Bible is "pretty childish."

SheikBen wrote:Ziggy,

You can see lives changed by Jesus Christ.

And I can see lives changed by their realization that their "Jesus message" was bogus, was but a stairway to imagined power and fame.

I can tell you that I went from an agnostic who was depressed and dark to a very fulfilled, happy, and nicer fellow. My point is that the truth claims of the Christian faith are not proven by the deeds of Christians.

So they are proven by what, then?

I do not begrudge you for being a fullfilled, happy and nice fellow. But you are not the only one of those around, you know- and they don't all share your faith in Jesus as God.

I can and would argue that the deeds of people professing to be Christians prove whether they are legitimate or not, but that is different.

No, it is not at all different. It goes to the heart of what "the word" does or does not mean.

Your point that I want to take on, again, is yours and Sam's quite untroubled assertion that religion exists in the minds of the adherents and not elsewhere.

If not there, then where?

You are guilty of a certain chauvenism that states that if science cannot examine a question it therefore cannot be true.

I am guilty of no such thing. I assert only that if science cannot prove it to be true or not true, that we have more to learn.

Do you think that science has answered all the unresolved questions in the natural universe?

The "unresolved" questions? Of course not. Only a damn fool would assert that the "unresolved" questions have been resolved.

If not (and I should hope not!), then how can you be so sure of yourself when you credit science with the ability to answer the unresolved questions of the supernatural?

Because up until now only science has provided answers to questions of both the natural and the "supernatural". Blind faith hasn't, prayers to mythical Gods haven't, and all the doctrines and dogmas of the religionists haven't provided one whit of an answer to the "questions of the supernatural"- other than to discredit them all as but deliberate hoaxes, and / or myths based on ignorance.

ziggy wrote:

SheikBen wrote:Any Bible thumper worth his or her salt would tell you flatly that "there is none righteous, not even one." (Romans 3:23). Man cannot be "good," and therefore heaven and hell do not rest on man's actions. If it did, we'd all go to hell.

Or maybe we are all already in hell. Or heaven.

I would say the path to one or the other starts here, such that someone destined for heaven is already en route, and will see intimations of it now, and the same for those headed for destruction.

Stephanie wrote:Michael,

How do you explain all the Christians that have found Christ but use their religion, and him, as a weapon against other people? Your religion has made you a happier person. I think that's terrific. However, it doesn't work that way for everyone.

Your interpretation of the Bible is different from that of many other Christians. I realize you're convinced you're interpretation is the correct one, but so do they.

I wonder though, how happy would your religion make you if one or more of your children left that faith? Americans are changing religions with greater and greater frequency. There is no doubt in my mind you love and value your children every bit as much as I do mine. I don't know how happy you could possibly be if you honestly believed their lack of faith meant eternal damnation.

A couple of thoughts.

First, a multitude of interpretations does not mean that they are all incorrect or that one or two isn't much more correct than the others. On minor matters of doctrine I will not be at all surprised to be wrong. On the doctrine that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh and has taken my punishment for me to satisfy a holy God I am "all in." Either that has happened or it has not. The "two interpretations" cannot be both true or both false.

People interpret statements and actions all the time. "Why was Michael so grumpy when he came home last night?" There can be many suggestions, but there is a truth that those suggestions may or may not be close to.

As for religion as a tool for harming others, it is hardly unique in that fashion. People use ethnicity as well as a tool for harming others--do we then reject that we are Gemans/Croats/Serbs/Italians/etc?

Lastly, of course there are happy and fulfilled people who are not Christians, and miserable ones who claim to be, but remember that my premise all along has been that Truth is not dependent on the actions or purity of it's adherents. I used my changed life as an example to placate Ziggy that I can point to an example of "real life change." I still do not offer it as "proof," but insist that neither can it be offered as negative proof that Christians have gone to war. So many criticisms of religion and war go back to centuries old Catholocism, which is a "womb to tomb" religion quite unlike evangelicalism.

On the matter of my children, there are a lot of realities that are unpleasant that I do not especially cherish. They can reject the faith (my biggest fear by far) but that doesn't say anything about the validity of faith itself. They can also reject dietary suggestions and be 1000 pounds (unlike me who is a smelt 280:), but that does not mean that the dietary suggestions are any less valid because someone I love has ignored them and faced the consequences.