Archive for the ‘Church doctrine’ Category

On Easter Sunday my son put on a video of the Internet comedian JonTron with his latest takedown of Gwenith Paltrow and her Goop people.

It was a hilarious takedown of what’s pretty much a bunch of people being grifted. There is a reason why he has 6.6 mil followers

The funniest thing about this? I’ll wager the vast majority of the people featured in this video would consider belief in Christianity foolishness.


Speaking of Christianity there was a great piece at Hillfaith linked by Instapundit with six proofs of the resurrection several of which I never thought of such as

The first witnesses to the empty tomb and the living Jesus were women: It’s a sad reality, but women only counted as half as reliable witnesses as men. So the fact all four of the Gospels present women as the first witnesses to the Risen Jesus is a strong indicator Matthew, Mark, Luke and John reported the facts, not what they thought would be the most credible claims

I should have thought of this myself but my favorite proof of the accuracy of scripture is one I used many years ago at my 1st personal blog:

Now lets look at the evidence. I am going to lean on Will Durant:

He first cites Josephus circa 93 AD and points out that the praise given to Jesus by a person out to please both Jews and Romans is a tad suspect but the big gun comes from a 1st man named Thallus.

Lets Jump to the Gospel of Matthew briefly:

From noon onward, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. And about three o’clock Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Some of the bystanders who heard it said, “This one is calling for Elijah.” Immediately one of them ran to get a sponge; he soaked it in wine, and putting it on a reed, gave it to him to drink. But the rest said, “Wait, let us see if Elijah comes to save him.” But Jesus cried out again in a loud voice, and gave up his spirit. Matt 27:45-50

Now Thallus the pagan isn’t going to put up with this. About 50 AD he states that the darkness is a purely natural phenomenon and just a coincidence.

Durant put this argument in its modern perspective:

the argument took the existence of Christ for granted. The denial of that existence seems never to have occurred even to the bitterest gentile or Jewish opponents of nascent Christianity.

And remember that particular fragment to the best of our knowledge predates the Gospel of Matthew that it unintentionally collaborates by two decades. The pagan provides the proof. Talk about working in mysterious ways.

You should really read the whole thing;


There are many candidates for some of the lamest arguments on twitter but this one is big

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The answer to this is so obvious that it was almost a waste of time to tweet it.

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Of course there is the possibility that this is a lab virus released accidentally in that case there is a murder to be upset at, but I’m sure he’d consider that racist.


As I mentioned during my midnight livestream podcast (available here) had a lot of fun with people insisting that Trump is a fool and this corona virus conferences are hurting him who are oddly not willing to bet $500 bucks and give me points to back up their beliefs. Apparently “experts” and those who don’t even like try know why:

Wallace noted, “In all of our [Fox News] polls for months, Biden had an 8-9 point lead, and that’s now gone. It’s dead even.” He continued:

It seems to me as this virus goes on, that instead of this being a choice between the president and Joe Biden, as a lot of elections are, I think that this election is going to end up being a referendum on President Trump and the handling of the coronavirus.

As we get into September and October after Labor Day, I think people are going to make a judgment, and they’ll understand, the president didn’t create the virus, so I think they’re going to be fair-minded about it. Do they think he handled the health crisis well? Do they think he handled the economic crisis well?

If they do, I don’t see how he gets beat. If they don’t, I don’t see how he could win.

And that’s not even taking into account that the polls have been undercounting Trump supporters from day 1


Finally, in a time of social distancing here is a story that surprised me:

 Around 400 people were at a party at an East Bakersfield apartment complex when dozens of shots rang out, wounding six people early Saturday morning, according to the Kern County Sheriff’s Office.

Based on evidenced recovered at the scene, KCSO says, it appears at least one partygoer fired back at the suspects in a white sedan that fled the scene. Officials said nearly 100 empty shell casings of multiple calibers were recovered at the scene in the 3500 block of Pioneer Drive.

Even at a time of social distancing 400 at a party in an apartment complex is a lot. You would think that a story like this during social distancing time would be front page news everywhere but I suspect it will not be because of this line:

The suspects were only described by deputies as four black males, in a white sedan.

Now I could be wrong, we might see this as a lead everywhere and see the Governor of California condemn the lack of social distancing here, but I suspect I’d have a harder time finding a taker for a $10 bet on this than I have for the Biden election one.

On today’s Podcast we revisit the story of Brer Trump Brer Donkey and the Corona briar patch talk about the odds in election 2020, give a bit of proof of scripture on Easter Sunday/Monday talk opening the economy or not and cover a few odd stories that I missed.

The livestream starts at Midnight you can watch it here

If you like what you see please consider sharing the video, giving it an up arrow subscribing or hitting datipjar.

