Moral Relativism

I would not say that you have to believe with all your heart in order to have your sins forgiven and be saved. That is probably impossible in this life. What you need to do is try your best to believe and let God transform that partial beleive into true belief. To truly believe we need supernatural help! Hence Mark 9:24 - "I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!"

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If you say there are no absolutes, I ask you, are you absolutely sure about that?

GN Yes but christ did not require great belief for you to accomplish this.All he said you needed was So come on! Surely one of you has this.If not I ask you what the hell do you defend with such vigour.Your egos? Your sanity?
This is the thing you say you dedicate your life to. I cannot tell the extent of your commitment as I do not know you.But you guys and gals surely know yourselves and is not one of you committed enough to actually implement faith the size of a mustard seed?You could render all this dialogue a moot point by one simple act.I do not know about the others here but a mountain,let's say Mt.Baker in Washington state doing a nose dive into the ocean off Port Angelas would break my atheist mindset in irreparable pieces,not to mention the publicity it would engender.What is stopping you?

FAITH.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

jarInteresting.Care to elaborate?

There is no need to prove anything. No imperative.And we also have faith that what happens will be something we can endure.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

jarSo dont use to prove anything. Do it in private and never mention it to a soul.Christ said the power is yours and is it moral to withhold its use in the sparing of tragedy and hunger?
I mean it is your power given to you do with it as you please but why would you consider it a problem to use it? Why would christ mention it unecessarily? He could just as easily have said it another way but he did not.Move mountains heck just walk into a cancer ward and heal sick children, remove pain from victims in the burn ward.{you want to see suffering visit one of those}.Are you believing I am trying to tempt you fine do what you need to make it right in your head but for pity's sake why would you wait?

Getting way OT.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

jarYes I agree. Perhaps I will begin a new thread on this soon but I am off to another province starting next week for about 8 days so I may wait till then.Bloody hell we have been going over the field between this topic and that other one LOL Good to bat things back and forth mate.I think I am going to ease up for the rest of the night or I may end up going longer and interupting my beauty sleep.{ a desperate need if ever there was one.}
Take care and we will see you back here.

It is not a self-centered attidtude. When we ask for forgiveness from God and recieve the gift of eternal life, we start the transformation from our wicked, self-centered natures into the nature of Christ, who was the very opposite of self-centeredness. Once we have begun this transformation, we can begin to share with others the good news of eternal life and lead them to eternal life as well.If we asked for forgiveness from humans instead of from God, neither us nor the humans we wronged would get to heaven. If we ask for forgiveness from God, we are able to start sharing about how to get to heaven with them, and us AND maybe the humans we shared with will also get to heaven.So asking for forgiveness from God is ultimately better for other people around us - it is helping secure their eternal destiny, thus it is NOT being self centered,, but rather caring about waht happens to others as well.Just READ the New Testament and look at the teachings. EVERYWHERE it says to do good to others, to help the poor, to love one another. Is this being self-centered? By no means!It has been said that giving the penalty of your sins to Jesus is just passing off our reponsiblity to the God "we claim to love," even if it is a freely offered gift. Hear this: it is MORE than a freely offered gift; God WANTS us to do it, he GREATLY DESIRES for us to give our sins to Him! We claim to love God. If I love someone, I want to make them happy, right? It makes God happy when we trust in Him for eternal life!

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If you say there are no absolutes, I ask you, are you absolutely sure about that?

bump

It is always preferable to have a good guide with you when venturing into unknown territory. And, for the guide, it is easier if those he is guiding cooperate with him rather than compete with him.

bob_gray says: I think we can all agree that some societies are more "moral" than others, for example Nazi Germany compared to the USA.Now for the next step. Allow me to quote CS Lewis: I know that many of you are going to argue that this "Real Morality" is simply what makes the most people the most happy. But I strongly disagree. Take homosexual marriage, for example. The majority of people in the United States oppose gay marriage - it would make more people happy if gay marriage is stopped than it would make people happy if gay marriage is allowed. Does this make banning gay marriage the moral thing to do? Consider this same situation reversed: suppose the majority of people in the US supported gay marriage. Is it now moral to allow it?Suppose there is a country with 100 million people. Suppose that 90% of the population of this country would love to kill the other 10% because of something like the hair or skin color of the 10% minority. The 90% majority would go into a fit of happiness if they could kill the 10%. This is the way to get the most happiness for the most amount of people. Does this make it the morally right thing to do?

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If you say there are no absolutes, I ask you, are you absolutely sure about that?

Are you sure about that?

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Fairly. Are you in any real doubt that the US is more moral than Nazi Germany was?

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If you say there are no absolutes, I ask you, are you absolutely sure about that?

Bob Gray had the answer. You need to pay attention to him.And now for your question relative to the US vs Nazi Germany.Would you say that invading a peaceful nation that posed no threat what so ever, conquering it and making the monarch abdicate was moral?What about invading a country, creating a rebellion just to supporting a phony succession to get property rights?What about forcably removing tens of thousands of people from their homes simply to steal their assets?What about commiting genocide?Are those moral acts?Edited to add:It's all relative.This message has been edited by jar, 08-10-2004 09:29 PM

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion