I don't find you intensely negative...just kinda quirky, which is okay by me... and who doesn't get grumpy sometimes? You should be here, as long as you want to be here. And if you're enjoying reading the posts, learning and don't feel like contributing much, so be it!

Interesting about your upbringing. It wasn't common for people to be atheists prior to the 60's, or so I've heard...how was that for you with your peers when you were a kid?

I think people who believe unquestioningly do not do so because they wish to do so. They were taught to believe by their socializers and their culture, and never broke away from their cultural conditioning. They probably are imitative rather than creative thinkers.

...and sometimes, beyond regular social conditioning, I think they were terrified into their beliefs, so we shouldn't assume they are not creative...possibly misguided imaginations though...many of them are hurting I think. It's hard to break away from a belief system, that has you believing heaven is only there for you, God will only accept you, if you believe as they interpret that you should, putting one constantly on the verge of going to hell, being told you should hate yourself for who you are and you don't deserve grace...yet any questioning will cast you into hell fire...and, ironically, that fear and guilt itself becomes  the hellfire one so often lives with. Some belief systems seem to do that and that's pyschological hell.

Even if they were terrified into their beliefs, it was still their socializers and oppressors who terrified them. Many of them are hurting, for sure, and they deserve our utmost compassion. Like, for instance, the Shafia murderers who were just sentenced to life in prison.

Agreed. I doubt they would ever have done that if they were taught unconditional love in the first place. It's sad for everyone.

Well, Kimmio, you must be from B.C. Only us BCers are still up at this hour.

You wrote, on a different thread, about people whom you admire, even if they are not Christians, just for their selfless service to humanity.

One of my most admired Vancouverites is Gabor Maté, who did (does) a lot for the downtrodden of Vancouver's East Side and elsewhere. I don't know him personally, but a good friend of mine does. His theories of why people are down and out and addicted, and how to help them, are fascinating. He wrote a couple of books on the subject, and I saw him on the Fifth Estate and on the Knowledge Network.

No problem...it was my Grandfathers RULE: No discussion of politics or religion in the house.

my grandmother never brought up religion...(But offered me a nickle for every book in the bible I could recite, in order...(I think I made a whole dollar!)

The only sware word I ever heard was my grandather's seldom  used, in exasperation "Judas priest!" :-)

(I don't think he was even aware of the vocabularly I learned while in the army :-)

Hi happy Genius---I noted what you said on the other thread. Many thing you have posted , has help my walk happy . Stick in there ,you have much to help others with . Sometimes it's just your way of seeing things . Or the way you talk about what you believe.You would be missed. God Bless . airclean33

Hi Arminius:

I have heard of Gabor Mate. I haven't met him...he seems to have become somewhat of a celebrity..doing only lectures and book tours now. I watched a David Suzuki, Nature of Things, documentary about his use of an Amazonian fruit to treat addiction...which Health Canada banned him from using.

Hi Happy Genius...we didn't talk much about religion in the house either. Sometimes politics. My dad likes to talk politics...most of which I now disagree with.

I want to also say, I like your posts so I'm gald you've stuck around and put up with us and hope you continue to. Sometimes they stump me and I don't know how to respond...but hey, you're a genius! ;) They give me something to think about.

Yes, I saw this episode of Nature of Things, too.

I think Health Canada should allow him and other qualified professionals to use this substance, under controlled conditions.

Happy Genius (and others who can do this),

do you have any favourite BS that you have tried out/on and enjoyed?

Yes! I's tell you if I knew what a BS was,

Do what????????????????????????????????????????????

Happy Birthday, Happy Genius.   Keep posting when the spirit move you.  Keep sharing the wisdom gained over a long, and interesting, life.   We need more people like you who are able to keep their cool, to avoid negativity, to consentrate on the good things, to share their beliefs without trampling on others, and to celebrate.

May you continue to bless us with your presence in the year to come.   Again - happy four score and five. 

Belief System

HG: I'm not sure how well Caesar understood women — taking Cleopatra as an example — but I accept the drift of his statement.

