I had an interesting chat last week with a fundamental Christian about his belief in the rapture. When I observed that many Christian sects don't adhere to belief in the end of times vanishing act, he remarked that this belief is based on what the Bible says will happen at the time of the second coming. In this regard, he is correct. 1 Thessalonians 4:13-17 (NIV) tells us:Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep, or to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope. We believe that Jesus died and rose again and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. According to the Lord's own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.
After hearing this, I asked him why he doesn't condone the stoning of homosexuals or eschew figs. The Bible is equally clear on these points. He just laughed and shook his head as if he had never thought about these questions before. I was going to ask him how he picked and chose what to believe from the Bible but I felt so sorry for him I didn't bother.
He laughed at you because you made a laughingstock of yourself. You asked an incredibly stupid question.
ReplyDeleteThe Old Testament contains instructions to the Ancient Hebrews. "He doesn't condone the stoning of homosexuals or eschew figs" because we are not Ancient Hebrews.
The jackass in the picture above holding the sign about Leviticus is also displaying his ignorance for all to see. We ARE skipping that one, and have been for the last 2,000 years.
Look, it's your prerogative to believe - or not believe - anything you want. But anybody with even a cursory understanding of Christianity understands this. Before posting this type of uninformed crap on the internet, why not take a Bible 101 course so you don't embarass yourself?
Lou, you are the one making a laughingstock of yourself. Just why do we need a Bible 101 course or any course to understand God's word? If God wrote it, or inspired it, it should be the least confusing book ever written, but it is in fact the most confusing one, being full of contradictions and that is why you require courses to help you understand it.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that there are 38000 different denominations of Christianity by itself should invalidate the religion. You could have 30000 different versions of the Bible 101 course!
All Christians have one God. It is the one they take with them to church, and yours is a different one from that of your neighbor.
Sorry Lou, looks like you're the laughingstock.
ReplyDeleteYour title caught me because I just wrote a post on "My Favorite Type of Christians" -- and wow, Lou would fall out of that category. I think it is OK to value different versions of Christianity if it points people on how to become better people. I would say the same for better versions of Atheism. (Yeah, I know, "Heresy !")
ReplyDeleteLou: thanks for your opposing viewpoint. I miss more rigorous debate on this Blog with the disappearance of the likes of Tirian.
ReplyDeleteJust one question: why would any Christian follow anything in the Old Testament unless s/he is an Ancient Hebrew?
Lou, let's look at words of your divine HeyZeus:
ReplyDelete"Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.": Matthew 10:34 (NIV)
"If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.": John 15:6 (KJV)
"For there are some eunuchs, which were so born from their mother's womb: and there are some eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive it, let him receive it." Matthew 19:12 (KJV) This one inspired the Skoptsy sect - one of my favorite brands of Christianity.
Now in the morning as he returned into the city, he hungered. And when he saw a fig tree in the way, he came to it, and found nothing thereon, but leaves only, and said unto it, "Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever. And presently the fig tree withered away.: Matthew 21: 18-19 (KJV)
The Bible is one of the greatest works of literature mankind has ever produced. However, it was written over the span of 1500 years by over 40 authors. The decisions on what to include and exclude were made arbitrarily by clerics bent on propagating their chosen dogma.
Lou, if you have visited this site before you will know that I strongly encourage people to educate themselves on the content of the Bible. Familiarity with the Bible will definitely not further the cause of Christianity to a freethinking audience. In fact, I am usually struck by how much more knowledge atheists have about the Bible than those who profess to regard it as the word of their god.
BTW, what is the specific brand of religious delusion that you prefer to call your own? I assume that you are a member of the One True Church (i.e. a Roman Catholic) and, if not, I would be interested to hear why not. I love asking that question because, no matter how you answer, there are plenty of beliefs that your chosen faith has decided to reject as wacky (such as self-castration) and plenty more that you have decided to accept (such as the physical resurrection of Christ). I am interested to hear how you pick and choose ... and I certainly hope you don't eat figs.
why would any Christian follow anything in the Old Testament unless s/he is an Ancient Hebrew?
ReplyDeleteBecause while the Old Testament contains instructions to the Ancient Hebrews, that's not all it contains.
For example, Mosaic law prohibited eating shellfish but then in the New Testament Jesus overturned that law.
On the other hand, homosexuality is called an abomination in several places in the Old Testament, and the New Testament backs that up, calling it perversion, immoral, and contrary to doctrine.
The decisions on what to include and exclude were made arbitrarily by clerics bent on propagating their chosen dogma.
Let's see you back up that claim. Prove that the decisions "were made arbitrarily".
Lou: For example, Mosaic law prohibited eating shellfish but then in the New Testament Jesus overturned that law.
ReplyDeleteExcept for the part where Jesus claimed that he came not to abolish the law or the prophets, but to fulfill them. So I guess ol' Jesus contradicted himself there...
Meanwhile, there's that part of Acts where Peter was up on the rooftop in Joppa and saw a vision of unclean animals and was commanded to get up, kill and eat. He said, "But I can't do that," and god said, "I've made those shrimp clean, ya moron."
So Peter got up and made himself some pork rinds in lobster sauce. Oh, wait, no he didn't. He realized that this vision of his meant that he could go preach to a Roman Centurion. So I guess that god saying that eels are hunky-dory to eat means Romans can believe but that homosexuality is still bad.
How's that work again, exactly?
It works precisely as I described it. What part didn't you understand?
ReplyDeleteWhat part didn't you understand?
