Dont confuse Christianity with religion

[DavidinSouthampton]

I do get your point. As an atheist, and as a friend of an atheist who puts Dawkins on a bit of a pedestal, I have on numerous occasions commented on his almost cult, or religious like following. There is an inflexibility to his thinking that I find difficult to accept, even though many of his concepts I agree with. He just doesn't need to be so religious about it!

Agree entirely. I read the God delusion and actually quite enjoyed it!

 

[DavidinSouthampton]

Thank you, that's an interesting point and one that makes a lot of sense. I do have a problem with that though in that we therefore would have been created sinful and being sinful is something that is within our nature so I don't see how God dying redeems us from that sin, just saying like.

To be honest, this is the sort of thing that one could talk about all night. The God dying to redeem us from our sin is something that I know one person had so much difficulty in accepting thaat he lost his faith over it.

 

[Bhafcman]

To be honest, this is the sort of thing that one could talk about all night. The God dying to redeem us from our sin is something that I know one person had so much difficulty in accepting thaat he lost his faith over it.

You are not talking about me are you? I was once a Christian but I lost my faith due to questioning and being questioned about my beliefs (Evolution and other stuff got me there as well). I just don't understand how the faith can stand if Adam & Eve are a fairy tale, as the Bible has Jesus' genealogy streching back to Adam who he (Jesus) refered himself as the second Adam and that he was here to die for sins casued by Adam.

 

[Westdene Seagull]

We're not bigoted. We were brought up under a different kind of society when the law was not so enlightened as it is now. In my parents' generation it was even more unenlightened than my own, and it was very difficult for my mother-in-law to discover, in her 70s, that her adult son (married with two children) was actually gay. But she has accepted it and so have we all.

But what is there to accept - that's just the point. My children think there is no difference between a man loving a woman and a man loving a man. It's normal, there is nothing the accept as there is nothing to question. It's like everyone needs to go to the toilet - nothing to accept or reject - it just is. I think you're bigoted because of your opening post saying teaching children about homosexuality is child abuse. It suggests you don't accept homosexuality.

 

[Crawley 'Gull]

So I don't need to accept a saviour into my life, eat his body and drink his blood and pray to him on how much I love him In all seriousness though, I want a Christian to tell me what sin is and how it came about being....

Simplist definition of sin I can think of is: "The breaking God's moral law." It came as a result of us being able to choose to do right and wrong rather than being created as robots who have to obey. Looking at Jesus' teaching it goes a lot deeper than what we do or don't do but what's in our heart, i.e "he who hates his brother is has committed murder in his heart" etc.

I personally find it hard to believe how people's faith can stand if they just believe Adam and Eve was a fairytale, however there are a lot of people out there who seem to manage it.

 

[One Love]

But does their religious book (which is written by their God himself) not say how sin came about being?

In my opinion, large parts of The Bible were not meant to be taken literally and has layers of symbolic messages within. What complicates the matter even further is that is was written for an age and people a long time ago.

 

[One Love]

For me, sin is anything that does not come from a feeling of Love, Joy, Compassion etc etc.

I believe the Adam and Eve story is symbolic of us choosing to follow what isn't the above and represents the Fall of Man.

The rest is history.

 

[Leas]

I have not fled or left the thread re one posters generalization , i have been reading and surprised by how much interest / abuse this thread has prompted ! i was trying to air my views on why people confuse religion with Christianity and thought it might be an interesting debate with mature questions and views and replies backed up with substance ? obviously i got that wrong and i apologies if i offended anyone , one of the posts accused me of preaching ? iv never done that but ill give it a go now and only once , there is so much hatred in the world today and unfortunately we feed off it because we are all born into sin from Adam and Eve , this is not how God planned it to be so he gives us a chance but by no means forcing us but by our own free will to be saved from it before he redeems his plan for a new heaven and a new earth , God doesn't want anybody to be left behind and separated from him forever because he loves us all , even if you don't want him to love you there's nothing you can do about because he does , he doesn't blackmail anyone or force anyone to believe in him but just gently asks if you would let him into your heart so you can get to know him better like any father would . he doesn't care what problems or baggage you come with, he doesn't care if you have named him in vain or rubbished him he only cares that you know the truth and his plan for you . if there are any questions please pm me ill be happy to try and answer them ..................... up the Albion and 3 points Saturday thank you very much .

 

[Bhafcman]

Simplist definition of sin I can think of is: "The breaking God's moral law." It came as a result of us being able to choose to do right and wrong rather than being created as robots who have to obey. Looking at Jesus' teaching it goes a lot deeper than what we do or don't do but what's in our heart, i.e "he who hates his brother is has committed murder in his heart" etc.

I personally find it hard to believe how people's faith can stand if they just believe Adam and Eve was a fairytale, however there are a lot of people out there who seem to manage it.

For me, sin is anything that does not come from a feeling of Love, Joy, Compassion etc etc.

I believe the Adam and Eve story is symbolic of us choosing to follow what isn't the above and represents the Fall of Man.

The rest is history.

That is all well but where does God punishing himself(Jesus cruxificion) to himself (Holy Trinity) to forgive us for creating us the way we are come in to the whole salvation thing?

 

[BadFish]

Not rich at all - if I wrote a book on lesbian gardening, why would you take me as an authority on the matter. Dawkins starts a lot of his furious rants by explaining things that Christians think etc. he's not a Christian. He doesn't know the first thing about being a Christian.

So you need the qualification of being a Christian to write a book explaining that god doesn't exists? That is a brilliant reason to write off anyone suggesting that god doesn't exsist. Except that it is entirely illogical.

If you take a certain side of a discussion you can easily find out what the other side believe by discussing it with them (kind of the point of a discussion) Dawkins does this often. There are plenty on youtube.

