Missionary Killed on Remote Island: Discuss?

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seeds
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Re: Missionary Killed on Remote Island: Discuss?

Post by seeds »

seeds wrote: Fri Jan 25, 2019 10:57 pm Is it not logical to assume that the Christian God would surely be forgiving of anyone who never heard the preaching of the “gospel” and thus grant them entrance into heaven?
Kayla wrote: Mon Jan 28, 2019 5:47 pm logical perhaps but that is not the way this was often understood

the missionaries considered their mission so urgent precisely because they thought not being exposed to the gospel at all guaranteed you were going to hell
Yeah, I do understand that.

However, I have often wondered how they determine a difference between an isolated human dying before understanding anything about the gospel, and that of a toddler or an infant who dies before understanding the gospel.

Yet (aside from a few extreme cases), most Christians assume that children who die before reaching an age that allows them to understand such things will surely be accepted into heaven.

So what’s the difference?

Of course I ask that rhetorically, because I already understand the answer is because they are operating under the ridiculous belief that humans “fell” in a mythological location called the “Garden of Eden,” and that a place called hell actually exists.
Kayla wrote: Mon Jan 28, 2019 5:47 pm most christians today recognize how insane that view is but cannot figure out a coherent alternative - and continue to reject universalism even though the bible is very clear on that
How is the Bible clear on “universalism”?
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Kayla
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Re: Missionary Killed on Remote Island: Discuss?

Post by Kayla »

seeds wrote: Mon Jan 28, 2019 8:01 pm Yet (aside from a few extreme cases), most Christians assume that children who die before reaching an age that allows them to understand such things will surely be accepted into heaven.
that in fact has been the traditional doctrine - children who are not baptized go to hell

very few Christians today hold this view, on account it being idiotic. however, they have to tie themselves into theological knots in order to justify not holding this view.

How is the Bible clear on “universalism”?
God wants everyone to be saved - 1 Timothy 2:4. It would be odd to claim that there there things that God wants but cannot get.
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A_Seagull
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Re: Missionary Killed on Remote Island: Discuss?

Post by A_Seagull »

I am just happy that the Indian government is not holding the native islanders to account. (Though they are prosecuting the fishermen who dropped him off.)

He broke the local rules and paid the penalty... too bad.
thedoc
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Re: Missionary Killed on Remote Island: Discuss?

Post by thedoc »

Walker wrote: Fri Nov 23, 2018 12:55 pm If he wasn’t a martyr he would have been more annoyed than the killers.

Why, you may ask?

Because, on the scale of life, being killed is more annoying than losing patience.
He isn't annoyed anymore, but the natives might still be annoyed if they get another missionary.
seeds
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Re: Missionary Killed on Remote Island: Discuss?

Post by seeds »

seeds wrote: Mon Jan 28, 2019 8:01 pm I have often wondered how they determine a difference between an isolated human dying before understanding anything about the gospel, and that of a toddler or an infant who dies before understanding the gospel.

Yet (aside from a few extreme cases), most Christians assume that children who die before reaching an age that allows them to understand such things will surely be accepted into heaven.

So what’s the difference?
Kayla wrote: Tue Jan 29, 2019 8:04 pm that in fact has been the traditional doctrine - children who are not baptized go to hell
Let’s look a little deeper into that “traditional doctrine.”

Imagine the situation of the alleged final judgment day.

Now I know it is difficult to fathom the logistics of such a thing, but imagine Jesus standing in the midst of billions of resurrected infants and toddlers, and proclaiming the following:

“...I realize that most of you neither now, nor at the time of your death, can even understand human language...

(not to mention the fact that most of you were born in areas of the world where knowledge of me was either nonexistent, or not promoted).

Nevertheless, because your parents (be they Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, agnostic, atheist, etc., etc.) never made the effort to have one of my agents pour some special water on your head,...

(“special water” that would have absolved you of the actions of two mythological knuckleheads in a mythological place called the Garden of Eden)

...I therefore have no choice but to give you an indestructible body and condemn you to an eternity (trillions and trillions of years – on into infinity) of unspeakable pain from direct and deliberate torture.

I mean, surely you little ones can understand my position, right? No? Must be that language thing again.

Anyway, I Jesus (the paragon of love and forgiveness), do hereby declare that your writhing in agony and eternal screams for mercy shall begin on this day and shall last forevermore...” :twisted:

And so ends the final judgment of unbaptized children according to the above mentioned “traditional doctrine.”

:shock: And people wonder why there are atheists.:shock:
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Gary Childress
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Re: Missionary Killed on Remote Island: Discuss?

