Apparently, God hates Sweden now, along with America, Canada, and "fags"

I have to reiterate what others have said. Phelps is the face of Xianity that I have experienced my entire life. While I agree that it would be inappropriate to paint all Xians with the same brush merely because there are people like him in the movement, given that he represents such a large and vocal part of the movement, I think it is perfectly fair to associate Xianity with people like Phelps. It is pure fantasy to think he is just a fringe whacko in an otherwise benign group.

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If I were to say that Crashfrog represents the atheist community, I would be saying something that I had never really examined.

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If you were to say that Crashfrog represents the "athiest community" it would make no sense as there is no organized religion of atheism. It is the absence of a belief in god/gods/pink unicorns. It is not a system of beliefs with a codified doctrine or dogma. Xianity is. And if you read my post carefully and not casually, you will see that I did not say that Phelps "represents" Xianity. I said that one can "associate" Xiantity with his beliefs because he represents a large group of like minded indivduals within the movement. Think of it as one can associate Ann Arbor Michigan with college football but that does not make everyone in Ann Arbor a football fan or player.

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While we cannot judge the Christian community publically, we CAN listen to what they have to say publically.

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why can't one judge the Xian community publicly? Has freedom of thought and speech already been eradicated in the US?I will also point out that Xians and particularly creationists are very willing to associate scientists (or those who practice other religions or no religion) with nazi's or any other disgusting group to claim they are superior to everyone else...and they do this frequently and publicly...yet according to you, Xians should not have to accept that within their community there are large groups of Phelp's ideological clones?I don't think it is we who need to get out more...you need to look around (even on this board) at what other Xians are actually saying and proposing.

I agree with what you are saying about association. I am not encouraging anyone to take it to extremes and claim that all Xians are the same or have the same viewpoint i.e. I have had positive experiences with Xians even as a non-believer. However, Phatboy was originally objecting to even associating Xianity with Phelp's or those like Phelp's. If Phelp's were the one and only person to act the way he does "in the name of Xianity" one could argue he is a whacko and not representative. However, this is not the case.

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Translate: It is the absence of a belief in an absolute standard. It is a relativistic belief system. I can only lump all relativists together in that they have internalized their own definition of their own mountaintop. They have defined the standard---themselves!

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Ironic then that you have millions of Xians who interpret your so called "absolute standard" any way they see fit and justify just about any kind of behavior (good and bad) based on that "absolute standard"...and all of them claim that they are behaving according to an "absolute standard"...and where do they end up?to quote you:

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They have defined the standard---themselves!

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Actually he admitted that absolute morality does collapse into relativism in another thread. He has an interesting interpretation of the "fall" story in that we first understood the singular absolute and that eating from the tree of knowledge allowed man to create his own moral absolutes... thus creating relativism.

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But that is just the problem. He claims to follow a religion based on "absolute morals" and a clear doctrine of how to follow those absolute standards i.e. the bible. Yet, when people justfify murder, rape, slavery, war etc. based on those "absolutes" he uses, as Quetzal points out, the no true scottsman fallacy. He may be consistent but it is a total copout and a dangerous one. If you can justify anything based on your claim to an absolute standard..and worse, convince millions of people to agree, you end up with the potential for extremely anti social behavior...living in Germany, one is constantly reminded of the extremes to which this can lead. To then brush it off as, oh well, nobody involved was a true Xian is just as dangerous since it insures a repetition of the event..or at least increases its liklihood.

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I didn't mean to say you were wrong, just trying to save you some time before finding out that he's end up agreeing with you in the long run on that particular bit.

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You are probably right. I can't tell really if Phatboy is a Xian apologist or whether he is struggling himself with issues of absolutism. But absolutism is absolute nonsense.

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By the way, how are things in germany?

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Things are pretty disasterous here in my field. They just got rid of free education and now universities will charge money to attend..with no provisions set up for people who cannot afford the cost (about 500 Euro a semester going to 2,500 in some states). The worst is, there is no guarantee that the universities will see this money. It may go to fill in other holes in the countries finances. So it is a de facto tax. There are also federal vs. state debates that are making it basically impossible to stay in research here. I will give them credit. I have never seen a government with such aptitude for shooting itself in the foot when it comes to education policy...they almost make the US government look competent.The extreme right wing parties here caused two scandals. One, two fo the most extreme are now in parliament in two states. They will join forces for the national elections next year. They will probably do rather well. In one state, those in parliament marched out during a moment of silence for the survivors of Auschwitz then came back and claimed that the real holocaust was the allied bombing of Germany. The response of the government is to try to ban the party and make rules about protests that would not only curtail right wing extreme groups but any political party i.e. they are playing right into the neo-nazi's hands.But all in all, things are not as bad as it sounds in the Netherlands. On the other hand, I live in Munich which is the first or second richest city in Germany with a big foreign population, lots of international companies and a low unemployment rate (compared to the rest of the country but which is still sky high). From other cities I have seen in Germany, including Berlin, it is not representative at all.