What I believe

[toothycat]

Well, part of it at least, because some people are interested.

It's worth noting that I don't speak for Serge here - we may share a LJ (because we only really use it to read other peoples' posts ;) and we may be married, but we aren't linked at the mind ;) Also, my beliefs have changed quite a bit over the years and I don't promise I won't change my mind on some things or the way I said them tomorrow.

This (in italics) is the Apostles' Creed, anyway, one of the earliest creeds of Christianity. I'm going to start with it but probably not end - I'm posting this late at night, and religion and belief are complicated, never mind the tangles my head can get into. There will probably be more, depending on what questions get asked.

I believe in God, the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in a Creator, who made the universe. I am, among many other things, an evolutionary biologist who is currently masquerading as a geneticist; I think God created everything and that evolution is the tool he used to do it, the brush with which he painted the world. I don't believe that is incompatible with Genesis, nor do I think that belief in a literal Creation is unChristian or in any way incompatible with Christianity (it does annoy me when non-Christians become convinced that one has to leave one's brain at the door when one enters a church).

I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord.

So yeah, the Trinity. I suppose I think of the Trinity in a very vague and fuzzy way. I am not only a scientist; in fact, first and foremost, although I think I tend to logical and rational thinking (at least, I try to) I would identify myself as a storyteller before I identify as a scientist. As such, I recognise that not everything is divisible or explainable in the current human languages and vocabulary. Possibly a good analogy for the Trinity is the three phases of water; ice, liquid, steam. They're all water, but different aspects. Anyway, I believe that there is one God and three persons in the Trinity, and I recognise that there are some things beyond my current comprehension. I'm willing to accept the Trinity on faith.

He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary.

Was Jesus born of a virgin? Does it matter if he was the product of rape or fornication? I don't think (as I understand Catholics do) that Mary was sinless. However, if you're going to swallow the idea that God is all powerful and made the universe, is it really so hard to believe that he could cause a virgin to be pregnant? There are much harder things in Christianity to handle than that, after all. So yes, I do believe he was born of a virgin, and then obviously God (the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity) would have had a hand in it.

He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended to the dead. On the third day He rose again.

The subject of atonement is never an easy one to explain. There are so many explanations and I have met people who insist that unless you accept their personal choice (usually penal substitutionary atonement, for those who are interested), you're not a proper Christian. That kind of attitude annoys me.

To go back to the beginning, I believe that every person born gets things wrong (except Jesus). We tend to stray, just like an apple, left to its own devices with nothing to support it, tends to fall. My view is that God wants us all to be with him; he loves us and longs for us to know him. However, because we have done wrong things (of our own free will, I should add), we cannot exist in the same place as God. His goodness and holiness and our wrongness or sinfulness literally cannot co-exist, like shadows can't exist when a dazzling light illuminates every corner of a room.

The entire Old Testament consists of God making covenants with his people, which they then broke. Those covenants - well, that covenant; it gets restated but it's pretty much the same one - consist of a promise on the part of Israel, God's people, to obey God's laws, and on God's part to forgive their sins and provide them with the promised land and what they need to survive - more, every good thing. God does actually enjoy giving us good things. (Note: I'm not a theologian. I could be getting this vastly wrong, but it's my understanding and a quick and probably somewhat flawed summary). The Israelites couldn't keep their covenant, and went through cycles of disobeying, being warned, being punished (which was also written into the covenant) and repenting and being rescued.

The new covenant is one where God upholds both sides, and because he is perfect, the covenant remains unbroken. He provides the reward, and he also provides the perfect life and obedience required to claim it. Because Jesus died - whatever the exact theological mechanism - we are permitted to claim his perfect life as ours, and so we receive his reward. We can then be in God's presence after death, because our sin has been removed.

Hell's not mentioned in the creed, but it did come up in previous conversations, so here's what I think. If someone chooses not to let God get rid of their sin (via Jesus), then God has no choice but to let them exist apart from him. I think that is hell; not a place of punishment as such but a place of being apart from God, who is the source and centre of everything that exists.

He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.

Jesus was perfect himself, and thus did not remain damned. Like I say, I don't pretend to understand how it all works.

He will come again to judge the living and the dead.

As it says. I have no idea when this will be.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of Saints, the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.

