When did I ever say that I'm picking and choosing which laws I want to follow? The New Testament makes clear that ceremonial law is no longer necessary, since the need for sacrifice was fulfilled by Christ for good. Moral laws, regarding sin, are still very relevant, and still condemned in the New Testament just as much as in the Old.
So my interpretation of the Bible is not the same as yours, then. Fair enough.
But that's not like 99.9% of abortion cases. It's not a matter of taking a life, it's a matter of saving a life. Life of the mother cases are the only ones in which there's ever even a tiny shadow of a doubt. But again, they're the exception, not the rule.
That was the point -- I was going for the logical extreme case here. That said, shouldn't these cases be handled separately, instead of just being all "Oops, too bad, see you in Hell because other people have non-procreational sex"?
If you want a system of law, then you're going to control elements of peoples' lives, no matter what. Do you think that, say, theft (because murder has been used as an example a lot lately) should be permissible as long as it's done in private?
There is a VERY critical difference between regulating what people do to other people non-consensually, what other people do with each other consensually, and what one does with themselves, in private. Murder, by definition, is an act where one party is non-consenting. In my mind, laws should only exist to protect against those. "Victimless crime" really should be an oxymoron, and not something people actually go to jail for. Of course where abortion gets weird. I see is as a breach against what one does with themself, because I don't think the fetus is alive until and unless it is viable. You think life starts at conception, so it's in the first case.
That said, if life begins at conception, shouldn't a woman who has a miscarriage be charged with manslaughter?
Also, no one has explained to me yet why being a sociopath is bad.
See, here's where I should describe what I mean by a sociopath. A sociopath only cares about themselves -- the thoughts and ideas of others bear no role in their decision. In some cases this is not bad, but if you take this to the logical extreme (e.g., killing people because you don't believe in God), it's very bad, indeed. By itself it's not bad, but it can lead to Very Bad Things in many situations.
Of course, my girlfriend argues that a formally defined sociopath also feels no emotion and can't be religious, but I'm not sure of either of those.
That was just a joke. I just think reality TV is pox on the entertainment industry because it's a quick and lazy substitute for actual creativity, and because there are only so many time-slots, the genuinely good shows are the ones that get canceled because they don't make money as quickly. But there's nothing morally wrong with it, per se, and to discuss it in-depth is probably for a different thread (but who am I kidding, all NatDT discussions end up debating the morality of homosexuality eventually).
Yea, figured. And threads only delve into homosexuality if people bring them up, though it appears I'm the one guilty of that in this thread.
EDIT: About a God who kills not being a real god, didn't God murder a bunch of people in the Bible? Some, for no real reason at all (e.g., Lot's wife)?