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Goodbye Jesus

Will Christianity Every Be "dead"


RunawayBride

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I often wonder if Christianity could ever die as a religion and relegate Jesus to the list of "mythological gods" like Zeus and Ra, a character deity that is fascinating due to lore but otherwise dead to true belief. And if it does die away, what brand of religion/belief/god will be "real" and enticing enough to replace it?

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I often wonder if Christianity could ever die as a religion and relegate Jesus to the list of "mythological gods" like Zeus and Ra, a character deity that is fascinating due to lore but otherwise dead to true belief. And if it does die away, what brand of religion/belief/god will be "real" and enticing enough to replace it?

 

And will I "every" learn to proofread my shit before posting it? Sigh. I need an edit button here, people. How many more posts do I need to get it! :ugh:

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Zeus and Ra were rather localized as compared to the Abrahamic religions. It's a much bigger world and they have a very good foothold in it. It will take a very long time.

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I often wonder if Christianity could ever die as a religion and relegate Jesus to the list of "mythological gods" like Zeus and Ra, a character deity that is fascinating due to lore but otherwise dead to true belief. And if it does die away, what brand of religion/belief/god will be "real" and enticing enough to replace it?

 

And will I "every" learn to proofread my shit before posting it? Sigh. I need an edit button here, people. How many more posts do I need to get it! :ugh:

 

I don't remember how many (I think 25) but just keep posting and you'll eventually get the edit button.

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I often wonder if Christianity could ever die as a religion and relegate Jesus to the list of "mythological gods" like Zeus and Ra, a character deity that is fascinating due to lore but otherwise dead to true belief. And if it does die away, what brand of religion/belief/god will be "real" and enticing enough to replace it?

 

And will I "every" learn to proofread my shit before posting it? Sigh. I need an edit button here, people. How many more posts do I need to get it! :ugh:

 

I don't remember how many (I think 25) but just keep posting and you'll eventually get the edit button.

 

Thanks, luv!

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eventualy it will thats just the way of history. but i agree with burnout that they will eventualy become more secular as they adapt to our society.

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Let's hope it will eventually die. But there is something about Christianity, which I don't fully understand, that is able to put a strong hold on people. We deconverters are a small minority, but just think how difficult the deconversion has been for many of us and you can begin to understand, I think, the hold the religion has on people. One of my goals is to understand that hold and then learn how to help others crack it and escape the filthy religion. That not quite understood hold is why I do my best not to have hard feelings directed toward Christians. I feel sorry for them and would love to help them escape. But one of the problems is that they do not even understand they are enslaved.

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I read a fascinating book called "The Religion Virus" by Craig James. It really changed the way I look at religions and how they have evolved and survived over the ages. He draws parallels between religions as "memes" or "mind viruses" and actual biological evolution, applying the "survival of the fittest" principle to religions. The ones that don't have adequate defense mechanisms (such as intolerance, fear of hell, inerrancy of scripture, fear of asking tough questions, etc.) will tend to die off, and the ones that do have strong defense mechanisms and inherent motivation to self-replicate (such as parents indoctrinating kids for fear that if they don't their kids will suffer eternally in hell) will survive and spread. Anyway, after reading that book and thinking of it that way, I think it is very unlikely that Christianity will ever go extinct. If it does, I think it will be probably thousands of years in the future. No matter what scientific discoveries are made which contradict or refute Christian theology, there will always be an army of apologists ready to apply insane mental gymnastics to explain away the apparent problem (as is already evident in their arguments about evolution.) It would be interesting to see how it plays out. Too bad none of us will be around to see it!

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Several times over the history of xtianity, we have seen the religion face very serious issues - yet amazingly, it managed to adapt and overcome all of those crises. Quite frankly, I find the Catholic church the most incredible of all from a survival perspective - look at the horrors it has inflicted in the past, and the number of times their "infallible" pope has been wrong. Yet, now, it does not merely survive - it thrives. If you were a devout Catholic, you'd probably take that as a sign of god that the catholic church is THE church. The rest of us wonder why you're still a catholic!

 

I think Martin Luther marks a kind of significant event in the history of Christendom. Martin Luther's boldness in doing what he did could've easily been used to advocate complete rejection of the church as a whole - yet instead, he sought to radically reform it (and indeed, had he chosen to reject the church entirely, he probably wouldn't have been able to justify the other things he did in his lifetime). I think that has been the history of Christianity. Something happens to really challenge it, and instead of dying, it simply adapts into a different form and keeps going. In a way, it reminds me of the black knight from monty python.

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What BurnedOut said is probably the most likely future for the Abrahamic religions. Christianity will get more cerebral, become tucked away into academia, then whither away into a collection of ancient sayings valued for their timelessness, even if they didn't originate from Jesus and Paul.

 

But then, how do we move from touchy feely American evangelist Christianity to something study oriented like Judaism is now? What institutions will make the transition?

 

I think the literal interpretations of scripture and fundamentalism will die out quicker, because our science and culture are advancing at a more rapid, exponential pace with less repercussions for advocating them adversely to religion. Most of the US could become like Europe, with only the poorer segments still taking the babble literally.

