Ion01

I totally get your point and agree that not everyone believes the same and should not be forced to however seperation of church and state is not found in the constitution or amendments. What is found in the first amendments is not even close to seperation of church and state. There is no real reason to argue whether it is better or not to have seperation of church and state, and that would be a whole different discussion anyway, because its not in the first or any other amendment. In fact the idea that the government can't favor one, whether you think thats a bad idea or not, is not actually there either. What is there is "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..." and "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

I didn't re-word it to fit anything. If you look at the definitions of the words used in the first amendment and apply them you get what I said in my post...period. there is no way around it. Also, if the amendments and constituation is in english, no "interpretation" is needed. Are people really so incapable of understanding a sentance or two that we need it interpreted for us. This is the ultimate problem with the way the constituation and ammendments have been apply. They are not taken for what they say but "interpreted" to mean whatever the person "interpreting" it wants it to say. If a long explanation or interpretation was needed they would have included that with it but they didn't because it is simple english. If we allow "interpretation" like we do then all you end up with is people applying thier person beliefs and opinions in place of the constitution and ammendents.

The council or carthage did provide their own canon but it was slightly different that the Council of Nicaea one which is what we use today. Also, to say that all has been reveal or that there is no new revelation does not put the responsibility on these people but on each individual to "prove all things" (thes 5:21) and "search the scriptures daily" (acts 17:11) Also, one does not have to beleive or agree with the bible to understand the concepts and what is taught.

I was not adding words but giving the context.

Actually it was a group of men at the Council of Nicaea in around 375 A.D.

Since that isn't what the 1st Amendment says, the rest of your post is worthless. Good job....but you obviously didn't notice that I didn't put it in quotations as I was not quoting it word for word but the was simply stating it. If someone says I said I was going to the store should I respond with "I didn't say that I said I am going to go to the supermarket!" Seriously I figured I had quoted it enough and that people new what it said well enough that I could paraphrase but apparently people don't know what the first ammendment actually says or means and don't have a grasp on how language works. How language works? You may remember in elementary school being taught that the order in which you put words in a sentance changes the meaning of that sentance. That is how language works. "Respecting the establishment of a religion" does not mean the same thing as "Respecting an establishment of religion." Since your whole post was devoted to arguing the meaning of the first phrase, your whole post is useless. There was absolutely no point in 'paraphrasing' that sentance except to dishonestly argue that the amendment is much more limited in scope than it actually is. You lose. Seriously, read my post in reference to first amendment. It doesn't change the meaning of the two words which I defined and is therefore directly applicable to the first amendment. If it is applicable then explain why.

Are you serious? Wow! I was not aware anyone said there were only ten commandments in the old testament. Also, read hebrew 9. With christ's death came the establishment of a new will or testament. Also, look it up, christ said he came to fulfill the old. If the old has been fulfill it no longer has "power" or effect. As for signs, according to the bible the apostles did sign and could bestow the same abilities to others, however, those who had recieved these gift from the apostles could not give them to anyone else meaning once they died off there were no more miracles. While speaking of the miraculous event of the mount of transfiguration peter speaks of Scripture as a "more sure word of prophecy" (II Peter 1:16-21). the point is that signs were to confirm the validity of the teachers however since we have the writings of these people signs are no longer needed. Miracles were also among the "signs of an apostle" (I Corinthians 12:12); they were apostolic credentials. The apostle Paul's ministry was verified by "signs and wonders" (Romans 15:19). "We walk by faith, not by sight" (II Corinthians 5:7) or signs. Paul warns that false teachers (1 Tim. 4:1-3; 2 Tim. 4:3-4; Acts 20:29-30) and men claiming to be inspired will come (2 Cor. 11:12-15). He also writes that the Scriptures are inspired and can assist us in dealing with "evil men and imposters" (2 Tim. 3:13, 16). Thus, it is our individual responsibility to search the Scriptures and determine whether what is being taught or preached is true (Acts 17:11). If we must do this for ourselves, of what value is modern day inspiration if it cannot alter what is written (Gal. 1:8-10; Rev. 22:18-19)? Jude 1:3contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. If we have God’s inspired word in the Bible, and it is complete, then we do not need catechisms, disciplines, creed books, or further revelations. If these books say more than the Bible, then the say too much (Gal. 1:8-10). If they say less than the Bible, then they say too little (Rev. 22:18-19). If they say what the Bible says, then we do not need them because we have the Bible. Basically there is on one left to give gift of miracle and they are not needed since the gospel has been delivered. And I am the one with the poor understandin of the bible while you, on the other hand, don't even understand what a testament is or the purpose of the old and new. You take things out of context such as you did with Mark 16:17 in which christ was speaking to his apostles telling them to preach to all the world and telling them that these signs will follow them should they believe. If you read the verses comming up this 17 you find he just finished rebuking them for not believing so if they will believe they will have these signs to accompany them. Its not saying that if I beleive I will have these signs as the purpose as, as stated earlier was to confirm thier validity. Also, Paul was accepted by the other apostles. We find this though the fact that paul made several trips to jerusalem to meet with apostles and in one case peter who he ends up rebuking in galatians.Maybe this will help: http://www.biblestudyworkshop.com/data/Lesson330.pdf

