He cares because while he himself is too smart to fall for some stupid fantasy like God, he can understand how some weak-minded ignorami like you and me need to delude ourselves about it. But he only thinks we should delude ourselves just enough to “try to be good folk.” He doesn’t think we should hold any real concrete beliefs about God, or anything. He’s enlightened enough to leave us alone in our belief in some nebulous higher power, but we just better not take things too far for his enlightened sensibilities.
From the perspective of those that would say they find Christians to be superior, I think that particular verse has the exact opposite effect. It might mean to you that there is no superiority, but to many non-Christians that could easily be translated to “You are right if you are a Christian, they are wrong” and I think that is where they find the superiority to stem from.
The whole thing comes down to: you believe it, non-believers don’t. To you it proves you are right, and therefore not superior; to them it could be proof that you feel you are superior.
PS: (being nitpicky, though I might be wrong, regarding a follow up you wrote about the verse) Isn’t that verse written by John who is quoting Jesus? If so, John wrote it, not Jesus.
A friend of mine told me that the Rapture will happen (he states this is in the Bible, I don’t know, though) when a leader from the East and a leader from the West clash. So, he believes that George W. believes he is the great West leader and Bin Laden is the East leader. So, Rapture is just around the corner with this ultimate clash.
Well, he listens a lot to Air America and hates Bush and Microsoft and (I think) for’ners. So I just shrug my shoulders, smile a little and hope for a phone call. He is entertaining, though.
I’ve said it before on here… Get the books, The Case for Christ and The Case for Faith by Lee Strobel. He is a Yale-educated legal journalist who set out to debunk Christianity from an evidencial perspective, and not only found out that he could not, but actually came to accept Jesus as his Savior in the process. The books are an easy read and can be taken in little “chunks” as your time allows. Furthermore, the books specifically tackle those “hard to answer questions” that everyone has about believe, regardless of where you stand.
By the way, following Christ is extreme! We believe that God became man; loved those who persecuted Him; died for our sins; rose again; and from a band of a few timid followers, spread His message over the entire world. If that’s not EXTREME, what is? Extreme love, extreme faith, extreme patience, extreme joy, extreme Peace.
The danger is in those luke-warm church-goers who self-righteously sit in their pews discussing what is wrong with everyone else, thinking that they’ve got it all figured out. I think they are the people you need to worry about, but don’t lump in every Christ-follower with their example, or reject Christ on that basis.
Does everyone from Catholics to Methodists to Baptists all believe in Rapture?? Seems like the Pentecostals talk about it a lot and the Catholics don’t talk about it much.
Just curious as to the beliefs of the differing Christian religions.
Also curious if anyone would know if there are other religions (that are Non-Christian) that have some sort of “Rapture” aspect – Like Pele coming out of the Volcano and taking the Hawaiians to heaven (note: this is an example – there is NO such story in Hawaii)
“My take on it is that if you believe in the Bible, you believe in the rapture because the Bible talks about it”
Although it’s probably good to point out that the Bible never directly talks about “Rapture.” The basic process though is mentioned several times. the basic idea is that some people can escape the trials and tribulations that preced the end of the world. As Casey said, the Bible is fairly clear about this. Jesus said:
“Be careful, or your hearts will be weighed down with dissipation, drunkenness and the anxieties of life, and that day will close on you unexpectedly like a trap. For it will come upon all those who live on the face of the whole earth. Be always on the watch, and pray that you may be able to escape all that is about to happen, and that you may be able to stand before the Son of Man.”
The idea is that some will “escape” the bad all that bad stuff in Revelations and be taken to heaven to stand before Christ.
and how will either of those books help me when i a) will never ever think homosexual behavior is wrong and b) will never believe that life begins at conception? aren’t those two pretty established tenets of christianity?
“and how will either of those books help me when i a) will never ever think homosexual behavior is wrong and b) will never believe that life begins at conception? aren’t those two pretty established tenets of christianity?”
You’re right. If you have already decided that nothing will ever convince you of anything other than what you already believe, then you should forgo reading those books. In fact, you should forgo reading any books,…or newspapers or magazines or plays or anything at all. you should also stop watching the news or the discovery Channel or trying to learn anything at all. After all, you’ve already got it all figured out.
see that isn’t a fair characterization. on something like abortion, where i am pro-choice, i am fully cognizant that my views could be changed if/when i have a child and see some earlier stages of development and recognize that it’s a little human even if not “viable”. in other words, i can envision evidence or situations that would lead me to change my views to a large, large degree. but with homosexuality or conception, i can’t think of any evidence that could be presented, at the moment, that would cause me to change my mind. “because it is” doesn’t cut it.
this is a further mischaracterization, by the way, because your posts definitely take on a tone that i reached my views uncritically or without thought, which isn’t the case.
moreover, the tone of your post implies a criticism that i could levy at many, many religious folks…
There’s precious little in the NT about homosexuality, (Jesus says nothing about it) although we all have probably heard the OT prohibitions. It’s probably safe to say though that historically both Catholic and Protestants have considered homosexuality a sin, although I’d argue that was simply a formalization of a popular prejudice.
There’s nothing in the Bible at all about life beginning at conception that I know of. I’m not sure where the Catholic theology that life begins at conception came from. I’m sure vitus will correct me if I’m wrong, but neither St. Augustine nor Aquinas believed that. But clearly some pope made that pronouncement ex cathedra right?
There’s a very large school of thought that says you can’t ever be in the club.
There’s a smaller school of thought that says you can.
Some would say it is up to you to decide which school you will put yourself into and which is right, though others would say it doesn’t matter what any of us think but that a higher force/power/spirit/being/“something”/“everything” will ultimately decide.
It’s an interesting question if people are willing to take it seriously.
“this is a further mischaracterization, by the way, because your posts definitely take on a tone that i reached my views uncritically or without thought, which isn’t the case.”
I wasn’t trying to say that you hadn’t thought out your views, but to say that nothing will ever convince you of X is a pretty closed minded way of going through life. Your own point seemed to be that reading those books was a waste of your time because your mind was made up. I was simply agreeing with you.
“moreover, the tone of your post implies a criticism that i could levy at many, many religious folks.”
And that criticism would probably be valid. Closed minds are a bad thing no matter what form they take.
"or from another angle, how could i ever be “in the club” so to speak, if i can’t get past those two hurdles? "
There are virtually endless ways in which people practice their Christianity. Every denomination believes slightly differently from every other denomination. As far as I know, having been an Episcopalian all my life and having taken 9years of Lutheran grade school, all you need to believe for sure is that God sent his only Son to Earth to die for the forgiveness of our sins. All the other stuff is important, but that is the real deal breaker. Not every Christian believes that life begins at conception or that homosexuality is a sin.
“Be careful, or your hearts will be weighed down with dissipation, drunkenness and the anxieties of life, and that day will close on you unexpectedly like a trap. For it will come upon all those who live on the face of the whole earth. Be always on the watch, and pray that you may be able to escape all that is about to happen, and that you may be able to stand before the Son of Man.”
I’ll have to go look at what precedes and follows that quote, but couldn’t the meaning really be “Hey, don’t get caught up in all the day-to-day stuff of living, because ultimately, we all die and so when that happens you want to make sure you were a good person.” ? And I probably should have written “good Christian” instead of “good person”.
Christ was talking to his disciples about the signs that the Kingdom of god is approaching. Jesus is basically saying that if we’re not careful, the signs of the end will pass us by. I’m sure it could be interpreted many ways, but it is frequently interpreted to mean that some may be spared the trials before the end.
