Did Pope Francis help the church by going woke?

[Paradoxical#1]

May I ask good as your Catholicism if everyone is right?

The ti,e to correct my post is past and it should have read:

May I ask what is the good of Catholicism if everyone else is also "right"?

My point is that I have heard from others in many debates in the past that all beliefs are a pathway to God. If that is true, then there really is no reason to believe that the Pope is infallible, that we need a priest as a conduit to "God," that Mary is the mother of God, that Jesus is our lord and savior, etc.

I believe I have stated to you but if not I have said this to many others. No one holds beliefs that he knows are false. This means that a Muslim, a Mormon, and a Quaker all think what they believe is true and that Catholicism is crazy. Now, with your refined and honed beliefs after decades of intense study going so far as to learn the proper Greek translations are absolutely, positively sure you are right. If that is correct then all those others who worship Allah and believe infidels deserve death or that a huckster named Joseph Smith found gold plates inscribed by God who have studied this endlessly and with there even being signed affidavits available as evidence are wrong.

But if I take your rather vague post for what I think you really mean is that all those people are first graders and on a path to nirvana which you have completed yourself and they will eventually find the "truth" here on earth or will be dealt kindly by your one and only true God when they die because they just didn't know what you did and were trying to get into the second grade?

 

[Paradoxical#1]

Are you asking, "What good is Catholicism if everyone is right?"

First, is it a fair conclusion that being right is either all important, or at least very important, to you? Next, there are over seven thousand languages in the world. Which is the right language? In football, is it passing that is right, or is it running that is right? How about kicking? In baseball, is it the fast ball or the curve ball that is right? In an earlier post you told of a debate you were having with someone and you were pleased that person told you that you were right. That's why I am guessing being right is of true importance to you. It may be why you don't understand my position of being right is of little import. I'll explain.

I focus more on the goal. Which is the right language, the right sports move, the right religion? The answer is the one that get you closer to your goal. The 'right' language to use is the one that enables you to communicate with those around you. In sports, the 'right' play is the one that brings victory. In religion the 'right' religion is the one which brings you closer to God. It's not about "right" it is about the goal.

I've contemplated that if the Catholic/Orthodox religion did not exist, which religion would bring me closer to God. None of the Protestant denominations could, nor could the LDS church, nor Islam, Buddhism, etc. Via the Catholic faith I was able to draw very close to God, and none of those other religions could have helped me in achieving this goal. So...if Catholicism wasn't a choice, which religion would I choose? Judaism. It is the other religion/faith that would be most likely to draw me close to God.

This led me to wondering why Protestants would not choose Catholicism. My conclusion on that is that many Protestants find too much within the Catholic faith that distracts them. Remember the Puritans? They removed all art from their meeting places/churches because they believed it was too distracting. Why leave Christ on the crucifix, and why do so many crucifixes have a skull beneath Jesus' feet at the foot of the cross. Pointless, they conclude as Jesus is no longer on the cross. For Catholics, the cross and its symbols tell a great story worth meditating on and contemplating--and bringing into our lives--every time we view the crucifix.

This is the importance of the Holy Spirit. We are all unique people, and the Holy Spirit knows how to work with those who are distracted by Catholic practices and teachings which keeps them further from God--and those who delve into Catholicism because it draws them ever closer to God. The goal is the same: Which religion brings each individual closer to God. I could not do it without Catholicism, but some can't seem to do it with Catholicism. Just like sometimes a passing game works, and sometimes a running game works.

Let's go back to you and your goal of shredding the Bible and the Catholic faith. Is it your goal to prove you are right?

I was writing my post while you were and you answered the post I wrote in the affirmative. Being devout is what the nuns who taught me were. They were some very fine people and taught me well. This is a story I only told a handful of people. I was maybe 10 or 11 doing the Stations of the Cross and my back was aching. There were two or three nuns doing the same in the distance at the front of this dark and foreboding church that was empty except for me, and them. A thought came to mind. "What if they're wrong", and being young and scared of blasphemy and going to hell for such a thought, I repressed it lest I die later today and have to go to hell for questioning "God".

One of my older brothers is a firm believer and more than once he mocked my nonbelief with the usual refrain that "We'll both find out when you die and you don't go to heaven like I will."

