Easter Is Coming in 8 Weeks

Quote: FrGamble

I'm glad you don't have to be a Christian apologist to exaggerate and takes things out of proportion.

I'm glad I get to say this: "It's called satire. Look it up."

Quote: FrGamble

. It is the realness of Christianity that in my book makes it a real religion.

Too bad most of the 'realness' is unprovable.
Can't prove Mary was impregnated by god,
therefore can't prove Jesus was gods son.
Can't prove he performed any of the miracles,
can't even prove he rose from the dead.
He died on the cross, and even that is not unique.

Remember a show called Candid Camera? One bit
they had involved the narrator telling a short uncomplicated
story to a person. They in turn told it to someone
else. By the 5th telling, the story was unrecognizable
compared to the original.

Thats the NT in a nutshell. Stories passed down by word
of mouth and embellished upon countless times. When
they are finally put to paper, they are either distant
memories from eyewitnesses, or more likely hearsay from
endless stories. That the 'realness' of the NT.

The NT is the most attested ancient writing ever, period. There are thousands and thousands of manuscripts, papyri, and quotes using the NT from the early Church fathers. The earliest of these manuscripts date to circa 115 AD and many around 200 AD that means that much less than 100 years after the event of Jesus the events were written down. For comparison look to the The Jewish Was by Josephus in first century BC. We have about nine manuscripts of that work and only one in Latin is from the fourth century, the rest from the 10-12th century. For you to doubt the historicity of the NT is to ignore the facts and to go against the grain of universal modern scholarship on the Bible.

Quote: FrGamble

The NT is the most attested ancient writing ever, period. .

And so inaccurate it's caused books like
this to be written.

What Did Jesus Really Say?

"The Jesus Seminar, a group of scholars who have attempted to locate the authentic words of Jesus, made headlines two years ago by reporting that, of the entire Lord's Prayer as found in Matthew, the only words that could conclusively be attributed to Jesus are "Our Father." In this book they have published their results. This new translation of the four gospels, augmented by the noncanonical Gospel of Thomas, presents Jesus' words printed in colored code: red for words Jesus almost certainly spoke, pink for his probable locutions, gray for the less than likely, and black for the implausible."

Quote: Evenbob

And so inaccurate it's caused books like
this to be written.

The Bible is the most accurately attested books of the ancient world. I've read that if all the current copies of the Bible disappeared we could reconstruct the New Testament entirely from ancient manuscripts minus about 11 verses. Things like the Jesus Seminar are the translations you mentioned are more considered jokes with a serious agenda than true translations in Biblical scholarship.

Quote: FrGamble

Things like the Jesus Seminar are the translations you mentioned are more considered jokes .

The Church considers all things religious that
it doesn't personally approve of to be a joke.
And always has..

Quote: FrGamble

The NT is the most attested ancient writing ever, period. There are thousands and thousands of manuscripts, papyri, and quotes using the NT from the early Church fathers.

Haven't we settled that belief is not evidence, and that the popularity of a belief is not corroboration of the non-evidence?

You should come up with something better? I'll help you:

How does the quality of life of Christians compare to non-Christians? How about Catholics vs other denominations? How about Christians against non-Judeo-Christian religions?

That wouldn't prove there is a Jehovah on a throne somewhere, but at least you could show there is something of value in your belief.

Quote: Nareed

Haven't we settled that belief is not evidence, and that the popularity of a belief is not corroboration of the non-evidence?

My pointing out the amazing number of ancient manuscripts of the NT was to point out that the Scriptures as we have them today is the same as they had them in the early centuries of Christianity. The first Gospels were written a mere 30 or so years after the death of Jesus and some of Paul's letters were written even before that. There is no other ancient texts more attributed than the New Testament and none so closely connected to the events they describe.

Quote:

You should come up with something better? I'll help you:

How does the quality of life of Christians compare to non-Christians? How about Catholics vs other denominations? How about Christians against non-Judeo-Christian religions?

That wouldn't prove there is a Jehovah on a throne somewhere, but at least you could show there is something of value in your belief.

As we discussed in another thread who is going to be the judge of quality of life? You've already mentioned a life of service and sacrifice is repulsive to you, but the greatest source of happiness for me. It sounds like your help in the arguments for Christianity is even more subjective than the testimony of over a third of the world's population. As usual you are just trying to weaken the argument for Christ. I'm on to you. You once told me that if ever you seemed even remotely to be supporting religion I was mistaken - aha you almost got me with this one.

Now of course I believe that if we did look at the quality of life of Christians I think we would find find great value in the belief that God loves you, thinks you are wonderful with a supreme dignity that can never be lost, wants to be in a real relationship with you, and promises that your life has meaning, purpose, and an eternal happy ending.

Quote: FrGamble

My pointing out the amazing number of ancient manuscripts of the NT was to point out that the Scriptures as we have them today is the same as they had them in the early centuries of Christianity.

All your scripture are in classical Greek? Amazing.

Quote:

As we discussed in another thread who is going to be the judge of quality of life?

That can be measured: wealth, means, education, employment, satisfaction (a bit subjective), growth, etc.

Quote:

As usual you are just trying to weaken the argument for Christ.

As usual, too, the sun shines bright, water continues to be wet, dogs keep on barking and the sky remains blue.

Quote:

You once told me that if ever you seemed even remotely to be supporting religion I was mistaken - aha you almost got me with this one.

Measuring the effects of religion won't ever support religion.

But if you want to convince people there are benefits to religion, rather than it being just a collection of made-up, largely bizarre, beliefs(*) you have to start somewhere.

(*) For bizarre beliefs, no one beats the Maya. Some of their myths are thoroughly alien.

Quote: Nareed

But if you want to convince people there are benefits to religion, rather than it being just a collection of made-up, largely bizarre, beliefs(*) you have to start somewhere.

This is really the point of what the Church has been calling the, "New Evangelization". This is an effort to show that Christianity helps us to understand ourselves as this weird creature called a human being. We have all this freedom, an amazing intellect, and a desire to do good - yet at the same time we are weak often easily confused, with limited capacity to know things, and a temptation to be selfish. How do we make sense of figuring ourselves out? Even outside of the explicit beliefs, applying the concepts of Christianity in how to live your life bears great fruit in peace and happiness. As you say this might be a good place to start.