🚀 go-pugleaf

pspat@opera.iinet.net.au (Patrick Canion) writes:

>No, I'm not saying that at all.  I'm saying that while I tolerate a
>person's freedom of choice to participate in any legal activity,  that
>tolerance will not translate into an abdication of a value judgement
>(based on God's word)  on that particular activity.  

Fair enough - I can hardly expect you to do otherwise. It is rare for
people on the anti-VE side of this debate to say that they're only
promoting their beliefs. We get a lot of rationalization instead. The
world is full of people trying to impose one or another morality on
others - it's refreshing to find a religious man who will not do this.

>>Do you, for example, maintain
>>the same reservations about killing in wartime that you do about VE?

>Yes.  The ultimate tragedy is for someone to die without having
>accepted the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

Oh, it's all right for them to be killed in warfare once they accept this?
What if someone enters the warzone with the express intent of being euthanased
in the line of fire?

Hmm. Actually, I wonder whether you have reservations about permitting
smoking too - isn't that an (admittedly slow) kind of assisted suicide?

>>>Let me be polemical:  How much of tolerance boils down to "if it feels
>>>good, do it" ?

>>Let me be polemical too: none.

>Peter, you are a deep enough thinker to realise the inadequacy of that
>answer!  :-)

Tolerance is always hard. It's hard to look at people warring with one
another, oppressing one another, exploiting one another in the names of
one or another totem, and let them go to it. It's hard to remember that
the alternative is worse. Even here in the land of pure thought, it's
hard to tolerate the hateful words of others. Kill-files guarantee
tolerance here by a single act of will. If only it were so
straightforward in the real world!

For me, tolerance is accepting peoples' choices, except where they
directly interfere with the choices of others. People choose paths not
for any particular pleasure, but because the experiences they have
already had lead them there. Sometimes, as with religious devotion,
people may choose a very hard path, with little aesthetic benefit,
because that's where their experiences lead.  Tolerance must extend to
these people too.

Voltaire is (apocryphally) quoted: "I may not share your views,
but I will fight to the death for your right to express them".  Me, I
won't fight to the death for anyone's views, but given the chance I will
try to respect them, no matter what they are. I only object when they
attempt to foist them onto others. Does your tolerance extend this far?

-- 
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