To Don, about sin.

If a person truly wants to find out what unconditional love is, they'll need to grow beyond the concept of sin.

Why do some people do bad things, while others don't?

If it is because they were created less good than others, you can hardly blame them.

If their life experiences conditioned them to be negative minded, for example an abused and unloved child, you can hardly blame them.

Some people might argue that despite what people are exposed to they still have complete freedom to choose the right way, as if supreme wisdom and love is imediately available to them.

Eventhough supreme love and wisdom are always there, sometimes, for various reasons,  people get separated from it and it often takes them time to get back to the point where they can tune into love and wisdom.

When I see people who do terrible things I don't feel judgment towards them.  Rather, I feel fortunate that I don't have go through the difficulty they're going to have to go through before they become free enough to find true wisdom, happiness, peace and love.

If I can feel nonjugmental towards people, then certainly God and Jesus who are more wise and loving than me, can be nonjudgmental towards them. To an extent where they would never think of people as sinners that ought be damned, as opposed to helped.

We aren't really separate from each other.  Therefore, in a deeper sense when somebody else does something considered negative, we all do something negative. The spirit of brotherhood is to help them see the error of their ways, not to judge and condem them, and lable them as sinners.

Consider a brand new baby. Does a baby think to itself, "Gee, how can I become a terrible person?" and then become one. Or is this unfortunately how some lives turn out?

If it were so easy to "not" become a person who does negative things, there wouldn't be so many people who do negative things.

The true spirit of love and wisdom is to understand that some Souls get lost for a while, and need time and help so that eventually all souls can find their way to true happiness and love.

If you're going to set things up so that people have to deal with the opposites of good and bad, then you have to expect that some people are going to get lost for a while. The fact of how alot of people do get lost proves that this is so.

Hi Don,

Your attempt to presume that I require syntatic tutoring from you in order to make my self clear and understandable makes me smile. I suppose if I substitute 'are' for 'were' that would less offend your tender academic mind?
Please, I was not writing a thesis there. My language and structure was purely colloquial, and served to place emphasis upon the point I made.
The logical equivalence of the structural syntax of the separate sentences you formulate - 'no S are P' and 'all S are P' posit unequal meanings. The first denies the second (or vice versa).
However, the structure used for the original sentence I wrote offered no other alternative meaning than that that was intended for it to convey. It simply posited the improbability of Mary Magdalene being Jesus' aunt, and for economy, the use of the parenthesis was to set up the identification (in the paragraph following) of the three females disparate sources have identified as Mary Magadalene. It may have been unsound structurally, but the contradiction was resolved in the next paragraph. The intended meaning was successfully conveyed. Your response with belittlement was truly academic and redundant.

Regarding your own self-contradictory statement, and whereas mine own resolves itself, yours does not. The meaning you intended to convey - 'platonic' as opposed to 'romantic' - is not successfully conveyed. You used the term 'lovers' not 'friends', and thus by any stretch of one's imagination, 'lovers' always carries the meaning of romance, not simply friendship. Thus your meaning is self-contradictory, even if the sentence is sound structurally.

Regarding the issue of sin. I maintain my stance. Sin has no existential reality of its own. It is relationally equal with man in the same terms as his history, they both arise out of his actions, out of what he does, how he behaves. Becoming cognizant of this, is the beginning of accepting one's self-responsibility for one's actions: you cannot repent until you do this.
The dogma and doctrine of institutionalised religion would have us believe that the Devil would tempt us into sin, and in sinning, and in being unrepentant, God would condemn us to eternal hell-fire and dammnation.
Fortunately, the reports from the experients of the NDE deny that this is so. Their emphasis for repentance is on 'self', and that it is not God that condemns us, but we ourselves, by not accepting self-responsibility for our own actions. This echoes quite clearly what Jesus is said to have taught as I have highlighted. Using the devil as the scapegoat for sin, is merely the non-acceptance of self-responsibility.

Regarding Nicea: the intimation is that the various disparate Christian sects holding to their own traditionally-held beliefs prior to Nicea, had to have discussed the issue of scripture prior to the convening. Nicea was to set up a universally-acceptable creed, that in itself requires a discussion on the 'interpretation' of scripture as held by the disparate groups. Most of the discussion would have taken place prior to Nicea, and associations would have been formed; it was almost a political process. Nicea was in total indifference to Jesus' adjuration that no other law be set upon His teachings than those He gave. The threat of being 'put to the sword', perhaps, held part of the persuasion in forgetting His adjuration?

