[co_heir]

I describe myself as a hopeful universalist. I believe God's grace is big enough and powerful enough to save everyone and I hope all are redeemed. I also believe there will be a judgement. What form that will take, I have no clue.

[myotch]

Pare away the influence of Dante's Inferno and the appropriation of other religions, and what we have left is what Jesus said about the grave and the coded imagery of John's Revelation.

[Ricardo]

As I say often, the church has not been able to figure out -yet- what to do with Copernicus.

The writings contained in the bibles assumed a cosmology including Heaven above the firmament and an Earth-based Creation of only seven thousand years. A god sitting on a throne? Quaint.

Now, we know God is much, much bigger -and older than that, and that the Earth is not the center of anything. The idea of a god that notices the actions of lives that are but an instant, and will reward or punish those lives with ETERNAL rewards -or punishments- no longer makes sense.

How many of us are attracted to a Heaven with streets of gold, or the chance at wearing crowns?

The idea of ETERNAL punishment goes against our basic understanding of Justice and Fairness. The punishment needs to fit the crime.

So, when our God-given concept of a Just and Fair God is not compatible with writings of believers from two to four thousand years ago, we have a decision to make: either we throw out our understanding of a Just God that we have a personal relationship with, or, we throw out those incompatible descriptions on paper.

IMHO, a no-brainer.

[myotch]

What do you mean about Copernicus?

[Ricardo]

Copernicus: The Earth is not the center of anything.

The Earth is not the center of Creation.
Humanity is not the culmination of anything.
God first giving us free will, then drowning us in a flood because we did not do what He wanted us to do never made any sense.
A creator of millions of galaxies wanting to receive sacrifices from us? for forgiveness of sins?
What type of god would want praises from billions of Earth creatures? (Or 144 thousand if you are JW.)

The writers assembled in the books we now declare as the Bible did the best they could, to define a being who surpasses all understanding. The NT writers tried their hand at redefining that being.

Time to do it again.

[myotch]

I get what Copernicus contributed. You said that the church hasn't figured out what to do with Copernicus. How has the church not processed / properly addressed / come to understanding on Copernicus' discovery?

Just trying to cut through some of the rhetoric, here. It's quite a jump to go from acknowledging a heliocentric galaxy to rejecting sacrificial systems on which Jesus sacrifice was based (another tenet you reject) because of heliocentrism.

Why not make the full jump to atheism, because science? It's not inconsistent with your logic.

[Ricardo]

No.

Christians (traditional Christians) have not had a problem rejecting the OT definitions of a genocidal god.

The problem is not believing in God.

The problem is reducing the definition of God to what people thought two to four thousand years ago.

Science has nothing to say about God. Neither for nor against.

[myotch]

Genocide has nothing to do with Copernicus or sacrifice. Copernicus has nothing to do with sacrifice or genocide. You are drawing lines that aren't there. Genocide is not sacrifice.

You need to explain how the church doesn't know what to do with Copernicus. Let's focus on that.

If you are merely saying that the church doesn't adequately address the earth not being the physical center of the universe, well, the church has acknowledged that and moved on.

If you are saying that Earth and humanity is not the central hub of the capability of acknowledging and worshipping a creative force, the spiritual center of the universe as it were, then that's another thing entirely, and I'd enjoy talking about that as well. What is your evidence to the contrary...

[rsc2a]

Evidence? Don't you know that merely asserting something is sufficient to make it truth?

[myotch]

" Your understanding of your religion is wrong. Let me enlighten you with my own unfounded assertions."