To EoIC: Debate what? That what the people who made up my religion have it over the people who made up yours? If you are going to toss scripture at me you don't know me that well. That book was written by people, not God. There's about as much chance of me arguing Jesus's divinity with you as me arguing the trinity with another Christian.

Why? Because arguments need to be based on something. As I said before, I can argue how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, but it meaningless to people who don't agree on the exitence of angels. You have no idea of how many hours I have bandied back and forth with revisionist historians about how every steeple is a penis and every bibilical figure is really a hijacked pagan mythology.

So, you'll pardon me a yawn. I apprecate your beliefs, and respect your right to believe them. I don't count them to be any less factually based than my own. That said, I don't think mine are all that much based upon fact, either. Maybe you are 'inspired', and maybe the people you disagree with are.

If you want to sit around in the temple and argue the law, fine, but if I choose not to it is no indication as to whether my works are "cold or hot". Whatever God may be, I'll be accepted or spewed for what I do, not because I failed to be a good PR person for him.

Other people's souls aren't of that much concern to me, and no God that needed me to prove his existence to the world is worth worshipping. My God is apparent to anyone who seeks Him. Those who don't, wouldn't see Him regardless.

Ok, I did say I was going to bow out, but there was something I wanted to add.

One of the things about me not caring for religion. Is the fact that every time I have gone to a service, of any faith -- I have never felt comfortable. In fact, I prefer to never go back.


~L

NOW, I'm bowing out.

" I'm perpetually sickened by the crass arrogance of 'believers' such as yourself who present themselves as the acme of truth before the rest of the heathen - but run like rabbits when challenged to give an account of their faith and why they believe as they say they do."

I keep coming back to that, since you mention straw man arguments. You, of all people want to talk about arrogance? Not everyone that doesn't spoonfeed you venom is running away. You are the one who likes to rank the pantheon of gods, and talk about this abomination or that weak projection of our insecurities. I'll opt not to project my insecurities on my God, because I don't think He really needs me to bat for Him.

If I choose not to play, it isn't because I'm scared of you, because I don't worship Crnobog or his brother or any other manifestation of people's insane need to measure whose God is bigger. It's because I, quite frankly, don't care whether you believe or not. I'm not that smart, as you say, but I'm smart enough to see that your faith relies on this conflict with other faiths.

Dig a little deeper, friend, and you might find that I don't worship the same God you think I do. I'll leave you to people who like to debate mythology and the little anthropomorphisms people like to project on God. Jealousy, cruelty, etc., are for entities in need. If you want to waste your time on critiquing cave paintings, knock yourself out.

Speak, believer. Or keep the silence that condemns you.

what exactly do you want to know? I see you quote scripture quite often. Why is that? If you have no use for Christ, why speak his words? That in itself is a contradiction.

I can see you have biblical knowledge. I'm willing to go head to head. Throw me what you've got. I'm willing to go toe to toe. I promise I won't run away. I will not be silenced, I will not back down nor will I ever give up. I'm a junkyard dog with a bone and I know the value of what I've got. You and your lovely wife do not scare me nor will you have any influence on shutting my trap.

You come across very strong here on JU. What are you hiding? Where is all this pent up anger coming from? Why are you warring against God so? I understand your anger is not at me...you don't even know me. It's what I represent. Your anger is with God.

Speak up you non believer or keep the silence that condemns you.

To KFC:

Speak up you non believer or keep the silence that condemns you.

Happily. What angered me against you was your original dismissal of something that I'd expended time and serious thought to create. I don't write without reason and what I write (as in an article itself) I require to be respected. I demand a response to the article, not the author, and I'll not tolerate the childish, fatuous nonsense you produced as a first response.

what exactly do you want to know? I see you quote scripture quite often. Why is that? If you have no use for Christ, why speak his words? That in itself is a contradiction.

The faith I now hold derives directly from the faith I once had. As a Christian then I was far more often moved and inspired by the books of the OT than those of the NT (with the exceptions of Romans, Hebrews, and Revelation). As I set out to make plain in the article there are deep rooted parallels and correspondences between the development of Christianity and Islam that deserve respect and exploration - up to and including the crucifixion of al-Hallaj, whose testimony and death are closely related to that of Jesus, the man and prophet.

