Richie 10,
Many of your ideas are fundamentalist cliche and not intelligent understanding of 21st century reality. They may be understood by ancient Jews familiar with the concepts of animal sacrifice.

Dear Richie,

I see that Philo has preceded me, thank you for that, but let me put it in my own words:

You must place the words of Jesus in the context in which he was living. The people among whom Jesus taught and preached were primitive. As funny or sad as it sounds to us today, they believed that God can be bargained with and even that they could play legalistic tricks on Him, so much that they became a nation of lawyers. They further blindly believed that the pain of poor animals being sacrificed can atone for their own sins (in other words, erase their own worldly attachments, for one cannot have two masters at once). To such people, Jesus had to speak using the highest possible words which they could still understand: "THE PRICE IS PAID IN FULL". This is the greatest news he could give them at the time.

Chicken and egg indeed: To be a Christian, one must follow the way of Jesus and be willing to shed one's life at the cross, if necessary, or endure any equivalent pain. This is not possible without the highest level of detachment from the world, and you know it isn't easy. However, by combining one's sincere efforts with the Grace of God, it is possible.

Richie 10,
Many of your ideas are fundamentalist cliche and not intelligent understanding of 21st century reality.....Oh leave the bloke alone. There are larger parasites that sit with-in the global site beasts that which tear at the hearts of mortal man. These parasitic infestations, worm though-out the syber space horizons, with such devastating negative so-called generosity, which is only seen by their own durations of ignorance and self-destructive stupidity. One can only be shamed by sharing this wonderful world with such empty hollow oxygen wasting pond scum. Oh eve, what have you done. Now the snake is loose on all that Adam was.

Quite poetic considering since truth has no place in a world evil.

Man-made of course.

BLUE

Dear Richie

I appreciate your passion, truly. But I will not fall into the arms of any God or deity in this lifetime.

I am a good person, I am happy and I know my path in life (for now). There is no bitterness within me, no confusion and this has all been accomplished without a father figure (not much of one anyway).

But I am what you would call a sinner, damned to the depths of hell to burn in all eternity...why? Because my soul mate, the person I am truly in love with happens to be in the form of another woman.
The fact that something so pure is sin in the eyes of your father, judged not by himself but his children, is to me, something I want nothing of.
Love...we share plenty, more than most people I know will ever feel, so I don't need another guiding spirit in life to show me the way because I am already there, we have each other.

Otokonoko, the following also extracted from Professor Fiona Stanley’s report:

“Eleven year olds are presenting to NSW Government with problems not encountered before. Some of them are so violent they are unable to be fostered, educated or controlled.”

More disturbing still is the data from the WA Education Department. “……they have seen a trebling almost every five years of children with quite significant behavioural problems; they have to be taken out of the classroom. These children are severely disruptive, very angry”. This report is referring to five year olds!!

Are we breaking “emotionally” with a wider range of symptoms, across wider socio/economic strata’s and at an earlier and earlier age than ever? Is this, as Hasbeen suggests, that we are now measuring and reporting on issues we never analysed before?

Either way, we have a problem because authorities and ‘ologists of every description are making policy decisions related to this phenomena. If as we have discussed, we are all “don’t get it’s” at some level, then it follows that those making such decisions also “don’t get it”.

This brings us back to the original point, that we are, as a species, making decisions across the entire spectrum of human domains that are based upon some lack of reality.

TPP, you say << So knowledge is proof? Oh. Hang on is it the “reasoning” involved why you believe or conclude something? >>

Absolutely, knowledge is proof. Reasoning is the means by which we gain” knowledge”, not how we achieve “belief”.

Your reference to children as uncomplicated and not having the ability to “get it” is really interesting. If the ability to “get it” is intellect and intellect cannot be taught, then the only conclusion is that children have it from the outset and our society, at some stage, introduces things that inhibit the application of that intellect. Jeremy Griffiths in his book
“A Species in Denial” provides some compelling examples of this. I don’t agree with the books conclusions but the reference material is great.

In my view children are just little adults and should be treated accordingly.

Nicnoto, beautifully said.

Yuyutsu:

You asked, "How are you going to sustain that attitude in the first (and inevitable) crisis? You just cannot do it alone to overcome the attachment to the world"

I agree. For some, that's how religious worship works: it collapses the time it takes to reach the spiritual vicinity of who and what they worship. Prayer (and meditation) helps many. It reweaves the rent fabric of the universe. It releases people, in time, from the snares of lower energies.

People often ask what difference can one person make in the face of injustice, conflict, human-rights violation, mass poverty and disease. One answer could be citing the courage, tenacity, dignity and magnanimity of people like - Nelson Mandela.

In his lifelong struggle against apartheid, and his steadfast refusal to compromise his beliefs during long years of incarceration. His inspired leadership, upon his release, in the peaceful transition to a genuine, multiracial, multi-party democracy firmly founded on a constitution protecting fundamental human rights. His ready willingness to embrace and reconcile with those who persecuted him the most. He continued to fight for reconciliation before recrimination, healing before bitterness, peace before conflict and so on.

If people could live up to just one fraction of the standards people like Nelson Mandela set for himself, then Africa, and the world, would possibly be a far, far, better place.