Is this perspective true or false?

Sorry, you’re right it was the dude.

He was betting that they didn’t thump bibles 100-500 years ago. I’m saying that since the Reformation didn’t start until the 1520s, those were their prime bible thumping years. (Ex the Puritans rebelled againts Charles II because he was too “Catholic”. They ended up chopping off his head.)

Dear amblessed, False…I don’t’ believe it is premarital sex that has our society in a mess. We can go back and go back not too long ago when incest was prevalent in many families but they were told not to talk about it. When spare the rod spoil the child was as common saying as common as the emotional and physical wounds cause by the rod. When women had no say as to their sexual needs. When men took liberties with their women good or bad. I believe I expressed my point in another thread that when men and woman live together and learn just what they can and cannot live with and what are deal breakers before they commit to a marriage they are likely not contribute to the 50% fail rate of marriage. Which I think is largely due to people who do marry without getting to know their partner first. ..of course this was once disputed but more and more info is coming out that proves that when we are compatible with our sexual partner we stand a greater chance at staying together. I cannot imagine the fate of someone unhappy with this part of their lives when married. I was encouraged as was my husband to discover our compatibilities. There are some things that are deal breakers in a marriage and I’m sure finding out your partner hates sex…would be one for most people. Sue…good luck

Do we have a “godless” society or a secular one? My view is that the government should stay completely neutral with respect to religion; neigher promoting it nor obstructing it. I get a bit tired of religionists who claim to be persecuted simply because they aren’t allowed to push their religion on everyone else. There are people who want to change biology to fit their religion by eliminating evolution from the curriculum. There are people who dont’ want sex ed classes to teach all aspects of sexual health because they want to only push their religious views of proper sexual behavior.

When I was a lad teachers, coaches, principals still lead prayers and witnessed in public school and back then kids still rebeled, did drugs, and 12 year olds got pregnant though admittedly it raised a few more eyebrows than it does today. Everyone going through the awkward period of adolenscence has to do a lot of soul searching to decide what they believe in.

Don’t stop him now Captain he’s on the road to becoming president of the US. ( They are totally confused too.)

…agreed.

I have to agree with rnealw about todays Christians. I read then when asked to name the gospels that most self-identified Christians couldn’t name a single one. 12% of these folks thought Joan of Arc was Noah’s wife (don’t know much world history either). 3/4’s of Americans believe the Bible teaches, “God helps those who help themselves” when it was actually said by the non-Christian Benjamin Franklin. Even though I’m not a Christain sometimes I try to get into a meaningful conversation with Christians only to discover that I know more about the Bible and Christianity than they do.

Today more people get their beliefs from televangelists, The DaVinci Code, or from Left Behind. The Bible is too hard to read and understand, Americans want someone to sum it up for them.

There are too many issues in your resolution.

Are we a faithless society? More people go to church and call themselves religious than ever before.

What is the “real mess” you are talking about? My wife is a labor and delivery nurse and she comes home telling me of 17 year old patients having their 3rd child. Statistically the number of teen mothers has declined every year for the last dozen years. The rate of STDs are a mixed bag, the rate of syphilys had gone down in the last decade with the rate of gonnorrhea has increased a little and clamydia has increased quite a bit. As I understand it the number of people with AIDS in increasing while the number of new cases is decreasing, mostly due to the improved survival of AIDS patients.

I’d have to say false. We don’t live in a faithless society and the mess we have seems managable and mostly improving.

Joan of Arc was Noah’s wife? I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.

That’s why I don’t vote…

Amblessed, I’m willing to bet money that for at least 500-100 years, in England (or another European country) your ancestors didn’t thump the bible & visit a christian church, believe in Jesus, or anything like that.

Yet, for a thousand years following, because they converted at sword point, you’re willing to claim that the society in which you live as a result of brutality & conversion or death is “faithless”.

Everybody has faith - I have faith the president won’t blow us all up tomorrow while he thumps the bible & robs me blind.

It’s a parents job to teach their kids, society doesn’t do it for them. Family structure, social influence, etc, are all a part of the parents job. It’s what I do. Don’t other parents? If they don’t, then they are to blame for the actions of their children.

Faith has nothing to do with good or bad parenting.

It’s true on FunAdvice.

This is a legalistic perspective.

true. you’ve got people that have children from 4 or 5 different people… and those 4 or 5 different people have the same thing… It causes a mess in so many different ways.