The words I most often cite derive from the Pentateuch and from the epistles, not from the gospels. They are no more the words of 'Jesus Christ' than these words I'm currently typing. So there is no contradiction between citing the OT and having no use for the false 'Christ' of contemporary Christianity.

You come across very strong here on JU. What are you hiding? Where is all this pent up anger coming from? Why are you warring against God so? I understand your anger is not at me...you don't even know me. It's what I represent. Your anger is with God.

Hiding? After telling you up front that I consider myself to be damned? After telling you that, in the terms of contemporary Christianity I'm an Apostate and a Heretic? After telling you that I consider my damnation to be righteous and the proper reward for what I freely acknowledge is 'sinful' in your terms - and that I look forward to my damnation with an eager expectation and joy that I'm entirely certain you'll never comprehend? How is this hiding?

As to anger, since I freely express it, making you and all others as vain, as prideful, as revoltingly hypocritical as yourself, its object and do so with no pretence that what I express is anything other than anger, how is this being 'pent up'? And you are wrong. My anger is directed directly at you, not because of anything in your personal life (about which I know nothing and in which I have no interest at all) but because you profess to be able to remove the mote from your neighbour's eye while remaining utterly oblivious of the beam in your own.

I agree with you that you are unable to convert anyone else. Not because that's the role of the Holy Spirit but because in your proselytizing you are condemning and judgmental - while awarding to yourself the kudos of one of God's favored children, bound for heaven. That 'heaven' may well be full of people like you is one reason I celebrate the fact that I'm (in your terms) going to Hell. Though to be perfectly honest I no longer believe in either Heaven or Hell as either physical location or spiritual states.

I will have what I want, in this life and the next, and while what I want may seem to others like hell (which is why I still use the term) from the point of view of my will and desire its heaven - though heaven without Jesus Christ, or the cheeping of his kid brother the Dove, or the endless vanity of his wretched Father.

I have no anger towards God, though I was at one time deeply pissed at 'Jesus Christ' and his followers. My anger is directed at you, and those like you.

Now, believer, do as your Bible requires you to do - and give me an account of your faith and why you believe. Do so, and I'll return the favor.

I believe, because when I asked I was answered, and when I turned my back on Him I was miserable. His presence has affected my life and my parents life very deeply. People dont recognize my father when they meet with him again after nearly half of a century. And him and I know that there is a reason for that. There are testimonies you wouldnt want to believe or you might consider as coincidence and/or made up.

I dont know the bible by heart. I probably should so I can defend my belief in front of those who like you challenge it

And Jesus was Jew!

#36 by island_gurl12

I no longer believe in either Heaven or Hell

Doesn't matter if you do or don't. You'll find out soon enough.

The faith I now hold derives directly from the faith I once had. As a Christian

you're fooling yourself. I don't believe you ever had it to begin with. If you had, you wouldn't be here like this now. Job is a testimony to that fact.

The words I most often cite derive from the Pentateuch and from the epistles, not from the gospels. They are no more the words of 'Jesus Christ' than these words I'm currently typing. So there is no contradiction between citing the OT and having no use for the false 'Christ' of contemporary Christianity.

Oh yeah? You like Hebrews? Then let's start there.

Heb 1:1-2 God who in past times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by his Son whom he has appointed heir of all things by whom also he made the worlds.

God doesn't change. He spoke to us in the OT and He spoke to us in the NT. It's the same God. His message was the same. The only difference is HE came down to SHOW us the way. So it's ok to read the gospels now. Now that you know this.

and give me an account of your faith and why you believe. Do so, and I'll return the favor.

I think I did so on your other thread but again I'll elaborate here. Like a bird that has found his nest, so my soul hs found it's rest in the will of God. I have found out the reason for my existence. I know why I'm here, and where I'm going. Do you?

We all have God sized holes in our hearts as I'm sure you've heard. What have you filled your heart with and have you truly found contentment? You don't come across as so contented, peaceful and joyful by any stretch of the imagination.

To island-gurl2:

I believe, because when I finally asked I was answered. But years later it transpired that what had answered me was not 'Jesus christ' but something entirely different, Nameless, and far more terrible.

