The sad thing that I see is people using that as some sort of evidentiary claim that Christianity itself is inherently wrong. To which I reply: Well, is that evidence of Christ being wrong, or of some His followers who manipulated His words for their own gain?
We don't base Christianity on other Christians who are every bit as fallible as any other human being-- rather we base it on Christ alone who uncovers those faults. Indeed, I echo Paul's sentiments here when he said that if anyone brings to you another gospel other than the one presented to you by Yeshua, then let it be anathema.
What people love to do is point out how some avowed Christian says or does something counter to their own ascribed theology, only to bring the whole of Christendom in to ill-repute. That kind of reasoning is flawed, as it only serves to confirm that the people espousing it are wrong, not the doctrine itself.
In an ideal world, every belief system would be judged solely on its own merits and not on the those who have misused it. But this is not an ideal world and the actions of Christians do indeed influence everyone's perception of Christianity and of its merits.
And also, doesn't the Bible, through the Matthew 7:20 test, instruct us to judge a theology by what it produces? Aren't the actions of Christians some of the fruits by which we are to know Christianity? Especially when those actions are the result of the doctrine that those Christians were taught?
Just what
is it that makes so many Christians misbehave in almost the exact same manner? Were they that way to start with and there's something about Christianity that draws them all to it? Or were they transformed into such people
by the teachings of their church? I believe that it is the latter case. For example, over the decades I have witnessed much dishonesty and deception and even outright lying being practiced by creation-science-ites. It is the very nature of "creation science" which leads them to such transgressions. Plus, their church leaders teach them to use those lies. An evangelical I met on-line, Carl Drews, tells of how he had to leave his church because the pastors supported using lies (see
No webpage found at provided URL: http://www.theistic-evolution.com/mystory.html) and the members cared nothing of the truth, but were instead eager to use anything that sounded like it supported their position. In an email, he described their intent to me as (paraphrasing from memory), "gathering ammo for proselytizing". To put that into proper perspective, Glenn Morton posted a newsgroup post by one Scott Rauch who said:
quote:
I still hold some anger because I believe the evangelical Christian community did not properly prepare me for the creation/evolution debate. They gave me a gun loaded with blanks, and sent me out. I was creamed."
Now of course, no Christian has ever followed Christianity itself, but rather they have all followed their own theologies. Everybody builds his own theology and each person follows his own theology. Of course, most try to model that theology after an ideal standard, which would be the doctrine of their church. But in order to follow that doctrine, they must know it. That means that they must learn it and, in that process, will fail to get it absolutely right. They will be ignorant of many parts of that doctrine and will probably remain ignorant of at least some parts. They will misunderstand a lot and must therefore discover what they misunderstand and endeavor to correct their understanding. Ironically, in order to uncover their misunderstandings they must constantly question what they believe, yet one of the beliefs that many have is that they must
not question their beliefs. Hence most misunderstandings are never corrected.
The problem is compounded by the fact that they are never actually taught their church's doctrine, but rather their teachers teach them the teachers' theologies, complete with the teachers' own misunderstandings of the actual doctrine. And this has been happening for generation after generation. Even the church's actual doctrine is build from the founders' and early generations' interpretation of that upon which they tried to base that doctrine, complete with their own particular misunderstandings. As Thomas Paine so aptly expressed in
The Age of Reason:
quote:
Revelation, when applied to religion, means something communicated immediately from God to man.
No one will deny or dispute the power of the Almighty to make such a communication, if he pleases. But admitting, for the sake of a case, that something has been revealed to a certain person, and not revealed to any other person, it is revelation to that person only. When he tells it to a second person, a second to a third, a third to a fourth, and so on, it ceases to be a revelation to all those persons. It is revelation to the first person only, and hearsay to every other, and consequently they are not obliged to believe it.
It is a contradiction in terms and ideas, to call anything a revelation that comes to us at second-hand, either verbally or in writing. Revelation is necessarily limited to the first communication- after this, it is only an account of something which that person says was a revelation made to him; and though he may find himself obliged to believe it, it cannot be incumbent on me to believe it in the same manner; for it was not a revelation made to me, and I have only his word for it that it was made to him.
[after giving several examples] - it is hearsay upon hearsay, and I do not choose to rest my belief upon such evidence.
I differ with Mr. Paine in that, due to the first person's need to try to understand that Revelation which he had received and the inevitable result that he will not understand it completely correctly and accurately. And hence it would have become hearsay even to that first person.
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