Whoo, lots there. I've already mentioned the Spirit. The 'holy catholic church' means the worldwide church, not that part of it that is the Roman Catholic church, although they are a part of that worldwide church. I think God is rather less bothered by denominational divides than we (Christian) like to think. I'm sure he'd rather have heartfelt devotion than absolute doctrinal correctness. (Do I get excommunicated now? ;).

The communion of saints, as I understand it, means that we're part of the family of believers ('saints' means Christians here, and makes no inferences about how holy an individual Christian is). As such, I should consider every Christian a part of my family. Even the ones I disagree violently with ^^;;

The resurrection of the body is interesting. I actually don't believe in souls - well, rather, I think it's an unnecessary term. We are built out of meat, our minds reside in the yellowish matter that is our brain. So to me it makes sense that it's our bodies that get resurrected, because without them, we are not ourselves. Mind and body are irrevocably linked. I don't think people born with disabilities will be resurrected with those disabilities; I don't know how it works. But I do believe that, in heaven, we will have bodies. And hopefully there will be jaffa cakes too ;)

Life everlasting is reasonably clear, but I should say that I have absolutely no idea what it will be like - except that it will be everything earthly life should be but isn't quite. Everything will be clearer, richer, more satisfying, more real. I love the accounts of heaven in Revelations, and I'm looking forward to finding out what it will be like, but I have no idea what it will actually be. I think - I suspect - that there will be paper and pencils there for me, though :)

----

That's it for the Creed. Here's a chunk of conversation from Rob's LJ that may (or may not) be of interest. Rob's parts are in italics.

I'd be interested to know what you think happens to non Christians who haven't heard the gospel

As far as I understand it, they are judged on their lives as they are. God knows what their response would be had they heard, and their lives should bear that out. I believe that is supported in the Bible, although I can't remember where and I could be wrong.

those who hear it and dismiss it

Depends on why. If all they hear/see is Jack Chick, I can't see God blaming them! ^^;;

and those who actively reject it.

See above. I honestly don't think we can tell what a person's eternal fate is. That doesn't mean I think Christians shouldn't tell people about Jesus; actively knowing him, in my opinion, is better than not.

....

Do you think that the only method God has of preventing people going to hell is if those people choose to become Christians?

I think that the only way to God is through Jesus. I don't think that that necessarily limits people to a particular set of rules or a brand of Christianity, but I would of course be very wary of recommending anything other than following Jesis (since that's the only thing I know that's guaranteed to work). I don't think, for example, that a Muslim who has no knowledge of Christ and who sincerely tried to follow Allah would necessarily be damned, and if he is saved, then it must be through Jesus somehow, since he is the only name by which men may be saved. But if I met that Muslim and he asked me what I would recommend, I would recommend Christianity every time (roughly speaking - obviously more thought and consideration would go into it ;).

----

Once, a friend asked Serge what Christianity was about, and he said, 'knowing Jesus'. I don't think I have the kind of relationship with Jesus that, say, Paul the Apostle did. I'd like to, but I don't. I do think that Serge's is a good, brief explanation. Like I said, I don't think correct doctrine is the be-all and end-all; if it were, people with limited mental faculties would be excluded, and that can't be the case. So I do think it boils down to trusting God.

That, for me, is a gift. I was brought up as a Christian, I made the commitment when I was 4 and I was baptised when I was about 11, I think. I have never doubted God's existence, (lots of other things, but never his existence). I did spend several weeks thinking that I couldn't be a Christian, because I couldn't see any sign of God in my life. I thought about it, and came to the conclusion that if, as I believed, God existed, and he was the God of the Bible, then I must be a Christian because I had committed myself to following him and I meant it. And for everything I said above, for all my woolly reasoning and the arguments that may be brought to bear, above all else I trust in God and I believe he can and will do the things he has promised.

I'm going to finish with a fantastic quote that I love to bits. "Man's chief purpose is to glorify God and enjoy him forever." I think (after a swift google) it's from the Westminster Shorter Catechism. I strive to do both of those.

Any questions, go ahead. I don't promise to be able to answer them, satisfactorily or not. I don't have enough time to handle large online conversations (note that I am posting this at 1:14 in the morning and I'm getting up at 5:45). But I can try :)

Comments

[ex-robhu.livejournal.com]

Thank you for posting that.

I would like to question whether your views on hell and the fate of non-Christians are in accord with the most probable reading of the Bible on those issues, but I assume you wouldn't have the time (or, probably, the interest) in doing that. Also I don't have any desire to cause upset or offence, as would probably be likely there, so let me move on to another question.

