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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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"I know this though...
All of us will stand before God at some point. In my mind, there will be one question asked of us, and that is.....What did you do with my Son? Accept Him?....deny Him?....boast of Him?....curse Him?
Living a good, honorable life is important. That Golden Rule....is the stuff!
I just know God sacrificed his Son for a reason.....and how we view that sacrifice is going to be key to eternity.
This is my belief"
Narcissistic beliefs for a narcissistic God.
In the end, the key to eternity the real nut here. Gimme dat.
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ydpl8s
Trad climber
Santa Monica, California
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Here's one of my buds, hoping that "the holds don't fall off" in Oregon. ha!
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survival
Big Wall climber
Terrapin Station
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The holds only fall off on guys that don't know how to properly "caress" them.... damn neanderthals....
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DanaB
climber
CT
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"Maybe if we all sit here very, very quietly, religion will just go away."
Ed Sklar, a.k.a Swami Sklar-ar-anda
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rbord
Boulder climber
atlanta
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Men are sinners...and I am amongst the greatest of these.
Cragman - this may be part of what people see as a problem with the Christian psychology and belief system. Maybe this seems like humility to a Christian, or maybe it's a reflection of the accuracy of the Christian belief system. But in a country with 15, 000 murders last year, the rest of us may need to see the TR before being convinced by your beliefs. While we admire you personally, we're embarrassed to be associated with the arrogance and irrationality of your Christian belief system.
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survival
Big Wall climber
Terrapin Station
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I hear Christ hung out with prostitutes.
Well woop de dooo, so do I.....
;o)
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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"I know there's a God (for which there is zero verifiable evidence)" - the most arrogant statement in human history.
Even an eternally damned pagan such as myself doesn't claim to 'know'. I only 'know' what I don't believe.
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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No one prays for the Rapture more fervently that I.
But, seriously, do your own thing as needed - and let others do theirs. Actions, not beliefs, define a person's impact on the world.
And thank God for that.
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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A gay married America is still the same America with a few more penis shaped wedding cakes.
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drljefe
climber
El Presidio San Augustin del Tucson
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Being an atheist and believing that Christian theology - the God part, not the Love They Neighbor part, is patently ridiculous on its face, is also OK.
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zBrown
Ice climber
Brujo de la Playa
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A complex mixture of genes are involved, but differences in 11 single-nucleotide polymorphisms alone could predict 23% of the total variance. Timmons was able to demonstrate that about half of the responsiveness ... was genetically determined.
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Let's put it this way:
If your blind date told you you had two choices:
1) Love me more than anything else in your life or
2) I'll torture you for eternity
what would your next move be?
Christian doctrine (the God part) is the very definition of psychopathy. The only different between the date scenario and real Christianity is that you can actually see your date in front of you - so there's actually something there to love.
If there are 2 billion Christians in the world, and let's say half believe that all unbelievers will go to Hell - then, in their view, fully 5 billion of us angry hairless monkeys are Firey Lake Bound for eternity.
That doesn't sound insane to me at all.
The cult - fundamentalist version, is exclusive, bigoted, and violence/punishment oriented on its face.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Thank god the Chinese don't believe in that tripe!
Although Chinese statistics on religious beliefs are not particularly reliable, there are probably more Chinese Christians currently than there are Christians of any other ethnicity. I do know that the growth of Bible Study Fellowship groups among the population of mainland China has been explosive.
John
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Christianity can be a popular product, given that:
Cost of goods is low - sellers need not deliver anything
Value (although its arguably mythical) is high: escape from death, ever present love, and exclusive status.
Ironically, homo sapiens evolved to value exactly those things more than just about anything else.
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Doctrine and its flock are not the same thing.
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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growth of Bible Study Fellowship groups among the population of mainland China has been explosive. The Chinese Government is doing a lot to interfere with their non-existent freedom of religion. After all Christians are often subversive of government.
Which leads to some curious or tragic paradoxes in the modern world
Putin is a "devout" Russian Orthodox ex Communist KGB agent. Pretty convenient way to get all the Russian Orthodox voters behind him.
Hitler pitted Christians against the Jews, homosexuals and the mentally retarded. The Lutheran church said little, the Pope said nothing.
Prime Minister Cameron of the UK recently called Britain a Christian Nation. And got thoroughly called out for it including by the Archbishop of Canterbury.
Even through the Anglican Church is the official Church Of England. (likely not for long)
India split into separate religions: India and Pakistan. They've been at each other's throats ever since. Even though Gandhi had close Muslim and Hindu advisors.
Iraq violence is largely between Shia and Sunni Muslims.
India is likely to elect a Hindu supremacist (my word) Prime Minister.
