe in God- when Jesus comes back and takes those who do believe- will you believe then? Or will you believe that we have been abducted by space aliens, like the cults are going to try convince you of....

2007-02-22 13:30:32 · 17 answers · asked by Erin 3

Not that life isn't special, but isn't acting like it is make us blind to certain truths?

2007-02-22 13:29:20 · 7 answers · asked by Joshua B 1