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Well, so long as you don't feel personally wounded, I guess it doesn't matter. But if you did, then it would probably make a difference whether you thought their reaction to you was intentional or not.
I think people with my experiences are wounded for a while since they are alone and feel guilty for having doubts leading to questions. But there are avenues for these people to pursue capable of answering questions. The problem is finding them and making them more available
There are many atheists who become believers because they were able to move beyond the superficiality and negativity of what they were being taught.
Jacob Needleman for example was an atheist. He was turned off by what he knew about Judaism and Christianity. When he was hired to teach a course on religion he had to explore Christianity from the writings of the Church Fathers. He quickly learned that Christianity was far deeper than he had known. It changed his mind as to the ancient truths which had become distorted by society.
Not at all. He's describing resurrection...quite a different thing, I think you'll find. Check the context, and you'll see for sure.
But the resurrection is the evolution of one quality of being into a higher quality of being. Some versions of modern Christendom deny the importance of the resurrection as the aim of Christianity and only concentrate on worldly morality. Again from 1 Corinthians 15:
12 But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? 13 If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. 14 And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. 15 More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. 16 For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either.17 And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. 19 If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.
So when the resurrection is removed from Christianity, what is left is the morality of secular humanism
Hmmm...the wording here doesn't make sense to me. And I'm pretty sure it's not what I meant. I simply meant that thieves steal. The action, stealing, is an expression of the inner character, that of a thief. So "sin" is a matter of both. But that's not quite what you're saying, I think.
So I've got to ask, how can we "begin to become ourselves," when we already are ourselves? And how would knowing what we already "are" make us more able to "become" what we already are?
Can you untangle that idea for me? It looks, at least on the surface, to be contradictory.
It would require more than a post to do justice to your question so this answer will be simplistic. First of all the Bible raises questions. It doesn’t supply answers. If it were to teach certain techniques they would be abused which is why esoteric Christianity is an oral teaching.
A person can learn important ideas from Platonic Christianity. Not to get into that now I’ll just post a thread to show how many church fathers were aware of the relationship between Plato, Plotinus, and Christianity.
http://www.john-uebersax.com/plato/cp.htm
The following is a list of Christian philosophers, theologians, and writers with Platonist/Neoplatonist interests or influences. Their main works, and especially those relevant to the topic of Christian Platonism, are also shown.
According to Plato Man exists as a tripartite soul rather then as inner unity. Thought, emotion, and sensation are not connected. As a result we live in opposition with ourselves. Rather than being consciously connected the tripartite soul becomes connected by imagination. As a result we cannot remain open to the help of grace. Imagination prevents it. Our task is to harmonize the tripartite soul so we function realistically rather than governed by habitual reactions. When we become ourselves, a conscious whole, then receiving the help of grace would be normal. As of now it is only our potential.
From book 1V of the Republic
“having first attained to self-mastery and beautiful order within himself, and having harmonized these three principles, the notes or intervals of three terms quite literally the lowest, the highest, and the mean, and all others there may be between them, and having linked and bound all three together and made of himself a unit, one man instead of many, self-controlled and in unison, he should then and then only turn to practice if he find aught to do either in the getting of wealth or the tendance of the body or it may be in political action or private business, in all such doings believing and naming the just and honorable action to be that which preserves and helps to produce this condition of soul.”
To become oneself a person must acquire self mastery and harmonized these three principles. We can see how far we are from it and why we remain attached to the shadows on the wall for meaning.