I appreciate that there are many, many, genuine testimonies as to the transformative power of conversion to Christianity. But there are just as many, just as inspiring, stories of the transformative power of converting to Islam (the most widely known example being that of Malcolm X, perhaps), of converting to Judaism, of converting to the B'hai faith. And just as there are countless testimonies as to the martyrdom of the lovers of Jesus Christ so are there any number of testimonies as to the martyrdom of other believers in other faiths.

Simply because your father (and you also or so I presume)have experienced a transformative spiritual event does not make you a Christian. For more than twenty years I was convinced I was a Christian - despite the inner dissatisfaction and perpetual spiritual craving that I experienced, despite the steadily increasing certitude that the scriptures I studied, while they contained truths, were neither the whole of the truth nor yet that they pointed me towards something called 'the Christ'.

Only many years after the events of my crisis conversion did it occur to me that there was no necessary connection between those events and the Christian milieu that was the background to them. I came to identify myself as a Christian, not because there was anything specifically and identifiably Christian in the events themselves, but because the context of my life at the time (and my woeful ignorance of things spiritual) made Christianity the only explanation then available to me.

I maintained this identity as forcefully as I did (I was a zealot's zealot for over twenty years) not because I was convinced but because I was afraid to consider any other possibility. And it was the omnipresence in my life of this unspoken and deeply hidden fear that was my first clue as to what had actually befallen me - because the testimony of the Biblical scriptures concerning fear is simply this:

1Jo 4:18 There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.

All scripture, be it Christian, Islamic, Hindu, B'hai, or some other, is God-breathed and able to convict: and since, after twenty years of zealous faith, I was still afraid it became evident to me that what I had placed my faith in was defective and false. And it was from that moment that I finally began to exercise the freedom of the believer - which is to question God. As it's written in Isaiah:

Isa 1:18 Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. and:

Isa 55:8 For my thoughts [are] not your thoughts, neither [are] your ways my ways, saith the LORD.
Isa 55:9 For [as] the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

What I found however was that as soon as I began to question and think for myself, instead of simply swallowing whole the dogmatic assertions of others, i encountered the most terrific opposition and hostility, because to question openly and honestly is to draw others into the possibility that what they believe has no basis in spiritual reality.

And since you've responded to this article in the way that you have, I will ask of you the same question that I asked of KFC - what reason do you have for believing that you are a Christian?

"Your presentation of yourself, your utter disregard, based on self-serving cynicism and the resentful ennui of a bored child, for the basic tenets of your supposed 'faith (which you use to castigate Muslims and anyone else you find to fall short of your supposed standards, is a testimony not to the power of the Risen Christ but to your own immaturity as believer. And as I pointed out, its the gross arrogance of those like yourself who preach one thing (oh not directly and overtly but through your contempt for others) that disgusts and appalls me and which I am no longer content to allow to pass without challenge - if only out of respect for the memory of the Christian that I myself once was."

lol, how's that for hypocrisy? You can't bear the idea that battle lines aren't drawn between me and you, so you have to divise them yourself by imposing standards that you think I am required to keep to. Your "side" defines itself with arrogance, and my "side" defines itself with humility? The medieval user manual says I have to fish for people so you castigate me for not riding around in a boat all the time?

For all the love of chaos you pretend, you have a damn hard time dealing with the undefinable. You, yourself castigate Christians for trying to define the undefinable. The whole basis of this blog is that Jesus wasn't Christianity portrays, and yet here you are, browbeating people for not diving in here like the inquisition to defend what you believe to be false.

This isn't about us, this is about how your definition of yourself falls apart if the "opposition" isn't what you demand it to be. Come on, you say things like:

"Now, believer, do as your Bible requires you to do - and give me an account of your faith and why you believe. Do so, and I'll return the favor."

Were you wearing a cape when you said that? That line deserved a cape, flowing in the wind; your opponent cowering in fear of you. I don't have to take my ball and go home, or run from you in fear, or even "deal" with it. You WANT people to run from you in fear, and I think that shows a deep-seated need to identify yourself with what you consider to be "powerful".

I don't see anything to be shocked about here. I see another mythology among many, which may or may not be true. I don't think it is, but that doesn't mean that I am threatened by it, not in the least. Defend your god if he needs to be defended by the likes of humanity. Mine doesn't.

