tcprowling
Junior Member
As an individual, what do you gain, for yourself, by practicing your religion? Do you actually practice your religion?
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Not really sure what you mean... to me, religion is a relationship with God and I don't know what you mean by "practice".tcprowling said:As an individual, what do you gain, for yourself, by practicing your religion? Do you actually practice your religion?
Scott1 said:Not really sure what you mean... to me, religion is a relationship with God and I don't know what you mean by "practice".
Can a person have a unintentional relationship with God?lunamoth said:Maybe by practice tc means to be intentional about one's relationship with God, in the case of Christianity anyway.
I hope this does not take the thread off-topic, but what kind of work to you do on "your end"?To me that would mean do I work on my end of the relationship...
Excellent response! Latter-day Saints believe that when we are baptized, we enter into a covenent relationship with Jesus Christ. I suspect that a lot of Christians would see the phrase "living up to my end of the bargain" as a sort of an offensive way of putting it, but to me, that is exactly what we do when we practice our religion. We live up to our end of the bargain or, as we would put it, we keep the terms of the covenant we entered into.Ød¥ said:As an individual, what do you gain, for yourself, by practicing your religion?
a sense of living up to my end of the bargain
You can have a relationship that you don't attend to...the relationship may potentially be there but it's not really living, or it can be anywhere from barely warm to passionate. God's love can be raining down on us but if we don't participate in it...respond in kind loving each other and letting that love return to God, it's static and not a source of nourishment for life.Scott1 said:Can a person have a unintentional relationship with God?
I hope this does not take the thread off-topic, but what kind of work to you do on "your end"?
Other gifts God gives us to help us nourish our relationship with Him and each other: prayer and the Sacraments, communal worship, the Liturgy, loving, forgiving, feeding, healing.7Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son[b] into the world that we might live through him. 10This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for[c] our sins. 11Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
13We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. 14And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. 16And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. 17In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him. 18There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. 19We love because he first loved us. 20If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. 21And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.
See what?lunamoth said:How do you see this?
tcprowling said:As an individual, what do you gain, for yourself, by practicing your religion? Do you actually practice your religion?
That's how I feel about it!Awen said:Completeness, knowledge, peace...all wonderful things. My path is one that focuses also on helping others and the community ~ I also get the satisfaction that comes with doing that.
tcprowling said:As an individual, what do you gain, for yourself, by practicing your religion? Do you actually practice your religion?
tcprowling said:As an individual, what do you gain, for yourself, by practicing your religion? Do you actually practice your religion?
tcprowling said:As an individual, what do you gain, for yourself, by practicing your religion? Do you actually practice your religion?
tcprowling said:As an individual, what do you gain, for yourself, by practicing your religion? Do you actually practice your religion?
tcprowling said:As an individual, what do you gain, for yourself, by practicing your religion?
Do you actually practice your religion?
A guilt-free, unrestricted ego which enables me to pursue life for my own happiness and needs without concern for a spiritual authority or a distored set of values.tcprowling said:As an individual, what do you gain, for yourself, by practicing your religion?
How could I not?Do you actually practice your religion?