When asked, "What do you think happens to us when we die?" Frank Zappa: Dust... BUT.. I will say, and this doesn't put you in the realm of metaphysics, that something animates you while you are alive. There's an electrochemical process that animates this bag of **** that everybody has to drag around, OK? So it is not impossible that at the point where the electro-chemical process that's motivating the bag of **** ceases to be strong enough to make that bag of **** move around, that energy may be exchanged, and may dissipate and have an existence of its own without the bag of ****. I wouldn't want to extrapolate that into the world of ghosts and goblins... I'm with FZ on this one.
It is good you think this way. I know some pentecostals who think only the saved from their church will make it to heaven.
I knew some of them. "I think Mary is great so you are not christian." I wanted to kick this one guy in the nuts every time I heard that
Ask them what God did with all the people that came before their religion was established? Are they all in Hell? Would God send them to hell for not following the proper religion even though that religion was not invented yet? DD
All those ignorant hicks believing in some sort of magic father figure sure are stupid, aren't they oh wise one?
The Catholic church has always believed this. Everyone but them is a heretic. In other news the sky is blue.
i really like Jesus a whole lot. i don't think the sermon on the mount needs much dogma attached to it. just a bit of historical context to understand what he means.
Half of the new testament is letters written by Paul to the various independently run worship centers and churches in the first century. If the first churches that ever existed were independently run with no central body, you would think they would still count as churches today.
But, as the pope would say, they were run by a central authority: paul and the rest of the apostles who set the policy for the church as a whole even while the churches handled the local things (example, the whole doing away with prohibitions on pork-eating thing)
looking at those letters...and considering how many churches were spreading like wildfire...and considering it was 300 years before they compiled a standard set of scripture for each church...i think it is a GIGANTIC leap to suggest that Paul and/or Peter had anything remotely resembling "central authority." there were shared beliefs that clearly pre-date Paul's letters...you can see him point back to them as creeds. but Paul seems to suggest that there is tons of freedom in Christ (Galatians 4 is a great example) and seems to balking at the imposition of real "religion" in the sense that we think of that word today. i think he very clearly understood that Christ didn't come to bring us another religion.
Acts 15 talks about a central council in Jerusalem -- where Paul and Barnabas went to settle a dispute on circumsion. Then some of the "apostles and elders" went back with them to explain their decision. I believe the "central council" did stress freedom in Christ (see the removal of the need for circumsision because we are saved by grace) but there does appear to be a central council Acts 15 The Council at Jerusalem 1Some men came down from Judea to Antioch and were teaching the brothers: "Unless you are circumcised, according to the custom taught by Moses, you cannot be saved." 2This brought Paul and Barnabas into sharp dispute and debate with them. So Paul and Barnabas were appointed, along with some other believers, to go up to Jerusalem to see the apostles and elders about this question. 3The church sent them on their way, and as they traveled through Phoenicia and Samaria, they told how the Gentiles had been converted. This news made all the brothers very glad. 4When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and elders, to whom they reported everything God had done through them. 5Then some of the believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, "The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to obey the law of Moses." 6The apostles and elders met to consider this question. 7After much discussion, Peter got up and addressed them: "Brothers, you know that some time ago God made a choice among you that the Gentiles might hear from my lips the message of the gospel and believe. 8God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. 9He made no distinction between us and them, for he purified their hearts by faith. 10Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of the disciples a yoke that neither we nor our fathers have been able to bear? 11No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they
the catholic church because its the oldest and most corrupt organization in the wordl with a lota of blood on its hands. i am saying i dont think jesus would approve of the church or its history or its present status and you cant just wash off your history by apologizing for it.
the spanish inquisition was a big misunderstanding Jesus, what you are claiming does have some merit; but it can hold true for every church.
And on a serious note, as the thread is of grave concern... I poorly used a dimwitted attempt at mild sarcasm to point out that the views expressed are probably not even stated in a Catholic Bible. So if it is missing from your denomination's Bible it's more one leaders agenda than God's declaration. I know the Pope has great influence as the leader of his denomination, I wasn't taking that lightly; but unless Jesus said it, or the Pope read it in the Bible, I will just say nice opinion. The next Pope may see it the opposite. Catholics shouldn't think too much of it and Protestants stopped protesting along time ago.