 

Unfortunately, it has too many heads to die altogether anytime soon. Too many nebulous doctrines and varying degrees of faith for one to toggle between. And Yahweh has become too good at hiding. It's not like we can just fly a helicopter over a mountain or explain lightning and say "see? There's no god there." As long as people are still willing to consign him to "existing outside nature" and bullshit like that, he's not going away … not as easily.

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What is probably need today is another council of Nicea to review and update the bible. Science to the most illiterate of kids makes sense and as they progress though the grades, by end of college they should be pretty much on the side of secularism and evolution.

 

By the way I read stuff here and elsewhere, these folk grow up in a retarded culture where jeebus is the talk of the town, the latest move of gawd and the next outpouring of the holy spook. Mix in some end of daze shit and they are all running round like chicken littles waiting to go cloud surfin' with jeebus Against that science has to battle plus do the kids really learn or regurgitate. It would appear the latter. Critical thinking is obviously not encouraged as too many questions means the teacher has to earn their pay. They after all are just senior day care centers. How can we expect kids to actually attempt to read the bible on their own cover to cover w/o a bible study guide which all tend to skip over the gruesome shit? It is after all not a very interesting read.

 

At the end of the day it spills out into politics and the guns gays and abortion matters are the hot topics they believe they can influence.

 

They are forever winners of the shiny mirror award as they do not practice what they preach.

 

Only those that reach a crisis of faith bother to investigate further and the end of that is where we all are.

 

It remains a self perpetuating ponzi scheme.

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The ancient pagan religions lasted centuries, even millennia so I don't think we should hold our breath until Christianity dies. Even when they do die people resurrect them into some quizzical form of the original. Look at modern day pagans "going back to their roots". Same thing will happen. As BO mentioned though, they'll eventually even out and synchronize with society. Already kinda has but there is still big segments of it in the US that exist.

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Several times over the history of xtianity, we have seen the religion face very serious issues - yet amazingly, it managed to adapt and overcome all of those crises. Quite frankly, I find the Catholic church the most incredible of all from a survival perspective - look at the horrors it has inflicted in the past, and the number of times their "infallible" pope has been wrong. Yet, now, it does not merely survive - it thrives. If you were a devout Catholic, you'd probably take that as a sign of god that the catholic church is THE church. The rest of us wonder why you're still a catholic!

 

I think Martin Luther marks a kind of significant event in the history of Christendom. Martin Luther's boldness in doing what he did could've easily been used to advocate complete rejection of the church as a whole - yet instead, he sought to radically reform it (and indeed, had he chosen to reject the church entirely, he probably wouldn't have been able to justify the other things he did in his lifetime). I think that has been the history of Christianity. Something happens to really challenge it, and instead of dying, it simply adapts into a different form and keeps going. In a way, it reminds me of the black knight from monty python.

 

I agree with you that Christianity - especially within the Catholic Church - has found incredible ways to adapt over time, but I have to take issue that it is thriving today. The Catholic Church in America is falling apart. The increase in their numbers, as I understand it, is due exclusively to evangelism in Africa and other undeveloped parts of the world. To that end I go against the tide in this thread. I have huge optimism in the trends I see in the US and Europe. What is needed to abandon religion is the next age of enlightenment like last seen in the 18th and 19th centuries. I believe we are beginning to see that as the internet is making information so readily available. The information is out there and people are spreading it (like YouTube atheism). Non-belief is the fastest growing "religious" group. The world has never seen a trend like we are seeing today. Religion is becoming irrelevant. Intelligent people in modern diverse societies are finding acceptance of all human beings - gays, lesbians, different ethnic groups, different religious beliefs, etc.

 

Said another way, a modern technological society leads to diversity. Diversity leads to acceptance and tolerance of other peoples. Acceptance and tolerance of other people leads to tolerance of their beliefs. Tolerance of other's beliefs leads to abandonment of dogmatism. Abandonment of dogmatism leads to free thinking and openmindedness. Free thinking and openmindedness leads to religious apathy or outright rejection of religious beliefs.

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I often wonder if Christianity could ever die as a religion and relegate Jesus to the list of "mythological gods" like Zeus and Ra, a character deity that is fascinating due to lore but otherwise dead to true belief. And if it does die away, what brand of religion/belief/god will be "real" and enticing enough to replace it?

Christianity, Islam, and other "world" religions will probably not find the obscurity that more regional belief systems did until a great deal of time has passed. Adherents to the Roman and Greek pantheons were arguably more widespread and "worldwide" and probably are the most similar religions we could look to for a hint as to how it might play out. Two millennia after the fact, we see no active adherents but the mythology is well known and has been integrated into mainstream culture AS myth rather than as belief. In that sense I don't see Christianity dying off, at least in the west or in parts of the world where it has held dominant sway; it has had too big an impact on society for too long. Forty generations from now popular entertainments will dramatize the Christian mythology just as today we do it with the old Roman and Greek legends. Also, the Bible will be considered great literature in the same sense that, say, Homer's Odyssey is today. In other words Christianity will lose its authority but not its romance.

