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You realize that theology and spirituality are two different things? And ecclesiology is something different yet? And religion is comprised of all these things? Sure, theological constructions are often mutually exclusive. But each construction is also one voice in a larger conversation. Truth isn't exclusive -- it's inclusive.
Not sure, I would have to do some technical semantic gymnastics to get even an arbitrary idea of dissimilarity. I think even if they technically do not have a common area of over lapping magisterium they might point to one which would make the third leg and a stable concept.
Spirituality is not the path to God, it is the result of finding him. So in that context lets rule it out. Truth is exclusive. As example of this is Chesterton say we have no way to know what God's qualities are. Every term we have suggests what they are not. We have no way to know what being a spirit is except that is not material, we do not know eternal is except it doe snot end, we have no way to know what omnipresent is except to know he is not confined to be only here, and on and on. Truth is almost always exclusive except in the few cases where it is intended to not be like saying everything or universal and even these have more exceptions than application.
Theology is an intellectual position, or hermeneutic. Spirituality is an intuitive understanding of self and environment. Sometimes, spirituality is a basis for theology. I think, maybe, you're confusing "theology" with "doctrine."
Oh, but it is a path. A path, not only to finding God (or not!), but to finding the self and the cosmos. Truth is more than just an aggregate of facts that "appear" to fit together. Truth is existence, and, as such, is highly inclusive.
1robin said:
But that's not a Christian belief!
The bible's quite clear that when our bodies die, we sort of "sleep" til judgement day..
"Don't grieve for those asleep,for they sleep in Jesus" (1 Thess 4:13/14)
Then we get a wake-up call and become spiritual beings-
"Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God.....
In the twinkling of an eye the dead shall be raised imperishable and we shall be changed" (1 Cor 15:42-52)
BOIINNGG!!
How can spirituality be based on two non spiritual entities. That is unless you grant human spirituality for the get go and then link your foundations specifically with it. In my experience spirituality is a "word" used to indicate that even if do not have the conviction to adopt a deity I still want the credibility for association. I do not even think an officially definition of the word spirituality holds any real meaning. I am as born again as anyone and have a few experiences being over come by the Holy Spirit but have never even been tempted to refer to spirituality in isolation. Let's get past the etymology and back to something more relevant. For example the mutual exclusivity in doctrines rules out the spiritual foundation for at least one the faiths that holds them. If you have two mutually excusive God's then at best you have only one source of spirituality.
I found myself and the world by inevitably and by necessity. Finding God (the source of spirituality) is a wholly unique matter. Positing spirituality without a coherent source for it is futile. IN this case truth is not redundant with revelation. Most faiths have truth, few have revelation.
Lacking a God is to lack any justification for spirituality. Almost every culture in history has not equated the soul with the body but distinguished them in profound ways. If it is equal with it then it is it. Saying X is equal to Y in this case, is to say X is Y. We are dualistic or triune beings, we are not redundant beings. The soul's or spirit's only relevant if it is not the body. If the spiritual is embodied in the physical then it is as transient and finite as the physical and no longer meaningful. The sounds like new age rhetoric to me.
If they aren't nothing is.
However these are about exclusive events. It will never be true he did not die if he didn't, or vice versa. X is in this case an exclusive claim to absolute fact. It can never be both X and not X in this context.
They both died.
IN this case it is a hard historical fact we are dealing with. No linguistic messages can remedy it. Islam did not permit him to even be on a cross. Our view place shim on a cross where he died and in a tomb where he suffered the second death. This second death by the way is the most essential. We all die the first death. It was this second death Christ suffered for us. It was not spiritual death Muhammad was commenting on. I can actually show that in many ways from the Quran.
Ok your technically correct. When you leave out where they came home from in what you quoted, saying it was cold coming home makes no sense and is unrecognizable.
What happened to the verse I gave. It said it is appointed ONCE for all men to die and then THE judgment. That is the diametric opposite to dying over and over and being judged over and over. I have no problem with your believing in re-incarnation but to say it is Christian is just silly.
No one can possibly die more than once in a life and the word life have any meaning at all. Life necessarily has one beginning and one end. Again I can't reject what you want to believe in but I can say without doubt it is not what Christ taught.
No major denomination accepts re-incarnation in a Hindu context at all. Unless you really torture the concepts of the eternal life (which by the way happens once and is permanent) or Christ's second (another that has one and only one occurrence, no third, fourth, or fifth coming, and not a single additional death after Calvary) you can't even pretend to find the idea in Christianity and then even the most imaginative child would probably balk. I am a Baptist by the way but for this issue almost any denomination would do.