In my late teens, I was a frenzy of activity. I was a part-time university student, a part-time drafted military (Navy) trainee, a full time worker at a jazz night club (6 nights a week, 8 p.m. - 2 a.m. most nights, 5 a.m. on Saturdays and Sundays).and fitting in as much diving, surfing and caving as I could. I could get along on 2-3 hours' sleep a night. Looking back, I was kind of deranged.

I majored in anthropology and psychology and there was an adult student on several of my courses who interested me and we'd have coffee and talk together after classes. He was in his 60s then: an ordained Presbyterian minister and Maori tohunga. He had an extremely wise, discerning spirituality of his own. I was an avowed atheist. Anyway, he had a gifted understanding of "belief" and "god" and affirmed me in my reasons for atheism (in a couple of words: "Billy Graham").

Diving one day, I had an amazing, close-up, mind-blowing engagement with a mako shark. You seldom see them near the coast, or diving. They are astonishingly beautiful in both form and motion and this mako suddenly appeared (they're capabable of extreme speeds underwater). It swam slowly beside me, its "port" eye (left side) engaged my gaze. We stared into each other. I reached out and it would not quite let me touch it. And, after perhaps aminute, it suddenly vanished. It zipped away so quickly I had the sensation of it having suddenly dematerialised. 

I told Hemi about this. He understood my awe and told me something totally ridiculous that I firmly believe to this day. "The mako is your kaitiaki," he told me in a matter-of-fact tone of voice. "It protects you, wherever you are, and will take you home when you die." ("Kaitiaki" is a Maori concept usually, inadequately, translated as 'guardian angel'.)  Now neither he nor I ever undertstood that to mean that a wild, wet shark is going to belly-flop its way to wherever I am when I pop my clogs — but that transcendent experience is available to me all the time and has often helped me in deeply important ways.

So there is truth there — something for ME to believe that is a kind of assurance of my identity and a tool of discernment. Hemi Potatau has, of course, passed on. But he is alive to me. He unerringly laid the foundations of my faith over a cup of coffee and gave me an invaluable understanding of "belief" from the tohunga side of his "Christian" love. Correctly, he saw it being helpful to me.

I've been blessed by a few such encounters with "saints", including one or two "Christians" and I'm not sure that any of them (in the fundamentalist sense) believed a word they were saying: they are people whose glimpses of meaning, experiences of awe and determination to be "close" to "god" gave them unusual authority. The "kaitiaki" thing is a truth for me, and I "believe" it, not because it is "true" but because it connects my awe with meaning on the grand scale, albeit in a way that's uniquely mine. It's mine because it derives wholly out of my experiene — a brief passing moment, an experience of beauty that I was at that moment somehow open to and ready for. I experienced a way of engagement that matters.

We can't get that from church alone. We have to get it from the depths of our own experience. We find that experience by opening to ourselves, by establishing a firmness of vulnerability that's willing to make the mystery our own. It's a way of living that has nothing to do with "belief" as statements of incontrovertible "fact". Belief has no more standing in a life of faith than its capacity to connect our "real life" experience with with the unkowable universal "truth", and the meaning of that "truth" … and making those connections is something that, ultimately, we have to do alone. 

Good "ministers", like Hemi, recognise the authenticity of our experience and respect its authority. They offer us an array of tools to make the connection and, sure, for a lot of people, the Bible delivers. Sometimes, other tool kits are helpful but it's a rare minister (in my experience) who knows enough of "other" ways to be especially helpful and direct us, perhaps, to a personally helpful and wise Imam, Rabbi or mystic, native teacher, physical challenge… or a branch of science.

Wisdom is a broad and strong-flowing movement of the consciousness that washes over and around every aspect of life and sings out from every possible experience… it's the personal path that's narrow and difficult.

And, as individuals, we have no choice — the narrow path is the only path because we are privvy only to our own expoerience. The path is sure only in the depths of those experiences. Finding it takes time and pain and truthfulness — walking it is tougher again. Then, one day, the path starts widening and then it becomes the only one you want to travel. Behind you, like litter, will lie a messy trail of discarded beliefs. Ahead lies a broad horizon of wonder.