Given that you're a scientist you're well accustomed to the power of science in working out what is true, and I assume you'd agree with me (although please tell me if not) that within it it has one of if not the most powerful methods for determining the truth. Presumably you are pretty certain that evolution occurred on the basis of the objective scientific evidence for instance.

You wrote about the religious things you believe, that you have never doubted God's existence, and that you broadly agree with the Apostles' Creed which includes all kinds of things that (ISTM) lack objective evidence to support them.

I'm wondering what (if any) differences you think there are between the two categories I've outline here. For instance, do you think there really aren't two categories, that they're all truth claims about the same objective reality? Are there multiple ways of knowing? Are you more certain of the claims in one category than in another? And so on.

I have never doubted God's existence
When you say 'God' are you making a claim that that God is Yahweh?

If so how do you reconcile that with the fact that people born in different places and different times have believed in the god of the religion of that culture? So for example if you had been born in India instead of England you'd likely be a Hindu, in the 5th century in Germany you'd be following Wōden (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woden), in 10th century BC Mayan society you'd believe in Quetzalcoatl (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quetzalcoatl) and the rest of the Mayan pantheon, and so on. ISTM that the particular god people believe in is an accident of when and where they were born.

I'm getting ahead of myself a bit here, but I'm wondering if you would back away from saying that Yahweh is the 'true' god (or the best approximation of the true god), and would argue that all the religions are likely correct to some degree (as the Bahá'í (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bah%C3%A1%27%C3%AD_Faith) do), or if you think there is something uniquely correct about Christianity. If so then what, and how do you know that someone who had a similar degree of religious faith as you in another religion would not be saying the exact same things about their religion.

I think God created everything and that evolution is the tool he used to do it, the brush with which he painted the world. I don't believe that is incompatible with Genesis
I would agree with you here. I don't think it has to be incompatible with Genesis, but it seems likely to me that it is. One of the reasons I stopped being a Christian was because I was fairly confident that by far the best theological interpretation of Genesis was completely incompatible with what we know from science, and it seemed to me that science had a better track record and so where there was a conflict I counted it as a point against Christianity.

The Bible by it's nature seems to rarely state things unequivocally, or perhaps it is better to say that as there are no obvious rules as to how it should be interpreted (allowing for example Episcopalean Bishop Spong (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Shelby_Spong) to redefine Christianity almost beyond recognition (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Shelby_Spong#New_Reformation)). However it seems to me that there are certain readings that seem more likely than others.

How would you deal with a situation where what you rationally thought or knew to be true conflicted with something your faith / the Bible said was true? If there were other ways of reading that Bible passage would you shift to those? What if the contradictory reading seemed to be overwhelmingly likely to be the correct reading of the text?

[toothycat]

I'm wondering what (if any) differences you think there are between the two categories I've outline here. For instance, do you think there really aren't two categories, that they're all truth claims about the same objective reality? Are there multiple ways of knowing? Are you more certain of the claims in one category than in another? And so on.

One is subjective and the other is as close as we can get to objective. I don't expect my faith in God to convince you. I do expect my paper to convince other scientists of my theory.

When you say 'God' are you making a claim that that God is Yahweh?

Who do you mean when you say 'Yahweh'? If you mean the God described in the Bible, then yes.

If so how do you reconcile that with the fact that people born in different places and different times have believed in the god of the religion of that culture? So for example if you had been born in India instead of England you'd likely be a Hindu, in the 5th century in Germany you'd be following Wōden, in 10th century BC Mayan society you'd believe in Quetzalcoatl and the rest of the Mayan pantheon, and so on. ISTM that the particular god people believe in is an accident of when and where they were born.

Yes, that's true. I explained my thinking on that sort of thing in the original post and in a reply to your comment.

I'm getting ahead of myself a bit here, but I'm wondering if you would back away from saying that Yahweh is the 'true' god (or the best approximation of the true god), and would argue that all the religions are likely correct to some degree (as the Bahá'í do), or if you think there is something uniquely correct about Christianity.

To my mind, Jesus is the uniquely correct thing about Christianity. Every religion will reflect truth, because every religion is a seeking after that sort of truth and God is in all Creation - we can't help see bits of him as we look. We just might get it wrong. The difference with Christianity, as I see it, is that it is all explained for us. I don't think God would punish a Hindu who had never heard of Jesus for not believing in Jesus.

[toothycat]

and how do you know that someone who had a similar degree of religious faith as you in another religion would not be saying the exact same things about their religion.

