"Religion is a bloody disgrace"

[timbo15]

I had an unbelievable history teacher in high school that I learned more from than any prof in college. At the very beginning of 10th grade world history we began by discussing the ancient Egyptian culture. He had us learn some hieroglyphics as we went along & at the end of that section he handed out a page of heiroglyphics that we had to decode. The phrase that came out of the symbols has impacted me to this day. "Man by nature is a worshipper." If you think about this, man has always looked for something above ourselves to hold onto, something after life that we can hope for.

I am one of those fundamentalist Christians that get such a bad rap from our friends to the left. However, I think it is important to define what a fundamentalist Christian is. So here goes my definition:
1. We believe that Jesus Christ is the only begotten Son of God.
2. That Christ was crucified on a Roman cross and raised from the dead 3 days later.
3. The reason for His death was to justify our sins.
4. All are sinners (even us vile fundamentalists) who have missed the bullseye.
5. That the only way into heaven is to believe in this Jesus Christ and believe that He died for us and that we can not achieve true holiness on our own merits.

CS Lewis said it best (and I paraphrase): In math there is only one correct answer, ie 1+1=2. The same is true in religion. Although Islam, Judaism, Buddhism or maybe even some Native American religions come close on some things there still can be only one true answer.

I think (as I would think most fundamentalists would) that answer is, "I am the Way, the Truth & the Life, no one comes to the Father except through Me."

I accept other people's views. As someone earlier in the post mentioned God gave us free will to choose Him or deny Him. Some of my good friends are Atheists, Mormons, & lip service Christians.

Before you judge me as some backwoods hick here are some of my stats. My sister, whom I love very much and speak with on a weekly basis, is gay. I am divorced. I live in a major metropolitan area in a house and not a trailer park. I drink a beer or whisky once in a while and I don't even own a gun. I am not convinced the war in Iraq is going all that well. However, I am still a fundamentalist because I believe the above statements. Can I force everyone to believe this way? Absolutely not. Only one can truly change the heart's of man and that is Jesus Christ.

 

[timbo15]

G.K. Chesterton was a rather witty British writer who was Catholic. He once wryly remarked, "the only good argument against Christianity is Christians."

The album recording of DC Talk's "What If I Stumble?" begins with Brennan Manning saying "the greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians who acknowledge Jesus with their lips, then walk out the door and deny him by their lifestyle. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable."

Amen.

 

[thrillme]

Zionism does not denote fundamentalism and has some association to secularism, in fact some religious Jews oppose Zionism on the basis that a Jewish nation founded by man is blasphemous. The hardcore religious nuts are definitely not productive.

You see we have to drag fundamentalist Christians into the argument for the simple reasons that they are very easy targets for abuse, literallly nobody cares if Christians are criticised or their beliefs mocked because they are the unpopular and big monolithic religious block that the secular west rejects with vigour. It provides the scant protection one requires to hold some more respected and revered religions of the world to account.
/there is some sarcasm in that last paragraph, but it is not far from the truth - Christians are targeted more than others in the media because it is acceptable to do so, I think that criticism of religion should be more uniform.

Exactly, people can say, mock, trash and just slag the snot out of Christians, because,

1. well, generally we take it up to a point. Still human, so the gut reaction to lash out and fight back, doesn't go away.

2. No one really cares about Christians beliefs, outside Christianity. Maybe some respect them to some degree but care for them, nah.


3. Christians are killed and tortured everyday, no news coverage huh? Christians could be wiped off the face of the planet, I don't think we'd be missed that much, well, you know, except the Christians in U2. Well okay, people who aren't Christians, but have Christian friends would care, but generally speaking, I don't think the "secular west," would mind. I really don't think so.

Would the world be better off with Christianity gone?