Wait.. so your whole reply is "sure, we are bad, but we aren't as bad as THOSE guys..."... I mean.. for fuck sake, if that is your benchmark just.. arggh...

My point, which I'm apparently having to spell out, is that fucking Western Imaginary Sky Beard is being held up as 'good' yet it is fucking terrible... so yeah, wooooo! Christians are not quite as bad as some Muslims... that's like saying "Well, I might have HIV but at least I don't have full blown AIDS!"

Literally every single ideological group (religious or otherwise) has fucking terrible elements. News at 11.

The real issue is how fucking terrible they are, how many fucking terrible people there are, and the level of support they get from the not-quite-as-fucking-terrible people in that group.

Islam in the modern world has a pretty bad report card, much worse than Christianity.

EDIT: I don't agree with SOTL and co.'s "The Quran is evil" shtick though. Christians always seem to pick apart The Quran the same way Atheists pick apart The Bible. In the latter, the Atheist usually cites a verse, and the Christian says "you're taking that out of context! This is what they're referring to and this verse here is what you're supposed to follow". That's fine, but you can't turn around and criticize the Quran in the same way without a learned Muslim to refute you, because you almost assuredly lack the context and comprehensive knowledge of the text to be at all authoritative.

all Christianity has done recently is had a hand in suppressing good conversation about sexual health,

We believe unborn humans are getting murdered by the tens of thousands every year.

Women can do anything they want to their own body - we aren't against women rights.
We believe the unborn child in their body is a separate person, deserving of separate rights.

Rewrapping it and dressing it up as misogyny and sexism because we are trying to defend a real (albiet unborn) person is a cheap tactic that does more to shut down conversation that anything you accuse us of.

Further, calling us sexist for refusing to pay for other people's abortion pills is added absurdity. And then the liberals intentionally spread it in the media as if the Supreme Court were allowing employers to banning their employee's access to contraceptives. "GET MY BOSS OUT OF MY BEDROOM!" -> That's a lie. The Surpreme Court said the boss couldn't be FORCED TO PAY for their employee's contraceptives. That's so 100% different, but liberals (including Hillary Clinton) spread a lie to stir up people's emotions so they could get angry at Republicans, instead of logically discussing the facts.

Added ontop, when discussing abortion, liberals often try to change the topic to rape and child abuse which becomes an even more absurd plea-to-emotions. Either you support abortion as a "freedom of choice and sexual health", or you're an angry uneducated male supporting child-rape and suppression of women. That's how the liberals love to portray it.

But when you see that the Pro-Life movement is predominately women, is led led by women, with a majority holding college degrees, you see that the liberals believe their own party's propaganda. You were lied to and believed the lie.

"Studies indicate that activists within the American pro-life movement are predominantly white and educated, with a majority of pro-life activism constituted by women [...]
Additionally, Granberg's survey provided basic demographic characteristics of his sample: 98% of survey respondents were white, 63% were female, 58% had a college degree, and 70% were Catholic. Granberg concluded that conservative personal morality was the primary mechanism for explaining an individual's involvement in the pro-life movement." - Wikipedia

So yes, we have morals, and our morals define our decisions and actions. Morals are supposed to influence decisions. Are we supposed to make decisions against what we believe is right?

We are against racism because we believe that race is sacred.
We are against sexism because we believe gender is sacred.
We are against sexual immorality because we believe that sex is sacred.
We are against abortion because we believe that life is sacred.

Why do you treat race as sacred, but desacralize sex?
Why do you treat gender as important, but treat life as common and not worthy of protection?

Or do you still believe the lie that Christians are just a bunch of idiots in the backwoods?

If I believed women were categorically a bunch of uneducated idiots, that'd be immediately pounced upon.
But liberals often claim to believe that Christians are uneducated idiots, and liberals socially promote that claim.

(Just to be clear, I don't believe women are idiots. My younger sisters (pro-life btw) are smarter than I am!)

the continued persecution of LGBT people (including recent laws enacted in US states)

We have the right to say what we believe is morally wrong, just as you do.
We also have a right to campaign to prevent that wrong from being legalized.

