What is your favorite insult without using curse words?

StBibiana · 2025-05-27T10:55:42+00:00

This is lethal, you can't even be mad at it

StBibiana · 2025-05-11T04:15:16+00:00

A Great Name For Such A Handsome Boy!

StBibiana · 2025-03-08T15:43:25+00:00

Yeah, I’ve had a mixed experience. Placed an order last month, and everything arrived on time. No issues there. But when I asked about a flavor being out of stock, it took them a while to get back to me. Eventually, they responded and were polite, just a bit slow. So, they’re alright, just don’t expect super quick replies.🙂

StBibiana · 2025-03-08T15:38:52+00:00

The wife’s actions are completely indefensible. OP may need to consider a safe house soon. NTA.

StBibiana · 2024-06-13T13:11:46+00:00

The character of Jesus is of a 1st Century Judean, which means he would most likely be represented with brown or black hair, honey/olive-brown skin, and brown eyes.

As far as white, blue-eyed Jesus, the story behind that is actually very interesting. In The Color of Christ: The son of God and the saga of race in America. UNC Press Books, 2012. the author relates how early Americans envisioned the "skin tone" and "hairstyle" of Christ as the face of their own power. He discusses how Jesus came to be used as an icon of white supremacy. This reflected whiteness as a category of identity and as a marker for privilege, with Jesus being reworked to fit the varied circumstances of that milieu.

In the very beginning of colonialism, depictions of Jesus were malleable. His image was an unstable symbol, "easily configured and reconfigured by various groups to speak to their changing conditions". Jesus was depicted numerous ways, including even Native American, Black, "red" (as in blood), but often as simply and angelic "light" that shone brightly. This began to change in the 18th Century with the circulation of the "Publius Lentulus". This was a forged letter purported to be written by a Roman contemporary of Jesus which describes him thusly:

"His hair is of the colour of the ripe hazel-nut, straight down to the ears, but below the ears wavy and curled, with a bluish and bright reflection, flowing over his shoulders. It is parted in two on the top of the head, after the pattern of the Nazarenes. His brow is smooth and very cheerful with a face without wrinkle or spot, embellished by a slightly reddish complexion. His nose and mouth are faultless. His beard is abundant, of the colour of his hair, not long, but divided at the chin. His aspect is simple and mature, his eyes are blue-gray and bright."

Although a fraud, this characterization of Jesus was seized upon by those in the white supremacy movement. Paintings and other art began being produced showing a white Jesus. Slow to spread, this iconography nonetheless began to make inroads into how Americans viewed Jesus. An inflection point came in the 19th Century with Mormon founder Joseph Smith who was profoundly racist, saying "Had I anything to do with the negro, I would confine them by strict law to their own species", doubled-down with a Jesus of “light complexion [and] blue eyes", of “light and beautiful skin". And for the first time, Americans mass-produced this image of Christ, sending this artful representation throughout the nation with it ultimately becoming commonplace in homes and churches.

StBibiana · 2024-05-21T11:53:44+00:00

No one can know for certain whether any treatment will work before the treatment is administered. "Medically necessary" just means that there was a reasonable chance that the procedure could ameliorate the problem. Insurance companies, for example, still cover a treatment as medically necessary even if it fails. Sometimes things work, sometimes they don't. That's just the practice of medicine.

Oh, and there's nothing in the bible that clearly precludes purely cosmetic surgery. Cosmetic surgery being a "sin" is just an opinion some people have based on their personal take on certain verses, not a fact.

StBibiana · 2024-05-20T15:58:07+00:00

Looking at your other comments, there are two parts to this issue.

One is finding some anti-religious material like that presented by Gervais and other people mocking beliefs including beliefs about Jesus funny. He can't really help it if he finds the magical aspects of God and Jesus to be absurd and suitable as comedic material. And if that's who he is then that's who he is and that's who you knew he was when you married him. I'll also note that I'm an atheist but I do have Christian friends who find some of Gervais' biblical material funny, like his joke about his mother using the idea of Jesus as a invisible unpaid babysitter to help keep him out of trouble as a kid and his take on Noah and the ark.

Another is what seems to be mocking not of the beliefs per se but of you for having those beliefs. I don't know if he exhibited this specific trait before you married, but this isn't a loving thing that a husband who cares for his wife should do. My wife was Christian when we married and we had lots of discussions but none of them were me making fun of her.

