1. I believe in God2. As far back as science can take me (all the way to the Big Bang Theory), someone (God) had to put everything there in the first place3. I view the Bible as a set of guidelines for life, rather than something to be literally interpreted4. Do I believe that Jesus was the son of God? I really dont know...how am I supposed to know....faith is the only option here. If a man approached you on the street today and claimed to be the son of God you would probably question his mental stability....5. What little fraction of religions in the world that Christianity comprises, is the rest of the world that chooses alternate religion, doomed?6. According to the literal interpretation of the Bible, people like Ghandi would be burning in hell? I just dont believe that.7. Most religions generally seem to present the same ideas in regards to morals and the leading of a wholesome life (although there are x number of differences as well)My issue rises really with the idea that any non-believer's in Christ/God are going to hell? The idea that a man who was 500 years old built a boat and carried 2 of every animal on it.....he parted the sea....etc.....I mean these HAVE to just be stories to inspire faith. I just have so many questions/concerns with organized faith and Im quite troubled by it.....obviously seeing a Priest would be helpful but tww is easier at the momentThoughts? Agreeing or disagreeing is perfectly fine and I welcome all opinions. But attempt to be constructive.
1/29/2007 9:21:01 PM
1/29/2007 9:24:46 PM
glad to see im not alonebut i had a debate earlier with some guys who are adament about their Christian faith and as soon as i presented a question about anything, they took offenseI cant help but have questions....it's human nature to question things.....
1/29/2007 9:26:50 PM
i'd recommend vintage21 (vintage21.com) and/or their theology on tap discussion
1/29/2007 9:31:38 PM
And they have a pimp ass H3 there every day too. God pays.
1/29/2007 9:34:01 PM
1/29/2007 9:38:21 PM
God really put the Babtist faith there to test us.Everyone who believes that shit's going straight to hell.
1/29/2007 9:42:31 PM
david i'd say you are just having conversations with the wrong people - not to say there aren't a lot of christians that just don't know any better though - it's a complex topic - if you asked the general public the square root of 144..what would you expect to hear back ]
1/29/2007 9:43:46 PM
12
1/29/2007 9:45:49 PM
1/29/2007 9:47:41 PM
God made God, silly.
1/29/2007 9:48:40 PM
1/29/2007 10:02:45 PM
Soap Box wants its thread back.
1/29/2007 10:11:13 PM
you said
1/29/2007 10:12:31 PM
I don’t believe in god. From a philosophical perspective there are several problems such as the problem with evil. From a historical perspective there are several problems like many religions through out the near east & greece, several older than christianity, that employee stock type literary characters who are demi gods that undergo things like immaculate conception and resurrection and battling against snake & serpents and water to wine… and all these miracles that were played out by the time people started attributing them to Jesus too can be easily explained by practical causes like migrations of peoples, a societies fears & concerns, technological advances like being able to store nutrients longer through being able to turn them into wine etc. The arbitrary nature of faith, choosing to believe in something you have no evidence to support, and choosing to do so only when it promises you immortality and the potential for happy sky land. And Yahweh heading an unbelievable religion, institutionalized, and full of hypocrisy isn’t something I can believe in.
1/29/2007 10:12:35 PM
^I'm not sure either, but I think he'd say that most people can't answer basic math questions, let alone answer the nuances of their own theological docrtine.Here's something I'd like to know, though. Don't most other religions (that have a heaven/hell concept) also believe that they are the one, true path? Why is it that Christianity is the focus of the debate when that comes to pass?As a Cafeteria-Catholic (I pick and choose what I like) I'm a believer in the revelation of God at different times in different ways. Thus, its not important what religion you follow, if they have in common the important ideas of morality. i.e. being kind to your fellow man, being slow to wrath, etc.I'm sure I'm not the only one who believes something similar to that on the subject.
