MENTALITY: Europe versus USA (Page 2 of 2)

Who's criteria?  Great question, jerome.oneil - seems that some groups aren't happy unless they can somehow feel superior to other groups.

For instance, some say Mormons aren't Christians because they see the Book of Mormon as being as important as (or as being a part of) the Holy Bible.  Some say any faith tradition not based on Apostolic Succession is invalid.  Some say any tradition that does not accept every word of the Bible as literal truth are not good enough.

It all seems rather silly to me - but some religious types would rather get all worked up over doctrine and dogma and theological minutea rather than investing their time and resources doing good things.

For me, the proof is in the pudding - if an individual or group is doing things then they are 'good'.  If what they are doing is making themselves feel better about themselves by simply criticizing others, then they are behaving like a wacko cult.  James

this is why in my song " i am an athesit" I sing

Don’t need no “good† man how to tell us to live
He’ll put out his hand but expect you to give.

it is all about money and greed and power in all religion

agree or not, but it is true.
everyone should sit down and think about this with an open mind, you will know I am speaking sense.

ken

Here is a video from years ago that tells a story about "The First Self-Righteous Church"
"The Mississippi Squirrel Revival"
by Ray Stevens
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qpfmosf9FpU

Ken, I agree that some churches can get entirely consumed with money and power and become purely self-serving entities - particulary when the church and state are one and the same.  However, not all religious organizations have (or want) secular sanction or authority. 

Unfortunately, there are plenty of zealous fundamentalist radicals here in the US that are very serious about 'taking back America' (whatever that means).  There are overtly political organizations that are tax-exempt simply because they claim to be churches.  Personally, I think that the tax-exempt status of all religious groups should be eliminated and their properties and revenues should be taxed like any other business entity.

A comment on criteria.

I am speaking of generally accepted criteria to be considered Christian.  Those criteria are based on Scripture and more or less codified in the four Creeds.  Now, I am one who thinks that Scripture contains truth, but I do not think it contains the WHOLE truth, and I also think that while it contains only truth that the truth is not always immediately obvious.  As far as literal interpretations, personally I think that's a pretty silly way to go.  God admits IN SCRIPTURE to speaking in riddles, and Jesus frequently used parables and stories intended to have deeper and alternative meanings. 

Now, what happens if a church falls outside those criteria established in the canon of Scripture and contains beliefs contrary to the Creeds - Mormonism being a good example.  Well, in that case I don't think they are Christian.  It's a religion, and it may even be a Jesus-based religion, but for the word Christian to have any meaning at all it must have particular meaning.  That meaning is well defined and agreed to over the centuries.  But what I am not saying is that all Mormons go to Hell for their belief.  It's not my place to judge those people.  But to the extent that their beliefs are contradictory to what Jesus taught as recorded in Scripture, then I feel that they are mislead or incorrect. 

Now it may seem "unfair" to some people that I think I'm right and others are wrong on a matter of religious belief.  But let's take a look at it from my perspective for a moment.  I think that I've learned the Truth of the Matter, and that the Truth of the Matter is that one can have an abiding, eternal relationship with the Creator of Everything.  Is it unfair of me to attempt to share that information with others as it was shared with me?  No.  What I should not and cannot do is FORCE others to my way of thinking.  But that's not something I can do anyway.  But for me to explain my point of view, and to live as best I can in accordance with my beliefs is hardly unfair, though I have been frequently accused that it is insulting to others and unfair.  Those people of course do not see the irony that while I am not holding them to my standards, but merely presenting my faith and allowing others to make up their own mind as to whether it is for them, those people are in fact attempting to hold me to their standards, which is the very thing they are saying is so vile for me to do. 

I am a believer that there is such as thing as objective, unadulterated Truth even in religious matters.  It is obvious that things could not have happened all the different ways the various religions believe they did.  So which way did they happen?  That way is the Truth of the Matter.  There is an objective Truth.  All religions are not correct.  The question then becomes not whether there is an objective Truth, but what is it? 

- Zurf

Hi Jerome Oneill,
Preacher and The Slave Tune, reminded me of an incident in my childhood that has stayed with me my whole life..I was born and raised a Catholic!
when i was around 11 years old i was sent to church for a service with some of my young brothers! My Mam gave us all some brown pennies for the plate in chapel. 
She also gave me 1 half crown to get more milk and bread on our way home!
Yes you guessed! i put the half crown { which was a lot of money in those days} on the plate by mistake! When i went to the parish house to explain and ask for the money back This is what happened.
The Parish priest, Thundered down the hall at me with long swinging black robes, didnt like the fact that i was interrupting his tea! When i explained, He bent down and in my face, said " Ask your Mother does She deny the house of God one half crown"? I explained what it was for, but he turned me by the collar of my  pink jacket on to the street and slammed his well polished door after me! So shocked was i at this supposedly Holy Mans act, that to this day i can still smell the scent of the lilac mixed with my tears as i walked the lane home!
I learned that day, what my Parents taught us at home was more about God then this man would ever know! They taught us what love was all about. Simple skills for life. Honesty, Thruth, Respect,and Compassion. They encouraged us to have an opinion on things in life, but respect  others also.
This same Church also went on to deny the Woman of Ireland the right to contraception!They denied us the right to divorce untill recently!  One could be killed in the rush for the divorce courts when this legislation was introduced!  We now have to be separated 5 years at least to divorce!  Lol.
  There Celibacy, {which i dont agree with } as it has turned out now was a farce as a lot of them "Fathered Children " and lived with and denied this fact Some to there death Bed!
Some Priest hid behind there Sacred Robes as they created Pedophile Rings around the world!
Some had the good grace to leave and admit there love for a woman, and were and still are shunned in this modern time for doing so! It seems the Catholic Church prefers hypocrisy? Some i knew became Alcoholics so trapped did they feel in there ministry.
Am i still Involved with my church? Yes! I love the community feeling it brings.
I love Our Church Leader, a wonderful beautiful Man. Whom i ask to" Marry Me" on a regular basis. He would make a great Husband and Father and a great Priest altogether. He always busts out laughing when i ask him, blesses me and sends me on my merry way.
The fear and Hypocrisy Our church instilled in us has paid a heavy price!
Practically empty Churches. Seven services per day, down to one a day! All our seminaries closed down, and not one person wanting to be A Priest or Nun!
Its been a long time since our parish door was slammed after me But I still use my Parents simple rules in life. There teachings were about Love and to me God is not about religion. Our Creater is about Love.

