The Christianity Thread

There actually is a stark difference between a lot of them. A huge number of Christians don't even accept Jesus as the Christ. A Mormon and a Lutheran believe vastly different things, as do Catholics and Orthodox Christians, or any two of the host of different sects. They're all unique, and many have diametrically opposed doctrine (Infant Baptism is the epitome of evil/Adult Baptism is the epitome of evil. The Father, Son, and Spirit are all the same thing/they're barely related.)

It's actually kind of a big deal to a lot of Christians, many of whom decide that other sects don't even "count" as Christian.

Which is absurd. Though I don't know if I'd even qualify a sect that doesn't think Jesus was the Christ as "Christian," since, you know, that's the damn point.

I should think that ultimately the emphasis should be on "let's get together and worship Jesus and God and be a big family and love each other," and you can leave the petty shit at the door. What need is there fore denominations.

It's idiotic, I say. Idiotic.

A person is a Christian if they think they are a Christian. There can't be any more strict a definition than that. And honestly, if I had read your posts five years ago, I would have been insulted (I was a Christian then, you see). People just don't have compatible beliefs. Seriously, saying all Christians should worship in the same way is like saying all Left-Wingers should all back the same laws. I mean, they all believe in Socialism, right? *

edited 3rd Dec '11 10:38:08 PM by TheEarthSheep

"I think I'm a Christian, therefore I must be a Christian," doesn't make much sense as a qualifier.

Christianity is based around Jesus the Christ. If you don't believe in Jesus or don't think he was the Christ, you categorically cannot be a Christian in any conventional sense.

And religion isn't like politics. At it's most basic, Christianity emphasizes community and love and integration. The New Testament is all about inclusiveness and finding God together. Why should they let petty differences in minor beliefs get in the way of communal faith in their God? In the end, all that matters is leading a moral life and being together in your faith; the details are better left unsaid if they get in the way of that.

Politics is about what works in reality. Faith, more often than not, is not about reality, it's about things outside reality, or at least outside the physical world.

And why don't we just abolish all Religion? I mean, at their basics, Christianity and Buddhism are basically the same thing, am I right? Everyone should just immediately convert to the Church of Not Offending Anyone Ever and call it a day!

The world might in fact be a better place if everybody was a part of the... I can't remember what their name is now, but I think it comes out to UU or something... church.

I would never advocate legislating such a thing, however...

If there's any religion for which it should be argued that a common spirit of love is more important than doctrinal precision, it's Christianity. Rigidity of worship is for Pharisees.

edited 4th Dec '11 3:29:17 AM by feotakahari

I don't see how there can be a better test of who is a Christian than a person saying "I believe I am a Christian" and meaning it. For one person to say to another, "You are not a true Christian" is to claim to have some particular knowledge that the other person does not have. Bertrand Russell touched on that question in his famous essay, "Why I am not a Christian." It's not like you can verify a person's religion from a blood test.

@USAF: You are thinking of Unitarian Universalism.

edited 4th Dec '11 9:29:11 AM by Lawyerdude

Yeah, that's really actually a regrettable attitude. I mean, first of all, "Christian" isn't synonymous with "good person". C.S. Lewis had an interesting bit in Mere Christianity about that, actually. Also, it's really quite insulting to the person you'd say that to, for the reason I explained not too long ago in this thread.

First and foremost, Christianity IMO is a relationship, not a set of beliefs. First you have to feel the presence of Jesus in your heart ("mind" for you literalists)- everything after that is a detail.

People do get hung up on those details. It's because people come to associate their internal feelings with external beliefs, rituals, or symbols, to the extent that they come to believe that the thing which symbolizes their feelings (the Bible, the Mass, the cross, whatever it is) is the thing itself, and not just a symbol (I'm sure Yudkowski has a name for this error in cognition, but I dont remember what it is).

Or else they believe that the beliefs and emotions they associate with their symbol are somehow superior to those of someone else. A Protestant Fundementalism doesn't just believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible, they believe that their source of belief is superior to that of the Catholic Pope. They often come to believe that their version of the same religion brings them into a closer relationship to God than other sect's do, and that this closer, more pure relationship is something worth fighting for, even to the point of violence. After all, if you have the key to God, then everyone else is proselytizing for evil. And that has to be stopped.