Buddha  had a story about "religion" as raft. He and his followers were travelling. They came to a river. They built a raft and crossed. Before them lay a desert and his followers, attached to the raft because it had saved their lives, argued about what to do with it and how to carry it with them. Buddha had to point out that they would have no use for a raft in the desert.

And there's a Sufi story about the monastery cat. A great spiritual teacher came to a monastery in the mountains and befriended the cat that caught mice in the kitchen. He widely respected and people travelled long distances to spend time with him. One of his disciplines was a time of evening prayer and reflection to end the day, and the demands on his time. These meetings were often crowded. The cat, hungry for its dinner, would wander among the crowd, rubbing against people and yeowling. People complained that it was a distraction, so the great teacher had the cat tied up for these early evening devotions. The problem was solved. The great teacher died. The evening devotions continued and the cat continued to be tied. Then the cat died. And the monks got another cat to tie up during evening devotions.

And Jesus taught, not about changing the law, but fulfilling it… there are many obstacles, and they all are found — not in the cruel and chaotic world — but within.

And you have a valuable role here, HG.

Hi Happy Genius,

Nothing at all surprising about that is there?

It does open the door a crack towards what a man (or a woman) might believe unwillingly or even against their wishes.

I think that you presume participation at WonderCafe.ca must be of the give and take variety.  I find that to be a generally healthy presupposition.  I'm not certain that the giving and taking need to be proportional in terms of quality, content, or chronology.

Take what you need.  Offer what you wish.  Do both as you are moved to.

I disagree.  Nobody here is required to be negative.  Everyone here who is negative chooses to be negative.  Sometimes that choice is understandable or even defensible.  Sometimes we invest a great deal of time and energy into rationalizing our negativity.

I am free to disagree with any post from any poster.  How I choose to disagree with any post from any poster is up to me.

True, the simple act of disagreement is me taking a negative position.  I don't have to be offensive in my disagreement.

How others read me is not something I have absolute power of control over.  Some, will automatically equate critique or disagreement with hostility.  According to some recent correspondence I am the greatest evil here at WonderCafe.ca.  Until that opinion becomes unanimous I won't consider it seriously.

If I remember correctly what a Rabbi once told my class the perfect life is 120 years in the making.  The first 40 spent discovering our purpose, the second 40 spent doing the work associated to our purpose and the final 40 years are spent enjoying the fruit of that labour.

My wish for you is that you have another 35 years of enjoyment ahead.

Grace and peace to you.

John

geez, rev john...

you are telling me that my busiest years are just STARTING...

i am already exhausted from the first 40.

this is not going to be pretty.

Hi signshootles,

No.  I'm relaying wisdom a Rabbi passed on to me about the perfect life.

Your mileage may vary.

Grace and peace to you.

John

whew... 

HG, So sorry, late the other night I didn't catch on to the 4 score and 5 comment being about your Biirthday ( pre-occupied non-geniuses like me might miss that ;) )!...Happy Birthday! Many happy returns!

So what do You believe, John. How do YOU decide what to believe and what to be less sure about? Do you have absolute beliefs or are they interim or conditional? How do you validate a "belief"? Are you consistent, in the sense of rejecting thoughts and ideas that conflict with your beliefs? 

I find it very difficykt to believe (in a litereral/factual sense) prety much everything… as I said (above) there are a few things in which I find belief because they have connected me with the Mystery ("god") and continue to do so — but none are things I'd expect of another person unless they assured me they shared the same ezxperience. That happens very rarely (which is why I'm so fully and joyfully married to my wife… we resonate to the same harmonies without feeling we need to wholly agree on the way we express what we experience — we undertsand. That particular resonance seems to connect both of us with "god", so we believe.) 

The issue of discernment seldon seems to get thoughtfully addressed here (or am I missing a whole lot?).

now that is a great question, byt i think it should read, " How do you validate a Beliefe to be True" 

because at the end of the day, everyone has beliefs and not all are true , so what is the worth of a belief if ist not?

It shows that we have free will.

