DaveW

How about you pay attention to your own words?

Note that I said your were INTIMATING, not intimidating...... And I don't see what Alan wrote as "intimidating" either. But the plain fact is that you have presented yourself as an organisation. What happens in other places is irrelevant to what happens here - this is this forum, and if you check you won't find any other "organisations" registered. You can get as grumpy as you like about it, but that is the fact, and nothing Alan said about that was offensive or out of line. As far the other info - which you have not denied by the way - I did several simple internet searches on your initials and the words represented by those initials, and once you past the Chinese and Eastern bloc undergound references, the UGC USA hits present as promoting small group worship and putting down local church. This is why I suggested you have work to do - so that people CAN FIND real info about you. But if you (or anyone else) posts links, then you must be aware that people like me won't use your links. It is a dangerous practice to click on unknown links. Now perception is important, but my perception is that Alan's post was in no way rude or nasty, but your tone to both him and to me is not nice. I did not and do not intend this to come across as attacking, but you obviously perceived both mine and Alan's in that way. Perception is important. Why don't you take a step back, take a breath, read what was actually written, and how about we all start over?

Alan is a long standing member of very good reputation. You would do well not to get yourself offside with everyone by intimating things about him. This forum does have a problem with those who have "Internet ministries", as many of them are not very biblical. You surely must understand that, and understand that we have a right to be suspicious of any such ministry until it is proven to be good. If Alan sees it as being somewhat anti-local church, then I am initially inclined to accept what he says. Indeed, in my independent searching I find very little about your "group" and what does come up is supporting "small group" ministries over local churches. If this is not your group, then you have some work to do, because many people like me WILL NOT follow links such as those you posted until after I have independently researched who you are. And when I did that search, it brings up info that aligns with Alan's statements. A suggestion: play nice, and people will accept you as that.

Well, let's face it they couldn't taste any worse, so go ahead and add salt. Of course you cannot have a Hawiian Pizza without pineapple, but a good "works pizza" should also have pineapple. I have no idea what this "ketchup" is that you speak of, but tomato sauce is also made of tomatoes, and whilst I would not have it on most eggs, scrambled can handle it. And you can add any number of different things to steak, but steak sauce or tomato sauce are definitely NOT acceptable. Here is a biggie: a burger is not a complete burger without a few slices of beetroot in the rest of the salad.

Sunset from Gracetown, South West of Western Australia

3 bears carpark and surf breaks in the background, our old Cruiser in the fore.

No bears here at all - not even koalas in Western Australia, and they are not bears. Apparently there are three surf breaks - Papa bears, Mama bears, and Baby bears - one of the the surf breaks is always just right....... It is a half hour of 4x4 only to the carpark from either north or south, but the main carpark was full - 30 or so vehicles parked up. It took about an hour to complete the track, with conditions ranging from hard dirt, to rocky surface, to soft sand, and the views were amazing. We met a few cars coming the other way and they were doing the soft sand hills hard, but we going down those not up. The big old cruiser was great on the run.

The Lord provided for us and I was able to take my wife away for our 31st anniversary- not "away - away", just to the south-west of our state (about 200km away from home), to stay in a little cabin in the bush for a few days. Anyway, one of the things we did was to find a popular off-road track down here called Three Bears. We have a 1985 Toyota Landcruiser - it is not new, but it is in good condition, and they are a capable truck. Anyway, we got a little video of the track. 31 years married and she still comes 4x4ing with me (on the rare occasion we get to go.) I hope you enjoy this few minutes as much as we enjoyed the hour of track work. a888c6703cca18dec3123e60981cca03.0.mp4

I love the way you mischaracterise the literal interpreter so that you can then discredit them. That is what is called a "Straw man argument". The literal interpreter takes the literal interpretation unless there is a reason to take it otherwise. The reason could be a literary mechanism, such as when the Bible uses the term "like", which indicates that something is not the literal stated item but is "like" it. Mat 3:16 And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him: Not an actual dove, but "like a dove". Or it might be where the context clearly indicates a literal interpretation is not intended. Mat 3:7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Jesus was not saying the Pharisees and Saducees were actually descended from snakes....... The ones leaning to their own understanding are the symbolisers. They decide what the symbols mean based on nothing more than their desires to find a particular interpretation or doctrine. Of course there are some literalists who do the same, but the safest way is to let the Bible tell us clearly what is literal and what is symbolic, and that lies with the literal interpretation. The point is that the literalist will accept symbolic meaning not at a whim as you suggest, but when it is clearly indicated, and will them interpret that symbol within the context of the passage. The symboliser takes whatever he wants as symbolic when it fits his purpose and then interprets it to mean what fits best with his doctrine. One is clearly not relying on the words of the Bible to define symbolic and literal.