It's actually very easy to get confused this way. It's hard to realize that other's people's symbolic beliefs are as spiritually satisfying to them as yours are to you. It's hard to give up the idea that there can only be one truth, and that everyone should follow it. And it's obviously not just Christianity which is guilty of this, Christians aren't any more likely to make this mistake than the followers of any other system are. But a lot of Christians do in fact think this way, which is very unfortunate. Tolerance should be the first duty of a Christian.

I've heard this many times before, and I still have absolutely no idea what it's supposed to mean. If you claim to "feel" Jesus in your heart or mind, I have no way of knowing if your claim is true, or if you're lying, or if you're mistaken, since it's something that, by its nature, is experienced by you and you alone.

Consider: There are billions of people on this planet who claim to have a relationship with God or Jesus, and that they act and believe how God or Jesus wants. Is there any way at all of knowing whose claim is right and whose isn't? You may fervently disagree with somebody else who claims to have the same relationship with Jesus that you have, and the other person's conviction is just as strong as yours. How can anybody know who is correct?

You cant. Faith is not a hypothesis that can be tested, except internally, by self-reflection. That wont convince anyone but the person reflecting. Yet God seems to love everyone. It's a paradox.

Is it possible to be more specific about what "feeling Jesus" means? I have a feeling you're applying religion to a concept that doesn't necessarily require it. (If I, as an atheist, have in fact felt what you're calling Jesus, then I'm slightly offended to see a property of human nature appropriated by religion.)

edited 5th Dec '11 12:13:41 PM by feotakahari

I've seen the inverse of this argument as well. You may have heard of C.S. Lewis's argument in Mere Christianity about God's existence being provable because there is some universal morality. Put briefly, he argues that because we humans have a sense of right and wrong, then our sense must have come from God, therefore God exists. Which is flawed in many ways.

It basically boils down to "You feel something that I call God. Therefore God exists." Which is of course also circular and nonsensical.

Ssssttttrrrraaaawwww!

That's not at all what Lewis' point was. Not even close. It wasn't even meant to "prove" anything, it was an attack on moral relativists.

No, Lewis's moral argument was intended to prove that God exists. That was the point of his attack on moral relativism.

Cites, or it didnt happen. As for my point, no time now, be back soon.

Without reprinting too much that book, here is a citation to Mere Christianity that I hope should satisfy your request:

from Mere Christianity, Book 1, Part 5. Link to source

edited 6th Dec '11 2:27:24 PM by Lawyerdude

^ Far be it from me to put myself on equal footing with Lewis, but science has advanced somewhat since he died. We now understand the situations in which evolution incentivizes teamwork—and furthermore, we understand the situations in which it incentivizes selfishness. (For instance, lions who take over a pride kill the cubs of the previous pride leader, so their own cubs will have less competition and be more likely to pass on their genes.)

If we want to promote goodness, we need to look to philosophy, not nature. Sometimes, we need to act directly against our own natures.

edited 6th Dec '11 2:33:41 PM by feotakahari

Yes. You can't derive moral laws by observing nature; it doesn't work that way. Both Lewis and Ayn Rand commit that error. Natural laws only describes what is, not what ought to be. Nature doesn't recognize good or evil.

Likewise, introspection doesn't reveal anything about the natural world or the universe at large. And the claim that everybody has a moral "guide" that tells them more or less the same thing is verifiably false. If you can imagine any moral law, then I would wager that there has been somebody at some time who has broken it and felt no remorse for doing so.

Lewis said that, yes, but that isn't what you said he said. You said that he said,

"You feel something that I call God. Therefore God exists."

but that isn't what that paragraph meant. In context, what he was saying is

"You feel something that I call God. Therefore, there is some kind of presence in the world that some religion may know about, but note that I'm not talking about my own God yet, I'll get there later."

Which is not the same thing, at all.

Oh, and , the Moral Law as defined by Lewis is explicitly Human, and not the same as Natural Laws in any way; in fact, he contrasted the Moral Law of Man with Natural Laws such as Gravity and Evolution on a regular basis.

Lewis disagrees, and I have yet to see him proven wrong.

edited 6th Dec '11 3:50:37 PM by TheEarthSheep

Ok, back again.

