Congratulations on raising this subject Yardbroom you’re so right. As you can imagine, I’ve seen everything which you referred to happen here, in the UK, and on a much bigger scale and for a longer period of time, given the bigger size of this country and it’s position at the forefront of trends of all manner and kind. What you see happening in Bim is what first started to occur here, some time ago and I can predict to you from our own experience that the result will be one of doom for all normal standards of decency, and decay and, eventually, your very existence as the first and foremost people in your own country will be threatened and overtaken by foreigners which is why, when I berate, I ask you all to listen to me, not because I’ve nothing better to do but because we’ve lived/are living the same experience ahead of you, here in the UK!

Unfortunately, I don’t see any real hope for you as your leaders seem to be just as blind as the generality of people. Look at the impossibility I had in getting David and BFP just to make a simple decision over r*d l*gs and from that, postulate your likelihood of getting anything done to improve things, in Bim!

There are times when you CAN learn from people who have lived/live abroad, and this is one such time!

Scout, thanks for sounding a clarion call that is desperately needed in our island home. But one small quibble: moral “interpitude?” Do you mean moral “turpitude?”

Also, it sounds to me like you’re pushing an Anglican agenda. Ya lookin’ in de wrong place.

If the “truth” as expressed by the gospels is able to be diluted, or made less relevant by multi-denominational interpretations, do we blame the messenger or the message?

IMHO the flight from meaningful church attendance is more a reflection
on our accepted messengers, not the tried and trusted message they are striving to teach us – i.e. the correct way to live our lives.

Grounding our precepts in this western religion is the quake that’s shaking the very foundation of our house today. This western sewer which was brought to us thru the barrel of a gun has done nothing but arrested our spiritual development. From its inception is has been a lie. And continues to perpetrate it today in more than one way. In our society there’s nothing as sacred as RELIGION and its from behind this curtain that all manner of evil are perpetuated. Had this been a foundation built on absolute TRUTH, it would have withstood any storm. But this is all by DESIGN for our collective destruction.

@ST…….Just remove ALL lies and ALL deceptions and you will arrive at absolute truth.

#1. THAT MAN WAS BORN IN SIN AND SHAPEN IN INIQUITY. (This is where all the bullshale starts for me).
#2. Than man is a mere physical being.
#3. You’re born, educated according to the precepts of the pyramid, work to feed the machine and keep the pyramid structure, be a good christian, believe in Jesus, you go to heaven, you don’t believe in Jesus you are burnt in the pit of hell.
#4. Some are created more equal than others.
#5. Follow the damn script you are accepted into the club, buck the phu…ng system and your’e sidelined/marginalised.
#6. Follow the ways and norms of the western man and you’re ok, go against the grain and its hell to pay.
And the list goes on and on…….

The Kernel of absolute truth is that man is more of a SPIRITUAL being than a physical being.

….To many, being a Priest, a Reverend, or a Pastor is just another job.

This might be the crux of the matter….

Why should being a Priest, Reverend or Pastor be a ‘job’?
Was anyone who did the same in the Bible paid for their work??
Why should you be paid for doing Gods work?
IMHO this is where a lot of the corruption begins because of greed. I remember back in the day,the pastor was also a mason, not so now.

That’s more like it , Hopi.

I thought we were reliable enough to buck the whole control system together.

Cast off the false prophets and child raping pastors and free your minds.

One rule… LOVE THY NEIGHBOUR AS THYSELF.

Everything else follows… peace contentment and even CSME, Scout, (but I must admit that last concept tests my faith to the breaking point).

@Technician/Dissident

We like the point about men of the cloth embracing their GODLY work i.e. serving their flock with all their soul/being. Nowadays its about a job ‘do as I say and not as I do’ and the PEOPLE accept it.

I can feel the CRAP coming on
It is getting into the Zone

Scout
There is nothing wrong with having a church around every corner in Barbados today, nor is there anything wrong with small churches being formed by folk breaking away” from larger churches, as long as they are bone fide NT churches that teach the Word in season and out of season, and once they are rightly dividing the Word of Truth.

The early church was definitely more like what is today called “cell groups” rather than mega churches. The bigger a church is, is not necessarily the better. I once read an article by a church guru who points out that the average church size in his country was 65 members.

I had always thought that that was about the correct number for a church simply because I noticed that the vitality, cohesiveness and love within the body of the church in which I was discipled declined significantly after the church had grown to over 65. So when I read his article I was not surprised. Certainly folk can not bare one another’s burdens in mega churches. But this is only my opinion and experience.

@David……ReLIEgion is what give you the illusion that you have a void by first condemning you, making you nothing. You call it void I call it fear of not knowing self. And KNOWING ONESELF is not dogma and another problem is BELIEF. That’s where the liars have us on lockdown, believe what we tell you, that’s all you need to get to ‘heaven.’

@Dissident……I’ll put my neck out on a limb and say that you are a christian and how I say this is the fact that you have just portrayed some very christian-like behaviour by judging me against your condemnatory value system in concluding that my truth is GAIA worship, pantheism whatever. Oh ye hypocrite!

Dissident
Brethren and Baptists and related denominations that rightly divide the Word of Truth believe as you do in “the priesthood of all believers.” As clearly taught in 1 Peter chapter 2.

