To ask if you think there will be a second coming?

[LuluBellaBlue]

This is inspired by the new Netflix show Messiah, about a second coming.

I really hope this doesn’t upset or offend anyone and people can share their beliefs and thoughts openly and without prejudice or judgement as I know this can be very sensitive for some people.

Following on from —binge— watching this series I did a bit of googling and it seems both Christian and Muslim regions predict this. (Not researched if any others do yet)

I’m not very well informed about different regions but the concept of this programme has really interested me, I find it fascinating that this could, maybe? actually happen!

Do you think there could be a second coming?!

(And what would it actually mean for the world? A rise in consciousness? Mass healing???)

YABU - no don't be so daft!
YANBU - yes, this could happen, why not?!

There's always a point in these arguments were someone talks about killings and war caused by religion and then someone else comes on and talks about all the non-religions wars and killing etc..

Both are awful but I would say religion and religious people have caused more misery and unhappiness for people (in particular women)the world over because they create guilt and hatred and tear communities apart with their narrow minded agendas and I'm better than you postulating ! And I mean all religions not just Christianity !

Coming from a particular area of the uk which has suffered more than most because of religious division I feel really strongly that while there should be freedom of religion it is even more important that there is freedom from religion!

There won't be a second coming because their never was a first one !

@ZenNudist
@73kittycat73

Pretty sure there's scriptures in the bible that talk about the fires of Hedes. But the idea of a pitch-folk devil and fire is a middle ages cultural and arts invention.
Jews don't believe in hell, as a place that souls go to either.
Hell, is the absence of all good, the absence of being, the absence of God's love. Things in this world happen and I often think it provides a tiny glimpse of what the absence of good and the absence of God's love would look like, really dark. But I don't think anyone is burning in hell for eternity. Death is described as sleep, souls resting in peace until judgement day. Those who wont live in paradise, will be returned to nothingness (absence of God's love), which is what many atheists believe - that we die and return to the same unconscious state of being that we were before we existed.
I'd have to look up the verses tho to explain in a less waffle-filled way

Christians don't get to kill gay people these days, but they get to fire them from jobs and block them adopting children
Guessing that not a reference to the uk? Because that'd be illegal and doesnt happen here

@RoseWines perhaps people should be more tactful, but there is no evidence at all for any of the 1000s of gods. To pretend to know that one of them is real is one isn't terribly sensible is it.

When you are asked for directions by a stranger and you don't the place they are looking for I assume that you don't pretend to know and make something up? That would be a ridiculous thing to do wouldn't it and unfair to the person asking.

@RoseWines A law was passed in Scotland allowing Catholic adoption agencies to refuse gay parents because god hates them.

That was 2006 I believe and I hadn't heard that it had been changed, but you could check.

@LastTrainEast No, of course I am not saying that men weren't Christian and that's why they killed people.

I AM saying that people of all religions and none can be real bastards and kill for fucked up ideological reasons. But that reason doesn't have to be religion, as those examples show.

Religion is an excuse. If ISIS really were bothered about being good Muslims, then they wouldn't kill a greater proportion of Muslims than any other religion. The Christians in the crusades weren't following Christianity. That was their excuse. It was a land grab in the Middle East.

People will blame their nasty, murderous, land grabbing ways on many religions and many ideologies. It's all a load of crap, designed to make them feel like they are not nasty, murderous, land grabbing bastards. That isn't the fault of religion. Its the fault of the bastard with the weapon in his hand.

Same sex marriage was only just legalised in NI, and no doubt would never had been legalised if the fundamentalist at the DUP had had their way.

Even if Christians admit that the bible is fictional (and where does that leave them?) that's still the role model that their religion rests on

Actually, it isn't. The think that differentiates Christianity from the Torah, is the New Testament. That's what Christianity is based on. And Christians believe that the arrival of Jesus created a new covanent. Whereby the 10 commandments still existed, but the most important thing is love, not judging, helping those less fortunate etc.

The Old Testament describes the Jewish faith until the birth of Christ. Which is why when Gideons give out bibles in schools, it's just the New Testament they give out. The Old Testament is the back story. The New Testament is the basis for Christian faith.

So our role model is Jesus and his teachings. Not the Old Testament.

because they create guilt and hatred and tear communities apart with their narrow minded agendas and I'm better than you postulating

Same sex marriage was only just legalised in NI, and no doubt would never had been legalised if the fundamentalist at the DUP had had their way

All those examples are examples of humans betraying their religion. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that gay people shouldn't adopt. It does say that we should come together and love our neighbours as ourselves.

