Quote:
Originally Posted by Andre Turner
Before anybody can answer your questions, we first must understand what Christianity is and where it's teachings came from.
Most of us call ourselves Christians because our parents call themselves Christians. And their parents call themselves Christians, because their parents call themselves Christians. Is this the truth? Of course it is. But why were they calling themselves Christians? They were calling themselves Christians because a man named Jesus visited the slave-plantation one day and baptized them in the waters of the Mississippi River. Jesus did not come to them in a vision or a dream, and say to them…"from this day forward, I declare you all to be Christians!" So, now if Jesus didn't come to the slave-plantation to give us this so-called Christianity, then who did come? Who was it that gave our forefathers and mothers these teachings of Christianity? Who was it that taught us this? You know who taught us this. The white slave master gave us these teachings of so-called Christianity, and we accepted these teachings with no questions asked, just like we accepted everything else that he gave us. Christianity, as we know it, is only the white slave masters teachings of what and who God and the devil is. We really were never taught the true teachings of Jesus. All that we have is the teachings of the white slave master, with Jesus' name on it.
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Does anyone else find this to be as deeply and fundamentally flawed as I do?
I find this to be grossly offensive to my convictions concerning the nature of Christianity and the two millenia of scholarship, careful consideration, and prayer on the sources and means of understanding the message of Christ.
What you want to believe and profess is your business and as an American I support your right to believe it. By the same token I assert my right to believe what I profess. What I challenge is your position that Christianity in the 21st Century is a recent construct filtered through the teachings of "white slave masters" of the early-18th Century to the mid-19th Century.
The historical Yeshua bar Yusef or Jesus, as we now refer to Him, was a swarthy complected, dark curley haired Semite. Not exactly the blond blue eyed Northern European type by any means. The message He gave to all of us was to love the Lord our God and to love our neighbors as ourselves.
So, What is Christianity? Christianity is the acceptance of Jesus Christ as the Son of God and the acceptance of His blueprint regarding how we should see and act upon our relationship with God and our fellow human beings. Where did it come from? From the teachings of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, handed down to us by the Apostles and their successors carefully studying and preserving the scriptures and traditions of the earliest time of His revelations. Not the filtered interpretations of "white slave masters".
What I personally profess is fairly well summed up in the Creed from the Council of Nicea which in the 4th Century A.D. promulgated this simple statement of what a Christian believes:
"I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, and born of the Father before all ages. God of God, light of light, true God of true God. Begotten not made, of one in being with the Father, by whom all things were made. Who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven. And was incarnate of the Holy Ghost and of the Virgin Mary and was made man; was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate, suffered death and was buried; and the third day rose again according to the Scriptures. And He ascended into heaven, where He sits at the right hand of the Father, and shall come again with glory to judge the living and the dead, of whose Kingdom there shall be no end. And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who together with the Father and the Son is adored and glorified, who spoke by the Prophets. And I believe in one holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. I confess one baptism for the remission of sins. And I look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Amen."
OK, You have had your say and I have had mine. I would however suggest that if you are going to propose your interpretation of Christianity and its origin and development you might want to support your argument with historical fact clearly traceable through 2000 years rather than by simply playing the race card. Considering the centuries of persecution suffered by
all shades of Christians for the faith of Christ, and the ancient seats of Christianity in Africa and Asia, that card cuts with a two edged sword!
AMDG
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