Like your study of religion and Hebrew, my life has been a study of belief and indoctrination and my book on that will be done in the near future. The main way to indoctrinate humans has been done since man first walked on earth and that is FEAR, and as a former CNN director named Charles Chester admitted FEAR SELLS, Without the threat of eternal damnation, the pews would be empty and priests and nuns and Imamas would be jobless and penniless. You claim that it was only Dante's Inferno that wrongly taught people that God would torture people for all eternity in a place called hell, but if you ask Catholics and other believers they picture a place like Dante's Inferno, and Catholics believe in a real devil that maintains the place.

A suggestion that atheists or others who don't swallow what you believe just don't get to go where you do after we die is a control mechanism using fear to motivate a belief like yours. If there is a God like that I want no part of such a petty entity who demands belief and worship. You can have him.

 

[Meriweather]

My point is that I have heard from others in many debates in the past that all beliefs are a pathway to God. If that is true, then there really is no reason to believe that the Pope is infallible, that we need a priest as a conduit to "God," that Mary is the mother of God, that Jesus is our lord and savior, etc.

All beliefs are a pathway to God? Have any been able to explain their encounter(s) with God? Because, when pressed, many agree that the better analysis is that all beliefs are a pathway to a heavenly afterlife. There is a difference. But yes, I do believe that people who are trying to reach God, even without religion (being more spiritual than religious, I think is the term) that God does reach back. The Bible teaches that God's Law is written on every human heart. We are all children of God.

Why is anyone who is not Catholic concerned with the Pope? First, most non-Catholics think "infallible" means that the Pope cannot be in error about anything. The fact is infallibility rarely comes into play. In all the papacy, there have been only two or three instances where a Pope made an infallible call. One was about the assumption of Mary into heaven; the other was the immaculate conception of Mary. It took decades, actually centuries, of investigation and debate (starting with the people in the pews) before the matter rose to priests, bishops, archbishops, cardinals, and finally to the Pope to decide these matters. These decisions matter only to the Catholics.

Priests are not a conduit. Understand the priestly role or not. I don't understand the need to denigrate a person or position when one is not of that faith.

Mary is the mother of Jesus who is one with God. Historically, the argument was Jesus was not God as he had an earthly mother. The Church countered as Jesus is God, then Mary is the mother of God. Mary, the child of God, the mother of God, more precisely the mother of Jesus who is God. We're not the only age to come up with silly arguments. At the time, the Church was insistent that Jesus is God, while the opposition insisted they won debate because Mary was the mother of a human being, therefore Jesus could not be God. This could have been the beginning for the teaching of Jesus having two nature, both human and divine.

 

[Meriweather]

I believe I have stated to you but if not I have said this to many others. No one holds beliefs that he knows are false. This means that a Muslim, a Mormon, and a Quaker all think what they believe is true and that Catholicism is crazy. Now, with your refined and honed beliefs after decades of intense study going so far as to learn the proper Greek translations are absolutely, positively sure you are right. If that is correct then all those others who worship Allah and believe infidels deserve death or that a huckster named Joseph Smith found gold plates inscribed by God who have studied this endlessly and with there even being signed affidavits available as evidence are wrong.

I see it differently. What are the truths in each faith. Does any faith have the entire truth. We are all on a faith/spiritual journey and we are all in different places. Again, Teresa of Avila's Interior Castle.

NO. I HAVE NEVER BEEN "ABSOLUTELY, POSITIVELY SURE (I am) RIGHT! One of the things I do absolutely, positive detest is another poster telling me what I "really" believe or what I am "really" saying. That is the point where I am absolutely, positively sure that a poster is no longer having a discussion with me, but with an imaginary Meriweather made up in his/her own mind that suits him/her.

If you want an imaginary poster to debate, leave me out out it.

 

[Mr Natural]

Enough of this woke crap!

The church needs to be kept in the dark ages so it can be considered a real church.

 

[Meriweather]

But if I take your rather vague post for what I think you really mean is that all those people are first graders and on a path to nirvana which you have completed yourself and they will eventually find the "truth" here on earth or will be dealt kindly by your one and only true God when they die because they just didn't know what you did and were trying to get into the second grade?

Then take something else. I know nothing of "nirvana" and never said or even implied anything about "nirvana". That's something you alone decided to infer. As far as the rest of the litter in your post, again that is something said only in your imagination. Stop it.

Scripture teaches that Jesus will judge the human heart. Nothing is said about God searching the brain to find out how much the brain has correctly surmised. Here is another point where you seem to think being right is what matters. My position is life is a journey and we all learn along the way and make behavioral choices as we go through life. As a Catholic, I choose Jesus way, because my journey and the choices I've elected to make have me believing Jesus truly is the Way, the Truth, the Life I want. I believe he is the Word of God, and I choose to follow the Word of God to the best of my ability. In the end, it is my heart will be judged, not how well I understand language and etymology.