Post by Gary Childress »

Veritas Aequitas wrote: Fri Nov 23, 2018 6:34 am
'You guys might think I'm crazy': Diary of US 'missionary' reveals last days in remote island
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/11/22/asia ... index.html

(CNN)The Christian evangelist who attempted to convert one of the world's last remaining isolated tribes wrote of his convictions in pursuing the mission even in the face of open hostility and attempts on his life, according to diary entries and notes.

In excerpts from his journal, John Allen Chau, the American who is believed to have been killed by members of the isolationist Sentinelese tribe on a tiny, remote island in the Bay of Bengal, wrote of returning to the island to continue his attempts at conversion even after a tribesman shot at him with a bow and arrow, piercing a Bible he was carrying.
Is this stupidity or what?

Discuss in as many perspectives as possible?
Yes. I would say that the missionary was probably pursuing something that better sense should have told him would not bear the kind of fruit he was maybe hoping for. In the long run, the only thing that will probably come of it is that he will be the subject of a few academic studies and some commentary for years to come. I don't think he deserved to be killed for what seemingly amounted to trespassing but apparently the islanders saw it differently. Although, if one considers what has happened to indigenous populations around the world that have welcomed intruders into their lands, maybe you can't really blame them. I don't know. :oops:
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Kayla
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Re: Missionary Killed on Remote Island: Discuss?

Post by Kayla »

seeds wrote: Sun Apr 21, 2019 10:35 pm :shock: And people wonder why there are atheists.:shock:
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another approach is christian universalism

God wants everyone to be saved - that is in the Bible

presumably, whatever God wants, God gets.

In my neck of the woods (rural south) the prevailing beliefs are somewher between the 'traditional doctrine' and universalism.

and it is good that vast majority of people reject the extreme, if internally consistent, traditional doctrine - even if they reject it in favour of somethign less internally consistent

but universalism is just as (if not more) consistent and is more in line with the idea of a loving God
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Re: Missionary Killed on Remote Island: Discuss?

Post by -1- »

Main course: Chau Mein. A bit chewy, but Delicious!
seeds
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Re: Missionary Killed on Remote Island: Discuss?

Post by seeds »

seeds wrote: Sun Apr 21, 2019 10:35 pm :shock: And people wonder why there are atheists.:shock:
Kayla wrote: Fri Apr 26, 2019 8:50 pm another approach is christian universalism

God wants everyone to be saved - that is in the Bible

presumably, whatever God wants, God gets.

In my neck of the woods (rural south) the prevailing beliefs are somewher between the 'traditional doctrine' and universalism.
Hi Kayla,

Just out of curiosity, what does it mean to be somewhere between the two?

In other words, please describe what this “middle belief” entails?

Or more to the point, according to the prevailing beliefs in your neck of the woods, will the remote islanders suffer any negative spiritual consequences for rejecting what the missionary was attempting to convey to them about Jesus?

Or even more to the point, what would the prevailing beliefs in your neck of the woods have to say about the fate of the islander’s souls who for centuries have lived and died without ever hearing one utterance about Jesus?
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Kayla
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Re: Missionary Killed on Remote Island: Discuss?

Post by Kayla »

seeds wrote: Fri Apr 26, 2019 10:47 pm Just out of curiosity, what does it mean to be somewhere between the two?

In other words, please describe what this “middle belief” entails?
the beliefs on this matter tend to be inconsistent

people who are not fucked in the head can see how the "if you are not a christian you will get tortured in hell forever" doctrine is insane

most people in my area are not fucked in the head but at the same time are unwilling to entirely let go of the traditional doctrine

so if you ask most people if non-christians go to hell, you will not get a clear answer

that is the "middle belief"

personally i think everyone in my area should become a no-heller Baptist. heck, everyone should become a no-heller Baptist but that is not likely to happen.
Or more to the point, according to the prevailing beliefs in your neck of the woods, will the remote islanders suffer any negative spiritual consequences for rejecting what the missionary was attempting to convey to them about Jesus?
i hesitate to speak for others - there is an incredible diversity of theological views in the remote parts of the Appalachians - but i think great many (perhaps most) people take the view that even if non-Christians get to go to heaven, being a Christian makes it a lot more likely

however the not-fucked-in-the-head demographic understands that the islanders had no fucking idea what the missionary was even trying to do so God is not going to hold them turning him into a pin-cushion against them
Or even more to the point, what would the prevailing beliefs in your neck of the woods have to say about the fate of the islander’s souls who for centuries have lived and died without ever hearing one utterance about Jesus?
drunk or sober?

alcohol makes people incline more towards universalism, I find.
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