egotheistic pantheism revealed...

No, my truth cannot be true. The truth is something that I must conform to, because it precedes me.John 1:29 The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, "Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! 30 This is the one I meant when I said, 'A man who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.'

I have to take the boys to the park before I get a divorce. Sometimes jar is right about her. I am not balancing all of my responsibilities well.I'll get back to y'all...

And yet your statement This is my second request for references that pantheist believe all paths "will lead to where the pantheists are".This straw claim is key to your leading statement in the OP. And now you provide scripture quotes to prove your religion is exclusive. We already know that. Edited by iceage, : No reason given.Edited by iceage, : No reason given.

How could anyone know? Why one gate?Law of Non-Contradiction?How absurd. Why would it apply? Of course. That could well be either a misreading of what the Bible says (as I believe) or just plain wrong.GOD is not a religion. Religions are just something men created. They are but Maps, not the Territory.In addition, the fact that one part of a religion might be wrong says nothing about other parts of the religion. All the Maps will have areas where they are accurate, and areas where they are not as accurate.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

No argument there.

I am not so swift, anglagard, but once you described Spinoza I finally realized who was on your avatar.

Care to elaborate upon why you believe this way rather than just engage in a bunch of unsupported assertions?I am pretty sure that at least in regard to Spinoza Pantheism, you don't have the slightest idea what you are talking about.Not only that, but I also believe you will never know what you are talking about in this regard because I believe you will never read Spinoza.

What if the religion simply says there are many paths to the gate? No matter what the gate turns out to be, or if the religion even attempts to explain, deify, personify or create the gate, they don't exclude THE gate from being true?

What is so funny is using the quote from John: If one reads the parable of the Sheep and the Goats it is pretty obvious that the GOATs are Christians, the Sheep may or may not be.Seems like Jesus is trying to tell most Christians that they don't have a clue what Salvation will depend on.The odds are that Heaven will be filled with far more Atheists and Satanists and Agnostics and Pantheists and Muslims and Jews and Taoists and Buddhists and Wiccans and Hindus than there will be Christians.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

So is it wrong to think that Jesus was not talking about any religion based on Him...He is saying 'I am the gate through which salvation came to the world' so that now, whether Hindu, Muslim, etc., men can be saved?I *think* that is what the church means by 'extra ecclesia nulla salus'. Not that only Catholic Christians will be saved, but that salvation only came to the world thru Christ.

"extra ecclesia nulla salus" is a problem for the RCC. It means that there is no salvation outside the Catholic Church.BUT ...Joseph Ratzinger once wrote that the interpretation of that had changed. His reasoning is that it is impossible to believe that all those people who lived before the advent of the Roman Catholic Church are damned.I have a feeling that what Joe says may become accepted RCC dogma.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I think the interp. has changed, or there have been folks in both camps for years, or that the interpretation was a misunderstanding and conflation of the words themselves with the concept behind them.You can go to heaven if you are not in the catholic church.No one would go to heaven if it weren't for the catholic church.I didn't want to get too off-topic, but I understand what you are saying.

from wiki:

quote:

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In a New Age context, egotheism can mean the deification of the self. Identification of the self, in some sense, with the divine, is a tenet of Hinduism (Atman as the "true self"), as well as certain versions of Christianity (as in the theology of St. Athanasios, that God became man so that man could become God). Complete identification of the self with God has been equated with atheism.

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This new age stuff you are talking about seems clearly egotheism that has come from a Hindu culture.

You're quite right... A true religion is not a religion. It is reality.Here is the difference between Christianity and religion. God came to man. It was top down.Sure we can't get there.
But He can.Btw, this thread is not about the definition of religion. it is about the fact that all belief systems; all philosophies; all religions; and reality, are exclusive.If you want to prove me wrong, then don't disagree, or you will prove me right.

Who revealed the truth to mankind, Jesus Christ or Spinoza?Matthew 24: 10 At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, 11 and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. 12 Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, 13 but he who stands firm to the end will be saved. 14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. 15 "So when you see standing in the holy place 'the abomination that causes desolation,' spoken of through the prophet Daniel--let the reader understand--