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patrick compton
Trad climber
van
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I'd like to ask a Christian:
I was raised Christian, Christian school, church 3 times a week.
But I foudnd the vast majority to be money-centered hypocrites.
Why does modern Christianity attract so many hypocrites?
like why do most evangelicals support Trump for president?
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
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"Although the REAL BALLS award will go to the first "Ask a Muslim" thread."
So why is it that it is so fashionable to beat up Christians here on McTopo? You guys can be pretty mean to Believers, yet for some reason it is acceptable?
What if you guys said the same thing about Muslims as you say here about Christians? What would be the reaction?
Or what if you beat up on the Jews? What would Piton Ron say?
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Pete, the self-avowed atheists are really just a bunch of closet Proddies
still trapped within their eternal guilt so they need to pretend to be
accepting of Jews and Muslims while hatin' on Christians.
In the same vein Robespierre was a famous libertarian until he came to
power and then he became all like:
"Damn, don't need that sh!t any more, sharpen up that guillotine thang!"
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limpingcrab
Trad climber
the middle of CA
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 4, 2016 - 01:37pm PT
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I'd like to ask a Christian:
I was raised Christian, Christian school, church 3 times a week.
But I found the vast majority to be money-centered hypocrites.
Why does modern Christianity attract so many hypocrites?
like why do most evangelicals support Trump for president? I think humans are naturally hypocrites (Romans 3:23, Matthew 7:3-5) and churches are full of humans. I believe the big difference is whether or not they acknowledge it.
I can't speak for why anyone supports anyone for president, and I honestly don't even know much about politics. I'm sure there are a million and one theories about this. It bums me out that the term "Christian" has so many other labels attached to it beyond the love of Jesus. I believe that's where a lot of the misconceptions about Christianity come from, and part of the reason I started this thread.
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Contractor
Boulder climber
CA
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void of religious beliefs can you:
Have a humanistic moral compass? YES
Have spirituality? YES
Love and forgive? YES
Achieve eternal life? Who knows?
Through Religious beliefs can you:
Have a humanistic moral compass? YES
Have spirituality? YES
Love and forgive? YES
Achieve eternal life? Who Knows?
Let Christians, let God be their master if they live well and let men/women be their own master if they live well.
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patrick compton
Trad climber
van
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crab,
thanks for your response. I have no problem with Christ and what he taught, but the church is such a pile of conservative politics, Trump-level hate these days that I doubt I will ever step foot in one again.
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
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"Why does modern Christianity attract so many hypocrites?"
We're all hypocrites. That is the nature of man. Christianity attracts the broken, the hurt, the imperfect. It's BECAUSE of our imperfections which we recognize, that we seek God's love and forgiveness and the Holy Spirit's help through Christ's redemptive payment.
If you already think you are bitchin' enough, then why do you need God's help with anything?
Most of the Christians that I know are Lowlier-than-thou. We need all the help we can get. [I know I sure do! Thank God. Without His help, I would be even more insufferable than I already am.] Most of us Believers feel amazed that God can and does love wretches like us. And the reason that God loves us has nothing to do with our "loveableness", but rather it is due to the nature of God, who defines himself as love. [1 John 4]
Perhaps the Holier-than-thou attitude of some Christians is more of a Merrican thing? I don't really know any like that - honest!
"Achieve eternal life? Who Knows?"
I know.
The preponderance of evidence is highly in favour of this being true. How many hundreds of people saw Jesus cheat death? Was it around five hundred? I can't remember. What about Thomas, the dude who wouldn't believe until he actually touched the wounds of the risen Christ? It's a pretty compelling story, to me.
Even more compelling: What about Jesus' disciples, who lived with him and saw him cheat death? Eleven of the twelve were put to death for their beliefs - really painful deaths, man. Legend has it that Peter was crucified upside down, but there is not a lot of historical proof of this. Only John died of old age - lucky bugger considering what happened to the rest.
