[Mefustae]

What, you mean the Catholics don't worship their God Cath? My worldview is shattered.

Australians will find that especially humerous. A cookie to a dirty foreigner who can tell me why.

You are a Christian if you do two things:
1) Realize that you are a sinner
2) Place your trust in Jesus to rescue you from that sin

That's what it looks like to someone on the inside. From the outside, it looks more like:

1) We are all dirty and God loves to hate us. [God seems to commit/entice genocide waaaay too often]
2) Believe what we tell you or burn for all eternity.

To be frank, I don't respond well to threats.

[Turambar]

yeah, who needs a god to destroy and torture us anyways.  people are bad enough.

[Nuke]

catholic, christian, doesnt matter to me, they will all one day fall before the heathen sword. 

[Ace]

Peace through superior firepower*!

*Brought to you by objective, secular, positivist science! Eat your hearts out fundies and postmodernists!

[Kernal]

Ah, Kernal, but didn't you say Mormons are not Christians?

So, by your arguments, wouldn't Catholics also not be Christians?

Or are you just wrong?

Holy crap........
They are a hundred percent different!

I already explained it to you. Stop being such a moron.

Did you even read my arguement! There are three groups Catholics, Protestants, and Orthadox. All three Disiphor(sp?) the same bible different. While mormans added a whole bunch more crap to it and said I have the long lost missing part of the bible. A 6 year can understand things better then you! Am I wrong?

This discussion ended a long time ago. Why the hell are you bringing over old crap?

catholic, christian, doesnt matter to me, they will all one day fall before the heathen sword. 

Looks at nuke. pulls out a flamthrower. I`m ready for you buddy.

[Dough with Fish]

Ooooooooh YAY! Religion discussion on the Internet!

[Ford Prefect]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who's excited about it. I can't wait to learn something new about religion from this internet discussion. I have so many questions. Which religion is right? Does god exist? Who are dumber: religious people or non-religious people? Is evolution compatible with religion? Is sodomy okay? Is the Bible accurate? Who wrote it? I can't wait to find out the answers!

[Nuclear1]

EDIT: After having read FP's post, I've decided to empty this post of whatever educational value it had and just sit back and say LOL Internets!

[aldo_14]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who's excited about it. I can't wait to learn something new about religion from this internet discussion. I have so many questions. Which religion is right? Does god exist? Who are dumber: religious people or non-religious people? Is evolution compatible with religion? Is sodomy okay? Is the Bible accurate? Who wrote it? I can't wait to find out the answers!

In order;
Rastafarianism.  On Saturdays. Neither.  If you close your eyes and hum hee-ha-haw-ha-hee at certain bits.  On Saturdays.  Yes, except for the bits where the 'this is a work of fiction' fell out.  William Shakespeare.

[Ghostavo]

Did you even read my arguement! There are three groups Catholics, Protestants, and Orthadox. All three Disiphor(sp?) the same bible different. While mormans added a whole bunch more crap to it and said I have the long lost missing part of the bible. A 6 year can understand things better then you! Am I wrong?

Yes you are, there are two groups, Eastern and Western christians.

Eastern divide themselves through:

• Eastern Orthodox Church
  Oriental Orthodoxy
  Assyrian Church of the East

And Western:

• Roman Catholic Church
  Protestantism
  Restorationism

Mormons belong in this last sub group, restorationism.

What did you learn today? That's right, we like pie!

[Kamikaze]

Is sodomy okay?

Yes, of course.

[Mefustae]

Eeeeeeewwww...

[karajorma]

Man in crowd III
He has given us a sign!

Man in crowd V
He has given us...his shoe!

Man in crowd III
The shoe is the sign! Let us follow his example!

Man in crowd IV
What?

Man in crowd III
Let us like him, hold up one shoe and let the other one be upon our foot, for this is his sign that all who follow him shall do likewise!

Man in crowd III
No, no, no, the shoe is a sign that we must gather shoes together in abundance!

Woman in crowd II
Cast off the shoes! Follow the gourd!

Man in crowd V
No, let us gather shoes together! Let me!

Woman in crowd
Oh, get off!

Man in crowd IV
No, no, it is a sign that like him we must think not of the things of the body, but of the face and head!

Man in crowd V
Give me your shoe!

Man in crowd IV
Get off!

Woman in crowd II
Follow the gourd, the holy gourd of Jerusalem!

Need I say any more on how silly the whole thing is?

