# "You are bad and you should feel bad about it" - a core Christian belief? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 18, 2017, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743 "2017-04-18T22:14:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/41 "2017-04-19T17:57:39Z")
> [@Alan\_Smithee](#): > > Instead, I’ll jump in to point out that kanicbird is not a mainstream Christian and has his own idiosyncratic beliefs that don’t reflect in any what most Christians think (and therefore aren’t relevant to the topic of this thread). Please support your statement about what most Christians think. And I do take objection to your diminishing my comments outside of the pit. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/42 "2017-04-19T18:03:14Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > … > And your response is…I’m not sure…saying that a true believer only fears god? > … Basically yes, though fear is not a term I would chose to use here. It’s a difference of living in the world, with it’s laws, fear and punishment by civil authorities and living how Jesus did, with trust in God and holy revelations, that those things worldly authorities don’t matter when doing the work of God. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/43 "2017-04-19T18:07:32Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > I was under the impression that said man was a mere blasphemer, who got executed in accordance with Deuteronomy 13. It is blasphemy to say what is true and of God? It appears Jesus’s case was taken up to an higher court and found not guilty with sentence reversed, and made King of Everything Forever and all that jazz for Jesus’ trouble. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/44 "2017-04-19T18:11:13Z")
> [@kanicbird](#): > > It is blasphemy to say what is true and of God? It appears Jesus’s case was taken up to an higher court and found not guilty with sentence reversed, and made King of Everything Forever and all that jazz for Jesus’ trouble. Or at least that’s the unconfirmed story put out by his press agents. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/45 "2017-04-19T18:55:48Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Or at least that’s the unconfirmed story put out by his press agents. It’s good to have friends in high places. ---
**Author:** ![ISiddiqui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/97f17d/32.png) [@ISiddiqui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ISiddiqui)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/46 "2017-04-19T19:06:34Z")
> [@Alan\_Smithee](#): > > I was going to jump in to point out to Czarcasm that in my years spent in Methodist churches, I heard the “missing the mark” definition of sin over and over again, and it seemed to be the standard understanding of sin, but others have already covered that. Well, there is a big difference in what Mainline Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox understandings on this and the Evangelical understandings on this. (not to say that Mainliners, Catholics, and Orthodoxy have the same view on sin - it seems to me that Catholics are far more into Hell than the two others, but I could be wrong). A lot of folks on this thread (and on this forum in general) seem to conflate Christian beliefs with Evangelical beliefs. ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/47 "2017-04-19T19:12:40Z")
I think the OP’s summary is not a bad description of where most evangelical Christianity is, and certainly how most people (including most Christians) understand sin and atonement. I would frame it this way: God loves us, and created us to be most satisfied and fulfilled when we are in loving relationship with God and each other. However, we are prone to selfishness (sin) and often turn our backs on God and each other. God loves us anyway, and demonstrated this self-sacrificing love in the incarnation, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. We are at our happiest and most fulfilled when we embrace this reconciliation with God and each other. ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/48 "2017-04-19T19:13:43Z")
> [@ISiddiqui](#): > > A lot of folks on this thread (and on this forum in general) seem to conflate Christian beliefs with Evangelical beliefs. Exactly. ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/49 "2017-04-19T20:09:25Z")
> [@kanicbird](#): > > Please support your statement about what most Christians think. And I do take objection to your diminishing my comments outside of the pit. I owe you an apology. I had read the OP as asking specifically about Christian beliefs that represent the teachings of a church or denomination. But I see that isn’t the case; in fact, the OP explicitly asked for people’s personal beliefs as well. That said, are YOU claiming that your statements here represent commonly held Christian beliefs? You’ve said in the past that you get your beliefs from direct revelation from God. In my book, that doesn’t make then any less or any more valid than the Pope speaking ex cathedra, but I do think it’s important in discussions such as this to explain to readers whether you are expounding some church’s doctrine or speaking the truth as you received it from God. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/50 "2017-04-19T20:47:06Z")
