Christianity Thread

[aero]

There's no proper thread for Christianity here, just a general religion thread that died and a bunch of off topic posts about it when Islam was discussed in other threads. I've been reading the Bible a bit, checked out some videos on Mormon Channel about Christ, some stuff about Brother Nathanael & Brother Dean, and have been listening to Common Filth Radio and I've got to say a lot of what I've read and seen is intriguing to say the least. I haven't converted or anything, but as I read I find several verses to be very applicable to the ills of today's dying cultures and more than just "le schizophrenic sand scratchings" like fedoras say. I'm not going to data mine, but if you're a Christian please reference or share your denomination and what you believe and don't. I don't want this thread to go off topic too much so I'd also want to ask that other religions or atheism not be discussed extensively making this a dupe of the Religion Thread.

[PixelPest]

I'm Roman Catholic, so that pretty much revolves around beliefs in creationism, Jesus being God coming down on Earth to die as a human being, thereby saving us from our sins, the Ascension, and His return to Earth at the end of time where the dead will rise and final judgement will be given. It also revolves around beliefs in the Holy Spirit and Heaven. We also are supposed to receive seven Holy Sacraments throughout our lives. We also are supposed to go to church every Sunday and our churches (and basilicas, like the giant churches in Rome, there's one in my city too) are the giant majestic ones with the stained glass windows, pews, etc. One of the things I struggle with believing in is Hell, because if God is all loving and all powerful, why would He let His own creations (us) be eternally tortured by Satin?

I agree that the Bible is interesting to read (I'm not one of those people that reads it every night and has the entire things memorized), but I did have to study it in Religion this year and last year, since I go to a Catholic school, and did quite enjoy those units. Even if you aren't Catholic, the Bible has a lot of interesting stories, especially in the beginning of the Old Testament (such as Genesis, Exodus, etc.) and near the end of the New Testament is especially interesting, yet somewhat disturbing (such as Revelations), however you don't even need to be Christian to understand the morals or enjoy it

[aero]

You have to remember that Hell is not a material realm and isn't necessarily the Hollywood style torture porn it's made out to be With Satan* wielding a pitchfork. To be in Hell is to be without God and so therefor without love, goodness, happiness, bonding, respect, or the life benefits that come from these things.

[PixelPest]

You have to remember that Hell is not a material realm and isn't necessarily the Hollywood style torture porn it's made out to be With Satan* wielding a pitchfork. To be in Hell is to be without God and so therefor without love, goodness, happiness, bonding, respect, or the life benefits that come from these things.

I'm completely aware that it is just like a cold darkness without the presence of God, but it just seems so awful that He would abandon His own creations. If you had a child that hated you, would you throw them out on the street?

[aero]

To that I would say it's man abandoning God instead of God abandoning man. The essential point of Christianity is believing Christ died and has risen, and that through Him you will enter heaven. It would be more like if your child hated you and then ran away from you, than kicking them out. This kind of goes into what's drawn me towards Christianity, because people defy Christ's teachings and all roads lead to Romans 6:23 every time for them.

[Shadow Yoshi]

The totally accurate representation of Christianity

Not appropriate for this thread.

[MistakesWereMade]

The totally accurate representation of Christianity

Not appropriate for this thread.

Aww, you're no fun
Your forum, your rules, so fine.

Now for my two sense; I personally identify as Christian (though I'm not exactly the religious sort) because I was brought up in a Christian household. However, my beliefs are very laid back, and are pretty much unchristian in relation to what other Christians believe i.e. I don't personally have an answer for whether or not there is a "God" nor do I personally believe that Jesus is the son of God (if he does exist), but I do believe that he was a great man who was very skilled and selfless. Also, while I do consider myself a Christian, I do not value the Bible as a whole, but rather, the morals that can be taught in certain stories. These believes have led me to question whether or not I can still technically be a Christian, for I do not know what makes someone a Christian as opposed to a non-Christian. I guess I could technically be considered unorthodox, but even then, I don't know what exactly it means to be any sect of Christianity to be honest. I was baptized as an Episcopalian, I believe, but that does not really mean anything to me now, especially considering how I grew up in a very lax household when it comes to religion.

tl:dr I'm Christian, but I really question whether or not it is by name only.

