Hey everyone, I am a current seminary student, and I am in a class on apologetics. Our "paper" is to have a 3500 word written exchange with someone outside of the Christian faith. I would like to complete our discussion about this by Tuesday or Wednesday next week. We can discuss via email or just message back and forth on here through the conversation feature. I would be arguing for Christianity, and you would be arguing that Christianity is false.
Please only inquire about this if you have the time to do this extensive written discussion throughout the next five days. Thank you!
If I were to argue against Christianity, I would base that argument on the proposition that the religion calling itself Christianity does no reflect the teachings of Christ.
A couple of points to consider:
1. Jesus was a Jew, and he remained a Jew to the end. He did not preach against Judaism, nor did he preach a new form of Judaism. He even admonished his Jewish listeners to keep to their Judaic precepts, and rituals, and traditions.
He was not starting a new religion.
2. Jews both back then and even to this day are not evangelical. They did not and do not believe that anyone needs to become a Jew to know God or to be right with God. Jews believe that anyone can do this in their own way, such that there is no reason whatever that they would need to convert to Judaism, or to any other religion, or to any religion at all. And as a result, Jesus was preaching his spiritual message to all people: Jews, people of other religions, and the non-religious, alike. Not to convert them, but simply to inform them.
3. The message of Christ is both a revelation and a promise to all mankind. The revelation being that ALL human beings have the divine spirit of God within them, as they (we) are all God's 'offspring'. That spirit being the spirit of love, forgiveness, kindness, and generosity. Also a spirit of truth, wisdom, and humility. That is the revelation. And it is not tied to any particular religion.
And the promise that comes with that revelation is that if we humans will choose to allow that divine spirit within us become us ... allow ourselves to become human vessels for it, it will heal us and save us from ourselves, and will help us to help others to do the same. And when enough of us are willing to make this choice, the whole world will be healed and saved FROM US.
4. These are not religious teachings. They are neither Judaic nor Islamic, nor Buddhist, nor Hindi. They are basically a new kind of spiritual self-awareness that ANYONE can grasp and test out for themselves. Regardless of any particular religiosity or lack thereof. In fact, it's likely that a strong bent toward religiosity might actually get in the way: muddy up the clarity and simplicity of this amazing revelation and promise by attaching all kinds of religious messages and requirements to it.
5. It was the religionists in Jesus' story that opposed this spiritual message most adamantly. Even to the point of having him killed to shut him up. Because they saw him illuminating the difference between spirituality and religiosity and they weren't having it. And it's still the religionists in the 'Story of Christ', to this day, that are objecting most vociferously to his revelation and promise (to all mankind). And they're doing so for the exact same reasons. He is still exposing the differences between real spirituality and their particular religiosity. And they are fighting to maintain and protect the superiority of their religiosity.
Just some food for thought along the lines an anti-Christian debate. (I am neither pro- nor anti-religious.)