Since that isn't what the 1st Amendment says, the rest of your post is worthless. Good job....but you obviously didn't notice that I didn't put it in quotations as I was not quoting it word for word but the was simply stating it. If someone says I said I was going to the store should I respond with "I didn't say that I said I am going to go to the supermarket!" Seriously I figured I had quoted it enough and that people new what it said well enough that I could paraphrase but apparently people don't know what the first ammendment actually says or means and don't have a grasp on how language works.

Okay, lets make this simple. "Congress shall make no law RESPECTING an ESTABLISHMENT of religion......" Respecting is defined as: regarding; concerning Establishment is : 1. the act or an instance of establishing. 2. the state or fact of being established. 3. something established; a constituted order or system. So lets look at the definition of establish: 1. to found, institute, build, or bring into being on a firm or stable basis: to establish a university; to establish a medical practice. 2. to install or settle in a position, place, business, etc.: to establish one's child in business. 3. to show to be valid or true; prove: to establish the facts of the matter. 4. to cause to be accepted or recognized: to establish a custom; She established herself as a leading surgeon. 5. to bring about permanently: to establish order. 6. to enact, appoint, or ordain for permanence, as a law; fix unalterably. 7. to make (a church) a national or state institution. So how does allowing people to not work on a particular day go against the consitution by "establishing a religion"? Does it prove christianity to be true or enact it or cause it to be accepted or found it as an establishment like a university ect...... Does having the 10 commandments at a court house do any of these things? Does having a prayer to open congress do any of these things? Its not about giving aid to one religion or another or even seperation of church and state. Its about "respecting the establishment" of a religion as defined above and nothing more no matter how one want to stretch or twist it.

My bad....however, the point remains the same in that it only says that they don't work on these days not that they must perform certain religious things or something. They simply don't have to work and can, therefore do whatever they want that day whether it is worship satan or nothing.

This brings me to the question of is there any other reason for a hook knife to be used other than having your reserve attached to an airplane? The only other thing I can think of is maybe if you are entangle in a canopy but are you really going to have time to cut it off with a hook knife before you have to deploy your reserve anyways? (this is probably a noob question. )

Thats hilarious! It was nice to come out of a long meeting at work and get to my desk to read this.

When are people going to not be okay with the state raising our children (communism)? The states teach our kids about sex, right and wrong (more accurately that there is no right or wrong), what to eat, etc. States have even passed laws prohibiting certain food and drinks in schools! And now we have a court saying that parents aren't responsible for thier kids. DZ's are really going to have to watch out as I am sure there are plenty of lawyers ready to cash in on this kind of a ruling.

I keep reading that the goverment is requiring people to observe these holidays. This is simply not the case. People are being given a day off from work not being required to do observe any paticular religious practice but simply don't have to go to work that day. Also, the it says "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Therefore having the ten commandments in front of a court house or a easter cross in a goverment building is not against the constitution. Why? Because it says "congress shall make no law" and there is no law involved in such things. There is no law in regards to federal holidays. Federal holidays simply means if you work for the goverment you don't have to work on these days and guess what...... if you don't work for the goverment you can still work on these days (I have had to in the past). Even having a prayer at the opening of each congressional meeting does not fall under this ammendment as there is no law saying it has to be done or that each person must be involved in it. As long as there is no law requiring people to do things there is no breach of the first ammendment. Prayers in schools doesn't breach the ammendment as long as there is no law requiring everyone to participate. The reality is no one want to follow what the first ammendment actually says. They want to extend it far beyond its bounds to include "seperation of church and state" which is a phrase from a letter written by Thomas Jefferson which basically said that he wanted that phrase included. However, we find from other writtings that it was included as they felt and knew that if such a phrase were included it would ultimately lead to the restriction of religion which is actually where we are moving today.

