A little cheer and a reminder of what's been taken from us.

[Aries144]

A little cheer and a reminder of what the efforts of enemies among us have taken from us. Let the craven destruction of cleanliness this makes apparent motivate you to action.

Morning Coffee

Vintage Autumn

A semi religious opinion follows:

For those who follow the God of our fathers, consider Numbers 25.

Leftists like to criticize the middle of the 20th century by calling it hypocrisy. I find myself concluding that the apparent difference between hypocrisy and a stumble at principle is what action is taken after bad behavior is uncovered. The unrepentant always mock those who attempt self control and fail. Misery wants company and hedonism craves evidence that self control is impossible.

Not exactly deep thoughts, but that's my reflection for the morning. I wish all of you a better day today than yesterday.

[Business_Casual]

It’s all the Boomer’s fault.

[Deadman William]

The Sin of Peor
25 While Israel remained at Shittim, the people began to commit infidelity with the daughters of Moab. 2 For they invited the people to the sacrifices of their gods, and the people ate and bowed down to their gods. 3 So Israel [a]became followers of [b]Baal of Peor, and the Lord was angry with Israel. 4 And the Lord said to Moses, “Take all the leaders of the people and [c]execute them [d]in broad daylight before the Lord, so that the fierce anger of the Lord may turn away from Israel.” 5 So Moses said to the judges of Israel, “Each of you kill his men who have [e]become followers of [f]Baal of Peor.”

6 Then behold, one of the sons of Israel came and brought to his relatives a Midianite woman, in the sight of Moses and in the sight of the whole congregation of the sons of Israel, while they were weeping at the entrance of the tent of meeting. 7 When Phinehas the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose up from the midst of the congregation and took a spear in his hand, 8 and he went after the man of Israel into the inner room of the tent and pierced both of them, the man of Israel and the woman, through the abdomen. So the plague on the sons of Israel was brought to a halt. 9 But those who died from the plague were twenty-four thousand in number.

The Zeal of Phinehas
10 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 11 “Phinehas the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, has averted My wrath from the sons of Israel in that he was [g]jealous with My [h]jealousy among them, so that I did not destroy the sons of Israel in My [i]jealousy. 12 Therefore say, ‘Behold, I am giving him My covenant of peace; 13 and it shall be for him and for his [j]descendants after him, a covenant of a permanent priesthood, because he was [k]jealous for his God and made atonement for the sons of Israel.’”

14 Now the name of the [l]dead man of Israel who was killed with the Midianite woman, was Zimri the son of Salu, a leader of a father’s household among the Simeonites. 15 And the name of the Midianite woman who was killed was Cozbi the daughter of Zur, [m]who was head of the people of a father’s household in Midian.

16 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 17 “Be hostile to the Midianites and attack them; 18 for they have been hostile to you with their tricks, with which they have deceived you in the matter of Peor and in the matter of Cozbi, the daughter of the leader of Midian, their sister who was killed on the day of the plague because of Peor.”

ive read and reread your post and numbers 25, and i cannot for the life of me figure out what your point is. that this god's followers should be killing liberals, or something?

[TomMcC]

I'm reminded from Numbers 25 of two things. First, that judgement begins in the house of the Lord. The church is fragmented into a thousand pieces, almost completely disunified, believing all manner of false doctrine, set upon by heirlings, false prophets, and just plain money grubbing hucksters, devoid of any historic perspective and basically wandering in the wilderness like the children of Israel (the church in it's infancy). The Lord will not be mocked, as the Israelites found out the hard way. Secondly, it reminds me that the enemy, the world, the flesh, and the Devil are always beckoning me to sin against God and neighbor. To be that hypocrite who says one thing and does another, to ultimately destroy myself in apostasy. It also reminds me of how utterly dependent upon the Lord I am to think, say or do anything remotely good and to cherish His forgiveness for the sake of my only mediator Jesus Christ.

[Aries144]

Well, I had a whole explanation typed up and m4carbine decided to log me out while typing and logging back in, the whole thing was lost. I'm not retyping it.

ive read and reread your post and numbers 25, and i cannot for the life of me figure out what your point is. that this god's followers should be killing liberals, or something?