They probably would, yes.

I would agree with you here. I don't think it has to be incompatible with Genesis, but it seems likely to me that it is. One of the reasons I stopped being a Christian was because I was fairly confident that by far the best theological interpretation of Genesis was completely incompatible with what we know from science, and it seemed to me that science had a better track record and so where there was a conflict I counted it as a point against Christianity.

Yes, see, I would not take that as a point against Christianity but against my fallible interpretation of the Bible. Faith rests on scripture, tradition, reason and experience, and the Bible is not God. My faith in God remains.

The Bible by it's nature seems to rarely state things unequivocally, or perhaps it is better to say that as there are no obvious rules as to how it should be interpreted (allowing for example Episcopalean Bishop Spong to redefine Christianity almost beyond recognition). However it seems to me that there are certain readings that seem more likely than others.

Yes.. within context. I'm willing to bet that if you took ten different people from different times throughout history, all familiar with the Bible, and asked them about a few contentious topics, they'd manage at least five different 'obvious' readings between them for each question.

You (generic) can never assume that your 'obvious' reading is that, nor that it is correct.

How would you deal with a situation where what you rationally thought or knew to be true conflicted with something your faith / the Bible said was true?

I'll find out when it happens. I don't believe it will, naturally ;)

If there were other ways of reading that Bible passage would you shift to those?

Depends on how believable they were and how much the issue mattered.

What if the contradictory reading seemed to be overwhelmingly likely to be the correct reading of the text?

A) I am fallible and don't entirely trust my reading of the Bible. B) I'll deal with that when it happens. C) Above all, I expect my faith to remain. Nothing else I've done has made it go away.

[raggedyman.livejournal.com]

thank you for that, very interesting read. no questions at this point, just compliments to you for givong a very clear view on such a personal topic

[toothycat]

Thanks. Talking about something so very personal is very hard for me to do, although doing it online to a bunch of people who've said they're interested is much easier! ;)

[ex-robhu.livejournal.com]

Perhaps a good solution is for us all to attend St. Pixels (http://www.stpixels.com/)? ;-)

[wrh-2005.livejournal.com]

You believe what you want, it's from your heart.

I won't question it. I will respect it however. :)

I did read everything but further comment isn't really necessary.

We are all humans, we all have that in common.

[ex-robhu.livejournal.com]

*pokes Mr toothycat to post his own version of this post, perhaps as a diff ;-)*

[denji.livejournal.com]

I have no real questions to ask, apart from that i've always wondered what people meant when they Jesus came back to life- my reason being (as far as i was taught) there doesn't seem to be anything written after that, which confused me! i just wonder whatever happened to Jesus after that? if anything? and i've heard some people say he still exist? re they basically saying he exists within us?

apart from that- I just want to say thank you ^^ this is the best explanation of someone's faith i've had so far. i ask my friends about christianity and often get things that feel rather forced, which in turn make me feel uncomfortble.

but it was clear, and open and i can understand it a little more now. :) it doesn't seem so scary/overwelming anymore =]

So I do think it boils down to trusting God. is something i agree with ! =]

[toothycat]

whatever happened to Jesus after that? if anything? and i've heard some people say he still exist? re they basically saying he exists within us?

According to the Bible, he came back, revealed himself to his disciples (that must have been some party ;) and shortly after, ascended bodily into heaven.
As far as I understand it, Jesus is still as human as he was when he was born - he is fully human and fully God (I didn't say that earlier, and I should have). According to church teaching - and I see no reason to disagree - he is alive and in heaven at the moment, with God, interceding for his people (I have a little mental image of people dying, and coming before God, and Jesus saying, 'it's cool, this is one of mine.' I don't know how accurate that is ;)
I think God is with us, but when Jesus left his disciples he promised them the Holy Spirit, so if I were to specify which member of the Trinity was with people now, it'd be the Spirit. But because they're all God, it can be a bit confusing sometimes..

And you're welcome :)

[atreic.livejournal.com]

There are lots and lots of stories in the bible about what happens next. Jesus kept appearing to people, but in strange ways, and it took them a long time to recognise him (like, in one story he walks with some of his best friends for miles, and talks to them, and they don't realise its him (bible)). And he did mystical ghostly things like managing to appear in locked rooms(bible). So he was back, and alive, but not alive in just the same way he was before. And then a bit later he got lifted back up into heaven (bible) while some of the disciples were watching, and that was the last anyone saw of him in person.