I believe God is love, He is unable to be anything else, because love is what He is. Since everyone is in the hands of a loving and merciful God, I have no worries about the fate of Muslims, Quakers, Buddhists, or atheists. It's not about who any of these groups are. It is about God.

 

[Paradoxical#1]

I see it differently. What are the truths in each faith. Does any faith have the entire truth. We are all on a faith/spiritual journey and we are all in different places. Again, Teresa of Avila's Interior Castle.

NO. I HAVE NEVER BEEN "ABSOLUTELY, POSITIVELY SURE (I am) RIGHT! One of the things I do absolutely, positive detest is another poster telling me what I "really" believe or what I am "really" saying. That is the point where I am absolutely, positively sure that a poster is no longer having a discussion with me, but with an imaginary Meriweather made up in his/her own mind that suits him/her.

If you want an imaginary poster to debate, leave me out out it.

My point was that everyone thinks their beliefs are true and correct. You were the one who brought up your extensive readings and study of religion. Not me. You were also the one who mentioned people being in the first grade, and third grade. That implies that those who don't believe as you do are beginners and need to learn and study more. Your posts come off as extremely condescending and you may not have ever been told that. They come off as you knowing more than others because you teach this stuff. Correct me if I am wrong here.

I come here from another venue. My hobby is debating. As I said I debated religious people over at CARM for many years. Some,e of them had advanced degrees. To a man and woman, they ALL thought their god concept and beliefs of what it takes to reach "God" were correct. I have learned not to care a bit about what others say or threaten about politics or religion. 999 times out of a thousand none of us change the other person's way of thinking.

I ask you and any others here to just stop and think for a moment about a God, and god, that would reward someone for what they believe and/or ban them for what they don't believe after they die. If you are right then after death they would know for certain that your god exists. You say that God would give them a second chance. That is not stated anywhere in religious texts. All those who are god believers (except for Calvinists) are taught that your petulant God demands belief. What kind of God is that who would be so petty and created the entire universe to create humans with a mind and free will to punish them for using their free will to not believe?

What you have are human-written stories long after the alleged events and it took 325 years for more humans to decide that Jesus was divine and included in some senseless trinity in order to claim that he was "God" himself and not just a son of God. Without the devious and ruthless Emperor Constantine, Catholicism wouldn't even be here.

You and others can all claim until you are blue in that face that someone your God had a hand in the writings and choices as to which writings stay and which go but in the end, all it amounts to are CLAIMS. I asked another poster here if the human writing were inspired and he has now run away. It doesn't matter, saying they were someone inspired is still a claim not backed by any evidence whatsoever.

 

[Paradoxical#1]

Then take something else. I know nothing of "nirvana" and never said or even implied anything about "nirvana". That's something you alone decided to infer. As far as the rest of the litter in your post, again that is something said only in your imagination. Stop it.

Scripture teaches that Jesus will judge the human heart. Nothing is said about God searching the brain to find out how much the brain has correctly surmised. Here is another point where you seem to think being right is what matters. My position is life is a journey and we all learn along the way and make behavioral choices as we go through life. As a Catholic, I choose Jesus way, because my journey and the choices I've elected to make have me believing Jesus truly is the Way, the Truth, the Life I want. I believe he is the Word of God, and I choose to follow the Word of God to the best of my ability. In the end, it is my heart will be judged, not how well I understand language and etymology.

I believe God is love, He is unable to be anything else, because love is what He is. Since everyone is in the hands of a loving and merciful God, I have no worries about the fate of Muslims, Quakers, Buddhists, or atheists. It's not about who any of these groups are. It is about God.

The heart is a muscle. Jesus was not recorded as having said anything. The writings are by people who never met him. (I hope you don't try to say any original apostle wrote them). Christians then claim that "Oh, at that time they passed everything down from memory and didn't need anything in writing and humans had total recall of every syllable because they memorized it all."

All we get are claims and maybes and possibles and in the end wishes that it is all truye because we were born into it and want it to be,

 

[Meriweather]

I was writing my post while you were and you answered the post I wrote in the affirmative. Being devout is what the nuns who taught me were. They were some very fine people and taught me well. This is a story I only told a handful of people. I was maybe 10 or 11 doing the Stations of the Cross and my back was aching. There were two or three nuns doing the same in the distance at the front of this dark and foreboding church that was empty except for me, and them. A thought came to mind. "What if they're wrong", and being young and scared of blasphemy and going to hell for such a thought, I repressed it lest I die later today and have to go to hell for questioning "God".

