Religion...

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Re: Religion...

Post by ShowMeKC »

Former Protestant becoming Eastern Orthodox...

My growing up as a Protestant was definitely a good thing and led me to the original Church. I've been trying to fully immerse myself in Orthodoxy and mold myself to the Orthodox world view and to an Orthodox mindset even though I'm not even a Catechumen yet (and am about half a year from officially joining the Church).

Even though I have found the Original Church, I still do not regard myself as a good Christian, and certainly consider myself to be a bad one. I am most certainly worse than everyone else.

The Eastern Orthodox Church is "the second largest single communion of Christians in the world", second only to the Roman Catholic Church. 1000 years ago, the Roman Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodox Churches were one church. Everything was done by consensus and through councils of all bishops (the main councils were called the Seven Ecumenical Councils. All bishops had equal voting power no matter the size of their jurisdiction). There were five main "Patriarchates" in the Church... Rome, Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria and Jerusalem.
However eventually, the Patriarch in Rome (known as the Pope) began attempting to exercise more power than he was allowed and made decisions without the council of the other Patriarchs and Bishops. Eventually, disputes and disagreements between the four other Churches and the Church in Rome became too great and the two split.

I personally was led to this through mainly historical research. I knew that my denomination couldn't possibly be the original Church and I wanted to know how ancient Christians worshiped... I researched some things, but then eventually was led to Orthodoxy. The more I learn about it, the better I feel about my decision and the more authentic and Christian it is seeming. I am now submitting myself completely to God and his Church and trying to put my own pride down to learn the truth.

But as I said, even though I am becoming Orthodox, I'm still not a very good Christian and am certainly worse than all. I am especially not a good Christian when compared to the Saints.
Last edited by ShowMeKC on Thu Aug 21, 2008 1:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Religion...

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beautyfromashes wrote: My morality is driven by my belief that God has given a perfect example of how to live and my job is to emulate it.
This example that he has given, these idea's on how to live, could these ideas not be followed by people who do not believe in your God or any God at all?  Is a organized religion not anything more then a collection of idea's and beliefs that have been collected and organized over time?  Could a person not have some of the same beliefs as a religion even if they don't believe in the religion itself?
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Re: Religion...

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aknowledgeableperson wrote: Not for all but there are some who do believe that God is working through the doctors to fix whatever is wrong for whatever reason.
Sure, or that's what they say they believe. But why the heck would God need to work through doctors? That doesn't make any sense. He's God!

I'm just saying, it isn't hard to make a case that the couple in question are putting far more faith in science than God, and then giving all the credit to God.
Maitre D wrote: There are certainly those instances.   I'd argue nearly everyone is capable of *some* good acts in his or her life.   But I'd have trouble taking someone seroiusly if he had major personal problems in life.  
The liar, lunatic, lord "trilemma" is total bunk. Lewis was a good writer, but not a very good theological historian. Personally, I seriously doubt Jesus ever claimed to be divine, although he may not necessarily have been eager to dispel rumors to that effect, if they were even around before his death--I have to think it might be easier to implement your revolutionary agenda if there are rumors that you're the Son of God. My guess is the miracles, the divinity stuff, all that were rumors spread not by Jesus himself but by overzealous proto-Christians (and/or anti-Christians--claiming you're divine is a good way to find yourself on the wrong side of the establishment). But I'm not even convinced those rumors existed while Jesus was still alive.

My guess is he was your average, run-of-the-mill, radical revolutionary and traveling healer / preacher.
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Re: Religion...

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ShowMeKC wrote: I personally was led to this through mainly historical research. I knew that my denomination couldn't possibly be the original Church and I wanted to know how ancient Christians worshiped... I researched some things, but then eventually was led to Orthodoxy. The more I learn about it, the better I feel about my decision and the more authentic and Christian it is seeming.
The original forms of worship were not even in a building but in 'house to house'.  There was a meal and discussion.  I'm sure there were no golden crosses, cups or plates; no stained glass or fancy architecture; people lived as a community and had 'everything in common'.  There was no priest or robes.  
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Re: Religion...

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beautyfromashes, we must not forget that the early Christians and Apostles were mostly Jews.

The Early forms of Christian worship were in fact Jewish. Yes they were in houses because of persecution, but there were bishops and priests. James was the Bishop of Jerusalem and presided over the first council ever in Jerusalem (which is written about in Acts).