In the NT, the term pastor, bishop, or elder refers to the same person and refers to the leadership of an autonomous local church.

Most NT leaders were bi-vocational, like Paul, or the pastor in St. Andrew to whom you refer. Some believers refer to such church leaders as “tent makers.” The Bible does teach that such are worthy of their hire and should be well-paid for the work they do.

I do not really think that Scout is pushing an Anglican agenda. I think he is reminiscing of the good features of the influence of the then state church at the time when we grew up.

For many of us who are evangelicals today, we learned a lot (and more than we think) in the Anglican church and school based system in our formative years.

Because the hymns and psalms and scriptures were read or sung according to a system based on the church year, it was easy to learn a lot of basic information, without even trying. Go read the collects that we learned in Sunday school again, and you will find that the men who wrote them, had a good understanding of the Bible. This was reinforced at “prayers” throughout the school week which involved the same Bible readings and hymns.

Also most of the hymns in Hymns A & M are paraphrases of Scripture, or allude to serious Bible doctrine.

One of my favorites is Once, only once, and once for all, his precious blood he shed! These lines express very simply the aguement that is developed in Hebrews 9 & 10, namely that Christ died once, and offered up himself once to erase the effects of sin This was in contrast to the multiple perennial and perpetual offerings by bulls on Jewish altars, which only covered sin temporarily.

I agree with Straight talk that the “truth” as expressed by the gospels is diluted, and made less relevant by multi-denominational interpretations. I believe that this a work of the devil, who seeks to strangle the truth by producing argument over church and denominational dogma, rather than dwelling on the doctrine as presented in the Word of God.

I also agree with ROK who opined that “As far as I am concerned, this little rock started going down after 1976 and it has not recovered since.” I recognized the decline after the BLP victory in 1981 ( I was absent from the island in 76 onward)

My my Dick Hertz II,

If God is a product of human imagination, how big a leap of faith is it to believe that life is much the same?

If we are comfortable devoting our lives to an imagined creator, what are the the limits to our imaginations.

If I can imagine an afterlife, why not this life.

Is reality an illusion, or was Einstein mistaken?

Hopi,
Sorry, not you, I meant Ace. You like you pun my mind. Watchya.

Can you imagine a pastor telling a congregation that he is accepting jewelry in the collection if you do not have money? That is the new type of prosperity gospel being pushed in Barbados. Prosperity for whom?

Fairplay,
And if he is given this jewellery in the ‘offering-plate’, who do we cast the blame on?
What about T.Wayne Bishop? Haven’t heard a straw about him at all. He should be cast into a den of ‘sandflies’ naked as he born. Criminal.

ROTFL……..lol….lol….rlmao…..

Rev Dr. Dick Hertz is something else…

What about the Pasor who asked his congregation for a ‘Pounder.’ This means some rice sugar flour and so on oh I fahget some pampers for his child! But this is the joke I had an aunt who could not afford to give anything a particular month and was frighten to go to church ha hahhhahaha lol!

There is a pastor at this point in time who has asked his congregation to give him an two months pay in advance When some persons said no he cuss them so stink lol lol welcome to being a so called Christian hahahahahashahahahahhhah lol!

@Bonny Peppa……Not to worry my dear. I just hope ya have ya adult briefs at hand along wid de good book. Have yaself a quiet nite.

And by the way, this word CHURCH and the whole ideology behind it, is derived from the Greek Goddess Circe who used to lure unsuspecting men into her home, indulge them sexually, keep them in her domain under some spell and have them work for and support her. This is EXACTLY what we have in our midst today.

Rev Dr. Dick Hertz,
You is a real ‘dick-head’. You have been forgiven. Go and sin no more.

Hopi,
Good nite huney. I got de adult ‘pamps’ but de ‘good book’, I got to beg you fa one.
I love de word ‘sheeple’. Makes me laff evrytime. Ya good.

To all you unbelievers
Since to you,no judgement is needed after death, we just happen to be here by some scientific accident, why are they laws, why should everyone be allowed to do as you like because “when ya dead,ya dead”. If there wasn’t a case of each of us giving account of our life, there should be no laws, then there would be anarchy throughout the world. Is this the kind of world you would like to live in? My friends, we have to give an account of our stewardship of our lifes, whether you like it or not. The quicker, you realise this the better it is both for you and the rest of society. A world without an account of your being here is a meaningless world without laws, on the contrary a world where there is accountability lends to a world of peace and being our brother’s keeper. You have the choice to make and you also have to accept the results of that choice you have make. Think and react with some common sense PLEASE.

Hopi // January 25, 2009 at 12:08 am

@Tech….They don’t pay taxes because they are pimps. You ever know a pimp/hustler to pay taxes.

****************

Hopi, I hope my reverend in nuh pimp cause I should have to ‘pimp my ride’!!

Ooops, I forgot!! You’re in Bim, so may not have seen that programme!!

@Scout…..Bro, I have a huge problem with respecting authority. Today’s authority is about ‘do as I say but not as I do.’ There are 1 set of rules for side A and another set for side B. Authority itself is at the heart of the problem because it is steeped in hypocrisy. Scout, ‘good moral behaviour’ is not based in Christianity, this preceeded christianity.