I'm new to the site and I'm a little confused by one of the rules for the Christianity forum: "NO BIBLE QUOTES! Sorry but we don't allow spam on this site. Quoting over and over from some ancient text, is SPAM! You want to advertise a book, take out a banner ad!" Yet the rules also state that the purpose of this forum is to discuss Christianity. Isn't that basically impossible? How can someone discuss Christianity without referencing the Bible since it is the Bible which shows everything Christianity is about? In the Buddhism forum I see the teachings of Buddha and sutras quoted. I see the Qur'an quoted in the Islam forum and the Tao Te Ching quoted in the Taoism forum. I don't understand then why you are not supposed to quote the Bible in the Christianity forum. If you take out the teachings of Jesus and the Bible out of a Christianity discussion you don't really have anything to discuss just like it would be very hard to discuss Buddhism if you can't talk about the Four Noble Truths or the Eightfold Path. What are you supposed to discuss on the Christianity forum if you can't quote the Bible?
oh , why be so literal ? please offer your views and interpretations as in loving your neighbors with common language , and referencing those ideas and feelings to a bible passage may actually be helpful . i did not write those grumpily phrased guidelines ; never even thought to read them before now . hello
stpetedada post in the section called the sanctuary Sanctuary where discussing the bible and Christianity is encouraged:2thumbsup:
Once upon a time, this forum was very active and particularly nasty. The anti crowd would get upset when topics were debated and the bible quoted as fact. Tired of 'because Bible' and because the webmaster has certain bias, the rules were made. In the main forum you can't use 'because the bible says', in the Sanctuary you can.
Because of the flood of proselytizing we were getting in that particular forum and the confrontational nature of the threads that were appearing from all sides.
I know a few of us have wondered this same question in the past... and it was explained to me the same way- about the sanctuary and the reasons why. Which I can understand and hey, even if I didn't (which I do), not my forum anyway... I do think maybe it's possible enough time has been passed???? since the out of control posts on either "side" but possibly a difference could be made between someone who is literally spamming Bible quotes/verses..... or repeating the same Bible verses over and over.... and someone who in a discussion, where, say someone else asked why Christian's believe or feel a certain way about something- maybe the best way to answer the question or explain something would be to use a Bible verse to begin with and then after doing so, explain your personal feelings or beliefs on the verse.. That's just my opinion though... I wasn't around to see the types of stuff people are referring to having occurred on this particular forum in the past though!
lol probably true. I guess it is good people can have those discussions in the other Christian forum then.
Whatever the merits or demerits of the rule, it doesn't seem to me to be that big a deal--since you can paraphrase and cite the Bible, or can quote it in full In the Christian Sanctuary. It is interesting that the really ugly attacks we used to get on this site don't happen nearly as much any more.
that is actually the primary reason from my perspective. Just look at the descriptions offered for each sub-forum in the religion section, very obviously biased in favor of Buddhism; "Learn how to end suffering and achieve enlightenment"... LOL, yeah, right, China and Vietnam are great examples, aren't they. It's the same type of blind-faith statement that Christians constantly get raked over the coals for.
We don't have current trolls anywhere like we used to and with the exception of one of them being omnipotent, the others usually got banned eventually. The omnipotent one doesn't even post anymore.
What was the name of the guy that had the pic of Bush with his hand up a dog's ass? LOL @ remembering that guy.
As someone who was here in the way backs of 2006/07 under different usernames, I can say it was pretty awful (quoting wise) though usually quite engaging and challenging (posting wise). Spam Bible quotes were the blame. Using a quote in reference isn't the issue, but there were numerous threads that devolved into posting the actual quotes. Here is an example of such a Spam thread: http://www.hipforums.com/newforums/showthread.php?t=154230&f=88