I recently heard a This American Life broadcast about Carlton Pearson, who was officially branded a heretic by the Pentecostal leadership because he started preaching that there is no Hell (although he is now an ordained mainline Protestant minister). Preaching the idea of no Hell is, of course, heresy because it's clearly stated in the Bible. His reasoning is that the world is full of people who are either suffering immensely or living peaceful, generous, and holy lives who will never hear about Christianity, and therefore will never have a choice to become Christians. This means God explicitly allows people to be born knowing that they will go straight to Hell when they die with no possibility of redemption. Not very nice to think about, huh. But these are the things that Christians must agree to when they become "believers". Same with homosexuality being a sin. Or tattoos. The Bible clearly states it, so Christians must believe it, and trying to be more socially acceptable is really just going against fundamental Christian ideas, however progressive it might sound. This is also one of the reasons I became an atheist. Since I really can't pick and choose what parts of Christianity I agree with, I have to give it up.
By the way, following up on my previous post today, this stuff counts as evidence for morality and ethics derived apart from the Judeo-Christian tradition that would naturally arise in an atheism-based system of morality. To Carlton Pearson I might suggest that if there is no Hell and everybody goes to Heaven, is it even necessary to believe in God? Can't we just be good people?
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2 comments:
Can't pick and choose? I refer you to Thomas Jefferson.
I think it depends where you live. Although fundamentalist Christians probably believe things like that are sinful, I know many Christians who don't believe in hell, etc. I mean, the Bible was translated so many times how do people know if it was translated properly? Even if it were, as many people know, things get lost or changed in translation. In the end, putting aside the question of is there a higher being or not, isn't religion (not spirituality or the belief in a higher being) just a man-made thing?
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