"Is it possible to be more specific about what "feeling Jesus" means?"

You realize that you're asking me to describe something that isn't really describable in words? I can try, but you might as well ask me what it is that I refer to as my "self". I sense a presence in the universe- a feeling that we aren't alone- sort of like being in a room and somehow knowing that someone else is there with you. And it isn't just anybody, but somebody who knows me and cares about me. As I seek answers to this experience, the description that makes the most sense, the one that most closely resonates with how I feel, is the description of Jesus in the Bible.

Undoubtably one could explain all this scientifically without any reference to religion. There are no proofs of God. I don't really disagree that my feelings are, in a material sense, most likely a result of a combination of evolution and cultural conditioning. But that misses the point. I don't really care what causes this sensation of mine, I want to know what it means, in a personal and spiritual sense. Much as I admire the scientific process, it cant really answer that question. So I personify my sense of presence with a symbolic person I call "Jesus", establish a spiritual relationship with this symbolic person, and this allows me to feel a greater sense of personal integrity. I am aware that all this is an emotional expression, not a logical argument. So if you share these feelings with me, then I expect you will understand, but if you do not then I do not expect you to find this explanation convincing.

Perhaps you will find it useful to consider that somewhat more than 6 billion of our fellow human beings have feelings that, if not identical to mine, are at least similar. I don't think a Buddhist, or a Muslim, or any other theist, would have any trouble understanding what I am saying, even if they disagree with the details. It will be easier for them to understand, I wager, than for a materialist to do so. Explaining faith to someone who feels no sense of the spiritual is like explaining sight to the blind (or, I acknowledge, a delusion to the sane).

By this point, you either comprehend what I am saying, or you think I'm completely crazy.

As for Lewis and human morality, I cant tell from the quote if Lewis intended his statement as a proof of God's existence, but in any case it's easy to demonstrate that it is no such thing. If you believe in God for other reasons already (as I do) then Lewis is pointing out an important clue to God's nature, but if you don't, then that wont make any sense.

By the way, I could start a debate on the issue of whether you can derive moral laws from nature. Technically, there is no other source. Humans are a natural phenomena, therefore there must be some way to reconcile the thoughts in our heads with phenomena outside. But that's a different discussion.

On the humanity-versus-nature thing, this is a very important statement:

Human morality becomes a lot less mystical when you can explain why given principles are more likely to survive, either as genetically hardcoded instincts, or as cultural memes. This is not to say that any given system of morality is "wrong," only to say that moral systems espousing things you and I would consider horrible can and do survive for quite a long time if they spread more readily than other systems.

On the presence thing: if those are my only two choices, I'll go with "crazy." The feeling of something with you in a room can easily be traced, whether to the subtle noises made by a human, or to a low frequency sound creating the illusion of a ghostly presence. If this feeling of Jesus cannot be traced, I cannot rely on it, since my sense can and have lied to me in the past (as when I looked at a stranger at the door just long enough to see the pants he was wearing, and managed to convince myself I'd seen his upper body and face, only later learning that he looked completely different from how I'd told myself he looked.)

edited 6th Dec '11 8:59:54 PM by feotakahari

Christianity disagrees with your first point, and I don't know if it does so in an arguable manner. I mean, you're just saying that morality stems from nature, which, by necessity, means that natural morality is good, but Christians would say that morality stems from God and rises above nature, (insert Bible reference about Carnal-mindedness here, but I can't think of one. I can think of some from the Book of Mormon, does that count?).

Edit: HA! Found one! Rom. 8:6-7, For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. - King James Version, obviously

Oh, and for good measure, a very similar scripture from the Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 9:39, O, my beloved brethren, remember the awfulness in transgressing against that Holy God, and also the awfulness of yielding to the enticings of that cunning one. Remember, to be carnally-minded is death, and to be spiritually minded is life eternal. *

Anyway, from these we can gather that, from a Christian standpoint, God's morality and Nature's morality are diametrically opposed.

Edit2: Oh, this one is even better! Romans 7:14, For we know that the law is spiritual: but I [Paul] am carnal, sold under sin.

Shows that the Moral Law, as Lewis called it, supersedes the laws of Nature.

edited 6th Dec '11 10:42:39 PM by TheEarthSheep