Also keep in mind that we have the writings of Church Fathers from the later first century up to the days of the Seven Councils. They are regarded as edifying and (mostly) true. Many of those Church Fathers were taught by the Apostles themselves. They speak about the Eucharist (known as Communion in Protestantism) and the form of worship.

In fact, we have the exact form of worship ca. 150 AD during the time of Justin Martyr. The early church worshiped Liturgically. Which is the way the Orthodox Church, the Roman Catholic Church, some Anglican Churches, and the way the Methodist Church (before something like 50 years ago) all worship.

In fact, the Jewish form of worship at the time was also Liturgical and in Chant. The early form of worship was the Jewish form of worship with Christian elements added.
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Re: Religion...

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Also beautyfromashes... I am NOT here for an argument. I have seen arguments from all sorts of people against Orthodox claims, and personally I cannot give definitive answers and cannot represent Orthodoxy, especially since i'm not Orthodox yet.
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Re: Religion...

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Yeah, we're not here to argue whether Eastern Orthodoxy or any other religious denomination is The One True Religion. We're just sharing our personal beliefs and having a shockingly good, reasonable, non-flaming discussion so far.

I'm actually kind of proud of us.

Anyway, I can totally respect someone wanting to trace their religion back to its source and try to get as close to its origins as possible. If I were a believer in whatever, that is probably what I'd do.
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Re: Religion...

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ShowMeKC wrote: Also beautyfromashes... I am NOT here for an argument. I have seen arguments from all sorts of people against Orthodox claims, and personally I cannot give definitive answers and cannot represent Orthodoxy, especially since i'm not Orthodox yet.
Hey, if you feel connected to God by the practice then that's great.  I just don't feel connected to God by chanting or repeating someone elses prayer or having an orchestrated service.  It seems to me the original Christian service was Jesus feeding the 5000 in a field by a lake and healing a man who had been lowered through a roof and having a meal with his disciples in the upper room.  That's the service that should be emulated.
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Re: Religion...

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mean wrote: The liar, lunatic, lord "trilemma" is total bunk.
Darnit!  We finally disagree on something!    :lol:


Lewis was a good writer, but not a very good theological historian. Personally, I seriously doubt Jesus ever claimed to be divine, although he may not necessarily have been eager to dispel rumors to that effect, if they were even around before his death--I have to think it might be easier to implement your revolutionary agenda if there are rumors that you're the Son of God. My guess is the miracles, the divinity stuff, all that were rumors spread not by Jesus himself but by overzealous proto-Christians (and/or anti-Christians--claiming you're divine is a good way to find yourself on the wrong side of the establishment). But I'm not even convinced those rumors existed while Jesus was still alive.

My guess is he was your average, run-of-the-mill, radical revolutionary and traveling healer / preacher.

Hard to ever know what he was or wasn't.  There are some disputes whether he actually existed.  The Jews (Talmud) claims he was an evil sorcerer who practiced witch-craft and the Muslims say he was a nice little prohpet but nothing more. 

We do know this:  he left a legacy 1/3 of our Globe follows today.
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Re: Religion...

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To all... The answer to all your questions will be answered when you die. It will all be clear for you then.. In the meantime, carry on with your lives as you see fit and be ready to take the responcibility for those actions when it is time!
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Re: Religion...

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Maitre D wrote: Darnit!  We finally disagree on something!    :lol:
Hah! At least I gave an explanation that, hopefully, you can agree makes sense whether you agree with the content of it or not.
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Re: Religion...

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KCKev wrote: To all... The answer to all your questions will be answered when you die. It will all be clear for you then.. In the meantime, carry on with your lives as you see fit and be ready to take the responcibility for those actions when it is time!
The problem with that theory is, religion is supposed to help you in your Earthly life.  All major religions teach daily life lessons.  Jesus himself spoke very little of heaven & hell.  He spoke almost exclusively about 2 things:  relationships with other people, and money.


In fact, 15% of all his speech involved money.  Which out-paces his discussions of heaven & hell combined.  The Bible spoke 2x as much about money as it does about prayer or the afterlife. 
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Re: Religion...

