Christians are better people?

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Examples, please.

 

Or one could also rewrite this rhetoric as:

The uncomfortable thing about both of these statements is how they unjustly imply that someone who holds either of the above stands is morally equivalent to a cannibal or a slavemaster. Such ugly rhetoric is not really necessary to make either of the arguments, I think.

What we haven't talked about behind the Christian anti-abortion stance is the extent to which it relies on the dualistic idea of an eternal human soul. If I were to believe that God united soul and body at the moment of conception, then I would be against abortion. This is not to mention the idea that such "souls" are supposed to be given a choice during the course of their natural life that would determine their fate after death. But given that I take the (far more reasonable IMO) non-dualist position that human consciousness emerges gradually out of a neural net as it grows in complexity, and that when the body dies, consciousness ends, then it's far more easy for me, for example, to view a foetus in its first trimester as a collection of cells that does not yet possess "humanness." I do not believe that this makes me nihilistic, nor does it make me care less about my fellow man. In fact, I think you will find that secular governments have a far better record of protecting "human rights" than have religious ones. At the same time, I might tend to resent those who would enforce their dualistic views on me in attacking my civil liberties.

 

Crusades, holy inquisition, christianization of whole populations by force, collaboration with oppresive regimes, destruction of non-christian cultures etc.

 

And slavery with the Bible in their hands.

Christians have done many bad things to the world, they still do, and it will allways be like that. But I don't know wether I would call them Christians or people who use god for their own good. Someone who knows just a litle about Gods intentions, should know better.

 

When an act is evil, motives don't change the evilness of the act. This means that a kill is always a kill. From that there is no exception based on... yeah, things people say to justify themselves.

From a different perspective, a tribal shaman who offers human sacrifice of captives from other tribes, might be offended by suggesting that he's equivalent to someone practicing abortion, which is done on own children and not on enemies captured at war.

Similarly, the slavemaster might also be offended by the comparison. Let's say, he believes slaves not to be fully human. Abortion doesn't make difference between slaves and slave owners, so it would include the "full humans", i.e. the freeborn as well. And here he could oppose.

See? Everyone looks from a different perspective and there is an infinite number of such perspectives. Does it make the very fact of a spark of life being extinguished something relative?

If someone does a wrongful act but calls it a different name, does he merit a different treatment?

Same as I don't believe that any race is superior or that a human can be owned by another human, I can't condone the usurpation of life and death authority over unborn children. No matter the name it's called, no matter what kind of rhetoric is supplied, there was a child and now there's none. That can't be changed with words.

That was done, yes. But in what way was it in accordance with the moral code? If a citizen of Whateverland breaks its laws and commits a crime, is the law of Whateverland, with which the act is inconsistent, the real culprit to blame?

Those were horrible crimes in most cases, but they were against the moral code, not in line with it.

 

This debate is starting to get to a key issue ... is there an objective moral standard? The answer to that question, from a Christian point of view, makes or breaks an ethical system.

If there is no objective standard, then we can post until our fingers fall off and never make a difference. If there is an objective standard, then we can talk.

I know Christians have not followed the Bible very well. The Crusades, slavery, witch hunts ... we've done very bad things.

To address this matter from a purely sociological standpoint, we'd have to say that Christians are slightly better, but not much. Look at the Barna Group (http://www.barna.org/), an evangelical polling and research organization. It has surveys that show that Christian's divorce rate is not much different than non-Christian. Similar results can be found in work ethics, marital faithfulness and child rearing.

What gives me hope, however, is that we do have that external code that is able to be internalized by the Spirit of God. When we are born again the Law of God is written on our hearts, enabling us to follow it. Before new-birth we are non-passe non-pecarre (excuse poor latin) not-able to not sin. With the gift of new birth, wear passe non-pecarre, or able to not-sin. The gift of the Spirit and the reality of the Law gives us hope for revival, reform and repentance.

 

Then who does follow the moral code? Not the so called holy men who are molesting young boys throughout america. It's probably the average Joe who follows it, which can be good. Yet I bet he could have figured them out without Christianity. The problem probably with christianity is that the entire 'organization' of christianity is/was too big and too powerful. With grandness and money comes power and responsibility yet many did not see that and went their own way.

I have a very important question to all christians on the board:

How many and which morals do you follow that come straight out of christianity?

 

Is it morality that separates the Christian from practioners of other religions, or the belief in being saved? Personally, I find the assumption that Christians are better than other religious folk to be offensive. If you want to debate the moral difference between someone with a religious upbringing and someone without, then we can talk.

