By your definition, of course not; by mine: why not?
I would offer and bestow any name I give the Spirit with my Best Definition, and only as an honor. I would not force in case memory is too painful or acknowledgement too dangerous.
You make many good points. Please listen to your Heart; even (especially?) if it contradicts your Book. That is the Heart and Soul and Spirit of Christ. That is the Heart and Soul and Spirit of the Name Christian. You Call it As You Wish, I Will Do the Same.
You may be Correct. The name Christian has been too long and too firmly hostage to the pharisees. The Name may be beyond Redemption. Stockholm syndrome strikes again.
Thank you. That’s all the information I needed. Please join me in the BBQ Pit. I’ve told you repeatedly why I find your assertions offensive and why. I think your position is completely and utterly wrong and insulting to those who have not chosen to be Christians as well as to this Christian. You insist, because of your own prejudice, on assigning a meaning to a word which it does not have! It’s time I took things to a less restricted forum.
Yes, Islam is part of the same Abrahamic monotheistic faith ‘family’ to use a phrase, but Muslim most certainly does not equate to Christian. There are fundamental differences between Christianity and Islam which mean that we are very much not one and the same.
Yes, the core values, the belief in one God, the do good to humanity, the treat others how you’d wish yourself to be treated, are the same across Islam, Christianity and Judaism, but other things are not.
In particular, the things that makes a Christian a Christian is belief in Jesus as God’s bodily incarnation on this Earth, and the Ressurection. These are completely and utterly incompatible with Islamic belief. According to Islam, Jesus cannot have been God’s incarnation on this Earth because God, according to the Koran
Verses 3 and 4 are fundamentally incompatible with Christianity – “He begets not” – he has no Son, ergo, in Islam, Jesus is not the Son of God, but rather a Prophet of God. One of the most important Prophets, on a par with Mohammed and Abraham, but a Prophet nonetheless. Can you see why a Muslim would be annoyed to be called a Christian, and a Christian annoyed to be called a Muslim yet?
There are some fundamental differences in belief between Christianity, Islam and Judaism, and to lump them all together as one, is quite frankly, insulting to the followers of each faith.
Color me confused, but isn’t the “Heart and Soul and Spirit” of the name Christian, Christ?
Doesn’t the very name imply one that believes that Jesus was the Christ (annointed Messiah)? Saying that one could be a Christian without believing in Christ seems to me, to be like someone saying that they are a vegetarian while sitting down to eat a hamburger because they think like a vegetarian.
No, that makes you a good Christian (with props to C. S. Lewis).
As a Mormon, I’ve been told by some that I’m not a Christian–that I belong to a cult. Stephen Robinson wrote a book called “Are Mormons Christians?” in which he went down the list of objections to LDS theology and showed how if you reject LDS then you also have to reject other groups that are currently accepted as Christian.
Personally I’ve never encountered anyone who claimed to be Christian that I would have said wasn’t. Though there are some who make me wonder why they claim to be Christian (say, those who don’t believe in the resurrection, etc.).
Because the core values, the belief in one God, the do good to humanity, the treat others how you’d wish yourself to be treated, are the same across Islam, Christianity and Judaism.
I said I would NOT call you a Christian by Sieges definition. Your definition is clearly closer to his than mine.
I would offer and bestow any name I give the Spirit with my Best Definition, and only as an honor. I would not force in case memory is too painful or acknowledgement too dangerous.
You May Be Right. It may Be Time for the Spirit to Move On. These names of Holy now bring Death and Destruction to those that would confess being. The Spiritual Bush may be burning. Again.
Please, no offense, but it seems this thread is going in circles. I tire. Let me put this bluntly.
Jesus was a poor Jewish Love Child that Understood the Spirit of I Am (Insert Word or Words of Your Choice, even to the unpronounceable). The Word Christ comes closest to my understanding of someone that is a martyr for the Spirit. Those pesky pharisees.
Please understand that my Book is written in the Spirit, not in the Words.
However, I Am not disrespecting the oppressed, I Am dissing the oppressor. My anger is similar to that of mx before he was marytred (by pharisees).
I am not one that would enslave others in the Name or with the Word. I would Free them In the Spirit. In deed, I would protect innocents from tyranny, even at cost or risk to my self. I would even protect the accused from the vengeful, and yes, even at risk to my self.
How is this not Christian? How is this Insult?
Justice can only be found when the Word is tempered by in the Spirit.
It becomes Insult and unbecoming of the sort of Spirit you apparently aspire to be when someone says repeatedly, “Please don’t do that. I find it offensive.” and yet you persist in doing something.
Let me give it one more try. I am a woman. Under many circumstances, I enjoy being hugged and as a rule, I consider it a good thing. However, if I were to repeatedly tell someone not to hug me because I wasn’t comfortable with it and he or she were to continue to try to do so, I would take offense and eventually come to dislike the person.
I don’t suppose I have a prayer of this making any sense to you.
It does make sense to me. You and I and We are All hostage to those that would oppress with Words. Although, I Am saddened that you seem to have aligned yourself with the pharisees, I understand that hostages tend to take on the characteristics of their oppressors. Hostages can be especially wary of being “Liberated” by what could be just a new oppression. D’evil you know…
The pharisees would control government, even daily Life. I say repeatedly, “Please don’t do that. I find it offensive”. “Keep your God Damned Religion out of my Government, out of my Life”. Not only do they persist, they seem proud to impose.