Not one of them - even under pain of torture - was willing to renounce his faith. They all died - for Christ's sake! [Ha, that was fun to say, I generally don't blaspheme]
Why were they willing to die? Because they had SEEN with their own two eyes the risen Jesus! They were eyewitnesses to a guy who had been killed, and returned from the dead. How cool is that??
So let me ask you guys this - would YOU be willing to die for a lie?
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rbord
Boulder climber
atlanta
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Limpingcrab - just use Christian to mean what you mean by it.
I know it helped me a lot to just redefine the word God to just mean what I mean by it. Then it didn't really bother me when other people said wrong things about her, like that she vouches for the truth of the bible, because they're talking about what they meant by God, not what I know, and if they get it wrong, ok. Theyre just doing the same thing we are.
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Lurkingtard
climber
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Did you know Jerry Lee Lewis and Jimmy Swaggert are cousins?
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Locker,
I can say with certainty I would probably be dead by now, without God's help and love. This is not "imaginary". This is an empirical observation.
If you have never trusted God, then who are you to know if his help is imaginary, or not?
Is God a crutch? HELL YEAH! I need all the help I can get, man! God is MY CRUTCH!
Ha! Praise the LORD and pass the pitons, man! I thank God for everything he has done for me in my life, for saving my ass from my own sorry self, for showing me cool things and taking me cool places, and I publicly proclaim that Jesus Christ [no H. in the middle] is mah LAWD and Saviour! Ah am startin' to sound like a Merrican! Next thing you know ah will be pro-nouncin' mah consonant-suh at the end of mah word-sah:
"Praise Gee-sus-sah!"
Good grief, Locker - I'm not trolling. It's freaking historically documented. Witnesses! I'll leave our historian Limping Crab to cite the historical eyewitness evidence of the resurrection.
Ya can't make this sh|t up, dude. Don't you GET it? These guys DIED because they SAW!
Would YOU die for a lie, Locker?
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Would you be willing to die for a lie? Something you knew to be untrue?
Maybe just to make a point, or to propagate some phantasmic conspiracy or something?
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Norton
Social climber
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I do believe that a HUMAN BEING named Jesus may well have lived and preached about "GOD" and such...
I don't
there is no record, none, in the Roman archives of a man names Jesus being crucified
in fact there is no record of a man named Jesus being ascribed any non human attributes until at least three generations of humans were born and died after his supposed death, and the reference is very, very vague, somewhere between 70-120 years after he supposedly lived and died
here's is just one source, out of many regarding the above
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_Jesus
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patrick compton
Trad climber
van
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sorry Locker,
unless you are as excited about Jesus as these guys, and believe everything in the Bible as 100% true, you are GOING TO HELL!
It's freaking historically documented. Witnesses!
No it isn't, and there aren't
but that's where faith comes in right?
The church I grew up in believed they could change the weather, just for them, by praying. Do you have this level of faith?
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Contractor
Boulder climber
CA
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Pete-
I know
I would expect a man of true faith to take umbrage to that question. I honstly believe you know- your a blessed man.
I, however, don't take umbrage to people who may question values and beliefs that have been forged through science and introspection. I've reconciled the prospect of impending and eternal non-existence, which alters the way I live, in no way.
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micronut
Trad climber
Fresno/Clovis, ca
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Norton you claimed above that there are no records in Roman history of non-biblical accounts of Jesus and his crucifixion. That's not true.
There are several well documented historical texts of non biblical origin that at least mention Christ and his life and crucifixion. Just for your information.
Look up some of the writings of Tacitus, Julius Africanus, and Pliny The Younger (No relation to the fastatsic beer sadly)
Tacitus (c. A.D. 55 - c. A.D. 117)
Annals, book XV:
"Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular."
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
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So Locker,
assuming you hung around with Jesus, who preached about God and stuff, and you thought he was cool and all, and he had some great teachings about "love thy neighbour" and stuff like this...
[Note: Jesus would have spelled it "neighbour", because as everyone knows, God is an Englishman]
Anyway, so you hung with Jesus for three years, and heard him say some other pretty rad things, and he basically claimed to not just represent God or be God's son, but actually to kind of BE God. And maybe you even thought he was bit crazy, but whatever, he was still cool cuz of all this other stuff he taught.
