Church members — many of them wearing identical blue shirts with the church’s name as they helped direct traffic and check weapons to make sure they were not loaded — were joined at the event by their friends and others who heard about it on the news. About 10 members of a local private militia were among those who attended.
The event has been criticized by other religious leaders, who say churches have no business glorifying deadly weapons. Across town, another event carrying an anti-gun message was held.
But Pagano, the Marine veteran and police chaplain who leads the Assemblies of God congregation, was unapologetic, saying one cannot defend a person’s First Amendment right to religious liberty without the Second Amendment right to bear arms.
“We love God, we love our country,” he told the applauding crowd. “Without a belief in God, without a belief even in firearms, I don’t believe this country would be here the way it is today. There’s nothing to be ashamed of.”
Attendees listened to rules about carrying unloaded weapons securely in holsters, recited the Pledge of Allegiance, sang patriotic songs such as “God Bless America” and “America the Beautiful” and watched a series of Internet videos arguing for the right to bear arms and warning that gun-control advocates would put people at risk of mass murderers and other criminals.
A milder flavor of the religious wacko gun-nut variety. RTFA and reflect.
The appropriate question: Which gun would Jesus Christ carry?
A guy I work with belongs to a Baptist church. They have a group of guys there that carry weapons on them during all services and church functions. For some reason, there is a loop hole in the law that says they can carry a gun in church as long as they are a part of a “security detail” for the church. Psychos.
#32 Alfred1
Dispensationalism? Now things suddenly fall into place.
#38 I guess there are closet dispensationalists.
Quoting the bible has no relevance in the modern world.
There is nothing in that piece of fiction that can apply to today’s situations.
Guns and religion, allowing guns in bars…what’s next? Lower the age limit where kids can get guns? Forgot, kids can get guns already if they want.
Found some loving quotes:
– After God has sufficiently hardened the Pharaoh’s heart, he kills all the firstborn Egyptian children. When he was finished “there was not a house where there was not one dead.” 12:29
– Those who break the Sabbath are to be executed. 31:14
– Handicapped people cannot approach the altar of God. They would “profane” it. 21:16-23
– Don’t do any work on the day of atonement or God will destroy you. 23:29-30
– “And ye shall eat the flesh of your sons, and the flesh of your daughters shall ye eat.” 26:29
– For impaling the interracial couple, God rewards Phinehas and his sons with the everlasting priesthood. 25:10-13
– If someone makes an image of anything (like a bird or flower) then God will destroy the entire nation. 4:25-26
– God will kill those who hate him. 7:10 (If god wasn’t imaginary, I’d be in trouble)
#17 & #21
Surprisingly, you both make a great argument FOR personal ownership of firearms.
Your examples show what happens when only a select, special, few are allowed to have firearms.
ALL mass murders have happened because those being murdered were NOT ALLOWED to have firearms and could not defend themselves.
The sole exception being antics conducted by Janet Reno, but that’s a horse of a different color.
Ah, yes, the Assemblies of God. That’s the cult in which I spent nearly all the years of my Christian indoctrination. It would have taken a bullet to the brain to do enough damage to my cerebral cortex to prevent me from seeing how logically flawed their religion is.
Sometimes, those people really take to heart the words of one of their songs…
Onward Christian soldiers,
Marching as to war,
With the cross of Jesus
Going on before.
If you’re serious about fighting a war for Jesus, you really should have guns — guns so big they show Jesus just how much you love him. But these people in the article are pussies for not carrying bullets, because if Jesus loves guns, you can bet he wants his followers to carry bullets. Unloaded guns are for lukewarm Christians, whom Jesus will spew out of his mouth.
Don’t be lukewarm in the eyes of the Lord. Load your weapon first, and only then load the kids in the SUV and drive to church. It’ll fill you with the spirit of the Lord, and set a darn good example for the children, too.
I took my kids to a large sporting goods retail chain yesterday where they were having little 30 minute sessions for the kids about such things as birdwatching, camping, fishing, archery and GUNS!
I sat in while my kids were taught the parts of a BB gun and safety rules like how to never point at people, and how if they ever found an unsecured gun to not touch and find an adult.
A group of little girls and their leader (I won’t ID the organization) showed up early for the camping seminar which followed, and when the leader discovered that gun safety was being taught, she immediately gathered the girls and left. She told the instructor that they were not allowed to learn about guns.
So, the best way to address gun safety is to remain completely ignorant and pretend that they do not exist.
It seems teaching children about sex and drugs is fine, but don’t say a word to the kids about guns. I suppose its alright to remain ignorant about firearms when your agenda is to remove them from society. The obvious conclusion is that premarital sex and drugs are just things society has to accept since they are allowed topics of discussion for kids.
#44
I am not against guns. I am against guns being used by complete idiots who have no training and/or use chemicals as recreation.
I say you get licensed federally, you get a photoID just like a car and you can carry open or concealed with no question.
But if you have a gun, you need what amounts to a driver’s license and test before using. PROVE you are competent enough and lawful enough to use it, just like a car.
And like a car, if you carry and get under the influence, you lose the license and the right to carry.
I see no difference between the car being considered a deadly weapon and a gun being one.
Cursor_
Whether or not the second amendment guarantees that you get to own a gun, in the US, guns are everywhere. You know, like CCTV in the UK.
Religion is quite another matter. It’s outmoded by definition, and we’ve proven that no one is willing to adopt any new religions–at least, not in any significant numbers. Like the Constitution, religious texts are based on old and long-dead models.
So we’re left with chanting and singing in a group as a surefire way to create and instill beliefs. Hey, I’m all for a Periodic Table singalong, or a devotional weekend featuring the programming of computers.
When you start talking about programming people, I’m outta there. I’ve tried it from both ends, and in every case, it got out of control.
Be aware of when your brainstem is being engaged. The limbic system is very useful in the case of an actual threat, but it can be easily tricked–repeatedly–to respond to dogma and other non-threats with the same mind-numbing adrenaline rush. Likewise, it can be trained to be attracted to certain people and then to a given belief system.
People buy from people they like. I don’t like the guns-in-church dude, but I still like Dvorak after all these years: Low, low cost, plus a generally valuable product.
Jesus Christ will carry a sword when he returns, and he will slay the unbelievers, his cloak soaked in blood.
Don’t take my word for it, its in revelations.