That's not being Christian. That's being Agnostic.

[aero]

What makes someone a Christian is the belief in the divinity of Jesus Christ, that he's God's son, and he died but came back to life.

[aero]

Your point is moot if you consider John 14:6 and Acts 16:31 since Jesus taught these things. To be completely honest you seem to be part of this new Christianity where the Bible, and faith are thrown out and the only things that matter is "don't judge" and "be nice."

[ragont]

I am a devout christian and this here is my 12 gauge

[PixelPest]

Your point is moot if you consider John 14:6 and Acts 16:31 since Jesus taught these things. To be completely honest you seem to be part of this new Christianity where the Bible, and faith are thrown out and the only things that matter is "don't judge" and "be nice."

That's pretty much me, lol. I guess I'm just a Christian, and not part of any one sect. In my defense, however, I do not believe that the Bible is entirely lies; I just feel that there are plenty of exaggerations of things that actually did happen (Moses parting the sea, for example, could be explained through a path that had been in the water whether by physical land mass or other materials, or Noah's Ark could just be massive flooding in one particular part of the world). But yeah, I'm pretty much a guy who only really values the morals that each story holds and only think of the stories as exaggerations of the truth or only stories. There are many different takes on what it means to "be a Christian".

I guess the issue we're getting to here is Christian by Culture vs. Practicing Christian

[TLtimelord]

I personally follow a pretty loose definition of Christianity. I grew up in a fairly lenient Catholic household and most of my entire extended family is Catholic. I go to church most sundays with my dad.

My personal views on the Bible? Any fundamentalists who unconditionally believe every word in it is God's word are delusional extremists in my opinion. There are so many outdated ethics in the Bible and most of them come from the Old Testament. As far as I'm aware (I've done very little studying on the Bible and I really need to do more), Jesus in a way nullified most of the Old Testament through his teachings, which are in the New Testament and I think the New Testament is the half of the Bible that us Christians should really follow more often as opposed to the Old as it would at least make us fit in more with modern society's ever-evolving beliefs.

I will also say that throughout the at most thousand (give or take) years the Bible has been constructed, there has ought to have been many different words changed and translated incorrectly, especially during the early middle age when there was hardly any society left after the fall of the Roman Empire. There is undoubtedly some stuff that may have been changed, removed, or added based on a corrupt pope's desires (and believe me, there was a fuckshit amount of corruption within the Catholic Church throughout the middle ages, like it puts most of modern day corruption to shame). I see most of the Bible as not so much completely 100% true stories, but more or less fables with plenty of potential historical truth behind stories, as well as plenty of lessons for Christians to follow. They don't have to be true stories to believe in the message they're trying to convey.

So aside my tangents, my closing statement is that not all of the stories of the Bible are true, especially if all of its stories come before the middle ages. But the stories likely not being real doesn't nullify any of the messages it tries to teach us Christians. As Christians, we're supposed to be loving and compassionate people. We're not supposed to condemn people for what they do, only condemn their actions. We're meant to be forgiving, no matter what someone has done and we're meant to pray for good fortunes to the people around us, even to the people we hate most. Hatred and wishing bad things upon others is sinful, even if you never speak a word about it to anyone else. Basically, our Bible is supposed to teach us to not be a resentful dick and be happy no matter what. It isn't followed perfectly, but hey, we're not a perfect species.

[Valtteri]

In order to work, today's society requires that everything is indeed thrown out of Christianity besides "don't judge" and "be nice". I don't mind the faith part (it doesn't really harm anyone to believe in Jesus etc) but it's dangerous to demand that the Bible is taken literally, i.e. that you should be killed for working on Sundays, not being Christian, committing a homosexual act etc.

