Re: the Pope's rewritten Good Friday prayer and the Rabbi critic

[Miller]

@Sophistry and Illusion

Don’t worry; I haven’t quit my day job yet.

The comment was made tongue in cheek, but my point remains the same throughout this thread: nobody has given me a compelling reason why religious people ought not *for intellectual reasons * be religious exclusivists. Frankly, the ‘one God, many paths’ view seems more like a contemporary feel-good position rather than one based in good theology. I’m willing to be corrected by the more theologically-knowledgeable posters on this board (God knows there are plenty of those), but as I noted above, Paul for one seems pretty explicit that if you don’t have faith in Jesus then you are screwed.

Because plurality is better than exlusivity. There really doesn’t need to be a better reason than that. Sure, Paul said X, Y, and Z. So what? Paul was just a guy saying stuff. If some other guy comes along and says something different, that works better than what Paul was saying, why not go with that? It would hardly be the first time a major religion has changed to better align itself with contemporary secular mores.

[Sophistry_and_Illusion]

@Miller

Because plurality is better than exlusivity. There really doesn’t need to be a better reason than that. Sure, Paul said X, Y, and Z. So what? Paul was just a guy saying stuff. If some other guy comes along and says something different, that works better than what Paul was saying, why not go with that? It would hardly be the first time a major religion has changed to better align itself with contemporary secular mores.

But see, this comment privileges contemporary secular mores over scripture, and says that in conflicts between the two, the former should prevail. It’s easy to understand why a religious person would reject this, and therefore reject pluralism as an artefact of contemporary thought rather than of revelation. And so it’s not hard to understand why a religious person would hope that others who (presumably) held false religions would see the light.

[Frylock]

@Sophistry and Illusion

True; I forgot about the part where Paul said “the gentiles have the law written on their hearts” or something. But the stuff you are talking about refers to people who haven’t heard of Christianity, not those who have heard of it and rejected it, right? For the Catholic Church, contemporary Jews would of course, by and large, fall into the latter category.

I think a lot of people who have heard people talk, or had people talk to them, about Christian doctrines have not necessarily thereby had the gospel preached to them.

Someone could easily hear about and reject Christianity–the social and doctrinal institution–without thereby having rejected “the gospel” (i.e. as “preached” by “the heavens and the earth” as well as, sometimes, by people relating the story of Jesus and the life they live in the Church etc etc.)

-FrL-

[Huerta88]

@Frylock

Paul also said elsewhere that the gospel has been preached to the entire creation. (By “the heavens and the earth” whatever that means. This is in Colossians somewheres.) This indicates that people who haven’t physically heard the spoken words “Jesus Christ” have nevertheless had the gospel “preached” to them in some fashion. Meaning, apparently, that it is available to them to live in faith in response to this gospel–even if they don’t know the physical word for what it is they have faith in.

So it may be that people can only be saved through faith, indeed, faith in Jesus Christ, yet this does not mean they require explicit, physical interaction with Christians and spoken introduction to Christian concepts. The gospel (and so, presumably, faith in it) exist outside their expression in the Church.

Similar discussions have come up in the context of the concept of “no salvation outside of the Church.” tomndebb has participated in some or all of those, here’s one I recall chiming in on:

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=136846&highlight=outside+the+church

Liberals would argue that this doctrine can be reduced down to “As long as you’re a good [whatever you are], it’s copacetic.”

Traditionalists would say “Christ must have died for something, and while you could read it as meaning the Church will be the vehicle for salvation for believers and non-believing freeriders, that doesn’t make much sense to us.”

If someone were praying for my conversion, even if I didn’t want it, I wouldn’t resent it – I’d view it as a kind of inverse Pascal’s wager. “Hey, I get some of the (putative) benefits of Christianity without bothering with all their weird doctrine (for now), maybe I’ll have a miraculous deathbed conversion (if I need one). And if I don’t need it – what’s the harm?” Someone wants to don an extra phylactery, burn a joss stick, invoke Odin, in the comfort of their own home or pagoda, to cure me of my wicked ways – well, thanks; I don’t think my ways are wicked, wasn’t particularly looking for your help, but no harm, no foul, and I appreciate the intention.

[monavis]

It was always my understanding that the Jews were the Chosen People out of whom the Messiah would come. Christians believe that Jesus was the Messiah. Jesus was a Jew and that was as far as the prophecy went. Jesus was now the new Law. The reason for their being chosen had been fullfilled.

There is a passage that says(In the New Testement) ,“He came into His own but His own recieved Him Not.”

The Jews had been waiting for a Messiah for 2000 years. Paul seemed to decide that his was it. His story was that he was blinded and spoken to by Jesus.

Monavis

[carnivorousplant]

@monavis

There is a passage that says(In the New Testement) ,“He came into His own but His own recieved Him Not.”

I never argue with someone who quotes scripture to support his thesis.

I used to post to a Jewish board-I believe it was on some Jewish singles site.
One of the MPSIMS type questions was “What would you ask Jesus if you could meet him?”
My favorite response was, “So, did Paul screw things up or what?”

[monavis]

@carnivorousplant

I never argue with someone who quotes scripture to support his thesis.

I used to post to a Jewish board-I believe it was on some Jewish singles site.
One of the MPSIMS type questions was “What would you ask Jesus if you could meet him?”
My favorite response was, “So, did Paul screw things up or what?”

I do not believe the Bible is any more God’s word than any other book. I do not believe in any Messiah. A person’s beliefs are personal so as long as they use their beliefs for good and no harm; as far as I am concerned there is nothing wrong with that. As far as I am concerned Paul was just a human and his word is no better than anyone else who may disagree with him.

Monavis

[C_K_Dexter_Haven]

@Sophistry and Illusion

No, but [Judaism is] also not a “one God, many paths” religion. Not to offend, but the OT would suggest it’s more of a “one God, one path, we’re on it, and neither we nor God really gives a rat’s ass about the rest of you” sort of religion. Contemporary Judaism isn’t like that, of course, but IMO that’s because contemporary enlightened theists just ignore the parts of their scripture that sound too much like Iron Age barbarism.

Sorry, but I disagree profoundly on two counts. First, like Malthus said, don’t confuse biblical Judaism with modern Judaism. But second, the Old Testament gives several examples of righteous people who are non-Jews: Abimelech, Jethro, and Rahab come to mind fairly quickly. I’m sure there are others, but it’s early in the morning. The statement that “God doesn’t care about non-Jews” is NOT a sentiment that the OT authors would agree with. The implication has always been that different peoples have their different paths; the OT laws are obligations for Jews (and we are honored to be given such obligations), but not required for non-Jews.