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> ...you get infinite forgiveness, so long as you truly repent... Thinking back to an earlier comment up the chain (from someone else) about how being nonrelig

> ...you get infinite forgiveness, so long as you truly repent... Thinking back to an earlier comment up the chain (from someone else) about how being nonreligious doesn't offer enough moral guidance, and I kinda think the "infinite forgiveness" thing is exponentially more fraught than even the most detached "nothing really matters" atheist. Being able to do literally anything and not face cosmic consequences so long as you say you're sorry is mind-boggling to me. I wonder if it's partly why so many convicted murderers get born-again when they're in prison.

analog31 3y ago
It's pragmatic. Being religious checks a box when they want to apply for parole.
NateEag 3y ago
In many stripes of Christianity, Divine forgiveness is given freely in response to repentance. Genuine repentance is marked by sorrow over the harms and wrongs you have done, and sincere efforts to make amends where you can. It's also marked by an understanding that your actions may have ramifications here and now and a willingness to bear the consequences of what you have wrought, insofar as you are able - "Take up your cross and follow Me," in the vernacular of the religion. Forgiveness is freely given, in the sense that you cannot earn it and God extends it to you, but it's recognized that even accepting forgiveness requires admission of wrong and actively renouncing your pattern of wrongdoing. You can't accept forgivenwas for something you think was just fine. shrug I'm not sure how widely this perspective inn it is shared in modern Christianity. It's where I wound up when I experienced Jesus' love and kindness firmly dragging my besetting sins in front of me to be dealt with, but since that day I've certainly noticed Christians who don't seem to share this perspective.
- graemep 3y ago
  > In many stripes of Christianity, Divine forgiveness is given freely in response to repentance. Many? I would say it was the central message of Christianity. > It's where I wound up when I experienced Jesus' love and kindness firmly dragging my besetting sins in front of me to be dealt with, but since that day I've certainly noticed Christians who don't seem to share this perspective. Sadly that happens.
  - NateEag 3y ago
    > Many? I would say it was the central message of Christianity. I would agree, but I don't see it treated or discussed that way in practice by plenty of self-identified Christians.
- arkey 3y ago
  I think you laid a very good explanation of one of the essences of the Gospel here, the forgiveness from God, so essentially the true message of Christianity. Real repentance only comes through God: John 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. Sadly you are right, for many reasons this is not necessarily widely understood by everyone that nominally identifies as a Christian.
  - prometheus76 3y ago
    I think the other essential part of Christianity is then extending that same forgiveness and mercy to those around us. Even our enemies. This is the especially unpopular aspect of Christianity, even within Christianity.
    - NateEag 3y ago
      agreed. Though with the important caveats that _forgiveness_ is not identical to _reconciliation_, and that extending mercy to the unrepentant is dangerous and borderline incoherent ("I assure you, he will by no means get out of there before he has paid the last penny"). I've seen those concepts misunderstood, missed, or forgotten far too often in Christian circles.
tpmoney 3y ago
The alternative is never being able to be forgiven. In the real world we see the consequences of feeling like you can't be forgiven with kids and teens who get labeled as "trouble makers". As soon as that label starts to become permanent and precede them, they live down to other people's expectations of them. When they start feeling like nothing they do will ever be good enough, and that no matter what they do they will be in trouble or someone will find fault with them, they stop trying to improve or stay out of trouble. See also the concept of stereotype threat. It's not (as I understand it) about "not facing consequences" so much as it is about being possible to be forgiven at all and therefore there is a reason to try to change and to try and make amends and to try to seek forgiveness. It also isn't enough in any interpretation I've seen to just "say you're sorry". You have to repent, and even secular definitions, let alone religious ones don't seem to interpret "repenting" as simply saying you're sorry.
- Jensson 3y ago
  > The alternative is never being able to be forgiven. No it isn't, there is a whole spectrum between "forgiving everything" and "forgiving nothing".
  - tpmoney 3y ago
    Yes, obviously there's a spectrum between those points. That's not what I'm talking about though. I'm talking about the consequences of being unforgivable, no matter where the line is. If something is unforgivable, you're setting a line in the sand beyond which a person has no reason or incentive to not continue behaving in that way because it doesn't matter, they're going to continue being punished.
MisterBastahrd 3y ago
Oh, I personally know one. He murdered an assistant professor because she had second thoughts about divorcing her husband when she was going to get a fat divorce check and it ruined his (the murderer's) dreams of training to become a pro golfer. He shot her, threw her body in a hole at a wildlife management area (they found her body after the police interviewed his father and discovered he had a life-long fascination with said hole), drove her car back to her apartment, and then took her credit card and ordered thousands of dollars worth of golf gear before driving to his parents' house 7 hours away. This was a Catholic altar boy growing up. But Catholicism doesn't like mortal sins too much, so low and behold, his redemption streak began by becoming magically "born again" so that it would be rude for people to ask him questions about his obvious guilt. He's now a luthier and prayer leader at Angola State Penn in Louisiana... and as I've known the guy since I was in diapers, I know that he is categorically full of shit from the interviews I've seen. I am friends with his sisters and didn't even realize he had a daughter who must have been a toddler at the time that he murdered that woman until I saw her in some of her LSU graduation photos. Didn't look like her aunts, and then I realized the child was the spitting image of her daddy. Sad that he robbed her of a dad over some childish bullshit.
arkey 3y ago
> Being able to do literally anything and not face cosmic consequences so long as you say you're sorry is mind-boggling to me. If it truly was like that, wouldn't everyone be doing it? There is, however, a bit more to it: Acts 3:19 - Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord, Turn to God. > I wonder if it's partly why so many convicted murderers get born-again when they're in prison. Convicted murderers get a very real chance to see just how evil people can be. The worse the symptoms you have, the easier it is to find out you have an illness. Sadly not everyone wants to acknowledge the illness and accept the remedy. Turn to God.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

analog31 3y ago

It's pragmatic. Being religious checks a box when they want to apply for parole.

