Lasto beth Lammen - Is your religion nuts?

Post by **River** » Sat Dec 17, 2011 6:09 pm

Alatar, I thought about posting that one but didn't get around to it. I like it. The 2009 one was for 5th-graders, but the 2011 one, with the pregnancy test...all the people I know who became parents in the last couple of years planned the pregnancies. They decided it was time, they tried, and in time they succeeded. They were still terrified when the test came back positive. In some ways, it's the end of the world as you know it.

Post by **JewelSong** » Sat Dec 17, 2011 8:24 pm

"Let the Mystery Be"
by Iris Dement

Everybody's wonderin' what and where they all came from.
Everybody's worryin' 'bout where they're gonna go when the whole thing's done.
But no one knows for certain and so it's all the same to me.
I think I'll just let the mystery be.

Some say once you're gone you're gone forever, and some say you're gonna come back.
Some say you rest in the arms of the Saviour if in sinful ways you lack.
Some say that they're comin' back in a garden, bunch of carrots and little sweet peas.
I think I'll just let the mystery be.

Everybody's wonderin' what and where they all came from.
Everybody's worryin' 'bout where they're gonna go when the whole thing's done.
But no one knows for certain and so it's all the same to me.
I think I'll just let the mystery be.

Some say they're goin' to a place called Glory and I ain't saying it ain't a fact.
But I've heard that I'm on the road to purgatory and I don't like the sound of that.
Well, I believe in love and I live my life accordingly.
But I choose to let the mystery be.

Everybody's wonderin' what and where they all came from.
Everybody's worryin' 'bout where they're gonna go when the whole thing's done.
But no one knows for certain and so it's all the same to me.
I think I'll just let the mystery be.
I think I'll just let the mystery be.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlaoR5m4L80

Post by **yovargas** » Sun Dec 18, 2011 2:59 am

Billboard is slightly more amusing but still fairly pointless. Meh.

Post by **Ethelwynn** » Sun Dec 18, 2011 7:58 am

Laliath, I wonder how many of those "icky attitudes about women's sexuality" come from the Roman and/or Greek cultures of later translators rather than the cultures/ideas of the original writers? I don't know much about the Hebrew ideas on women's roles in society, freedoms, rights, etc., but I do know how the Greeks and Romans treated women. Women in both of those societies were virtual prisoners, not entitled to any voice in their own fates and without even the power to defend themselves from physical or verbal attack.

On a side note, I think that's what freaked the Romans out most about Boudicca. She was a woman who beat the tar out of them.

Post by **vison** » Sun Dec 18, 2011 4:47 pm

They were regarded as fields for men to plough, incubators of seeds. But they were not regarded as vessels of sin and temptation. That was a concept alien to Greece and Rome.

A woman was "not a man". Because war was seen as the proper occupation for men, a man's "real life" was lived with other men. This is still true in some places. Heck. Many places.

These ideas linger yet. They are still prevalent. Medical textbooks, for instance, generally use the man's body as "the standard". I wonder if there's a medical textbook that has a woman's body as the standard, with the man's relegated to footnotes? Because women have different symptoms than men if they have a heart attack, often no one "sees" she's having one.

When car manufacturers (to mention another daily life situation) first put airbags in cars, they were designed around a man's body, and women and children were injured many times when the airbags deployed. It took a lot of re-engineering to fix that.

To the Greeks especially the rules of Beauty were all concentrated in the body of a young man. That's another discussion.

Post by **Pearly Di** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 12:32 pm

I've been busy as all heck in the last few days and have had no time to get back to this thread until now. I wanted to pick up on something Jewel said.

JewelSong wrote:A male baby cannot get started without sperm. Period. I certainly believe that Mary was a virgin when the angel gave her the message. And I believe that the Holy Spirit was responsible for the conception. But I think the Holy Spirit was in the form of a man. And I think that was the reason Mary went away for 3 months...so God could arrange the meeting and conception.

Well, if the HS ‘was in the form of a man’, then why couldn’t it have been Joseph?!

I mean, why invent ‘fanon’ when the ‘canon’ is right there in Scripture.

Here's a question for Lali and Pearl and anyone else: If Mary was NOT a virgin - in other words, if Jesus' conception was NOT "supernatural" - does that change who Jesus was? Would he no longer be Divine? Does it change his message? Does it matter? I'd be interested in your answer.

Yeah, in all honesty, I think it would change who he was and who he claimed to be. Not because I believe God is ever short of options.

Honestly, I think he could have brought about the Incarnation in any number of ways! He is the King of the Universe, after all.

But I do think there is always a reason for God doing stuff the way he wants to. There is a reason, for example, why Jesus was born in a particular time and place: his ethnicity, the timing of his birth, are not random. And I think there is a reason for his supernatural conception.