Then lots of other stuff happened, like the arrival of the holy spirit at pentacost and lots of people being converted to christianity and trying to work out how a church should function. And all of that is in the bible too - only the first four books of the new testiment are about Jesus being around, all the rest are about what people said / did afterwards!

[woodpijn.livejournal.com]

And he did mystical ghostly things like managing to appear in locked rooms
Plus distinctly non-ghostly things like eating fish, to show that he had been bodily resurrected.

[darth-mongoose.livejournal.com]

I had been wondering what your views on evolution would be, considering your job. I always felt isolated in my youth club in my teens because I was the only one who stubbornly believed in evolution (the rest just went along with everything the leader told them without thinking about it, it seemed to me).I like the idea of god, rather than just plonking everything down on the earth in six days and go 'there, that'll do. Nap time!', planning and tweaking and subtly allowing or encouraging things to adapt and change and grow. My experience has always been that God is capable of mighty things, but he works in subtle ways. If time was nothing to you, and you were immortal it wouldn't matter that the glacier will take millions of years to carve the valley!
For me, the thing that makes the existence of God seem most credible is the fact that humans can take pleasure from the beauty of nature. There's no simple need for us as animals to take pleasure from the sight of a butterfly or rainbow, or, for that matter, to want to try to imitate those things with pen and paper or clay. It makes sense to me that God, as creator, is the source of creativity.

[toothycat]

It makes sense to me that God, as creator, is the source of creativity.

Yeah, absolutely! I love the idea that God appreciates our own creations because they're reflecting his image in us. We had a set of sermons at our church about two or three years ago about how God is glorified in every part of our lives, our work, our hobbies - it's all as relevant as, say, a job as a missionary or working in Sunday School. They actually got people like playwrights and artists up to talk about their work before the sermons. I really appreciated that, because there is a tendency to feel that comicking (or any creativity) is just a hobby and if it doesn't mention God explicitly, it's not connected - but of course, it is :)

As for evolution, I used to think it untrue until I actually studied it ;) I miss it a bit now. I'd like to go back to it for my next postdoc, if I can ^^

[woodpijn.livejournal.com]

Yes, I very much agree.

I think it's much more impressive that God created a world with the right conditions for creatures "in his image" to evolve, than that he simply created them directly.

As a programmer I can appreciate that it's usually a more interesting challenge to write programs which write programs, than simply to write programs. :)

[ex-robhu.livejournal.com]

(This is a rephrasing of something pw201 said (http://robhu.livejournal.com/421626.html?thread=1637882#t1637882) on my journal. He expresses exactly what I want to say so well that I hope people will forgive me for rephrasing what he said rather than writing the same issues out again from scratch)

There are problems with being an Evangelical and having a non-literal reading of Genesis though. If you do that you lose the mechanism by which the problem which evangelicals say Jesus came to deal with arose, and you're left with dangling questions about what the bits in later Biblical authors that refer back to creation and the fall actually mean (examples of this can be found on plenty of creationist sites), and about bits of theology which seem to rely on literal creation.

For example the mainstream Evangelical belief is that natural disasters, disease, and so on are a result of human sin, that nature is fallen as well as humanity. This is a component of Evangelical theodicy too. Without a literal Fall, there was never a perfect world to start with, and these natural disasters are just the outworking of physical laws which have been operating on the planet both before and after humans turned up. Human sin has no cosmological effect.

So, a key motivation for literal creationism is that it provides the pre-cursor for the rest of Evangelical theology. Without it, you are left in the slightly uncomfortable position of saying "well, I believe that human sin spoiled a world that once was perfect, but I don't understand how that happened, and I'm just going to ignore this apparent explanation I have here because science says it is false".

(edited to change icon to the one I meant to click on)

[woodpijn.livejournal.com]

"You will bear a son." - "How can this be? I am a young woman." Doesn't make sense.

Or do you mean that the original word in the OT prophecy meant "young woman", and the entire story in the NT was made up to fulfil it?

(Personally my view on the virgin birth is I think it's probably true, for the reasons toothycat outlined above, but it wouldn't bother me if it turned out not to be.)

[atreic.livejournal.com]

There is a very nice explanation of your misunderstanding written already, so I won't re-iterate it.