"What I found however was that as soon as I began to question and think for myself, instead of simply swallowing whole the dogmatic assertions of others, i encountered the most terrific opposition and hostility, because to question openly and honestly is to draw others into the possibility that what they believe has no basis in spiritual reality."

Yet woe unto any opponent that questions and comes to conclusions that seem irrational to you, right? They should keep to the dogma and cower in fear in your presence. Heh.

To KFC:

you're fooling yourself. I don't believe you ever had it to begin with. If you had, you wouldn't be here like this now.

You're at liberty to believe whatever you want - but by beginning in this way you demonstrate exactly the quality that I accuse you of being possessed by - the rush to judgment and the condemnation of those who refuse to think like you. Who are you to say what the nature of my faith is?

Heb 1:1-2 God who in past times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by his Son whom he has appointed heir of all things by whom also he made the worlds

What you're quoting is a statement by the proselytizing tent-maker whose objective was to create a doctrine that was consonant with the OT and which vindicated his people by showing the descent of Jesus the prophet, whom he conflated with Jesus the Christ, from the puritanical and Law-obsessed pharisees and sadducees - hence the tent-maker's repugnance towards homosexuals and women preachers.

A study of the gospels (and yes, I've read them many times) reveals Jesus the prophet to be far less concerned with observance of the literal tenets of the law and far more concerned with the love of the Father for his own sake and without regard to the fear of hell or the hope of heaven. To quote scripture is one thing. To quote it without understanding, as you do, is entirely another.

God doesn't change. He spoke to us in the OT and He spoke to us in the NT. It's the same God. His message was the same. The only difference is HE came down to SHOW us the way. So it's ok to read the gospels now.

Actually, it's profoundly obvious from a study of both the OT and the NT that while the nature of God doesn't change his behaviour in relation to the believer does - hence the often cited 'inconsistency' of the two narratives which is used as an excuse for unbelief. I refer you to the writings of Joachim of Flores for an exposition of the Three Ages of the Spirit - the age of the Father, in which merciless Judgment reigned; the Age of the Son, in which absolute Judgment is tempered by absolute Mercy; and the Age of the Holy Spirit in which the union of the Spirit of God with the Spirit of Man becomes manifest as a prelude to the end times and the Last Judgment.

The nature of God does not change - but the manifestation of that nature in its relation to the whole of creation does. Your comment is nothing more than a further manifestation of the ignorance on which you base your foolish, deceptive judgments.

Like a bird that has found his nest, so my soul hs found it's rest in the will of God. I have found out the reason for my existence. I know why I'm here, and where I'm going.

A pity, then, that you sound so very much like the believers I knew in the church to which I gave almost five years of my life: parroting pretty-sounding nonsense and irrelevant metaphor in a vain attempt to convince themselves and others that they were among the righteous rather than the lost.

I refer you to my reply to island-gurl and I ask you once again to defend your Lord against the accusation of his non-existence, rather than attempting to demonstrate why I'm 'wrong' in maintaining that non-existence against your hysterical prejudice.

To BakerStreet:

the more you deny what your faith requires of you the more ridiculous you become - and the more evident is the canting nonsense you substitute for the dogmas and doctrines of the faith you profess. I believe the phrase 'Whited sepulchre' is appropriate at this point.

For all the love of chaos you pretend, you have a damn hard time dealing with the undefinable. You, yourself castigate Christians for trying to define the undefinable. The whole basis of this blog is that Jesus wasn't Christianity portrays, and yet here you are, browbeating people for not diving in here like the inquisition to defend what you believe to be false.

Ding-Ding-Ding! EXACTLY! Oy, Baker, If I could shake your hand now... Ah hell -- *shakes Bakers virtual hand*



You took the words and said them exactly how I would love to have. If I could've thought of them.

~L

To Lucas:

still here? I thought you didn't want to play kick the puppy any more? But, since you evidently do...

It's not the part of a wise man, Lucas, to join a fool in his folly. Especially when his folly is unintelligible to you...

You took the words and said them exactly how I would love to have. If I could've thought of them.

"the more you deny what your faith requires of you the more ridiculous you become - and the more evident is the canting nonsense you substitute for the dogmas and doctrines of the faith you profess. I believe the phrase 'Whited sepulchre' is appropriate at this point."

