I must confess to a kind of 'evil' relishing of dealing with the barren wasteland of the life Brother Tebbutt suggests.

The comfortable confident 'I'm alright Jack'.. and the clinging to emptiness as if it was substance.. the denial of the logical ramifications of these cherished (but meaningless) presuppositions...the fear of actually living them out.. the hypocrisy of claim Tebbutts position is truly monumental.

If Tebbutts was honest he would take a grim hard look at life, and say:

1/ I'm only here for a while.
2/ Lets maximize my pleasure while here.
3/ It doesn't matter whether helping an old lady across the road or raping her daughter fits the bill.. it all doesnt matter anyway...

4/ He would admit that the only thing holding back all of the above is the "Law"...
5/ He would admit that there is no such thing as morality.. just power...

annnnnd so the highway to hell of secularism atheism etc goes as it winds it's way past many signposts which call it to account..

NO! he says.. I'll have none of that rot.. away with it.

and out from the mists of time....comes that voice.. "For me.. to live is Christ.. to die is gain" which in turn hark back to a moment on the road to Damascus..."who are you Lord?" response "I am Jesus who you are persecuting".. and thereafter.. he proclaimed the man he had tried to destroy...

"In Him dwells the fullness of deity bodily".. yes..quite a turn around indeed....

One day.. it will all come home.. the aged body, the fading mind..the wearyness of life.. "What's it all about.. Alfie?" the eyes glaze over.. as he does not wish to hear the answer..

But Paul has said it "He who knew no sin became sin for us, that in Him we might become the righteousness of God"...

"I am crucified with Christ..it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me"

A silly myth ? :)

some might say so.

Peter doesn't realise that we already have a word to describe things which are not literally true but only 'imaginatively' or 'spiritually' or 'analogically' true.

That word is 'false'.

EVO

'I know i should know better, but Runner! Seriously mate! what is wrong with you? Evolution is a religion! lol! if so,

where is our god?

That is the point. Evolutionist are ignorant enough to practice a religion which denies that creation requires a Creator. That is one dumb religion.

From a philosophical standpoint, thought that this problem was solved when Thomas Aquinas spurred on historical Christianity towards Enlightment and Democracy, when he realised that to be truthful, faith needed be tempered by Reason.

It is also so interesting that it was not only St Thomas who became a Saint through his realism, but other great Christian thinkers during the same period.

Regards, BB.

"Thus the authority of biblical texts does not rely on the idea that they are the dictated words of God but on our experience of them."

There is a lot of truth in this statement. The problem is that those of us who are not Christian and whose ancestors have suffered at the hands of Christians do not read the biblical texts with a sense of wonder and wellbeing. Instead we can often find ourselves reading them with fear and dread.

Sells, you are clearly getting closer than you know to the most exhilarating experience life can offer.

Which is that nothing, absolutely nothing, can compete with the sheer vital, gut-grabbing moment of realization, that this is, in fact, all there is. Life is about living, that's all. In the real, corporeal, material world.

Full stop. Punkt. Point. Punto.

It is the single most exciting and energizing moment of one's existence. It also brings fear - what will I be able to make of this opportunity? And humility - how unbelievably lucky I am to exist at all.

http://www.geocities.com/fang_club/galaxy_song.html

The progress you are making towards this goal is evident.

>>Imagination is the necessary ingredient when reading biblical texts.<<

As it is also needed, Sells, when reading the back of a cornflakes packet. Or Dante.

See how close you are?

>>The universe did not stand for something else, Plato’s forms, or God himself, the universe was nothing but itself.<<

Yep. Moving along nicely. Just one tiny step from realizing that...

"...mankind does not stand for something else, Plato’s forms, or God himself, mankind is nothing but itself"

As Popeye so beautifully put it, "I yam what I yam"

>>...the only purpose to human life, we are told, is the transmission of genetic material. But why would we want to do that?<<

This is the bridge that will take you across the chasm of uncertainty to the land of self-awareness.

When you can accept that this is not actually a purpose - that would be silly, wouldn't it - but a process, you will find yourself able to free yourself of the need for a spiritual support group, and begin to live your own life, instead of someone else's.

I can't recommend it too highly, Sells, but it is a realization that you have to come to on your own. There are no sacred texts to enlighten or confuse. No self-proclaimed leader whose example you can emulate. It is something that you do entirely on your own.

And no-one to praise or blame, but yourself.

Now that's living.