This stuff never ceases to amaze me. Maybe Santa is evil too!:rolleyes:
Re: Incredibly Not So Smart
Originally posted by kungfu cowboy
This stuff never ceases to amaze me. Maybe Santa is evil too!:rolleyes:
Of course he’s evil! Go back to the 1 in 24 Americans Recruited post- the red clad sod has been recruited by the Feds! You want that comeing down your chimney?
That whole site is just more evidence to me that most christian schools/churches are a cult.
When Christians take up the martial arts for self-defense, they are saying to God, “I don’t trust You to protect me.” Christians are to depend on God for protection.
ummmm… yeah… if I pray this dude will stop beating me into the ground:rolleyes:…
sorry if I offended… but c’mon…
“Santa Claus wears a red suit-he’s a comunist.
He has long hair and a beard-must be a pacifist.
What’s in that pipe that he’s smoking?
Santa Claus walks through your house at night-must be a dope fiend!”-Arlo Guthrie
I personally never trusted Santa Claus. That whole 'he knows when you are sleeping, he knows when you’re awake, he knows if you’ve been bad or good.." too much big brother for me.Santa is obviously C.I.A. nope, nope, don’t like it one bit.
He seems afraid of everything and you know what they say:
fear leads to anger
anger leads to hate
hate leads to suffering
Funny link but more funny sad.
Could it beeeeeee?.. SATAN!
Kung Foos is da Debil Bobby!
I like how he quotes the Bible axiom “turn the other cheek”. I don’t recall the Jews turning the other cheek at Jericho. Didn’t they put all the defenders to the sword in that Biblical story?
Is that Southern Praying Baptist kung fu any good?
Seems to me more people have been killed because of some god than any other reason.
Life is not rocket science but some people do need a rule book I guess.
Southern Praying Baptist kung fu is mostly just hitting people with a bible then lots of yelling.
When Christians take up the martial arts for self-defense, they are saying to God, “I don’t trust You to protect me.” Christians are to depend on God for protection.
I actually agree with their use of this philosophy. Its a great way to get killed. I view it as a little chlorine for the gene pool.
Close your mind child and you shall be saved
Christians have no business being involved in the martial arts, even at the most elementary level. The one benefit that can be derived from the martial arts – exercise – is available in so many other spiritually harmless activities that there is no reason to open oneself up to the spiritual hazards or commission of sin that these techniques lead to.
Can I have a Amen?
I sent the author this email…
Mr. Brown,
I read your article titled “The Martial Arts”. At first I assumed that it was a spoof of some sort. No reasonable and thinking person could possibly come to these conclusions. I finally came to the conclusion that no reasonable and thinking person did.
Let us examine some of your more ridiculous points. In the order that they appear (not the order of importance):
You wrote:
The rising crime rate has caused many people to consider taking up the martial arts for self-defense.
My reply:
Both property and violent crime have been declining for years. Perhaps you haven’t heard. Check out the Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/.
You wrote:
The Martial Arts are Violent
The very terms “martial arts” and “self-defense” should tip off the Christian that something is wrong.
My reply:
The very statement “Martial Arts are Violent” should tip off the informed person that you have no direct experience with martial arts to speak of. I have about 24 years of experience with martial arts. I (and anyone that actually “knows” what they are talking about) can tell you that martial artists are the least violent community in general. Generally, people study martial arts because they disdain violence and don’t want to be a victim of it. Martial arts training teaches people how to be in control of their impulses and avoid violent confrontation. People without martial arts training are the ones that go around attacking people - Christians and non-Christians alike.
You wrote:
When Christians take up the martial arts for self-defense, they are saying to God, “I don’t trust You to protect me.”
My reply:
This one is my favorite. By an extension of this logic, we can say that wearing seat belts sends the same message. For that matter, we should do away with doctors for the same reason. To be true to this concept, we need to do away with clergy, because by listening to clergy one says to God, “I don’t trust You to inform me.”
You wrote:
Many, though not all, martial arts students are taught to revere their teachers to the point of worshiping them. There is nothing unbiblical about respect for authority, but within the martial arts, this veneration can reach levels that violate the First Commandment.
