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Christianity is a religion of tolerance and other assorted myths


Achilles

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How did they torment her?
It seems that her question was rhetorical. She already knows that the church group is practicing intolerance, so I don't know how her post was intended to move the conversation forward...other than to put more distance between her and the staffs' posts.

 

Yes, Nancy, we already know that christianity is intolerant. So are islam and judaism. Sorry to hear about your friend. Thanks.

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You seem to have a great personal stake in me being Nancy.
On the contrary, I have absolutely no personal stake in it at all.

 

So I leave from being against atheism and come back to promote it? How is that logical?
This presumes that there is an expectation for logic in your posts.
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She embarrassed herself one time by popping off, farting to put it crassly, and all the time she was tormented about it even when she said she did not like it. After she left, as I said, the church group character assassinated her, saying how she slept around, how she brought a bad influence to other church groups, she was this, she was that. Really tolerant behavior.

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As a Christian I can only speak for Christians. By that I mean I can not properly represent people of other faiths. As an actively participating, born again Christian I am saddened and shamed by the acts of many other people who claim to follow Jesus. I'll explain.

 

Jesus' main teaching (aside from the subject eternal salvation) was to break down the massive barriers that religion had built. You have to look at it in the perspective of the ancient Roman occupied Middle East. The political control of the tribe of Judah (a.k.a. the nation of Jews) was held by the Romans. This conflicted heavily with the religious control of the tribe of Judah (a.k.a. ancient post-exile Judaism). The conservative Jews of the day wanted to abolish anything non-jewish in their religion. The many centuries prior to that included distortions and perversions of their religion (by this I mean things like the Greek hellenization, the translation of the Torah & Tanakh from the original Hebrew into Koine Greek, the Babylonian & Assyrian captivities, and the inclusion of many non jew religious practices like the Amorites, the Philistines, and so on...). Ancient Judaism had finally reached a point where they desired "purity" in their religion.

 

Getting back to my point...

Because of this desire for religious purity, the Judaism of the day openly rejected any foreign traditions interfering with their religious practices. Then the Romans took over in 63 BC and the struggle between political and religious power began. To try to appease the people, the Romans kept Herod the Great as their king. Of course what they failed to understand is that the Jews of the day did not fully accept his rule since he was not of the line of David (he was of the Hasmonean dynasty who had power since the days of the Maccabean revolt). Instead the Jews of the day anxiously looked forward to the coming of their Moshiach (where we get the word "Messiah" from). The Moshiach was to be a descendant of David, the second king of Israel. This king was to return the reign of the davidic kingship on Earth, a dynasty that would never end. The religious and political tension was thick, and there had already been several impostors claiming to be the Moshiach.

 

Then one day a man named Yeshua, who was the son of a Nazarene carpenter, came forward claiming to be the Moshiach. However rather than a political king who would overthrow the oppressive Roman tyranny, he preached about loving your neighbor, turning the other cheek, and blessing those who curse you. He preached the Abrahamic concept of "all nations being blessed through Abraham." He taught about tolerance toward the depraved and forgiveness for the sinful. Immediately he was shunned by the religious elite of his day. He spent more time around "sinful people" and less around the self-righteous religious authorities of the time. And of course I think we all know how that story ended up.

 

This Jewish carpenter, turned Rabbi, taught a message of compassion and love. His earliest followers formed a new sect of Judaism, following all of the religious traditions of the old covenant sects, but also adopting the teaching of eternity and earthly compassion and peace. The Romans called named them Christians.

 

Now some 2,000 years later a lot has changed for this former sect of Judaism. They have grown exponentially in numbers and have set up political governments (a.k.a. the Church-state governments throughout Europe). Sadly many of the people who make the claim to be "followers of Christ" seem to miss what He was actually teaching about. Jesus never preached about political power, or how to solve the "homosexuality problem." Does the Bible teach that homosexuality is wrong? Technically yes, but it preaches more about the evils of intolerance and hatred.

 

Now as a Christian, I am firm in my beliefs. I may seem liberal in some areas, and quite conservative in others. Whatever. You can feel free to put whatever label on me you wish. I am what I am, and Jesus loves me for it. Now going back to the original post about the son tempted with homosexuality (or whatever) and the mom fearing he was going to lose his salvation. Honestly I think that's ridiculous. I know this sounds bad, (and please please forgive me for making such a comparison...I'm only trying to make a point) but who do we Christians claim Jesus died for?