Yes, a few so-called Christians violate the Bible by hating the homosexuals, which the rest of Christianity condemns that hatred as wrong.

The Bible holds that Love and Truth are intertwined.

Love without truth isn't real love. That's where most liberals stumble.
Truth without love isn't real truth. That's where most conservatives stumble.

But many Christians strive to walk in both Love and Truth, and apologize when we mess up.

We believe homosexuality is a sin, but it's just as much a sin as adultery or porn, which most Christians also struggle with - including myself.
Unfortunately, some Christians believe homosexuality is a worse sin, but that's just self-righteousness and counter to the Bible ("Your sin is terrible, mine's okay!").

But even when Christians struggle with the same issues, we still need to call it wrong. Even if we ourselves are prey to the same things or related things.
It's hypocrisy if I say what you do is wrong, but what I do is fine.
It's not hypocrisy if I say equally acknowledge that what I do and what you do is wrong.

Hypocrisy is when we pretend that we are more moral than we really are. (Which many Christians do, and many liberals do (because many liberals believe they are really moral while turning a blind eye to their own faults)).
But it's not hypocrisy for us to call out something as wrong even if we ourselves aren't perfect. Otherwise, no progress would ever be made, because nobody would be able to call out anything as wrong.

We try to hold to our morals, believing they come from a higher authority, even when we fall short of those standards.

Which is better for society? People who believe they are accountable for their actions to a higher power, and who don't change their standards, or people who change their morals depending on whatever they happen to like on any given day or whether they can get away with it without being caught?

There are Christians in both camps, unfortunately, who change their views when society changes its views. But there are many Christians who draw the line, and hold to it, regardless of how they feel from day to day or what their personal preferences are.

So if by 'persecution' you mean screaming at gays, I agree that's wrong. As do many Christians.
But if by 'persecution' you mean talking about it being wrong, that's not persecution, that's legitimate discussion.

Oh, by the way, just as some Christians scream at homosexuals, some homosexuals scream at Christians too. Some pro-choice people scream at pro-life people also. Try this: Put a "I support unborn children" bumper sticker on your car for a month, and park it on the street. See how many times it gets vandalized.

There was a situation a few years back where a group of about fifteen Christians (male and female) were praying visibly but silently in San Francisco on a street corner. Offensive? Sure. Aggressive? Nope.
A mob of homosexuals surrounded them, threw boiling coffee into the womens' faces and started screaming that they were going to rape them all. Yea, that's a reasonable response.
So the male Christians formed a protective ring around the female Christians, and the police quickly arrived and made a ring around the Christians, and had to escort them to safety, with the mob continuing to surround the police screaming (and continuing to threaten rape) for several blocks.

Your side has your own Westboros mate. Except here we're talking physical assault and not just hate speech.

Christians condemn our Westboros, but most liberals seem to ignore theirs.

and the covering up of systematic abuse children by the preist hood...

You're talking about 0.1% of the centralized leadership of one denomination of Christianity. It's because of abuse-of-authority in centralized leadership, and the Protestants broke off of the Catholic church, because every centralized form of power (whether secular or religious, whether economic, ideological, or governmental) leads to abuse.

it means the Bible's net effect has not influenced Christian to the wars, violence and "an eye for an eye" kind of justice of the old testament

For the record, an "eye for an eye" actually is just.

I know, I know, people love to say "an eye for an eye makes the world go blind", but those people miss the point. Let me explain.

Human nature is, "If you hurt one of mine, I'll kill ten of yours. If you rob me, I'll kill you. If you break into my house, I'll burn your house down. If you accidentally bump into me, I'll force you onto the ground and make you lick the dust."

It's pride-based retaliation, going above and beyond equality. It's not seeking justice, it's seeking overwhelming humiliation of anyone who dares to go against you even by accident.

Or to quote The Untouchables, "He pulls a knife, you pull a gun. He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue! That's the Chicago way, and that's how you get Capone!"

In Genesis, the Bible gives this example (of an unrighteous person),

"I have killed a man for wounding me, Even a young man for hurting me.

