Offshoot discussion of "what religion are you" thread

[Millane]

I think that Christianity is a real thinking religion, and it's a shame when people don't bother to think things through. You've probably seen a few of my posts and Lief's posts - do you think we're mindlessly obeying a set of rules, or do you see us using our brains and thinking things through?

hahaha no i wasnt referring to anyone here though it did probably sound that way sorry ... i was generalising to some degree and i cant say that every Christian is just mindlessly obeying a set of rules, i just think that in a lot of cases we can make up our own mind and choose what we believe to be right and live better for that, as opposed to be living a depressed life because we dont want to 'sin'... to put it into context a homosexual grows up outside the constraints of Christianity and finds a man and lives a happy, healthy life, as opposed to a homosexual who decides to put his faith before his sexuality and ends up having a poor, depressed life.

However, both of us (Lief, correct me if I'm wrong about you ) accept the standard that we see in the Bible (as expressed in the New Testament, which is the standard that applies to Christians), and choose to do our best to follow it, because we have used our heads and thought it through and believe the Bible to be the Word of God and the truth.

well i guess there are the Christians that live by God's word because it is the 'right' thing to do for us to get into heaven, and those that if they found out God didnt exist would probably still live by the bible because those particular morals seem to be the good life. Now i have no problem with the second of these, but the first i think is a very poor waste of life.

There are some areas that are not currently popular culturally, such as the statement that sex belongs in a marriage between a man and a woman, but "popularity" doesn't matter, because it makes sense to assume that the Creator that made us in the first place knows how we best operate. IOW, a car manufacturer usually includes an instruction manual with the new car that you buy, and any "don't" rules are for the good of the machine (like please don't inflate the tires over a certain psi, or don't put anything besides a certain type of gasoline in the tank); the Bible, among other things, is an instruction manual for how people run best, written by the Creator of people, and the "don't" rules are for the good of the person.

yeah well thats sorta contradictory to what you are trying to say because we CAN look after ourselves and we arent mindless like a car... i feel completely able to live a good, healthy life without the help of the Bible or God.

Now some people seem to want to "pick and choose" those items in the Bible which they want to obey; however, this is because, IMO, they don't really believe in the God of the Bible, because this is really just saying that they know better than God, isn't it? And that certainly isn't the Biblical image of God!

hmm i would think that someone who 'picks and chooses' like that, wouldnt believe in God just agree with certain morals and disagree with others, and i wouldnt find anything wrong with that, except in the case they were claiming to be a Christian...

Now I believe you're an agnostic or athiest, is that right? And it looks like you're a fan of MM. Then your standard probably comes from basically what is currently thought to be right or wrong in that particular sub-culture. (And this implies that there is no absolute truth, BTW. Do you believe that?) We ALL have standards; what differs is where we get them from.

hmmm now my thoughts get very confused and overlap here and there so ill try and make it as intelligible as i can. Yes i am an atheist and a fan of MM, i wouldnt put my standard just down to MM or my belief that God doesnt exist, ive been influenced by many things and each has a little imput into how i live (this would include Christianity aswell no doubt)... No absolute truth? (ill refer to Plato because it will be easier to explain) well its hard for to explain my views because i agree with Plato's Forms in my head as concepts yet i dont agree that we can ever have absolute truth apart from what we experiance in our life (IOW i dont believe our souls have experianced any transcendental reality before or after we die, hence we've never been around the forms) and so basically no i dont think we can ever have absolute truth...

It is consistent with reason, IMO, to do it, as long as it doesn't go flat against any of his other teachings in a harmful way.

fair enough but that doesnt account for your own views and values but trusts entirely in someone else who could easily decieve you this one time and that would be it...