egotheistic pantheism revealed...

Quick question; how do you deal with the philosophy of Christian Pantheism? Who is excluding who, in that case?

........Revelation 20:11 Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. Earth and sky fled from his presence, and there was no place for them........ Orthodox Christianity = All Things are seperate from God. He can lose the heavens and the earth, and remain. He can lose the heavens and the earth and be complete.I have read your links, Archer, two of them I had read on my own. It is a very hard distinction to make, and almost beyond my ability to express at this juncture...nonetheless there is a distinction. If there was not, we wouldn't HAVE examples of panentheistic christians, but all christians would be panentheistic.I would not consider myself to be ...God is in all things? I would say something like "God uses all things" He works with creation, he is actively messing around with His art, but he is not exactly IN it. He is not united with it in any sense, except that His Spirit comes into us as a seperate and distinct force...He is still working with us, but not us, He is IN us, but not by nature. That's the best I can do.Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.

That is one flaw I would have called at the outset of this topic. Not being terribly familiar with pantheism in practice, I left it up to those who are to make the call.I think a person may say 'I am God' like an icicle saying 'I am ocean' ...'I am made of the same stuff as the ocean'...'I make up the ocean, but I am not THE ocean'?Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.

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

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?

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.

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.

Can you explain in clear terms?All beliefs exclude reality?Reality is exclusive?Reality may exclude any other reality...but are you saying all religions exclude reality?

So now it IS about the definition of religion? Exclusive of other religion?Tell me again, if there are pantheist christians, how is either exclusive? Why not just a slightly different explanation into which the other can be incorporated?

You know they don't Rob. Some do, some don't. And that is because they are coming from those different cultures and starting points. I say, if they know the truth, they know it. Showing them the gospel doesn't do anything but confuse a mind that is not steeped in the same culture. It happens all the time. Showing two Europeans of the same decade the gospel doesn't even mean they will recognize the truth...heck, no one can agree on what truth is in the gospel. There CAN only be one truth, right?

But if Christianity is God's standard, how could it be reality and yet subject to moderation?Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.

Please dissemble, or tell me my brain is fried?

And this includes your religion, yes?So you are left with proving how you know YOUR religion is reality. The law of non-contradiction is beside the point. If you prove they are all wrong, or all right, or mutually exclusive, or whatever, you can't prove which is reality.Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.

But I did, and I have, and it is! It would be so much better if you would start with a simple belief statement. Do you include, or exclude, and if so why, and whom?

You know I think your religion is closer to the truth than others, or at the very least it is my preferred path...How does one religion openly declaring itself to be true MAKE it true? How does a religion understand itself? It is just us trying to understand God.I really don't want to give you a hard time, just ignore me.