An 'eye for an eye' is the still extreme but limited response to crimes against you. It limits the amount you can demand as punishment, and mandates that the government has to implement it, rather than vigilant justice.

This was for people living under the government's rule, but who weren't really actively pursing God despite being Jews and living in Israel. i.e. it's the difference between merely living in the USA or going to church every Sunday, vs dedicating your life to pursuing intimacy with God and being discipled by God.

The Bible says it's not right, but it's what maximum recompense God will tolerate for those who aren't personally devoted to being transformed by God. Jesus shows this by saying, if you're really following God, then the better way is that you give up your right to justice, and leave it in God's hands, because since God forgave you, you must also forgive them, and also let God cancel their debt if they repent of their actions.

That's part of his Sermon on the Mount starting in Matthew 5.

God tolerates immorality and injustice up to certain thresholds, for certain durations of time. But holds His own people to a higher standard (as long as they are actively seeking God), and brings judgement to His own house before he brings it to the rest of the world.

If you're wanting an example of questionable Biblical morality, an eye-for-an-eye isn't the reference you want to go for. :wink:

I believe that God is just and loving (from logic first, followed by (much later) personal encounter with God and 3rd-party testimony), and I believe that the Bible is inspired by God. There's only about two or three 'immoral' areas in the Bible I don't have explanations for. If you're going to cherry-pick examples to fire at Christians, those ones would be more powerful bullets. :)

All the other parts that on the surface looked bad, when I actually looked into them, they surprisingly made alot of sense.

Oooooo excellent; good twisting of words there, I like your word play *claps*

You also managed to respond to points I never made, brought up a whole subject I never mentioned, twisted it to include sexism, made assumptions about my points of view, made me a 'you' and attempted to make me part of a group and generally did a good job of playing the 'poor old persecuted Christian' card... honestly, none of which I have any interest in responding to because it was points I didn't make etc etc.
(I mean, seriously, "Or do you still believe the lie that Christians are just a bunch of idiots in the backwoods?" - excellent word play, implying that I thought this and still do asking me to defend a point I never made, nice trolling! Do you want some polish for your cross?)

You, and the posters before you, took a great deal of time to point out why things said where wrong, how they don't apply to all Christians and did all you can to minimise the numbers involved... and maybe not in the post directly above (but I'm willing to bet if I looked in other places or after this it'll have been posted), but in others proceed to dump all followers of Islam in to one group and say 'be afraid!'.

I mean, lets ignore that in many Western countries there are plenty of Muslims living lives which are near indisguisable from the Christians around them, have done for many years now, nicely integrated, allow their daughters the same freedoms as others.... no.. they want to all to a man do all the bad things!

That alone makes the 'fear of Islam' insane... and to give it a American twist, if I was in the USA I'd be more afraid of a Christian white guy shooting up the place (doubly so if I was near a Planned Parent Hood place) than a Muslim doing anything...

I mean, lets ignore that in many Western countries there are plenty of Muslims living lives which are near indisguisable from the Christians around them, have done for many years now, nicely integrated, allow their daughters the same freedoms as others.... no.. they want to all to a man do all the bad things!

The problem is that in those moderate Muslims living in the world (Including the USA) there's double digit support for suicide bombings against civilians being justified

http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/michael-w-chapman/pew-144000-us-muslims-say-suicide-bombings-civilian-targets-often-or

This isn't represented in Christian/other populations.

Compare it to Mormons. Are Mormons annoying when I'm answer the door thinking I'm going to get a package, and instead I get a 15 minute lecture? Yeah, of course. But at least I know there isn't a 13% chance that mormon doesn't find suicide bombings against civilians justifiable, and I can say "Jesus is fictional" without getting into a fight to the death like in majority Muslim countries.

I can draw some fan art of Jesus blowing Mohammad and show it to Servant, and while he might be offended, I won't be getting dragged to a Sharia court and executed as if I showed that same drawing to someone in a majority Muslim country.

