Outgrowing God: Why religions fail
Posted by overmanwarrior 10 years, 9 months ago to Philosophy
"I left the church unofficially because of the false premise that sacrifice was needed for human life to move forward. Creativity is the real driver of advancement, not pouring the blood of Christ into a cup and drinking it on Sunday. Softened rituals of human sacrifice which is what Lutheran communion was only served in providing basic childlike foundations into living a life of goodness. It did not help a person live a life where they are in control, where they are accountable, and they dictate the fate of their own existence. So I continued on and only returned for big family events until this last service. I couldn’t help but notice the tears from the audience, listening to the organ from the balcony, the lit up cross I had spent so many Sundays and years helping keep the place alive. I looked out the window at the same trees I looked at growing up. They were a little bigger, but mostly still there. During sermons I had stared at every line of every brick in the front wall of a church that was quite a popular place in the 70s and 80s. Many of my first girlfriends came out of the church. Even during some of my most rebellious years mentioned prior, I still attended church at Holy Cross almost every weekend. It had become a sanctuary of goodness for me over the years that I had a lot of value for. But not enough value to sacrifice my life to, or the lives of my children. The church was not more important than me and my family and that is a tough concept to explain to people who have not taken those steps."
It's critical of life and worships death.
From your article: "Like the pastor from two decades prior, who was now deceased, it was easier to pray to God, trust in the wisdom of His benevolence than to take personal responsibility through personal creativity to lead one’s own life to a conclusion of self motivated destiny."
There is nothing about being a believer that would prevent one from assuming personal responsibility and utilizing one's creativity. In fact, you miss the point that at least Christian theology advocates such - to borrow a phrase from the Army - to be all that one can be. That is the calling for Christians.
I can respect your choice, but not your rationale for how you got there.
I have no lack of self-esteem nor confidence. I have no need to be "ruled" by a super being. I do not believe that all people are "born bad", but I do realize that nobody is perfect.
I do not believe that the only way to salvation is to serve my fellow man, but I do believe that I should use my gifts to better myself, my family, and my community.
I beg forgiveness of my failings of those whom I have wronged, and to my God for failing to live up to my potential. You can take that last item as self introspection and remorse at not actualizing my full potential, it works out the same way. None of which is counter to the "ideal man" as espoused by AR.
I have no special criticism of life, and do not worship death. I hope that it is far off, yet have no fear of it whenever it comes upon me.
You speak of desiring to live a life as if you are accountable / responsible for its outcome...where your actions matter. You have reached a conclusion this not to be had in Christianity...I just don't get that. This message is pretty much all over the place in the Bible. Perhaps it wasn't observed in the lives of the people at this church. Perhaps your grading standard is just too high.
From my perspective, Christianity teaches that your goals, desires, plans, motivations, creativity, whatever you want to call it...are but one input affecting the outcome of your life. The message of Christianity is not to shut off these things and trade them in for a prayer, a bite of a cracker, and a sip of grape juice. Man, I can't deal with that attitude and I've heard it expressed. There was this popular bumper sticker a few decades back that said "God is my co-pilot", and I once heard someone try to take that up a notch and say God ought to be your pilot. Sounds really ultra-spiritual. Wow, man - better than those co-pilot slackers. But that's just garbage. God is not going to drive the car of your life. He put you in it, and it's up to you to drive it on interesting paths towards the great destination before you run out of gas. But if you think you're going to do that 100% on your own and end up in a good spot at the end...you're not. You are not in 100% control of your life. There are other inputs - some of them trying to force you off the road, and others that can overcome them.
You seem to have gone Homer Simpson on me and invented a replacement religion: one where God still exists and is the factor behind inspiration and drive, but one where Jesus either doesn't exist or didn't die for any meaningful purpose. I don't understand your hangup with sacrifice. The apostle Paul makes this comment at the end of the Corinthians letter about how "If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied."
You seem to say the message of Christianty is "You'll amount to nothing in this life without the sacrifice of Jesus", and you reject that. Well, OK. I can deal with that because that's not the message. After reading through the article a couple of times, I'm beginning to suspect you don't believe in an afterlife. Perhaps you believe this life is all we've got, and you're rejecting the idea that anything meaningful comes about in it because of the sacrifice of Jesus. Well, the payoff is at the end, from my read of the Bible. All sorts of people ignore it in this life and make successes of themselves. If all one cares about is this life, the sacrifice in Christianity can be safely disregarded. The sacrifice has its ultimate meaning in Eternal Life, not here. What it provides in this life is another input to steering the car, figuratively speaking.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMMcQ6nPy...