But then he kind of got too big for his britches. The religious and legal authorities caught wind of him, and accused your buddy of fomenting a revolution. So they did the logical thing: they put him to death.
So now, you're pretty bummed, cuz your teacher and friend is dead.
But guess what? Three days later, he's baaaaaaack! Living, breathing, you talk to him, touch him, give him a hug. It ain't bullsh"t, the dude has cheated death.
Suddenly you realize - BECAUSE he cheated death - that this ain't no normal dude with some cool ideas. He really IS the Lord!
So not only did he promise you eternal life, he PROVED to you that it could be done! You saw it happen with your own two eyes. So now, Locker, you saw the hokus pokus. You actually saw it happen.
Imagine yourself, Locker, in this situation. A witness. How would you feel? What would you think?
Without the resurrection, the whole Christianity exercise would be pointless, and probably a waste of time. Jesus would have been just another guy, nice teacher and all, whatever. {shrug}
But WITH the resurrection?? He ain't no regular dude.
And you guys are missing the point - this isn't about religion, which is about a set of rules. It's about having a personal relationship with your creator!
So what about the "proof"? That the resurrection happened? That Jesus cheated death, came back as Lord? That I actually BELIEVE the hokus pokus? Am I a dumbass? Have I been brainwashed by the modern day Pharisees at church who preach religion - a set of rules?
Do *I* - the quintessential dirtbag - seem like the kind of guy to you that would subscribe to a set of RULES??? Really??
And do you think I - a Professional Engineer who studied science and proof and mathematics and stuff - would believe in God without having checked to see if there might actually be reasonable EVIDENCE supporting my beliefs?
My faith isn't blind, that's for sure. And to me, the most compelling evidence is the resurrection, the eyewitnesses accounts, and the willingness of the participants to die for their belief. This is what sold me the most. That and the empirical evidence I mentioned above.
And to other guys: There is all sorts of historical evidence to support the resurrection! Tons of it.
But you're missing the point there, too - you have to look at what happened to the people who were actually THERE at the time, and how it affected their lives thereafter.....
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micronut
Trad climber
Fresno/Clovis, ca
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Another account from the time of Christ by a guy who had nothing to do with the Bible.
Josephus (A.D. 37 - c. A.D. 100)
Josephus' Antiquities (early 2nd century A.D.) refers to Jesus in two separate passages. The common translation of the first passage, Book 18, Ch. 3, part 3, is disputed and is most likely from an altered source. F. F. Bruce has provided a more likely translation:
Now there arose at this time a source of further trouble in one Jesus, a wise man who performed surprising works, a teacher of men who gladly welcome strange things. He led away many Jews, and also many of the Gentiles. He was the so-called Christ. When Pilate, acting on information supplied by the chief men around us, condemned him to the cross, those who had attached themselves to him at first did not cease to cause trouble, and the tribe of Christians, which has taken this name from him is not extinct even today.
The translations of this passage are discussed in Josephus: Testimonium Flavianum from Jesus.com.au.
The second passage is from Book 20, Ch. 9, part 1:
...so he assembled the sanhedrim of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned...
Obviously this doesn't prove he "rose again", just that there were some non biblical cats out there who at least believed he existed.
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Craig Fry
Trad climber
So Cal.
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Die for a lie?
the problem is that personal truth is not the same as facts.
Is the earth flat?
many people died that said the earth was round, they were put to death by Christians
Millions died for a LIE and millions will die in the future "for a lie"
Take religion out, and far fewer will die for a lie
Biblical scholars have debated if the resurrection was a fact or a made up after the fact, the early docs don't support the resurrection story
look it up
No Resurrection, No -what was it again?
"it would be pointless"
Critical thought experiment!!!
What if there was no life after death?
What if it was proven that once you die, that's it, the soul does not live on.
How would this influence your religious beliefs?
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Contractor
Boulder climber
CA
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Pete, you could've stopped at "I know", who can question your faith? You and your savior- that's it...
The hard evidence thing gets plain whacky my friend.
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