That alone makes the 'fear of Islam' insane... and to give it a American twist, if I was in the USA I'd be more afraid of a Christian white guy shooting up the place (doubly so if I was near a Planned Parent Hood place) than a Muslim doing anything...

Statistically speaking, you're dealing with such a low chance that either situation's almost as likely. The issue is that Muslims make up such a small percentage of the country yet are over-represented by violence, while Christian white guys are a large portion of the country and yet, compared to Muslims, commit way less violent terrorist offences per capita.

2) "The reason that Christianity seems moderate is because we believe you have to God-given right to choose for yourself what you believe, and we don't try to kill you if you leave the faith like Islam does."

Source? Really, when you make statements like thos, you should back it up, else it just seems to be rightwing hate speech.

"The right to be convinced and to convert from Islam to another religion is held by only a minority of Muslim scholars. This view of religious freedom is, however, not shared by the vast majority of Muslim scholars both past as well as present. Most classical and modern Muslim jurists regard apostasy (riddah), defined by them as an act of rejection of faith committed by a Muslim whose Islam had been affirmed without coercion, as a crime deserving the death penalty." - Abdul Rashied Omar

"Many Islamic scholars, but not all, consider apostasy as a Hudud (or Hadd) crime, that is one of six "crimes against God" a Muslim can commit, which deserves the fixed punishment of death as that is a "claim of God".
Under traditional Islamic law an apostate may be given a waiting period while in incarceration to repent and accept Islam again and if not the apostate is to be killed without any reservations."- Wikipedia

Compare and contrast the Wikipedia page: Apostasy in Islam vs the Apostasy in Christianity page.

The Islam page almost entirely deals with the religious debate about, and the realities of, killing people who leave Islam.
The Christianity page almost entirely deals with the religious debate about conceptually whether or not the person was ever saved, with nothing about punishments (except vague 'when God judges them in the afterlife' punishments).

So here. we're saying, if you're a majority Christian, you support people's right to choose what they believe, as promoted by the Bible, but that some Christians might be bad Christians and kill non-believers (and honestly, how often do you see that happening?).

On the other hand, we're saying a huge percentage of Muslims openly support the death penalty for people turning away from Islam, as supported by their religious texts (not explicitly by the Quran, but their supplemental doctrine books), sharia law, and as argued for by their religious scholars.

But that many Muslims also disagree, and don't support the killing of those who turn away, but it's a very close tie. Far too close for a religion of 1.6 billion people.

Doesn't mean that this is enforced, other than by religious nutjobs.

Have you looked it up?

Saying, "This doesn't mean it's enforced" isn't a good response. Asking for evidence that it is enforced, or providing evidence that it's not enforced, is a better response.

Again, christians burned heretics at the stakes... seems they also found ways to legitimitize it.

Yes, people in power always find ways of doing what they want regardless of what the Bible says, and regardless of what their governmental laws say (they just change the laws - thankfully, they can't change the Bible).

Most of the people burned at the stake were other Christians. And it's counter to the Bible.

But most Islamic scholars agree that Islam should kill people who leave Islam, and hundreds of millions of Muslims agree (but not all - hundreds of millions also disagree).

All I know is that Jesus according to the bible loathed the temple, and preached wherever he was.

Jesus taught in the Temple, out in nature, on the streets, in houses, and in Synagogues.
Pharisees and religious scholars taught in the Temple, out in nature, on the streets, in houses, and in Synagogues too.
Other Jews taught inside and outside the Temple. Teaching wasn't limited to the Temple. Teaching wasn't limited to Synagogues.
Jesus' disciples and apostles did the same thing. Peter and Paul spoke in the Temple, synagogues, houses, streets, nature, and so on.

Paul even went into temples to foreign gods and preached there.

Jesus didn't loath the Temple, He called it "My Father's House". He hated the commercializing and exclusionary way the Temple was being ran (which is the same way some modern churches are being ran), which was counter to how the Temple was supposed to be ran.

Jesus did break open worship of God to any location, and the priesthood to everyone, but he didn't disown the Temple. It was still important as a symbolic bridge between man and God, which has now been manifested in each individual believer.