"Faith" in the way you use it is just a human construct; a checklist of things you have to believe to be this or that. Which flavor of "faith" do you want me to adopt to be your villain? Do you want me to demand you acknowledge the transubstantiation, or should I be outraged that you are denying the trinity? Sadly, I'm not Bernardo Gui, nor are your ideas 'dangerous' to me.

If I was "whited" I'd be spitting doctrine and scriptures at you and secretly questioning them like most Christians. I openly admit that I don't follow them, and the literal 'word', while of philosphical value, isn't God's voice directly in my ear. You are just incensed that the rules of this Milton-esque conflict aren't being held to, and I'm not casting you out to rule rather than serve.

I value people like you, believe it or not. I think you shortchange yourself by defining yourself according to what you oppose, but you also go a long way toward showing that people are stuck in beliefs they've never questioned. Granted, it makes you impossible to deal with when people don't cower before your supposed unholy might, but you serve a purpose, nonetheless.

To Lucas: still here? I thought you didn't want to play kick the puppy any more? But, since you evidently do... It's not the part of a wise man, Lucas, to join a fool in his folly. Especially when his folly is unintelligible to you...

Well, I decided to come see how the thing was going, and saw that. I felt what Baker said was exact.

It's not the part of a wise man, Lucas, to join a fool in his folly. Especially when his folly is unintelligible to you.

Hmmm...Fool. *thinks* You? That's the only fool I see here. Well, I'm one right now, for bothering to come back to this thing.


~L

To BakerStreet:

Your faith, on your own testimony, is a ragbag of ideas which (for all I know) may change on a daily basis dependant on the degree to which you find them acceptable or convenient. This may not be the actual case. The actual case may be, in reality, that the practice of your faith is consistent and stringent. But nobody could tell that's the case from what you yourself have presented here.

What you portray here is the image of a man whose faith is dead. The essence of religion is not what we make of it but what it makes of us.

Which flavor of "faith" do you want me to adopt to be your villain?

The kind that takes issue with others while being lifeless and meaningless in itself. But wait.... That would be the kind of faith you've exhibited here already - so there's nothing left for you to adopt - unless it's another pose, another posture, another pretence.

If I was "whited" I'd be spitting doctrine and scriptures at you and secretly questioning them like most Christians. I openly admit that I don't follow them, and the literal 'word', while of philosphical value, isn't God's voice directly in my ear.

Actually, that's not so. Compared to the original definition what you've presented here is another shoddy excuse designed to hide from yourself that what you once possessed is dead and gone. I should perhaps call you Lazarus - though I believe there was less of the stench of decay about him, even while still in the tomb, than there is about your writing here.

Mat 23:27 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead [men's] bones, and of all uncleanness.
Mat 23:28 Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.

I know. Quoting scripture at you is meaningless, right. But that doesn't deny it's power to describe you, even if it's content no longer reaches you.

A believer who professes that scripture is meaningless to him and whose beliefs consist in whatever is convenient to him. Lazarus, Lazarus, what a perfect example of the contemporary Christian you are. I can see your Jesus hugging himself with glee over the good job you're doing. But then, of course, the Word of Gord isn't the word in your ear, right? That would be just too... inconvenient.

I am a believer.

I wrote an article on how I came to meet Jesus long before I knew who He was. How He introduced Himself to me and I'd never heard of something called "The Bible." No one in my family was a Christian, no one talked about God..

Link

This article was just the beginning of my belief in Jesus. I love Him Emp, more than anything else in this life. He loved me, and came for me when there was nothing else.

He owns my heart and my loyalty.

But I won't lie. I am not a perfect Christian. Not even close. But then if I could be a perfect Christian, Christ wouldn't have even needed to come. I coulda paid my own bill as it were.

If someone asks for proof all I can offer is my heart. That is all I have. People can argue about scripture until the cows come home....but in the end, to me, I need the proof to be in the pudding. Meaning of course, I need to see evidence of Christ in my life.

Funny thing about that....when I am doing daily reading and studying of scripture and truly seeking His face...I am closer to Him and see His presence more clearly in my life. So if scripture were "wrong" then I don't believe that would be the case.

I choose to believe Jesus is God and died for my sins. I choose Him.

