{"id":360,"date":"2018-01-15T22:14:13","date_gmt":"2018-01-15T22:14:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/religioustolerance\/?p=360"},"modified":"2018-02-08T23:51:28","modified_gmt":"2018-02-08T23:51:28","slug":"absolute-relative-truth-religion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religioustolerance\/2018\/01\/absolute-relative-truth-religion\/","title":{"rendered":"The Conflict Between Absolute and Relative Truth In Religion"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Truth in religion. What, actually, is the truth?<\/strong><\/h3>\n <\/p>\n A person, whom I will call \u201cAnon\u201d \u2014 short form for \u201cAnonymous\u201d \u2014 recently sent me Email discussing absolute and relative truth in religion. He asked:<\/p>\n " \u201cIf I believe I am an automobile, does that mean I am one?\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n I feel that the correct answer is no, that a human cannot be an automobile. I base this assertion on the source of all secular knowledge, \u201cGoogle,\u201d which defines \u201cautomobile\u201d as:<\/p>\n " \u201ca road vehicle, typically with four wheels, powered by an internal combustion engine or electric motor and able to carry a small number of people.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n That sounds like a reasonable description, although I might have added the presence of doors and a steering wheel. Also, the word \u201cvehicle\u201d is not defined. However, Google\u2019s seems sufficiently precise in this case.<\/p>\n I suspect that A.C. has no wheels, has no engine or motor in the conventional sense of those words, and would find it difficult to carry even one person of average weight for a long distance, let alone a small number of people.<\/p>\n Therefore, I confidently assert that he is definitely and absolutely not <\/strong>an automobile.<\/p>\n The essence the remaining part of Anon\u2019s email is similar a quandary that I had some 23 years ago when I launched the ReligiousTolerance.org<\/a> website, during the infancy of the Internet.<\/p>\n Various sources claim there is between 20,000 and 40,000 individual organized denominations, sects, and faith groups worldwide, within Christianity.<\/p>\n Let us assume that there are 30,000. All base their beliefs and practices on various translations of the Hebrew Scriptures (a.k.a. Old Testament) and Christian Scriptures (a.k.a. New Testament), and perhaps include the Apocrypha. Most of them regard themselves as having the fullness of truth about Christianity. That is, their<\/strong><\/em> version of Christianity is the<\/strong><\/em> correct one. However, they all teach different beliefs and follow different practices. Further, many faith groups regard others who regard themselves as Christians to actually be sub-Christian, non-Christian, or even anti-Christian.<\/p>\n My quandary was: when essays on my website discuss Christianianity, how wide a net should be used? What faith groups should be included as \u201cChristian?\u201d and which should be excluded?<\/p>\n Some conservative Protestants teach that a Christian is any person who believes that the Bible is\u00a0inerrant<\/a><\/span>, that\u00a0salvation<\/a><\/span>\u00a0is by grace, and that one must be \u201cborn-again<\/em>\u201d to be saved and avoid eternal punishment in\u00a0Hell<\/a><\/span>\u00a0after death. Otherwise, they will be sent on to the torture chambers for all eternity.<\/p>\n The Catholic Church teaches that their denomination is the only one with the fullness of Christian truth.<\/p>\n To many in the very early Christian movement, a Christian was defined as a person who was baptized and proclaimed \u201cJesus is Lord<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints<\/a> is often referred to as the Mormon church<\/a> or the LDS. They believe that when the last apostle died during the first Century CE<\/a><\/span>, all of the Christian groups started to deviate quickly from the original teachings of Jesus. They believe that the LDS founder, Joseph Smith, created a denomination that is the only one that follows the original Christian beliefs. And so on, with other faith groups.<\/p>\n After much discussion in the group, we decided on a definition of \u201cChristian.\u201d The current definition<\/a> that we use is:<\/p>\n " \u201cWe accept as Christian any individual or group who devoutly, thoughtfully, seriously, and prayerfully believe themselves to be attempting to follow the teachings of Yeshua of Nazareth (a.k.a. Jesus Christ) as they interpret those teachings to be.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n This definition includes the two largest organized Christian denominations within the U.S., the Roman Catholic Church, and the Southern Baptist Conference, as well as tens of thousands of smaller ones. It probably includes essentially all of the 280 million in the U.S, adults who consider themselves to be Christian.<\/p>\n \u201cAnon\u201d disagrees with this definition, because it regards a Christian as anyone who thinks they are a Christian. By the same general argument, anyone who thinks they are an automobile should be considered an automobile.<\/p>\n Perhaps the resolution to this conflict is that \u201cChristianity, the religion\u201d cannot be defined. But if one cannot define a religion, then how can one discuss it?<\/p>\n References<\/strong><\/p>\n Robinson B.A. 2016. ReligiousTolerance.org. Who is a Christian?<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n The views presented on this blog are an extension of\u00a0those presented on the Religious Tolerance<\/span><\/a> website. The purpose of all articles is to compare the full range of beliefs and actions by people who are members of various faith groups within Christianity and other world religions, individuals who are NOT Affiliated with a faith group (NOTAs), and secularists.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Truth in religion. What, actually, is the truth? A person, whom I will call \u201cAnon\u201d \u2014 short form for \u201cAnonymous\u201d \u2014 recently sent me Email discussing absolute and relative truth in religion. He asked: \u201cIf I believe I am an automobile, does that mean I am one?\u201d I feel that the correct answer is no, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3079,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-360","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Conflict Between Absolute and Relative Truth In Religion<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Truth in "Christianity, the religion." What, actually, is the truth? But if one cannot define a religion, then how can one discuss it?\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religioustolerance\/2018\/01\/absolute-relative-truth-religion\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Conflict Between Absolute and Relative Truth In Religion\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Truth in "Christianity, the religion." What, actually, is the truth? 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