Various Moral Issues

I wasn't attempting to start some new doctrine. Simply stating my thoughts on the subject. I absolutely appreciate the beauty of Gods creation. I kind of think that was the point. But yes, I love dogs and cats, cats not as much, and flowers etc. But if I'm starving, you could be a Westminster Blue Ribbon Queensland Heeler, but you're going into a pot, just saying.

Jesus once stated that “the poor you will always have with you” (MT 26:11). However, He also taught us to “give to the poor” (MT 19:21). These verses suggest that we should do our best to alleviate, if not completely eliminate, the problems related to poverty. We know that “You shall not steal” (EX 20:15) is the eighth of the Ten Commandments (TOJ #110).

The apostle Paul synthesized these two commands in Ephesians 4:28, saying: “He who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with his own hands, that he may have something to share with those in need.” Another command (in 2THS 3:10) states: “If a man will not work, he shall not eat.”

Paul also states (in 1TM 5:8): “If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for his immediate family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” And again, he wrote: “Our desire is not that others might be relieved while you are hard pressed, but that there might be equality.” (2CR 8:13) Equality does not require uniformity or conformity or a communist system, which often has resulted in a smaller pie to share, but rather that every person should have an equal opportunity to earn a living. Sewing these verses together with spiritual thread, we can discern that the will of God is for people who are able to work to seek employment, so that earning a fair wage will provide at least the basic necessities plus something (a tithe or tenth per Malachi 3:8-10) left over for charity.

Full employment at a livable wage is a wonderful goal; the problem is how to achieve it. On one side of the debate are those who seem to believe that government can solve the problem of poverty by giving people welfare in one form or another. On the other side of the issue are those who stress that every able-bodied adult should work and support themselves without charity (sometimes called workfare). The “welfarists” criticize the “workfarists” for an apparent lack of sympathy for the poor, while the “workfarists” say the “welfarists” create permanent dependency by the poor. The area of agreement by both sides surely includes the fact that people sometimes experience financial misfortunes beyond their control and need help. Perhaps most people would agree that the need for help often exceeds the capabilities of many families and private agencies, so there is a need for government to do something, but what policies should we Christian voters support to encourage industry and discourage laziness?

Sounds about like the plan for getting a new phone, if you get it from a major service provider and pay for it monthly as part of your contract charges.

What if a person in this program becomes disabled before completing the indentured part to recoup training and relocation losses? What if he cannot complete the full term because of his new disability?QUOTE]


The government already has losses because of disability, so nothing new there.

Not sure if people are not posting because of disinterest in the topic, so I will go on to my next one soon, but first I want to say that I once worked for a profit-sharing company that provided above minimum wages, healthcare, and retirement plans for part-time employees, which was great and why I advocate that business model.

Not sure if people are not posting because of disinterest in the topic

I do comment on the things that i find interesting, but for the other topics i'm not sure what to say because ... i don't know ... you can beat a dead horse to death and not gain any new insights because that's how it is.
I mean, what else can we say about abortion that hasn't been said? So it's not interesting to me anymore.

What is interesting are new things in our generation which involve technology that i find interesting.
Things such as gene editing, assisted suicide, legalization of drugs and things like that. UFOs too.

But the topic of abortion has been beaten to death, literally.

I welcome you introducing discussion of those topics, but I am surprised that you did not find what I said about abortion to be a new approach. I will repeat it below for you to reconsider:

If a person studies fetal development, at some point he/she will probably contemplate two pictures: one of a seven-month-old fetus in the womb, and one of a seven-month-old premature but viable baby outside the womb. This should lead one to understand that geographical location is not a valid basis for defining personhood. There is no qualitative change that occurs at birth, merely a difference in the mode of breathing and feeding. And so a person will be led to consider the crucial question: when does a developing fetus become a human person with the God-given right to civil life so that to kill it is murder and warrants punishment? People on both sides of the debate usually overlook this question when they discuss this issue, but considerations other than the advent of personhood are irrelevant, unless someone would use the same rationale to justify the killing of children and adults.

Those who adopt the conceptionist viewpoint are certainly right that a qualitative change occurs when the chromosomes in the egg and sperm are united, so that physical development of a new human being begins. and they should mourn the death of a miscarried fetus at any stage of development in the same manner they would memorialize the death of a post-birth baby, in order to practice what they preach or believe. Those who adopt the birthist opinion apparently assume that birth is the qualitative change that marks the beginning of personhood. However, learning about fetal development should enable birthists to realize that the advent of personhood definitely does not extend beyond the seventh month or viability, when a premature baby is frequently able to survive.

Thus, birthists should at least become “viabilitists”. Are there any changes between conception and viability that might more reasonably/logically be viewed as indicative of the beginning of personality? There is one possibility: the counterpart of the basis doctors use for determining when an adult person no longer is alive. This basis is brain death or the absence of certain brain wave activity detected by an electroencephalo-gram (EEG). We might call this stage “sentience”, referring to the level of brain activity which indicates the fetus has brain life and is therefore a person, who should be granted the civil right to life. If our best definition of sentient death is the cessation of these brain waves, then it is logical and consistent to view sentient life as beginning at least when these brain waves are detectable. Thus, I think every open-minded and truth-seeking person on both sides of the abortion debate should agree that the fetus becomes sentient and a legal person at least by that stage of development. Birthists or viabilists and conceptionists should become “sentientists“.

This is only a partial solution, but it is better than the current consensus that allows abortion throughout pregnancy. It is a big step in the right direction toward no abortion except in order to save the life of the mother. It recognizes that a gray area still exists from conception until sentience, so people may still reasonably disagree about the status of the fetus during this period, which may change as science improves. This view permits most forms of birth control. Implementing this solution requires educating every post-pubescent person about fetal development until society develops a new consensus that when a fetus becomes sentient, abortion is a type of murder and should be punished appropriately. Two wrongs do not make a right.

Sorry, this is not new.
Look, i understand that you're passionate about abortion. Many Christians in USA are obsessed with this topic, but for me like i said, what i find interesting is things in the last 20-30 years which i can talk about for hours.
I don't want to talk about topics which are as old as time like abortion, prostitution, war, slavery etc etc.
We have different preferences and levels of interest but thank you for bringing up these various moral topics. It is an interesting thread.
You might be looking for people to be more interested in abortion and i am looking for people to be more interested in gene editing, the merging of man with machine, assisted suicide etc, and we haven't found a lot of people here interested in them i guess.
So it is what it is.