NateEag 3y ago

In many stripes of Christianity, Divine forgiveness is given freely in response to repentance. Genuine repentance is marked by sorrow over the harms and wrongs you have done, and sincere efforts to make amends where you can. It's also marked by an understanding that your actions may have ramifications here and now and a willingness to bear the consequences of what you have wrought, insofar as you are able - "Take up your cross and follow Me," in the vernacular of the religion. Forgiveness is freely given, in the sense that you cannot earn it and God extends it to you, but it's recognized that even accepting forgiveness requires admission of wrong and actively renouncing your pattern of wrongdoing. You can't accept forgivenwas for something you think was just fine. shrug I'm not sure how widely this perspective inn it is shared in modern Christianity. It's where I wound up when I experienced Jesus' love and kindness firmly dragging my besetting sins in front of me to be dealt with, but since that day I've certainly noticed Christians who don't seem to share this perspective.

graemep 3y ago
> In many stripes of Christianity, Divine forgiveness is given freely in response to repentance. Many? I would say it was the central message of Christianity. > It's where I wound up when I experienced Jesus' love and kindness firmly dragging my besetting sins in front of me to be dealt with, but since that day I've certainly noticed Christians who don't seem to share this perspective. Sadly that happens.
- NateEag 3y ago
  > Many? I would say it was the central message of Christianity. I would agree, but I don't see it treated or discussed that way in practice by plenty of self-identified Christians.
arkey 3y ago
I think you laid a very good explanation of one of the essences of the Gospel here, the forgiveness from God, so essentially the true message of Christianity. Real repentance only comes through God: John 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. Sadly you are right, for many reasons this is not necessarily widely understood by everyone that nominally identifies as a Christian.
- prometheus76 3y ago
  I think the other essential part of Christianity is then extending that same forgiveness and mercy to those around us. Even our enemies. This is the especially unpopular aspect of Christianity, even within Christianity.
  - NateEag 3y ago
    agreed. Though with the important caveats that _forgiveness_ is not identical to _reconciliation_, and that extending mercy to the unrepentant is dangerous and borderline incoherent ("I assure you, he will by no means get out of there before he has paid the last penny"). I've seen those concepts misunderstood, missed, or forgotten far too often in Christian circles.

tpmoney 3y ago

The alternative is never being able to be forgiven. In the real world we see the consequences of feeling like you can't be forgiven with kids and teens who get labeled as "trouble makers". As soon as that label starts to become permanent and precede them, they live down to other people's expectations of them. When they start feeling like nothing they do will ever be good enough, and that no matter what they do they will be in trouble or someone will find fault with them, they stop trying to improve or stay out of trouble. See also the concept of stereotype threat. It's not (as I understand it) about "not facing consequences" so much as it is about being possible to be forgiven at all and therefore there is a reason to try to change and to try and make amends and to try to seek forgiveness. It also isn't enough in any interpretation I've seen to just "say you're sorry". You have to repent, and even secular definitions, let alone religious ones don't seem to interpret "repenting" as simply saying you're sorry.

Jensson 3y ago
> The alternative is never being able to be forgiven. No it isn't, there is a whole spectrum between "forgiving everything" and "forgiving nothing".
- tpmoney 3y ago
  Yes, obviously there's a spectrum between those points. That's not what I'm talking about though. I'm talking about the consequences of being unforgivable, no matter where the line is. If something is unforgivable, you're setting a line in the sand beyond which a person has no reason or incentive to not continue behaving in that way because it doesn't matter, they're going to continue being punished.

MisterBastahrd 3y ago

Oh, I personally know one. He murdered an assistant professor because she had second thoughts about divorcing her husband when she was going to get a fat divorce check and it ruined his (the murderer's) dreams of training to become a pro golfer. He shot her, threw her body in a hole at a wildlife management area (they found her body after the police interviewed his father and discovered he had a life-long fascination with said hole), drove her car back to her apartment, and then took her credit card and ordered thousands of dollars worth of golf gear before driving to his parents' house 7 hours away. This was a Catholic altar boy growing up. But Catholicism doesn't like mortal sins too much, so low and behold, his redemption streak began by becoming magically "born again" so that it would be rude for people to ask him questions about his obvious guilt. He's now a luthier and prayer leader at Angola State Penn in Louisiana... and as I've known the guy since I was in diapers, I know that he is categorically full of shit from the interviews I've seen. I am friends with his sisters and didn't even realize he had a daughter who must have been a toddler at the time that he murdered that woman until I saw her in some of her LSU graduation photos. Didn't look like her aunts, and then I realized the child was the spitting image of her daddy. Sad that he robbed her of a dad over some childish bullshit.

arkey 3y ago

> Being able to do literally anything and not face cosmic consequences so long as you say you're sorry is mind-boggling to me. If it truly was like that, wouldn't everyone be doing it? There is, however, a bit more to it: Acts 3:19 - Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord, Turn to God. > I wonder if it's partly why so many convicted murderers get born-again when they're in prison. Convicted murderers get a very real chance to see just how evil people can be. The worse the symptoms you have, the easier it is to find out you have an illness. Sadly not everyone wants to acknowledge the illness and accept the remedy. Turn to God.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]