Working With Theistic Humanists

beliefnet

 christine3 wrote:

... I wouldn't dismiss believers. They have a strong feeling that it is possible a man in first century Jerusalem was doing things that nobody else could, and I don't doubt that at all. .....

  There are many smart people within Christianity that are going back to the man that was doing those things and was a theistic humanist.  They aren't making much progress in changing the institution that depends on keeping people dumb and believing in the God man, but they are becoming a significant minority in both Catholic and Protestant Christianity.  They are still theistic, the meme of something more encompassing than the individual whether it be Gaia or God is well ingrained in the modern psyche. 

Perhaps working with rather than against humanistic theists would be a better strategy for atheists. 

Christianity or Shinto

On replacing Christianity with Shinto - Beliefnet:

"I find the evolutionary reason behind religion is not spiritual fulfillment, but for community identity. The spiritual fulfillment is co-opted by the shamans as a community building and unifying technique.

While Shinto has some very attractive attributes, I suspect that trying to convert Christians is a lost cause. Christ gives hope to the hopeless at least after they die, and the minister makes sure they are hopeless sinners, at least in their own minds.

A more useful exercise, is to promote 'Progressive Christianity' with its emphasis on Jesus' teachings of a direct personal relationship with God and its corollary love your neighbors even if your other neighbors hate them. It is a natural progression for Christians who get tired of the hellfire and damnation bigotry of traditional Christian teachings. They get to keep their Jesus mediated afterlife, and all the spirituality. A much easier conversion process.

I find the Two Great Commandments very easy to live with as an atheist, and the personal God of the first does not bother me at all. If a person needs to believe and many do, the absence of proselytizing is welcome. They will of course be enthusiastic about sharing, but they can't really tell you how to believe in their God except have faith. Much easier to live with than Christ or Hell, take your pick. As the classic Jack Benny line goes 'I am still thinking about it'"