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Your idea of what's a good person is based on what the world tells you is a good person. I, too, am tempted to think of myself as being inherently good, but if
by xamuel 7y ago
Your idea of what's a good person is based on what the world tells you is a good person. I, too, am tempted to think of myself as being inherently good, but if I were born hundreds of years ago, would I really have been so inherently good as to realize how wrong it is to (say) suppress women, when the culture all around me normalized doing so? My temptation is to think "I'm better than that, I wouldn't suppress women", but statistically speaking, almost no-one actually was better-than-that! Trying to be a good person without the guidance of the Holy Spirit is futile. "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23)
- Fauntleroy 7y ago"Not suppressing women" is a really odd issue to bring into the conversation when Christianity is involved.
- xamuel 7y agoAre you suggesting I should do a better job of cherry-picking things? I'm not trying to "trick" people with fake cherry-picked Christianity, we're all smarter than that here. It was an example that what's deemed "good" by the world changes from decade to decade. "Therefore everyone who hears these words of Mine and acts on them is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain fell, the torrents raged, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because its foundation was on the rock." (Matthew 7:24-25)
- germinalphrase 7y agoI was raised Catholic though I have intentionally distanced myself from the church as an adult. There are active aspects to the church’s teachings that our larger society would likely see as negative, if not outright wrong. Your suggestion of female suppression is a good example.
- em-bee 7y agowhile you could not have changed the social order, you could have treated women with more respect than was the norm, especially your own wife. allowed your daughters to learn what they were interested in instead of forcing them into their assigned roles. these exceptions existed, and you could have been one of them.