Helpmabob

Hi Amaleq13 – Jesus said: "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.[Matthew 11:28] Not: Go to your nearest church, and they will give you rest. Any ‘churches’ that claim to offer some salvation in themselves, are peddling false hope.Please let me know where I can find this salvation from an instituion. I am intruiged to know what you have discovered.

Amaleq13

I specifically reworded my statement because you seemed to be assuming "institution" could only mean "church". I'm speaking of the religion centered around the salvation offered by the sacrifice of Jesus. I'm pretty sure you have heard of it.

institution: A custom, practice, relationship, or behavioral pattern of importance in the life of a community or society: the institutions of marriage and the family.

also

institution: An established organization or foundation, especially one dedicated to education, public service, or culture.

Christianity is an institution.

Christianity offers salvation.

Helpmabob

Hi Amaleq13 – You have given fine definitions of ‘institution’, but none of ‘salvation’The church may be able to tell you about this, although the more time and resources a church devotes to honing its institutional concerns, the less time it has to tell folk the wonderful good news that salvation is found in Christ alone.

Steven Avery

Hi Bitar. In the RCC catechism, when the RCC post the 10 commandments, they break down the 10 differently than the protestants and others. In so doing, what we generally consider two commandments, not worshipping other gods and not making graven image (Exodus 20:3-4 & Deut 5:7-8) are one command. Then, for 'brevity' or avoiding 'repetition' the graven image command is not put into the catechism summary. Pretty crafty, since apparently the alternate grouping goes back to Augustine, with the 'summary' aspect being the more modern nuance that hides the graven image command from the RCC folks, who are not encouraged to read and consider the full Bible verses vs the catechism.

Shalom,
Steven Avery
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Messianic_Apologetic

Steven Avery

"You gotta serve somebody ... " - Robert Zimmerman

Steven Avery

If you are going to make a long "appeal to audience response" it would seem appropriate to give the topic details and/or thread where this thread unravelled.

Steven Avery

Which many would consider a 'distinction without a difference'

Amaleq13

Since the "finding" of Christ is the same as becoming a Christian which is the same as becoming part of the institution of Christianity, you continue to have no substantive disagreement with what I've been saying.

Lógos Sokratikós

Right, it's like the choice of words between ikonos (English 'icon') and eidolon (English 'idol'). I don't think any pre-Christian Greek pagan in his right mind would consider a wooden eidolon THE god in question, just a likeness. Ask the Catholic or Orthodox about his venerated saint icon, and you'd get the SAME answer.

That's one of my big problems with Christianity. Not that classical Judaism was any better. "Thou shall not make [...] likeness of anything in the sea [...]" and they had images of seraphim, angels and the like. Religion makes me dizzy!

Amaleq13

The "appeal" was for any confirmation of the other individual's claim of coherency and was addressed to anyone who had been following the discussion. I question whether that includes someone who sees the appeal but not the discussion the motivated it.

"There is no greater calling than to serve your fellow men. There is no greater contribution than to help the weak. There is no greater satisfaction than to have done it well." -- Walter Reuther