Re: A brief question...
Submitted by Ray on April 12 1999 at 09:05:35
In reply to A brief question... Submitted by Tygyr on April 11 1999 at 19:40:46
|
Tygyr, I was going to stay out of the discussion, but decided to give a try at responding to your thoughts and questions. You use it [The Bible] as a reference on how to think, what to feel, how to act, what to believe. Personally, I think I'd say I use it as a reference to understand how I think, feel, act, believe. It seems to be a yardstick as to what's good and bad, described in incredibly specific detail. Every facet of your life appears, essentially, to be directed by this one book. For some people, yes. There's a stage of spiritual growth where to maintain order in your life, you try and follow all the laws. The law-and-order stage! :-) Often zealous religionists at that stage (not just Christians, but other faiths as well) will try to get everyone else around them to obey the same laws they see as providing the best order for society. And if those religionists also have political power, watch out if you disagree! IMHO (and that of M. Scott Peck in his book, Further Along the Road Less Traveled: The Unending Journey Toward Spiritual Growth), there is a higher stage of spirituality based on principles (like love) and I see Jesus in the New Testament as a 30-something zealot for principles above law! His summary of Old Testament law was 2 things: 1. Love God, & 2. Love your neighbor as yourself. And for Christian BLers, probably the most important point of all that is "love yourself"! And 2nd is give others the freedom and empowerment to become and be their best selves. Does God really want a bunch of clones? ... Does God want everyone to be homogenous in beliefs and thoughts? ... Quite frankly, if God believes that everyone should be heterosexual then I'd rather not be in his Heaven anyway. If God believes in smiting heathens then I'd rather not share my afterlife with the superhuman equivalent of Pol Pot. First, to answer the questions, no. Second, I think because of human nature, what you're suggesting in those questions is, in the most absolute sense, impossible. Even persons with the same genes, e.g., identical twins, can never have exactly the same experiences and live their life exactly the same, no matter how much they think, act and look alike. I happen to think that the best Christians think and act independently, and the best congregations are those that teach and empower their members to do so. We could start our own homosexual Heaven! You can be the judge of who gets in! 'Course, I'm not sure I'd be happy either if most of the "homosexuals" I know would be there! I'd rather lead my own life and be judged for it than spend a lifetime basically pandering to mould myself into someone else's image. ... What I prefer to do is live my life the way I think it should be, with no more guidelines than "try to do no harm". I think that if my God is worth serving, then he should accept that. If God finds a problem with that, then he's probably not the sort of deity I'd like to hang around for eternity anyway. Right on! 'Guess if I were asked, I'd say, "Try to do lots of good!" But I suppose that's from hanging around Christians for a long time! Ray |