Hey FrGamble!

Quote: FrGamble

Where did you get that quote? Romans chapter 5: 12-21.

Jesus had no idea OS even existed,
it was invented after he died.

"Paul believed that Adam's transgression in a mysterious way affected the nature of the human race. The primeval sin was a Pauline creation with no biblical or post-biblical Jewish precedent." Vermes, Geza (2012). Christian Beginnings from Nazareth to Nicea. Allen Lane, Penguin Books. p. 100.

Augustine developed OS a
few centuries later. It's a
contrived concept that has
no Biblical precedent that
would have been unknown
to Jesus. When I discovered
this in the Xtian group, I was
told to stop asking so many
questions and just accept
everything as presented.
Jesus died for Original Sin at
that is that.

Quote: FrGamble

Please tell me what questions you are asking to believe that the universe has always existed without a cause?

Where did universe that all the
galaxies exist in come from? It
didn't 'come' from anywhere,
it's always been here.

Quote:

see a creation and think there must be a creator

See what you're doing? You skip
the important step of proving
the universe, the place that
billions of galaxies exist in, is
a creation. Things are easy when
you assume instead of investigate.

How did Jesus die for Original
Sin when it hadn't even been
invented yet.

http://diversitytomorrow.com/thread/1454/139/#post146055

Quote: Evenbob

How did Jesus die for Original
Sin when it hadn't even been
invented yet.

http://diversitytomorrow.com/thread/1454/139/#post146055

Jesus had absolutely no idea what
OS was, let alone dying for it.
This is why religious leaders often
dodge the question. 'Jesus Saves'
literally meant Jesus save us from
original sin when the saying was
made popular in the 1920's. Now
the myth means he saves us from
all the times we did wrong when we
knew we should do right? Big deal,
who cares. You alter your whole
life for that? Really?

My favorite Zen story is, one day the master is being
chased by a tiger. He throws himself over a cliff to
save himself from being eaten. He grabs a vine near
the top and is hanging by one arm. Certain death in
the form of the tiger is above him, certain death at
the bottom of the cliff below him. He sees a strawberry
growing on the side of the cliff just a few inches away.
He eats it and marvels at how sweet it is.

The point of this fable is to show the master was
so attuned to living in the eternal moment, not
even his certain demise threw him off track. He
could still appreciate the sweet flavor and enjoy
eating a strawberry.

Another good story is, two monks we're talking. The first
Monk is bragging about the miracles his master could
do. The second monk said my master can do miracles also.
When he eats he eats, when he chops wood he chops wood.

Meaning when he eats, that's all he's doing, all his thoughts
and concentration is on his food. Or on the wood chopping.
He's totally in the eternal moment no matter what he's doing.

He's not worrying if he's pleasing some God, what's going
to happen after he dies, what's going to happen next week.
He truly lives his life always in the present moment. 50 years
ago a zen master wrote a book called Be Here Now.
The title says everything.

Just finished re-reading "Siddhatha" by Hermann Hesse. What a great book, have you read it?

Quote: FrGamble

Just finished re-reading "Siddhatha" by Hermann Hesse. What a great book, have you read it?

In 1969 and 1970 I read every book Hermann
Hesse wrote. I much preferred Steppenwolf or
Narcissus and Goldmund over Siddhartha.
The thing you have to realize when reading
Hesse is, he was born into a rabidly pious
Xtian family in the 1870's. He hated his
father so much he often day dreamed of
murdering him.
Hesse was sent to a Lutheran monastery
when he was 14 to make him a minister.
He so violently rebelled against this he
was for a time committed to an insane
asylum.
I probably loved Siddhartha the first
time I read it. But later when I read
it again, I realized he was confusing
objective reality with wishful thinking
and the book was obviously his
rebellion against Xtianity, which he
hated.
Hesse was extremely popular in the
60's, he had a cult following. That's
where I heard of him, in college.
I was so young and ignorant..

Hermann Hesse said about his parents,
"their Christianity, one not preached but lived, was the strongest of the powers that shaped and moulded me."

I think you might be misinformed about his opinions on Christianity.

Quote: FrGamble

Hermann Hesse said about his parents,
"their Christianity, one not preached but lived, was the strongest of the powers that shaped and moulded me."

I think you might be misinformed about his opinions on Christianity.

It shaped and moulded him into something
else.

"He was born into a Protestant-Pietist family of missionaries, preachers and theologians against whose rigour and severity he soon rebelled. His father's attempt to use religious education to break Hermann's self-willed nature caused the boy to feel increasingly estranged from Christianity.. His later work, Das Glasperlenspiel, bears literary testimony to this lifelong search for a God. Hesse believed in a "religion outside, between and above confessions, which is indestructible." He always took a very skeptical view of dogmas and teachings. "I believe one religion is as good as the other,"
Hesse's concept of 'god' was based on individual discovery, and not on pat statements from traditional or organized religions."

Hesse searched for a god
all his life and never found
one. How could he. If you
truly look you will always
come up with nothing.

He did find God. You will too someday.