First I want to thank you for your reply, I will address everything you point out.
My pleasure. I always enjoy civil discourse.
First my view on what christianity is may be the correct view, that simply being kind and treating people as you wish to be treated makes you "christ like".
I would agree; that is the essential core to Christianity, as evidenced in 1 Corinthians 13 (the last verse of which is "And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.")
However that is not what popular consensus is, the bible belt is used because if you live there Christianity is defined by the very people calling themselves christian, mostly baptists, pentechostals, and other fundamental bibile literalists. So no you cannot say because I define those people as false that I get to undo what they have done to the religion. They define it, the majority.. not me. That is why I use the word christianity to describe them.
I would argue that they represent a branching off of true Christianity. True Christianity remains intact, however much concealed it may be. They have created a corruption, and while they may CALL it Christianity, that does not make it so.
And I pointed out I don't have a cult following in sarcasm to "we are all sons of God", not in the sense of christianity. If you are not christian and are jewish or simply a theist I have to ask why you don't hold the same view of the old testament?
I am Christian. To what are you referring when you ask why I don't hold the same view of the old testament? (Same view as what?) If you are asking why I don't accept the NT as divine, but do accept the OT, it is because Paul wrote in one of his letters (that was later included in the NT) that the scriptures are complete. Nothing should be added to or removed from them. That would include the entire NT, since it wasn't in the picture at the time of his writing.
The OT is even worse with genocide and reffering to other peoples as "unclean" or "not god's chosen people". I have news for you, if there is a God or supreme intelligence he will not be racist. The mere act of believing ones own way to be the "correct" way always leads to wars, famines, pestilence, and hatred.
I tell you why, lets say your religion tells you that you are not to mix with other people. Why would that be? Are other people somehow dirty? If you move into another country of another people how do you think they are going to take your "religion"? Do you think maybe they would take that pretty offensively? Don't you see how that may lead to violence? As the world gets bigger this problem expands into nations living among other nations.
Religion is at the heart of modern "us vs. them" mentality. This line of thinking may have been useful when we were little more than animals fighting over the same resources, however today we should know better.
I agree, if there is a God, he isn't racist. However, I suspect that the ability to communicate with God is a genetic development that first occurred in the Hebrews. During the time of the OT, in a need to protect that genetic marker, it was necessary for the Hebrews to maintain a relatively clean lineage. I believe this is what is meant by "God's chosen people" (remember, no one at that time knew anything about genetics, and wouldn't have been able to describe this in any other way). But you are very correct, that believing one's own way to be the "correct" way, and intolerance of others is a sure-fire recipe to all the atrocities you list. AND, in Christianity, none of those things are taught. (Well, in the NT anyway...)
I find it peculiar that you seek proof of religion being used to murder, remember the crusades? And even though people may not admit it, they look down on other cultures because differing points of view on God and other things. This leads to treating people less than human in one way or another all the way up to genocide. Nowhere is this mentality more obvious than in the minds of religious fundamentalists.
I seek SCRIPTURE that is used to justify these atrocities, because it isn't. The crusades, jihads, the inquisitions, have all been motivated by NON-RELIGIOUS factors, and misinformation (i.e., corruption) was used to motivate the masses. Hatred is the cause, not the effect.
Now you mention the catholics, actually I have little issue with them. The pope it seems is trying hard to be tolerant, to accept science, and to accept other religions as just as "right" as their own. However mostly you don't see catholics out here picking fights with atheists or trying to justify their bible as a factual document, heck most are even open to the notion that maybe there isn't a God but if there isn't I'm still going to live this way and believe there is one. I have no problem at all with that kind of faith because its not harming anybody when executed properly.
Perhaps now, but my issue with Catholicism is what it did to the name of Christianity for a thousand or so years.
And I was not singling you out, however the fact you felt I was simply shows this line of thought bothers you. You have tried to engage yet still you ignore what the bible actually says about "inspired by god" which I pointed out in several scriptures spanning both new and old testament. The bible's books proclaim they are the literal law or word of God to be followed to the T.
I didn't feel as though you were singling me out, but rather simply prefaced my response with the statement that I didn't know who you were directing your comment to, so I would go ahead and answer regardless (rather than waiting to let whomever you were targeting speak for themselves).
Regarding your claim that I am ignoring something... I haven't noticed any specific verses you have raised, but would be happy to provide additional explanation for anything that seems wrong to you. (But please let's not waste time with the Levitical law, which was a set of physical laws for a nation at a specific point of time. There is no indication that they were spiritual guidances, and in fact they largely use the term "unclean" rather than "sin" because they weren't being called out as sins. They were in fact unclean, and in a time where there was no medicine and little technology, in a developing civilization, cleanliness was key in survival.)
The fact that any man felt comfortable saying that and teaching that to entire races of humans makes me very skeptical of their intentions being "divine", more controlling most likely.
Yes, those who have absconded scripture to control others (like the Catholic Church) make me very skeptical of their intentions as well. Are you suggesting that there are specific verses (or chapters, or books) in the Old or New Testament that fall into that category?
