[Tfug] The NET

[Matthew Patenaude]

The Bible did not give the Catholic Church its power. The "Mother 
Church" claims that its own edicts are above the authority of the Bible. 
Furthermore, freedoms from the Catholic church are largely due to the 
fact that people began ignoring the Catholics' prohibition on commoners 
even reading the Bible for themselves. The Bible doesn't even support 
the Catholic dogmas, and when people began to find that out for 
themselves, the Catholic church began to loose much of its power. Only 
in recent years have priests allowed parishioners to read the Bible, and 
they encourage them to read versions of the Bible that Catholic 
theologians have tried to rewrite.
Just had to add my $0.02 :)
Matthew Patenaude

Stephen Hooper wrote:
> On 10/5/06, Judd Pickell <pickell at gmail.com> wrote:
>   
>> I don't know, some would argue that the American Constitution has had as
>> much of an effect on the world as the Bible. Both are very influential world
>> wide, although for vary different reasons. The Bible gave the catholic
>> church the power it wanted, and the Constituation gave people the freedom
>> that they didn't/couldn't have until then. :)
>>
>>     
>
> You could then argue that the light-bulb has had as much effect on the
> world as the Bible, or that toothpaste has had as much effect on the
> world as the U.S. Constitution.
>
> They look like reasonable arguments as there are absolutely no good
> measurement systems to argue them in.  It is very qualitative.
>
> That said, I think you missed the main point of my thought, which was
> that the Bible being a religious document,  is not in the same genus
> of documents as the U.S. Constitution.
>
> To imply that the Constitution, and the Bible are therefore somewhat
> equivalent, and at the same time hold them up as examples of a
> specific set of documents referred to by a previous author as "social
> documents", while arbitrarily excluding all other documents that would
> also serve as an example of this kind of document was  what I was
> endeavouring to make a point about.
>
> As an aside, it also left quite a bad taste in my mouth as it seemed
> to me to diminish both the Bible, and the Constitution.
>
> If you believe in the Bible (as being holy), then to imply that the
> Constitution is holy would seem to me to be slightly arrogant.
>
> And from the opposite point of view, I like the U.S. Constitution just
> as it is:   written by *normal  people* as something akin to a
> governmental RFC document.  I think the U.S. is great, but we don't
> need a  "we are descendants of  gods" mentality.
>
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