Tercel

I think you have little experience of Christians then. The above is little more than a paraphrase of CS Lewis btw.

That would be because Christ commanded it.

I'm not entirely sure this is a purely "Christian" fault. It is true however that some who have called themselves Christians have done some quite awful things to other cultures. It was to such people, I believe, that Christ was speaking when he said "You say to me 'Lord, Lord' but you do not do what I say!"

I think you need to get your facts straight!
If you have a look at the average atheist's attitude towards beliefs other than theirs (yours included) as expressed in these forums, I think it's easy to see that lack of respect for other beliefs is not soley a Christian failing.

What, atheism?
Seriously, yes I believe the only way to the Father is through the Son. That hardly equates to damnation for everyone of other beliefs though.

The Other Michael

Hello Tercel,

This leaves me wondering what it DOES mean for everyone of other beliefs.

It seems to me that if you posit only one way to salvation, then everyone else is, by definition, left out in the cold (or heat as the case may be).

cheers,
Michael

brighid

Specific experiences that are purely psychological that you subjectively attribute to the Christian God cannot be PROVEN to be the Christian God, or Satan (as I addressed in TWO separate posts that have been conveniently glossed over for less substantive ones). You think, feel or believe these purely psychological experiences are indeed a manifestation of your personal deity. And because the only place you can experience such things is in your psyche you can no more prove or disprove that it is REALLY God or Satan with whom you communicate with and experience inside your psyche. Therefore your experience is dependent upon your psyche for manifestation and the source of this stimulation cannot be verified to be the ACTUAL stimulant of your interpretation. You interpret the musings in your mind to be communication with one God, the Christian God. You interpret these musings in such a manner because you have been told that this communication is from the Christian God. However, you do not KNOW it is the Christian God, or that it is a god at all and not just a chemical or hormonal reaction to an environmental stimulant that you interpret to be something it is not.

However, you experience many things outside of the very subjective and closed experience of your psyche, that although filtered through the psyche are TESTABLE in the natural and REAL world and can be experienced simultaneously by a multitude of people, even if those individual people relay that same experience in accordance with the subjective interpretations of their psyche. And unless you are somehow dysfunctional mentally or physically all those who simultaneously experienced said event with some level of accuracy could form a common conclusion about said experience.

When my hand touches a hot surface I will be burned and it will cause me some degree of pain. No one outside of myself needed to tell me to interpret this experience as painful, it simply IS painful. But you had to be told that the feelings and thoughts you had are contact with your SPECIFIC god and you have put “faith” in those people telling you that you MUST interpret these experiences in this specific manner and in this specific manner only.

When it comes to the psychological interpretation of an experience as being divine, this interpretation cannot be factually tested by the one experiencing this event OR anyone else, simultaneously or otherwise (at least not yet). Also, the religious experience so to speak can and HAS been reproduced in the laboratory without the actual introduction of A specific god or other deities. Furthermore, the same sort of religious thoughts and feelings are had by ALL types of theists, whether they are Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Pagans or otherwise. Therefore, one can conclude that some experiences should be held as more reliable, while others should held to be less reliable or not at all reliable. How do you determine that your interpretation is the CORRECT interpretation and all other interpretations are incorrect?

All the theist CAN say is that he or she believes the events he or she has experienced are from perceived outside forces, interpreted to be his or her personal idea of a deity. Theists CAN NOT say that these experiences are INDEED the work of ANY outside entity, and most specifically that these experiences ARE the work of THEIR personal deity. It seems awfully silly and illogical (given the inability to disprove the actual nature of the experience) as being from any god, more or less a specific God and place confidence in this over all other logical, provable (and disprovable) alternate explanations. IMHO this sort of interpretation denotes a weakness or lack of confidence in ones ability to perceive and interpret reality.

In the realm of infinite or great possibilities, it is conceivable that it may be possible that your experiences are the musings of a god, but highly unlikely, if not improbable given the current data and our ability to measure and interpret that data. The JC theist MUST eliminate all other possibilities (such as the communications and feelings they receive aren’t really the work of a demon, or another deity) before the theist can conclude the possibility that this experience comes ONLY from ONE deity (as well as eliminate all other likely and plausible explanations for said experiences). In all likelihood, your experiences are the creative interpretation of your mind of specific events that have been directly shaped by the environment you have been exposed to (the JC environment as opposed to the Hindu or Pagan) and nothing more and nothing less. The whole theistic line of reasoning seriously puts the theist in a major quandary and an unnecessarily complicated one at that.


Brighid

Tercel

Brighid,

I am inclined to think you missed the point somewhere.

But you've just begged the whole question repeatedly here.
You say there are things "outside" my psyche, that there exists a "real" world, that there exist other "people".
But you can't prove any of that. You can't prove that your perceptions of the world aren't simply psycological projections of your mind. You can't prove that your experiences of the "real" world isn't an illusion created by Satan.

Just as I can't know absolutely that my experiences of God are actual communication with the Christian God, neither can you know that your experience of the world are actual interactions with a REAL world.
Just as I can't know absolutely that the Christian God exists, neither can you know absolutely that the physical world exists.

The best we can both do, is to simply trust our in our experiences as true.