"90 per cent involved victims who were unarmed and did not pose a serious threat."-from the referenced article Go on youtube and you can find numerous unarmed people not posing a serious threat to officers by attacking them and beating the officers up. Lets also keep in mind that the officers don't know if the person is armed or not the majority of the time. Let also keep in mind that "nearly one in five officers killed as part of a crime last year (2003)were shot with their own or a partner’s weapon, according to the National Center for Law Enforcement Technology." If we approach this from the other direction we have to considered that thousands and thousands, maybe even tens to hundreds of thousands, of times police are approached aggressively by people requiring some action by the police officer to protect himself. Should he pull his gun or a taser? "The report says "excited delirium" could explain why so many deaths have been associated with use of the devices. In such a state, sufferers are often incoherent, violent or unco-operative. The condition is usually caused by drugs or psychiatric illness. It has previously been associated with deaths in custody, or "in-custody death syndrome." "Definitive research or evidence does not exist that implicates a causal relationship between the use of CEDs and death," says the report. "Existing studies indicate that the risk of cardiac harm to subjects from a CED is very low." The following quote from another source says it all. "...the Taser study shows fewer injuries to police, and fewer deaths of those resisting arrest....." So without tasers death to officers and those resisting arrests would be higher.

Actually you have it wrong as christ said " "You have heard that it was said to those of old,'You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.' But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, 'You fool!' will be liable to the hell of fire." Theres a lot more there than just don't kill! In addition, In romans the 13:4 it says that the goverment is "an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.” There is more to it than just that but I won't go into detail but I think you have seen your initial assesment is incorrect.

No need for imaginary and unscientific black holes: Winston H. Bostick made the front page of the New York Times, and other local newspapers such as The Daily Courier, Connellsville, PA (20 Dec 1956), for creating a "test tube universe." Over 50 years ago he produced the structure of a barred galaxy in the lab. Science is supposed to be conducted through experimentation which he did 50 years ago yet today scientist will claim that they know black holes exist because there is no other possibility and everytime evidence is produced which contradicts the accepted black hole theory the theory is simply modified but never questioned. No one has seen a black hole and certainly no one has experimented with one in the lab yet this explanation is accepted and true scientific experimentation is rejected which clearly demonstrates there is no need for black holes. "Plasmoids appear to be plasma cylinders elongated in the direction of the magnetic field. Plasmoids possess a measurable magnetic moment, a measurable translational speed, a transverse electric field, and a measurable size. Plasmoids can interact with each other, seemingly by reflecting off one another. Their orbits can also be made to curve toward one another. Plasmoids can be made to spiral to a stop if projected into a gas at about 10−3 mm Hg pressure. Plasmoids can also be made to smash each other into fragments. There is some scant evidence to support the hypothesis that they undergo fission and possess spin." NASA and other scientist are constantly finding charge, magnetic and electric feilds, and "million degree plasma" yet we are constantly told that it does nothing ignoring that the electric force is 10^39 times stronger than gravity (or a thousand trillion trillion trillion times). http://www.holoscience.com/news.php?article=2m1r5m3b http://www.plasma-universe.com/index.php/Plasmoid

I didn't see anything about anybody being beaten much less to death. Why should the enemy be given better treatment than what our soldiers are having to endure? How horrible that they were strip of their clothes!?!?!?!? That is something done here in our own prisons as there is no other way to ensure that they have no weapons or can create weapons or even hang themselves with their own clothes. Some of the enemy we are talking about here is suicidal. This is war! Do you know what is also considered torture? Making prisoners listen to a loud recording of a crying baby day after day, spraying them with cold water, shining a bright light at them and yelling......oh the humanity! Lets get real people. They have killed people in war. Why should they be given better treatment than not only our soldiers but even the people of the country they are fighting in....or even many people here without jobs or the children without parents in the system?

Playing guitar is not a sport but a lot of guitarist make guitar pick necklaces or carry a guitar pick in their wallet or in a pocket on a keychain so that they always have thier fravorite style pick with them just incase they come across a guitar and want to play.

Some historians claim the jew were never in egypt. Sounds like theres some conflict in the "scientific community".

Wow! I don't know why I keep expecting educated or logical responses when I have yet to get one. I can present facts, logical arguements, and even references yet continually recieve simple statements such as "crap". Is all this really that threatening? I should really quit wasting my time.