Candidate Cuomo

Posted: March 31, 2020 by chrisharper in Church doctrine
Tags: ,

The hashtag #PresidentCuomo has been trending on Twitter.

Musings about Cuomo as the Democrat nominee have come from everywhere on the left, including DaTimes columnist Maureen Dowd and MSNBC host Rachel Maddow.

If Democrats think Andrew Cuomo is the answer to their Joe Biden problem, think again!

The Trump ad campaign would start with Cuomo’s own words rolling on the screen:

“We’re not gonna make America great again. 

It was never that great. 

We have not reached greatness….”

Even an audience of Cuomo’s supporters booed when he said that in 2018.

But there’s more. Cuomo is an alleged Roman Catholic who supports late-term abortions, same-sex marriage, and divorce. That’s a troubling trifecta for religious conservatives throughout the land. 

But there’s even more.

Cuomo pushed for the NY State Act, which he described as the most stringent gun control law in the United States. 

The New York governor, who has spent nearly all his life in government, has opposed hydraulic fracturing, also known as fracking and would stimulate the economy in Upstate New York. All you have to do is drive along the border of Pennsylvania, which fracking is allowed, and New York to see the difference in how much better the economy is south of the border. 

If the Democrats are thinking about appealing to Republicans, here’s Cuomo on what he considers “good” members of the GOP. 

“Their [Republicans’] problem is not me and the Democrats; their problem is themselves. Who are they? Are they these extreme conservatives who are right-to-life, pro-assault-weapon, anti-gay? Is that who they are? Because if that’s who they are and they’re the extreme conservatives, they have no place in the state of New York because that’s not who New Yorkers are.”

If you go to https://www.ontheissues.org/andrew_cuomo.htm, you’ll find a host of issues that would make Cuomo unpalatable for many Americans.

–Raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour.
–Expand Obama Care.
–Opposes school vouchers.
–Tax the wealthy.
–Expand trade with Cuba.
–Supports the Green New Deal.

If the Democrats want to dump Joe and go with Andrew, it’s like trading for a younger Bernie. And think about the possibility that his younger brother, Chris of CNN, might be the White House spokesman. That’s a sobering thought whatever your politics are!

Autloc: Tlotoxl was humiliated. He will not forget, nor will he forgive.

Barbara: I did as he commanded.

Autloc: But not as he expected.

Barbara: What did he want? A miracle?

Autloc: We all awaited it.

Barbara: Why should I use divine powers when human ability will suffice?

Autloc: Yetaxa has spoken.

Dr. Who The Aztecs 1964

There’s an old joke about a man in a flood zone who can’t swim but is not worried because he has faith that God will save him. A police man comes by in his truck to get him out of his house before the water comes but he refuses saying “God will save me.”

Then the water rises and he has to go to the 2nd floor of his house and some emergency workers come by in a small fishing boat to evacuate him but he refuses saying “God will save me.”

The the water rises so high that he is perched on his roof and a Helicopter comes by and lowers a man with a winch to get him to safety but he refuses again insisting: “God will save me”.

He drowns and finds himself before St. Peter and is very confused: “I don’t understand why I’m here? I thought that God would save me?”

St. Peter replies: “I don’t understand why you’re here either, why didn’t you use the truck, boat or helicopter we sent you?”

The moral of the joke is of course that there is a difference between faith in God and expecting him to perform a conjuring trick at your insistence.

This is one of the traps that is in play during the Corona / Wuhan virus. There are plenty of devout Christians. People who go to mass daily, receive the sacraments regularly, visit the blessed sacrament who might be tempted to ignore the public restrictions that have been imposed for the safety of the general public. In fact there will be a fair amount of mocking of faithful Christians who follow said restrictions by those who disbelieve or hate Christianity saying that this proves such people don’t actually believe in God prodding them to do just that.

But this form of temptation is one that is specifically illustrated in scripture as is the proper response to it

Then the devil took him to the holy city, and made him stand on the parapet of the temple, and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down. For it is written: ‘He will command his angels concerning you and ‘with their hands they will support you, lest you dash your foot against a stone.'”

Jesus answered him, “Again it is written, ‘You shall not put the Lord, your God, to the test.'”

Matthew 4:6-8

The promise of Christianity is eternal life, but not eternal earthly life. Lazarus, Jairus’ daughter and the son of the widow of Nain were all raised from the dead by Christ but all eventually died again. While Christ came to earth to serve he is not our manservant here to do our will, we are here to do God’s.

When we put God to the test we reverse our relationship with him, instead of the loving sons and daughters that he helps guide to the right path we become Veruca Salt who wants it now!

Don’t let yourself be tempted this way, particularly in this current crisis, because the drop it can help lead you to will prove a lot worse than what’s at the bottom of a garbage chute