A while ago I blogged about one of my favorite Non God blogs The Obvious? and spoke about how much I like his blog
Following on from this we had some email correspondence about my interpretation of his dream– I will leave you to interpret it rather than stating here what I thought. Anyway the following is from an Email from Euan (quoted with permission)
Firstly I would have no difficulty in having anything in common with you, in fact the more the better as I believe we are all part of the same complex environment and differences are more of our own making than real.
This is my first difficulty with religions – they preach difference, you are either in or out, saved or damned etc. This has led to most of the violence in the world throughout the ages and still does.
My second difficulty, with Christianity particularly, is its focus on fear as a means of control. The perpetuation of the outdated paternalistic, judgemental, angry God which may have made sense in the Middle East 2000 years ago is bonkers.
My last difficulty is the fact that you feel that I am in need of being saved. This is the most pernicious characteristic of religions. You have every right to believe what you will but I equally have every right not to. I don’t go about trying to persuade you to give up on your faith so please leave me to enjoy my lack of it.
But Euan, whats a man to do? If you are right then sure there is no issue around you needing to persuade me. After all I am just a man to be pittied a little- missing out on all the so-called fun the world has to offer. You know, all that wine woman and song (which incidently I seem to remember that you are largely abstaining from yourself having settled down to a traditional family life). But does it matter if I am wrong to you? No, I guess not.
Of course, to me, it matters immensely. Asking me not to ‘preach difference, you are either in or out, saved or dammed’ is asking me to admit I am wrong. You see, if I really believe what I claim to believe is actually true, how can I do anything else? As the atheist once said of Christianity “If I really believed all that, I would crawl across the nation on my hands and knees to tell just one person about Jesus.”
I am not into trying to force someone to believe, and for sure a perverted idea of religion has led to war. But fake religion (and there sure is plenty of that around) should not put us off the genuine any more than encountering counterfeit money should make us want to give up the real stuff!
If God really is angry at sin then we are in trouble. But the good news of the gospel is that he is also a God who loves the sinner.
The chance for forgiveness, to start the new year with a clean slate, knowing that all those things you are ashamed of thinking of or doing are blotted out- what could be better news than that?
Now I can’t force you to believe, but what I can say is for goodness sake look into it- perhaps do an alpha course or something- there is bound to be one near you. You don’t have to accept that this is all true from this post, but surely it is something that is SO important if it is true that it is well worth looking into properly as an adult to make up your own mind?
But tell me, how can Euan and I communicate about matters of faith without either I dropping my beliefs or him being offended at another example of ‘the most pernicious characteristic of religions’?
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