Avoiding the Heart of Christianity!

[dougdean]

I watch for intellectual reason but stay for the bumper music!

[loryugan]

I think that part of the reason for Jesus telling the rich man to give all of his material possessions away is because he was an apocalyptic preacher and believed the world was going to end/God was going to intervene in the world very soon.

[sbushido]

At around 14 min you mention that Christians give more to charity than non-believers. I've heard this mentioned fairly often, but I have to ask: does this "charity" include giving donations to a church? Because if so...paying someone's salary at a church doesn't sound like much to brag about.

[joegillian]

I'm really beginning to think that this guy (Fruit Addict) is speaking out of ignorance. He brought up Mother Teresa as if there isn't a counter-narrative to her supposedly "perfect" charity lifestyle. If he's not even going to bother to look into the issues he chooses to speak about, he should at least be up front about it and let everyone know that what he's saying is pure conjecture.

[GeraldLede]

As I understand it (I've never been Christian) when Jesus asked his would-be followers to give up everything to follow him that of necessity included giving up their wives and children as well as old, possibly infirm parents. In that case not quite as 'socialist' as one would at first think.

[chrisfrench]

"Life isnt fair, it'll never be fair." Is alot easier to say when life has been fair to you. Its alot like betsy devoss buying her 11th yacht with the tax cuts she gave herself and looking down at the college students who are drowning in debt and cant find jobs like "oh sorry, life isnt fair and it'll never be fair."

Im not trying to compare you to betsy devoss just trying to emphasize the point that capitalism, the sort of "everyone has to work and theyll reap what they sow" mindset only works if everyone gets a fair chance. Capitalism works great if you have rich benefactors just give you 500 chickens to make money off of. yeah you worked hard, but the difference between success and failure isnt usually the working hard part, its whether or not you get that lucky break, that act of charity to build off of.

So "life isnt fair, and we should do something aboutthat." Is more where i stand. I agree somewhere in between communism and Outer Worlds style capitalism is a good balance to be found, but if we narrow that down applying some humanistic values, the balance is far closer to socialism than capitalism. Thats my opinion anyway.

Love your videos, they make me think.

[DBCisco]

IMHO, the resurrection is the most unbelievable claim of Christianity. PROVE it happened and I will believe all the other miracles right down to a talking snake.

[MartialVillager]

Poverty, wealth, and its distribution is a result of social factors, not simply merit or productivity.

Many people grow up in communities where there are few chances to develop their potential. Many poor people have jobs, wages haven't increased in decades. A relatively small group of people grow up with a silver spoon in their mouth. Merit doesn't play the biggest role.

Most wealth is inherited. The biggest fortunes are a result of slavery, land theft, genocide, and imperialism. U may say slavery and land theft were a long time ago, but it formed the economic basis for today's world system where u$a and Europe dominate the 3rd world majority.

[loryugan]

You bring up reasons for Christians having doubt and bring up the OT. I’d go as far as saying that what is probably the highest cause for doubt among Christians is that the claims of Christianity don’t seem to match up to our every day experience of the world.

E.g. Romans 8:28 says God is at work in all things for the good of those who love him yet there are many who claim to love him who go through so much suffering wherein I’d say at least some of it is meaningless suffering. Why would a loving God who’s compared to a loving father (parental figure) allow so many of his children to go through so much suffering, especially seemingly meaningless suffering.

Thoughts?

[dougdean]

Kudos to Doug for bringing up the fact that enabling can produce as much misery as insensitivity does. It's best to avoid both ends of this spectrum: over-sensitive and insensitive - which best characterizes the far-left and far-right respectively.

[scienection]

Giving up everything is even more absurd than meets the eye. If I give up everything then the poor become "rich" compared to me, so they have to give up everything and give it back to me.... and then i have to give it all back....Jesus skipped Math 101?

[TheDanEdwards]

For long have we had Mithraism and Marcionism and Mormonism... but now we have Myronism.

[ataho]

Well, every Christian apologist is using miracles to defend their religion but when it comes to atheists calling miracles for what they are (ancient bullshit) than you complain and say that it is not fair. Don't you see the irony here?

[dustinosborn]

Christians count giving to their church as a charity, take that out and non religious people actually give more.

[greglogan]

The silly aspects of Christianity are rising from the dead... (per Fruit Addict right at the beginning...)

Jesus christ [have mercy on us]!!

[morte]

I don't think Fruit Addict is advocating for Socialism, were government owns the means of production. Nor is he necessarily advocating that everyone give away all their money. It looks like he still has some. His point isn't really about economics at all. It is about agape, selfless unconditional universal super human love, as the heart of Christianity. Agape IS an exclusively Christian theological and ethical innovation that intends to transform the human soul as a precondition for transforming social and economic life. It, along with the inbreaking of the Kingdom of Heaven, probably was the essential teaching of the most probable historical Jesus. It was according to the Jesus Seminar, and it probably deserves to be taken seriously by Atheists.

[MOTIVATIONBYDAR]

You bring up that you think many christians may have mental problems such as depression but you were also a Christian at one point so it makes me wonder if you consider that you deal with mental health issues yourself.

I think mental health issues is something everyone has but only a few admit to and others just have such a high degree of mental issues that they couldn't hide it even if they tried

[gamotter]

I'm confused why he'd think you should be responding to a view that Christians don't even believe?