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......

end of daze shit and they are all running round like chicken littles waiting to go cloud surfin' with jeebus .....

 

Hehe. End of daze.

 

"In a climate-controlled cabinet in one corner was the original scroll in the shaky handwriting of St. John the Divine of Patmos, whose "Revelation" had been the alltime best seller. Aziraphale had found him a nice chap, if a bit too fond of odd mushrooms. " --- Good Omens

 

 

"Nobody's perfect. Well, there was this one guy, but we killed him...."

Christopher Moore (Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal)

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I often wonder if Christianity could ever die as a religion and relegate Jesus to the list of "mythological gods" like Zeus and Ra, a character deity that is fascinating due to lore but otherwise dead to true belief. And if it does die away, what brand of religion/belief/god will be "real" and enticing enough to replace it?

 

I don't think it's going to die anytime soon, but it seems like more Christians are moving away from the literal interpretation. If you look back in the 80's, there were hardly any liberal Christians. Most of the believed the standard 'Jesus is the only way'. Plenty are still that way (fundamentalists), but I think more and more people are realizing how 1) wrong it is and 2) stupid it is. I think they're going to change those literal beliefs like 'Jesus was born of a virgin, died for your sins, rose from the dead' into symbols of things, not literal. I least I hope they do because it's really fucking stupid.

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Yes I think it will die. But the stupidity of people that has kept christianity going will never die.

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The Egyptian religion(s), in various forms, lasted thousands of years. Re was extremely long lived. Zeus was known to have been worshiped up until at least the 1800's on some small island communities. He too was very long lived.

 

So why think that the much shorted lived "jesus" should just disappear anytime soon? It will eventually go by the wayside but it will take time, and education, for this to happen. Odds are we'll all be long dead unless something (dare I say it?) "miraculous" happens. ;)

 

The people in the middle of the reigns of those other gods (and the many others that have been "king") wouldn't have thought the "end" was going to come any time soon (if ever) but we know, after the fact, that isn't the case. They all come tumbling down in one way or another in one time frame or another.

 

mwc

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From observations, it is clear that death is a major fuel of religion.

 

I've seen it over here in England. The moment a person dies, all non-religous folk turn to religion for comfort. For 99.9% of their lives, they ignore it, but when death is around, religion is a protector.

 

I attended a Catholic school not so long ago. The behaviour was very un-Christian like, but the death of a few folk and suddenly, it was like a robot switch had been turned on. Really annoyed me.

 

As has been mentioned, it will take a long time.

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I suspect Christianity will go the way of Judaism. It will become more academic, more oriented to the head, not the wild emotional thing it is now. Look at where Judaism started and how savage it was in the early years, how superficial it became in the First Century AD, and it is far far less blood thirsty than it was. The one's who are crazy are much smaller portion of the general population than they were in the Middle Ages. Look at Islam now, it reminds me of what Christianity was in the Middle Ages. I suspect Christians will go the way culturally as the Jews have. and Islam in another 500 to 1000 years will be where Christianity is now.

 

This, essentially.

 

Religions tend to moderate themselves as their host culture changes and adapts. Christianity will prove to be no exception

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  • 1 month later...

No it won't die until people stop passing the bullshit from generation to generation.

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Let's hope it will eventually die. But there is something about Christianity, which I don't fully understand, that is able to put a strong hold on people...................

 

I tend to look at Christianity in the U.S. in much the same vein as nationalism or maybe even patriotism. It's so ingrained in the culture that being without it, rejecting or betraying it is unthinkable regardless of the rationale to do so. From birth it's a constant barrage of Jesus and all things Christian with the greatest hook for a toddler being Christmas. On the national level I don't think I have been in a more flag waving country than the U.S.. Americans are desensitized to the USA #1 attitude because it is so pervasive. But how to break that hold, I don't know. Maybe as a poster said, another age of enlightenment, globalization and ubiquitous information will introduce a negative meme associated with Christianity and slowly break down the social structure perpetuated by the organized faith body.

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Will Christianity ever be dead?

 

Unfortunately I don't think so because there will always be some unscrupulous peddler of shoddy goods and some gullible twerp who buys into it.

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No. Christianity won't die as long as people are content to lazily or fearfully accept easy answers and unexamined premises to the real, substantive issues about life and humanity.

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Let's hope it will eventually die. But there is something about Christianity, which I don't fully understand, that is able to put a strong hold on people...................

 

I tend to look at Christianity in the U.S. in much the same vein as nationalism or maybe even patriotism. It's so ingrained in the culture

 

I don't see a society's religion as something separate, it's part of the culture and deeply embedded in the national psyche. It's so established in us, that flat out denying the religion after being a part of it for so long isn't an easy change to come by. It feels like fighting against yourself, but it's really fighting against the ideas passed on to you by your society. It's so embedded, for some people denying Christianity is like saying the sky is red instead of blue. They can't comprehend such a seemingly wrong idea.

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