| ah pek | 1. Can Christians buy Toto or smoke ciggie? | 2007-04-26 23:48:31
To make things easy, I'll split the questions into 3. What are your views?
1. Can Christians buy Toto or get involve in stock market?
2. Can Christians smoke?
3. Can Christians work in a casino/Toto outlet or even a cigarette producing company? |
| martianunlimited | 2. RE: Can Christians buy Toto or smoke ciggie? | 2007-05-16 09:53:50
The answer is the may be the same as below
a) can Christians eat Char Koey Teow / McDs or make uninformed investments in the stock market?
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| ah pek | 3. RE: Can Christians buy Toto or smoke ciggie? | 2007-05-16 22:26:47
The answer is the may be the same as below
a) can Christians eat Char Koey Teow / McDs or make uninformed investments in the stock market?
ok I get your point there, in that case, would it be alright for people ministering church funds to invest the money based on informed investments in the stock market? think of it as a way to increase the funds at a faster pace. what do u think? |
| martianunlimited | 4. RE: Can Christians buy Toto or smoke ciggie? | 2007-05-20 20:59:07
This is my stand on the investment thingy.
If you entrust someone to manage the church finances you are as guilty and liable should the finances be "mis-invested"
and as the person entrusted with the finances... if you treat the money entrusted to you not as how you would treat your own money, you are liable. secondly, if you withhold any part of the earnings then you are also liable |
| ah pek | 5. RE: Can Christians buy Toto or smoke ciggie? | 2007-05-23 08:24:11
So from your view I take that you mean it's ok to invest church funds in stock market if only the person who entrust or entrusted with invest it with care. |
| jack | 6. RE: Can Christians buy Toto or smoke ciggie? | 2007-05-23 11:24:14
Funny that folks like aquinas warned the faithful not to imagine that money can beget money (interest earning).
My bible study teacher once said to us, reading from Paul's 1 corinthian, the question we often ask is "what's so bad about it" but the right question ought to be "what's so good about it".
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| martianunlimited | 7. RE: Can Christians buy Toto or smoke ciggie? | 2007-05-23 20:00:51
Then again... the servant who buried the silver the master gave him was condemned as wicked and unfaithful...  (but thats probably because of the statement he said after that... but see the words used, 'Sir, here is your mina; I have kept it laid away in a piece of cloth. I was afraid of you, because you are a hard man. You take out what you did not put in and reap what you did not sow.' )
Why the hesistation? reaping what was not sowwed? Which is why my stand is, if you handle the money as how you would your own, then your conscience is clean.
IF the church entrusted the money to someone with bad finances, a high roller or blind risk taker, then first, they are idiots, second, they are as guilty as the person they entrusted it to. I hate it when people just try to wash their hands looking for people to blame should something go wrong with the finances. it makes positions of responsibilities much more stressful than it already is.
Not objecting to the appointment is tentamount to sanctioning the appointment |
| ah pek | 8. RE: Can Christians buy Toto or smoke ciggie? | 2007-05-24 01:16:50
Jack, your questions "what's so bad about it" is a mirror reflection of the question ""what's so good about it". There's nothing bad nor is there anything so good bout it. You get get the same answer.
May I know who is Aquinas? Some philosopher? |
| ah pek | 9. RE: Can Christians buy Toto or smoke ciggie? | 2007-05-24 01:30:08
This may be a little off topic, I recall a friend once discussing about whether it is ok to rent a part of the church for tuition classes during the weekdays which the christian teacher will charge a fee and the justification is to bring the students to know Christ. It's a win-win situation as in the church is able to collect rent (kind of like a form of investment) & winning new souls while the tuition is like a community service to the people around. One of the friend opinion is that we should not conduct any business in church premises, just like how Jesus drove the traders out of the temple for conducting business there.
Come of think of it, isn't selling insurance or direct selling product to church members a form of running business on church premises? Your thought on this. |
| jack | 10. RE: Can Christians buy Toto or smoke ciggie? | 2007-05-26 16:41:58
What's so good vs. what's so bad is as i have mentioned a question straight off Paul's letter to the corinth church. All things are permissible but not all things are beneficial. So something which is not "bad" perse may be in the permissible category but paul invites us to ask, what is the "goodness" of it? What is the benefit of it?
Thomas Aquinas is a medieval philoshoper-theologian who influenced much of the church's thoughts. He is primary in bringing aristotelian philsophy into doing theology (which in the final analysis may not be beneficial after all). The most famous catholic saint after St. Augustine of Hippo |