[WeatherOp]

You are a Christian if you do two things:
1) Realize that you are a sinner
2) Place your trust* in Jesus to rescue you from that sin

Simple as that.  All this stuff about sprinkling/immersion baptism, papal/independent leadership, etc., is completely ancillary.

Though I must point out that the different denominations confuse the issue somewhat.  "What religion are you?"  "I'm Catholic."  "I'm Methodist."  "I'm Presbyterian."  No, you're a Christian first, and a denomination second.

*Long-term trust, not "sign here and you're done".

Amen

Denomination doesn't make you a Christian, nor does it make you not one. If you are a Catholic and have trusted in the Lord as your savior then your are as much of a Christian as I am.

Allthough the term Christian is very broad these days.

[jr2]

You are a Christian if you do two things:
1) Realize that you are a sinner
2) Place your trust* in Jesus to rescue you from that sin

Simple as that.  All this stuff about sprinkling/immersion baptism, papal/independent leadership, etc., is completely ancillary.

Though I must point out that the different denominations confuse the issue somewhat.  "What religion are you?"  "I'm Catholic."  "I'm Methodist."  "I'm Presbyterian."  No, you're a Christian first, and a denomination second.

*Long-term trust, not "sign here and you're done".

Amen

Denomination doesn't make you a Christian, nor does it make you not one. If you are a Catholic and have trusted in the Lord as your savior then your are as much of a Christian as I am.

Allthough the term Christian is very broad these days.

Agreed.  I think the term you'd be looking for is "born again".  Of course, you'd have to define that if no one knew what it was.  But in simple terms, its

You are a Christian if you do two things:
1) Realize that you are a sinner
2) Place your trust* in Jesus to rescue you from that sin.

The problem is that too many people think that you are a Christian if you go to a certain church, do a certain thing(s), try to be moral & do nice things for others, etc... which is all fine and good, but you know the old saying about McDonalds...

BTW, Christian in the Greek means "little Christ".

[Goober5000]

That's what it looks like to someone on the inside. From the outside, it looks more like:

1) We are all dirty and God loves to hate us. [God seems to commit/entice genocide waaaay too often]
2) Believe what we tell you or burn for all eternity.

I can definitely understand that.  A lot of it depends on your perspective.

I'd recommend trying to see the whole picture though.  If you believe God exists, there's plenty of evidence that he doesn't hate us.

To be frank, I don't respond well to threats.

It's more of a warning than a threat.  For example, if I tell you there's a bridge out in the road ahead, that's not a threat, that's a warning.  If you continue driving along the road, you're going to fall off the bridge, regardless of anyone's opinion on the matter.

[Turambar]

It's more of a warning than a threat.  For example, if I tell you there's a bridge out in the road ahead, that's not a threat, that's a warning.  If you continue driving along the road, you're going to fall off the bridge, regardless of anyone's opinion on the matter.

thats the real thing here.  you religious people believe that all of it is real, and all of the rest of us know better.  when people say theyre 'warning' me (don't get it except for the nutjobs who preach in the common area at my university), i just roll my eyes or make some other gesture which indicates my lack of concerned-ness over where i go when i die.

[Nuke]

when i encounter a nutjob christian who tries to convert me i usually just look at em all evil and threaten to burn down their church, works every time. i know where im going when i die, into a crematory oven.

[WeatherOp]

You are a Christian if you do two things:
1) Realize that you are a sinner
2) Place your trust* in Jesus to rescue you from that sin

Simple as that.  All this stuff about sprinkling/immersion baptism, papal/independent leadership, etc., is completely ancillary.

Though I must point out that the different denominations confuse the issue somewhat.  "What religion are you?"  "I'm Catholic."  "I'm Methodist."  "I'm Presbyterian."  No, you're a Christian first, and a denomination second.

*Long-term trust, not "sign here and you're done".

Amen

Denomination doesn't make you a Christian, nor does it make you not one. If you are a Catholic and have trusted in the Lord as your savior then your are as much of a Christian as I am.

Allthough the term Christian is very broad these days.

Agreed.  I think the term you'd be looking for is "born again".  Of course, you'd have to define that if no one knew what it was.  But in simple terms, its.

Yeah, I thought of putting that, but as you said I didn't want to define it.

[Setekh]

At risk of ignoring most of the rest of the thread, I just want to say to Eish: yeah man, I agree. What really confuses me the most, though, is when I ask people in conversation, "Are you a Christian?" and they answer, "No, I'm Catholic." I think that sort of response is what has led to a lot of people thinking so much.