(June 30, 2014 at 7:34 am)Pickup_shonuff Wrote: I wonder, if a person can simply pick and choose which words of Jesus they embrace and take literally--and clearly Jesus had some awful, idiotic views about unbelievers and hell-- then can I still claim to be a Christian while rejecting all the bullshit in the New Testament? (I'm down with the "blessed are the poor" and "love thy neighbor" and the general idea of redemption through suffering bits).
That's a good point.
The Westboro Baptist, for example, would definitely not see Christians ignoring all the nasty stuff preached in the Bible to be true Christians, but simultaneously, other Christians could also argue that the Westboro Baptist guys are not true Christians because they ignore all the other passages focusing on love, which sometimes contradict the former passages on hell and God hating people, etc.
But is there really a difference between most atheists and most Christians with regards to what is accepted as truth in the Bible? Sure, atheists don't profess belief in God and all that, but a Christian (at least according to the pure meaning of the word, which means "follower of Christ") doesn't have to. And if Christians can reject certain passages in the Bible and still be considered Christians, why can't atheists?