Just an update. There are people worldwide who are blaming the recent and current bushfires on "climate change". As I have already mentioned, fires such as these (this scale) are not common, but also not unprecedented. Twice in the last 40 years we have seen fires similar to this. I don't know if it is being reported, but over the last 2 - 4 weeks there have over 180 arrests of arsonists related to the recent and current bushfires. This is unprecedented. We do have fire bugs of course, but a bad year would be 30 arrests through the nation over the entire summer. 180+ is astoundingly out of proportion. I am not really one for conspiracies, but with all the protests about climate change shouting about the fires, and all the accusations against our PM, along with a hugely disproportionate number of deliberately lit fires........ well, it all just seems a little bit...... coincidental. But is it really possible that people would risk causing death and horrendous damage to property, just for political gain, and to advance the "environmentalist agenda"?

One of the funniest things about our politics is the main conservative party is called the Liberal Party!!!!!!! (Currently in power).

To be fair, the harvest bans are a regular thing. In summer here everything gets so dry that even driving through a field can start a fire. A few years ago a man was using a grinder during a total fire ban, and he started a fire which caused huge damage and a death. Total accident, but this place really goes to tinder in summer. The no cool burning, no clearing, and no bush grazing are the things that have added to the current problems, and they are all main platform policies of the Greens party, the Labour party, and the Democrats. And now they are all attacking our Prime Minister over the fires.......

To give you an idea, with 40+ bush fires burning in Western Australia currently, my family went for a country drive today. Covered a loop of about 400km and did not even see smoke from any of these fires. Western Australia is huge, so as with all things numbers and statistics do not tell you the whole story. But there are definitely people in trouble from these fires.

Ok then - a few bits about this. The article is referencing the fires on the East coast - I am on the West Coast. That means that those fires are not affecting me. However, there are extensive fires along the east coast and in fact all over Australia. Every State and Territory is suffering fires at the moment. But it is summer in Australia, and we ALWAYS have fires in summer. These are worse than recent years, but really only because the last several years have been relatively mild. The stuff about our Prime Minister is political fluff from his opponents. The PM is not responsible for the fires and cannot do anything about them. The fire services are State controlled, not federal. But for context - Western Australia (where I am), currently has 40+ Bush fires raging through the state, including one that has cut the main transport route between the east coast and the west coast. But the majority of these fires are in unpopulated areas, and so there is almost no news on the WC fires situation. On the East coast, the population is far greater, and spread wider in the country, so many smaller country towns are suffering. The suffering is widespread and real, but not extremely unusual. The problem is that the progressive political parties have managed to stop all sorts of management of bushland areas (like cool weather burning of bush areas, cattle grazing of bush areas), and now they are blaming our (conservative) PM for the results of their own policies. We have had two bushfires within 3 miles (5km) of our house, but in WA most houses are built with a construction that makes fires less of a threat. Double brick walls, tin or tiled rooves, and not generally right against bushland. Remember that I put up a photo of our fire danger signs? They start at "low moderate" and the second level is "high" which is every day from spring through autumn that it isn't raining. We currently have a total fire ban - if you go into the bush you cannot light any campfire, and can only cook with a controlled, contained bbq flame. You cannot drive through bushland off the well defined tracks for fear that your exhaust may light scrub. No harvesters can be moved through fields. No welding, grinding, or anything else that could throw sparks. And those are normal summer restrictions. In short - the bush fires are worse than the last few years, but we always have them.

The study of Mary in Catholic dogma is called "Mariolatry". All other area of study in theology are "...ology". With the exception of "Idoloatry". The difference? And "olatry" is worship....... Anyone who says that Catholics don't worship Mary is seriously misinformed.