Admitting You're a Sinner

[The Valkyrie]

So, you're saying we should kill newborns before they grow up and sin?

No.

Awwww.

I just sharpened my machete and was about to head over to the delivery rooms!

*Pouts*

[The Grand Nudger]

Waste of billable hours.

[vorlon13]

Waste of billable hours.

Waste of a good meal too .. . . .

[The Grand Nudger]

I don't think that people appreciate the logistics of Valks baby killing apparatus.  We lowly monkeys have to begin digging the refuse holes before the first fetus ever hits the grinder.  OFC that means that many of them need to be properly motivated by wall to wall counseling..because we're lazy shits.  Just the slightest start stop incidident represents a massive loss in efficiency....and I think we all know that those babies aren't going to kill themselves.

The longer we put it off the more of a pain in the ass it's going to be..and nobody likes a procrastinator. They just get bigger and better entrenched with every passing day of indecision.

[SteveII]

It is a description of someone who is well down the path of Sanctification.

Well, it may align with your Wesleyan doctrine, but the passage itself says: "This is what is meant by true repentance for sin..." so I thought it directly concerned our discussion of the value "Admitting you're a sinner." My initial argument was that this admission seemed to have little/nothing to do with an improvement in one's moral character. In fact, I argued that such a thing might be detrimental to moral progress (and I still hold this view pretty much).

As I said earlier, admitting your a sinner has very little effect in itself. However, it being a prerequisite to salvation and a relationship with God who can help with your moral choices, it has significance nonetheless. 

What's interesting about the passage is that it draws a line of causation between the state of repentance and "the Eternal Goodness." I interpret "Goodness" to relate to morality, and see "Eternal Goodness" as something similar to a Platonic form. A Christian might interpret it as "Gawd, Gawd, Gawd," and not catch the fact that (while the Eternal Goodness is certainly meant to be related to divinity) the word "goodness" signifies a moral phenomenon. Maybe I am interpolating too much here, but that's what I got out of it. If anything might be said to endorse viewing oneself as a vile sinner, it would be that such a state leads to transcendance.

I don't think the passage is about repentance in the sense of the action preceding the asking of forgiveness and the acceptance of salvation. Rather it seems to be about understanding the reality you are in (we fall so short of God's holiness) after a serious contemplation and discovery of knowledge that takes time and therefore not available to the new Christian. 

Still, I think the concept "vile sinner" is more so used as a harmful pejorative than a catalyst for transformation. The fact that "sweatin' like a whore in church" has earned status as a common colloquialism indicates a general perception that "vile sinners" ought to feel unworthy among the ranks of Christians.

That is a mischaracterization of the doctrine as well as the colloquialism. The comparison is not with other people (ranks of Christians)--the comparison is and always will be with God's standard. The church could have no one in it and the whore would still be sweating. 

Romans 3:23 NKJV – for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
Romans 3:10 NKJV – As it is written: “There is none righteous, no, not one;

A key component to Christianity is the humility that results in falling short. 

It seems to me that Jesus preferred the company of prostitutes and outcasts. He didn't spend too much time among the sanctimonious religious authorities except to overturn their tables and insult them. Here's a neat little exercise: next time you read the Gospels, change out any instances of "scribes and pharisees" and replace it with "modern American evangelicals" and see if the shoe fits.  

Perhaps a segment of "modern American Evangelicals". That group is quite large and contains many people with a Christ-like attitude and perspective. 

Another point worth mentioning (from Theologia Germanica) is the quote: "Such men are in a state of freedom, because they have lost the fear of pain or hell, and the hope of reward or heaven..."    If this represents the expression of one who is further along the path than most, why are Christians taught to emphasize such things?

(On a side note, I noticed that John Wesley made it into my quote journal a couple times, so obviously I think the guy had some good thoughts. The above wasn't meant to criticize Wesleyan doctrine so much as explore the value/non-value of "admitting you're a sinner.")

I think it is describing a change in perspective not in beliefs. Heaven and hell are still core doctrines of Christianity.

[The Grand Nudger]

-and yet you simultaneously maintain that this gods "help" with moral choices just doesn't manifest itself in the majority of christians..or..when it does..is indistinguishable from no help, or from the default state of godless heathens like me....

Not exactly being a paragon of moral behavior, myself..but still qualitatively better than most christians..and indistinguishable even from the select few lvl ten christian mages you know.

Give it up. God doesn;t help anyone with their moral decisions. God, itself, is morally ineffective and/or irrelevant.

[Banned]

Admitting you're a sinner is generally only a problem for narcissists.

They hate to think that they are prone to make mistakes, which they make more often than anyone else.

The comments on this thread suggest that Atheism is the perfect religion for narcissists.

[The Valkyrie]

Admitting you're a sinner is generally only a problem for narcissists.

They hate to think that they are prone to make mistakes, which they make more often than anyone else.

The comments on this thread suggest that Atheism is the perfect religion for narcissists.

The moment you refer to atheism as a religion is the moment you lose any credibility you MAY have had.

And since "sin" is a religious concept, most atheists don't recognise it.

Everyone makes mistakes, and no atheists will say different.

[The Grand Nudger]

-another fine example of when when churchspeak makes people sound stupid. Quietly, that's one of the worst parts of religion. It's a personal debasement..and so it's intimate..except that it's doing it to everyone, because the religion of shaming is pro-misc-u-ous.

It's taboos are an expression of the adherents supposed or very real deviancies.

I'm just over here wondering why they think they're gonna get right with god if they can't get right without him. Obviously aint right if they need that sort of push in the first place..and even our resident christian apologist has indicated that the jesus bump isn't exactly emptying the prisons.

[Banned]

The moment you refer to atheism as a religion is the moment you lose any credibility you MAY have had.

And since "sin" is a religious concept, most atheists don't recognise it.

Everyone makes mistakes, and no atheists will say different.

When we talk about mistakes we are talking morality. And since that term is out of the question with atheists, they cannot admit making mistakes.