MC, if you read the question again, its not about free will to believe, its about validateing the beliefe to be true , a simple free will to chouce has no validation process 

BB: you don't read other people's post very closely do you. I guess few do.Maybe you'd care to re-read my post above (response no. 16 or thereabouts… the one responding to HG) and save me the trouble of re-posting.

BB, I stand by my statement. The value of holding a false belief is that it demonstrates that we have the awesome gift of free will. So there.

i perty sure I read it quite well Mike

deciding what to believe does not conclude that the belief is in fact true does it

So then how do you prove any belief true or not?

and the ability to be decived 

I put the question out, I have read much i the topic of Truth , hopefully some of our pastores here will comment 

Hi MikePaterson,

Over the course of my lifetime I have believed in a number of things.  At present I continue to believe in a number of things.  Some of the present things believed are contrary to previous things believed.  I don't believe that I have the time required to make a detailed list of what I believe and why nor do I believe anyone has the time or the inclination to read it.

That's a fair question and one that is probably easier to deal with as it speaks to method of belief rather than me categorizing and listing all of my beliefs.

I suspect that most of what I believe about anything depends upon how trustworthy I find the source of the information to be.  Other parts depend upon my connection to the community that believes them (again there needs to be some semblance of trustworthiness).  If a piece of information that was foundational to a belief I held or am holding was to be seriously compromised then I would re-evaluate based on the new information.  

I believe in the possibility of absolutes.  I don't know that I have encountered any.  Personally I would not list any of my beliefs as absolute as that would mean there would be no possible way to challenge and any occasion of doubt becomes a failure rather than a testing ground.

I suspect that automatically moves all beliefs previous and present into the categories of interim or conditional.  What remains is the ease with which any belief previous or present is rejected or modified.

It would probably depend upon the belief and the value that I placed upon it.  I believe that peameal bacon is the only bacon worth eating.  I wouldn't turn my nose up at side bacon if that is all that was offered.  I believe that the Montreal Canadiens are the best hockey team ever and when Toronto fans point to the standings I point to history.  Neither of those beliefs impact much on how I interact with the world around me beyond the breakfast table of the odd sports conversation.

Primary beliefs about how the universe works or how I believe God put it all together tend to have a greater impact upon how I interact with the world around me.  Though neither dominate my action from moment to moment.

Ethical behaviour and my beliefs around it is where most of my interaction occurs.  It is also where there is potentially the greatest opportunity for conflict on an interpersonal level.  

The concept of fairness for example.  What do I deem to be fair?  How does that mesh (or not mesh) with what you deem to be fair?  How do I handle when our ideas on fairness conflict with one another?  I believe that disagreement is essentially fair.  The imposition of agreement is essentially unfair.  So, even though you and I might have a disagreement about what is or isn't fair I have principles of fairness that I ascribe to that dictate to me the proper way to handle that disagreement.  Conversation being the first tool towards reconciliation.

I don't appear to have the same difficulty.  I'm not sure that either one of us suffers from some character flaw (that you are too cynical or I am too naive) I have no problem believing that critics of either of us would have difficulty suggesting such flaws.

Resonance is a powerful proof of a particular vibration.  Pianos are great for demonstrating just that.  What becomes difficult in discussions about faith and belief is the distinction between which vibrations are good/Godly or evil/satanic.  I'm not saying such distinctions cannot be made.  I'm saying that few are cautious about how they make such distinctions.

I don't think you are missing much.  Discernment is rarely addressed here at the WonderCafe.ca so much as it is implied.  The general state of such implications appears to be, "I find belief X to be foolish therefore it is foolish."  Depending upon who is making the statement and who they make the statement to there is the appropriate embossing of position.

As much as WonderCafe.ca hoped to be home to open-minded discourse there is more close-mindedness here than anything else.  Some are more open than others.  I have yet to meet anyone who is completely open-minded and I certainly don't believe myself to be completely open-minded.

I may be more open-minded than others.  That doesn't mean I am actually open-minded at all.  It may serve to make me appear to be less narrow-minded or close-minded.  That is simply a matter of degrees and not kinds of mindedness.

