The Marketing Of Christianity

So you believe in one god that will judge us - the Christian god - the resurection, heaven, holy ghosts etc, but you don't think it matters whether it's true or a bunch of myths?There's any number of ways believers can delude themselves it seems.

I believe in One God because it logically makes sense. Only One is needed. Were I to believe that no God were needed, I would have faith in myself, you, and all the rest of us. I was raised Methodist, but until I was around 30, I never thought much about God---apart from cartoon images of an old man. I understand most of the arguments. Belief is illogical unless one has a reason or even a need to believe. Apparently many people don't.When I became a believer, it happened suddenly. I dont recall wanting anything to happen because I was unaware that I would or even could feel any different.I thought it odd, however, that these people did nothing but talk about God and Jesus and actually enjoy it as much as the rest of us would enjoy a football game and talking about the players.

You can be forgiven for beliving in "a" god - at least until we know more about how our universe works - but you also believe in the rediculous idea of religion.You believe in an interventionist god that requires worship and condemns all other belief systems and their believers. You believe in heaven and, I suppose, hell and all the daft human invented biblical trappings. You could only believe those things by being born where you were born at the time you were born there. (A few hundred years earlier you would have believed in ancestor worship.)But the issue is that you believe something different to Jar and something different to Faith and something different GDR. All the same damn religion. All supposedly the revealed truth. Well if that not proof that people make up their beliefs I don't know what is.Edited by Tangle, : No reason given.

Not quite.I do believe that there is a GOD and I do believe that we all will be judged based on our behavior, not our beliefs or acclamations. I also understand that as long as we are alive and perhaps even after we are dead we will not know if that is true.But I think the message that Jesus marketed (according to the stories) about how we should live our lives, this life, how we should relate to others and to the world itself is important and significant even if the stories were nothing more than tales told around the campfire.I see Christianity as the path I have chosen to follow but also understand that the Map is not the Territory. It is not the only path and certainly not the "True" path or even the "Divine" path, but rather the path I am on.As to the resurrection, that is a minor point. The ascension is far more significant and yes, I do believe that happened. But I also understand that it is a belief, not a fact.I've covered all this many times here at EvC and if you would like will happily cover and expand on it yet again for you. Please feel free to ask if you have more questions.

True. Although many of us agree on some points-- yes. that would be Christianity. No. some of us believe that truth is not revealed but is chosen through logic, reason, and reality. I personally believe that it is also revealed by God through the Holy Spirit. It is what it is.Edited by Phat, : No reason given.

What you describe is just another version of liberal, pick-and-mix, 'nice', Christianity. That's fine, it's what most here believe. But it isn't what you professed to believe, which was the Nicene Creed.

So the 'truth' has been revealed to you but it's a different 'truth' from GDR's or Jar's or Faith's? That's quite a puzzle isn't it? Are there different 'truths' ?? It sure is - it's something people made up and self-evidently makes no sense.

Really? Have you actually ever read the Nicene Creed? Would you like to point out what part of the Nicene Creed I do not believe?Too funny!

Or orcs and hobbits. Or anything else that has no real effect on our lives.

This comment is getting a little tired don't you think? I admit that I leapt to the assumption that you believed the Catholic version which obliges you to also believe that only the one church can remit sins which excludes the majority of the world's population from a pleasant afterlife.And then there's the fussiness over the resurrection which you prefer to finesse.....

Just to be clear, the word "catholic" in the Niocene Creed is distinct from the term "Catholic" which refers to the Catholic church. "catholic" lower case is generally translated to mean a universal Christian Church composed of all believers. "Catholic" upper case refers to the Roman Catholic Church.There is only one Niocene Creed. If you can distinguish jar's beliefs or any other protestants from being in accordance with the Niocene creed, being non-Church of Rome really is irrelevant.

There appear to be at least 2First Council of Nicea (325)
First Council of Constantinople (381)Nicene Creed - WikipediaThe second is the one I assumed.

Right. But as I pointed out, that creed does not put the Catholic Church as the authority for remission of sins.

As I see it jar there are two aspects to the Christian faith. The first is that God has given humans the ability to understand right and wrong, good and evil, and wants us to infect the world with that point of view. We are in agreement on that but so are people of other faiths and non-faiths as well for that matter.The second aspect is the Christian narrative. It is the story of God reaching out to hearts and minds of people, and in this case one small beaten up tribe in the Middle East. The OT tells the story of this people with all their triumphs, but even more so of their failures. The climax of that part of the narrative is Jesus Christ. It is the life, crucifixion, resurrection and ascension of Jesus that is the basis for the Christian narrative.Slowly through the narrative we can see a progressive revelation of how it becomes less and less about trying to figure out how to get God to do what we want Him to do ,and more and more about what we can do to serve Him. This comes to a head in the Gospels in places like the Sermon on the Mount or Matthew 25. It is also in the OT as you can see in my signature.If Jesus is simply a man, (as I recall you saying), who lived and died like anyone else never to be seen again, then the Gospel stories aren't good news only good advice. On top of that, as I have said before, it shows Jesus as being delusional, with the idea that He could replace the Temple by forgiving sins, and saying essentially that He was embodying Yahweh's return to His people. Christianity is the belief that Jesus got it right and this belief is vindicated by God with the resurrection.

Let me see if I have the basics:
1) One side believes it is important for humans to commune/relate to God. The other side says it does not matter since we have been given instructions in the stories. Whether the stories are factual or not is irrelevant according to one view. Content is more important than Source. I would argue that it is important to my faith to believe that God is interactive with humanity.Critics may scoff and say that without evidence, such a belief is ludicrous and is a commonly made up story over the years.Others may say that this is not just a story---this is reality. God does exist. God is interactive. We believe this because we believe in the story of Jesus Christ.I was taught that belief is the cornerstone of faith. Critics would argue that actions speak louder than words. Without evidence, we have nothing...they would assert.