Subsequent truths

[The Grand Nudger]

It was only a matter of time wasn't it GC..lol.

[Godscreated]

It was only a matter of time wasn't it GC..lol.

What else can I do, I will defend scripture against blatant misuse and misinterpretation.

[Erinome]

Chad I hate to tell you this but the Catholic Church does not hold a monopoly on christianity. I know several Catholics and have no doubt they are saved, they most certainly do not talk the way you have so far. My wife's family is Catholic and there are several of them and most believe they are saved, if they are then I have salvation all wrong.

That's one of the major problems with this xtian religion- It's entirely subjective. You never know if you're doing it wrong, and then the consequences could be devastating if you die and find out you were doing it wrong.

God ordained that the scripture be put into the common languages and from this came the different protestant denominations.

Really? God ordained it? I could have sworn it was Henry VIII.

Though this may not relate to a 24 hour day scripture says "and there was evening and there was morning the 1st, 2d, 3rd and ect. day". This to me is a description of a 24 hour day, especially when a lunar calender is being used. No one denomination has it right but we each try our best, well except those who blatantly misuse the scriptures. Now I'm not saying that you are not a christian, I do however see signs to make me pause and think.

Oh no, chad! GC is pausing to think! He might deem you to be non-christian, and then you'll have to redefine yourself.

[chadster1976]

Christ is written to have said... not Christ himself said. I am perfectly consistent in my approach towards the Bible, insofar as I do not believe it to be the infallible and literal truth. With many inconsistencies and contradictions, either you are hiding from that or employing spectacular doublethink! How come you can happily say that it doesn't say it was a 24 hour day then say "but it must mean a 24 hour day because..." a day always means a 24 hour day except when it doesn't. Can't you see the poor logic? Gods only witness during the early stages of creation was himself. A human being wrote that it took seven days, despite the chronology suggesting it all took place at night (evening and the morning were the first day)! This human, like all others, is fallible, as are those who scribe, re-scribe, translate and re-translate. Have you never thought why we might say "the Day of David" and "the 1st day of creation"? Have you failed to consider the use of metaphors and analogy throughout the Bible, including ALL of the parables? Where the book itself is so deliberately filled with the use of these literary tools, why is it so important to pin down certain verses as absolute fact, rather than accept them in a more poetic fashion? Again I ask, why seek to limit God by defining rigidly the time frames in which he can choose to act? My beliefs do not tear up the doctrines of the Catholic Church and are in fact closely aligned to those of the Catholic Church in the early middle ages. It is interesting how, over time, analysis of scriptures brings new ideas to the fore. But why do you wish to make believing in God so difficult for yourself? Why must you insist that to believe in God and Jesus, you must reject obvious observations, evidence and common sense rather than accept that the problems ONLY happen when YOU limit God to what a person has written on a piece of paper. I must act within the laws of the universe because that is where I am. F=mA works for me so we write it down and call it a law. God is not confined by our concept of the universe so F=mA is irrelevant to God, so why write it down as a law? I am confined in time and space, God is not. Arguing that he must have stuck to a 24 hour timetable because someone wrote it down is just a tiny bit illogical, if you truly believe in the infinite power of a Creator.

I may be making no sense to you because I am being entirely rational.

And yes, St Paul could have been an Uncle Billy Bob, but that would still make his Church, at worst, equally as worthy. The point being, should one criticize the other as being "not Christian"?

[Voltair]

Let's say that your interpretation and the catholic church's interpretation are correct. That also means that there is no Hell/permanent punishment for those who don't make the cut per say correct?

So those who believe in God vs those who don't there doesn't seem to be much lost. If we all end up in paradise per say and maybe some of us have to do a little time in purgatory but hey as long as all get there in the end I guess there is no urgency. So if you're right I don't have to wrack my mind about it anymore because either way everyone wins?

The issue isn't people trying to simply limit God I think as much as it is them trying to understand. I do agree that the habit of trying to squeeze everything into this idea of black and white can get us into trouble. The good news for everyone is if your theology is correct none of us burn in Hell forever. Also there is a good chance that God isn't a psychopath if we lose a lot of the Bible.

I don't think its that people here, including myself, simply just hate the idea of deity and therefore reject it as much as we simply question the validity. Problems of what counts as authoritative is just one part of the problem a lot of people have with the idea of belief in God. It isn't only believing in a deity but which one, which particular flavor, which particular religious texts, is there any additional authority on the subject, etc.

It turns into this whole mess where do matter what we are all "wagering" that we pick the right one. Your beliefs doesn't seem to represent a real risk to anyone as you don't have a Hell. However plenty other flavors of Christianity do have hell so if they are right then we are screwed.

Honestly I don't think I would be opposed to your idea of God/religion but just because it sounds nice doesn't mean I can go all cards in. The problems still remain even if you throw out the Bible. I do hope we all win in the end though that would be kinda cool although it seems unlikely.