My reply:
Again, this underscores your ignorance of the subject at hand. Rarely does the student/teacher relationship come anywhere near this level. Usually students are taught to respect the knowledge of their elders, but this relationship does not approach anything like the Pope’s for example. I have never in 24+ years seen any instructor claiming any kind of spiritual authority - unlike you.
You wrote:
But even the Christian who never uses martial arts to purposely injure another and trusts the Lord to protect him is getting involved in a religion that contradicts the teaching of the Bible.
My reply:
OK, this is a bizarre generalization that I will postpone comment on until you get a chance to support it with the next statement.
You wrote:
Masutatsu Oyama, in his book, This is Karate, says: “In many countries around the world, the question, ‘What is Zen’ often turns up. Usually we answer that Zen is karate and that karate is Zen.”
My reply:
Clearly you don’t understand the concept of Zen either. Zen is a philosophy more than a religion in the western sense of the word. Zen is a description for everything. Zen is everything, everything is Zen. Christians often equate Zen to God. This is an adequate approximation of the concept. It could be said that God is Zen and Zen is God. Just as it could be said that karate is Zen and Zen is karate.
Is God not omnipresent? Is God not present in the martial arts? Was God not present during the bloody Holy Crusades or the Spanish Inquisition or the birth of my child or when my neighbor’s car broke down?
It is difficult for many Christians to understand a religion that does not involve worship. Zen Buddhism is such a religion/philosophy. You probably think that Zen Buddhists worship Buddha don’t you? You need to do your homework.
You wrote:
The mental state brought about by such meditation gradually conditions one to adopt a different world view from what a Christian should have. The emptying of the mind brings about a feeling of union with the universe. […] After this experience, the subject can come to believe that he is at one with God or is God, because God is in everything. Arrival at this pantheistic conclusion is the goal of Eastern religions, which teach that man can solve all his problems if only he will realize that he is divine.
My reply:
First, your ignorance of the subject at hand hardly makes you an authority to tell Christians what kind of world view they should have. Are you saying that earthly man cannot know God? Are you saying that even though God is omnipresent, people cannot see God in anything/everything?
Your use of the term “pantheistic” shows that you do not understand Zen Buddhism (or Buddhism in general). Zen Buddhism is an atheistic view that is not mutually exclusive with other monotheistic, polytheistic, or atheistic views.
You wrote:
It is not surprising that people in this mental state open themselves up to possible demonic influence.
My reply:
This is true. I cannot count the number of times I have been with someone who was meditating when suddenly they were possessed by demons. This happens all the time. We have finally resorted to dipping students in water to see if they float before we let them out of the building.
You wrote:
Most martial arts teachers include meditation as part of their instruction.
My reply:
No actually, most don’t, but they should.
You wrote:
The mental conditioning that meditation brings is largely responsible for the amazing physical feats that advanced martial artists do. Focusing the attention on the single task, such as breaking many boards with a bare hand, is brought about by achieving the impassive Zen mental state.
My reply:
Well, it certainly helps, but is not strictly necessary. Are you saying that focusing on a single task is somehow evil? If so, I am in trouble. Perhaps if you had focused on the single task of writing an accurate, well-informed article, you would have written something meaningful.
You wrote:
Christians have no business being involved in the martial arts, even at the most elementary level.
My reply:
You sir have no business telling Christians anything about martial arts as you simply know very little about the subject, not even at the most elementary level.
If you would like, I could recommend a few books that would actually tell you something about these subjects. Then you could go back and write a well-informed article to replace this drivel.
Best regards,
Brent Carey
After I got out of the Army, I spent a few years getting my Master’s degree in Theology at a very well respected University. I know a thing or 2 about this stuff - which, with $1.50 will by me a cup of eternally full coffee at Denny’s so that when I go to heaven I won’t have an eternal headache.
Having an actual educated background in theology gives me a real low tolerance for what I call “fundaholics.” Like alcoholics, they are a real danger to themselves and their communities - only more so, since instead of just f’ing up their bodies they are messing up their (and other people’s) minds and souls.
So while I agree that this particular idiot is another in the long line of Christian idiots out there these days - please don’t judge all Christian theology by this moron.
