Wednesday, November 13, 2002
Are You a Christian?
An easy question maybe, of course you say because you believe in god and that's more or less all we expect in this day in age. This wasn't always the case and in the past, being a Christian meant unquestioned belief in certain dogmas of whatever religion you wanted to be tied to. For instance, and I'm picking on Catholics only because I would've once identified as such, a friend of mine professed to be of the Catholic faith. Many people I know do the same. But of course, they no more accept the teachings and doctrines of the Catholic church than this here atheist would. Of course, if the church held all self-professing Catholics up to a doctrine microscope it wouldn't have very many followers though would it. Most people's faith is more of a personal belief these days and not necessarily tied to an exact religion. I would think, for a majority of people, the reason they would call themselves Catholic for instance, is because their parents told them so. I take this as further proof of a gradual move away from religion. It will be more diffcult for the children of such people to identify with a particular religion if they in fact hold to one at all.
An easy question maybe, of course you say because you believe in god and that's more or less all we expect in this day in age. This wasn't always the case and in the past, being a Christian meant unquestioned belief in certain dogmas of whatever religion you wanted to be tied to. For instance, and I'm picking on Catholics only because I would've once identified as such, a friend of mine professed to be of the Catholic faith. Many people I know do the same. But of course, they no more accept the teachings and doctrines of the Catholic church than this here atheist would. Of course, if the church held all self-professing Catholics up to a doctrine microscope it wouldn't have very many followers though would it. Most people's faith is more of a personal belief these days and not necessarily tied to an exact religion. I would think, for a majority of people, the reason they would call themselves Catholic for instance, is because their parents told them so. I take this as further proof of a gradual move away from religion. It will be more diffcult for the children of such people to identify with a particular religion if they in fact hold to one at all.
