The 10 Commandments

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Pr. Jae said:
You're speaking of God I imagine. I don't share your perspective. I believe that murder is an act humans are capable of. I don't feel such a charge can be duly made against God.
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Neither do I, as the stories aren't believable.

But to say you won't form a fan club for history's notorious murderers, while holding aloft a symbolic cross-shaped torture and execution device, as a symbol of a fan club for a God who isn't above a spot of murdering himself, seems a little curious.
 
Waterfall said:
Don't know...it hasn't happened on a world wide basis has it?
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And it isn't about to. And what a great excuse Christians will always have then, eh?

Whenever someone points out that loving thine enemy doesn't work, Christians can always reply that it hasn't been tried.

Christianity, it appears, keeps requesting an extension on its project of loving enemies.

Any sign that it's about to happen? No? Then at what point can we consider it a failure because it will never happen? Just because a rocket has never exploded, does not mean it isn't a failure, if it was never going to launch in the first place.
 
chansen said:
Neither do I, as the stories aren't believable.

But to say you won't form a fan club for history's notorious murderers, while holding aloft a symbolic cross-shaped torture and execution device, as a symbol of a fan club for a God who isn't above a spot of murdering himself, seems a little curious.
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Thing is, I believe that murder is an act done by humans, not God.
 
I dislike the word evil because we all too often use it to separate out the things with which we are uncomfortable; to pretend that they aren't really part of our world.[/QUOTE]

Actually I am acknowledging that there is evil, it sounds more like you are the uncomfortable one.
 
chansen said:
And it isn't about to. And what a great excuse Christians will always have then, eh?

Whenever someone points out that loving thine enemy doesn't work, Christians can always reply that it hasn't been tried.

Christianity, it appears, keeps requesting an extension on its project of loving enemies.

Any sign that it's about to happen? No? Then at what point can we consider it a failure because it will never happen? Just because a rocket has never exploded, does not mean it isn't a failure, if it was never going to launch in the first place.
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It works when tried. Also loving ones enemy doesn't guarantee a change in the enemies behaviour but it can create a bridge that both can cross to meet on.

Remember, to the enemy, we are the enemy.
 
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This is where I think I am going this week...
http://ministerialmutterings.blogspot.ca/2014/09/looking-forward-to-october-5-2014.html
Early Thoughts: Living in community can be hard. That's why we have rules.

The 10 commandments are a central part of how we, as a covenant community, understand what it means to live with each other and with God. It is a matter of great debate how much they impact our civic legislation, because many of the precepts we find in them, particularly the last 6 which talk how we treat our neighbours, are found in law codes from other areas (such as the law code of Hammurabi). So maybe some of these are truly universal, and not a result of Judeo-Christian thought...

But we live in an era that seems to chafe at rules. Well sort of, we routinely click OK on terms and conditions of websites without reading or questioning the rules and regulations and permissions they include. But rules tell us what we can't do, and the idol of personal freedom and independence tells us that we should be able to do whatever we want. (Admittedly this plays out differently in different generations and at different ages)

DO we still think rules are important? And if so why?

Jesus tells us that he comes not to abolish the law but to fulfill it. Christian freedom does not get rid of the rules (if anything Christian freedom places more restrictions as Jesus goes on to say in the Sermon on the Mount). If we are going to live in community we need to name that without rules we have anarchy. And anarchy means the weakest among us will be left on the figurative ice floe to drift away and die.

So how do we live in community? How do we deal with the need both to have rules about how we live and the need to challenge/discuss those rules to ensure they are accomplishing their purpose (or to ensure that purpose is worth accomplishing)? This week we will have a bit of that discussion, using the "Big 10" as our starting point.
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chansen said:
No, that turns us into robots, loving and servicing everything. That's a hellish existence. We don't have to love everything. Curling, for example. Or back bacon. Or Justin Bieber.
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You're absolutely right, you don't have to love anything at all, if you don't want to.
 
There has to be an allowance for the fact that many things in this world just suck. We don't have to love them. We should be able to disagree, debate and challenge things, or recognize that they suck and simply ignore them. I'm not too good at that last one. But we do not, and should not have to love everything. That's not truthful. That does not allow for personal expression. That silences people for the sake of some artificial harmony that isn't harmonious at all.
 
chansen said:
There has to be an allowance for the fact that many things in this world just suck. We don't have to love them. We should be able to disagree, debate and challenge things, or recognize that they suck and simply ignore them. I'm not too good at that last one. But we do not, and should not have to love everything. That's not truthful. That does not allow for personal expression. That silences people for the sake of some artificial harmony that isn't harmonious at all.
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But I'm not talking about "personal" expression, and that's the key to it all. We need to view all life from the Soul point of view, and not from the personal.