 

Did Jesus just die for the alcoholics, the pornographers, the murders, the slanderers, the rapists, and the thieves, but not the homosexuals? Is homosexuality somehow a worse sin than any of the others? Those are rhetorical questions of course.

 

(Again please forgive me for the comparison...I'm only trying to make a point. At no point here am I implying that I'm judging anyone. I'm simply stating what the Bible labels as sins.) I personally believe that you can be addicted to drugs, and be "saved." I believe that you can be addicted to lust and pornography and be saved. I believe you can have deep bitterness in you, so much that you wish a person was dead, and still be saved. I believe that you can have sex outside of a marital relationship (premarital sex, adultery, etc...) and still be saved. Lastly, I believe you can be homosexual and be saved. Now I believe that it's God's desire for us to abstain from sins. However the Christian belief is that once Jesus saves your soul, then as sin increases, His forgiving grace increases all the more. This doesn't mean that it's o.k. to go on sinning. However when we do sin (and yes, EVERYONE sins every single day) Jesus pardons those who He has saved. Again this is the Christian belief. I'm not making judgment on anyone here, and like I said at the start I can only represent Christians.

 

So I apologize if I have offended anyone. It is surely not my desire. I only seek to become more "christ-like" and practice what He preached.

 

Peace be with you.

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Jedispy,

 

I really like your interpretation of christianity. No doubt that the world would be a very different place if more people shared the same vision of the religion as you did.

 

I do think it is unfortunate that there is no one, clear, objective interpretation that everyone can look to and say "yes, this is clearly Jesus' message and any other interpretations are incorrect". While your take on christianity focuses on acceptance, it is clear that there are other versions that are very intolerant and are just as valid as yours.

 

Take care!

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  • 1 month later...

Looking through the

forums here I found a

quote on how not

believing in god is logical,

okay? Not believing in

god is logical. A logical

life is an ethical life, this

atheist contests, and

atheists play the morality

card, claiming to be

more moral than religious

folk. The problem I have

with that is atheists have

shown to be unethical.

They have shown to be

immoral. How can

atheists drone on about

being in some way

superior when they are

guilty of things such as

intolerance?

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But who is to say which interpretations are more valid? I would say someone who's studied the Bible for a whole for quite some time without biasing to particular passages taken out of context would be closer to having that authority than say the average Joe who hates someone and uses the Bible to "justify" it. In the end you can take any work and make it say anything you want it to say.

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But who is to say which interpretations are more valid? I would say someone who's studied the Bible for a whole for quite some time without biasing to particular passages taken out of context would be closer to having that authority than say the average Joe who hates someone and uses the Bible to "justify" it.
Right, but you're making an individual value judgment to get to that conclusion. Someone else might make an equally valid value judgment that could be in direct conflict with yours. So even the context for defining subjectivity is subjective.

 

Using your criteria, should I put more faith in Bart Ehrman or William Craig?

 

In the end you can take any work and make it say anything you want it to say.
While there is probably some truth to this statement, I don't think that should excuse any works that claim to be extant or the supreme word of a supreme being. Kinda hard to be "perfect" and "imperfect" at the same time. Seems like that would be one of those "either/or" things.

 

Take care!

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Only that books that claim to be the perfect word of god should be exempt from the "it's ok to be open to interpretation" clause that you suggested. I'm ok with Jane Austin or William Shakespeare or Homer or JK Rowling being open to interpretation, but not god. I don't think it's acceptable that our supreme creator only communicates to us via texts and then forgets to create a commandment that requires that we preserve them (and their languages) for all time (completely ignoring the question of why a perfect being cannot create a perfect book, impervious to age or destruction and capable of translating itself into modern languages).

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Hey man, I don't think I was missing any words but I think I was missing some punctuation. It was late and I was tired, sorry :p.
No worries whatsoever :D

 

What I meant was how can a person objectively say that two positions are equally valid?
I guess I would have to know more to answer that intelligently. At face value though, I would state that if all other things were equal, that it would be quite easy to say that two positions are equally valid. Generally speaking though, situations in which all other things are equal are difficult to come by. Presuming that you're referring to scripture, since the source is the same, then we have to look elsewhere for that "something else" (which kinda takes away from that whole 'The Word' thing).
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  • 2 weeks later...
Okay, from the top. A friend of mine goes to church and in a church group there was this girl who they tormented until she was uncomfortable and left. Then the group said that she was bad for the church, a bad person.

 

That is definitely not what Jesus taught. There aren't "bad people" for the church. "All have sinned" says the Bible, so I don't understand why some so-called Christians view it as some kind of an exclusive club.