I’d say true.

i dont really no if you should have sex befor you get married but most people do it so i dont think it is that big of a deal! :)

Actually if you look at your history 100 years ago they were thumping those bibles 200 years ago you would get chased out of the county for the wrong beliefs 300 years ago they would whip you in public 400 years ago they burned you at the stake before the reformation they would kill you and your whole village. . . with the popes blessing. I agree with filletofspam that More people go to church and call themselves religious than ever before. But at the same time less of those people understand what it means to be a Christian.

Uhhh… it was ‘thedude’ who was willing to bet money, and he was betting that they DIDN’T thump bibles…

Amblessed… I am in complete agreement with you, and I know that you are comparing todays society to 10, 15, 20 or more years ago… not… 100, 200… etc. When I was a child… things were not the way they are now, they were not perfect, but, there was no comparison to the problems we have in todays society, if one looks at it from a Godly perspective, and that is what we are supposed to be talking about, this is the religion part of this board, and secular answers are really not even supposed to be posted here, if everyone stuck to the way it was laid out. Only the ones claiming religion should answer, secular answers should stick to secular posts. Answers truly having to do with religion or faith, or questions pertaining to the same should be here, others are violating what is set forth. Not that I am against debate, but, it brings confusion into the situtation, when the category is clearly stated as religion, and many voices answer… in the name of religion…

Thanks all - wasn’t my statement but I thought it was worthy of consideration.

Should such a thing happen, that a godless society convince their children that premarital sex is ok and ineffective parents not convince them otherwise, that would indeed be a real mess. However, I am not quite sure that that is what we have today, although it is dangerously close. In fact, I think our mess is quite a bit different, and more serious than just premarital sex

If by society you mean government, then I don’t know that I would call ours godless. It may be secular, but there is enough religious morality intrisically linked to the government system that it is almost impossible to operate the government without a fair amount of religiocity (as George Washington pointed out in his farewell address).

If by society you mean the population, then your perspective becomes more accurate, and the concern more dire. The family is the basic unit of society, and all attacks against the family are attacks against the very structure that holds civilization together. All individuals have the right to family life, and all governments have the responsibility to defend it. (see Pope John Paul II’s Apostolic Exhortation “Christifideles Laici”)

Aside: I want to know how much money filletofspam is willing to bet, because 500 would have been 1507 and the Protestant Reformation hadn’t even started yet, and bible thumpers didn’t exist. That’s one thing about Catholics: traditionally, we’re not bible thumpers, although we did have several great British witnesses in the years following, notably St. Thomas Moore, St. John Fischer, and St. Edmund Campion. The bible thumpers came to England as Puritans (Oliver Cromwell), Presbyterians (John Knox), and Methodists (from James Westley).

Oops! I guess I should have asked to see the money first;-)

I think our society could def. be called faithless… meaning without faith… in the one true God, which is a fact by many. I don’t know what the numbers are, but, I do see what the effects are all around me. I am 50+ years old, and I see much less faith now than I did years ago, and the push on all sides is to make America a “Godless” country. Everything that has anything to do with God, is under attack, including his followers. Not to the extent that many have suffered, by any means, but , persecution is begining, and will escalate. Believers may as well get ready to dig in… We have experienced many years of respect, but, that is crumbling, faith is being replaced by the voice of reason… and the decision by many that they intend to be their own god… Christians have been too silent… too long… now, we are going to pay the price for our lethergy… We have not made our voices heard, we have tried to hard to fit in to the worlds system… tried too hard to be politically correct… tried too hard to be nice… instead of standing firm on the values that we believe in… We have given our precious resources (our children) into the hands of the world to teach… the schools do not reflect our values , they reflect the spirit of the world, and when they and the colleges get thru with our children… there is little faith left… There is a generation of children that are completely lost, they don’t know who to believe in… they have seen so much falsehoods… everywhere they turn, and the value system that some of them may have been taught, is crumbling… under the weight of what others around them are doing… They are constantly bombarded by sex… everywhere they turn… it is in their face.. their peers for the most part believe that if it feels good do it… and it is extremely hard for one to stay pure in this society… in the church or out…

We reached an all time low, when the schools started handing out condoms to 6th graders, recently… I think the only way we can raise children nowdays with a Godly value system, is to home school them. What they have to experience in school is a fright for many of them, and they need an alternative. The message that comes from the world around us, is going to continue to erode our value system, and our children need all the help they can get in order to face the world that they must enter.