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The Forum > Article Comments > Does Christianity have a future? > Comments

Does Christianity have a future? : Comments

By David Young, published 20/4/2009

It is not Jesus who is irrelevant in our lives today, it is Paul’s Christianity.

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Hi to you all. Thank you for your mostly positive comments.

RopP I was disappointed that the SBS only dealt with the end of the Cathars. The last two good men was the end of the genocide started in 1203 by the Church of Rome. It is a hideous story and shows the true nature of Christianity. Dominic Guzman (St Dominic) deserves a special mention. He makes Hitler look like a rank amateur.

Ho Hum. There are many ways to spirituality. The greatest sin of Christianity was to set itself up as the only true religion and violently suppressed any other religious views. Our society would probably be a lot richer had the ideas of the Gnostics, the Cathars, Pagans, Wicca and countless other forms of seeking spirituality had been allowed to exist.
I am of the view that the way forward is to integrate our spiritual life with the physical word the way the Cathars seemed to have done.

Pericles. <<Surely, as with every religion, Christianity exists only for the individual, and not - in any spiritual sense - external to the individual?>> No. It is true of what Westerns today think of as religion (Christianity, Judaism and Islam) but not all religions. The Buddhist religion (an example) seeks to help and guide an individual to there own understanding.

<<The entire piece seems, to the non-religious, to be an advertisement for something called gnosticism.>> Gnostic Christianity appears to have been the original form before Paul came along and destroyed it. Hence harking back to Gnostic Christianity as the true Christian religion.

My understanding has deepened in the last ten years, but the essence of the understanding that Paul destroyed Christianity as it could have been has not changed. This does not mean I am a closet Gnostic or Christian of any sort.

John J. Jesus son of God is something Paul dreamed up after the death of Jesus. It was not part of the original Christianity (nor was the Trinity). The 'Sermon on the Mount' from the literal Greek translation may change your mind about Jesus.
Posted by Daviy, Monday, 20 April 2009 7:56:41 PM
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**>>This basic form of Christian law says that we can do anything we like to anyone at any time under any circumstances, and provided we find a reason why we are right, we remain free of sin.<<

That is clearly a nonsense.**

Pericles,

I think what Daviy is talking about is the way Christianity has been practised by many adherents over the centuries, not necessarily the way people some practise it or see it now.

For example, the ultimate heresy in my view is the way the Church had, for many centuries, twisted the meaning of Christ's resurrection around to say that Christ died for mankind's sins, as if all those sins were magically hoovered away and absolved.

Did you see the program on SBS? Look at the way those of superior intellect in the Church manipulated the situation for personal power and advantage over the centuries. A nonsense - I don't think so. A certain amount of that past attitude has been transmitted to today's world without a doubt.
Posted by RobP, Monday, 20 April 2009 8:36:05 PM
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Anyone who doubts that Christianity has a future should take the time to attend the Hillsong Conference in July. It will have to be the one in 2010, because the one in 2009, is fully booked out. It is held at Acer Arena at Olympic Park, and brings together some of the very best preachers and teachers in the world to one place for a week. The venue probably hold 24,000 people and attracts delegates from all over the world.

At Easter Hillsong did a head count of all its attendances, and claims 38,000 people attended its services across the city. It held Easter services in the Entertainment Centre in the City, with an electronic interface with its Baulkham Hills campus, and its Macarthur campus in the South of Sydney, and unless a person has attended these services on a weekly basis for a couple of years, the wonderful way it teaches Christianity as a way of life, is not clearly understood.

It makes no pretence that Almighty God is not alive and well. It changes lives for those who seek its lessons. It works miracle like changes in the lives of those who come to it, and start to read and understand the Word of God. Its influence is far greater than the numbers would indicate. In fact it probably heralds the future of Christianity, and the way we will be governed into the rest of the time that Australia survives as a democracy.

David Young raises a number of interesting points. One is that Christianity is a political system. It is a political system that has stood the test of time; With a few aberrations leading to civil wars, after Rome tried to discipline the unruly English, and promoted warfare within Britain. Christianity supplied the governing principles under which the English democracy thrived. It was adopted by the United States. We must take government back from the lawyers. The Commonwealth will fail as all republics governed by lawyers have failed. Lawyers and Priests are the bane of every society. They mix God and power in one person, disastrously
Posted by Peter the Believer, Tuesday, 21 April 2009 7:44:33 AM
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Daviy, we are going to have to disagree again, I'm afraid.