> [@kanicbird](#): > > It is blasphemy to say what is true and of God? It appears Jesus’s case was taken up to an higher court and found not guilty with sentence reversed, and made King of Everything Forever and all that jazz for Jesus’ trouble. I’m not aware that he (a) was found not guilty or (b) is king of anything – and most folks on the planet don’t seem to be under either impression today, just like most folks on the planet didn’t seem to be under either impression back when. As far as I can tell, the guy simply died as he lived – as a mere blasphemer – and, were some oddball to show up claiming to be the god who got found not guilty after he was born in a manger and is the king of everything, I’d wonder if a local asylum is missing that patient, since to the best of my knowledge no such king exists. Now, if you want to say you have an _opinion,_ that’s fine. But things can get real confusing if you blandly state as a _fact_ your belief that he was sinless. ---
**Author:** ![nani](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/58956e/32.png) [@nani](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nani)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/51 "2017-04-19T22:30:47Z")
“Love your neighbor as yourself” would seem to imply that “loving yourself” is important. Showing yourself mercy, charity, kindness, etc. The way I was raised (Mexican Catholic), “We are all sinners” was a kind of matter-of-fact “We are all imperfect”. Since we are commanded to love our neighbors and ourselves, all sinners, then being a sinner should not take away from our dignity or mean that we deserve less love. One of the lessons of the incarnation, I was told once by a priest, was that it meant that the physical world is not valueless. If God would choose to be incarnated as matter, then there must be some worth to matter, and to this world. In what was probably a stroke of luck for my psyche, I was taught that hell was a state of separation with God that people freely chose at death. Not a punishment, but a kind of logical extension of free will - someone with truly free will should be able to choose to separate themselves from God even with full knowledge of God. It was only later in life that I realized people were raised with a literal fire and brimstone version of hell. That was one of the things that inspired me to study religion academically. How could these words - love, hell, God, sin, etc. - mean such different things to different people? ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2017, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/52 "2017-04-20T01:56:46Z")
I had a college religion professor (large, top-tier secular university) who defined the _wrath_ of God as God’s absence. God being the source of all love and goodness, the absence of God is the unbearable torture of hell, which we freely choose when we reject God’s attempts at reconciliation with us. Personally, I subscribe to the sizeable minority (albeit ancient) Christian view of Universalism - that all people will ultimately be saved, in this life or the next. It’s the only way I can reconcile God’s ultimate love and goodness and omnipotence: if God wants us to be saved yet allows us to be condemned, either he isn’t that good or isn’t that powerful. Like that professor I had way back when, I believe that hell exists by definition - but it will eventually be empty. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Scrappy\_Hero\_Pup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ea5d25/32.png) [@Happy\_Scrappy\_Hero\_Pup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Scrappy_Hero_Pup)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2017, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/53 "2017-04-20T03:44:44Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > I’m not aware that he (a) was found not guilty or (b) is king of anything – and most folks on the planet don’t seem to be under either impression today, just like most folks on the planet didn’t seem to be under either impression back when. > > As far as I can tell, the guy simply died as he lived – as a mere blasphemer – and, were some oddball to show up claiming to be the god who got found not guilty after he was born in a manger and is the king of everything, I’d wonder if a local asylum is missing that patient, since to the best of my knowledge no such king exists. > > Now, if you want to say you have an _opinion,_ that’s fine. But things can get real confusing if you blandly state as a _fact_ your belief that he was sinless. I’m confused. If you don’t believe in God, as is evidenced by the level of unnecessary snark in this post, then how can you believe in sin? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2017, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/54 "2017-04-20T04:43:00Z")
