(February 25, 2011 at 3:05 pm)Rwandrall Wrote: I disagree. It's not the basic foundation of Christianity, but to help the poor and the helpless it definitely is a very central principle to Christianity. All men being sinners and all not believing in Jesus going to Hell forever are also central principles of Christianity. But still, some of their teachings are fundamentally good. Many are not. And since cherry-picking is what the greater part of theists do, a lot of theists keep the "help the helpless" part and ignore the "non-believers go to Hell part".
Helping the poor and helpless should be a central tenant of any compassionate human being's philosophy. If Christians keep the help the helpless part and not the hell part, then they, in practice, don't seem much different than well-meaning atheist volunteers. Of course, Jesus also said sell everything, leave your family and follow me. Not very ideologically sound either. Your keyword is "entirely," and while it's not entirely flawed, it's mostly flawed, but even the commendable parts are hardly exclusive to Christianity, and some straight stolen from elsewhere ("Do unto others ...").
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We have lingered in the chambers of the sea | By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown | Till human voices wake us, and we drown. — T.S. Eliot
"... man always has to decide for himself in the darkness, that he must want beyond what he knows. ..." — Simone de Beauvoir
"As if that blind rage had washed me clean, rid me of hope; for the first time, in that night alive with signs and stars, I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world. Finding it so much like myself—so like a brother, really—I felt that I had been happy and that I was happy again." — Albert Camus, "The Stranger"
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We have lingered in the chambers of the sea | By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown | Till human voices wake us, and we drown. — T.S. Eliot
"... man always has to decide for himself in the darkness, that he must want beyond what he knows. ..." — Simone de Beauvoir
"As if that blind rage had washed me clean, rid me of hope; for the first time, in that night alive with signs and stars, I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world. Finding it so much like myself—so like a brother, really—I felt that I had been happy and that I was happy again." — Albert Camus, "The Stranger"
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