I am not a strict literalist in every single instance of Bible interpretation , neither do I deny the frequent use of metaphor in the Bible; but when it comes to key doctrines like the Virgin Birth (or Virgin Conception, to be more precise) and the Resurrection, then, yes, I am down with the 'official version'.

I guess I believe that God is imminently practical. I also believe that God works through natural phenomena...God bends the forces of nature to the will of the Divine.

Yes, I believe that too. But in ‘bending the forces of nature to the will of the Divine’, there is no reason, purely in faith-terms, why this particular male baby (Jesus) could not have been conceived supernaturally.

Of course, in a purely materialist universe, such a belief is nonsense, a fairy-tale: as are the other claims of Christianity. Yeah, of course the Virgin Conception is a complete and utter stretch! So is the Resurrection. But it seems to me that if you can accept the enormous hurdle of the supernatural conception of Jesus – his incarnation – then accepting a literal Resurrection is almost a doddle.

Not wanting to sound facetious, but you get my point.

And this is indeed a great discussion.

Post by **JewelSong** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 2:10 pm

Pearly Di wrote:
Yeah, in all honesty, I think it would change who he was and who he claimed to be.

As far as I know, Jesus NEVER claimed that his mother was a virgin, or that he was conceived supernaturally.

But it seems to me that if you can accept the enormous hurdle of the supernatural conception of Jesus – his incarnation – then accepting a literal Resurrection is almost a doddle.

I love how you put things! It's always great when you get into one of these discussions!

Post by **Pearly Di** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 2:56 pm

JewelSong wrote:As far as I know, Jesus NEVER claimed that his mother was a virgin, or that he was conceived supernaturally.

LOL, no, he didn't

but he did claim to be God

and at least two of the gospel writers make a case for his supernatural conception ... so I do accept that as written.

I love how you put things! It's always great when you get into one of these discussions!

Heh, I enjoy them too.

It's actually very liberating and pleasant to be able to discuss matters of faith, or non-faith, with such a brilliant online comm as this one is.

Post by **Alatar** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 4:31 pm

At the risk of trolling, and admitting myself to be a completely "a la carte" Catholic, I find myself wondering if there's any difference between questioning the literal truth of Adam and Eve versus the literal truth around the Immaculate conception, the virginity of Mary and the parentage of Jesus. (And yes I realise the Immaculate Conception refers to Mary's birth and not Jesus')

Seriously though, I don't believe the world was created in 7 days, or that Adam and Eve were the first humans. I treat those as parables, meant for a simpler time and simpler people. So, if I'm willing to argue that not everything in the Bible is true, it seems facetious to argue for the bits that I personally agree with. It reminds me a little of Halplm's argument that if you believe in an all powerful God, you kinda have to believe he's capable of making sure his biography is accurate. (Ok, I'm paraphrasing a little

)

Post by **Pearly Di** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 5:03 pm

Well, yeah, it's a legit question, Al, and I don't regard it as trolling.

The answer for me is that science has already provided the answer to the age of the planet

so I don't have take the seven days in the Genesis creation account as literal, whereas the nature of Jesus is not something that science can 'prove'. What do the ancient Creeds of the church focus on? There's nothing in them about precisely how God created the world. Instead much of their focus is on the nature and person of Christ.

I realise that answer won't satisfy everyone but it's how I am able to reconcile what science has actually proven to be true and the fact that some articles of faith are, IMO, 'beyond' the realm of science. Science tells us 'how': it doesn't tell us 'why'.

Post by **JewelSong** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 5:16 pm

Pearly Di wrote: The answer for me is that science has already provided the answer to the age of the planet so I don't have take the seven days in the Genesis creation account as literal, whereas the nature of Jesus is not something that science can 'prove'. .

The nature of Jesus, no. His conception, yes. As I said before, parthenogenesis (literally: "virgin birth") IS theoretically possible for a human being...BUT the resulting offspring would be female. It would still be pretty miraculous.

Scientifically, it is IMPOSSIBLE for a woman to have a male child without that "Y" chromosome from the male. As impossible as it would be for the entire universe to be created in 6 24-hour days.

I like Frelga's thought/explanation. In virtually ALL stories about god-becoming-man or anyone with godlike attributes, it is part and parcel of the story that the circumstances of conception/birth be supernatural. Just as the Creation story in Genesis follows a certain pattern for creation myths, so too, does the account of Jesus' beginnings.

Post by **River** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 5:26 pm

So I'm just going to go ahead and get myself in trouble...

IIRC, the Gospels were written decades after Jesus died. Not only that, but there're a whole bundle of them that aren't in the NT - they were laid aside by the people who decided what would be in the Bible and what wouldn't. Furthermore, the story of Jesus parallels many other tales that everyone agrees are myth. And, finally, tales of people who are considered awesome tend to grow in the telling. They get embellished. That story about George Washington and the cherry tree for example? Never actually happened. So...why is the story of Jesus treated like a literal truth and more importantly, why would Jesus's teachings be diluted if the story isn't literally true?