Grace and peace to you.

John

Hi MorningCalm,

Except that it doesn't.

It shows that we have the ability to make choices.  That doesn't prove that our wills are free.  Do we have the ability to be perfect and without sin?  Does sin only affect certain parts of our bodies so that the will is immune to sin?

If the will is not immune to sin then the will cannot be free.

Grace and peace to you.

John

Hi Johnny. Since when is the human will a part of our bodies?

You ask, "Do we have the ability to be perfect and without sin?" As I'm sure you know, different theologians would offer different opinions on that subject. I'm sure you could find some in the holiness movement who would give you a big fat yes.

You already know my views on the subject, so I question why you're asking about them now.

Hi blackbelt,

I understand that the question you are asking is, "What is the value of a belief that is not true?"

This presumes that there is a neutral evaluation agency of all belief and it is that neutral evaluation belief which can rightly assign a value to belief based on a criteria of truth.

I do not believe that there is any such thing as a neutral evaluation agency.

The value of any belief, whether that belief can be described as true or not, can only be determined by the individual who holds that belief.  I believe that peameal bacon is the best kind of bacon.  Is that belief true?  Of course that belief is true, it is what I believe.  Do facts support my belief?  What facts are we going to consider?  What facts should be considered?  What is most important to this belief?  If a survey of 100 people shows that 99 out of a hundred prefer side bacon is my belief untrue?  Only if I am one of those 99 otherwise even if I am the only one who believes that peameal bacon is the best I can still validate my belief.  The other 99 clearly have no sense of taste that I can trust.

But of course you really don't care about belief in the best kind of bacon.  Your concern about value has to do with belief about God or in God or even false Gods.

The worth of any belief is the value the believer ascribes to it.  There is no puzzle or mystery.

You may not be convinced that the value I set upon a particular belief is the real value of that belief.  That isn't my problem.  I may not be convinced that the value you set upon a particular belief is the real value of that belief.  That also, is not my problem.  That is disagreement.

What is problematic is when we claim that we can prove our beliefs and the proof doesn't exist.

Going back to the bacon example.  The stats showing 99 out of 100 prefer side to peameal bacon only prove that 99 out of 100 people prefer side bacon to peameal bacon.  They do not prove or disprove my belief that peameal is the better bacon.

We could easily change the subject of the study from preference for bacon to preference for style of Christianity and turn up with the same preference rates.  For example, this Calvinist rejects the notion of free-will.  If we took a poll how many do you think would throw down with me?  Should I base my belief on a popular vote?  Argumentum ad Populum is not given much logical value.

Turning back to my post to MikePaterson, somethings I value as belief because I find the source trustworthy.  Does that mean that every argument put forward by the same source is equally trustworthy?  Well no, actually it doesn't.  That would be Argumentum ad Verecundium unless the source is regarded as an expert then the source has a certain credibility and can be trusted somewhat.  Mind you if the person I am in conflict with doesn't credit my source with the same credentials as expert any argument from that source will not be valued.

Which is where many Christians fail when debating spiritual issues with other Christians or non-Christians.

Christians will identify Authorities they appeal to.  God tends to be first, scripture (or more to the point a particular interpretation of scripture) comes second and then there are a number of scholars we will all pick and choose from.  What is most interesting is that some sources brought forward as authoritative will be challenged (I've been known to do this from time to time) and that is where discussion should take off because when all of us are stripped of our favourite authorities we have to deal with what we find to be personally compelling about our beliefs.  For the most part that doesn't happen here.  Typically what happens is once we have our cut and paste proof refuted we cease to participate in discussion.

So what value is there in my believing peameal bacon to be true if it can be proven that it is not true?

At minimum it means that I prefer peameal bacon to side bacon and given a choice I will always eat peameal bacon.  My preference doesn't appear to harm anyone.  If I indulge in my preference that could carry physical consequences for myself (those same consequences exist if I indulge in side bacon).

Grace and peace to you.

John

There are some beliefs that are false. Believing that a slice of peameal bacon is a banana does not make it so.