I was ten, nearly eleven and it was All Soul's Day, where we were encourage to pray perfectly, preferably in Church four the souls in Purgatory. That afternoon, Mom was going to be late picking us up, so into the church I went and tried to pray perfectly. I tried my hardest and clearly I had my doubts because my last prayer to God was, "If I managed to do this perfectly, can you--someway--let me know." And He did.

We were taught to constantly bring our questions to God, to seek and find, so I never developed the fear you had. Think back. What if all the priests and nuns are wrong? How will that change the person you are?

One of my older brothers is a firm believer and more than once he mocked my nonbelief with the usual refrain that "We'll both find out when you die and you don't go to heaven like I will."

Because I was in a family with a much loved atheist grandfather, when I was little I asked a priest about this. His response: Do you love your grandfather? And, of course I said I did. He said, "It may be hard for you to imagine, but God loves him even more than you do."

Someone once asked one of our teachers if everyone would be equally happy in heaven. She told us each would be filled with happiness. Then she asked us: Do you want to be a thimble filled with happiness, or do you want to be a huge oak barrel filled with happiness?

When you told me about your older brother, I did not imagine him in heaven and you not there. I could picture your older brother (a big oak barrel) and his little brother (a thimble) running or cycling after him, with the happiness big siblings and little siblings often enjoyed together. It was a funny, cheery image, nothing more.

Hopefully you will not take umbrage with the thimble image. Sister's point was not the size, only that all would be together, filled with happiness. Also remember, the trouble with analogies is that they all fail at some point.

 

[Paradoxical#1]

I was ten, nearly eleven and it was All Soul's Day, where we were encourage to pray perfectly, preferably in Church four the souls in Purgatory. That afternoon, Mom was going to be late picking us up, so into the church I went and tried to pray perfectly. I tried my hardest and clearly I had my doubts because my last prayer to God was, "If I managed to do this perfectly, can you--someway--let me know." And He did.

We were taught to constantly bring our questions to God, to seek and find, so I never developed the fear you had. Think back. What if all the priests and nuns are wrong? How will that change the person you are?

Because I was in a family with a much loved atheist grandfather, when I was little I asked a priest about this. His response: Do you love your grandfather? And, of course I said I did. He said, "It may be hard for you to imagine, but God loves him even more than you do."

Someone once asked one of our teachers if everyone would be equally happy in heaven. She told us each would be filled with happiness. Then she asked us: Do you want to be a thimble filled with happiness, or do you want to be a huge oak barrel filled with happiness?

When you told me about your older brother, I did not imagine him in heaven and you not there. I could picture your older brother (a big oak barrel) and his little brother (a thimble) running or cycling after him, with the happiness big siblings and little siblings often enjoyed together. It was a funny, cheery image, nothing more.

Hopefully you will not take umbrage with the thimble image. Sister's point was not the size, only that all would be together, filled with happiness. Also remember, the trouble with analogies is that they all fail at some point.

If the atheist goes to heaven and God loves him more than you do, why be a Catholic?

 

[Meriweather]

Like your study of religion and Hebrew, my life has been a study of belief and indoctrination and my book on that will be done in the near future. The main way to indoctrinate humans has been done since man first walked on earth and that is FEAR, and as a former CNN director named Charles Chester admitted FEAR SELLS, Without the threat of eternal damnation, the pews would be empty and priests and nuns and Imamas would be jobless and penniless. You claim that it was only Dante's Inferno that wrongly taught people that God would torture people for all eternity in a place called hell, but if you ask Catholics and other believers they picture a place like Dante's Inferno, and Catholics believe in a real devil that maintains the place.

I was neither indoctrinated or ever given any reason to fear. I was more fearful of never being able to understand algebra than I was of God. Fortunately my dad was a math teacher, and he patiently helped me to find my way through algebra, which I sometimes teach today. One of the great ironies in my life. One of my students once grumbled, "Why do I have to learn this anyway. I'll never use it."

I laughed and told him those were my exact words when I was his age trying to learn algebra. I added, "It turns out that I did have to use it."

A suggestion that atheists or others who don't swallow what you believe just don't get to go where you do after we die is a control mechanism using fear to motivate a belief like yours. If there is a God like that I want no part of such a petty entity who demands belief and worship. You can have him.