My info and the info I sited has not been "debunk" and simply stating it to be untrue with no evidence does not "debunk" it. The reality is that is all that can be said as there is not sufficient info to "debunk" it as the standard theories of evolution and the big bang are flawed and unscientific. Simply a wave of the hand and calling it stupid does not change reality. Also, I am not going to waste my time addressing the flaws in the previous quotes of the bible. People have simply taken and isolated verses, in order to remove thier context, as well as applied unfounded assumptions as to the reasons for such commands and grossly misapplied the purpose of the testaments. To put things simply, God is pure and cannot be in the presence of sin. We have all sinned meaning we must pay for our sins. The penalty of sin is death not just in this world as we call death but ultimately death by seperation from God for eternity which is what we call hell. The sacrifice of animals, which had to be pure and unblemished, was not only a symbol for christ but to take the place of thier life until the perfect sacrifice, christ, had come. Why did christ die. So we didn't have to. We have all sinned and deserve death as a result but christ died and took our punishment for us. However, we have the ability to reject his offering for taking our place as he has given us requirements (a will or testament) that we must meet. Just as a will or "testament requires the death of the testator" in order to take effect, the death of animals under the old and the death of christ under the new was required. Also, just as will today require others to do things in order to recieve the gifts described in the testament so to with the testament of God. Its that simple in reality. If one had actually read the bible one would understand this. There are actually many bible scholars which do not beleive the bible who understand all these simple concepts and they dont turn to such rediculous stretching and twist of words to arrive at thier non-beleif. Infact they just simply say that there can't be a God so the miracles couldn't have happened yet they cannot and don't deny the accuracy and completeness and logic of the bible. They just say it can't all be true.

Also, to help you understand why verses like the one quoted no longer apply.....christ was our "sin offering" given "once for all" as he was the perfect "lamb of God". Just another reason aside from the one I already stated.

The old testament or covenant is just that...the old one and a new one has been in place sanctified through the death and blood of jesus christ. The old testament is not what is to be followed but the new is. Its that simple. Also, as I have stated and shown in the past a belief in god does not come from the bible saying to but from looking at the world in an actual scientific view point and, as is continually proven over and over, things like electric motors, complex machines, and extreme amounts of information are created. Whether it is the zeros and ones in a computer, a story on a tablet or DNA the method to draw a conclusion is the same. Big Bang and evolution science ignores the scientific method and picks and chooses the evidence it needs and ignores all else. From this a point one looks for who the creator or creators are through historical accuracy. When one does this they find the bible to be overwhelmingly accurate the best example being the book of daniel and its predictions as well as the not so well know findings of ancient egypt which also confirm the bible. Once again the same methods that are used to confirm other historical writings can be applied and one quickly confirms the validity of the bible. This is how one should come to believe the bible and the amount of evidence for a creator and the validity of the bible far outweighs such imaginary entities such as dark matter, dark energy, an expanding universe, black holes, etc.

If it was built into us and the same world over that would mean we have no free will. Ultimately your logic is flawed. Just as one can prove that a clay pot was created so to can one prove that a electric motor was created. Just as one can prove the sequence of zeros and ones in a computer were created so to can the complex encoding of DNA was created. DNA result in complexity far beyond what we have yet to replicate through our own "creations" yet it happened by accident? No real explanation as to how just that it happened? Once the existance of a creator or creators has be found then one simply needs to look at the historical validy or accuracy of each religion. One will actually find that the only real argument against the bible is that it simply couldn't be true. Such books as the book of daniel are believed by many to have been written after the events it predicted as it was so detailed and accurate inspite of all proof to the contrary. They simply say they can't explain it but there is no way it could have been that accurate. Although hard to come by since the scientific community doesn't want to add any validity to the bible, there is ample historical evidence for the many claims in the bible. One such example is the egyptian temple in present day Iraq where the "bagdad batteries" were found. This same temple has drawings and stories regarding the ark of the covenant. We actually have the gates to babylon and their historical writings which coinside with the bible. Historians and egyptologists have constantly said that the things written in the bible about it were untrue yet they constantly find proof to the contrary. They have discovered the signant ring of Joseph and although they claimed the numbers of horses and chariots egypt was claimed to have in the bible during the exodus was far to many they found not to long ago that egypt had far more than what was sent after the hebrews. When one takes a truely scientific approach the only truth that can be arrived at is that of the bible. People will ignore and twist things to meet thier likings but reality does not change.