"We are God's sheep." wow, great analogy...

[El Blanco]

Ummm ... no. Try again. Money was the divider. The aristocracy and clergy had it, peasants did not.

And yo ucan prove this how? Oh, you can't. You are just making an assumption and trying to pass it off as fact.

Where do you think the traditon of European universities not charging tuition came from? It was from the universities not charging anyone to begin with way bag in the Middle Ages. Anyone who made the trip and did the work could learn. Of course, the aristocracy were usualy the only ones that could make such a trip, but don't just pull something out of your ass and scream," It's the Church! Its all their fault."

And they were commisioned to do what? That's right! Religious art work which is ironic considering it was for a religion that was supposed to be opposed to idoltry, graven images, ect.

And there were no advancements in architecture or engineering because of that or anything.

And notice how their work agreed with the view of the church at the time

Actually, there was no Church hierarchy when Augustine wrote City of God, so who was going to persecute him?

And Aquinas was delving into subjects nobody else, including the Church, was willing to touch.

One lil' bit of trivia that cracks me up was that Da Vinci, a non-Christian, was commisioned to do several religious works of art for the Catholic church and used to put little inside pagan symbols and references within the context of the painting which religious leaders didn't even understand. What a prankster!

Meh. I've heard that and seen a few examples. If the Church officials didn't know what it meant, how would anyone else besides Davinci and a select few? Its like hackers putting a bunch of 733T all over a board. It only makes them look like assholes.

Still, his genius still did the work for the Church.

'Cept for child bearin'! Be ironic as you like, it's true.

Ya, no woman ever did anything especially heroic or noteworthy in the bible.

I'm comfortable in my stone house

Uh, your "stone" house is see through and brittle. And shatters when you play music too high.

Back up the trash instead of just spouting off Vinth-style

Hey, watch those rocks. I'd have to say you and ArtificialBrandon are closer to a Vince than I ever will.

I just wish they'd shed themselves of the hypocrisy and BS and get down to the kernel of what Christianity supposed to be.

Ok, Jesus, what might that be?