the end of the church in nigh, thank god!
church is just a place where people meet. but i think it would be smart to drop the religion, as that is just a farce.
the moment one becomes "saved", one has set up ones self upon a sandcastle on the foreshore. i.e., no intantaneous transformation occurs at that moment and the now saved sinner is still just as succeptabe to all the sinful habits acquired, just as much as a non saved person.
this gives the ego of the christian an excuse to sin (do wrong) and the illusion of not feeling as convicted when ignoring the unction of the conscience, because it (the ego or self with a small s) now believes that it is impossible or virtually impossible to become unsaved.
let's say i am saved and i tell a lie to someone i will never see again. I am not worried (technically) about my salvation, as i believe that that is guaranteed, but i still confess my sin to god (perhaps via some preist) and ask for forgiveness.
how stupid is that? why not just ditch the saved bit and exchange it for the more practical way of acknowledging the conviction of the conscience (the real Self, perhaps) as it is revealed. That way one becomes responsible to one's self and accepts the responsibility of being one's own judge. Thus the repressive force of the church dogma is renderd impotent to that particular individual. When one accepts the reality of the Self, shackles and stocks are unlocked, and perhaps a taste of genuine freedom occurs.
No god is going to save anyone from hell (suffering), that will only come by practicing detachment from the false self.
Imagine if there is a heaven and when a saved person dies they are transformed intantaneously in to a sinless state forever. That would mean that "God" forces that person into a perfect being, in many cases against the will of the persons illusory self. That doesn't happen when someone becomes saved and I feel I can reasonably extrapolate that into the above situation.
christians generally appear to focus more on JC than his teachings.
I don't think JC would encourge people to look upon him as a saviour. Rather, I think he taught people how to save themselves.
The jews and the christians both miss the punch line.
