Mixed Beliefs

MizzLolly

Hey Christians,

Just wondering if any of you would like to offer your view on something for me.

I'm curious about what your feelings are in relation to alternative beliefs, for example, a person who believes in God but still reads Tarot cards?

Or a person who prays to Jesus but also includes other beliefs in their prayers. For example, a reiki practitioner praying to God, to the Sun, to Mother Earth, to Allah... all at once?!

I am intersted in hearing a Christian opinion on this please.

Thanks

kelly1

MizzLolly wrote: »

Hey Christians,

Just wondering if any of you would like to offer your view on something for me.

I'm curious about what your feelings are in relation to alternative beliefs, for example, a person who believes in God but still reads Tarot cards?

Or a person who prays to Jesus but also includes other beliefs in their prayers. For example, a reiki practitioner praying to God, to the Sun, to Mother Earth, to Allah... all at once?!

I am intersted in hearing a Christian opinion on this please.

Thanks

Hello MizzLolly, I would say that tarot cards show a lack of faith in God's providence. Divination is condemned in the bible.

Praying to the Sun and to Mother earth is idolatory/paganism and breaks the first commandment.

Praying to Allah shows that someone doesn't believe that Jesus is the Son of God (and God the Son).

I would ask this person how concerned they are about the Truth. It sounds like this person is picking beliefs to suit him/herself without much concern for the truth as *revealed* by God. Everything else is lies.

"I am the Way, the Truth and the Life", "The truth shall set you free"
-- Jesus

God bless,
Noel.

CerebralCortex

Ya pretty much what Noel said is what I expected you would hear from people in this forum. Try the question in the A+A forum.

PDN

CerebralCortex wrote: »

Ya pretty much what Noel said is what I expected you would hear from people in this forum. Try the question in the A+A forum.

Well, hardly much point in asking in the A&A forum since the OP specifically said they were interested in hearing a Christian opinion.

My own take on this, as a Christian, is that a great number of religious people want to 'cash in' on the respect that many other people have for the name of Jesus. They invent a religious figure in their imagination and then call it Jesus, even though it bears little or no resemblance to Jesus as He is portrayed in the Bible.

Jesus, according to what Christians believe to be eye-witness accounts, claimed that He was the only way to God. This is not compatible with occult practices or praying to Allah etc.

JimiTime

MizzLolly wrote: »

Hey Christians,

Just wondering if any of you would like to offer your view on something for me.

I'm curious about what your feelings are in relation to alternative beliefs, for example, a person who believes in God but still reads Tarot cards?

Or a person who prays to Jesus but also includes other beliefs in their prayers. For example, a reiki practitioner praying to God, to the Sun, to Mother Earth, to Allah... all at once?!

I am intersted in hearing a Christian opinion on this please.

Thanks

It would like being a Jewish Rabbi who is also a Nazi. They are completely at odds with each other.

MizzLolly

JimiTime wrote: »

It would like being a Jewish Rabbi who is also a Nazi. They are completely at odds with each other.

What if they were aware that none of these beliefs can be solidly proved but believed in a higher power of some form. So they involve all possibilities in their prayer. Surely, that's the sign of a caring person who is interested in doing the right thing? No?




Cerebral Cortex, thanks for that suggestion. If you are an atheist don't feel that you cannot contribute to this thread. Your opinion is appreciated either way.

I haven't said what I believe in and I'm not trying to disprove anything anyone here is saying. I simply want to hear opinions on it.

AtomicHorror

From the Christian point of view, this is always going to be a no. From the atheist point of view, said person sounds as if they are in the first stage of abandoning religion. Mind you, I know plenty of people who spend their lives in a state of directionless spirituality.

Zombrex

AtomicHorror wrote: »

Mind you, I know plenty of people who spend their lives in a state of directionless spirituality.

Yeah to be honest it sounds more like that than the first steps of abandonment of religion

the quote when someone stops believing in God they don't believe nothing, they believe everything (paraphrased) springs to mind.