Regarding the alleged personal attacks upon you...perhaps, you bring it upon yourself, although, that does not make it right. We can add pride to your (academic) ego, you sinful person, you!

Regards Don

Elysiumfire,

You have the misfortune of engaging a former Teaching Fellow in symbolic logic in dialogue, though logic was not my primary field.   The syntactical schematization in question was often stressed in our logic courses!  Of course, symbolic logic is not very practical.  So when I got a rare chance to reproduce such trivial quibbles, I couldn't resist.  

"lover": "a person who loves" (so Webster)!  
OK, I admit that "friend" would have been more clear.

Your own view of sin is a separate issue.  On this site, I have often engaged in debate on attempts to deny the good vs. evil polarity.   The important point here is that the historical Jesus believed in the reality of sin.

The scholarly consensus agrees that the shape of the New Testament canon was never discussed at Nicea or any early ecumenical council.  The issue was only debated in regional conferences.  I eagerly await your attempt to refute this consensus.  

The Bible and the early church imply that God's love never permanently abandons anyone after death.  Hell is self-chosen.  Universal salvation always remains a theoretical possibility, depending on the choices of those trapped in hellish planes.  Niether the Greek nor the Hebrew terms translated "etermal" mean that!   They mean "an indefinitely long period."  In fact, early Christianity is the literary origin of the doctrine of soul retrievals from lower planes.  I have created long threads on this board defending all these claims in great detail.

Don

forgive me for butting in...Elysiumfire but I must make comment that i have just met you. I hope you will not be embarrassed that I say your response to Don is elequently worded..for I myself have never been able to engage him at all.

the way you talk makes me want to throw my book away and begin all over....

oh please god, no more editing. I see we are in off topic thread..good. I can therefore say whatever I want.

AND THE GRAND ADVENTURE JUST KEEPS GOING!!! YEEEAAAAA!!!!!

Beserk you are like a Zealtor on a quest!

  Ya know, i happen to believe in aliens collecting jokes from our little ole system, or in advanced technology from a lost civilization.

  I take Monroe quite literally on these.   And there are other issues i disagree with Don about, and i rarely agree with his particular personal style, but at least Don isn't constantly saying how full of PUL he is, and then doing the very opposite of what p.U.l is.

  This is one of the things i like and respect about Spitfire, was his lack of hypocrisy.  Another person i didn't always agree with, and thought their people skills lacked, and our beliefs systems were quite different.

Alysia wrote, [quote]I suspect our esteemed patron Don enjoys drawing a crowd, especially when the administrator of this board is absent. and so I have no further comments and find this "off topic" thread to be appropriately named; off topic.

I am astounded that over the years Don's comments, scuse me, hello Don? your comments, questions, debates remain the same issues. is there a reason for this non-change? I am referring to Monroe's experience with joke collecting aliens. has it ever occured to you Don, that aliens might not know what a sense of humor is? That they might want to study humans for our emotions and differences? Surely you don't think aliens are going to be just like humans. I already know your own sense of humor is nearly absent, unless you are chuckling away to yourself right now as you have indeed a knack for stirring up things. too bad you can not stir up in a positive and heart warming way instead of pummeling others with your clever wit and perhaps less than sincere putdowns.

Kathy, I saw nothing wrong with your post to Don and you do not bully. you inform. and I might add much better than myself but I believe you waste your time and energy with Don.
I'm sorry, I believe any who talk with Don waste their time, because he's only going to find your weakness and then get you where it hurts the most. He's not here to be of service to you although he may occassionally toss you a generous tidbit and you will think he is kind. but don't take my word for it. find out for yourself. of course many love

even in the wrong of wrongs there is the truth. this is not for fancy saying, it is a fact when you are able to get to the deepest level in all that wrong.
so...very related..When PUL and oneness is mentioned along, i would hesitate to say what somebody feels is his/her responsility...or is gonna be a contradiction. if there is a man crying in a lonely desert in africa, it is likely that i personally am responsible of it in a way.this is not a random example. something is happening there? what is happening in africa? any news, thoughts?  one night right before sleep it almost seem obligatory that i must go to africa. i still wish it wasnt a literal obligation that i sont have to travel there?
and no..i true seeker would come to understand sooner or later that finding truth can not be related with letting your mind and soul be burried under the centuries old information. but well yes:), "how soon" would classify one as a a true skeer? i definetly do not know.