by Paul Schingle

Created on: May 02, 2009

If one is to call oneself a Christian, accepting this on moral grounds is actually relatively easy. The person who lived on earth some two thousand years ago named Jesus, who many call the Christ (or the messiah), lived a simple and meager existence. His philosophy was simple as well. Basically, the core moral tenet behind Jesus' (Christ's) teachings is that all mankind is to love one another. Love thy neighbor, thy friends, even thine enemies as you would love yourself. The absolute core value, the golden rule, states, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." The bottom line in the morality behind Christianity is to treat everybody as you'd like to be treated. Who, with any moral fiber at all, could argue such a philosophy? No, the problem with Christianity isn't morality.

Now, if you want to call yourself a Christian and try to back it up with any degree of intellect, I wish you well. Nothing about Christianity makes any kind of logical sense. Frankly, nothing about any religion makes logical sense. But, the question at hand is about Christianity. I only bring up other religions to show the folly of any one dogmatic view. I'm not even going to touch on the belief in God thing. Though I don't believe it personally, for the purpose of this argument, let's pretend there really is a God.

If there is a God, and Jesus is the only way to eternal salvation, then two-thirds of the earth's population is doomed to a life of eternal damnation. Sorry, Christians, but that's just a fact of life. Though Christianity is probably the most mission-oriented religion in the world and, yes, they gain converts every day; the fact of the matter is, only apporximately one-third of the world's population is Christian. If the other religions are right, an even higher percentage of the people on earth are going to hell. No matter how you slice it, less than half of everyone on earth is doomed. And, this is an all-loving God?

Seriously, back up any of this with an intellectual argument. God creates man out of the dust of the gorund. He discovers that man is lonely. (He couldn't figure that out to begin with?) He makes woman out of a rib. (Why not just make her out of the dust as well?) He tells man and woman to help themselves to anything they want (you know, except for the one tree). God wanders away. (Where did he go, anyway?) He comes back to find man hiding. (How do you hide from God?) "Why are you hiding?" God asks. (Shouldn't he have already known?) The whole story is just convoluted and ridiculous. And every page of the Bible continues down the path of the ridiculous. Man keeps sinning and God keeps acting surprised. There isn't a shred of intellect throughout the whole book. And, if there really is a God, and if Jesus really is the only way to heaven, then why does God let all these other religions get invented in the first place. A great number of these religions existed before Christ even walked on earth. And, we're supposed to know which one is the right one? And, if we don't, we burn in hell forever? Sounds to me like God is donig all the tempting. So it's all just a game? We pick the right religion and we go to heaven-get it wrong and burn in hell? There is absolutely no intellectual justification behind any of it.

What is the greater challenge to accepting Christianity: Intellectual or moral? Listening to the philosophical teachings of a man who preached of love of one's fellow man makes perfect moral sense. But, believing in the fairy tales of one particular brand of religion as the be all, end all of existence doesn't make any intellectual sense at all. The answer is obvious. Intellect will always get in the way of accepting Christianity, or any other religion.

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