Maybe the evangelicals get the bennies you mention but in my Irish and French Catholic background it doesn't work out that way. Because Christianity instills fear and guilt you don't get off the hook by your faith or even God's forgiveness for long. Once you throw self-gratification into the mix to feel guilty about you are pretty much screwed the day after confession. It seems to me that using God's forgiveness to remove guilt distracts people from repairing the social contract by getting forgiveness from the person harmed. So many of the Church's transgressions are about pissing God off anyway. I think the chimps have it right. When you do something that hurts another member of your tribe you go to them and hold out your hand making an oooooo sound. The other chimp could bit your hand, so for a moment you are vulnerable. The other chimp kisses your hand and then you start grooming. If you are in the Bonobo species you might dry hump for a few minutes. Better than saying a few "Our Fathers' after confession!
--- In [email protected], "authfriend" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > --- In [email protected], "curtisdeltablues" > <curtisdeltablues@> wrote: > > > > "completed Jews." > > > > I don't know how they get the foreskin back on but that's > > gotta hurt! > > Oy... > > > I never took the time to really connect the vague prophesies in the > > Old Testament with the New claims to notice how they fail even by > > their own criteria. I usually get hung up on the miracles. > > The miracle stories, though, are just feel-good > stuff. They never did non-Christians any harm. > > The weird > > thing is that even if you definitively pointed all this out, > > the Christian just drops back and punts. "Well it is just a > > matter of faith". > > There's a lot to be said for faith in and of itself, > IMHO. Faith that Jesus' sacrifice on the cross (even if > it never happened) has reconciled those who accept > Jesus as Savior to God relieves a person of a huge > burden of guilt and fear over their past transgressions. > If God forgives you, who the hell are you not to forgive > yourself? > > Without that guilt and fear, it's a lot easier to make > a fresh start. > > That ingenious formulation was Paul's doing, so as much > as his rejection of Judaism and his homophobia and > misogyny pisses me off, I gotta give him credit for > coming up with something that works. >
