<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(GrimFang4 @ Aug 18 2006, 07:05 PM) [snapback]249510[/snapback]</div>
Quote:
Well, I think I have a few interesting points.
Most of what has been said here and corraborated about the meaning of life has been the example of a humanist lifestyle. Humanists just want to further the race and help those around them without any more motivation than that. Before I became a christian, I thought of a scenario that solves the humanist problem but in a non-humanist way. This is in no way a reason to believe, but is interesting to ponder. If everyone in the world was a real christian, then we would have a perfect humanist world. If everyone lived following Jesus's example and loved God, then we'd all be doing our best to help one another.
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And lastly, I always want to differentiate between christians and catholics. Don't blame all christians for what some catholics believed in. If there were more leaders than followers, we wouldn't have so many types of christianity and past atrocities. What Christians live for is the love of God and their trust of Jesus. They don't justify themselves with their deeds. In truth, all men should be leaders.
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If you are going to get religious on this topic (not that I believe that it is a bad thing), the point of each individual human life is to choose to be either good, or evil. Those that deliberately choose the good will eventually spend eternity in communion with the Trinity and those that choose to turn themselves away will spend eternity barred from that communion. It may seem harsh for people to be condemned to eternal damnation, but they are condemned by their own words and deeds. No one is forced to become an unrepentant sinner and no one who truly repents is denied absolution (look up Saint Olga of Pskov).
Anyone who says "The Devil made me do it" is someone who feels guilty for getting caught and wishes to escape justice. Everything you do is the result of your conscious choices and you must shoulder the blame for anything that you do. Excuses are just that-- excuses, you either choose to be good, or seek forgiveness for what you have done. However, before you can seek forgiveness, you must accept that what you have done is wrong, that there will be consequences of your actions, and that you must accept those consequences.
One of the biggest problems secularised society has with the Catholic Church is that it refuses to grant absolution for anyone who continues to sin. The other is that it refuses to change its standards to allow the moral relativists to attend without feeling guilty.
The irony of your desire to differentiate catholics from christians is that if we all followed Christ's teachings, we would all be catholics.
To pick an example: Jesus specifically defined the only proper sexual activity to be between a man and woman, living as husband and wife.