Full Thread: A rose in the flames
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Old December 7th, 2009 #4
Jerry Abbott
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Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: In the hills north of Hillsboro WV
Posts: 1,048
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I'm posting here a discussion that I'm having somewhere else. If I can get consensus on principles for action with respect to Christianity, I can use them as principles for action for WN. Here's my latest contribution.

Quote:
I think some might be missing the point. One can forgive an offense or an injury. But those are not the kinds of things I was speaking of.

I was referring, rather, to incorrect religious beliefs of the kind that can send a soul to Hell. As the saying goes, "Hate the sin, but love the sinner," however, and more to the point, "Love the sinner, perhaps, but certainly do hate the sin. Don't forget to hate the sin!"

It is not kindness, from a Christian perspective, to tolerate incorrect religious beliefs. The idea that there's some sort of back door to Heaven, by which non-Christians may enter without accepting Salvation by Jesus, is an example of an incorrect religious belief that can damn anyone who believes it to Hell. According to Jesus Himself, no one comes to God, except through Jesus. Christianity is most definitely a "One Way" religion. Tolerating error of this kind is like tolerating a belief in children that playing dodge-the-train at a railroad crossing is great fun.

It is, rather, intolerance that shows the greater love. And since eternity hereafter is so much more important than life on Earth here-and-now, it follows that forcible conversion to the true faith is less callous than pretending not to know what's going to happen to those heretics if they don't get right in their faith. Hell is called Hell for a reason: the suffering that souls will endure there is so much worse than anything man can do to man that any action required to destroy false belief is, at least, morally justified.

What would Jesus think, if you failed to administer a spanking to a child who, after narrowly evading a train down at the railroad crossing, bragged of his exploit? Better a millstone were tied to your neck and that you were thrown into the sea, than face His anger! (Mark 9:42-49, Luke 17:1-4.) It's not a question of whether you will or won't forgive someone for offending or injuring you. The question is whether you will or won't try to keep him out of Hell.

It seems to me that the attitude of the Church a thousand years ago had much logic to it.