The worst violence in the Central African Republic is Christians against Muslims.
Sri Lanka has been torn by Hindu-Buddhist violence until very recently
Burma is Hindu against Muslim right now.
(The Muslims can't catch a break lately)
All of these religions teach something akin to you are your brother's keeper and do unto others. Just as long as it stays within the family.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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The cult - fundamentalist version, is exclusive, bigoted, and violence/punishment oriented on its face.
God is God. While you're free to believe what you will, your belief has no effect whatsoever on what God chooses.
I promised Wade Icey a couple of days ago to say why I think intelligent people can (and do) believe Jesus will return. In very brief terms (to coincide with a very brief lunch break) here are my reasons. Others may decide for themselves what constitutes "intelligence" in acceptance or rejection of beliefs.
First, I choose to believe the New Testament texts on what Jesus said and did. The texts themselves are better supported by ancient manuscripts than any other ancient texts, with the possible exception of the Old Testament portions found in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Consequently, I find it logical to conclude that they accurately reflect what the authors wrote.
I am aware of textual criticism, "higher criticism" and just about every other way people who don't like what they read in the Bible choose to re-write it to their liking, but I find it takes more faith to believe the critics than it does to believe the truth. Similarly, I am aware of the heretical texts such as the so-called gospels of Judas and Barnabas, which were rejected by those who knew the authors, and by those who saw Jesus. Again, for all of these reasons, I conclude that the canon of the Bible accurately reflects what Jesus said and did.
The authors of the New Testament were, for the most part, eye witnesses. I say "for the most part" because Luke/Acts specifically states that it was the result of diligent inquiry rather than eyewitness accounts, and we do not know who wrote the book of Hebrews. Once again, I conclude that the Bible accurately reflects what Jesus said and did.
It is equally clear that the authors of the New Testament were convinced of Jesus's bodily resurrection. The message on that point was, essentially, "He arose. We saw him after his crucifixion and death. Ask us." (See, e.g., 1 Cor. 15:1 ff.) The effect on Saul of Tarsus was particularly dramatic, but I, too, have seen people change because of Jesus Christ. In fact, a paralegal -- who was not a Christian -- in our office where I worked in Los Angeles, once remarked that the only things she'd seen that really changed people were substance abuse and Jesus Christ.
Of equal importance, all evidence shows that the original Apostles were willing to die -- often horrendous deaths -- rather than renounce their belief in the risen Christ. Why would these men, who were eye witnesses, refuse to renounce their beliefs despite given many chances to do so, and rather be fed to the lions, crucified, beheaded or lit as torches by Nero, unless they believed what they said they saw?
Similarly, those religions that come after Jesus, but differ from the Biblical account of Him, necessarily have to argue that the Biblical account is simply wrong. The evidence that it is wrong is nothing more than disbelief. There is no text even remotely contemporaneous to the First Century with any historical authenticity.
All of this is preliminary to saying that I choose to believe the eye witness accounts as presented. Others argue that any references to miraculous events must be erroneous, because modern humanity has seen no miraculous events. That is a logical, but circular, argument. While circular arguments are not necessarily false, neither are they necessarily true.
All four Gospels, as well as the epistles of Paul, Peter and John, and the Book of Hebrews, attest that Jesus claimed divine status. Similarly, all of those same authorities state that Jesus said He would come again in power and glory, but that the time of his return would be unknown and unexpected.
Is 2,000 years a ridiculous time to wait? In the human life span, it seems so. That may be why 1 Peter reminds readers that for the Lord, 1,000 years is like a day. Concluding that it hasn't happened yet, therefore it won't happen is a non-sequitur.
Obviously, I am not saying that pure logic inevitably leads to the conclusion I've reached, but I am saying that the evidence available makes such a conclusion rational. In a way, though, Todd Eastman was on to something with his comment of a couple of nights ago involving a secret handshake, etc. I spent many years as what I like to call a Heroic Existentialist Atheist.* I think the intervention of the Holy Spirit is the only reason I converted.
Put another way, I don't think of myself as more righteous (or more anything else good) than anyone else, and certainly not than non-Christians. I think I am fortunate that God waited for me, because much of my pre-Christian existence included all of my time when I was learning to climb. That time gave me some excellent lessons, but only because I survived.
Sorry to be so sketchy and yet so long-winded simultaneously. If I had more time, I would explain myself more succinctly. Again, I'm not saying those who disagree are stupid, evil or anything else. I'm just giving a glimpse of why I don't think Christianity requires that you forfeit your mind.
John
*Atheism is not a necessary condition of Existentialism, as Kierkegaard, among others, showed.
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