Tercel

Hi Other Michael,
Not exactly: Christ died for all. (Romans 5:18,19; 2 Cor 5:14,15,19; 1 John 2:2 et al)

Paul, when preaching to the Athenians as recorded in Acts 17, does not say that those Athenians who lived earlier and died without knowing Christ were doomed to hell. Rather he said that "God has overlooked the times when people did not know him".

The word "Gospel" meant good news. (An example of the usage of the word was for messengers bringing tidings of a victory in battle) The good news in the case of the Christian meaning is that God has put us right with himself through his Son, Jesus Christ.

Of course, we must accept what Christ has done for us. Food is no help to a starving man unless he eats it, nor money any use to a beggar if he refuses to use it. But I see no reason to think that this acceptance must occur during our life on earth and cannot happen afterwards. Otherwise Paul's comments do not make sense, neither does Peter's comment that "the Good News was preached also to the dead" (1 Peter 4:5). And if Christ died for all, as is made clear, then clearly people who die never hearing the message about Christ must also have the potential to benefit from his death.

You might be inclined to ask then what the point of being a Christian is if you can wait until you die and then accept Christ if and when the truth of Christianity becomes transparently obvious. I would say "because it's true" and because ignoring the revelation God has given to us now is wrong, and not what God wants us to do.
The Athenians may well have had the same question in mind. Paul continued his speech to them with: "[God] commands all [people] everywhere to turn away from their evil ways. For he has fixed a day in which he will judge the whole world with justice by means of a man he has chosen."
Paul writes elsewhere the reason he strives so hard as an apostle:
"So we preach Christ to everyone. With all possible wisdom we warn and teach them in order to bring each one into God's presence as a mature individual in union with Christ. To get this done I toil and struggle, using the mighty strength which Christ supplies and which is at work in me." Colossians 1:28-29

It is clear that Paul's goal is to form in people the nature of Christ and turn them towards goodness and love. eg Romans 12:2; 1 Cor 12:31-14:1; Gal 5:14, 5:19-26, 6:10; Eph 4:1-3; 4:17-32; Col 3:5-14; (Just to name a few verses I have noted down recently - that is far from a comprehensive list btw)

Tercel

brighid

I’ll give you a little give and take here on this “can’t know” idea. I remember this from my freshman philosophy class – Nemo – Morpheus – is that you? Did I swallow the red or the blue pill? However there is more tangible and reliable evidence for my existence. My birth has been recorded by objective sources. My history is documented at a myriad of locations both on paper, photographically, on video and on a vast number of electronic sources. When I die my death will also be recorded for posterity and there will be a visible sign that someone, perceived to be Brighid has indeed existed. Furthermore, the fact that you and I and many others are engaging in an actual and electronically transmitted and recorded conversation is a legitimate form of proof that something is taking place between beings on this plateau of existence. Our conversations can be monitored and critiqued, archived and studied. Admittedly, my given name is not Brighid, but the ideas, thoughts and experiences I share here are my own. Perhaps, (as I have been accused by theists SO many times before) I am a daughter of Satan, come here to test your resolve as dictated by your idea of God. In the end there will be no question that I have certainly existed. Perhaps the perception of “reality” is an illusion. But if everything a human experiences in life is all an illusion then why choose to believe in something that is a far greater and less tangible illusion then the body and mind you will be using to reply to later posts?

You have admitted that you cannot know that the propagator of your faith is not Satan or that it is even your version of God, or that you know anything because life is quite possibly an illusion. I think that is a not so clever way to weasel out of the question you know I was getting at, such as the certainty that you are indeed correct in your perception of the illusion you call reality and God. You certainly can KNOW to the greatest degree one is able to know that YOU are indeed alive, that other people around you exist and are alive, that your body needs certain things such as food, water, sunlight, and other forms of nourishment. If it is all an illusion I am afraid that this illusion is all we have and we can’t escape it, so we had better learn to live with all that we have. And if what theists believe is correct and this God of yours is responsible for creating this world, and everything in it, He is also responsible for creating this horrible and inescapable illusion. Yet another quandary for the theist!

You don’t know your Holy Book isn’t the work of Satan, yet you formulate your entire illusionary world-view upon this “faith” that it is really God who is the disseminator of this faith and do so by the urgings of the Holy Bible, not the Quran, not the Vedas, the Gita, the Satanic Bible, or any other ancient text. You do so for one reason and one reason only – this is what you have been exposed to in your environment and because this is what you have been TOLD is the ONLY true path to your illusionary and “unknowable” God. Talk about circular reasoning – YIKES! How terrible to be trapped in your squirrel cage!!

Brighid

Ted Hoffman

Tercel
You can prove it - we use each other as testing-boards. If I see an pink elephant and ask someone if they can see it too, then I have proved that my perception is not simply a psychological projection.

Pomp

IntenSity,

If I see an pink elephant and ask someone if they can see it too, then I have proved that my perception is not simply a psychological projection.

Well, not necessarily. It's always possible that the person you ask to verify your perception of the pink elephant is also a psychological projection.

Wayne Delia

I made this offhand remark a few years ago, which ended up in the sig file of a friend of mine posting on alt.religion.kibology:

"So, then, why don't we go out and WORSHIP anything and everything that could possibly be true?"

GunnerJ

BUMPed because the Finch is back.