Aren't these Christian beliefs, all concocted by Euro theologians & bishops,
farcical? We have been fed on myths & fables for too long. Why on earth does
God need to have a son? To us earthlings, 'son' means the product from the
physical relations between man and woman. In the Euro Christian case, the
father is God but wait - isn't God genderless! So he decides to have
'relations' with one of his own creatures - Mary, a Jewish teenager. Could
anything be more weird??
How was this accomplished? We are told that the power from the Most High
'overshadowed' her and she conceived. Now we are getting into magic and
fantasy. Ha, ha.
But, why go through these spiritual gymnastics?God had created defective
creatures and he wanted to redeem them. How? As Roland says: through "the cruel
and unnecessary death of the son."
So after man's redemption, why is the world rotten as ever? Why do people (like
Trump, Natenyahu and Modi) continue to prosper despite their crimes? Was the
redemption in vain?The way out of this impasse is for our Asian theologians
(and there are brilliant ones like John, Amaladoss and Pieris) to devise our
own Christianity. But would they have the guts and would Europe allow this?
Until then, let's wait for the next redemption.
The next Mary might be a Goan, who knows?
Eddie
On Wednesday, 9 August 2017, 17:40, Roland Francis
<roland.fran...@gmail.com> wrote:
One of the arguments against non-belief in a god or gods or religion is that
people would get away with injustices if there was no afterlife. Punishment in
the form of hell (Christianity, Islam) or rebirth to a lower caste of life-form
(Hinduism) solves that. God is merciful and yet administers firm justice.
Atheists on the other hand say that one can expect that people will sometimes
get away with crimes against other people and prosper till they die with little
price (but for one's conscience) to pay. It is an inevitable part of the human
condition.
That is an honest stand compared to the hypocritical stance of the major
religions. Islam for example teaches that Allah will forgive anything except
'shirk' (belief in another God) or 'riddah' (apostasy, a Muslim denying Islam).
In Christianity, you may do anything, yes any crime, no exceptions, and with
asking forgiveness you will enjoy heaven.
Aside from the fact that no one has any good evidence of heaven or hell, it
also means that the concept of god's justice tempered with mercy is a fallacy.
In Christianity you are told of hell, a punishment from the father, but you are
offered a loophole of redemption due to the sacrifice, meaning cruel and
unnecessary death of the son.
In human terms, a judge can convict you and with mitigating circumstances can
give you a lesser term than you deserve. Justice tempered with mercy. With
condemnation to hell, how is there mercy? In the religious context, afterlife
believers should admit that for them, justice and mercy are mutually exclusive
terms.
Roland Francis
Toronto.
