Were You Scared Into Loving God? By Gary Amirault I am presently reading "A Gentler God" by Doug Frank. I haven’t finished the book, but it appears to be teaching Universal Salvation, what I have coined "The Victorious Gospel of Jesus Christ." I plan to write a review of the […]
Yearly Archives: 2010
17 posts
Four Sorrows are Certain to be Visited on the United States "Four sorrows … are certain to be visited on the United States. Their cumulative effect guarantees that the U.S. will cease to resemble the country outlined in the Constitution of 1787. First, there will be a state of […]
Ethics Sometimes in the name of country, flag, pride, nationalism, duty, we don’t think through our values. Often we find ourselves filled with contradictions, because our convictions come from other men/women and their institutions, not from our inner convictions or from God. We can actually become or produce blind killers […]
[Note from Gary re: this article: Brian McLaren and I (Gary Amirault) have some differences regarding the Bible, alternative lifestyles, etc. Nevertheless, I believe he is hitting a nail on its head regarding why we so often tolerate intolerant boggiemen and allow them to diminish our influence in the world through […]
OBAMA:
Where do you move forward with that? This is something that I’m sure I’d have serious debates with my fellow Christians about. I think that the difficult thing about any religion, including Christianity, is that at some level there is a call to evangelize and proselytize. There’s the belief, certainly in some quarters, that people who haven’t embraced Jesus Christ as their personal savior, that they’re going to hell.
GG
You don’t believe that?
OBAMA:
I find it hard to believe that my God would consign four-fifths of the world to hell. I can’t imagine that my God would allow some little Hindu kid in India who never interacts with the Christian faith to somehow burn for all eternity. That’s just not part of my religious makeup.
Part of the reason I think it’s always difficult for public figures to talk about this is that the nature of politics is that you want to have everybody like you and project the best possible traits onto you. Oftentimes that’s by being as vague as possible, or appealing to the lowest common denominators. The more specific and detailed you are on issues as personal and fundamental as your faith, the more potentially dangerous it is.
Jesus said in His day the traditions of men made the word of God of no effect to His listeners. The same is true today.