Whispers

Very interested to know your thoughts on this....

I am at heart a buddhist, exploring the Christian tradition. The reason for my exploration could really be tied down to Richard, an ex neighbour that is a Christian. I have known him, his wife and their kids for a few years now. Since my wife and I first had dinner at their place, they have always made it clear that they are Christians and have no shame about the fact. As a Buddhist, Richard and I found a common ground or subjects to discuss, and over the years we have had many deep chats about life, death, wisdom, god, existence etc etc.....Over the last few months, the chats have got deeper and seem to be going toward god in a more regular fashion. This is not purely because Richard is leading us there, I too am feeling drawn more and more. You see, its not just the chats that have made me look deeper at the Christian tradition, its Richard himself and his family. Its difficult to tell you this without sounding like I am over exaggerating or adding to my story.

Quite simply, Richard is the most straight headed, kind and generous person I know. He has been since the day I met him and continues to be untill this day. He is placid, welcoming, non-preaching, and deeply moral. These opinions I have formed about him, are not the result of a mere passing aquaintance, they are the result of meeting with him regularly, getting to know his family and sharing their lives. His wife is just the same, and their kids are simply awesome. They radiate happiness and love and are just so cool and well behaved. No harsh discipline is needed to keep them in line, I promise. They are just treated with love and respect always.

I have talked with and debated many things with spiritual people and I have met Buddhist monks that truly seemed deeply insightfull. Richard is the same and unlike the monks, he has not given up his day to day life to practice his faith. his day to day life IS his faith. When I am in their house, I feel safe, welcome, warm and relaxed.....always. There is a deep element of peace there and it radiates outwards. I can say this with all assurance, if I was in trouble of any kind, Richard would be there for me without question or complaint. He's like that you see, deeply committed to doing what is right.

His example is getting to me, I must admit. The way he lives his life, and the happiness that you can see in his eyes are all making me enquire further into his faith. Christianity must have something goi9ng for it, other than judgement, punishment and all the other negatives which are repeated endlessly. What about the love, forgiveness and compassion it also teaches? My whole spiritual life feels very rocky at the moment and I would so like it if you guys and gals could advise me of your thoughts...

Thanks for your time =)

Godless Dave

I haven't met Richard of course, but I am making an educated guess that all the good qualities about him would be there whether or not he was a Christian.

Darth Dane

It requires no faith or belief system to be a nice and loving person.

Humans do not need anyone to tell them to be nice, many are nice, because they choose to, not because they have to, or some book claims that God wants this or that.

Regardless of your conviction, if you are a loving and kind person, you earn my respect, whatever teh motivation is to do good, the good act will speak, so to say, for itself.

If your act is based on "God" I say more power to you, if it is based on "no God" I say more power to you, as long as you act "good" what is there to complain about?

Believe what you will, if it motivates you to loving living, it must be good....at least in my humble eyes.




DD - Love Spliff

Jayjay

Great to hear something positive about christians on this board for a while. I've always thought that Jesus' moral example was at least adequate as far as religions go, and certainly inspires some people to be good. But, I also think that the drive to be a better person comes from within: religion is never a silver bullet you can shoot yourself with to magically become the local saint. As for the philosophy that drives these friends of yours, I say go for it... go grab a bible and read it thoughtfully, try to see the good stuff and ignore the nonsensicalities. You don't actually have to become a christian to absorb the best of their moral guidelines.

Well that's my silly opinion at least.

Mageth

I must say that I agree with every response so far on this thread.

I'd be curious what your friend thought of the teachings of Paul. Your friend sounds like a Christian (a follower of Christ's teachings) and not a Paulian (a follower of Paul's interpretations of Christ's teachings).

If you looked around, you'd find other examples of such good people as your neighbor, and if your sample size was large enough and diverse enough, you'd find they held a variety of religious beliefs, or none at all! You could do the same for what you might consider bad people and get similar results. As Godless Dave says, the quality's in the person, not in the religion. As all three responders indicate, such qualities come from within, not without (though experiences from without in early childhood can definitely mold the "within" that will persist in later life)!

But I reckon there are some people who need a written-down moral structure or code to corral them into leading a "good" life. There are plenty of examples of people who lived a rather rough life until finding "religion". Of course, there are such examples for all religions; Christianity doesn't have a corner on that market, though some Xians claim they do.

As an aside, two of the gentlest, kindest, best people I've known in my life were both Moslems from Bangladesh.

Starboy

If 50% of all the Christians on the planet lived such idyllic lives I would say go for it your odds are good. But the chances of happiness with Christianity are no better than placebo. It doesn't appear to contain any effective ingredient. The only factors that affect outcome are determined by the inputs that are not Christianity.

I don't know if this has ever been tried but it would be interesting to see a study of recidivism rates for convicts that were indoctrinated by different religions. My guess is there would be little difference between the religions. That any improvement among the prison population is due to the increased attention they are getting and not due to any intrinsic property of the religion itself.

Starboy

Whispers

Of course there is always the chance that god is working directly through him

or not?

BioBeing

That would be interventionism, wouldn't it? Why doesn't he (God, not Richard) just come right out and say "Hi, I'm God" rather than play these silly mind games?
More probable, IMHO.

BioBeing

Or a desire to "prove" they have become "good citizens" and get early parole?

Or am I just too cynical?

Whispers

Thats because he (God, not richard ) cannot prove himself, because that would take away our choice. If you know fire burns, you no longer have to think about whether or not fire burns. You simply know.