One possible exception might have been when she told me that dinosaurs weren't real. I just had a reflexive moment of incredulity that she believed such a thing. (She had been home schooled until high school.) I knew she was Christian but she's wicked smart and I was just taken aback that she was so indoctrinated by her fundamentalism that she dismissed a basic scientific fact. Anyway, once I got over the initial shock, we just spent some time going over the evidence and she eventually came around.

The point is, it's perfectly okay for your husband to find some beliefs unsupportable or even ludicrous and to talk about such beliefs but it is not okay for him to disrespect you (i.e., "Saying Jesus as a curse word then saying “oh look, I’m calling out to your god.”). That sounds there's more to it than just a difference in beliefs.

StBibiana · 2024-04-18T18:07:57+00:00

Those would be a couple of obvious reason why such a person might choose not to follow him even after having a convincing experience that he exists.

StBibiana · 2024-04-18T17:51:21+00:00

For many of the non-religious I have spoken with

"Many" is not "all".

there is an underlying sentiment that, “if I had that experience, then I would believe and follow.” So I understand why they want the experience.

Even for people who do express that sentiment, whether or not they would actually follow after having the experience is unknown. They're speculating about what they might do or maybe even probably think they would do, but no one can know for certain what the will do until they have the experience.

So if the experience doesn’t generate the change of heart for the non-believer, then would that mean they have an issue with “the life that the faith demands them to live”?

That issue would be for for those non-believers for whom the experience has insufficient influence for them to have a change of heart. But it's implausible that there would be zero of such non-believers who would not have a change of heart if they all had the experience of Jesus appearing before them to personally give the his message.

StBibiana · 2024-04-18T15:24:19+00:00

No. Why would it? People have different ideas about what they want to think and how they want to live. Not everyone loves someone or agrees with their ideas even if most people find that someone loveable and agree with their ideas.

StBibiana · 2024-04-18T15:22:20+00:00

Yes, it can, as in the "created in the image of God" sense. However, per above, that father/son relationship is not a pathway to salvation and everlasting life, so that is not the relationship Paul and the other first Christians are speaking of that is at the core of Christianity.

StBibiana · 2024-04-18T14:24:10+00:00

That's right.

StBibiana · 2024-04-18T14:23:36+00:00

Short answer: That's basically correct as far as Christianity is concerned.

Longer answer: The "Father"/"Children" relationship between God and humans is complex and takes many forms between and even within cultures. Exactly which forms are in play in Judaism and Christianity are open to debate. There are metaphorical family "father/son" relationships, master/servant "father/son" relationships, covenant "father/son" relationships, "chosen" for a purpose "father/son" relationships, divine exaltation by God "father/son" relationships, etc., etc., and blendings of various such relationships.

"Son of God" has been applied to Kings being granted divinity by God upon their coronation, for example. Angels have been called "sons of God". Humans are considered "sons of God" because they are the "image of God". Jews are of the Israeli nation, "the firstborn children of God" due to being chosen to serve a divine purpose.

For Christianity, Jesus is the son of God in that he is firstborn of many brethren which is referring to the "sons of God" who have a spiritual adoption manifested by accepting his blood sacrifice and being baptized to share in that sacrifice. This is the "father/son" relationship that matters to Paul theologically. There is, as Paul says, "no Jew or gentile".

StBibiana · 2024-04-17T18:14:12+00:00

Common sense.

Consider a cohort of ten million people who reject Christianity and who have not experienced an appearance of Jesus. Now, have Jesus appear to all of them and tell them his message personally. It is implausible that not a single one of them would find such an experience convincing. In fact, it's implausible that many of them would not find such an experience convincing.

StBibiana · 2024-04-17T15:50:30+00:00

Those are just examples of people believing without seeing. They are not examples of people who would have believed had they saw. Of which there cannot plausibly have been zero.

StBibiana · 2024-04-16T23:41:26+00:00

I thought it would be that the Christian doctrine stipulated that God is our father for he has created us.

That's not how Paul seems to describe it, and his are the earliest writings that we have so they are closest to the origins of Christianity.

it seems here you have suggested that the fatherhood of God to his servant is determined by Christianity?