Western society got beyond that, not thanks to the christian religion, but thanks to showing religion their place.

Western society got beyond that, because the Christian denominations in-fighting and in-persecuting, led some sects to realize this wasn't sustainable, and to break the cycle.

Which is in everyones private life, not in politics.

Christians don't have a right to speak politically, or else must deny their own views to suit non-believers?
You can use your beliefs and opinions to influence laws, but Christians can't?

By what logic do you get to bring all of your mind and views to the table, but Christians must leave half of theirs behind?

Yes, the USA shouldn't make laws promoting one religion over another, but that's a far cry different than hiding Christianity from sight as if it's an embarrassment. Freedom of religion does not mean freedom from religion. It does not mean you get to go through life without exposure to other views.

If a person truly believes in something (religious or not), it affects them throughout their life, and their behavior and personality.
You want to artificially cut Christians in two: Their religion half only within their house, within their church, and within tiny areas of atheist-approved protest zones.
And then you want their work-life, public life, and political life, to not show any hint that they have views different than you.

Well, topic is quite dispersed (if that's the right word, my ability to use the force/english diminishes greatly when I am stressful so apologies in advance for elementary level content and mistakes) but

First of all, problem isn't about plane/airline staff as rules are quite strict and clear, but if he is arrested simply because of saying Inshallah (which means if God wills it) it is plain stupid. That word is even more of language then religion, there is even an "Oxala" (Oushala) in Portugese language meaning same probably inherited during Moorish presence in Iberian peninsula before Spanish Reconquesta. And this incident ,just like Ahmad's clock incident, is unfortunate at least. It is obvious that in modern times, "organized ignorance/stupidity" is far more dangerous than once "organized religion" was.

There were always some extremists in every religion, just that we witness their dramatic rise recently in Islam one. If there was a very violent Christianity sect (The following season 2) or any sect dangerous to the political system, it would be wiped out immediately but rise of this Islamic one is almost encouraged. (War torn country, fueled hatred of sects, deep hatred against USA/Europe, general ignorance during founding of ISIS) Far more Muslim died in recently sect based killings than bombings in Western states, but it isn't the case (for West). There is now a stupid irony of people killing saying "Allah-u akbar" (which means Allah is great , unlike "Allah wakauba" ) and other dying saying same thing.

I think main problem of Islam is that it hasn't been through a Reformation movement and as Gian-Reto stated it's not forced to back unlike Christianity. I am ofc not a Bible expert but I seriously doubt that Bible shines in terms of gender equality or violence as well. As Servant (of the Lord, tbh I never thought this Lord is that Lord :) just noticed) mentioned, Islam claims that it is the final and eternal form from same god of (starting from Adam-Eve to ) Judaism and Christianity and applicable until apocalypse. Because of that, current theoretical Islamic view (noticably Salafi/Wahhabi one) seeks for creating an Islamic order depicted partly in Qoran and other sources.

I don't know how things are in Christianity but in Islam, Qoran itself isn't the sole source but there are other sources depicting prophet's practices ( growing beard is for example ) aka "hadits" from "Ashab" (companions lived during time of prophet) or generally accepted Imams (most notably Bukhari) which also leads to different sects.

Quoting myself from NATO-Russia topic : And for Islam, after golden age of first centuries, Islam never got back to route after Al-Ghazali's winning argument of "Islam is narrative" which leads to non reformative "classic" canonical law having even an explanation for what ISIS does. For example, apart from Hanefi sect (which is dominant one in Turkey) other 3 main sects considers those not making daily prays as "heathen".

ISIS and other terrorist organizations usually justify their acts on Salafism which is very rigid and violent and denies any involvement of logic. In their standards, at least 95% of Muslims in Turkey aren't Muslim enough :) and most of them can be killed. This dangerous view is something whole world should be fighting against, but not bu turning this into Huntington's clash of civilizations or Muslims vs Christians. A delicate balance and a certain amount of education on matter is advised.