> [@Happy\_Scrappy\_Hero\_Pup](#): > > But it does. > > “Sin is a failure in genuine love for God and neighbor caused by a perverse attachment to certain goods,” per the Catechism of the Catholic Church. > > Besides, as a point of order, all you’ve said so far is “no it doesn’t mean that, it means what I say it means.” _Doesn’t_ it mean whatever you want it to mean? Even putting aside the arbitrary nature of language itself, how do you define a concept like “sin” that, let’s be honest, has no empirical properties associated with it? ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Borgia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/larry_borgia/32/156_2.png) [@Larry\_Borgia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Borgia)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2017, 5:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/55 "2017-04-20T05:51:10Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > _Doesn’t_ it mean whatever you want it to mean? Even putting aside the arbitrary nature of language itself, how do you define a concept like “sin” that, let’s be honest, has no empirical properties associated with it? root(-1) doesn’t have any empirical properties associated with it, but it’s a well defined concept. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2017, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/56 "2017-04-20T06:42:59Z")
> [@tim314](#): > > When I was an adolescent and a younger adult, I had a lot of guilt issues, and I was very hard on myself for making mistakes and not always being as close to perfect as I wished I could be. Over the last decade I have mostly worked through these issues, and I now am able to see myself as a good person. I’m not perfect, of course, but on the whole I am honest, kind, hard-working, loyal, dutiful, loving, etc. The fact that I am aware of this basic goodness doesn’t _just_ make me feel _substantially_ happier, it also makes it easier for me to admit to my flaws and errors (because doing so doesn’t pain me as it once did), makes it easier for me to accept criticism, makes it easier for me to recognize that other people can also be fundamentally good in spite of their flaws, and makes it easier for me to be understanding of the imperfections and struggles of the people around me. Because I feel good about who I am, I am _both_ happier _and_ kinder to others. Moreover, because I now believe that I _deserve_ love, I am much more able to accept the love of others as genuine and sincere, and my relationships have benefitted as a result. > … > You might say: Tim, what you’re describing is just your personal issues; the Christian view of sin doesn’t affect people that way. Perhaps not, which is why I’m asking… But at least anecdotally, it seems there are many Christians who experience feelings of guilt associated with their religion (e.g., “Catholic guilt” is something of a cliché). And Christian “forgiveness” of the flaws of others seems to often be expressed in a form that suggests “Well, we’re bad too” (e.g., “judge not lest ye be judged”, “let he who is without sin cast the first stone”, “there but for the grace of God go I”), rather than that people may be basically good and deserving in spite of their flaws. > > So, what’s your view? It would be great if, when replying, you let me know if you’re a Christian, and whether you belong to a particular denomination. I’d be interested to get a sense of if there’s a denominational split in how people answer. But I appreciate your reply, regardless. All that I can say is that I have had basically the opposite experience. I was raised in a non-religious household and through the end of college and a little bit beyond that, I was not religious nor had much in the way of coherent philosophy. What I did have a lot of was anger, primarily directed at all those people out there who didn’t agree with me and do the things that I knew were right and which everybody should do. When I became a Christian, I began to understand that it was not actually the case that I was right about everything and the world’s problems were not all caused by people refusing to do what I told them was right. Rather, the Christian attitude towards forgiveness is exactly as you say: I am a flawed person in a world full of flawed people. I could continue to lash out at other people for doing things that I am certain are wrong, but then on what basis could I expect anyone else to forgive me when I do something wrong? I am now a Lutheran and **Tom Tildrum** has already posted the often-quoted statement from Martin Luther about this. Luther clearly believed as he said in the Small Catechism , “Daily we commit much sin and deserve punishment”, but Jesus has cleared all of that away on the cross. Nor do I think that it’s fundamentally any different for Catholics. My favorite Catholic author, G. K. Chesterton, lays out a similar argument in his book _[Orthodoxy](https://archive.org/stream/orthodoxy16769gut/16769.txt)_, that the belief in forgiveness through the cross of Christ is a mystical belief. We cannot understand in a precise series of logical steps _why_ Jesus dying on the cross lead to the forgiveness of sins, but by believing that it’s true we have a basis for a life of joy and inner peace. (And for the record I think that the whole “Catholic guilt” thing is a myth. A great many of the happiest, most carefree and mentally healthy people that I know are Catholics. Serious, church-attending, Rosary-saying Catholics. I have never encountered any factual reason for believing that Catholics as a class are harmed by excessive guilt.) ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2017, 10:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/57 "2017-04-20T10:49:53Z")
