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Ex Marine.
Born and raised in La Jolla/San Diego, CA but moved to Anchorage, AK 44 years ago.
Currently a retired taxicab driver after 30 years.
Single. Divorced 3 times. Had 3 children (2 still living), have 7 grandchildren and 1 great granddaughter.
i'm a moderate Republican. My hobbies are playing poker and chess.
i'm a Deist but i do believe in evolution. My religious beliefs, which i wrote several years ago (A Search for Truth), can be viewed at the URL above.
i may not agree with you but i cherish your right to disagree (even if you are wrong).
aarthur001's Advice
There are very few people who do not eat at least once a day. Most people try to eat more than once a day, but I think that it is safe to say that all people try to eat at least once a day. Don't you think that your soul deserves at least one good ...
Orion, we really don't want to get into this discussion on this thread too, do we?
I am a believer. I don't think that I would categorize agnosticism as the lazy person's religion. It seems that the logic of agnosticism is flawed (as classically defined: one who believes that the truths of God are unknowable). While I agree that t...
I am a Catholic, so I will try to tell you what the Catholic Church believes instead of what non-Catholics think the Church believes. (And I'm not sure what all this Teresa business is...) First of all, we do not worship Mary. All official Church ...
Orion, I would be fine with moving this discussion to funmail, (although I will be leaving for the summer shortly). There are just a few things that I think need to be clarified before we do so. I apologize for not including the citation for the ...
Toadaly had asked if I could provied verification for the claims that were made at Lourdes, because he could not find anything about them. This is the link for the official website of Lourdes. The list of miracles is under the heading of "cures and m...
This is a follow up to the post I had before. As Catholics, we do believe that homosexual acts are sinful. We do not need to know the source of the inclination towards homosexual behavior in order to determine that the act is a sinful (along the sa...
I suggest looking into the reports on the miracles at Lourdes before making the claim that they can be explained by psychology. It is immpossible for Psychology to allow a person with severe damage to the cornea to see with 20/20 vision. It is also i...
I am familiar with the bible refering to the dead as "those who have fallen asleep," but I have not seen those portions saying that the dead "know nothing." In any case, we still hold that those who have fallen asleep in Christ are not truly dead, but...
In response to paradise: There are several scriptural scholars who disagree with your analysis that Jesus claimed to be God. To see what I mean, I recommend the book "Between Heaven and Hell" by Peter Kreeft. Also, while the evidence that Christ...
As regards the miracles at Lords and other places: The Church's requirement for a miracle is that it MUST be unexplainable by scientific means. The miracles verified at Lourdes that the Church recognizes are the sort where people are literally miss...
In response to the quote from Karl Marx: "religion is the opium of the masses" In the past, I have had the experience of working at a convenience store for minimun wage. While there, I discovered the antithesis of Marx's view: Without God, opium...
We are not God. We are seperate from God. However, the scriptures do have an interesting take on this idea of "becoming God." Unfortunately, you can't do it by studying something. "His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to lif...
He was very charismatic and very intelligent. Unfortunately, he believed his own press clippings. I think that he is an extreme example of what can happen when people try to decide subjectively and arbitrarily what is right and wrong. (in his case...
I do believe in God. One of the major reasons that I believe is because of Scientifically verified miracles, such as the healing power of the Spring in Lourdes France, the miracles involved in the canonization of Padre Pio, the Eucharistic miracle...
This will be a rather long post, so I apologize in advance. Samurai, You have said that you are a faithful Catholic. I think that it would be good to look at the Church's official teaching on homosexuality. The "Catechism of the Catholic Church" s...
That is a loaded question. God is a Trinity, a family whose life is love (authentic love). He is completely tracsendent. He contains within his very being all truth (classically understood: existence/being/"that which is"), unity, goodness, and ...
I apologize for taking so long. I promised to answer the second question later, so here goes: The question of God's eternity brings up two foundational principles: the concept of the Holy Trinity and the concept of time as a "created reality" Al...
The other part of levzeroni's response dealt with Catholic's praying to saints. This issue was already addressed above, so I will not dwell on it long, but I will address it again briefly. The New testament asserts that those who have died are al...
I believe in one God the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth, of all things seen and unseen. I believe in one Lord: Jesus Chist, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father; God from God, light from light, true God from true God; ...
If God loves everyone and forgives everyone, then why is there a hell? God does necessarily forgive everyone; he forgives those people who allow themselves to be forgiven. The name "Jesus" (Yeshua in Aramaic) means "God Saves." He wants to save us...
In response to levzeroni: It is incorrect to say: "Christians know they sin and ask for forgiveness so that through faith and grace and good deeds ALONE they will recieve heaven. Catholics believe that through good deed alone they will get into hea...
I believe in one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. Christ himself is the head, and he said to St. Peter, "you are rock, and upon this rock I will buid my Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it." He has only one Church, fou...
Thank you flossheal for your kind and thoughtful comments. I am familiar with the Gospels, including those verses that point to the possibility that Jesus may have had siblings (thus implying that Mary did not remain a virgin before, during, and aft...
It is true that there is no specific mention of storing up treasures in heaven in the letter of Philemon. That is why I cited it from the Gospel of Matthew. It is part of the over-arching Gospel message, and fits in perfectly with what the text of th...
Since my last serious post, I have done some serious reading, and have spoken with one of my advisors about the veracity of the claims that have been made regarding the translation and origin of Isaiah’s possible prophesy of the virgin birth from Isaia...
I know that I'm going to catch hell for this, but I have to point out that the Catholic Church officially believes and teaches that Mary was, in fact, a Virgin before, during, and after the birth of Christ. As a Catholic, I submit to the authority of ...
I must have missed something when you "pointed out references that prove the hollistic approach doesn't work." If you could copy and paste them from your arguments above I would appreciate it. In speaking of the letter of Philemon, you left out the...
In my last post, I made a critical error (that was quite attentively pointed out). I said the following: " the evidence of George Washington's leadership in the military and government is nowhere near as compelling as evidence that God created the uni...
You say that my argument is a "hand waving hollistic argument that amounts to nothing at all." If my logic is faulty, point out its faults. I have not waved my hands once, and I am not convinced that a holistic approach is invalid. As the coucils te...