a rabbi and a priest pass each other every morning on the way to worship. they always smile and give a harty hello and pray for each other that day. one day the priest who is always on a bike is walking. the rabbi stops him...

'where is your bike my friend?' the rabbi asks.

'some one has stolen it. can you imagine. it was given to me by the youth of my church.' said the priest heart broken.

'oh how terrible.' said the rabbi. then rubbing his beard his eyes lit up and he had an idea. 'father, sunday give a surmon on the ten commandments, i will give one on saturday. when we reach the one about stealing the thief will feel very guilty and return your bike.'

the priest feeling much better went to the church and wrote a surmon on the 10 commandments.



the next monday the rabbi pas t the priest on the bike and called 'father i see my idea worked.'

'yes rabbi when i got to the part about adultry i rembered where i left it.'

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customerjon @gmail.com is where information happens.

"I just do not believe that we are here by chance and after we die we simply quit breathing and cease to exist. "

Why on earth not ?

"I can think of nothing more hopeless and bleak than that."

Yes, I'm afraid it's tough.

If there is no purpose to our existence, and there is nothing after we leave this earth, what should we do -- simply live our lives for today, for instant self-gratification with no thought to the well-being others?

No, do what all the other species do. Socially interact for the benefit of the group and thereby yourself.

"I see too much evidence around me that God exists. How could this world, as beautiful and diverse as it is, be formed by chance? How could the animals, as beautiful and diverse as they are, have come to life and then evolved into what they are today simply by chance? I just don't buy it."

You should buy it! Read books on it.(eg Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors) It's pretty simple nowadays to project evolutionary theory on a computer. The probability of the above diverse and beautiful species being here is high enough that they could evolve by chance. It's a simple mathematical model.

"Believing that there is a God out there who cares for me and loves me gives my life meaning and purpose. And believing that I'll be taken care of by this God even in death gives me hope that stretches beyond the life in which I live right now".

You need to lose your fear of death a bit, then you won't need this quasi parental comforting quite so much.

"I don't think religion is the opium of the masses."

What drug is it then? Some kind of mind altering has taken place.

"It could better be termed the hope of those who believe."

Or perhaps the hope of those afraid not to believe. Fear is a very dominant feature in all religions.

"Religion also should not take away personal responsiblity for one's actions. Christianity does not eliminate personal responsibility. We are given the free will to choose whatever path we so desire, but we will be held accountable for those choices."

At last a voice of reason, but you know, we're held accountable whether we believe or not. Just ask the Hussein brothers.

"So yes, my religion does give me a reason for living, and it gives me hope for the future. It makes me complete, and it makes me feel whole.

For this very reason I would urge you not to change. Without this metaphorical crutch you'd be hopeless, a basket case and a burden on society.

Without God, our existence is hopeless. With God, we have the hope of eternity."

Hope, hope .... is that all !

And that is very, very powerful.

Amen

Kevin wrote: I would like to ask the christians if there is a christian triathlon club that I need to know about on the internet.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/triChrist/

David W / FEY2K

Once again, we are about to get off on another tangent which we will be unable to resolve. I do not for a fleeting instant believe in anything you typed. And apparently, you do not believe in what I typed. This is one of those things where we will just have to agree to disagree and let it go at that. I respect your right to believe as you do, and I respect you for putting your beliefs on the forum, though I may not agree with what you wrote. This another one of those things that I do not mind discussing; however it is probably best discussed off the forum.

Robert Preston
rnhpreston@charter.net

I read his book a couple years ago and seem to remember the cross having something to do with a fellow cancer patient and his mom. Anyway I found this excerpt on another ng. Didn't have time to look it up myself.

From "It's not about the bike"....

"My mother came across two pretty silver crucifixes on chains, and bought them for me. I wore one, and I gave the other to Stacy. She was completely agnostic, just like me, but I said "Stacy, I want to give you this cross, and I am going to wear one, too. This is going to be our bond. You wear it when you're being treated, or wear it whenever you want. And I'll wear mine forever." We wore them not as religious symbols but universal ones, symbols or our cancer kinship"


I believe Stacy was somebody that worked (a secretary maybe?) with a good friend of his. If memory serves me correctly, she was not responding to the treatments and elected to discontinue chemo. She did not make it through the disease.