Let me give you this well done link.
If you can get past your prejudices the way I had to and just absorb the words then I think you will agree with her and I.
So, I managed to watch it, where I am. Well, listen to it actually.
This is full of theological errors, and does not accurately depict the Christian outlook. At least, not every Christian outlook. I'll grant you that some Christians believe in the manner that is outlined in the video. But I would argue that those Christians are incorrect.
First, she states that "one of the central tenets of Christianity is that Jesus was God in the form of a man." While I can't ask this person what she meant by "form," I'd like to clarify that, for my part, and the part of the Catholic Church and other Christian groups, this tenet says that Jesus was fully human, not merely in the appearance of a man. Some consider it a niggling point, but being fully human means he experienced in the same way what we experience; pain, pleasure, sadness, joy, etc. Merely taking a human appearance doesn't necessarily grant this.
She says that "Jesus allowed Himself to be crucified in order to suffer the punishment for the sins of humanity, essentially taking our place." I'd like to refer back to my earlier post in which I indicate that a punishment is (or should be) the natural consequence of an action. Biblically speaking, the natural consequence of sin is death. That is recounted numerous times throughout the Bible. Sin is the separation of oneself from God, the source of life. Separating oneself from the source of life leads to death. Therefore, the natural consequence of sin is death.
You can certainly argue with the premises of this. You may posit that God isn't the source of life. Rather, food, sunlight, sleep, water, etc. are the sources of life. And even if you don't separate yourself from these, you're still going to die. Cell death occurs as part of nature. I certainly don't disagree with this.
However, I believe in a spiritual dimension, and that the spiritual dimension has real power in the physical dimension. It is upon this that the Christian position stands (or falls, I suppose, depending on your perspective). Sin causes spiritual death, and spiritual death leads to physical death. The argument goes that prior to sin, the human spirit had the power to sustain bodily life indefinitely, but that sin cuts the person off from the source of life (God) and causes spiritual death. Because the spirit and the body are not separate, but one, spiritual death leads to physical death. Thus, the Bible says that it was through the sin of Adam that death entered the world.
All of that, however, depends on whether you believe in a spiritual dimension. I don't know if you do or not, but there it is.
Anyway, regarding her statement, "essentially taking our place," that's not technically correct, but I'll get back to this.
She goes on to say that, 'this means that regardless of what we do, we all have an opportunity to go to heaven, provided that we believe in Jesus.' I know that there are many Christian groups who believe this, but it's not really correct. To understand why this is not exactly correct, just take a look at what Jesus Himself says. Before that, though, I'd like to note that the passages that are used to support "belief only" use the word "faith." But what is faith? People often associate faith with blind belief, which is not only false, it's absurd. A lover doesn't have blind belief in his/her spouse. The faith that lovers have for each other is based upon the character of the person they're putting their faith in. To put your faith in your partner is to suppose that your partner is a faithful person. Does he/she live up to his/her word? Does he lie or cheat? Does she manipulate or coerse? To be clear, faith a relationship word. Faith as an action is a love action. A faithful spouse is faithful out of love. Faith out of duty, or fear of human scorn, or some other reason, isn't really faith. It involves trust, but is not itself trust. It comes out of love, but is not love itself. It is a self-sacrificial way of living in love with your partner, and believing that your partner is living the same way toward you.
Now let's go back to what Jesus has to say. He says (and I'm paraphrasing here), "If you love me, you will keep my commandments." Well, He commanded quite a few things. "Love God with all you are, and love your neighbors as yourself." "Go out and teach all nations, baptizing them in God's name." "Take this bread and eat, take this wup and drink, do this in memory of me."
So, having Faith in Jesus, which should consitute a way of living in love with Him, according to Him, means doing a whole lot more than simply having an intellectual, or heartfelt belief in Him.
She finishes that little bit with "because he nullified the penalty for our sins." Again, this isn't quite accurate. He nullified the penalty of original sin. Individual sins are a different matter. His sacrifice is enough to nullify our individual sins, provided that we unite our own sacrifices to His. But let's be clear, we still have to do our part to pay our own penalties. St Paul references this when He talks about what is lacking in Christ's sacrifice.
She goes on to talk about the nonsensicality of someone being punished for the sins of others as a valid form of justice. Natural justice, which may be stated simply as "an eye for an eye," is a concept not missing from the Bible. That ideal came along with Abraham out of Babylon (Abraham was from Ur), where the prevailing law was the Code of Hammurabi. Indeed, this justice was the prevalent form of justice that the Jews had in relationship to God before the Messiah. That is, if you were wicked, your life was cursed. If you were good, your life was blessed. This story of Job ran counter to this, and you can see in that story this prevailing sense of justice, as those around Job accused him of sinning, and thus receiving curses from God. But Job foreshadows Christ, in that despite the apparent curse of God, and God's forsaking him, he remains faithful. What we learn in Christ, and Job, is that, that old rule doesn't necessarily apply. What we find, especially in Christ, is that the blessings and curses of God are predominately spiritual in nature, rather than physical. In the old model, the canundrum of the wealthy wicked person just wouldn't have an answer.