Post by **yovargas** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 5:30 pm

JewelSong wrote:
Pearly Di wrote: The answer for me is that science has already provided the answer to the age of the planet so I don't have take the seven days in the Genesis creation account as literal, whereas the nature of Jesus is not something that science can 'prove'. .
The nature of Jesus, no. His conception, yes. As I said before, parthenogenesis (literally: "virgin birth") IS theoretically possible for a human being...BUT the resulting offspring would be female. It would still be pretty miraculous.

Scientifically, it is IMPOSSIBLE for a woman to have a male child without that "Y" chromosome from the male. As impossible as it would be for the entire universe to be created in 6 24-hour days.

It strikes me as odd to believe that god could create a fresh new universe or two (which I assume you believe?) but not believe that god could create a fresh new zygote.

Post by **JewelSong** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 5:32 pm

River wrote:more importantly, why would Jesus's teachings be diluted if the story isn't literally true?

Basically my question above, only pared down to it's essence.

Post by **Maria** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 5:37 pm

Why would Mary's egg even be used? Perhaps she was just a surrogate mother.

If you are creating a charismatic person with super powers in order to change the world, then at that time and place you'd have to make him male. A female just wouldn't be taken seriously. So, of course Jesus would be male, by whatever mechanism necessary. I'm sure a god could figure out how.

Post by **Pearly Di** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 5:46 pm

River wrote:So...why is the story of Jesus treated like a literal truth and more importantly, why would Jesus's teachings be diluted if the story isn't literally true?

Because if the story isn't literally true Jesus becomes just another nice guy who said some nice things -- and some weird things -- and ... I honestly believe there's a lot more to him than that.

yovargas wrote:It strikes me as odd to believe that god could create a fresh new universe or two (which I assume you believe?) but not believe that god could create a fresh new zygote.

I wonder that too.

Also, I think it perfectly possible for God to create the world in seven days! He's God, after all.

I simply have no problem with what science has told us on that score, though, neither do I believe an old earth is any kind of slur on God's character ...!

Sorry, my time is limited, but I am enjoying the conversation ...

Post by **Frelga** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 5:49 pm

I like Frelga's thought/explanation. In virtually ALL stories about god-becoming-man or anyone with godlike attributes, it is part and parcel of the story that the circumstances of conception/birth be supernatural. Just as the Creation story in Genesis follows a certain pattern for creation myths, so too, does the account of Jesus' beginnings.

I don't think that was Frelga.

Post by **JewelSong** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 6:01 pm

Frelga wrote:
I like Frelga's thought/explanation. In virtually ALL stories about god-becoming-man or anyone with godlike attributes, it is part and parcel of the story that the circumstances of conception/birth be supernatural. Just as the Creation story in Genesis follows a certain pattern for creation myths, so too, does the account of Jesus' beginnings.
I don't think that was Frelga.

Oops.

Sorry - I think it was River.

Post by **River** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 6:32 pm

JewelSong wrote:
Frelga wrote:
I like Frelga's thought/explanation. In virtually ALL stories about god-becoming-man or anyone with godlike attributes, it is part and parcel of the story that the circumstances of conception/birth be supernatural. Just as the Creation story in Genesis follows a certain pattern for creation myths, so too, does the account of Jesus' beginnings.
I don't think that was Frelga.
Oops.

Sorry - I think it was River.

No, actually, I think it was Rose who brought that in and I hopped on her idea because I've read a lot of mythology.

You guys have any idea how many Greek heros are credited with a divine parentage? And how many of those stories involve the divine half of the equation taking some other form (like a bull, or a sunbeam)? It's an old theme, because obviously people can't just be awesome and amazing in and of themselves. To really elevate them, you have to make them half not-human.

Post by **JewelSong** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 7:07 pm

River wrote: You guys have any idea how many Greek heros are credited with a divine parentage? And how many of those stories involve the divine half of the equation taking some other form (like a bull, or a sunbeam)? It's an old theme, because obviously people can't just be awesome and amazing in and of themselves. To really elevate them, you have to make them half not-human.

Pearl wrote:Because if the story isn't literally true Jesus becomes just another nice guy who said some nice things -- and some weird things -- and ... I honestly believe there's a lot more to him than that

I believe there was more to him than that, too...but I don't see why, in order to believe he was Divine, his very conception must be supernatural.

Jesus was a Man. Fully human, as we say in one of the prayers in the Presbyterian church. He was fully Human and also Divine. I do not believe he was the first Human to be infused with the Divine. He IS the one I look to because I know him the best...and perhaps because the others have become lost in the mists of time.

I think God - the Divine - keeps trying. And we keep not listening...or twisting it all up into something else.