“I don’t think you’re a Christian. At least youre not a Christian to me. How can you claim to be earnest to the truth if you ‘embrace’ muslims and hindus and the like.” (J in Colorado)
“I understand where you’re coming from with that mindset. Remember, I grew up in a very fundamentalist home where we were taught that only one path was acceptable. Fortunately, through sheer happenstance, I was just lucky enough to have been on that path.
I simply don’t find it necessary to claim allegiance to one spiritual path over another. I suppose that I consider myself a Christian for two reasons: 1) That is the faith that I was brought up with, so it is the path that I am most familiar with; and 2) After thoroughly studying the teachings of Jesus, I truly see God revealed through his ideology. When one removes the layers of influence from the early Christian movement that has impacted Biblical scripture, and Jesus’ philosophy is truly examined, we move beyond the “believe in me” Jesus and are free to passionately embrace his teachings of love and compassion.
Man loves to create distinctions and division. A “we’re in and you’re out” mentality is common place within the framework of conventional wisdom. Jesus derails traditional thought. Within his philosophy, all man-made barriers are removed and we can simply focus on loving each other—not within a contextual framework of one religion versus another, or agreement on ‘my path’ versus ‘your path’, but rather in relationship where we merely find a brother or sister to connect with and love. Hindus? Muslims? Christians? I don’t care what kind of label you attach, the bottom line is: beyond the brand is a brother or sister to love…to engage in a relationship of kindness, caring and compassion.
I hope that clarifies my mindset.
Thanks,
True”
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
