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Spiritual War

clarsct

Illuminator
C
Joined
Mar 14, 2005
Messages
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Just saw this in my local rag today. Seems that some preachers are now saying that prayer is like a 'hand grenade against the enemy.' Huh? Prayers ar the Lord's artillery, now? Why the smurf would an omnipotent being NEED artillery? Aren't they just admitting that their god isn't all that great?

I did find it humorous, however, that the funnies are in the same section...
 
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A Reading from the Book of Armaments, Chapter 4, Verses 16 to 20:

Then did he raise on high the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch, saying, "Bless this, O Lord, that with it thou mayst blow thine enemies to tiny bits, in thy mercy." And the people did rejoice and did feast upon the lambs and toads and tree-sloths and fruit-bats and orangutans and breakfast cereals ... Now did the Lord say, "First thou pullest the Holy Pin. Then thou must count to three. Three shall be the number of the counting and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither shalt thou count two, excepting that thou then proceedeth to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the number of the counting, be reached, then lobbest thou the Holy Hand Grenade in the direction of thine foe, who, being naughty in my sight, shall snuff it."

-- Monty Python, "Monty Python and the Holy Grail"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Hand_Grenade_of_Antioch
Click to expand...
 
Last time I heard the expression "Spiritual War" or more acurately "Spiritual Warfare" a fundie were trying to convince me that I, and every other member of that particular board whom were not of the christian faith, were possed by the Devil due to the fact that I was not christian.....

You should have heard the shreek when it were pointed out that the Devil were part of the christian pantheon and therefor had absolutely no claim to my soul since said entity didn't exist in my little corner of the world. :D
 
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Yesss. I tink dat da miltaristic verbage est possibly a clue dat dey veel powerless. Maybe hast somethink to do with der mamas.
Dey see the power and influence of violence and military might, and like a baby must have some mudder's milk. So up on the milk bandwagon they go.

Prayers might do good as a kind of tribal meditation. Like a rally before the big game. HOLYHOLYHOLYYes, very tribal. But to say prayer is a hand grenade? Ack! Meaningless and silly.
If prayer is like a weapon, it is something that unites you in action: going with you or before you - not something to be cast like a spell toward your enemies.
 
arthwollipot said:
I've heard the Jesuits described as "God's Shock Troops".
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St Ignatius of Loyola was an ex-soldier, and the Roman church really needed to fight Protestantism just then.

Military metaphors do seem appropriate for the Church Militant, and of course a really good metaphor could be really useful. I just wonder whether the grenade represented by prayer is a fragmentation grenade or a stun grenade ...
 
Nettles said:
St Ignatius of Loyola was an ex-soldier, and the Roman church really needed to fight Protestantism just then.

Military metaphors do seem appropriate for the Church Militant, and of course a really good metaphor could be really useful. I just wonder whether the grenade represented by prayer is a fragmentation grenade or a stun grenade ...
Click to expand...


Just a couple of days ago I was thinking of a song I used to sing in vacation Bible school when I was very young and attended such things. At the time I didn't think anything about it, but in retrospect it's more than a little disturbing in its glorification of violence in the name of the Almighty:

I may never march in the infantry,
Ride in the cavalry,
Shoot the artillery,
I may never zoom o'er the enemy
But I'm in the Lord's army,
Yes sir!
Click to expand...

Anyone else remember singing that in your ignorant youth?
 
New life for an old metaphor.

If you can have "the sword of the spirit", why not more modern weapons?
 
Max560 said:
Hopefully because of some nuance in this thread, and not because you are recycling your body's moisture.
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Let's leave my body's moisture out of this! ;)

It's the deal with the weapons they use near the end, where they can make that noise, and blow things up. OK, I only saw the movie once, LONG ago. I forget the details lol

I'm seeing folks using something like that, except prayers are the sound :eek:
 
JamesDillon said:
... in retrospect it's more than a little disturbing in its glorification of violence in the name of the Almighty:

I may never march in the infantry,
Ride in the cavalry,
Shoot the artillery,
I may never zoom o'er the enemy
But I'm in the Lord's army,
Yes sir!
Click to expand...

Anyone else remember singing that in your ignorant youth?
Click to expand...

Yes, but it went, "We may never fly over Germany/We're in the King's Navy/By jove!"

The far more popular lyrics involved great, green gobs of greasy, grimy gophers' guts ...

Violence in the name of the Almighty works for me ... I've taught my elder daughter to tell the other girls at her (Christian) school all about how Chanukah is the holiday of gutting enemy elephants from beneath just so, and how Purim is the holiday of pre-emptive strikes against your enemies ...
 
Abdul Alhazred said:
New life for an old metaphor.

If you can have "the sword of the spirit", why not more modern weapons?
Click to expand...
Because all my ideas are tasteless, unfunny, and lead straight to terrorism. The Dirty Bomb of the Spirit, the Anthrax of the Spirit, the Jacket Lined With Explosives of the Spirit, the Box Cutter of the Spirit...

JamesDillon said:
I may never march in the infantry,
Ride in the cavalry,
Shoot the artillery,
I may never zoom o'er the enemy
But I'm in the Lord's army,
Yes sir!
Click to expand...

I may never build any infantry,
Steal a refinery,
Move my artillery
I may never airstrike the enemy
But I'm in the Nod army,
Low power!
 
occasionally it's nice to hear a burst of "smite the unbeliever" instead of the usual "hey, god's this great guy, you know?" thing.
 
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