Maybe there is an exchange or return policy. If you are instantly burned to a crisp or imploded in a vacuum your next hundred lives are free.Incidentally, scientists predict our sun will eventually turn into a red giant and toast the earth, so if the earth ain't there any more, where will those who believe in reincarnation get reincarnated back to?
Self and environment are imminently spiritual, for we are the imago dei, and the entry of our environment is made up of the Godly material from the Big Bang. Spirituality is about getting in touch with Divine within us and coming to grips with the sacramental universe.
Not at all, if doctrine is held as hermeneutical and not cosmological.
Two different ways of looking at the same coin. You view the Divine as something mainly transcendent and almost wholly exterior to the self and the world. I view the Divine as naturally imminent and totally encompassing of the self and world. Either POV works as we seek to discover how we, in our differentiated particularity, relate to the Divine.
Not necessarily. For some, the source of spirituality is the cosmos, itself (see pantheism).
Again, too atomistic for my sensibilities. Also again, both viewpoints are necessary to the conversation, and are not exclusive of each other, where the bigger picture is concerned.
We are, rather, whole human beings. Not new age, but new science. We know that matter and energy are not destroyed, but only redistributed. Our bodies die, and its constituent parts become something else -- but they are still here. That lends an incredible amount of relevancy to embodied spirit.
Ingledsva said:
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Night is dark. Day is light. Summer is hot. Winter is cold. Caucasians are light-skinned. Negroids are dark-skinned. Men have penises. Women have vaginas. Which one is true? They can't both be -- right??
Yet -- Jesus did not die, for he lives. It's not an "exclusive event." It's a theological construct. It's a metaphorical statement. It's a metaphysical understanding.
Is it? Or is it a metaphysical truth? Or is it both?
Labeling something as the image of God is not to say it is spiritual. Almost every atheist believes our being made in God's imagine is a physical likeness. This is of course absurd but does point out the intuitive idea of what "the image of means". Image almost always refers to a way a thing reflect light. No I can certainly allow that is doe snot always have to but your claiming the opposite. Your saying it necessitates the opposite. I can't agree.
I have never heard anyone claim that doctrine is cosmologic. I don't even know what that could mean. The sources of two mutually exclusive claims to truth do not have identical or even similar credibility. Two doctors saying I do and do not have cancer have colorized credibility whoever is right is at 100% and the other at 0%. What they cannot be is on the same medical page.
It apparently is not the same because 100% grant one and through trial, error, torture, and intent less that 33% grant the other.
Pantheism is incoherent is at best a thought experiment. I do agree that pantheism would be the best candidate for what your suggesting but pantheism and traditional theism are not compatible. Buddhism is more of a philosophy than a theology.
In this context of the body and soul are equal they are the same entity. That is bizarre given the fact the purpose of the two terms is to distinguish between them. The bible even divides them asunder forever. At least the original body with the eternal soul. The bible also perhaps adds the spirit as a third distinct aspect.
Then we are less than human beings when the body dies? Even non-theists recognize that loosing a non essential body part does not degrade the self or soul. A paraplegic is no less human that a complete person. My car rusts and dissolves, it ceases to be a car. My atoms may remain but my body does not. That is why the soul which carries on is distinct from the body.
There was not a single mistake in what I said.
That is irrelevant and your making assumptions since I did not indicate what time period this occurred in and it was an analogy. Analogies have a few similarities. Not every aspect of the thing representing another can be glammed onto for convenience. Not even if included would it matter.
See the above. Forget mars since you seem to prefer ignoring the relevant aspect of the analogy. Think about an unexplored cave. Anyone who went into it whether claiming it was hot or cold are in an infinitely better position to know that people in labs guessing about it. Mars was a place holder and the scientific knowledge time frame was not even mentioned because it never occurred to me someone would torture an analogy so badly. Forget caves or planets. Personal experience is always better than indirect speculation.
No my religion at least it's core claims are proven fact. The experiential facts however are not available to export my faith to others. The same way the temperature at any known point to science would be proven to anyone who had been there and felt it. You know very well that was the intent of my statements. I guess the fact you have no contention against it mandated the semantic torturing of an analogy.
Not in mars case because maybe with mars you have a scientific perspective on it. For faith you have absolutely zero. So the theme of my analogy is even stronger.
Yes, in every way possible it is your belief against my facts. Just like my analogy at least in it's obvious spirit, my facts are not available for your review, only my evidence is.