ReplyDeleteMostly the part where after 25 years in Evangelical circles I asked myself, "Why the hell did I ever think this book made a bit of sense." But, in general, it's the fact that God says A, Peter does Not-A, and somehow that's okay, but doing thing B is totally not allowed. Because it wasn't until Joppa and Paul's later insistence on going after the Gentiles that the idea even came up. And that seems to be based on Peter's misinterpretation of a vision...
Oh, that and the fact that Paul (and the people who weren't Paul but were later writing under his name) was pretty much a jackass who was only interested in creating his own version of orthodoxy and he's the only one who mentioned homosexuality in the Christian third of the Bible. But since you don't seem to be the type to do anything other than look at the Bible and assume it came out whole-cloth exactly as god intended, that's probably a conversation you won't want to have.
But since you haven't even engaged the part where Jesus claimed that he was going to create a new Law and that he was going to fulfill the old Law, apparently you're not willing to even begin to see the inherent contradictions. So please, precisely describe that then tell me I don't understand it, either...
I'm still waiting to hear if Lou is a member of the One True Church and, if not, why not. PLEASE DECLARE YOUR CHOSEN BRAND OF CHRISTIANITY. The one thing I admire about the Catholics is that at least they can lay claim to being first on the scene.
ReplyDeleteMy "chosen brand of Christianity" is beside the point. We are all part of the Body of Christ and we are billions strong.
ReplyDeleteListen, I'm sure you're a nice guy, but you are rambling. If there was some point to your "A and Not-A" screed, you're going to have to tell me what it was.
he's the only one who mentioned homosexuality in the Christian third of the Bible.
And?
If you didn't enjoy your "25 years in Evangelical circles" and you think the Bible contains "contradictions" perhaps you are not a fundamentalist. So find another church.
Why throw the baby out with the bathwater? If you were attending church for 25 years you undoubtedly felt God's presence. Why deny that based on something you don't understand in the Bible?
Going to church for 25 years is never due to "God's presence". There are lots of other causes, though:
ReplyDelete- Sunk-Cost Fallacy
- Friends, Family, Status
- Comfort, Solace
- Kids, Spouse
- Music
and several more ...
Going to church for 25 years is never due to "God's presence"
ReplyDeleteNever? What do you base that claim on?
Once you feel God's presence - even once - you won't be able to later deny it.
Dude, I denied "it".
ReplyDeleteOoops, I guess that shows I never felt it.
Darn.
Did you understand the question? On what do you base the claim "Going to church for 25 years is never due to God's presence"?
ReplyDeleteMy comment "Once you feel God's presence you won't be able to later deny it" was directed to the guy who went to church for 25 years.
Why throw the baby out with the bathwater? Because the bathwater is poisonous.
ReplyDeleteAs far as feeling God's presence is concerned, with talk like that you should be a Mormon. If you're not, then you need to look yourself in the mirror and admit that you are just as much an atheist towards their beliefs as I am towards yours.
When people start talking about basing their faith on personal experience, I always ask them: "if I were to get up and walk on water would you accept that I am the second coming of Christ?". Of course, they wouldn't rely on that observation to reach that conclusion - most reasonable people would look for a non-miraculous explanation. Why they are willing to rely on second and third hand accounts of miraculous events that supposedly occurred over 2000 years is beyond me.
@ Lou
ReplyDeleteI was a former Christian too. So your comment could have been to me too. I left Jesus and was a fervent, prayerful believer in love with the creator of my soul.
As far as evidence: I have a god-meter and have personally tested 123,223 church goers and never found god's presence. OK, maybe that is a small sample size but it is a start.
What is your evidence?
Now, to be generous to Lou -- I think Religion can offer a lot to believers that should not be thrown out with the wash. And if an atheist throws these out, he/she does it at her/his own peril:
ReplyDelete- Friends, Community
- Music
- Reading clubs
and more ...
If someone has used a church for a long time, these may be their sole source for these meanigful activities. Completely dropping them along with their beliefs can be very disorienting. People do best with others when in loving and caring relationships.
But I doubt that is what Lou meant, is it Lou?
No, I said what I meant.
ReplyDeleteAs far as evidence: I have a god-meter and have personally tested 123,223 church goers
Very intelligent.
Why throw the baby out with the bathwater? Because the bathwater is poisonous.
I'm glad I'm not your baby.
TAM, this is another caricature. Under the law some principles are immutable and others are not. This is the case with civil and canonical law.
ReplyDeleteUnder western law precedent has great value, and that was certainly the case with the early Christians, except that they believed they had been given the authority to 'bind and loose' by the promulgator of the law, i.e., Christ.
So they discarded a great many Mosaic laws that they believed were designed for the Jews pre-Messiah, but which were no longer of value to Jews under the new covenant. You could cite hundreds of examples. The point is that the early Church saw no salvific nature in many of those laws post-Christ and dispensed with them (for better or worse).
So immutable laws would include the 10 Commandments, because these were understood to represent the essence of the law and were a reflection of Natural Law, but all the dietary laws and juridical laws that were merely applications of the law under Moses were seen as disposable.
If you study civil law you will find it is the same in our judicial system over decades, let alone millenia.
So, your question should be directed at the Church councils who chose the canon and promulgated the canonical laws, and not some poorly-formed evangelical.
Am I the only one to rumble Lou? i think he was being ironic. :D
ReplyDeleteThe Church councils who chose the canon and promulgated canonical laws did so for POLITICAL PROGAGANDA reasons, in order to strengthen Constantine's tyrannical dictatorship over the Empire. Constantine himself never believed a word of these fairy tales.
ReplyDeleteWhere did you get that idea?
ReplyDelete