Iconophili's Great Big Thread of Conspiracies!

[Ebor]

I have read the Bible. I still read the Bible. That doesn't mean that I must somehow agree with what is apparently your own personal ideas.

You've made assertions. When called on them or offered countering ideas you do not offer support to your own ideas and then you've changed the subject.

All of Humanity is broken in one way or another. it's part of the Fall. But there's still Good in the world, too. God made it and He made the laws of Physics and everything else. I haven't seen anyone asserting or arguing anything that your statements in your last could counter.

Have you talked to your priest about what you write on the forum? Have you checked your ideas with a reliable spiritual director?

Ebor

[Ebor]

This nation's treatment of minorities has been awful. Minorities were better off at the turn of the 19th-20th century than in the 20th-21st in many respects.

"Better off"? In their segregated living areas and slums in the big cities? In the sweatshops and mines with little safety concerns? With adulterated food and less chance for advancement? With no vote (in the East, the Western states gave women suffrage in local elections starting in the 1800's) and little chance of education? WIth 10% of babies dying before their first birthday and more children dying before 5?
With laws that forbade intermarriage between Chinese and Caucasian or Black and Caucasian?

Minorities came in all colours, btw. There were the ethnic minorites from places like Ireland and Italy and Poland and Russia and Greece and Japan and China and Spain.

Many of the ancient saints and Church Fathers were African. St. Athanasius was dark skinned and red headed. Maybe people in ancient times didn't have big racial hangups like they do now.

Some people have "hangups" other people don't. My neighborhood would not have existed 100 yrs ago. We have people from Cameroon and Roumania and Pakistan and Korea and Canada and Pennsylvania and Montana and more. and we're not in a "city" situation and the children play together.

Also, "ancient times" covers alot of time and alot of territory. There is no one monolithic mindset.

Ebor

[CGW]

There is no seal on the constitution

That is not true. Go to the national archives and see for yourself.

Are you saying that because you've been there and seen it, or are you merely confident that it is there?

Even politicians have commonly referred to the US as "E' Pluribus Unum" (Al Gore recently) and "New World Order, peace and security" George Bush I.

Give the date, the time, the place, and a link to the text.

I suggest you dig allot deeper than websites for your information.

I suggest that you demand of me what you yourself haven't done. "It is my understanding"? That is no deep study, but nothing more than "I might have heard somewhere." What with your claims about the masonic Founding Fathers, I would expect to find it somewhere on the net. But the only places that even vaguely agree with you are just that: vague. Every site I find, even those of masonic groups, that makes any attempt to address the issue concretely claims less than ten at the Continental Congress and maybe twice that many at the constitutional convention (which had over twice the representatives). All agree (as I will now have said three times) that Charles Thomson, who designed the seal, was not a mason.

I see no reason to go "further" because I find no "further" to go. You are making unsubstantiated claims, at best; at worst, what I'm finding is lots of evidence against your claims. I am disinclined to make the 2+ hour round trip to the archives (though I might make a phone call tomorrow) not so much because I fear I will be refuted, but because I suspect that if I do go, and the seal is not there, it won't make a difference in your claims.

Democracy is not the hope of mankind, in fact it is seriously flawed.

And so is every other form of human governance. Your statement is platitudinous and largely irrelevant.

Jesus Christ is the only hope for the world.

But since Jesus did not come to be king over the earth until the end of days, we are still forced to govern ourselves in the meantime. And again, this has nothing at all to do with whether the American forms of government are a masonic conspiracy.

[TomS]

Sometimes numbers are just numbers.

Yea. Like a cigar.

[ICONOPHILI]

ALL people who have wrote about Masons have said that a Mason who's under 33 Degrees does not know whats he's into, you have to be a 33rd Degree in oder to understand your 1. Worshiping "Lucifer", 2. Part of a Scheam to bring in a "WORLD SOCIALIST TOTALITARIAN Government" ALL the Founders of U.S.A. were under 33rd degree, GEORGE WASHINGTON spoke against the Masonic Order and was Baptised by a Baptist Preacher, and latter on when he was undergoing surgery, his physiction (a Mason) Bled him to Death.

[CGW]

This is getting to the point where it's easier for everyone just to assume that anything said on the pro-conspiracy side isn't true. I mean, I don't know about 33rd degree masons, but I'm inclined to just assume that it isn't so. And while I'm not going to be bothered to seek out Washington's baptismal records, it's reasonable to expect that a life-long Anglican was baptized in an Anglican church by an Anglican priest.

But as far as Washington's death is concerned, here are two eyewitness accounts: one from George Washington Custis, his step-grandson through his wife, and another from Tobias Lear, his private secretary. Yes, he was bled-- on purpose, and not because of any surgery. Yes, it probably hastened his death, but then the standard remedies of the day often had that effect. If he had epiglottitis, as is suspected, it wouldn't have made any difference in the end. I don't see any indication of which of Drs. Craik, Brown, and DIck was a mason, but then again, at this point I'm just as inclined to believe that none of them were.

And of course, Geo. Washington was the most famous mason in the nation. Ever been to Alexandria and seen the masonic memorial to him?

[AndyHolland]

This nation's treatment of minorities has been awful. Minorities were better off at the turn of the 19th-20th century than in the 20th-21st in many respects.

Sorry Ebor, but we don't seem to speak the same language. The statement was qualified as highlighted above.

Being materially well off is not an indicator of success or happiness. In fact, I have found that money and country club living are a different sort of hell, but hell just the same for many people.

I have shared some of these views with a confessor in the past, and he disagreed. People have the right to do that you know, even in the Orthodox Church.

Jesus Christ is Lord everywhere - including politics. The blood of 40,000,000 dead babies (Fetus means young one) cries against the secular oligarchy of judges. Some day, there will be real justice but thank God that there is real mercy. Too bad we aren't more merciful to others.

I happen to love America, which sounds ironic, but I also view it as wayward and headed for disaster. Maybe we'll all repent in Sackcloth and ashes like the men of Nineveh. Then perhaps when we are consumed by fire, it will be the fire of the Holy Spirit in love of God and one another. That is what I hope for - truly. Jesus Christ is Lord is a better American dream.

andy holland
sinner - not an authority - not speaking for anyone else