*Yawn*

A dead faith is one that got stuck hundreds of years ago and refuses to admit any inspiration or reflection. I should expect this from EoIC, because the only way his self image can be retained is if his enemies continue to define him. I mean, he's basically sitting there outraged because I won't brand him a heretic.

It's good for a few laughs, I guess. Let him condemn people for trying to view their religion in new ways when he, himself, is blogging on... a different perspective on Jesus. It's obvious that this venom is just disappointment that he can't bait the Jerry Falwell crowd into making enough of a stink. If that's what he wants, maybe he should have picked one of their forums.

This will stand as a glowing example of someone acting like a teenager who is totally annoyed that his parents are too darned open minded to really rebel against. What is the world coming to when you plan a war and your enemies don't care enough what you think to attack you, right? I mean, if I am not condemning his heresy it must be because my faith is just too shallow, lol...

To BakerStreet:

from the outset, your contributions to this thread have been directed toward the author, not the article. Why is that? Comments directed toward description and analysis of your responses have been ignored and each response - despite the fact that you, Lazarus, assured me you had no interest in taking part - has been an attempt to turn away from the topic at hand to a discussion of myself.

My, how you dote on me.

You're at liberty to leave now. Not that you will, of course. I see the fascination in your eyes, little Lazarus. Perhaps, as a child, you longed for some large, dark eyed man to fiddle around with you in a darkened room? Sorry, sweets. You're not my type.

Wow! I am wowed by your answer honestly. You are a very smart/intelligent person. You like to reason alot. I'm not criticizing, pretty admirative really! I guess I dont reason too much because then my head hurts lol. I didnt read all the other replies but here's what i have to say.

I know there are mysteries in the Bible, and I dont bother exploring them because what is a mystery means it can only be revealed by God right?

I think your point is that, whatever higher itentity that is worshipped by Jews, Muslims, Christians, and so on is the same one and only itentity. Is that right? Correct me if i'm wrong, i'm slow sometimes.

I for one dont really think it's like that. I understand that mankind has always had the need to worship, mankind has always had the intuition of a greater Being to which it owed life. But I also know from the Bible that my God is a jealous God and he cannot accept me worshiping something else with a different name.

Now to say that Jesus is an idol. I have to disagree yet again. The trinity thing. I dont agree that there are 3 beings that equal to one God. Nope. But that's just me. If God is the same in the Old Testament as he is in the new, how can He all of a sudden become three, right? I think there is one God with three different nominations/descriptions whatever (The Father, The Son and the Holy Spirit). Just as I am a daughter, a sister, a friend and so on.

How can I prove that God is GOD? That's a tough one. It's as if I was trying to prove that the wind is there even though I cant see it. I guess it is just a matter of faith. You'll argue that you have faith in something else and that i works wonders for you. And to that I dont know what to say. Just that my mind and my heart are at peace. Are yours?

I suppose my answer sucks big time, I'm not as bright as you are. And probably some of the stuff I said sounds corny. And I dont want to preach to you. I dont even know the Bible as well as you do. I just hope you'll find in the coming answers what you're looking for.

The trinity thing. I dont agree that there are 3 beings that equal to one God.

St Patrick - one of the few kickarse saints - used to explain it using the three-leaf clover as a metaphor. Basically all three beings are simply aspects of the same God just as the clover's three leaves are simply parts of the plant. We perceive God as being one of his aspects because our minds cannot encompass the whole, but in reality he is at one and the same time Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Emperor - I made a comment in Satan's Advocate's Christianity thread about belief which might relate to your argument against Baker.

In essence though I don't believe God calls for anything particularly strenuous, merely that we abandon everything and follow him. That doesn't mean we should abandon the accoutrements of modern life that make conversion of others easier or our example shine brighter.

To island_gurl2:

Thank you. For a reply that's honest and non-self-serving and on topic. You're perfectly correct. You have no way to convince me that your experience of Truth is the same as my experience of the truth. But this article was never about that (though doe-eyed Lazarus, in his coquettish way, has tried to turn the argument into something like that - batting his eyelashes at me all the while, of course). It was and is about correspondence, relations, parallels, between different faiths - and also about the arrogance of those who think themselves fit to preach to other while being, in terms of their own professed faith, little more than walking corpses.

