I do have one question about your reply to LinearAQ re: the Bible. In response to his question about Paul telling women to cover their heads in church, you said you don't. The question, therefore, remains:
Do you do everything the Bible tells you to do?
Those who know the scripture know that all men are sinners. To deny this is foolish. But there is a remedy. That's the good news. The term 'gospel' means 'good news'.
It is a religious idea that to stop sinning will get one into heaven, but it's an idea not found in scripture.
The answer appears to be no. I imagine it's no for everyone, unless they also think they should be doing things like slaughtering sacrificial animals and other things Deuteronomy tells them to do.
Therefore, every person who follows the Bible makes a choice about what they will take and what they will leave. It is not logically possible to claim that you do otherwise.
Really? We know that we are weak & imperfect. If we fail, your logic says this is a decision to abandon a given portion of scripture. We know who'd like us to abandon scripture, but not everyone's easily fooled.
The bible tells us there is One who will not abandon us when we fail; One who encourages us. And another who wants us to give up.
Therefore, Christians today make decisions about what it is practical and relevant to believe and to do in this day and age.
You confuse issues. Doing & believing are two different things in this context. "Practical" shouldn't even be part of the question, IMO. "Relevant"? That's redundant. There's not much point pursuing the irrelevant.
But you don't mean "relevant from God's perspective". You mean "relevant from man's perspective".
Therefore, a person's entire faith need not come crashing down if they make this kind of rational decision about how to interpret the book of Genesis.
It is clear what you mean by "rational decision", and there's nothing rational about it.
A Christian's faith need not come crashing down if they fail to be perfect in the first place. But choosing to elevate oneself and claiming to know better than God? Not something I'd recommend.
For those who tell themselves "there isn't really any God; I'll just pretend & it'll help me comfort myself & get along with others" your approach might make some sense. Deliberately misinterpreting an imaginary god is no sin. Neither is it so bad to deliberately misinterpret the words of some ancient, deluded man who mistakenly thought there was a god.
This sounds like a logical chain of reasoning to me.
Try it again, assuming God is real. Try it again assuming the bible is a blessed gift given for our benefit. Doesn't work so well, does it?
It doesn't work for any example of truthful writing. There's just no benefit in telling oneself a lie.