I was never taught atheists are destined for hell. Hell (separation from God) was for those who believed in God, knew God, and chose separation from Him over loving and serving Him.

A little over a year after my atheist grandfather died, I was in tears because we had a plumbing problem and no money to pay a plumber. I was so upset and I was in tears. My grandfather (who had been a plumber) came to help me.

My mother didn't tell me the particulars, but several years later, she told me she had been praying for her father, worried about his afterlife. She told me, "I don't have to worry any more. I know he is alright." (No, I didn't tell her that I, too, knew he was alright.)

Could it be you are imagining that all people of faith are fearful and it is only fear that keeps them practicing their faith? I think your theory about fear will crumble in the same way as did the theory that the earth is flat. I never worried about the afterlife. I did have many concerns about how to make it through this present life, as I had to get through some very tough times. Commandments, Beatitudes, Parables, Jesus' Way, shone a badly needed light on my journey. I tremble at how I and my life would have turned out had I not been given these. God and His Ways are a guide through this life and that is nothing to fear.

 

[Meriweather]

My point was that everyone thinks their beliefs are true and correct. You were the one who brought up your extensive readings and study of religion. Not me. You were also the one who mentioned people being in the first grade, and third grade. That implies that those who don't believe as you do are beginners and need to learn and study more. Your posts come off as extremely condescending and you may not have ever been told that. They come off as you knowing more than others because you teach this stuff. Correct me if I am wrong here.

As I've already explained: I do not judge what I (or anyone else learns) as true, correct, or right. Is what we are learning and putting us into practice, moving us toward our goal, whatever that goal may be. In other words, is what we learned, are learning, helping us through our journey. Students making their way through school is a good analogy of a journey. No, I didn't imply anything, but it sure reveals what you inferred from what I said. I said nothing about having to need to learn and study more. Keep in mind what I said about imagining your own Meriweather who has nothing to do with me. The analogy was to point out we all are in different places on our journeys.

I cannot help you (or others) choosing to paint my posts as "extremely condescending". What I write is sincerely, from the heart, and joyful another poster and I have something to share, to compare, and contrast. I try to take care to read the words people write, and to never make personal judgements. That's not my style. If you wish to make judgements about me and my style, shrug. I don't care. I know who I am.

The only conclusion (judgement if you will) I currently have about you, is that being right seems to be very important to you. It may be so important you can't understand that being right does not matter to me at all. I like/enjoy discussing enumerable possibilities--the more possibilities the better.

 

[Meriweather]

I come here from another venue. My hobby is debating. As I said I debated religious people over at CARM for many years. Some,e of them had advanced degrees. To a man and woman, they ALL thought their god concept and beliefs of what it takes to reach "God" were correct. I have learned not to care a bit about what others say or threaten about politics or religion. 999 times out of a thousand none of us change the other person's way of thinking.

Why would anyone even want to change another person, including that other person's way of thinking? The thought of that truly puzzles me, perhaps because of this adage: Trying to be someone else is to waste the person you are. Why would I want to waste another human being? Their concepts, beliefs, and perspectives are different than mine! I know my own ideas, beliefs, perspectives like the back of my hand. What are all the other ideas, beliefs, perspectives--possibilities? Those are what interest me. The last thing I would want in a world is everyone to be a cookie stamp of me--or of everyone else.

 

[Meriweather]

I ask you and any others here to just stop and think for a moment about a God, and god, that would reward someone for what they believe and/or ban them for what they don't believe after they die. If you are right then after death they would know for certain that your god exists. You say that God would give them a second chance. That is not stated anywhere in religious texts. All those who are god believers (except for Calvinists) are taught that your petulant God demands belief. What kind of God is that who would be so petty and created the entire universe to create humans with a mind and free will to punish them for using their free will to not believe?

It is you who say God would reward someone for what they believe. Jesus noted that it is not beliefs that are judged, but the human heart. One of his parables was about the rich man and Lazarus. In the parable the rich man asks if Lazarus can return from the dead and warn his brothers what lay ahead for them if they continued on the same path. The answer is thought provoking. The answer was no, because even if someone were to return from the dead with that news, the news would still be dismissed/ignored. Paul notes, "But as it is written, 'What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him'."

We are called to love God. Great things come of this. But...if God is not worth knowing or loving in this life, what do people imagine happens the moments after death?

My question is that you seem certain that God is there to punish those who chose to not to love, know, or serve Him. Isn't the better question about the people's reaction, not God's reaction? Why would someone who dismissed God in this life want God in their presence in the afterlife? They chose separation from God in this life, why would they choose differently in the next?

