Conversation with J

Here's a random e-mail I got from someone who'd apparently read some of my religious views.

Sorry for such an untimely response. Basically, I found it weird that I happened upon your website, and was directed to your statements you have about God. My question to you is, "Why would you not believe in the teachings of Christ Jesus?" God sent his Son to us so that we might be given a true fulfillment of life, and forgiveness. I read that you don't like the fact that someone thinks that they can tell you what to do, but being a Christian is not about that. It is about loving your neighbor and the Lord with all our heart, soul, and mind. And if we truly love the fact that we have life, existence itself, then we should logically thank God, who gave us this gift.

Read through these words again, and really think about them. More importantly, I invite you to read through the Gospels in the Bible. And finally, try a meditative prayer, praying to God, asking if it is real. I hope to hear from you again. If you have any questions, or need anything, just ask.

In Christ's Love,

J

Okay, I couldn't quite let this person get away with this random Godvertisement when proselytization has become more and more of a repugnant idea to me, so I went off.

In a message dated 04/17/2001 3:21:34 PM Eastern Daylight Time, J writes:

<< Why would you not believe in the teachings of Christ Jesus? >>

I have far too many responses to this question to reasonably list, but I can start with the important ones: One, I don't believe in "the teachings" because they were written by men, no matter how divinely inspired those men are believed by any party to be. Two, I don't believe in "the teachings" because they contain more than their fair share of contradictory material, which would leave one unsure of which statements to believe. Three, I don't believe in "the teachings" because I choose to take my knowledge of and beliefs about life, death, and the world around us from my own intuitions and what strikes me as true, and though there is plenty of truth in "the teachings," I refuse to take a book and place it into my mind as beliefs verbatim. Four, I don't believe in "the teachings" because there are plenty of other "holy books" that also claim to be the only road to enlightenment, salvation, or what have you; I tend to be highly suspicious of something that encourages you to only believe it and to also attribute any evidence of its untruth to the meddling of Satan. And five, I don't believe in "the teachings" because I continue to learn and change, and books written thousands of years ago tend to be static documents--I prefer developing beliefs based on their reflection of truth in my environment; I refuse to blindly accept as true something that I have never seen in the reflective mirror of nature.

I could have just said "because I already have a religion," but I figured you'd want more of an explanation than that.

<<I read that you don't like the fact that someone thinks that they can tell you what to do, but being a Christian is not about that. It is about loving your neighbor and the Lord with all our heart, soul, and mind. And if we truly love the fact that we have life, existence itself, then we should logically thank God, who gave us this gift.>>

If this in itself, these practices and ideals, are "what being Christian is about," then I was already practicing Christian values and morals before I'd ever heard of Jesus. Just being nice and praising the divinity we think responsible for existence does not equal Christianity; they are simply attributes of what it is *supposed* to be (but often isn't, in popular experience).

<<Read through these words again, and really think about them.>>

I really wish that you wouldn't have sent me this e-mail. The object of your e-mail is to try to get me to change my beliefs when as such they are fine without the help of the gospels telling me to be nice. I have rather good morals and values, if that's what it's all about. Jesus remains to me in a position of honor reserved for those who have led remarkable, exemplary lives, but I do not consider him a door to paradise, nor do I believe in that sort of paradise in any case.

<<More importantly, I invite you to read through the Gospels in the Bible.>>

I don't need an invitation to do this, though you are not the first to suggest it and I'm afraid you will not be the last. Is it because I do not consider the Gospels "truth" that you assume I have never read them, or that I need to read them again?

I am open to discussion of religion, but I become offended easily when a discussion partner insults my intelligence and/or spiritual "credentials" by saying they've got the only "right" way to live or worship--thereby labeling my beliefs and practices as "wrong" and essentially telling me I don't know how to worship God as well as they do. I'd really rather not go in that direction if you were thinking about it. Thanks.

I never received any reply.

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Comments from others:

Mikey: I will just say this I think the last Paragraph says it all and all should read this when ever talking to another person about religion.

Yes I wouldn't think that you would receive a reply, I think that it is nice for someone to have such faith in what their belief is but to push it in a way that isn't quite polite to try and invade others' own belief system is quite wrong in so many ways, and I must add I think that you handled this one quite well.

Sarah: Sheesh, like I mentioned before...the only reasonings some people are able to muster up as to why they think they're right about their religion are the ones which were sewn into their minds since they were old enough to understand the concept of heaven and hell. Why can't people come up with anything better than what they were told time and time again? I'm impressed that you even wasted your time explaining your feelings to them. *Sigh*...I wish people would be more tolerant towards the opinions of others. And, if they don't agree with another's opinion, they need to come up with a logical claim to their argument. Argh!

D.: Actually, this is just sort of an overall thing on the religion thing in general.

It's always funny to me how they (religious nuts in general, but my examples here lean more toward Christian and Catholic) will take whatever they want from the Bible and throw it at you, like the homosexual bit while completely ignoring another part of Leviticus that basically tells us "no fish for you! fish bad!" or when they quote ye olde "thou shall not suffer a witch to live" I have two responses to that. One is that I take my own spin on it, and say "thou shall not make a witch live in suffering" because I like that better, or I throw back the "thou shalt take unto thee no graven images, not from this earth, nor the sky above it, nor the oceans under it." Cause you know... statues of animals and such are so popular with Christians and Catholics these days.

And recently, during dinner, just to even things out, we had to deal with some rather stubborn Jehovah's Witnesses, who were insisting that they were pretty much REQUIRED to talk to us RIGHT THEN about Jesus. My girlfriend said "no thank you" and they said, as she was closing the door, "we need to talk to you about Jesus!" and she said "not during dinner." and they said "jesus is more important!" and she said "jesus is NOT more important than dinner, thank you goodbye" *SLAM!* I love my girlfriend. XD

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