Diá Linn { God to You }

Old Doll.

Old Doll,

I firmly believe that there are really only two churches on Earth.  There is the Church of God, which is made of those who seek God, and the Church of Power, which is made of those who seek power and control.  There is nothing else.

Zurf,

Thank you for a thoughtful response, but it doesn't answer the question.  "Who's criteria?"  You say it isn't up to you to judge, but that is exactly what you've done, answering the question in a not so direct manner.  It's Zurf's criteria.  To be a Christian, one must simply profess their faith in Christ.  The Mormons do that, and are by every definition a Christian organization.   

The Bible is just a book, written by men for their own ends.   It has no more or less claim on the truth than the Book for Mormon, or the Perl of Great Price, or the Doctrine and Covenants, or the Bhagavad Ghita, or the Quran,  for that matter.   Scripture does not define truth.  It is just a reflection of the truth in the world.   The true word of the Creator is written directly into the creation.

Jerome, we have a disagreement.  I do not think that Scripture, the Old Testament and the New Testament are equal in nature to the Book of Mormon and the other books you listed.  While those contain some true things, I do not believe that they contain The Truth of the Matter, as I used that term above. 

A quick example...  The Book of Mormon conflicts with Revelations, so they cannot both be correct.  It is logically possible that they are both INcorrect, but it does not stand up to reason that they can say opposite things and both be correct.  There is an absolute truth.  Relativism is a good thing for how to treat people, i.e., you are worth as much as am I and neither of us is worth more than any other, but it is not a good thing when attempting to deduce truth.  If you accept that anything CAN be true, then nothing is.  But if you accept that there IS a truth, then the matter becomes one of seeking it out.  What makes the most sense?  What fits best with our observations and best meets the tests of logic and reason (bearing in mind that much of what some people observe is not reasonable). 

So, with a little application of classical logic, when you say that all these books are equal, what you are in effect saying is that they are all incorrect.  That none of them contain the Truth of the Matter.  To that assertion, I respectfully disagree. 

To your assertion that the truth of creation is written in Creation itself, I heartily agree.  It is by that measure that I have determined my choice of what faith to follow. 

To Old Doll, just a little story to show you that all paid professional holy men aren't what you observed (as you observed yourself with your current priest), another little story that demonstrates the best example of Christian love I have seen from the pulpit. 

I grew up in the seventies.  As a young man, I lived in an Appalachian valley in Pennsylvania.  It was rural, some industry, and extremely conservative (not in the political sense but in the daily living sense).  Parents still had their boys wearing crew cuts, etc.  In the town, there was a college.  The college kids did not look like the town kids.  Not by a long shot.  Anyway, I attended an old-school Methodist church.  Complete with pews with plaques saying which family donated them and those seats were "passed down" from generation to generation.  Everyone dressed for church, and the old ladies coated themselves in lilac & rose water until the sanctuary smelled sickeningly sweet.  The Sanctuary was on the second floor.  The first floor foyer was in the flood zone of the Susquehanna River, and so was also elevated up eight or ten steps.  The doors were enormous walnut and elaborately carved.  An impressive entrance.  To get to the sanctuary, one had to climb those stairs, go through the impressive entryway, and go up a flight of stairs that was twenty to twenty-five steps high.  Then, at the start of service doors were closed at the back of the sanctuary.  Again, impressively large carved walnut doors.  To enter after service had begun, one had to first climb to the second floor foyer and then open those forboding walnut doors.  Then come into the aisle and find a seat in a pew. 

One Sunday, the choir was singing.  In the old Methodist churches, the pastor always sang with the choir, and because he had a microphone in the pulpit he was always the loudest.  Well, the choir was singing, and the doors creaked open.  In walked a college kid.  Long hair.  Tye-die shirt.  Jeans with holes in the knees and walked off cuffs.  Clunky sandals.  He looked bad and smelled worse.  It took little imagination to determine how he had spent the preceding portion of the weekend.  But there he was.  If you can think of looking at a person and thinking, "Now there's someone who needs Jesus," this guy was a good example.  He walked up the aisle and saw no one make room for him.  He turned to leave.  And the pastor asked the choir to stop singing.  The congregation was wondering how the pastor was going to make an example of this young man - daring to interrupt church and not being properly dressed.  He made an example all right, but not as they expected.  He said, "Young man, if you can't find a seat, you're welcome to sit with my family in the front.  And if you haven't got any plans for lunch, we'd be honored if you'd join us at my home after the service."   You could have heard a pin drop.  That's the way it's done.  I've never forgotten that lesson, and doubt I ever will.   

- Big D