 

There's no such thing as which or how many. There's no such thing as a finite number of Christian morals. It's not about laws, it's about love. Morals don't exist for their own sake in Christianity. God isn't a Bible thumper. Christian morality needs to be lived rather than obeyed. I try to follow it, without making exceptions for things that aren't convenient to me. I'm no saint, but I keep trying.

Yeah, it disturbs me a lot.

 

My opinion of Christians can't be stated, as it would be a violation of forum-rules. This opinion was formed through personal experience. I've seen what they did and how they defended themselves and I've seen some of them going to the place they belong, and that's jail. According to this experience, that of course is purely anectotical, I will never ever trust no one, who's claiming to be christian. Never ever. Particularly form the evangelic and reformed branch. Never ever. My opinion of Catholics is actually a tad bit higher, as I've seen Catholics do some good. But to me, prostestants are baby****ing scum. And that's what some did. And I've seen the preacher of the church I used to have to go to, defending it. I've seen lots of protestants defending the raping of his daughter. They even influenced judges with their "his a good christian". And it took the federal court to get that ******* into jail, because all the biggest-part of the church-going flock joined together to defend him and blame his victims. To me, they are the lowest of all scum. And I am happy to not be any longer connected to them in any way.

 

Of course, this is begging the question, as is using the term "unborn children" in place of "foetus." I would not grant you that a foetus in its first trimester is a child, nor would I grant that it contains a "spark" of human consciousness. Again, this rhetoric is based a priori on a dualistic view of the world. Consciousness is not a "spark" which is either present or absent; it is something which emerges from a critical amount of neural activity. This neural activity takes time to develop, and it certainly isn't present at the moment of conception. That is, not unless you hold a dualistic view, that the soul pre-exists the body and continues to exist after the death of the body, and is somehow attendant to the body without actually being part of it. It's simply impossible for me to imagine that the zygote, or fertilized egg formed at the moment of conception, has consciousness, let alone a soul. Absolutely no relativism is needed for me to maintain this position. However, if by not being a mind-body dualist, I automatically qualify as a "relativist," then it's hard for me to imagine that we can establish the terms within which to have a debate on this issue.

 

I think that is something which I find almost a bit amusing. Christians, especially conservative ones can go to great lenghts to forgive and explain crimes committed by one in their own flock but if it is a stranger the attitude seems to be: "Send him to the chair!".

 

I don't think there is a word to describe this. So I'll make up a term. How about generalized religious exceptionalism?

This differs from say, just gross generalizations like Iago mentioned. I also find it amusing that he said he couldn't state his opinion based on forum rules, and then stated his opinion anyway...

 

This is nonsense. Christians are not better people than atheïst or whatever. But sometimes society treats them better. There are a lot of things wrong with society so, just ignore the statement.

 

Joc ... if anything we are harder on our own. Just ask Jim Baker's son who was completely alienated after his father fell.

As to this being offensive ... that's what Christians are supposed to do. We are an offensive religion, really.

But, for the terms of this debate, it might be better to ask the question, "Does Religion Make You A Better Person?" Would that be less offensive Rally?

 

I can only speak of my own experience and from what I hear in the media. Just look at the Catholic church treatment of their errant priests. However, from what little I know of christianity so is this approach the "christian" one. Forgiveness and understanding is something I have been told are central tenets of faith.

 

I think that most of this debate is hampered by our ever-present flaw of Over Generalisation. As has been said many many many times before: there are lots of good and bad religious people and lots of good and bad non-religious people. That's all I have to say on the matter (for now).

 

Harbourboy ... that's why I like you ... you are *always* right (just to be clear, that was a joke on the over-generalization thing ... hb has a great point)

 

@Chevalier

The moral code, the law if you like, is always defined by the official church of each doctrine and therefore all of the these actions were in line with official moral code of their time. The moral code was "liberate the holy lands and your sins will be forgiven", the moral code was "make the witch confess and save her soul", the moral code was "these infidels natives must believe to the one true god in order their soul to be saved and this must be done with every possible way". If these actions were not in line with the moral code, why did church nominate saints people like the emperor Theodosius I?

 

Having religion, whether Christian or otherwise, does not automatically make one a better person. Suicide bombers and head choppers are religious zealots. Many "good" Christians have used the beating of a large, heavy bible to justify racism, sexism and various forms of immorality. Various Church authorities through the big mural of time have been guilty of heinous crimes...

Ethnic Cleansing, anyone?

But it doesn't change the fact that a properly understood, applied and lived moral code derived from religous humility can and will make one a better person than they could have been secularly.