Thanks for all the kudos. What I have experienced over time is an awareness of things apart from what I had become accustomed to accepting. One thing I'd like to make clear, though, is that the changes in my views don't represent steps away from christianity. I am still a staunch follower of Christ and always will be. The bible is my guide for life. What I want is to live my christian life being open to the needs of all, and that requires that we step out of our worlds and experience the worlds of others as well.

How does your acceptance of evolution, jive with 'Original sin' and the need for the substitutionary atonement of Jesus' sacrifice to forgive humans for this original sin?

If there were no Adam and Eve to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, what did early humans do to cause original sin?

(February 26, 2015 at 1:08 pm)Simon Moon Wrote: How does your acceptance of evolution, jive with 'Original sin' and the need for the substitutionary atonement of Jesus' sacrifice to forgive humans for this original sin?

If there were no Adam and Eve to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, what did early humans do to cause original sin?

I would believe original sin is nulled because you know there was nor ever will be the biblical adam or eve. Though sin is such a generic thing everyone does bad whether they realize it or not and its to broad of thing too sin is.

So, Lek, am I to assume you're not going to address anything I put to you on page one?

(February 26, 2015 at 2:59 pm)rexbeccarox Wrote: So, Lek, am I to assume you're not going to address anything I put to you on page one?

I was wondering the same thing.

These 2 especially intrigue me:

Quote:So when can it be relied upon, and how do you know which parts are the accurate ones?

I have asked Christians this for years. Yet to get a reasonable answer.

I'd love a non-literalist Christian to go through a Bible with different color highlighters and highlight the passages they believe should be taken literally, which are figurative, which are metaphor, which are parables, etc.

Then explain what heuristic they used to determine how they made their decisions, and why other Christians come to very different choices using another heuristic?

Quote:Why not? How long do you think one's time there will be?

And do they go to heaven after?

(February 26, 2015 at 4:01 pm)Simon Moon Wrote: I have asked Christians this for years. Yet to get a reasonable answer.

Swedenborg already answered that question in the twenty-two volumes of 'Arcana Coelestia'.

(February 26, 2015 at 4:30 pm)ChadWooters Wrote:

(February 26, 2015 at 4:01 pm)Simon Moon Wrote: I have asked Christians this for years. Yet to get a reasonable answer.

Swedenborg already answered that question in the twenty-two volumes of 'Arcana Coelestia'.

Can you summarize the gist of his thesis?

And why should I believe his method as opposed to others that disagree with him?

But why should a god; the most powerful, knowing and infallible being, require a 18th century fallible human to make this clear? Why wait thousands of years?

Why not create the Bible in such a way as to; not be susceptible to edits, copy mistakes, in languages he would surely know would die out and be susceptible to mistranslations, contain historical and scientific inaccuracies, etc?

Surely this god had the ability, the knowledge and the imagination to make sure it was transmitted impervious to the above and unambiguous, right?

This is supposed to be the most important message for all of humanity. Why such a bad method to transmit it?

(February 26, 2015 at 4:30 pm)ChadWooters Wrote:

(February 26, 2015 at 4:01 pm)Simon Moon Wrote: I have asked Christians this for years. Yet to get a reasonable answer.

Swedenborg already answered that question in the twenty-two volumes of 'Arcana Coelestia'.

So, I just looked up 'Arcana Coelestia' on Wiki. They summarize it like this:

"It consists of an exposition of the spiritual sense of the books of Genesis and Exodus, according to the doctrine of correspondence (theology), and demonstrated by many supporting quotations from the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament. While not denying the historicity of the stories of the Patriarchs (Bible) and The Exodus from Egypt, it explains them as describing symbolically the process of spiritual growth and struggles in each individual person."

Is this accurate as you see it?

If so, it sure just sounds like cherry picking to me, and I'm sure a lot of other theologians see it the same way.

Do all theologians accept his thesis? If not, as I expect, again I ask, why should I accept his explanation and not the other theologians that disagree with him?

That sounds like a fair summary. The reason I accept it is because his heuristic remains consistent, which is the opposite of cherry picking.

It's like you're half way there. Another year and you'll finally be ready to let go of faith and look towards reality. Congratulations, honestly, it's good to see Christians actually learning. Even if you stay Christian forever, that you believe in evolution is a good step.