RE: Do you think you'd still be a believer if the bible were more pleasant/accurate?
May 17, 2016 at 10:06 am
(May 3, 2016 at 7:58 pm)Cecelia Wrote: A thought occurred to me. What if the bible were far more pleasant? Instead of stories of Adam and Eve getting kicked out of the Garden of Eden, of God flooding the world, and of Hebrews stoning people... you'd find stories of God actually showing what we consider kindness. No laws against working on Sunday, or disbelievers going to hell, or eating shellfish, or gay people.
Take out some of the scientific inaccuracies, the sexism, the homophobia, the genocidal rage, etc... and replace it with more pleasant things. For example the ideas of feeding the poor being important, while also allowing gay people to get married, being against slavery, etc... Instead of saying the world is only 6000 years old, it might make no claim to the age of the Earth.
Do you think you'd still be a believer if the bible were more pleasant and less inaccurate?
It's hard to say, for sure. I think I almost certainly would have lasted longer, but I'm not sure how much longer. Me being troubled by certain parts of the religion was part of what pushed me away.
There's a book called Love Wins by Rob Bell that basically paints Christianity this way. He comes up with creative ways to jettison belief in hell and some other unpleasantries. My wife and I read it within the first year or two of me not believing in God. At the time, I'd wondered if I'd still be Christian if I'd read it three or four years earlier. I honestly can't say for sure...
