How is wanting to live a live of peace irrelevant?
Heck, even God leaves people alone if they tell Him to buzz off. How now should a man rule over another by fear and intimidation? That is wrong.
Discussion
So, you are a pacifist?
peaceful != harmless
I am neither.
It isn't either or. I am very capable and willing to use violence, but the standard for initiating violence is high and very limited.
Okay, so, you're harmless.
To most people at most times, yes.
Again . . . Why is that a bad thing?
It's not necessarily bad, but it's passive and doesn't effect it's environment.
You are entirely incorrectly again.
I am NOT passive. I affect everyone around me. There is a difference between being passive and doing what God calls you to do. I am trying, in earnest, to live that life. That means I am actively engaging with the world directly around me and not shrinking from it anymore, while also rejecting all of the evil and villainy.
You remind me of all the messianic separatist groups that were rising up against Rome around the time of Jesus' ministry. They were fanatical, focused, and violent. But . . . Who's ministry and sacrifice split time and is the healing balm for all? I want to be more like Him than focused on penny ante isms that or ologies that try to limit what God has in store for me.
I didn't say passivity is necessarily a bad thing. I just don't think it's necessarily a good thing.
Since when am I fanatical? You disapprove of me because I am _not fanatical enough_, after all.
You seem to cling to the state too much. I dislike that in anyone. It frustrates me, a bit, because you are smart and I think you are generally a good and righteous person! I just find that the entirety of "the state" is incompatible with being a Christ follower. I can't see any other way to read the entirety of the Biblical story and come to another conclusion.
It isn't like I dislike you any less, and I am only this chatty on this topic with you because I have a huge respect for your intelligence. And, well, I could be wrong, but I honestly don't think I am on this topic.
I don't have an antipathy to the _state_ — as a word or concept— so I can just call a state a state, without suffering cognitive dissonance and feeling the urge to rename it.
We can discuss whether larger or smaller states are better, but a state consisting of a cow village on a hill is still a state.
well, that's the point, what are you doing "defending freedom" if it's not at risk?
I think defending freedom is continuous, until Christ returns. We cannot solve for that. It is part of Nature.
nature is not above God.
also, the society of Christ is certainly not in need of reforming.
there is a lot of assumptions in your thinking you are not aware of the implications of. especially the one saying Christ the King is not a man, who has refined himself to the state of purity He was trained and guided to get to.
Then what was the point of Christ redeeming all of creation?
Christ already came. You are redeemed. You have t he mind of Christ. You have The Holy Spirit. You are a new creation. You have been born again/from above (take your pick of translation).
What are you if you are NOT supposed to be the representative of God's Will on earth by building Truth, Goodness, and Beauty into this world? (Which you DO!!!)
I have eternal life. That doesn't mean I cannot sin. It means I have access to additional Grace, through the sacraments, such as baptism.
Baptism gets rid of Original Sin. It doesn't make you permanently sinless.
yes, actually, it does. go read back.
this is a central doctrinal issue in christianity. in american christian (protestant) there is a debate between "once saved always saved" and what is perjoratively called "works doctrines" which say that you are still human.
well, i say that as a human, you can improve. we can always improve. i reject the idea that humans cannot shake off tyrants like we have on our backs now.
it's a matter of everyone taking up their own cross and doing the hard work. maybe dying.
i hate to say this but as a woman, you are supposed to be protected from that.
so you also should understand that it tends to be women who persuade young men to not be vigilant and rigteous.
i have met many many many men in my life who i considered to be righteous. the idea that you can't supersede that base state is toxic, and authoritarian.
no, who says you can't
and who gave them the authority to claim that?
i do my best. i'm not perfect. sue me. fuck you.
So just because there is sin in the world you should accept tyranny.
Right.
That makes so much sense.
The right way is to TURN FROM SIN, of which tyranny is one, and make the world more perfect.
I have yet to see a practical demonstration of non-coercive governance unless we are talking about some kind of covenant-based community, which should be entirely possible to do and even likely if all the BTC maxis have their way.
My point is that humans don't NEED a state and the coercion that goes along with it, ESPECIALLY in the context of the fact that we have a model of how to do so in the history of The Church.
I am not OK with any coercion. That is not Christ-like.
Even excommunication and banishment are a form of coercion.
that whole excommunication thing led to protestants.
Protestants also do excommunication. That is why there are so many different ones.
You can even excommunication yourself.
Protestants do so much protesting, most Protestants are not, IMO, actually Followers of Christ. But neither are most Catholics or even Orthobros.
It's a hard path because we have to continually die to ourselves. I kinda hate that, but there is no other way but to trust and obey, to quote a pithy hymn.
Sure.
But that is exactly what Jesus did with the temple booting, people doing something at an inappropriate place.
And, for the record, I don't have all the solutions, but I know Who does. And thankfully, I don't need to solve all the world's problems. I just have to be where I am supposed to be, and I am.