I hope these events at least lead to a reinterpretation movement of Islam, because it is obvious that a religion claiming to be sent for "all ages after itself" can't be incompatible even with democracy. As it makes zero sense to considers all Muslims as warmongering blood thirsty people in the name of Allah, key point is even there is canonical basis (which is also a great matter of debate nowadays) most of Muslims simply ignore it or aren't even aware.

Ok, I sense this post is a bit half baked and off topic but I am exhausted :) maybe continue later.

@Servant

Actually this (apostasy) is one of the topics taking place in Turkey in term of "Qoran Muslims" taking only Qoran as source because for example in this particular example, Qoran states that "Your religion is to you, mine to me" and "There is no forcing in religion" while Bukhari says "kill those leaving the faith". This leads to some people suspecting of legitimacy of Bukhari hadits, but at the end (for Turkey) it isn't something people would practice or want. Islam needs a thorough and extensive review in these hadit issue.

This topic is starting to get nasty, but I'd just like to point out that public perception is drawn not out of what religious groups believe, but what people that identify as members do. People that bomb abortion clinics may not be "true Christians", but when the only admissible filter for "true Christian" is "have you bombed an abortion clinic before", that's a wee bit too little too late. Likewise, if one out of every ten dentists was a deranged mass murderer, you'd probably leery of your teeth cleanings.

People are fearful of muslims because there's a whole shitload of them that like to blow people up. Yes, they may be in the minority. The Quran may damn the behavior, or it may not. They may not even be "real muslims". All of that is frankly irrelevant. The fact of the matter is that there's a lot of people who call themselves Muslims and like to blow people up, and that scares the crap out of us, so we're cautious and sometimes even reactive about other people that call themselves Muslims. Comparisons to Christianity are silly because today there are far fewer Christians that like blowing people up, and protesting/lobbying is seen as generally more acceptable than blowing people up.

This topic is starting to get nasty, but I'd just like to point out that public perception is drawn not out of what religious groups believe, but what people that identify as members do. People that bomb abortion clinics may not be "true Christians", but when the only admissible filter for "true Christian" is "have you bombed an abortion clinic before", that's a wee bit too little too late. Likewise, if one out of every ten dentists was a deranged mass murderer, you'd probably leery of your teeth cleanings.

People are fearful of muslims because there's a whole shitload of them that like to blow people up. Yes, they may be in the minority. The Quran may damn the behavior, or it may not. They may not even be "real muslims". All of that is frankly irrelevant. The fact of the matter is that there's a lot of people who call themselves Muslims and like to blow people up, and that scares the crap out of us, so we're cautious and sometimes even reactive about other people that call themselves Muslims. Comparisons to Christianity are silly because today there are far fewer Christians that like blowing people up, and protesting/lobbying is seen as generally more acceptable than blowing people up.

Blowing yourself up in the name of God to be martyr is a Middle Eastern thing, we (Turks) are being exposed to that tradition rather recently ("thanks" to ISIS and PKK) . Like one Egyptian atheist woman once asked at an Egyptian TV "Have you ever seen a Jewish blowing himself up in Germany?" , same applies to Christians as well. Simply, it is very Middle Eastern.

And people's concerns are understandable but it won't help to treat people "guilty until proven innocent" especially if based of proud tradition of ignorance.

Blowing yourself up in the name of God to be martyr is a Middle Eastern thing, we (Turks) are being exposed to that tradition rather recently ("thanks" to ISIS and PKK) . Like one Egyptian atheist woman once asked at an Egyptian TV "Have you ever seen a Jewish blowing himself up in Germany?" , same applies to Christians as well. Simply, it is very Middle Eastern.

And people's concerns are understandable but it won't help to treat people "guilty until proven innocent" especially if based of proud tradition of ignorance.

Replace "blowing people up" with "killing people". The point is that there's a lot of Muslims killing people right now, and profiling is a natural, healthy human defense mechanism. There's no "tradition of ignorance" at play here. Most people are fully aware that the probability of one random Muslim being a terrorist is vanishingly small.

Regarding the whole "innocent until proven guilty" thing, here in the United States it's a concept for criminal proceedings, not "pulling some guy off a plane".