Christian "purpose" and "meaning" in life.

[Lemonvariable72]

Sometimes it helps to restate the opposing positions.

My side says that mankind has a propensity to make "WooWoo" gods with supernatural powers to comfort them in their vast ignorance. The Christian god was created from a combining of the ancient Jordanian and Israel gods about 2000 bc. and the jewish religion born of that was doing well until the roman occupations. Christianity sprouted from multiple dissent groups within the mid-east Jewry that demanded a Messiah to deliver them from the hands of the Romans. When the reality became evident that that wasn't going to happen, A writer named "Paul" created the whole "jesus was the son of god and his messiah-ship meant something new, that he didn't have to save us from the Romans, he had to save us from the Debbil, and a new burning hell." Sleekly plying men's fear of death, and finally convincing a roman emperor of the silly new religion, the word of jesus was spread at the tip of a spear and became a mishmash of the old roman pagan beliefs and the new jesus jewism. As new generations were raised in this religion, new writers constantly polished both the words and the hard sell.
And boom that is why you are a christian. No god involved except for the one that you imagine talking telepathically in "warm feeling" code during your prayers.

I presume your version tows the line that you were one day touched by guilt and prayed to jesus to save you and that he told you in a magical elf voice in your head that he loved you and that he is going to save you from himself and your deserved punishment of hell.


Am I way off??

First of all, your explanation of how Christianity came about is really silly and the Jews were expecting the messiah long before they were occupied by the Romans. Read the prophets. As far as how I became a christian - I was raised as a Catholic and so had plenty of guilt to deal with since I was a kid. I really wasn't a christian I just spent my time trying to follow all the rules and going to confession every so often to confess the times I broke them. I figured that when judgement came if my good stuff outweighed my bad stuff I would go to heaven. I did pretty well until I went overseas in the military and was away from the family and I became a drunken whore monger. I'd even wake up on Sunday mornings with a major hangover, with whatever woman I happened to sleep with that night, and hurried to the base chapel for mass. When I returned to the US I happened to get in with some friends who were Christians and they introduced me to the faith. It wasn't long after that I realized I wasn't going to get to heaven by my own means, so I put my faith in Christ to get me there. Since then I've been trying my best to follow what he taught, and over time, with the help of the Spirit it's getting better, but I wont't be perfect until I get to heaven.

Truth be told your explanation for how Christianity is even worse. At least brake mans explanation will account for why the Jews are still here and why there is no note of Jesus at all until Paul wrote his epistle to the thessolians around 50 ad. More over once you know the dates of the new testament literature you can actually watch the growth of the myth in the bible. For example the first gospel penned, mark has no ressurection scene in the earliest copies and the least miracles. Also in mark Jesus does not claim to be the son of god irrc, and instead the gospel focuses more on the moral teaching Jesus. The gospel of luke came next and that was the idea of the virgin birth came from as well as the ressurection. Then we have matthew shortly after taking the works of luke and mark and trying to fit it all with the old testament in order to make it appeal to the Jews. Lastly and at least 20 years later we have john which by Christian admission sits oddly next to the three synaptic gospels which portrays Jesus as a full on rock star . This is from established and respected bible scholarship too. So therefore brakeman's description is quite apt.