Edit to add: to view "all" life from the Soul is one of the biggest sacrifices we can do as human beings. And it can only be done out of love.
 
That has absolutely zero meaning to me. Like somebody threatening to punch me in my aura.
 
Waterfall said:
Actually I am acknowledging that there is evil, it sounds more like you are the uncomfortable one.
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My problem is not with acknowledging the existence of evil. I acknowledge it. Racism is evil, for instance. My problem is with the use of the word as a label. All too often it is a label that we pin on others while ignoring it in ourselves. More cynically, I might say that we pin it on others to avoid seeing it in ourselves. Jesus taught that we are all sinners, that no one is qualified to throw the first stone. And he was right.

Do you acknowledge the evil in our own society or only in Nazi Germany and Khmer Rouge Cambodia? Our treatment of the natives, our treatment of the Japanese and Chinese, our persecution of "communists" all smack of the evil we tend to pretend only exists in those far off places. It's just a matter of scale. We stopped short of actual genocide, save in the case of the First Nations where we did give it a try.

We need to stop looking for evil elsewhere, stop pretending that evil is something that happens somewhere else, and deal with our own evil. We also need to recognize that humans, even Hitlers, aren't necessarily "good" or "evil" in some black and white sense but fall along a spectrum. Pure evil does not exist. Alas, neither does pure good.
 
Neo said:
I know Chansen, you don't get me or what I believe in at all. You're not the only one.
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But it's not for a lack of trying. A "soul point of view" is a completely meaningless phrase to me. It just is. Would you prefer I lie and agree enthusiastically?
 
Mendalla said:
My problem is not with acknowledging the existence of evil. I acknowledge it. Racism is evil, for instance. My problem is with the use of the word as a label. All too often it is a label that we pin on others while ignoring it in ourselves. More cynically, I might say that we pin it on others to avoid seeing it in ourselves. Jesus taught that we are all sinners, that no one is qualified to throw the first stone. And he was right.

Do you acknowledge the evil in our own society or only in Nazi Germany and Khmer Rouge Cambodia? Our treatment of the natives, our treatment of the Japanese and Chinese, our persecution of "communists" all smack of the evil we tend to pretend only exists in those far off places. It's just a matter of scale. We stopped short of actual genocide, save in the case of the First Nations where we did give it a try.

We need to stop looking for evil elsewhere, stop pretending that evil is something that happens somewhere else, and deal with our own evil. We also need to recognize that humans, even Hitlers, aren't necessarily "good" or "evil" in some black and white sense but fall along a spectrum. Pure evil does not exist. Alas, neither does pure good.
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I dont recall saying evil couldn't exist anywhere. In fact your own examples didn't seem to include anyone from North american society.
 
chansen said:
But it's not for a lack of trying. A "soul point of view" is a completely meaningless phrase to me. It just is. Would you prefer I lie and agree enthusiastically?
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Not at all, we should all be as honest as possible regarding who and what we are.

Imagine if you can, what it would be like for a single cell in your body to suddenly become aware of the rest of the trillions of cells in your body and thus become aware of "you" sitting in your chair right now.

That is the scope of true "Soul-Awareness", aka God-Awareness. It doesn't come easy and it would probably blow our minds if it came too quickly. And btw, through this analogy and extrapolation, even God has a God, part and parcel thereof.
 
Are you saying that we need to be more aware of others on this planet? Because that's not far off what I'm saying. I'm just trying to put it in really simple terms.
 
chansen said:
Are you saying that we need to be more aware of others on this planet? Because that's not far off what I'm saying. I'm just trying to put it in really simple terms.
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Yes, but not just in a simple neighbourly way. It's an awareness where one realizes that everyone and every thing (including Justine Beiber) is part and parcel of the same whole. From this realization comes true love, even for our enemies.
 
Christian love is agape. "Make sure that your love is true agape," said Paul in one of his letters.

Although, in modern Greek, agape just means "love," to the ancient Greeks it was godly love, universal love, love without exception. The ancient Greeks had many types of love. Apart from agape there was the sexual love of eros, the filial love of philia, the playful love of ludus, and others. The love of agape was the unconditional love with which creator loves created: the love that unites opposites: transcendental love.

One can, of course, not like somebody, but still love them in the spirit of agape.

My son-in-law, for instance. I don't like the guy very much, but I love him anyway, in the spirit of agape. Thanksgiving Day is coming, and he will be here for dinner, and, lucky for him and even luckier for me, I will have a chance to practice my agape on him.

Or my father, who was a Nazi. I absolutely detested that part of him, and still do, but love him anyway, with the filial love of philia, and later in life I came to love him with the love of agape.

And I love you all, with the love of agape, even though I don't like some of you very much.:)
 
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