Sounds like you are wedded to a fundamentalist, literal reading of scripture, and that you have a version which you believe to be infallible. You deny that there are conflicts within scripture. Try Google.
Do you know why Matthew, Mark and Luke are called the synoptic gospels? Because John is so different.
If parables are not allegories (despite the generally accepted definitions of theses words), do you believe that Jesus was actually concerned with raising grain, grapes, fishing and sheep herding, rather than making (allegorical, non-literal) teaching points about human behavior? And if you insist on literal fundamentalism, isn’t there all of the Old Testament genocide, slavery, rape and torture to reinstate?
People absorbed by such dogmatic interpretation are likely to get sidetracked into quibbling over doctrinal differences of interpretation and generate schisms within the Christian community, rather than focusing on bringing everyone together and improving their holiness and happiness.
The point is the spirit of the law, not the letter of the law, when it comes to spiritual realm - a very central message of Jesus to the legalistic and ritualistic religious leaders of his days on Earth.
The fundamentalist muslims of ISIS and al Quaeda are derisively called takfiri by other muslims. Takfiri means “those who declare others to be heretics”. Anyone who varies from their reading of scripture (and the rules they use to interpret it) they attack as heretics - kind of like another apparently fundamentalist poster accused me of blasphemy, for using the word “interpret” in reference to understanding scripture.
Yes...I do believe I've heard that before.
Does their message contradict? Is Jesus the Savior? Did He die on a cross? Was He resurrected on the third day? a simple story used to illustrate a moral or spiritual lesson, as told by Jesus in the Gospels.
Parable: a simple story used to illustrate a moral or spiritual lesson, as told by Jesus in the Gospels.
And if you insist on literal fundamentalism, isn’t there all of the Old Testament genocide, slavery, rape and torture to reinstate?
Wow...I have no reply to this statement that has no support in the New Testament.
The only ones calling others *heretics* are the Catholics who throw that label around with reckless abandon towards anyone who dares to disagree with CATHOLICISM.
People absorbed by MONOLITHIC interpretation are likely to get sidetracked into quibbling over doctrinal differences of IMPLEMENTATION and generate schisms within the Catholic community, rather than focusing on bringing everyone together and improving their holiness and happiness.