Grace and peace to you.

John

[/quote]

I too relate belief to what I can trust.   If I find from sources that I usually find to be reliable, and from my own experience that I can trust something or someone then I find I can believe in what they say and do.   I also find my beliefs can change (or grow) when I am exposed to other experiences and other sources that I consider trustworthy, so what I believe today may not be what I believe tomorrow and a decade from now it might have developed into something quite different.   (ie in the last decade I have grown further away from a theistic approach to God - that doesn't mean that I feel I am any closer to being a-theistic - I just see God differently now than I did then.)

Hi MorningCalm,

Very true.  How do you know that what you claim is a banana is, as a matter of fact, a banana and not as you claim, a slice of peameal bacon?

Most of us believe bananas to be bananas because there are concrete things which we have applied the label bananas to.  While bananas are not bacon they are bananen or banane or even mpananes.

And we believe that bananas are bananas because we have always been told that bananas are bananas.

We believe bacon is bacon for pretty much the same reason.

Believing God is God or that only Yahweh is God is a different belief.

For starters we cannot go to the local grocers and walk to the God aisle for a personal size of Yahweh in the same way that we can head over to the produce section for a bunch of bananas or the meat and deli section for a slab of bacon.

If I put a banana in your hand and tell you I have given you a banana.  You believe it because we share an understanding of banana and you can see and touch the banana.

If I put a Bible in your hand and tell you I have given you everlasting life how do we test that to prove it?  Care to take on a shotgun point blank?

Presuming that you will say yes what do you expect the observer will record at test's end?  Do you expect them to see you living still or do you expect them to see your remains painting the sidewalk?  Does that prove your faith in the Bible as everlasting life true or false?

Grace and peace to you.

John

Hi seeler,

I think all of us do.

I also think that we set different criteria for trust for some things than we do for others.  I find this completely natural if not slightly illogical.

Grace and peace to you.

John

yes I agree, Trust has a great impact , so John if i am ask futher and deeper and i read your post to me (Thank You), and i am trying to word this correctly,,,,,,

1) how  does the Physical  Resurrection (assuming one believes)   apply worth and meaning  to the words of Christ in a sense that they are  True Absolutes

 &

2)  what do those absolute truths (when accepted)  say about other truth claims that contradict it?

Everyone believes in something, whether we were coerced into it or not. Even I, who swears by the pure, unconceptualized experience, and by acting directly from the depth of that experience, without intervention by the faculty of thought, do think and do have beliefs.

I think belief is potentially dangereous if the belief is unquestioning, uncritical, or absolute. I regard believing as a creative proccess in which our beliefs mature and evolve as we mature and evolve.

In other words, absolutism, not belief, is the enemy. When the belief is absolute, then B.S. becomes b.s. Ask Inanna, he knows all about it.

Seriously, and to finally and decisively answer H.G.'s question: all of our concepts are relative—relative to the viewpoint of the observer, which is arbitrarily chosen by the observer. Thus, our believes are chosen—and relative. 

dont you believe in one God who created everyting? is'nt that an absolute? believeing in one?

now what we believe about that oneness is another matter

I too believe in what I need at the present ... as that is ... isall I know and ID has toby tested ... thus tomorrow IT could be different ... now there's a change even an evolution! Is that biblical babble?

If you lay your God (emotive) head (intellect; as imperfect) out there in the present public domain ... you can be guaranteed someone will crap on it even if they don't know they will follow their will to tromp on anything they will ... as emote in ...

I've been away for a bit, like the bit is better'n the bark of a dogfish it can serve as a sharp word to keep the emotions at bae ... so carry on HG be as you were asd as you will be with much banter to carry you through the additional year nin's ... IT's a Thessalonean thing ... out on the IO'nin wadis ... betweem the waves of debelles ... Hoppy birthday from us that see you much rae Nude ...

BB & John:

I do NOT believe in a god — ANY god — because I can't imagine the "god" that I discern, the "god" I experience. The moment I embark on description, it all collapses into paradox, complexity, unknowlingness… I trust my experiences of "god" and I find various description of "god" fascinating, often very helpful, but that's NOT belief. 

