6 ms·

I don't know what your point is. The lack of consistency in Christian behavior does not imply that Christian morality is on the whole unhelpful. Especially sin

I don't know what your point is. The lack of consistency in Christian behavior does not imply that Christian morality is on the whole unhelpful. Especially since Christianity tends to downplay ritual and effort-based holiness, comparatively speaking. You don't achieve level 100 in Christian by donating, passing theology tests, travelling, conquering, converting people, or being sin free. Of course actual Christian practice will be all over the place. None of it is explicitly mandatory. Morality is fairly explicit, but actual enforcement of morality isn't the job of Christians outside of particular scenarios.

_emacsomancer_ 7y ago
> Especially since Christianity tends to downplay ritual and effort-based holiness, comparatively speaking. This sounds like a rather Protestant-centric viewpoint.
- humanrebar 7y ago
  Even for Catholics and Eastern Orthodox Christians compared to other major religions. Non-protestants are still rather light on compulsory behavior on the whole. Compare to orthodox branches of other major religions. No particular rules on clothing, cleanliness, charity, gender separation, pilgrimages, prayer times, need to attain spiritual states, etc. No karma to optimize. No hidden knowledge to uncover. Some churches eat a bit of cracker and juice/wine on a regular basis. Some get a person wet as a one time initiation ceremony. That's pretty light ritual on the whole. And while various High Mass clothes and rituals are certainly there, there's no particular requirement of parishioners to give one, attend any particular mass, or even attend a minimum number of them.
  - _emacsomancer_ 7y ago
    I still might debate the role of ritual in Catholicism, Eastern & Oriental Orthodoxy, > No karma to optimize but I actually had the more karmic things in mind, i.e the importance of Works vs importance of Faith, which certainly does vary between different Christian sects. > No hidden knowledge to uncover. There are gnostic types of things. If perhaps less so today than in the Renaissance. But it's not as if it's absent. So I still think this is a rather Protestant perspective. Edit to say: Also, in fact even or perhaps even especially, Protestants were engaged in gnosticism/Christian mysticism in the Renaissance period.
    - humanrebar 7y ago
      But my point is that, comparatively speaking "behave like a faithful person" is a fairly open ended assignment compared to attaining nirvana, circumcision, forgoing beef, or literally earning one's way into paradise.
jmcqk6 7y ago
>The lack of consistency in Christian behavior does not imply that Christian morality is on the whole unhelpful. I wasn't trying to say that it's unhelpful, just make the point that it's not uniform. If someone says "we should follow christian values" the necessary followup question is "which christian values?"
- humanrebar 7y ago
  > which christian values? """And one of them, a lawyer, asked [Jesus] a question to test him. “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.""" Most people have a hard enough time with those. But, you might say, what about the details? What about white lies and second donuts? That was also covered by Jesus: """Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others.""" The details might seem inconsistent and controversial, but the basic morality isn't all that convoluted or up for discussion. People just don't like thinking about how everyone is bad at the fundamental stuff. Anyway, Christian philosophy is pretty coherent even if the people aren't. And it's not clear that your expectations of consistency are required for there to be social benefits to Christian belief in particular or religious belief more generally.
  - jmcqk6 7y ago
    There are millions of christians who disagree with you. But yeah sure, clearly you're the one person in the world who has it right! You're right about my expectation of consistency for there to be social benefit. I just have an expectation of consistency from those claiming to have a monopoly on fundamental truth in the universe. My expectation has nothing to do with social good in that case.
    - humanrebar 7y ago

_emacsomancer_ 7y ago

> Especially since Christianity tends to downplay ritual and effort-based holiness, comparatively speaking. This sounds like a rather Protestant-centric viewpoint.

humanrebar 7y ago
Even for Catholics and Eastern Orthodox Christians compared to other major religions. Non-protestants are still rather light on compulsory behavior on the whole. Compare to orthodox branches of other major religions. No particular rules on clothing, cleanliness, charity, gender separation, pilgrimages, prayer times, need to attain spiritual states, etc. No karma to optimize. No hidden knowledge to uncover. Some churches eat a bit of cracker and juice/wine on a regular basis. Some get a person wet as a one time initiation ceremony. That's pretty light ritual on the whole. And while various High Mass clothes and rituals are certainly there, there's no particular requirement of parishioners to give one, attend any particular mass, or even attend a minimum number of them.
- _emacsomancer_ 7y ago
  I still might debate the role of ritual in Catholicism, Eastern & Oriental Orthodoxy, > No karma to optimize but I actually had the more karmic things in mind, i.e the importance of Works vs importance of Faith, which certainly does vary between different Christian sects. > No hidden knowledge to uncover. There are gnostic types of things. If perhaps less so today than in the Renaissance. But it's not as if it's absent. So I still think this is a rather Protestant perspective. Edit to say: Also, in fact even or perhaps even especially, Protestants were engaged in gnosticism/Christian mysticism in the Renaissance period.
  - humanrebar 7y ago
    But my point is that, comparatively speaking "behave like a faithful person" is a fairly open ended assignment compared to attaining nirvana, circumcision, forgoing beef, or literally earning one's way into paradise.

jmcqk6 7y ago

>The lack of consistency in Christian behavior does not imply that Christian morality is on the whole unhelpful. I wasn't trying to say that it's unhelpful, just make the point that it's not uniform. If someone says "we should follow christian values" the necessary followup question is "which christian values?"

humanrebar 7y ago
> which christian values? """And one of them, a lawyer, asked [Jesus] a question to test him. “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.""" Most people have a hard enough time with those. But, you might say, what about the details? What about white lies and second donuts? That was also covered by Jesus: """Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others.""" The details might seem inconsistent and controversial, but the basic morality isn't all that convoluted or up for discussion. People just don't like thinking about how everyone is bad at the fundamental stuff. Anyway, Christian philosophy is pretty coherent even if the people aren't. And it's not clear that your expectations of consistency are required for there to be social benefits to Christian belief in particular or religious belief more generally.
- jmcqk6 7y ago
  There are millions of christians who disagree with you. But yeah sure, clearly you're the one person in the world who has it right! You're right about my expectation of consistency for there to be social benefit. I just have an expectation of consistency from those claiming to have a monopoly on fundamental truth in the universe. My expectation has nothing to do with social good in that case.
  - humanrebar 7y ago