All the gods (though they be dead) are worthy of worship - if someone finds them so. I've no particular wish to trouble the genuine faith of anyone, merely to provoke and rebuke those who think themselves fit to rebuke others while wallowing in cynicism, cowardice, and contempt (are you listening, little Lazarus? Is you heart going pit-pat pit-pat with excitement?)

I think there is one God with three different nominations/descriptions whatever (The Father, The Son and the Holy Spirit). Just as I am a daughter, a sister, a friend and so on.

I like this. It chimes with my monotheism, and it's a more reasonable explanation of the trinity than most.

"You're at liberty to leave now. Not that you will, of course. I see the fascination in your eyes, little Lazarus. Perhaps, as a child, you longed for some large, dark eyed man to fiddle around with you in a darkened room? Sorry, sweets. You're not my type."

You DO wear a cape when you post, don't you? I bet you like vampire movies.

Anyhoo, the first comment I made wasn't even talking to you, it was talking to the people who were trying to make you into an 'antichrist' which both amused me and made me a little nauseous. I didn't say anything about you, I was just commenting on the fact that painting you as the villian was just exactly what you were shooting for.

Had I made that on one of LW's blogs, she would have taken it in the spirit it was intended, I think. I don't blame you, though. It takes all kinds, even the kind who sound like they should be wearing a cape and a scary mask. I've known too many people who really earned their cape to be much impressed, though.

You adjust your position how you need to. If people who don't burn you at the stake need to be cowards and of little faith, then by all means, enjoy your comic book villian self-image. After all, without a good nemesis or two, there wouldn't be much image at all, would there?

To BakerStreet:

Stop fluttering your lashes, love. It won't work, despite your desperate attempts to woo me through pretending you're some icy intellectual. I see through your girlish pretences. I know that, behind those foolish and not very effective attempts at disdain, your little heart throbs only for me. But, alas for you, tis not to be - I am immune to your charms (though I have heard that you look very good in a thong....)

No. No. It Is Not To Be. I never liked 'Failed Demagogue' as an aftershave...

Tell me again, dear. Which of those nasty boys was it who played with your peepee in the shower that day?

To Tova7: I read your linked article. It's well written and to me not that surprising. I've heard such voices. On the night of my conversion and again, many years later. That first time, I had no other context, no other symbol with which to explain what had happened. I'd been spending time with Christian people, listening to them explain the universe as they saw it - and their eschatology was the only type of explanation I had that seemed to fit what had happened. I didn't just hear a voice, I felt a presence: and then I blacked out for five hours.

Years laterI had a very similar experience - almost identical in fact. I heard a voice, I felt a presence, and once again I passed out for several hourse. I felt, when I woke, that I had regained God. As I said to Sabrina later, over the net, "I have a God again." But there was not the remotest indication of a Christian element in this second experience - even though voice and presence that I encountered on the second occasion felt identical to that which I'd encountered the first time. And I realised that there had been nothing in the first experience, either, to tell me that 'Jesus Christ' was involved, that was something I had imposed on the experience - not something I had taken from it.

Unlike most I don't deny the existence of Jesus even though I don't believe in 'Jesus Christ'. The Jesus I know and honour (though I make no appeal to him, offer him no allegiance, and he plays no part in my Ritual life) is a God-form. God-forms take life from the fervency of those who believe in them. 20 centuries of worship and prayer have given rise to an actual spiritual entity, a God-form, capable of answering prayer, capable of changing lives, perhaps even worthy enough to die for. But Jesus is not 'Jesus Christ', not the Son of God, and no more capable of saving you for eternal life than I am of turning Lucas into a wit.

I don't believe in the Christian heaven. I don't believe in the Christian hell. I don't believe in salvation. I don't believe in redemption from sin. My God has no morality, only aesthetics and humour (the kind of humour that gives someone a flipper for a left hand - and then makes him naturally left handed). I do however believe in the Last Day, and a Judgment of sorts - a Judgment as to the degree to which each life has conformed to the aesthetic of God's creation, as revealed through Natural Reason and through Revelation.

So I can readily agree with you if you were to say that you had 'met' Jesus, that Jesus has transformed your life. It's just that I'd differ with you as to the Jesus you had met.