[Godscreated]

Christ is written to have said... not Christ himself said. I am perfectly consistent in my approach towards the Bible, insofar as I do not believe it to be the infallible and literal truth. With many inconsistencies and contradictions, either you are hiding from that or employing spectacular doublethink! How come you can happily say that it doesn't say it was a 24 hour day then say "but it must mean a 24 hour day because..." a day always means a 24 hour day except when it doesn't. Can't you see the poor logic? Gods only witness during the early stages of creation was himself. A human being wrote that it took seven days, despite the chronology suggesting it all took place at night (evening and the morning were the first day)! This human, like all others, is fallible, as are those who scribe, re-scribe, translate and re-translate. Have you never thought why we might say "the Day of David" and "the 1st day of creation"? Have you failed to consider the use of metaphors and analogy throughout the Bible, including ALL of the parables? Where the book itself is so deliberately filled with the use of these literary tools, why is it so important to pin down certain verses as absolute fact, rather than accept them in a more poetic fashion? Again I ask, why seek to limit God by defining rigidly the time frames in which he can choose to act? My beliefs do not tear up the doctrines of the Catholic Church and are in fact closely aligned to those of the Catholic Church in the early middle ages. It is interesting how, over time, analysis of scriptures brings new ideas to the fore. But why do you wish to make believing in God so difficult for yourself? Why must you insist that to believe in God and Jesus, you must reject obvious observations, evidence and common sense rather than accept that the problems ONLY happen when YOU limit God to what a person has written on a piece of paper. I must act within the laws of the universe because that is where I am. F=mA works for me so we write it down and call it a law. God is not confined by our concept of the universe so F=mA is irrelevant to God, so why write it down as a law? I am confined in time and space, God is not. Arguing that he must have stuck to a 24 hour timetable because someone wrote it down is just a tiny bit illogical, if you truly believe in the infinite power of a Creator.

I may be making no sense to you because I am being entirely rational.

And yes, St Paul could have been an Uncle Billy Bob, but that would still make his Church, at worst, equally as worthy. The point being, should one criticize the other as being "not Christian"?

You really need to study the Hebrew language, if you would do that you might find that each creation day was 24 hours. As for my limiting God you are fooling yourself, you think that God set things into motion and let the process of evolution do it's work, that is limiting God and denying His omnipotence and omniscient power. I on the other hand recognize His great and unlimited powers and that He did use them to create a universe and all it contains in six 24 hour days. What kind of thinking does your brain do, "suggesting it all took place at night", by using the lunar calendar description of a 24 hour day. When the scriptures use a parable it's plainly stated that a parable is being used. My logic is not poor, it follows the true use of the Hebrew language, why can't you, you say the Catholic Church has so many of the old Hebrew Scriptures. As far as your being more closely aligned with the early middle age church, I agree, you would keep the people from having a true understanding of our God and Savior, keeping them blinded to His true authority, I would bet that is what you are afraid of, the authority of God, seems you are trying to deny it. I do not make it difficult for myself to believe in or see God for who He is, by trusting in His Word I get a really nice picture of my Savior, it allows me to believe in who He truly is. Now prove to me that God's powers were so weak that it took Him billions of years to get the universe going, instead of doing an awesome work in six days. Have you ever considered that a six day creation could not be claimed by anyone else.

[5thHorseman]

'Now prove to me that God's powers were so weak that it took Him billions of years to get the universe going, instead of doing an awesome work in six days.'

[chadster1976]

Godschild. I worry that you don't even know which language many of the scriptures were originally written in.
The concept of time measured in "hours" was not defined when Genesis was written. Day was used (as even you acknowledged) to signify both a solar day and a significant period in time. A day of destiny does not literally mean 24 hours. Why you keep measuring the lunar calendar is beyond me as the moon wasn't created until day 4 (and it says nothing about it being set in motion). Time in the old testament cannot be accurately judged by modern standards because of a lack of understanding of basic principles regarding the motions of the sun and the moon. Seasons were often counted as years which also led to mistakes during bouts of unusual weather. If you take away our modern definitions of hour, day, month, year etc. how WOULD you describe 6 separate periods of creation? Ergo, saying it was the first day (of Creation) does not mean it was the first 24 hours. Let's face it, Genesis doesn't even say which day God started on (because Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday etc. didn't exist as words when Genesis was written), so why assume Saturday or Sunday is his Sabbath? The Babylonians hadn't sold Moses one of their new Pirelli Calendars so with the greatest of respect to the author of the first few books, he didn't really have much of a handle on timekeeping or recording.
Suggesting it took place at night was what we normal people call "a joke" because it says "the evening and the morning were the n'th day" and not vice versa.
Did I deny his omnipotence or did I suggest that he had chosen a particular method of creation? What I have done is remove all human limits from him. I simply believe that human ideas of time have been added to the story to help people make sense of it, so everything fits in a place. It simply isn't necessary and it makes no sense to make the literal translation so fundamental to having faith in God.
The Bible does not clearly draw distinctions between metaphor, parable, poetic language and historical account. One important reason it doesn't and can't is because it is an in-annotated collection of different writings from different sources that were collected over a period of 300 years and chosen by a committee. This committee chose and rejected scripture for a range of different.t reasons, which we simply are not party to. Politics, power, personal beliefs, favourite texts? The bible is not infallible.
By insisting upon the 6 day creation rather than what is obviously observable, you say you get a really nice image of God. So your preferred view of God is more important than what is obvious to all basic observations?
Creating the universe is awesome no matter how long it took. Is all you want a game of "my God's better than your God"?

[The Grand Nudger]

GC, I'm sure I've mentioned this to you before, but I (and the members of every christian denomination other than your own) don't accept your interpretation as authentic or authoritative. As such, you really can't swing the "not really christian" sword, or else you'd be cutting yourself with the same blade.

[LastPoet]

Its a double edged blade R.

An oh-so-omni god needed a week? FFS, that is lame, a true god™ would make the universe in no time at all, since alot of our christian fellas claim that he is outside of space-time.