I believe that the people I know are the same people they were the last time we met…  but I would not be willing to say I believe they have the same attitudes and feelings. A belief, it seems to me, can never be much more than a concept you or I consent to: as such, it's circumscribed by a  particular context, purpose and variety of experience. 

And a belief, being bound as it is to our biology, is as organic and adaptable as we are; and as deeply affected by our culture, attitudes, values and interests. It's necessarily a working hypothesis.

Fundamentalists seem keen to assert that particular forms of an assertion are independant of context and are unchanging, inviolate… eternal.  But that is NOT the way human experience is; it not the way anything in the Universe seems to be. 

Belief, in those assertive, inflexible ways is, in my view, worse than a delusion. It is an attempt to stand between people and their experiences of "god"; it is bullying, alienating and false. I know so many people, many close friends, whose deeper thoughts about existence and curiousity about faith issues have been crushed out of them by that kind of harrassing god-talk. People are less drawn to atheism than they are driven to it.

So often, when posters here cut and paste their pet excerpts of self-justification from scripture, I recoil. I feel they are treating the Bible more like an autopsy report than a challenge to life and to love; it's like offering me a look in their underwear drawer.

Revelations of the "divine", experiences of the mystery, sensations of wonderment, peals of pain and joy, unfurlings of beauty from everything we touch, smell, see or taste… the welling up and the compulsions to love… these are ongoing, moment by moment, and there's not a "belief" I've yet encountered that has more than dumbing-down and mortification to add.

Mike, as Einstein said the infinite is beyond mortal imagination without de light ... a relational term of time and space and enigmatic frothy passings to bier.

But no matter what some will say they experienced it all even without a KISS from the illuminati ... choqan ... and that is sum Job ... in the dark at that ... occult behaviour of obtuse behaviour of stepping beyond the earthy gods? That's myth man ... one can only fabricate as indeterminate ... quantum poe a Tres thing ... like logic ... emotional people don't get it ...

Hi blackbelt,

It may just be a function of communication between us.  I don't know that belief in the Physical Resurrection automatically renders the words of Christ absolutes.

For starters an absolute cannot change.  It is what it is and it always will be.  

The words of Jesus recorded in scripture are interpretted by those who follow and in that interpretation things do change.  Jesus himself, a great lover of scripture, does not appear to treat scripture as an absolute.  Throughout the whole sermon on the mount he quotes a piece of scripture "You have heard it said . . . " and then he supplies something different, at times contrary "But I tell you . . ."

If we believe that the meaning of the Biblical texts can never change then we run into difficulty with Jesus suggesting that chunks of scripture no longer have application to his followers.  Jesus takes what was once believed to be an absolute and shatters it.

Because Jesus did that and Jesus teaches us that such practice has its place I think it is almost impossible for us to say that anything attributed to Jesus is an absolute.  Which is not me saying that the words of Jesus are without value.  It is me saying that in order for any faith to be a living faith it cannot cling to anything as absolute.

Certain beliefs may be more resistant to change and interpretation, such as the commandments to love God and neighbour (they are about as close to absolutes as we get, I think) and even then it takes a fair bit of discernment to decide what such love entails from time to time.

Anything we claim as an absolute automatically renders competing or contradicting claims as opposite.  So if a certain absolute is good, all that competes with or contradicts it must absolutely be bad and vice versa.

Accepting anything as an absolute also locks us into that absolute.  There can be no reformation of that belief in future generations.  That automatically renders any expression of the Christian faith that deviates from the absolute as apostacy.  It also sets any expression of the Christian faith which accepts the absolute later than the early Church heretical.

Let me explain in plainer terms.  The Churches that were spawned by the Protestant Reformation believe that "The Church is reformed and always reforming" and yet ever reformation takes us further and further away from the initial congregation in Jerusalem immediately following the death of Jesus.  Every step away is a step away from an absolute.  That renders all but first century Jerusalem churches apostate.