[toothycat]

Does it matter that much? I don't think it's a salvation issue. I just don't think it's that important. The deity of Jesus, the existence of God - those are important. Creation/evolution, the virgin birth, those are side issues.
IMO, obviously ;) I don't think that 'how can it be? I am a young woman' makes sense either, but like I say, I don't think it's important enough to make an issue over ^^;;

[emperor]

Thank you for that, toothycat! :)

[ex-robhu.livejournal.com]

It would be helpful for me to know what are the 'core' things that lead you to believe in Christianity. What could be stripped away and you'd still continue to be a Christian?

So for example you might not think a virgin birth is critically important, or the trinity. I'm wondering what things are absolutely core (e.g. that someone called Jesus existed who died for your sins)?

Those are intellectual things, but are there experiential things, or things about the nature of the world that if they were missing (or conversely if certain things were present) you'd either have trouble continuing to believe or would choose not to.

I ask because as others have said (http://pw201.livejournal.com/21769.html) Evangelicalism can produces a very strong faith (largely based on biblical correctness) it can also be very brittle, but clearly your faith is not like that. Perhaps this will help me understand how your faith differs from that of other Christians I know, and keep assuming you are similar to.

[toothycat]

It would be helpful for me to know what are the 'core' things that lead you to believe in Christianity. What could be stripped away and you'd still continue to be a Christian?

So for example you might not think a virgin birth is critically important, or the trinity. I'm wondering what things are absolutely core (e.g. that someone called Jesus existed who died for your sins)?

Oh goodness, I can't make a list like that - I'd be here all night! The virgin birth I don't think is critically important. The Trinity is more so. Ultimately, I think the most important thing is Jesus, who he is (hence why the Trinity is important, I guess) and what he did (so there has to be a doctrine of sin and redemption somewhere). Jesus is who matters. That doesn't mean other things don't.

Those are intellectual things, but are there experiential things, or things about the nature of the world that if they were missing (or conversely if certain things were present) you'd either have trouble continuing to believe or would choose not to.

... I don't know, partly because I'm not sure I can envisage what you mean (examples would be useful).

I ask because as others have said Evangelicalism can produces a very strong faith (largely based on biblical correctness) it can also be very brittle, but clearly your faith is not like that. Perhaps this will help me understand how your faith differs from that of other Christians I know, and keep assuming you are similar to.

I hope that helps. I have been Evangelical, but to my mind that sort of structure is too rigid. God is far, far bigger than the human mind can encompass, and trying to fit him into rules and 'it happens this way' just isn't going to work.

[atreic.livejournal.com]

It would be helpful for me to know what are the 'core' things that lead you to believe in Christianity. What could be stripped away and you'd still continue to be a Christian?

I like to think in axioms and catagories and things that are in and things that are out. This is, I think, the main thing that stopped me calling myself a Christian for so long, because I didn't believe in x,y and z, and my internal (slightly evangelical New Life) definition of a Christian was that Christians believed in x,y and z. Then I got more and more wound up as I met more and more Christians who when you poked them hard enough didn't seem to believe in x,y or z either, and still went around calling themselves Christians. I can see that if one person says "I believe in a giant fish orbiting the earth, and that's what the phrase 'I am a Christian' means to me" they're taking the piss. But if there are beliefs / disbeliefs that more than half the religion seem to be doing then maybe it is part of the meaning of the word, but you only see it once you start to think about it in depth. So for me, coming back to Christianity was about swallowing the idea that it's broader and deeper than a box ticking exercise of beliefs.

I think also that there are lots of things where it is hard to pin down a core set of beliefs, and in a way we make them up for convenience even though it leads to some odd edge cases. Like "What is the core thing that makes an animal a mammal?" There is a sort of "platonic ideal" of mammalness that we know and understand even if we can't put it into words (furry, makes milk, has live young etc). But then there are hundreds of borderline animals that fulfil most of our ideas but not all of them. Likewise questions such as "what is the core thing that makes something alive?" or "what is the core thing that makes something a person?". They're interesting questions, and thinking about them helps us understand what we're talking about, but generally what we conclude is "there are many things that we might expect, but if it lacks only one or two of them it's probably still a foo". It's a table with hundreds of legs. Asking "which legs must I take away to make the table fall over" seems to miss the point. Although obviously, some legs are more structual than others, if you were only to remove one the table would probably still stand. And although there is probably a subset that it is sufficient to remove to make the table fall, it is probably not necessary either!

[theorah.livejournal.com]

wow, that was really interesting! (both yours and Serges posts ^^ )
It was really nice and interesting to see your veiw on everything, thanks for sharing! =D