Psalms used to settle court case in USA.

[heliocentric]

Then by this criterion you wouldn't be a very good Christian.

Oops, I thought it was the Old Testament being referred to, and obviously it doesn't really matter what order the books of the New come in, as you say. Equally obviously I'm not claiming to be any kind of christian, although having been brought up with that mythology it still has a certain fascination: as Anthony Kenny puts it, "if there is no God, then God is incalculably the greatest single creation of the human imagination."

[amateur51]

Oops, I thought it was the Old Testament being referred to, and obviously it doesn't really matter what order the books of the New come in, as you say. Equally obviously I'm not claiming to be any kind of christian, although having been brought up with that mythology it still has a certain fascination: as Anthony Kenny puts it, "if there is no God, then God is incalculably the greatest single creation of the human imagination."

I'd have no gripes with that.

The incalculable bit, I mean

[MrGongGong]

Oops, I thought it was the Old Testament being referred to, and obviously it doesn't really matter what order the books of the New come in, as you say. Equally obviously I'm not claiming to be any kind of christian, although having been brought up with that mythology it still has a certain fascination: as Anthony Kenny puts it, "if there is no God, then God is incalculably the greatest single creation of the human imagination."

Surely this is the kind of mythology we need Heliocentric ?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAIR1DrT8SY

(as well as , not instead of )

[heliocentric]

Surely this is the kind of mythology we need Heliocentric ?

That goes without saying.

Now I look at it, I find my quote from Anthony Kenny looks rather hyperbolic. I mean, back in prehistory, when people started to feel compelled to find explanations for why the world around them was the way that it was, the activities of supernatural beings behind the scenes must have actually been the most plausible one, given the amount and kind of information available.

[jean]

I became quite curious about how the question was phrased, and I found the whole questionnaire here.

Q23. What is the first book of the NEW Testament?

Matthew 35%
Genesis 19%
Acts of the Apostles 3%
Psalms 3%
Don’t know 39%
Prefer not to say 1%

With that amount of prompting, I'm a bit more surprised than I was before that so many didn't know. And I love that 1%.

There are larger questions here I think about what Christianity actually is, and how far you're allowed to self-identify.

[MrGongGong]

There are larger questions here I think about what Christianity actually is, and how far you're allowed to self-identify.

Indeed

If, as was suggested by Fraser, one can simply "self-identify" as a "christian" (or should that be Christian ?) without believing in what are supposed to be the basic tenets of Christianity then it becomes more than a little ridiculous.

"Diabolists in the CofE" ???

I guess there must be a few "theological grey areas" ????

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

"Prefer not to say"????!!!!

[heliocentric]

"Prefer not to say"????!!!!

Maybe those were the monks and nuns who'd taken a vow of silence.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Maybe those were the monks and nuns who'd taken a vow of silence.

[Magnificat]

Why at a terribly unwise judge. Basing an "opinion of this court" directly from a statment in Psalms, he is ideologically aligning himself (and the court) with a book of the Hebrew/Christian bible, and against the plaintiff. His stance is supposed to be objective and non-partisan.

In short, he's saying that non-believers must be fools because I'm with the believers.

Boilk

On the contrary: The judge knows that the atheist cannot have a holy day because he is an unbeliever so he uses the holy book ( the Old Testament) of the Christian and Jew to look for a way of treating him as fairly as possible and finds a neat solution in the Book of Psalms. The atheist's problem is not that the judge has been subjective in his judgement but will be getting the State to declare April 1st a public holiday or persuading his employer to give him the day off!!

VCC