 

I don't think it's acceptable that our supreme creator only communicates to us via texts and then forgets to create a commandment that requires that we preserve them (and their languages) for all time (completely ignoring the question of why a perfect being cannot create a perfect book, impervious to age or destruction and capable of translating itself into modern languages).

 

I'm not sure where exactly you're coming from here; it sounds as though you are saying that you believe that, if the Bible is truly the Word of God, then it is a perfect book and shouldn't be "open to interpretation" by whoever.... in which case I would agree with you. But I'm kinda confused as to the context, I haven't been in this discussion.

 

Oh, and Achilles: to go back to the start of your post, I would say this. Christianity is not a religion of tolerance, if it is the tolerance that you seem to advocate. In otherwords, I wouldn't accept someone as a Christian who went out and murdered/raped people every night, so would you say I was "untolerant"? That's not saying that I wouldn't gladly have them repent and follow God, regardless of their past mistakes.

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I'm not sure where exactly you're coming from here; it sounds as though you are saying that you believe that, if the Bible is truly the Word of God, then it is a perfect book and shouldn't be "open to interpretation" by whoever.... in which case I would agree with you. But I'm kinda confused as to the context, I haven't been in this discussion.
Yep, that's exactly what I'm saying :)

 

Oh, and Achilles: to go back to the start of your post, I would say this. Christianity is not a religion of tolerance, if it is the tolerance that you seem to advocate. In otherwords, I wouldn't accept someone as a Christian who went out and murdered/raped people every night, so would you say I was "untolerant"? That's not saying that I wouldn't gladly have them repent and follow God, regardless of their past mistakes.
Many christians claim that their religion promotes love, tolerance, acceptance, peace, etc, etc, etc. The purpose of this post was to show that this is not the case. Those that interpret the bible literally (aka "Fundamentalists") are clearly unloving, intolerant, unaccepting, non-peaceful, etc, etc, etc people around.
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The purpose of this post was to show that this is not the case. Those that interpret the bible literally (aka "Fundamentalists") are clearly unloving, intolerant, unaccepting, non-peaceful, etc, etc, etc people around.

68.gif Fallacious straw man rhetoric. You are making a claim based on your opinion, and not on facts. You are making claims regarding a small portion of a population, and claiming it is representative of the whole. I gotta say that's pretty closed minded and intolerant of you. Please take the plank out of your own eye before picking the specks of dust out of other people's eyes.

 

Your argument is fallacious in another way too. Literary translation and interpretation is broken down into two camps. They are exegesis and eisegesis. Exegetical interpretation means to draw the meaning out, and basing one's understanding on the text alone without presupposition. Eisegetical interpretation is the opposite. It means to put meaning in (aka putting words into another person's mouth) by basing one's interpretation of a text filtered through their own presuppositions. This type of interpretation is of course unfavorable as it does not reflect the author's original meaning and intent, nor does it accurately capture the context in which it was written. To clarify, the distinction between these two methods is applied to all literary interpretation, not just the Bible.

 

What you are claiming is that those who exegetically interpret biblical scripture are "unloving, intolerant, unaccepting, non-peaceful, etc, etc, etc." This is of course a fallacy. I postulate to you that the REAL Christians are highly tolerant, caring, and charitable people. (I'm talking about born-again, believing individuals with transformed lives, who not only read the Word but desperately cling to Christ's teachings of love, compassion, charity, sacrifice, etc.... What I am not talking about are people who just go to church regularly and have a dusty bible somewhere in their house, who do things that they think are right because some legalistic religious leader tells them that's how things have to be). I guarantee you that Westboro Baptist Church does not represent me, and the Jesus Christ I know does not condone their hypocrisy. Real Christians care for widows and orphans. Real Christians provide for the sick and the homeless. Real Christians are not perfect. Yes we sin. Yes we are capable of things like intolerance, hatred, deceit, prejudice, etc..., just like everyone else in the whole world. Although we are capable of such things, real Christians, though still sinful due to a fallen human nature, desire to do what is right, to have a Christ-like attitude toward life and our fellow human race.

 

Regarding your arguments:

Look, I could write volumes about my perception of proper professional body building technique, or how only unintelligent troglodytes would get into such an occupation. However since I am not a professional body builder (I'm not even an amateur one), what I would be writing would be nothing more than fallacious theory based on my presupposed opinions. Now if I were to make such claims, how useful would my testimony be? That is exactly what your testimony is of Christianity.

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