I think a lot of people like the general fuzzy idea of Christianity, the idea of a wonderful God who loves you, and an after life, but they don't particularly like all the fine detail. So they co-op bits from Christianity and other religions and put them all together into a big ball of warm fuzzy "spirituality"

Now as an atheist one crazy nut job belief is the same as another crazy nut job belief (:pac:), but I can understand why some Christians go "er, hang on a minute, that isn't the way it works ..."

brianthebard

I think that it might be possible to combine things like Christianity with say Buddhism philosophically, ie things like turn the other cheek, non violence, love thy neighbour, whatever. But combining religions would not work in most cases. Some like Quakerism afaik try to seek knowledge and faith from many different sources, and you can afaik be a buddhist quaker, a christian quaker, etc, but at the same time they still come under the umbrella of Christianity as quakers.

(at least that's what wiki says):

Although nearly all Quakers throughout history and many today consider Quakerism to be a Christian movement, some Friends (principally in some Meetings in the United States and the United Kingdom) now consider themselves universalist, agnostic, atheist, realist, humanist, postchristian, nontheist or Nontheist Friend, or do not accept any religious label.[4] Calls for Quakerism to include non-Christians go back at least as far as 1870,[5] but this phenomenon has become increasingly evident during the latter half of the 20th century and the opening years of the 21st century, and is still controversial among Friends. An especially notable example of this is that of Friends who actively identify as members of a faith other than Christian, such as Islam[6] or Buddhism.[7]

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Wicknight wrote: »

I think a lot of people like the general fuzzy idea of Christianity, the idea of a wonderful God who loves you, and an after life, but they don't particularly like all the fine detail. So they co-op bits from Christianity and other religions and put them all together into a big ball of warm fuzzy "spirituality"

I aggree Wicknight, I think a lot of people think like this. I have a good friend who is exactly as you described - but he calls himself a Catholic. We had one very interesting conversation about this when I started asking him about what he believed Jesus to have done while on earth. My friend didn't beleive Jesus performed any miracles or did anything supernatural. He didn't believe Jesus to be the son of God, in his opinion Jesus was just a "really good guy". I tried to explain that this does not make him a Catholic.

I think what we have in Ireland is a lot of people who are cultural Christians and not really followers of Christianity. I have a cousin getting married in a Catholic church next year. My cousin is an atheist and his wife-to-be is a diest. I would describe both as cultural Christians though as they go to mass, receive communion, say the rosary ... etc when they are at home with their parents.

sorella

Seems to be easy to be a Catholic without being a Christian, indeed.

Louis Full Bearer wrote: »

I aggree Wicknight, I think a lot of people think like this. I have a good friend who is exactly as you described - but he calls himself a Catholic. We had one very interesting conversation about this when I started asking him about what he believed Jesus to have done while on earth. My friend didn't beleive Jesus performed any miracles or did anything supernatural. He didn't believe Jesus to be the son of God, in his opinion Jesus was just a "really good guy". I tried to explain that this does not make him a Catholic.

I think what we have in Ireland is a lot of people who are cultural Christians and not really followers of Christianity. I have a cousin getting married in a Catholic church next year. My cousin is an atheist and his wife-to-be is a diest. I would describe both as cultural Christians though as they go to mass, receive communion, say the rosary ... etc when they are at home with their parents.

Joe1919

Its interesting to note that the great theologian, St Thomas Aquinas were said to have got into trouble and came close to being branded a heretic for his continual interests in Aristotle (pagan), Averroes (Muslim) and Maimonides (jewish) writings.

Its also said that the Jesuits, on first arriving in China, admired the philosophy of Confucious and saw in it no contradiction with Catholicism. As far as know, some Chinese see no problem in multiple religions (Confucianism, Daoism, Buddhism) as it may help to explains different aspects of life. However this tolerance seems to only exist where there is no threat to the 'unity' of the political system.

Many argue that Catholicism is full of idolatry (in terms of ritual) anyhow and of course this became a big issue during the reformation when in many places the statues and other 'pagan symbols' were removed from many of the reformed churches.

I had the great pleasure of visiting the Pantheon in Rome once. This was originally a temple to the Roman Gods but was converted into a church but it does show the pagan influence on the origins of Christian practice.

Having said all of the above, 'religious thought' is different to 'religious rituals' and practices, and (imo) thinkers like Aquinas were interested in other religions only in so far as that their teaching were rational and could make some type of positive contribution to the Christian philosophical thought or to rationality in general.