Do I need to throw out all my music biographies because the authors are not the musicians. I would assume that the only biographies you own are autobiographies?

you can become an authority on Lesbian Gardening, of course you can. You just need to research it thoroughly and talk to lesbian gardeners. There are many authorities on the Roman empire who are not members of the Roman Empire the list is endless if you think about it.

 

[Bhafcman]

I have not fled or left the thread re one posters generalization , i have been reading and surprised by how much interest / abuse this thread has prompted ! i was trying to air my views on why people confuse religion with Christianity and thought it might be an interesting debate with mature questions and views and replies backed up with substance ? obviously i got that wrong and i apologies if i offended anyone , one of the posts accused me of preaching ? iv never done that but ill give it a go now and only once , there is so much hatred in the world today and unfortunately we feed off it because we are all born into sin from Adam and Eve , this is not how God planned it to be so he gives us a chance but by no means forcing us but by our own free will to be saved from it before he redeems his plan for a new heaven and a new earth , God doesn't want anybody to be left behind and separated from him forever because he loves us all , even if you don't want him to love you there's nothing you can do about because he does , he doesn't blackmail anyone or force anyone to believe in him but just gently asks if you would let him into your heart so you can get to know him better like any father would . he doesn't care what problems or baggage you come with, he doesn't care if you have named him in vain or rubbished him he only cares that you know the truth and his plan for you . if there are any questions please pm me ill be happy to try and answer them ..................... up the Albion and 3 points Saturday thank you very much .

So you believe there were two people who were responsible for all the death, diseases and suffering today? I'm at the uni library with a deadline tomorrow so I can do this all night

 

[brightn'ove]

you might want to inform wikipedia:

Christianity is a monotheistic and Abrahamic religion

 

[Leas]

Bhafcman if thats meant for me pm me if you want to i will get back to you as soon as i can

 

[BadFish]

The main thing that rankles with me about Richard Dawkins is his seeming total intolerance of any view which goes against his own on this. Does that make him a fundamentalist? And fundamentalism has the possibility of being dangerous wherever it is.

Yes I think it does, I never finished The God Delusion for the very reasons you suggest. (Although I find him far more interesting when he debates with people). Apart from the fact that i disagree with you on the existence of god and the need for religion I suspect I share more in common with you than someone as fervent and fundamentalist as Richard Dawkins. Weird innit?

 

[TrickyOne]

Just adding my 2 pennith....religion is for the weak of mind that can't see beyond their noses!

 

[Crawley 'Gull]

Just adding my 2 pennith....religion is for the weak of mind that can't see beyond their noses!

Try telling that to the thousands of people over the centuries who've lost their lives/been persecuted because of their faith in Jesus.

 

[BadFish]

I'm not so sure I'm all that old-fashioned! It is currently fashionable (especially here in Brighton) to think that same-sex love is commonplace, and it is currently fashionable to be gay, especially among the young who do love to experiment during those years when one's sexuality is still developing. (We are all, intrinsically, bisexual, though psychologists debate this.) Those fashions could change, just as other fashions do. What will not change or revert, thankfully, is society's attitude to homosexuality which, while I was a young teenager, was actually still a crime. In Scotland, that law changed as late as 1980 so times and attitudes have changed a great deal. (I just wonder how far we should involve little children in this process.)

I think it is interesting that in your first point you suggest that Homosexuality is merely a fashion and in your second you distance yourself from homophobia by being thankful that we don't revert to 'how things were. It is my suggestion based on what you have written on this thread that you still hold a lot of homophobia in your opinions.

I would be very interested t understand what 'process' you are suggesting that we don't involve the children in?

 

[El Presidente]

Yes I think it does, I never finished The God Delusion for the very reasons you suggest. (Although I find him far more interesting when he debates with people). Apart from the fact that i disagree with you on the existence of god and the need for religion I suspect I share more in common with you than someone as fervent and fundamentalist as Richard Dawkins. Weird innit?

I gave up part way through The God Delusion too for the same reasons. The rationale Dawkins puts forward make for a compelling case against the existence of a deity and that religion, like Communism, is good in theory for people who don't want to accept that we're a lucky accident as a species, but his smug, self satisfied polemic left me cold.

Once you realise that there is no evidence to support the existence of God by about page 50, why wade through another 350 pages of a bloke agreeing with himself?

 

[BadFish]

I have not fled or left the thread re one posters generalization , i have been reading and surprised by how much interest / abuse this thread has prompted ! i was trying to air my views on why people confuse religion with Christianity and thought it might be an interesting debate with mature questions and views and replies backed up with substance ? obviously i got that wrong and i apologies if i offended anyone , one of the posts accused me of preaching ? iv never done that but ill give it a go now and only once , there is so much hatred in the world today and unfortunately we feed off it because we are all born into sin from Adam and Eve , this is not how God planned it to be so he gives us a chance but by no means forcing us but by our own free will to be saved from it before he redeems his plan for a new heaven and a new earth , God doesn't want anybody to be left behind and separated from him forever because he loves us all , even if you don't want him to love you there's nothing you can do about because he does , he doesn't blackmail anyone or force anyone to believe in him but just gently asks if you would let him into your heart so you can get to know him better like any father would . he doesn't care what problems or baggage you come with, he doesn't care if you have named him in vain or rubbished him he only cares that you know the truth and his plan for you . if there are any questions please pm me ill be happy to try and answer them ..................... up the Albion and 3 points Saturday thank you very much .

so you respond to the criticism of preaching by first denying it and then ...... Preaching. very odd. But hey he does move in mysterious ways, huh?

 

[turienzo's lovechild]

Just adding my 2 pennith....religion is for the weak of mind that can't see beyond their noses!

being a christian is hard work.....certainly NOT for the weak minded