Having said that – he makes ONE point that is actually **** hard to refute from a grounded Christian theology. Namely, that Christians are called to refrain from violence to others.
Non-violence, even in self-defense, has a long and deep history within the Christian tradition. While Christian theologians of the day had to make long, arduous arguments to support things like the Crusades, the opponents of those activities just had to point to the Biblical texts and say something like “Show me where in the Gospel Jesus says ‘bash their heads in!’”
Now, that doesn’t mean that I think Christian’s shouldn’t be involved in the Martial Arts, even to the extent of participating in full contact sparring (where the participants are consenting to the event and are not acting in violence for violence’s sake). But I do think that thinking Christians do need to spend some time thinking about what they really WILL do if confronted by an attacker on the street. And decide for themselves if the answer they come up with is one they can live with in the context of their own personal theology and relationship with Christ.
For me, I train my Chin Na stuff very hard precisely for this reason – because I HOPE that should I be attacked I can control the situation and protect myself without committing violence against another person. But if I can’t, I know what I will do. My choice, however, may not be the choice another thinking Christian would make. But that is something they SHOULD be thinking about if they take their faith seriously.
Sorry to bust up the Christian bashing with a thought that wasn’t bound in stereotypes … feel free to return to ranting on about how evil all us Jesus freaks are . . .
Originally posted by SanShou Guru
[B]Seems to me more people have been killed because of some god than any other reason.
[/B]
Btw - this is a pet peeve of mine.
It is an ignorant and foolish statement that shows a huge lack of historical perspective.
Hitler, Stalin and Mao killed far more people for their respective states than all the religiously motivated wars in history combined. That’s NOT counting all the people that died in various military combats they initiated or took part in. That’s just counting the people they slaughtered out of the general population of the land that they controlled.
Now, I understand that religion has played a huge part in world history and was the cause (and sometimes the result of) numerous conflicts. But that is precisely because of how many people see religion as valuable. So one of the problems I have with this (and similar statements) besides the utter historical inaccuracy, is that it says “what all those people thought was valuable in their lives wasn’t” and does so in a way that exudes a certain arrogance that I find personally offensive. It is not my place to judge the value of another person’s beliefs to that person. And I am offended when I see other’s doing it.
I understand the reason for making this mistake – it is generally very difficult to understand the big numbers that people start talking about here.
But to get a handle on this consider that the number of people that lived in the 20th century is MORE than the total number of people who ever lived prior that century!!
The world didn’t reach 1 billion people until around 1850 or so. Today there is almost 6 billion people on this planet.
The few hundred thousand people that died in ALL the crusades are nothing to the millions that died under Stalin. The few thousands that died under the Inquisitions aren’t even a significant digit in the number of people Hitler murdered.
A little historical perspective please.
Originally posted by Kope
Sorry to bust up the Christian bashing with a thought that wasn’t bound in stereotypes … feel free to return to ranting on about how evil all us Jesus freaks are . . .
I went back and reread all of the posts and can see only one that I would consider “Christian bashing”, and I believe it was a joke. There were plenty of people poking fun at a deluded man and his tragically misinformed and illogical article.
Insanity is not proprietary to Christianity.
Best regards,
Brent Carey
Brent, it was said in jest .. guess I should go add a “smiley face” to make that more clear.
quote
Hitler, Stalin and Mao killed far more people for their respective states than all the religiously motivated wars in history combined. That’s NOT counting all the people that died in various military combats they initiated or took part in. That’s just counting the people they slaughtered out of the general population of the land that they controlled.
quote
you also have to note that in the spanish inquisition, and the crusades to name a few, man’s potential for killing another man was pretty much restricted to the blade/arrows
if we had had guns and bombs and other such things back then, i’m sure many many more people would have died; also stalin controlled close to the largest amount of land anyone has ever controlled (if not the largest), the christians during their wars had far fewer people to kill 
travis
Brent Carey said:
This is true. I cannot count the number of times I have been with someone who was meditating when suddenly they were possessed by demons. This happens all the time. We have finally resorted to dipping students in water to see if they float before we let them out of the building.
What the fuck?
IronFist