1/29/2007 10:15:54 PM
1/29/2007 10:17:26 PM
probably a horribly bad analogy but it's what i just came up withdid the stupid people at ncsu make your degree worthlessthe idiots at big blue haven't made you quit yetjust because idiots do something doesn't necessarily mean it's stupid - there are probably some smart people mixed in
1/29/2007 10:25:11 PM
Right, but every state funded university will have stupid people.Every large company will have stupid people.I've noticed a much much larger percentage of stupid people in Christianity vs other religions.[Edited on January 29, 2007 at 10:33 PM. Reason : ]
1/29/2007 10:33:01 PM
I'm not reading or critiqueing anyone else because they have their own rights to their beliefs Me personally ... Christian? Yes. I pretty much assume the Old Testament is mostly records keeping and people trying to explain away normal events with the supernatural, and hoes blaming their love-child on God. God gets around in the OT. I can't explain the two versions of creation some people see, but I can say that the 6 days idea fits well with the 6 eras in the Earth's history. The "days" could mean a general period of time rather than a literal 24 hour definition ... YAY multiple meanings. JC takes faith, period. Do I believe it? Sure, but I was raised in it, and frankly I think most of the NT isn't worth my time except the redletter. Do I believe God is a heartless asshole who's going to hold it against someone who is religiously fervent, not breaking Da Rulez, and happens to not be Christian (like Ghandi)? No. I also think the modern establishment of a church is, for the most part, a waste ... aside from all claiming to believe, they're no different from the rest of the world. In fact, I've encountered more hate-filled snobs IN church than OUT of church. While there's definitely some value in a support system, I don't think it requires me to sit in a pew from 9:30-11:30 every Sunday morning and get told how much of a bad person I am. I'm pretty sure God isn't into abusive relationships. I do think my children should still go to Sunday school to get trained in the basics because that's my religion and it's my responsibility to pass it on, but I'm not going to hate other parents who take their children to other houses of worship. Regardless of what you practice, the worst thing you can do is be apathetic. Whatever you choose, learn it and be ready to teach it and defend it, but never use it as an excuse to kick someone's ass, because no one likes a bully. Hope that helps
1/29/2007 10:37:26 PM
1/29/2007 10:40:03 PM
you have people that couldn't their GED if they tried their hardest in christianity....or any other religioncheck with a janitor/cleaning company and compare them against christianitythere are stupid people everywhere - there are smart people in most places - your encounters aren't enough to make a generalization i don't think - to base your opinion on anything (including something like religion) because of people you met is something that i used to do up until a relatively short while agoi don't think you are trying to say christians are in general more stupid than people in other religions but go live in india or some other country where another religion is the majority for a while and you will see the same
1/29/2007 10:42:01 PM
^^Ever hear of "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."?
1/29/2007 10:43:48 PM
what is your screenname - i must not have it anymore and you aren't on ST
1/29/2007 10:45:01 PM
As far as people saying the Bible is a set of guidelines for life -- why?ActOfGod: What makes the red letter worth your time? Other than the fact that Jesus spoke it, what about the content appeals to you?
1/29/2007 11:04:19 PM
1/29/2007 11:38:43 PM
1/30/2007 1:38:24 AM
1) OK...2) I generally agree.3) I see you're coming from a "literal interpretation is bad" point of view, but you need to realize that there is a happy medium between "the Bible is just guidelines" and "the Bible is the literal word of God." Ultimately I don't deny that God is as capable of using figurative or cryptic language as His much less competent creations are, but I also don't think He'd confuse us with an entire book of metaphors.4) Of course you can't know any of it, and of course it boils down to faith. One would hope you'd have more faith in a thing that has been believed by billions of people for two millenia than in one professed by a random guy on the streed, but in either event it does boil down to faith.5) Not all Christian denominations hold that nonchristians are doomed to hell or any other unpleasant treatment.6) I disagree, if only because some parts of the Bible don't have a clear-cut literal meaning. Sometimes you run into areas where even an effort to make a literal interpretation can't in all honesty get you anywhere. Take, for example, the "only through me" bit -- did Jesus mean through Him personally, or through His teachings, or His values -- what, then? But, if you don't prefer that tack, I do agree with you on the conclusion, which is ultimately that it is unreasonable to think that a good and loving God would send people like Ghandi to hell, and there are those Christian denominations that don't buy into that. I am Eastern Orthodox, for example (and I know many of you on here already know as much, I'm not harping on it, I'm merely talking to this guy), and the gist of our belief on who is going to where is, "We know how to get in, we don't know who is getting in," which is to say, we know that our way will get you into heaven, but we don't know that other ways might not do the same thing.7) The explanation from a Christian apologist's point of view would be that we were preprogrammed to some extent by God with a moral code, which would, of course, therefore manifest itself in pretty much all human cultures.