Post by nota »

mean wrote: I suspect you may be referring to someone with the attitude of, "I actively believe with certainty there is no God," as a true atheist. We in the club refer to that as strong atheism. For my part, I just don't believe in any of it because I have never seen anything that convinced me it had any chance of actually being real. Even so, I wouldn't say I am 100% certain there is no God. Just 99.99999999999%--a small difference numerically, but a reasonable difference in opinion. I accept the possibility that I could be wrong and I'm going to burn in hell for eternity, but at least I can live with the clear conscience of not being a hypocrite and not being intellectually dishonest with myself. I trust that on the off chance there actually is a God who loves me, he'll understand. After all, he'd have been the one who created my brain to be incapable of believing extraordinary claims without seeing extraordinary evidence, right? I like to think he'd at least give me a high five for not being a hypocrite before pulling the lever that shoots me into the lake of fire.
Atheist

Agnostic

By my personal definitions.

Madalyn Murray O'Hair was a true atheist in my book, or at least seemed so by all that I read.
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Re: Religion...

Post by mean »

nota wrote: Atheist

Agnostic

By my personal definitions.

Madalyn Murray O'Hair was a true atheist in my book, or at least seemed so by all that I read.
I dig. I think it's mostly a semantic debate. I just don't like the word 'agnostic' because it seems to imply (to me) a higher degree of uncertainty than actually exists. While I have no problem conceding a 0.0000000000001% probability, I would concede that same probability to virtually any conceivable possibility in the universe. I don't consider myself "agnostic" or "undecided" on the issue of, say, whether or not there are nymphs that live in oak trees, or a sun god named Ra, and I don't think most people would say they are undecided on such matters either. We simply say, we don't believe it.

Serious question. As a Christian, would you say that you are 100% certain that, say, Wotan doesn't exist? Would you say you are 100% certain that Yaweh does? Or would you say you are not 100% certain about anything, and are technically agnostic about both, but have a stronger inclination to believe in Yaweh?

Anyway, O'Hair was definitely a strong atheist, much like Richard Dawkins today. I can't say those folks really speak for me, but I do appreciate their viewpoints and find them interesting, and I appreciate what O'Hair was trying to accomplish in terms of the rights of atheists to have freedom from religion in the same way that religious Americans enjoy the freedom of religion.
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Re: Religion...

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KCKev wrote: To all... The answer to all your questions will be answered when you die. It will all be clear for you then.
Not necessarily.  If you believe in reincarnation, then you'll live again in another body...past or future...and will most likely not remember a previous life.  So your questions may persist once again, and go unanswered just as before.
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Re: Religion...

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Maitre D wrote: The problem with that theory is, religion is supposed to help you in your Earthly life.   All major religions teach daily life lessons.   Jesus himself spoke very little of heaven & hell.   He spoke almost exclusively about 2 things:  relationships with other people, and money.


In fact, 15% of all his speech involved money.   Which out-paces his discussions of heaven & hell combined.   The Bible spoke 2x as much about money as it does about prayer or the afterlife. 
That is common sence and isn't needed to be explained to most people, let alone pounded in to their heads as most preachers think.

He also died for our sins so does that imply my need to sin or else he died in vain?

spin it any way you need to to feel go about oneself.
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Re: Religion...

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Maitre D wrote: Guess I'm not following your point then.  I don't know of anyone who would sit in a church pew to listen to the good things Brittany Spears taught.   The notion of 'credibility' exists in most people's minds.   A bad messenger can and does, hurt the message.
I don't know that I would necessarily follow Britney Spears as a teacher or anything, but if she said something I agreed with, I'd acknowledge that.  Having been brought up in Catholic schools, it's impossible for me to say how much of my beliefs which coincide with Christianity are because I was taught that way (in which case you can obviously trace all those beliefs back to Jesus) and how much I would believe regardless just because it makes sense.  Even as an atheist now, I still believe many of Jesus's core teachings because when you strip away the supernatural elements, they're good lessons regardless.  I try to treat others as I want to be treated because I think the world would be a much better place if everyone had that kind of empathy and compassion.  It's particularly important to me because, as an atheist, I don't believe any of us are going to experience heaven or hell when this life is over.  It's wrong to murder someone, but it seems to me at least that it would be more wrong to murder someone if their life is just going to end than to murder someone who's going to transmigrate to "a better place" after the deed is done.  It's obviously nobody's place to end another person's life, but I think it'd be worse to truly end it than to prematurely send them off to heaven (though I guess the worst would be to prematurely send them off to hell).