It isn't that eye for an eye isn't true. Indeed, that's exactly why Christ had to come. Humanity (as a whole, but through Adam) had incurred an impossible debt to repay. Justice demaded that it had to be paid. In order to fulfill the demands of justice, God lovingly stepped forward to pay it. But the debt had to be paid by humanity. Therefore, He became a man. Not an image, nor an avater, but a real flesh and blood man.
But a big part of her objection is the idea that one person can pay the debts of another. Quickly considering a simple vein, if you were put in jail and you could get out by posting a $500.00 bail, but didn't have the money, would you ask a friend, or a relative to help you out? There is no requirement on behalf of your friend to help out, but it's certainly generous if he does so.
We consider God's actions to be generous and loving in this sense. However, this doesn't really answer the deeper philosophical question of whether a person can validly pay for the debt of another, or if that debt is merely transferred to the payee. Christ's sacrifice is said to be a free gift (ie, the debt isn't transferred), but is it valid? It rests on the idea of communal guilt. This was commonly understood by Jews in ancient times, but many Christians today even find this concept hard to accept. I know that I myself thought the idea wasn't true for a long time. But do we have any evidence that communal guilt is a real thing?
I think most people, if they found out that Hitlar was a close relative, or great grandparent of theirs would feel some level of embarrassment, or shame at the relation. Indeed, I think most Germans feel ashamed of that time in their history. Germans today aren't the ones who committed those atrocities, yet they still feel some shame regarding it. I'm a Canadian, and even though I don't identify with those who settled in these lands centuries ago (especially considering my grandparents all immigrated here within the last century), I am still treated by many Natives as part of the White Man who stole their lands.
This doesn't mean communal guilt is valid, but I think that the average person unconsciously adheres in small ways to the principle. Using broader, more accepted principles, we can draw conclusions that tend in the direction of communal guilt. For example, we can take the butterfly effect with regards to physics, seeing that a small change here on earth can have at least some small impact on the moon. Perhaps the impact is miniscule to the point of being nearly unmeasurable, but the impact is still real. Everything in the universe affects everything else in some small way. Likewise, we can consider this to be true in the spiritual world. In fact, we do. If a man commits a murder, and I stand by and watch, making no effort to stop it, I am also guilty of the murder. Not to the same degree, nor in the same way, but I share in the crime nonetheless. Not only do I share in the guilt of it, but I also share in the effects and consequences of it.
Perhaps this is not exactly proof that communal guilt is real, but it is evidence. It may not even be the best evidence, but it is evidence.
So if we take communal guilt, which is the basis of Original Sin, as true, and the sin of one can be impugned to many, then so too can the payment of one be meritted to many.
She then goes on with an example of an innocent man put to death for murder, and then the real murderer is found, and that this situation would be horrifying. This situation is horrifying, but that's not a proper analogy of Christ's sacrifice. The real murderer was known before Christ was put to death. The murderer was in jail for life, without any hope of freedom. Jesus freely offered his life for the life and freedom of the murderer. That is a more correct analogy. Her statement, then, that God's sense of justice is insane and less developed than our own, based on the analogy he provided, is incorrect.
She then talks about Christ's sacrifice as meaningless due to His resurrection. This idea stems from the idea of ultimate oblivion in death. Almost nobody in the ancient world, and even in the millenia leading up to the past couple of hundred years, believed in oblivion after death. Nearly everyone believed in some kind of afterlife, whether rebirth as an animal, or god, or release from the body as a pure spirit and entry into a spirit heaven or hell, etc. The Jews believed in life after death, and resurrection. Egyptians believed you could take your possessions with you into the afterlife. Hindus and Buddhists believed your soul migrated to a new body after death. The Greeks had Hades and Mt. Olympus. Yet, did that diminish the pain and horror of death in any way to any of these cultures? Was not a heroic sacrifice still just that to these people? Of course! Perhaps compared with the idea of total oblivion, it doesn't mean the same thing, but oblivion was foreign to almost everyone in the past, and death remained a terrible enemy. Christ's death and resurrection were two separate events, and one does not negate the meaning and reality of the other.
Another question she poses is "couldn't God just forgive our sins?" The answer is no, because justice demands payment for offenses made. Justice isn't just a tool to allow for harmonious living. It's an essential part of God's nature. God could as easily ignore just as you could ignore breathing.
Everything else she says is derived from what I've already addressed, so I think I'll leave off there.
