Oh, neat, anybody who ever reads Paul’s letters in church is not a Christian. OK fellas, let’s all go home, last one please switch off the lights…
I would wager that *devout *Christians, who aren’t just social members of the church but who take theology seriously and believe they have to actually follow Yahweh’s commandments or risk eternal damnation, are pretty consistent in seeing Islam, Mormonism, or even Catholicism (in that order) as heresy at the least. I am an atheist who has read the Bible pretty extensively, and frankly the only “Christians” who could possibly take all those faiths as being essentially compatible are mushy-headed namby-pambies who aren’t taking almost any of the Scripture seriously–to the point that you have to wonder why they bother. Is it for the church basement potlucks or what? You can get those at a Unitarian church without having to pretend you believe in a theological doctrine that you clearly don’t.
Of course we’re not speaking the same language. I’m using English with logic included.
That’s not an apt (or even accurate) description of the other poster’s assertion. The polytheists who worship the Norse deities long ago did not worship the same deities as the Hindu polytheists, nor did those polytheists assert they were doing so. Christians assert (except for certain small sects which, IIUC, are no longer extant) that their deity is that of Judaism; Muslims assert that their deity is the same deity worshiped by both Jews and Christians.
They are quit obviously incorrect to make such a claim. Latter-day Saints assert that the deity they worship is that explained in the Old and New Testaments, meaning that the LDS are Christians.
No doubt.
You do realize “heresy” is a Catholic concept, right ?
Your framework, which (again) I doubt would be accepted by many who are devoutly religious, quite explicitly declares that anyone starting a new religion (sect, cult, whatever you want to call it) has the prerogative to tell established orders that they must accept them as members of the true faith, like it or not. This is reminding me of some of our debates about gender, and I suspect you were on this side there too. The difference being that if so, you had a far, far better case when it came to that subject!
So if I start a sarcastic “Flying Spaghetti Monster” type deal, and assert that it’s Christian, other Christians just have to accept that? :rolleyes:
This completely ignores that the writers of the Bible, whom devout Christians believe to be inspired by God, very specifically warn about and preach against exactly this kind of error in being all loosey-goosey about what doctrines you accept. It would take forever to cite all the examples, so here are just a few:
1 John 2
2 Corinthians 11 (this one’s ironic, as noted upthread, but apt since it is widely accepted as canonical)
**2 Peter 2
**
Deuteronomy 13 (my favorite!)
I’m familiar with the Inquisition (nobody expects it!), but it has a broader meaning. Google defines it simply as:
Hey, I’m a comic book fan. Obsessing about the continuity of fictional characters is what I’m all about.
So yeah, the Abrahamic God is the same one for Judaism, Christianity and Islam. That’s Canon.
I’m genuinely curious as to from where you pulled that interpretation of what I posted.
What on Earth are you talking about?
Well, if you start a FSM religion in which said FSM happens to be the Christ of the New Testament, albeit with additional deeds to his credit attested by whatever scripture your new FSM faith happens to introduce, then, yes, that would be Christian. As it is, the current folks who started up the FSM group, although it is sarcastic, do not happen to have the FSM being Jesus Christ. Your inability to recognize the difference does not make the difference go away.
I snipped the rest of your malarkey as it was a tangent you went on based on your own fantasy of what I posted, not on what I actually posted.
That’s just absurd. Almost not worth addressing, but since so many of you seem to swallow this whole, I’ll take one more stab at it (or who knows, there may be more as I have been known to be intemperate from time to time).
Announcing my new religion. It’s called The Church of Jesus Christ of Even Latterer Day Saints, as revealed to Prophet SlackerInc by these brand new Seer Stones I found (no, you can’t see them). Some of the new revelations include:
–Everyone has to tithe directly to me. If you don’t, it’s the lake of fire for you.
–Mary wasn’t a virgin. In fact, she was the town whore.
–Jesus was fond of killing newborn babies and scooping out their brains to spread on crackers like pate.
There you go. This is obviously a Christian religion, so you have to consider me a good Christian. You’re a bigot if you don’t!
:rolleyes:
Heresy is not limited to the Inquisition (and in turn, the Inquisition didn’t deal exclusively in straightening heretics).
To have heresy, you need to first have an authoritative doctrinal canon, an institution that defines what orthodoxy is within strict and explicit boundaries. In Christianity, only the Catholics, the Orthodox and the LDS have that. The Protestants don’t have any, sort of by definition. Islam and Judaism have myriads of them instead.
As an anecdotical aside, it will never cease to fascinate me how so many Americans seem to consider Catholicism to be some weird, deviant off-shoot of Christianity rather thanthe historical basis where everything else stems from. And I say this as a kid who’s technically supposed to be Lutheran (baptized, catechized, confirmed and everything. Alsatian family :)). Though I suppose it’s just as weird, or just as ethnocentric, that I’d see Caths as the norm…
Aw, you were doing so well until the end there. If you founded such a religion (and appeared to be serious in doing so), it would indeed be considered a Christian sect. “Good” has nothing to do with it, nor does bigotry per se; the first is relative and the second has to do with how any doctrinal disagreements manifested themselves.
I forgot to mention something: The use of the word cult tells more about the person using the word than about what the person is describing with that word.
Is cult a bad word or something? Don’t all religions start as cults?
On Edit: Ah ok nm I get it. Durp!
Great, now explain it to me. I agree with your first stab: “cult” is what the big, established religions call the little upstarts.
I’ve known several Baptists who claim Catholics aren’t Christian. Scholarship is a bit spotty, some Baptists being well educated and some being dumb as stumps.
Let not the eye saith to the foot “I have no need of thee”.
Christ commands us all to love our brothers as we love ourselves, simple as that … yet amazingly ignored by all. The heathen would complicate this as to form their own doctrine, their own lifestyle, their own cult. Such a lonely existence with only your bastard children to hate you, and only a tombstone to mark your worth to the world.
Those that fear Islam are fools, for in truth it is your own self that you fear … you are already terrorized, petrified and loathing. The heathen have hardened their hearts and can no longer love, for they know they are not worthy of love.
So they hate … first themselves, then everyone else … I’ll grant you that Jesus Christ was just a man, no better and no worse than you and I … but it took balls to forgive those who nailed Him to the cross … more balls than I have.
To Slackerinc. All monotheist must of necessity worship the same god because they admit of no other. Polytheists would not be so restricted. You are trying to apply the logic to a group for whom it is not applicable.
Fully admitting this is a weird hijack, this isn’t exactly true. It’s totally possible for there to be two monotheistic religions who each think that the other group is not worshiping a real God. Like the whole golden calf thing. That was supposed to be a representation of the one true God. But when God saw it he got pissed and killed a bunch of people because it wasn’t him. Or, he had Moses kill a bunch of people. (he is a jealous god). It’s just in this case they don’t worship different gods, they worship the same God in different ways. Except for maybe Christianity. The whole trinity thing always struck me as a bit odd personally. The argument could be made that Christians switched to worshiping a God that they believe to be the one true God and that Jews and Muslims are praying to a deity that doesn’t exist because it’s really not the same God.
Again, this whole thing is a weird hijack. But then, this thread is strange beyond belief anyway.
Well, you obviously haven’t studied it all that extensively, because you don’t seem to know jackshit about Catholicism.
I bet he doesn’t know Jack about Mormonism either.