I don't actually think of Jesus as a teacher to me (although like I said before, it's impossible to know whether I would have come to these beliefs myself without Jesus/Catholicism's influence -- I'd like to think I would, but I'll never know for sure), which is maybe the part that doesn't entirely make sense to you, how you could allow yourself to be taught by someone who was clearly at least partly insane.  I think of Jesus as a guy who had some good ideas, many of which I share with him.  If Jesus were around right now (uhhh...ignoring all the religious/Apocalyptic implications of the Second Coming, that is), I don't think I'd necessarily follow him because I would probably recognize that this guy claiming to be the son of god is not totally right in the head.  But if he's saying good things, he's saying good things, regardless how crazy he might be.  I'll freely admit that Jesus said a lot of good things, but I don't turn to the Bible for life lessons.  Same thing with Britney Spears -- if she made a good point, she made a good point, but I'm probably not going to ask her for more nuggets of wisdom (after one, that well is probably dry anyway).
nota wrote: Atheist

Agnostic

By my personal definitions.

Madalyn Murray O'Hair was a true atheist in my book, or at least seemed so by all that I read.
I personally think of it a little bit more strictly.  "Atheist" at its root just means without god/religion/whatever.  Almost just irreligious, although you might also apply that word to a non-practicing believer, so it doesn't quite fit.  Thinking of it that way, "agnostics" are just a subset of atheists -- none of them have religion, but agnostics don't believe in god and "strong atheists" disbelieve in god.  Because it's impossible to truly know whether god exists or not, I personally think it's a little irresponsible to disbelieve in the existence of god.  At that point you're just taking it on faith again -- a faith that is exactly the opposite of a religious person's faith, but faith all the same, and to me there is a bit of a disconnect between building your entire position on logic and empirical knowledge and then still taking something on faith.  In my personal experience, I feel that the vast majority of atheists are agnostic -- that is to say, every atheist I know, myself included, would all technically be classified as agnostic.  But again, I feel that agnosticism is really just a subset of atheism, and like mean suggests, I think that it suggests more uncertainty than really exists.  To call yourself agnostic, to me, is almost like hedging.  I am open to the possibility, however slight, that god actually does exist, as soon as I see some sort of evidence that doesn't require me to take it on faith.  I have nothing against faith, I just don't have any of my own, I need something tangible.  Lacking that, I am not inclined to believe -- whether it's in god, Santa Claus, Nazis still living inside the hollowed-out Earth, or anything else.  By your definitions, I'd be agnostic, but I don't feel like that's any different from saying that I'm a Missourian instead of an American -- they're both true, it's just a matter of how I'd prefer to self-identify.
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Re: Religion...

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"If there is no God, then all things are permitted"
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Re: Religion...

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phuqueue wrote:By your definitions, I'd be agnostic, but I don't feel like that's any different from saying that I'm a Missourian instead of an American -- they're both true, it's just a matter of how I'd prefer to self-identify.
I like your take, I think that sums it up pretty well. I just don't feel very agnostic. To me, someone who is agnostic ought to give God more like a on in ten chance of existing, rather than one in a hundred billion. But technically, I suppose that isn't really the case.
ShowMeKC wrote: "If there is no God, then all things are permitted"
Bad people do bad things whether they're religious people or not. Also, don't start an argument. I think we've already quite nicely covered atheistic morality. Suffice to say, your statement has been shown to be false.
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Re: Religion...

Post by nota »

mean wrote: I dig. I think it's mostly a semantic debate.
Of that, I'm 1000% sure  8)
Serious question. As a Christian, would you say that you are 100% certain that, say, Wotan doesn't exist? Would you say you are 100% certain that Yaweh does? Or would you say you are not 100% certain about anything, and are technically agnostic about both, but have a stronger inclination to believe in Yaweh?
I've never read about Wotan, not a whole lot about Yaweh, but who can be absolutely 100% sure???? Agnostic on that subject.
I appreciate what O'Hair was trying to accomplish in terms of the rights of atheists to have freedom from religion in the same way that religious Americans enjoy the freedom of religion.
Definitely, but as I'm older than you, I vividly remember how hated she was. But she did a lot of good for her followers.

To me, one is an atheist if they truly believe there is no God. To me, one is an agnostic if they have wonderings about God. Maybe my definitions are too strong, but they are what I believe and what I understand.
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