[PixelPest]

My personal views on the Bible? Any fundamentalists who unconditionally believe every word in it is God's word are delusional extremists in my opinion. There are so many outdated ethics in the Bible and most of them come from the Old Testament. As far as I'm aware (I've done very little studying on the Bible and I really need to do more), Jesus in a way nullified most of the Old Testament through his teachings, which are in the New Testament and I think the New Testament is the half of the Bible that us Christians should really follow more often as opposed to the Old as it would at least make us fit in more with modern society's ever-evolving beliefs.

I would disagree. Everything written in the Bible is God-given knowledge and truth, the reader just can't always take it literally

[Shadow Yoshi]

God being omniscient has nothing to do with whether he presents his information figuratively or literally.

[PixelPest]

But if God is omniscient, then his wisdom would never be questioned, meaning what he said would have to be taken literally.

Just because He is all knowing doesn't mean that He's not going to make us work for His knowledge. A lot of the Old Testament teachings though could be interpreted literally back in the time they were written, and we now have to look for hidden messages that are still in them to apply to present-day, but also sometimes they would have to still do the same thing we do now; not expect everything to be given straight to us

[aero]

But if God is omniscient, then his wisdom would never be questioned, meaning what he said would have to be taken literally.

Matthew 13:13

There's plenty of examples of Jesus using hyperbole to communicate the seriousness of sin, such as in Matthew 18:9.

killed for working on Sundays, not being Christian, committing a homosexual act etc.

Killing refers to Old Testament laws. Since they're fulfilled in the New Testament they don't apply as they did then, but the lessons do depending on the denomination of the church that observes them (if they do at all.)

[Kyo Saito]

killed for working on Sundays, not being Christian, committing a homosexual act etc.

Killing refers to Old Testament laws. Since they're fulfilled in the New Testament they don't apply as they did then, but the lessons do depending on the denomination of the church that observes them (if they do at all.)

I hope you do realize that the differences between the Old Testament and the New Testament are people picking and choosing which laws they would like to follow, while still trying to keep Christianity in the light of "good". An example of this is right here, which is taking out the mentions of killing people. You can omit them from your following of Christianity, but we all know that they're still there, and that is what Christianity stood by. With the amount of butchering the religion has received in the last X years, I'm surprised people didn't drop it entirely and form a brand new religion centered around God and Jesus Christ, because I bet if they did, they wouldn't be getting put in the spotlight every so often.

[aero]

I do realize people pick and choose, otherwise there wouldn't be different denominations. What I'm trying to get at is the Biblical explanation on the matter, because if you ask people you'll always get different answers to what laws are to be followed and what teachings are observed. The killing part is there, and you have to interpret it in the context of the passages the verses are written in as well as if it's pre or post Christ because there is important revelations that separate the new law from the old.

For the last thing you mentioned, that's not really how religions work. What matters is revelation, and not necessarily popularity or wordly circumstances.

[Kyo Saito]

For the last thing you mentioned, that's not really how religions work. What matters is revelation, and not necessarily popularity or wordly circumstances.

What I'm getting at is that since the texts within the Bible have been translated, swapped around, and re-translated to the point where the original texts have lost their meaning and a majority of the religion is abandoning what used to be, that being the Old Testament, it would have been a lot easier on them if they abandoned the idea of Christianity entirely and formed a new religion with their new texts, instead of rewriting what was old. I'm not saying it's even remotely possible for that to happen in this day and age, but if, say hundreds of years ago, they didn't want Christianity put into a bad spotlight at times, they shouldn't have kept the mentions of killing in their namesake. It's one thing to abandon texts and label them obsolete, but it's another thing to keep them under your name as the "Old Testament", because that still puts them to your name.

I must ask, which version of the Bible do you refer to?

And I also must ask, are you in the belief that Jesus died, yet came back to life? If so, how, logically, did that happen?