> [@Happy\_Scrappy\_Hero\_Pup](#): > > I’m confused. > > If you don’t believe in God, as is evidenced by the level of unnecessary snark in this post, then how can you believe in sin? I believe in God just fine. I just object to **kanicbird** ’s breezy assurance that _“What they did back then was to kill a sinless man. They did it by casting their sins onto Him and condemning Him to death (instead of them who it was rightly for).”_ That’s **kanicbird** ’s belief; my belief is that, no, what they did back then was to kill a sinful blasphemer. I’m not sure why you think my post involves unnecessary snark as compared to **kanicbird** ’s – “who it was rightly for” is just _harsh_ – or why a belief in God would be incompatible with a rejection of Jesus; Judaism exists. ---
**Author:** ![truthseeker3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e68b1a/32.png) [@truthseeker3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthseeker3)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2017, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/58 "2017-04-25T17:44:25Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > “I have sinned against him in thought, word, and deed” > > It was the “thought” that got me – how could a thought be a sin? Words and deeds, sure – they could hurt people. My parents always taught me that the ultimate guide for morality was how one treated other people. Thought didn’t, and couldn’t, have anything to do with how others were treated. I couldn’t hurt anyone, or help anyone, with a thought. Only with words or actions. > > This bothered the hell out of me. If a God really cares about what I think, and insists that certain thoughts were either required (say, a belief and worship for him) or disallowed (pervy thoughts or whatever), then that God was being an asshole. > > I couldn’t (and still can’t) see a way around this. I think you’re misunderstanding this concept. It’s true that a thought in and of itself can’t hurt anybody, but thought is the seed of action. To take an extreme example, premeditated murder starts as a thought. But even if you’re not going to follow through on something, it’s still not good to spend a lot of time on a bad idea. One can reasonably debate how much time is too much, but there’s definitely a point at which holding onto a poisonous idea (“dwelling on” or “cherishing” it - _ **NOT** _ merely having it pop into your mind) is unhealthy. Continually hoping somebody gets run over by a bus or whatever is really not in the spirit of that whole “love thy neighbor as thyself” thing. ---
**Author:** ![ISiddiqui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/97f17d/32.png) [@ISiddiqui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ISiddiqui)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2017, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/59 "2017-04-25T18:15:55Z")
> [@truthseeker3](#): > > I think you’re misunderstanding this concept. It’s true that a thought in and of itself can’t hurt anybody, but thought is the seed of action. To take an extreme example, premeditated murder starts as a thought. > > But even if you’re not going to follow through on something, it’s still not good to spend a lot of time on a bad idea. One can reasonably debate how much time is too much, but there’s definitely a point at which holding onto a poisonous idea (“dwelling on” or “cherishing” it - _ **NOT** _ merely having it pop into your mind) is unhealthy. Continually hoping somebody gets run over by a bus or whatever is really not in the spirit of that whole “love thy neighbor as thyself” thing. Indeed. Not having the proper ‘thought’ was kind of a key thing for Jesus. He constantly railed against other religious leaders who did what they were supposed to do by the letter - they did the right words and the right deeds, but didn’t go any further than that. If you are angry at your neighbor, you aren’t willing to go beyond just what you are ‘supposed to do’ to be a good person. ---
**Author:** ![tim314](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim314/32/3468_2.png) [@tim314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tim314)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2017, 9:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-are-bad-and-you-should-feel-bad-about-it-a-core-christian-belief/784743/60 "2017-04-26T09:05:27Z")
Thank you all for the replies, and sorry I’ve been a bit slow to follow up. Instead of quoting individuals, I’ll try to respond to everyone in one go: **watchwolf49** says “Love your brother as you love yourself” is the _only_ core Christian belief. Maybe that’s _a_ core belief, but I find it hard to believe it’s the _only_ one, at least for most Christians I’ve ever encountered. Surely “Jesus died for your sins” is somewhere in the mix. Some folks – **Thudlow** , **ITR** , etc. – mentioned that for some believers Christianity is not a source of guilt but a relief from it, and is something which can help believers to reach an emotionally healthy state where they can be forgiving of themselves and others. I don’t doubt this is true, and certainly I’ve heard many Christians describe how much it means to them to know that God loves and forgives them. I’m not entirely clear, though, on whether they’re just choosing to focus on (what I would consider) the more positive half of “God loves me and forgives me _even though I don’t deserve it, and in fact deserve punishment_” or if the second half of that actually isn’t something they believe. I’m quite surprised by the response (from **kanicbird** , **Blaster** , **Morgenstern** , **Alan** ) that “sin” can just mean “missing the mark” – I’d never heard that before. Similarly, it was suggested (by **ñañi** ) that “we are all sinners” can just mean “we are all imperfect”. I’m not sure how this fits with the other ways I’ve heard Christians talk about sin. Is it not mainstream Christian belief that sinners deserve punishment, and that by being crucified, Jesus took on the punishment that the rest of us humans actually deserved (because unlike Jesus, we are all sinful)? **ITR** quoted Martin Luther as saying "“Daily we commit much sin and deserve punishment”. I would have thought that if someone says we “deserve punishment” for sinning, then it is implied that sinning involves “doing something bad”. But if Christian belief is that sin is merely “missing the mark” or “not being perfect”, then does that mean Christians view _imperfection_ as deserving of punishment? Moreover, isn’t it generally held by Christians that the Bible has a lot to say about morality? That it says certain actions (or beliefs) are moral, and others immoral? If so, then are those things that the Bible tells us are sinful _different_ from the things that it says are _immoral_? ( **Blaster Master** at least, seemed to be suggesting that the things we think of as bad and immoral are a proper subset of the things that are sins.) I always thought that the things Christians considered sinful were one and the same with the things that they view as proscribed as immoral by the Bible. (I guess I’m asking mostly about the New Testament here. I’ve read discussions of the difference between the Hebrew words “to’evah” and “zimah” that appear in Leviticus – but my understanding is Christians don’t generally consider themselved bound by the rules in Leviticus anyway. Also, so far as I know Christianity doesn’t have a strong distinction between “These are the rules we follow as members of our religion” and “These are the rules all humans are supposed to follow”, unlike Judaism.) It could be that I’m looking for consistency between what are actually different views on sin held by different groups of Christians. **ISiddiqui** mentioned there are big denominational differences: > [@ISiddiqui](#): > > Well, there is a big difference in what Mainline Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox understandings on this and the Evangelical understandings on this. (not to say that Mainliners, Catholics, and Orthodoxy have the same view on sin - it seems to me that Catholics are far more into Hell than the two others, but I could be wrong). A lot of folks on this thread (and on this forum in general) seem to conflate Christian beliefs with Evangelical beliefs. I quoted this specifically, because I’d really like to know more about this. When it comes to the view of human beings as “sinful” and what this actually means, is the way I described it in the OP basically accurate when it comes to evangelicals but not other groups? Or not even accurate when it comes to evangelicals? Or is it really more of a cultural thing than a denominational thing – e.g., “Christians in red states tend to believe X?” I suspect I may indeed often mistake evangelical beliefs for general Christian beliefs. (Possibly I’m more exposed to evangelicals through media coverage, or perhaps evangelicals tend to be more outspoken about their beliefs when I meet them in real life in non-religious settings.) Also interesting to me is **Crotalus** ’s observation that it depends _which_ of the many words which are translated as “sin” you’re talking about. Although – and I mean this without snark – what the Bible says, whether in English or its original languages, is a somewhat separate question from what Christians _believe_. A friend of mine from my grad school days made the suggestion (which **ñañi** brought up here) that Salvation is really about choice, and that you can choose after death (with full information) whether to accept God and be with Him for eternity, or not. At the time, I was arguing a rather different point, namely that this notion of “you’re forgiven if you believe” seems very unfair to those who weren’t lucky enough to be raised from birth to believe the correct thing. But I’ve always assumed that my friend’s view was a minority opinion – anecdotally, a lot of Christians certainly seem to think it matters what you believe here on Earth. 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