Further, the Reformation Churches by stepping further away from the 1st century Jerusalem Church automatically become heretical because they do not speak with the same voice as the 1st Century Jerusalem Church.

That is the power of the absolute to destroy a living tradition.  Absolutes tend to turn hearts of flesh into hearts of stone when the message of scripture indicates that God wants the reverse to be happening.

From observation, when we argue about absolutes we focus on the nature of the absolute and by defining it as absolute we attribute to it the very nature/being of God who alone is perfect.  When we do that with doctrine it is idolatry.

Grace and peace to you.

John

Hi MikePaterson,

Fair enough.  It sounds to me that you believe in a God which can be experienced.  Defining the God behind the experiences appears, from your post, to be an unsatisfactory exercise.

If I am reading you rightly I don't have a problem with that.  My experiences of God don't tend to come as doctrinal or dogmatic reinforcers.  Personally speaking, I would say that these experiences have had the power to shape some of my thinking about God and would impact upon some doctrinal formulations that I find fairly trustworthy.  I couldn't honestly build a systematic theology out of them.

I would agree with that.

I would agree with that as well.

True it is not the way anything in the Universe seems to be and if the "absolutes" are studied we find that their history doesn't bear out that they are unchanging, inviolate or eternal.  Still, those who wish to believe differently will.

I think that is fair comment.  I am mindful that it is made in the same manner any absolute is expressed so I do not think that such belief is of necessity bullying, alienating or false.  The minute such belief dictates the experience of others or defines what they must experience it becomes dangerous.

There will always be, I think, a current of anti-intellectualism involved in any expression of faith.  Those who operate on the frontiers of established thought will always be a threat to those who cannot or will not follow.  This, alongside of the reality that every trail blazed is not automatically worth being taken can lead to places where questions are less important than carefully arranged and pre-set answers.

The strength of the anti-intellectualism will in turn lead faith expressions to limit questions and questioning.

There is also an inherent laziness in humanity which settles for answers and seeks no new questions.

Those content with where they are will stay where they are.  Those who yearn for more will seek it out.

Religion can get in the way or open the door.  What it chooses is not a given.

Grace and peace to you.

John

Hi Rev John  and Mikepaterson-------------------You wrote---------------------------------------------

 RevJohn Wrote

True it is not the way anything in the Universe seems to be and if the "absolutes" are studied we find that their history doesn't bear out that they are unchanging, inviolate or eternal.  Still, those who wish to believe differently will.------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------airclean33--Gentlemen-----------Do you both believe if you throw a rock up, it won't come down?-------Do you believe the Moon or sun are moving away? I believe there are absolutes that don't change. I Did note John, you said seems to be.  Could you explain this?

Airclean: the universe's measured expansion means the stars we see at night are receding from our solar system. Even the "noble" gases — the most stable atoms known — have been observed forming compounds. Energy today is matter tomorrow and vice versa. Our sun is putting out more energy that it used to and it will one day run out of fuel and die; orbits within the solar system are variable and it's all held together by interacting fields of gravity from a number of sources, principally the sun… our galaxy is in constant motion and agitation... and our place within it is changing… on our little planet, even the land masses are shifting as tectonic pltes do their stuff; moutains are eroding and mew mountains are rising; evolution continues and we are seeing species become extinct almost day by day. Everything is mobile, everything is dynamic. Have you ever thought about going back, let's say to a city you visited last month: people will be in different places doing different things, some will have died, some will avere been born, buildings come and go… plants grow, flower, fruit and die… no two days are identical... stability is an illusion. Even you are physiologically distnguishable today from what you were yesterday. Ah, you say, but not in any way that matters? But yesterday was one more day you lived and a day closer to your death. we will all pass into the rivers of life, the turning of planets, the shifting of suns, the lives and deaths of galaxies. Nothing is stationary, stable or enduring. It's not nature's way, it's certainly not the universe's way… everything has a narrative, a story, everything IS a narrative. The Bible describes a narrative; Jesus gives us narrative after narrative. Stability, permanence is not not nature's way; it's not humanity's way… each of us is unique. Changelessness is not god's way… not, at least, according to nature or the Bible.