ThomasM is offline ThomasM Post #1  May 19,2010, 8:57pm
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Notyet closed the sigh thread. I can understand his POV. Below is from a thread I posted last December. Perhaps it is time to revisit it after the rather heated discussion in sigh.

Karen Armstrong: Let's revive the Golden Rule | Video on TED.com

Above is a link to a 10 minute video by Karen Armstrong. Karen Armstrong is a former Catholic nun. She said, "All the great traditions are saying the same thing in much the same way, despite their surface differences." They each have in common an emphasis on the transcendent importance of compassion as epitomized in the Golden Rule.

Karen Armstrong talks about "the centrality of compassion in all the world's faiths." She says that, if we could implement the golden rule globally, people could live together in peace.

Religion is often seen as part of the problem. Ms. Armstrong said that we can go on emphasizing the dogmatic and intolerant aspects of our faith, or we go back to the teachings of Rabbi Hillel, an earlier contemporary of Jesus, who said: That which is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the Torah. The rest is commentary.

From Ms. Armstrong: This is the source of all morality - this imaginative act of empathy - putting yourself in the place of another.
 
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sweetdestiny24 is offline sweetdestiny24 Post #2  May 20,2010, 6:47am
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hi thomas, ty for your message, nice to meet you!! i’m glad that alan closed the "sigh" thread, it got out of hand, it’s unfortunate that words can be misconstrued so easily or that truth can be manipulated, but i understand why and how that happens...

i viewed the karen armstrong video, she has some great points, her compassion teaching is in line with what Jesus taught when He said “love others as yourself”…this is a wonderful thought, very altruistic and noble and what we as humans are called to do…however, as a follower of the teachings of Jesus Christ, i personally cannot ascribe to believing that we can be one, happy global family simply by being compassionae and by embracing many different ways to God, because then why would Jesus come and then need to die as the price for us to have relationship with God?? what purpose would His death serve if it wasn't necessary to bring us into relationship with God?? if not for Jesus, we could have just considered ourselves good, compassionate people and just been good people and followed the ways of any religion or just all did our own thing and measured the way we treat others by the way we treat ourselves (which isn't always good), right??
in my view and in the view of most Christians, Jesus Christ is the ultimate example of compassion, and He is the ultimate example of how we should love ourselves and love others...He loved all people with the love of the Father (Holy Spirit) that was in Him, that is where He drew love/compassion from and where we are to draw love/compassion from...but Jesus also did not tolerate anyone being opposed to what the Father sent Him to do...He firmly but lovingly stated that He was sent by God the Father to bring all people into relationship with God the Father through belief in His life and then His death on the cross...He clearly stated that "His blood" was the sacrifice for the washing away of our sins/transgressions so we may be spiritually purified and able to connect with God, who is Spirit, all pure and holy, and that once in relationship with God, it would be God‘s love (compassion included) that we can extend to others…we as humans are insufficient on our own to be that good, loving or compassionate...

many then and many now believe we can be in relationship with God just by being "good" or in karen armstrong's case "compassionate"...the actions of compassion, in God’s view, are to be a direct result of our faith in Him, they are not to stand alone so that we can get accolades, wait for a reward in return or even just to consider ourselves good people…the Word clearly states that “faith without actions” is dead…but the faith (in God through Jesus) is to precede and be the foundation for the actions of love we show others…through our relationship with God, we should daily be growing in love for all people no matter what their race/gender/age/religion, but that doesn‘t mean we should compromise the price paid by God and Jesus for us to do so…it means love all people, extend compassion to all people, but speak the truth of the Word of God in love to all people...when they receive it God will water the seed planted, when they don‘t, unless God directs us to do otherwise and stay, we need to wipe the dust from our feet and move on to tell others about the great and wonderful gift of love available to them through knowing Jesus…J
 
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ThomasM is offline ThomasM Post #3  May 20,2010, 8:09am
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SD,

You have well articulated a point of view shared by many within the Christian faith. Once again, I am going to bring forward something that I posted earlier. This is a video of Rev. Billy Graham giving a very broad definition to "the body of Christ." Perhaps the implications you found in from the Karen Armstrong thread are more directly set out by Rev. Graham.

========================

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNCnxA91fHE

Rev. Billy Graham was asked about the future of Christianity, and he responded with a very broad definition about who is included in the body of Christ. Here are his words from the video. The one minute video is linked above.

[COLOR=blue][FONT=Arial]I think everybody who loves Christ or knows Christ, whether they are conscious of it or not, they are members of the body of Christ, and that is what God is doing today. He is calling people out of the world for his name, whether they come from the Muslim world or the Buddhist world or the Christian world or the non-believing world, they are members of the body of Christ because they have been called by God.
Last edited by ThomasM; May 20,2010 at 8:11am.
 
