In reply to Pierow
If you'd said you thought the world was getting worse in the past 50 years I wouldn't have said anything.
But you said four thousands of years all of these behaviors would have never been tolerated. I said that pre-Christian western history is rampant with all of the things you said were not tolerated.
Then you said they were on the periphery, which is false because they were normative.
Then you amended to that they weren't "government sanctioned" (still not sure what that means) and doubled down pederasty was never government sanctioned anywhere in history. But this is also demonstrably untrue.
This is a nice rant, I guess, but I don't see why it is directed at me.
But, since you asked - do I expect prosecution of Christians? In the US? I don't know, I'd need a time frame. Much of Christian morality is "baked in" to our legal and societal framework. The #metoo movement is more or less a direct historical descendent from Christian morality (which is the source of the idea of sexual consent regardless of nationality, sex, age, etc). Do I expect the ungodly to persecute Christians? Yes. This is fairly common in the history of the Church.
The last few centuries have been exceptionally peaceful in that regard - but not globally. Millions of Christians were killed by the Soviets. Over a hundred thousand clergy were murdered between 1936 and 1938 alone. Is it worse today here than Russia in 1936?
Christians were not allowed to print Christian materials in the Ottoman Empire. If you went into a church in the middle east around 1900 and looked, they would have been reading from manuscript gospels and lectionaries. Hand written. Is it worse today here than Turkey or Greece in 1900?
I don't think Christians are called to speak biblical truths because the world is getting worse. And I don't think that if the world is getting better that means we stop talking about the gospel. By nearly any measure the world is better now than it was in the first century. I don't really understand why this impinges on us speaking the truths of the gospel, which really transcend material well-being.
But you said four thousands of years all of these behaviors would have never been tolerated. I said that pre-Christian western history is rampant with all of the things you said were not tolerated.
Then you said they were on the periphery, which is false because they were normative.
Then you amended to that they weren't "government sanctioned" (still not sure what that means) and doubled down pederasty was never government sanctioned anywhere in history. But this is also demonstrably untrue.
This is a nice rant, I guess, but I don't see why it is directed at me.
But, since you asked - do I expect prosecution of Christians? In the US? I don't know, I'd need a time frame. Much of Christian morality is "baked in" to our legal and societal framework. The #metoo movement is more or less a direct historical descendent from Christian morality (which is the source of the idea of sexual consent regardless of nationality, sex, age, etc). Do I expect the ungodly to persecute Christians? Yes. This is fairly common in the history of the Church.
The last few centuries have been exceptionally peaceful in that regard - but not globally. Millions of Christians were killed by the Soviets. Over a hundred thousand clergy were murdered between 1936 and 1938 alone. Is it worse today here than Russia in 1936?
Christians were not allowed to print Christian materials in the Ottoman Empire. If you went into a church in the middle east around 1900 and looked, they would have been reading from manuscript gospels and lectionaries. Hand written. Is it worse today here than Turkey or Greece in 1900?
I don't think Christians are called to speak biblical truths because the world is getting worse. And I don't think that if the world is getting better that means we stop talking about the gospel. By nearly any measure the world is better now than it was in the first century. I don't really understand why this impinges on us speaking the truths of the gospel, which really transcend material well-being.