Essentially, no, I'm not advocating killing liberals, progressives are elitist subversive anti-constitutional control freaks whose ideology seems to hate me for even my best qualities, right down to my very core, I have nowhere on the planet I can go to escape their unending meddling and promise of future legalized abuse (passing laws taking away things I can't imagine living without- which I consider abuse), I think Americans need to consider everything Progressives do from now on as illegitimate and illegal, establish a parallel society and government that excludes them and protects us, and I think your way of phrasing that question comes across as dismissive and condescending.

Are we communicating to one another sincerely, or is this just something in front of an audience for you, or something?

[Deadman William]

Well, I had a whole explanation typed up and m4carbine decided to log me out while typing and logging back in, the whole thing was lost. I'm not retyping it.



Essentially, no, I'm not advocating killing liberals, progressives are elitist subversive anti-constitutional control freaks whose ideology seems to hate me for even my best qualities, right down to my very core, I have nowhere on the planet I can go to escape their unending meddling and promise of future legalized abuse (passing laws taking away things I can't imagine living without- which I consider abuse), I think Americans need to consider everything Progressives do from now on as illegitimate and illegal, establish a parallel society and government that excludes them and protects us, and I think your way of phrasing that question comes across as dismissive and condescending.

Are we communicating to one another sincerely, or is this just something in front of an audience for you, or something?

you posted a tale about 24,000 of god's own people being cut down by god himself, the carnage only being abated when one man takes matters into his own hands and slays representatives of the group he/god/whoever believes are essentially responsible for this social rebellion from god, and make allusions to this being something applicable to today's world. so i ask if you're suggesting this somehow be applied today.... is that not a valid question? it kinda sounds like you're suggesting we need to kill off "evil" people. and since that's what it kinda sounds like, you shouldn't be surprised when someone is alarmed and raises questions about it.

"essentially, no" - odd way of answering. that doesn't sound particularly concrete or unconditional to this author. i'm left with the feeling that you, in fact, would not object if certain people of particular ideologies were killed for theological reasons, then? but only in certain circumstances, i'm sure... you wouldn't condone just going house to house shooting anyone identifying as liberal or progressive, no, not exactly, sooo.... essentially, no.

clarify for me - if you say that's absolutely false, you'd never condone anything like that at all and how dare i make such an accusation, i will take your word for it. i am a fair debater.

its been my experience religious zealotry very frequently brings a selective disregard for human life. if you value all human life equally - atheists, muslims, conservatibes, liberals, jews, christians, et al - then i will bite my tongue. just clarify that for me.

[Aries144]

You come across like you are just itching for a fight. You also come across to me like you think you have some power over me, or that you're used to wielding power over others.

I will correct an embarrassing error:

In my frustration and haste at losing my carefully worded post, I used the word "essentially," meaning I was summing up the post I spent all that time typing up. It was intended to be read as "Essentially:." No, I absolutely do not advocate murdering liberals, or anyone else. I don't appreciate your hall monitor attitude, acting as if your hand hovers over the button to destroy my life for a word.

I'm not going to be put on the defensive, as if I have to answer to you, or as if I'm some child and you some authority figure.

I've found that all humans are religious in behavior- and most atheists I've spent time talking to have gone to great lengths to convince themselves they aren't, which seems to me to have only built up a blind spot for dogmatic behavior.

Change your tone to a friendly one, devoid of the pretense of righteous authority implying the threat of vengeance, and I'd be happy to exchange further communication. Until then, your arrogance merits no further response.

[Deadman William]

You come across like you are just itching for a fight. You also come across to me like you think you have some power over me, or that you're used to wielding power over others.

I will correct an embarrassing error:

In my frustration and haste at losing my carefully worded post, I used the word "essentially," meaning I was summing up the post I spent all that time typing up. It was intended to be read as "Essentially:." No, I absolutely do not advocate murdering liberals, or anyone else. I don't appreciate your hall monitor attitude, acting as if your hand hovers over the button to destroy my life for a word.

I'm not going to be put on the defensive, as if I have to answer to you, or as if I'm some child and you some authority figure.

I've found that all humans are religious in behavior- and most atheists I've spent time talking to have gone to great lengths to convince themselves they aren't, which seems to me to have only built up a blind spot for dogmatic behavior.

Change your tone to a friendly one, devoid of the pretense of righteous authority implying the threat of vengeance, and I'd be happy to exchange further communication. Until then, your arrogance merits no further response.

i don't even know what to do with any of this - it doesn't line up with my perception of our interaction. so i agree - we're not to have a productive debate.

thanks for clarifying, though.