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deistdreamer is offline deistdreamer Post #4  May 20,2010, 8:14am
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ThomasM wrote :
Notyet closed the sigh thread. I can understand his POV. Below is from a thread I posted last December. Perhaps it is time to revisit it after the rather heated discussion in sigh.

Karen Armstrong: Let's revive the Golden Rule | Video on TED.com

Above is a link to a 10 minute video by Karen Armstrong. Karen Armstrong is a former Catholic nun. She said, "All the great traditions are saying the same thing in much the same way, despite their surface differences." They each have in common an emphasis on the transcendent importance of compassion as epitomized in the Golden Rule.

Karen Armstrong talks about "the centrality of compassion in all the world's faiths." She says that, if we could implement the golden rule globally, people could live together in peace.

Religion is often seen as part of the problem. Ms. Armstrong said that we can go on emphasizing the dogmatic and intolerant aspects of our faith, or we go back to the teachings of Rabbi Hillel, an earlier contemporary of Jesus, who said: That which is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the Torah. The rest is commentary.

From Ms. Armstrong: This is the source of all morality - this imaginative act of empathy - putting yourself in the place of another.
I have read, I think, every Karen Armstrong book. I am very much a fan of her thinking. I once attended a lecture she gave and briefly got the chance to talk to her. She has a fine mind and a good grasp on the core teachings of all the world's religion.

In A Case For God she argues that Christianity (gasp) was never simply about some simplistic assent to this or that creed or teachings about Jesus the Christ. One practiced being a Christian by imitating, in effect, Jesus the Christ.

Words are cheap which is probably why so many prefer to reduce Christianity to mouthing a few pious formulas and promoting a kind of tired old set of teachings on sexual purity and how to best manage your household slaves while waiting for the world to end.

The less on says about what is God and what God wants the better she argues since no one really could possibly know God. To claim knowledge of God is to claim oneness with God and to do so is blasphemous. We are not God What we need do is follow the path of compassion and by doing so in effect have our being in the Way God revealed.

Is this open to people of other faiths? Yes, assuming Jesus was right one need not mouth platitudes about Jesus in order to believe on him. Be compassionate is what Jesus taught. Love God. Be nice to each other. Feed each other. Clothe each other. Forgive each other. Stop being moralistic hypocrites. Forget about the sins you see in your neighbors. Worry if you must about your own sins.

Christianity is about doing not believing and doing is encapsulated in the Golden Rule.

Peace
 
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deistdreamer is offline deistdreamer Post #5  May 20,2010, 8:21am
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I started a thread giving my response to the closure of sigh, but it is being modded so I am not sure it will be published.

But for now let me say this:


| regret that Alan felt the need to close the thread. I think it was a hasty and wrong decision. But he is the boss. In my opinion, I think what scared him was that the discussion was honest and forthright. These are generally viewed as virtues in most arenas we frequent. But when talking of the Bible or God, honesty and forthrightness are considered dangerous.

Given that Alan has often said CS is akin to an open air meeting of believers and non believers, faithful and skeptics, true believers and doubters, I found it surprising that a little disagreement would lead him to close down the park, to stifle a free exchanges of ideas.

I think Alan needs to rethink what he wants from this site. If all he really wants is a bunch of genuflecting God believing church believing bible thumpers to sing the praises of the made in America God then he should say so. Because at this point he is giving mixed messages: promoter of free speech and the right to disagree with self appointed God experts on the one hand and shutting down the one thread where this took place.

Either be tolerant of free exchanges of ideas and accept that a few feathers may get ruffled in the exchange or play it safe and allow only those who follow your party line the right to speak.
 
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deistdreamer is offline deistdreamer Post #6  May 20,2010, 9:25am
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[QUOTE=ThomasM;985312]SD,

You have well articulated a point of view shared by many within the Christian faith. Once again, I am going to bring forward something that I posted earlier. This is a video of Rev. Billy Graham giving a very broad definition to "the body of Christ." Perhaps the implications you found in from the Karen Armstrong thread are more directly set out by Rev. Graham.

========================

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNCnxA91fHE

Rev. Billy Graham was asked about the future of Christianity, and he responded with a very broad definition about who is included in the body of Christ. Here are his words from the video. The one minute video is linked above.

[COLOR=blue][FONT=Arial]I think everybody who loves Christ or knows Christ, whether they are conscious of it or not, they are members of the body of Christ, and that is what God is doing today. He is calling people out of the world for his name, whether they come from the Muslim world or the Buddhist world or the Christian world or the non-believing world, they are members of the body of Christ because they have been called by God.
Last edited by deistdreamer; May 20,2010 at 9:33am.
 
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ThomasM is offline ThomasM Post #7  May 20,2010, 10:08am
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(I hope that we direct our attention in this thread to my opening post rather than begin a debate on whether or not the sigh thread should have been closed.)

