Szilard

Mine is probably Romans.

I know that they are somewhere in between, but what exactly do they believe?

I am attending a Bible group, which is mainstream Lutheran, and the people there seem to be rather liberal compared to other Christians.

Today we had to share a situation that happened in the past days, when we talked "straight forward" to someone...

The other ones came up with stories when they stood up for themselves in their workplace or in their family, or things like that...

I told them that I have a "religious" Catholic friend, but although he is "religious", he sleeps around with many-many women. This guy told me that he doesn't see anything wrong with that, and I responded that he should measure his morals to God, and not to his life.

I thought that the Bible group members would say "good job, you should stand out for the word of God", or something like that... Instead they were shocked and asked why I was judging (?) my friend.

The only one who was on my side was the pastor, who is a women. But her main reason wasn't either the Bible, but rather that she is a feminist and she thinks objectifying women is wrong. (Actually I do agree with this part of feminism.)

In the Bible you see that he never compromised of what he was preaching, he never tried to wrap it up in a nice box, and never cared how many people he offends. In fact, many people were nervous, angry, and triggered around him.

The first time he went preaching, they wanted to throw him off a cliff! (See Luke 4)

Also... It is true that he was hanging around with prostitutes and tax-collector thieves, but he told them to change their lives, not "be who you are and carpe diem".

People nowadays confuse loving someone (=wanting the best for the other person) with encouraging them to do what they feel good doing!

If I understand the Gospel in the Heideberg Catechism correctly, it teaches this:

(Also if I don't understand it correctly, please correct me!)

It says that we are depraved. So "repentance from sin" is not just feeling sorry for certain acts (like lying, murdering...), it is a repentance from sin in general.

As an example (not from the Catechism, I heard this from a Pastor): Let's say we love somebody, our love is very rarely unconditional. We often expect something in return. We often don't want to love someone more than they love us, because we are afraid to get hurt. Also society labels too much devotion towards another person as a sign of weakness, so we only give a person a certain amount of love. Therefor even though this kind of love is valued by people, in the eyes of God it is still far away from holiness.

So when we repent, we are a new person (as the Bible says, we are born again.) After that we have to grow in faith, "bear fruits", and show our faith in deeds too. But this is not the same as trying to fix the "old me", that did not give their entire life to Jesus.

Not your opinion what it might be like, only experience!

Not your opinion what it might be like, only experience!

Science is inside our comfort zone (or our "safe space", and tells us not to drink soda all the time, to take care of the environment etc, and threatens us with diseases and ecological disasters if we disobey.

However, the world doesn't turn their back on God, so that scientists can tell them what to do.

How many times I hear "I don't believe in medicine", "I don't believe in climate change", etc. As if they were all something too spiritual to understand, and just a matter of "personal belief"!

We Christians should know where this is leading!

They will say it's all made up, and it only want to make some people rich. We have to argue about things that were solved decades ago. And if someone in our circles makes a mistake, they will say they have no reason to trust us any more. If we have debates, they will say we disunity.

Meanwhile everything is just an "opinion", a theory of a Facebook group might just be as valid as they years long research of a Nobel-prize winning scientist!

My native tongue is not English. I think I speak it fairly good, but I don't understand the old language (like KJV).

Being a reliable translation is of course important too, not just the easiness...

I have an NRSV. Is that considered good?

I have to look up many words while reading it, do you think there is any easier but reliable version or should I keep it?

In the first few centuries of Christianity Christians were outcasts, they were tortured and murdered for their beliefs.

I am biologically a white man.

But if I feel like a black women, am I black women?

Or what about species?

I am biologically a white man, but if I feel like a genderqueer female baby dolphin, am I one?

The saints (or Mary) are not obligated to pray for us. AND we can easily pray to God directly.

Pro-life people say that abortion is murder, pro-choice people say it is not murder. And since one of the few things Christians and Atheists agree on is that murder is wrong, it is a question whether abortion is murder or not.

(I don't care about your opinions on abortion, if it has nothing to do with my question!)

I know that they are very different, but which one rather?

I'm a Christian and I don't understand how a Christian can support it. I won't down vote you if you do, I just want an explanation.