1/30/2007 2:17:00 AM
I've waffled between agnosticism, atheism, Christianity, fundamentalist Christianity, agnosticism again, and then back to regular old ChristianityI can't tell you that God exists, and ask you to take that as the truth.However, I can tell you that weird things happen the closer I get to God.Weird to imply some good, some bad- but life definitely changes, and overall, things take a positive turn. At the very least, the bad things in life are easier to deal with.I'm don't really want to get into Biblical interpretations, although I do see the OT and the NT as nearly a retelling of the same story, with the latter being how that world was changed by Christ. There are implications to be made, and connections that are necessary, as with any literary work. As the original translations called them, the "old covenant" and "new convenant," which carries an entirely different meaning than the word "testament." I'm not one of these "translation nuts," but I do think that study of the history of the words, and the changes made for clarity in modern times, should be understood and taken in the context for which they were originally meant. For instance, Christ saying "Father, why have you forsaken me?" on the cross isn't truly a questioning of his own faith, or "the weight of sin" as I was taught in a baptist upbringing, but rather the first lines of the "Psalm of the Christ." As the psalms weren't numbered and neatly placed on pages back then, they were identified by their first line. Psalms 22, I ...think... is the one I'm talking about. It makes the image of the cross at the end completely change, in my opinion.So my suggestion to you is: always keep an open mind, remember no man, nor religion, is perfect, and keep studying. When you get that sense of "peace" with it, then you've discovered the truth - or at least the truth that works for you.
1/30/2007 8:57:51 AM
1/30/2007 10:08:10 AM
1/30/2007 11:12:14 AM
1/30/2007 11:29:25 AM
1/30/2007 11:41:42 AM
That’s because you've probably met a much larger cross section of Christians than other religions. The lower rungs of the Hindi / Islamic / Buddhist / etc. ladder don't tend to have the means to travel to the United States and regale you with their stupidity in person.On the other hand, it could be argued that most "christians" in the United States aren't Christian at all (meaning that they follow Christ) but rather that they follow an intertwined ideology of WASPish values mixed with capitalism, individualism, and western traditions. Judeo-Christian values, in their ascendancy to the dominant religious spot in the western world, naturally took on a large share of pre-existing western values. The same can be said for Islam which, though in some ways was meant to be a break with the old Arab tribal law, is inexorably linked with the society which gave it birth.I'm really not sure what my point is.[Edited on January 30, 2007 at 12:16 PM. Reason : ]
1/30/2007 12:15:12 PM
1/30/2007 1:10:37 PM
you really have to base your decision on one question: do you believe the Bible is true?if you do, then you have to believe it completely, particularly the important part that says Jesus, son of Joseph the carpenter, is the son of God, the Christ.why? because Jesus said he was. if you believe that, than you have to believe everything else he said. if you don't believe that, then you have to believe that the Bible is completely and utterly untrue.
1/30/2007 7:17:38 PM
^ but why must it be hit or miss?is a little faith and trust in it all, better than none?i just dont buy into this all-or-nothing thing.....
1/30/2007 10:19:25 PM
1/30/2007 10:31:12 PM
nah i see what kdawg is saying, and i think his point works to a certain extent... it's a commonly held point of view from most evangelicals, etc. There's nothing wrong with that view, and I for one pretty much agree with it.but at the same time, that doesn't mean there aren't days when i don't understand it; and times when i don't necessarily agree with it... but that has to do more with my imperfections, than the messages of Christ.but to believe in something, and to believe that it is true, doesn't necessarily mean it happened (creationism, etc.)... as perhaps believing in the symbolism and meaning behind some things are just as practical and useful as believing in the absolute fact that they really happened.
1/30/2007 10:48:37 PM
[Edited on January 30, 2007 at 10:55 PM. Reason : ]
1/30/2007 10:54:37 PM
You say the messages of Christ, but what messages? I don't see much of ethical worth in the NT. Christ isn't preparing us to improve our world, he's preparing people for the "kingdom of heaven." Remember that Christ thought this was coming soon after his death, he makes this pretty clear to the disciples.
1/30/2007 10:58:40 PM
no
1/30/2007 11:01:26 PM
^^i was referring to the commonly known "turn the other cheek," "love thy neighbor as thyself," "give unto caesar what is caesars," etc. messages they he gave in his sermons. I'm not sure he had any clue as to when he would return, but you're right... I think Peter and Paul especially thought his resurrection and return to earth would be during their lifetimes.
1/30/2007 11:08:32 PM
1/30/2007 11:09:38 PM
sweet, a new pic to add to the gallery
1/30/2007 11:12:50 PM
i'm not sure what you mean by that verse... what's the context of it?(i'm honestly not trying to bait you or anything, i'm just trying to figure out what you mean by "it was wrong.")
1/30/2007 11:16:44 PM
I still don't see why we have to believe every word of the Bible.It's written by man.So why can't you pick and choose what you believe?If I was Christian, I'd be down with the compassion, love, charity, forgiveness, etc... parts,but I'd see the homosexuality-is-bad part as the opinion of one of the homophobic authors of the Bible.
1/30/2007 11:18:03 PM
He's talking to the disciples, giving them instructions about what to do on the road, how to preach, and who to preach to. Things like:
1/30/2007 11:20:48 PM
1/31/2007 12:40:55 AM
1/31/2007 10:05:35 AM