 

[Meriweather]

What you have are human-written stories long after the alleged events and it took 325 years for more humans to decide that Jesus was divine and included in some senseless trinity in order to claim that he was "God" himself and not just a son of God. Without the devious and ruthless Emperor Constantine, Catholicism wouldn't even be here.

You and others can all claim until you are blue in that face that someone your God had a hand in the writings and choices as to which writings stay and which go but in the end, all it amounts to are CLAIMS. I asked another poster here if the human writing were inspired and he has now run away. It doesn't matter, saying they were someone inspired is still a claim not backed by any evidence whatsoever.

Scripture is about God in our midst, God among us. Have you ever read an account about someone who wasn't even present? God inspires people to act, and then people write accounts about what became of choosing to act when inspired by God. God has a place in the story. The story has something for the audience to learn; it has a lesson, a theme.

If the person was not inspired, then he would not have acted, and there would be no story. There's your evidence. Isn't that what ding was saying about evidence?

 

[Meriweather]

The heart is a muscle. Jesus was not recorded as having said anything. The writings are by people who never met him. (I hope you don't try to say any original apostle wrote them). Christians then claim that "Oh, at that time they passed everything down from memory and didn't need anything in writing and humans had total recall of every syllable because they memorized it all."

Do you hold the same opinion of Socrates? He wrote nothing. Many biographies are about people who wrote nothing. What's your point? What we have are from those who knew Jesus and/or those who knew people who knew Jesus.

The same can be said of Plato and others who wrote about Socrates. We are blessed that early accounts and beliefs about Jesus (or Socrates) were written down.

Why do you think it would be good if all this never was or could be dismissed/destroyed? Do you hold that same belief about the people, writings about Socrates?

 

[Meriweather]

If the atheist goes to heaven and God loves him more than you do, why be a Catholic?

Already answered. I am Catholic and choose to be Catholic because it has drawn me closer to God. God has been a blessing throughout my life. It bothers me not if God's love is greater than my own. I rejoice in that, and attempt to further my own love.

Consider this: My sisters love me (and others). My best friend loves me (and others). If my sisters and friend love their husbands even more than they love me, why be friends?

 

[Paradoxical#1]

It is you who say God would reward someone for what they believe. Jesus noted that it is not beliefs that are judged, but the human heart. One of his parables was about the rich man and Lazarus. In the parable the rich man asks if Lazarus can return from the dead and warn his brothers what lay ahead for them if they continued on the same path. The answer is thought provoking. The answer was no, because even if someone were to return from the dead with that news, the news would still be dismissed/ignored. Paul notes, "But as it is written, 'What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him'."

We are called to love God. Great things come of this. But...if God is not worth knowing or loving in this life, what do people imagine happens the moments after death?

My question is that you seem certain that God is there to punish those who chose to not to love, know, or serve Him. Isn't the better question about the people's reaction, not God's reaction? Why would someone who dismissed God in this life want God in their presence in the afterlife? They chose separation from God in this life, why would they choose differently in the next?

You quoted Paul, a con artist and fraud who jumped on the bandwagon, CLAIMED a vision and somehow in that vision Jesus himself told him what was what. His account differs with other alleged apostles (which Paul was not). No one knows what Jesus said, especially Paul since he never met him.

Accepting what some Jew said 2,000 years ago (Paul) because of a claimed vision no one else corroborated is your choice but to say that what he said was what Jesus said is to me, beyond belief.

 

[Paradoxical#1]

Scripture is about God in our midst, God among us. Have you ever read an account about someone who wasn't even present? God inspires people to act, and then people write accounts about what became of choosing to act when inspired by God. God has a place in the story. The story has something for the audience to learn; it has a lesson, a theme.

If the person was not inspired, then he would not have acted, and there would be no story. There's your evidence. Isn't that what ding was saying about evidence?

These are your beliefs.

 

[Paradoxical#1]

Do you hold the same opinion of Socrates? He wrote nothing. Many biographies are about people who wrote nothing. What's your point? What we have are from those who knew Jesus and/or those who knew people who knew Jesus.

The same can be said of Plato and others who wrote about Socrates. We are blessed that early accounts and beliefs about Jesus (or Socrates) were written down.

Why do you think it would be good if all this never was or could be dismissed/destroyed? Do you hold that same belief about the people, writings about Socrates?

I do t believe Socrates was a prophet. He was a mere human. Not a god.