>>Pericles. <<Surely, as with every religion, Christianity exists only for the individual, and not - in any spiritual sense - external to the individual?>> No. It is true of what Westerns today think of as religion (Christianity, Judaism and Islam) but not all religions. The Buddhist religion (an example) seeks to help and guide an individual to there own understanding.<<

Which is exactly as I described - an entirely individual "understanding", or experience. The fact that there is someone there to guide you is entirely common across all religions.

The point I was making, and which you avoid, is that the future of any religion is entirely dependent upon its impact on the individual. If it continues to provide spiritual sustenance to people who need it, then it will survive.

As a direct result of this, a religion's future surely depends far more on the present conduct of those who "guide" - the Pope, Jensen, Sun Myung Moon, paedophile priests etc. - than the antics of folk a couple of thousand years ago.

You are looking at the issues, as so many religious people do, from the point of view that one or the other has to be "right", and religious satisfaction is only a matter of choosing the "right" one. Hence this stunningly unimportant differentiation between Christianity and gnosticism.

It is entirely irrelevant which religion a person either finds themselves involved in, or chooses for themselves.

Essentially, religion fills an emotional, not an intellectual need. Wrestling with the trivia of one interpretation versus another can only have the effect of turning even more people off the idea. It's the penalty for thinking about it too hard.
Posted by Pericles, Tuesday, 21 April 2009 8:28:52 AM
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Pericles

At least we agree that you and I disagreeing is nothing new.

<<Which is exactly as I described - an entirely individual "understanding", or experience. The fact that there is someone there to guide you is entirely common across all religions.>>

What you describe is reasonably close to how Christianity started. But Christianity went feral and set up a structure that destroyed anything or anyone that refused to accept that they had the sole authority to dispense 'Gods Law' on this earth. This is not guiding, this is oppression.

<<The point I was making, and which you avoid, is that the future of any religion is entirely dependent upon its impact on the individual.>>
Exactly what I am saying head on in my article. If Christianity can dispose of its despotic oppressive structure and return to being a guide that has relevance to the individual then it will survive. If not it will die.

Even though the power of the Christian church to destroy has largely taken away by separation of church and state the basic structure of Christianity has not changed. It still attempts to rule and oppress rather than guide. It demands blind obedience.

<<You are looking at the issues, as so many religious people do, from the point of view that one or the other has to be "right", and religious satisfaction is only a matter of choosing the "right" one. Hence this stunningly unimportant differentiation between Christianity and gnosticism.>> I am not religious, nor do I claim any form of right or wrong.

When you write things like this I wonder if you are confusing what I write with what someone else as written. With the Christian attitude there is no choice. That is why I oppose it in its existing form. If you look at what I am saying you would see that we are very close in our thinking. Maybe judgement is getting in the way of seeing what I am saying. Why keep arguing with someone who agrees with you?
Posted by Daviy, Tuesday, 21 April 2009 11:21:36 AM
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The author obviously does not know the history of Christianity well or simply is out of touch with the church esp the Catholic Church.

I was converted more than 10 years ago from Tibetan Buddhism (which seems also be legal by his standards) and never in my faith life have I experienced legalistic situations in the church. In fact, Christian mysticism is getting popular and the church simply embrace any Christian spiritual exercises according to his or her stage of maturity. For myself, I am more into inner works embracing the spirituality of Hildegard of Bingen and the mystics. The church did not say we are wrong. In fact, in church we were taught to look within where God exists and practices inner life. There are so much of this in the church that the author is not aware of.
Yes, there are rules in the church but every community has its own rules even new age bodies and cult groups. But rule must be interpreted according to the conscious and as a guide. But all in all is trying to help us lead to union with God.
There are also traffic rules but as long as you cross the road, that is the objective. Imagine there are no rules and guides, no government everyone can say and do what they like in this world.
May be the author have been hurt by someone in the church whom he could not forgive and that is why he thinks that the institutional church need to be dismantled.
The institutional church exists to protect the faith as handled down by the apostles. I see this as a great thing to protect liars like Dan Brown.
BTW, Gnostic christianity is a later development just like the reformation and don't be fooled by all these evidence lacking novels.
Posted by healer, Wednesday, 22 April 2009 4:51:47 PM
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