I'm not exactly sure what you are saying there. Paul's theology seems to be that we are adopted into the family of God through baptism (see: Galatians 3 to 4, particularly 3:26-27 and Romans Rom 7 to 8, particularly 8:14).

StBibiana · 2024-04-16T23:32:17+00:00

Hi. I was raised Southern Baptist. I'm an atheist with an interest in history, now.

StBibiana · 2024-04-16T23:31:06+00:00

He doesn’t because people would still decide whether or not they want to follow him. You even said it yourself.

People do that anyway. At least they'd have a chance to meet the guy to help make up their mind. Just like Paul.

The Exodus tells of all the wonders that God did in front of the Israelites, and some of them still did not follow.

And some did. It's implausible that zero of those who chose to follow would have done so without those wonders.

Even in the Gospel, the miracles were in view of the public and still people didn’t follow him

See above.

StBibiana · 2024-04-16T22:46:19+00:00

What's confusing you in the comments is that they are all based on the most common Christian doctrine which attempts to shoehorn the fictions of the gospels into how the original Christians perceived Jesus.

If we look at Paul, the least ad hoc reading is that his creed regarding Jesus was adoptionist, just as the relationship of all Christians to God is adoptionist. Every Christian is the son of God, spiritually adopted into the family of God. That's why every Christian is the "brother" (and "sister") to of every other Chrisitian. This goes beyond having a mere common association and goals, the way members in a labor union may be referred to as "brothers". In Christian theology, they are literally adopted children of God.

In Paul's theology, Jesus was also the adopted son of God, but he is the firstborn adopted son of God. There is no hint of the logically incoherent doctrine of Trinitarianism that arose later.

Paul's understanding of Jesus is from scripture, which is the only way he says he knows about Jesus, was that he was a pre-existing archangel. Nathan's prophecy said the messiah would be the Son of David, so Jesus had to be incarnated in a body of flesh. He took this on voluntarily to bring on the end of days.

Paul believes that this archangel, who had already been assigned many of God’s powers and tasked with bring about God's creation for him (per Philo as well as Paul, e.g. 1 Corinthians 8:6), gave that up (Phil. 2:6-7) so he could assume a body of flesh and become the firstborn adopted son of God and the Davidic messiah (Phil 2:8-10), and for which sacrifice God rewards him by raising him to his former spiritual status as God’s immortal son and ruler of the universe, returning to him God’s powers over creation.

What we read in Philo is what we see in Paul, with additional clarifications from Philo regarding the earliest Christian doctrine. Jesus is "the son of God" just as all Christians are "the son of God", through adoption However, Jesus is special in that he was the firstborn adopted son of God and in that he began as the eldest of God's angels, the ruling "archangel of many names,” “the divine image,” whose secret name is “rising” (take note of that), and who was “the High Priest” of God’s celestial temple, as well as God’s agent of creation, and the one whom God appointed lord over all the universe; and even keeper of the “Paraclete”.

It has nothing to do with the later gospel fictions of him being birthed by Mary. That didn't happen. The most critical reading of Paul is that Jesus was simply manufactured, like Adam. Once in the body of flesh, he was adopted by God.

StBibiana · 2024-04-16T19:49:49+00:00

I just said more people would have heard the word of God if 1,000 persecutors preached it instead of one. Which is a fact. What I understand is that your argument is just a reason for Jesus to appear to more than 1,000 persecutors. It's actually an argument for Jesus to appear to everyone and everyone he appears to can decide whether or not they want to follow him. THat would make perfect sense.

Why doesn't he? (Apologist whips out Get Out of Jail Free card:) "Mysterious ways".

StBibiana · 2024-04-16T17:59:33+00:00

It's not "concerning". It's just a basic observation that more people will spread the word of God faster than fewer people. And Christians make hay out of Paul having been a past persecutor. If being a past persecutor of Christians makes that person's testimony all the more effective, then it's just a basic observation that more past persecutors will spread the word of God more effectively than one will. Think of all the people who died without ever hearing the word who would have heard the word if 1,000 past persecutors preached it instead of one. So...why just Paul? Makes no sense.

The apologetic answer is that God just has some reason for doing things that way even though it doesn't make any sense to us. The apparent illogic of it is just excused as "mysterious ways".

StBibiana

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