You Words and actions tend to align with those of the pharisees. You fled Temple, but could only vend a distorted, if not false witness to the den. I find that offensive. I plea: don’t do that.
I would welcome you back to share in the Spirit of Truth. I pray you will find what you seek.
And I don’t use that term in the customary blasphemous use, either.
If you had the vaguest idea who Siege is and the battles she’s fought, you’d be begging her forgiveness for that post. She’s discussed them in some detail in posts on this board; go and search.
In the interim, let me suggest this to you:
“Christian” means someone who self-identifies as following Jesus Christ, in word and deed. It incorporates a lot of people who seem to give more credence to a revivified Law abstracted from parts of the Old Testament and from a legalistic interpretation placed on His and Paul’s words, the folks you (and I) would use the term Pharisees to castigate.
It does not mean someone who has specifically and intentionally taken another path and does not so self-identify.
Does Christ have the ability and power to “save” them, to work in their lives and through them? Absolutely. He’s God the Eternal Son, not merely a long-dead Palestinian rabbi. The Spirit works at His command, leading, teaching, comforting, and strengthening.
Like you, RW I – and I believe Siege as well – despise the use of Christian and of “saved” to draw lines in the sand to shut out people. But what she’s been saying is that, while the Spirit can and does work in the lives of others than Christians, the term has an actual and descriptive meaning, and that should not be transferred into the meaning of “one who serves the Spirit by whatever means seem right to him.” That Siege’s and my Fundamentalist>Atheist>Wiccan friend is a great, compassionate, and thoroughly decent man who does God’s will, I have no doubt. That he is not a Christian, he will himself tell you, and be quite aware of what he means by it. And it does not mean that he does not serve the Spirit, which he will also tell you. But he apprehends it and interfaces with it through quite different metaphors and modes of operation.
Ok, I made it through all four pages of posts and I still have my same definition of a Christian as when I started.
If someone says they’re a Christian, then they’re a Christian.
It doesn’t matter to me what they believe. Since it all boils down to faith and the unprovable then I have no grounds on which to deny their claim. If they claim they’re born again in Christ and therefore a Christian, I’ll consider them a Christian. If they claim a watery tart threw a sword at them and called them Christian then I’ll consider them Christian.
I’d like to see a practical uniform definition of Christian but if this thread is any indication that is not going to happen.
I’m not sure you know who the Pharisee is. It was a Pharisee who practiced distinguishing himself from the rabble:
To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: "Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men–robbers, evildoers, adulterers–or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’
"But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’
“I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Seige is truly Blessed to have so many good and caring friends. I do not doubt that she is a good and worthy neighbor.
I have repeatedly and continually defined, explained, refined and clarified my words.
I cannot find any hint or implication that I would insist that others use my words in place of their own.
I would Not.
By my definition: We are All Christians, We are All CiNners. But that is Just my definition, my understanding; the best Words I have for the moment. Unlike others, I would not put words in your mouth.
I have an idea:
You use words and definitions that best describe your intention.
Please allow the same.
I will ask for clarification if I sense a misunderstanding.
Please do the same.
Poly,You do not know me. You do not know the harm to Spirit I have suffered; you do not know the harm to Spirit I have witnessed, helplessly. Yet, I have suffered naught compared to others.
No more.
I will stand up to those that would impose their will on others; even your good friends; even you.
I would protect the innocent from tyrants, even at cost or risk to my self; I would protect the accused from the vengeful, even at cost or risk to my self.
For Spirit’s sake.
My best answer to the OP is: Whichever definition best suits your Spirit; your Self.
Um, attention Rwjefferson… Clean-up on aisle nine…
I’m not sure you know who the Pharisee is. It was a Pharisee who practiced distinguishing himself from the rabble:
To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: "Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men–robbers, evildoers, adulterers–or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’
"But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’
“I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
I surely understand what you mean. Although I was once in the priesthood I no longer desire to call myself a Christian. There are many good and loving people who are Christians and sincerly striveing to serve God. Christianity has become weighed down with tradition and myth. I can still go to a church and enjoy worship without worrying about the details of doctrine but unwilling to become a member.
I think the answer to what makes someone a Christian? is simply laying claim to the titile. there seem to be no standards, only vague and shifting opinion.
The question of what makes someone a follower of Christ’s teachings is a different question indeed.
I think it is nessecary to challenge and denounce beliefs and traditions that are not valid. Within ourselves and with others. Do so with forgiveness and love as much as possible. If you occasionaly lose it, remember the money changers at the temple. Jesus understands.
I enjoyed your post. When I was going to church we would discuss the family of God.
The concept was that those who seek and sincerely try to follow the spirit are the true members and God knows who we are. We acknowledged that there were family members and non family members in every church and some who didn’t go to church. at all. A few years ago the Reorganized Church of JEsus of JEsus Christ of LAtter Day Saints changed their name to The Community of Christ. I like the simplicity. The Family of God would reach beyond those who worshipped Christ to those who seek the spirit in other ways. Lets start an church that has no official structure. No buildings. We meet in homes and outdoors when the weathers nice.
When people go on a rant about organized religion, we can invite them to join our unorganized one.
).