Danes feel Obama is greater than Jesus

[kandrathe]

But what I do notice is how thoroughly you reject it, while simultaneously being willing to take (for instance) Joseph Smith perfectly seriously as a believer in his own faith. Like I said, it doesn't seem balanced.

I can't read Joseph Smith's mind either. His fundamentalist contemporaries are committed (or should be). But, there is a vast portion of Mormonism that has become more moderate, and is more tolerable within our culture. But, you are right in drawing a parallel between the FLDS choosing to ignore centuries of history, and Islamicists who choose to ignore centuries of history. Both pine for those glorious ancient days, when men were men, and women were chattel. Like I said earlier, citizens, whether they be FLDS, Islamicists, or skin heads should be afforded Constitutional rights. That was my only point in siding against the government in that case. Do you understand that difference? I don't believe the underwear bomber has constitutional rights, since he is obviously an enemy combatant in our war on terrorism (wars on ideologies aside). Back to Mohammad, you don't know if he was sincere and you haven't read the texts. I believe he was manipulative, and I have read the texts. What is missing is that you have no basis to make an informed decision, and I feel that I do.

Regarding the ancient texts; Only fundamentalist Christian's (<3% of all Christians) "believe" the bible in the way you are interpreting it. The other recognize the difference between the Old and New testaments and they recognize the difference between the gospels, and the additional works added later. Many, including me, look at gnostic, epigraphical and other apocryphal works rejected at Nicea for insight. Regarding Paul, and his rules about women and men, well, observe modern Christians and how much of that antiquity has been set aside. The same is true with only about 25% of Islam where it is allowed to be moderate, meaning that about 75% of Muslims follow a fundamentalist ideology. Only the extremist fundamentalist Muslims choose to interpret the Quran in the most violent ways. There is very little that separate the true believer from the homicide bomber.