About twenty years ago, I spent a year backpacking around the world. I came to appreciate the humanity of people in diverse cultures and religions. That made me all the more comfortable with the views of Rev. Graham that he expressed in the video.

When I was in Nepal, I spent some time at a Buddhist monestary. I found that they had the books in their library divided into 5 levels of thought. The first level, I found similar to doctrines found within fundamentalist Christianity. As I looked at books in the other levels, I found increasingly abstract thoughts and concepts.

These differing yet similar ways of presenting the subject seem to be within various religious traditions. We all see on the news the Muslim fundamentalists and their actions. Within that tradition, there is other more abstract thinking. I was looking on the internet for definitions of "transcendent reality." I came across the following which appears to be from an author within the Muslim faith.


Reflections

Transcendent Reality is a spiritual state which is experienced by the inner-self. It represents the real awareness of the “Nafs-soul” during a higher level of consciousness. Rare moments of self-possession.
And it is a state of perception and awareness of the cosmos. Such awareness is as a result of tranquility of the thought process; the state of equilibrium of the inner-self, for it is an experience of the state of the manifestation of absoluteness. It is a triumphant moment of the reality of Nafs in reaching realization of the cosmos.

It is the “Nafs-soul” being conscious of a higher Reality which is other than itself; of a different station of existence.
In that station, this transcendent Reality is perceived by the Nafs and it may be defined differently, for every lover gives a different definition; having different experience of this station; the station of the Beloved;

Buddha calls it Emptiness.
Al-Halaj calls it “Al-Haq”
Jesus calls it “the Father”
Sufi’s call it the “Beloved”

All of these pure souls define their intimacy, with the Beloved in their own way and experiences, for the Beloved give them different tokens of love.

But All of them are aware that they are gazing at the “One”
they are gazing at the Absolute.

All lovers are burnt by the same Fire of the “One”
For it is unique and incomparable to anything else but itself.
The Nafs, in this state, never seen anything like it; no previous model; no prior experience;
so the Nafs get bewildered; drunken and thinks it is “Emptiness”

For it is the Nafs’ way to self-realization.
So Transcendence- Emptiness- is a definition of that state, in relationship to the intellect and such state is perceived by the “intellect”

but at the same time, such station of “Emptiness” is defined as “fullness” in relationship to itself, for there is nothing really exists except the Majesty of the Absolute.

So “Fullness” is a manifestation of the Glory of Allah;
is a manifestation of the “Truth:-Al-‘Haq” and the Splendor of the Beloved, where “Al-Haq” is the essential fabric of existence and everything is swimming in it.

Katib
Posted in Islam, Mysticism, Reflections, Sufism

« Ali was not a Shi’a nor was Umar a Sunni Part-VI
Jesus and his Son hood to God »


http://katib.wordpress.com/2007/05/03/transcendence-reality/
 
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cardguy is offline cardguy Post #8  May 20,2010, 12:48pm
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deistdreamer wrote :
Billy Graham was once a much beloved figure in the born again sects. But recently this constituency are busily condemning him to Hell. There is no way that anyone in this constituency wishes to share their Jesus with the unwashed. It is their way or Hell. Legions of bible waving born again Christians are beside themselves with ill disguised glee at what will happen to Billy Graham when God gets His hands on him.

In case anyone thinks I am over stating the case--do your own research-- take a peek at those videos on you tube that go on and on about how Billy Graham will be tortured forever for his inclusiveness. Read the comments from the bearers of the Good News. But warning you may not want to do it on a full stomach. It is pretty sickening stuff...

But again do your own research. Watch Billy Graham. Watch what his former Christian friends have to say about him. Read what they think will await this man for daring to imagine a Jesus beyond Christianity.

Best of all take the time to read the Bible for yourselves and don't let anyone tell you what it is supposed to mean. Decide for yourself whether you think Billy Graham deserves to be tortured forever for re imagining what it means to believe on Jesus the Christ. Don't take my word for it. Don't take the word of any one who claims to speak for God. Don't even follow the men in the reverse collars.

Do you or do you not think Billy Graham deserves to be tortured forever? Do you or do you not think his ideas about Jesus the Christ are truly unbiblcal.
Now that you've told me how I feel about Billy Graham, could you cite your sources?
 
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deistdreamer is offline deistdreamer Post #9  May 20,2010, 12:54pm
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cardguy wrote :
Now that you've told me how I feel about Billy Graham, could you cite your sources?
Please cite where I said anything about you?
 
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cardguy is offline cardguy Post #10  May 20,2010, 12:55pm
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I would consider myself "born again". You proceeded to make many blanket statements about what born again people believe about Billy Graham without any explanation for those statements. So I wonder: on what are those conclusions based?
 
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