#1: and what do i do when the heart and mind god has given men cause me to question Scripture, the Church, and the way people use Scripture to justify their own prejudices? you're right, Scripture doesn't mean much to me. it might be interesting, but the amount of stock some people of faith put into it i find entirely misguided -- it's a text, and should be treated as such.
#2: the heart is alive in 2004, Scripture isn't, unless we bring it to life through our own set of lenses and prisms. all reading is prejudiced and, by definition, interpretation. the way in which you're using Scripture is maddeningly closed. got a question about Scripture? Scripture has an answer about your question about it. if, as you say, "these feelings do not occur independent from God," then that's great -- i'm using these God-given critical faculties to understand the message, and when it directly contradicts my real world experience, or i hear people using Jesus's description of man and women being made for each other as a basis for anti-gay discrimination, then thank God warning bells go off! i guess he did have a plan, after all ...
#3: had a turkey and pesto sandwich from Whole Foods. yum. and the point was that your pointing to scripture as proof means little. what do you say to people who cannot, intellectually or morally, accept literal interpretations of Scripture as they would a dictionary?
#4: the "feels good" part of that is neither here nor there -- what on earth are you talking about. i also cannot accept, rationally or morally, that a Hindu child born on the streets of Calcutta who has never heard of Jesus Christ cannot be saved by the terms you have set forth. this is one of those letter of the law vs. spirit of the law. it makes perfect sense to me that good works can add up to a life compatible with what, you say, one who accepts Christ as savior is rumored to have, by definition, lived. i'm still not comfortable with that -- that you'll sin, but fully understand your sin and be forgiven, if you really accept Christ. that sounds like another closed, North Korean-like system to me, kind of a "he leads because he is great and he is great because he leads" argument.
if the basis of your faith is unquestioned acceptance of Scripture as Truth, then there's little to be argued about here. you either accept it or you don't, and if you do and this is your Ground Zero for understanding the world, then there's not much to discuss. there are rational and moral arguments to be made for Christianity that appeal to the head and the heart, but i don't see you making those. i see you asserting the infallability of a certain set of facts, and that's it.
which you're perfectly free to do, and i respect your right to do so, but i think this is where you're finding resistance from some of us who don't hold said facts to be quite as incontrovertable as you do.