So anyone who is causing strife in an area, or trying to say Gay people shouldn't adopt or whatever, they are simply bigots who are not doing what Jesus said they should do. This sometimes happens at an organisational level, which was part of the issue that Jesus had with organised religion being corrupted by men. It doesn't mean Jesus's teachings were wrong. It means that the so called religious person isnt following them.

If Christianity is so anti gay, then why do we have so many gay clergy and congregation? Rev Richard Cole's husband died the other week. Who was also a Rev.

I am not saying that division in communities and anti-gay rhetoric doesn't and hasn't existed in religions. But in terms of Christianity, that is humans warping the messages for their own purpose. Even the Pope has said "love is love" when asked about it.

And what I am saying is that historically religion has been the basis of evil doings since its first existence!

Sacrifice to gods, forced conversion of local indigenous populations to save them for gods, vilification of those who don't follow a certain religions pathways, denial of rights based on biblical teachings, taking babies from unmarried mothers and killing them to protect their salvation for god, abusing children to make sure they behave in a way god would want, the list goes on !

Even if Christians admit that the bible is fictional (and where does that leave them?)

While there is a substantial section that would believe the Bible word for word (e.g. creationists), anyone with some knowledge takes it as "inspired by" rather than directly "dictated by" God.
Even the Old Testament is a collection of books, as is the New Testament. People are encouraged to get together, because God is among them. I think this reflects that nobody has the sole truth, but that people can get to God in a community. The various books are similar. They should be taken together, because none represents the entire message, or God.
That's why there are Bible reflection groups and why they are written as stories and letters. It's not supposed to be an instruction manual.

If you believe in God, you can say the books were inspired by God. If you don't, then you can take them as inspired by a community getting together.

If we get past the idea of God to explain phenomena we don't understand or as a means of trying to make sense of reality and to control it, perhaps we could view God as what arises from communities coming together. A sort of consciousness that doesn't arise from one but many brains, not in a supernatural sense.

I grew up as a Catholic but with an enlightened if conservative mother.
I find the main messages from the New Testament very appealing still today. Not so much because of any after death salvation, but because it's a message that should lead to communities at peace.
Not so keen on the official religions, though. Many, and notably Catholicism, have become like the Pharisees that are heavily criticised in the NT.

So I'm left with being a fan of Christ's message (whoever he or they were) but not so keen on the supernatural aspects that form a religion.

In fact, if we think of a second coming, then we have had it several times. Every time a community comes together and changes rules.

There already has been a second coming. She's currently in a secure unit on olanzapine. The doctors say her delusions are fixed and long term and she got referred to the local police force after radicalising members of a community youth group.

I detest most organised religions apart from Bhuddism.
The soul ( and as a scientist i di believd in rhe soul) is not meant to be tortured and bound by thess toxic cults.
The second coming is a fear tactic.

Typos sorry

CreekIsRising 😀😂

@Igotthisjustabout
Yep ...I'm with you .

Nah it’d have happened by now! All that going on 2000 years ago then... nothing.

@SirChing "Nowhere in the Bible does it say that gay people shouldn't adopt" no it says you should put them to death. And no that's not just the Jewish religion because the Christian claim is that it's the same god.

There's no getting around that people believe the bible is about god. Without the bible there's no reason to think the god of Abraham exists. And the bible says that god killed innocent men, women and children personally.

Now of course that is made up. The whole religion was invented by people with their nasty, murderous, land grabbing ways, but now in the 21st century people worship a god who boasted of infanticide and give bibles to children and pressure schools to make the little kids pray to him.

"our role model is Jesus and his teachings. Not the Old Testament" so.. god spent some time with a therapist and came to say that mass murder wasn't the right way and re-invented himself?

Maybe he still has it wrong and will change his mind again?

Even if true he is still the mass murderer and the bible handed out to kids includes the old testament monster. I've checked and it doesn't say "events in the OT don't count"

That's how come we still have Christians who want gay people dead. They 'know' that god wants that. Mummy and daddy wouldn't have read from the bible at bedtime if it were full of lies.

I thought there already had been.

Megan Markle

@Lweji Assuming that Jesus existed as a man (I'm not ruling it out) maybe he was just trying to turn people from a cold and harsh religion to one of peace and comradeship. If so good for him.

So if people inspired by that thought come together in peace then good luck to them too. One nice thing about that is that you are not bound by old rules and can work on improving them over time.

@LastTrainEast that is an incredibly literal view but one, of course, that you are entitled to have. I personally don't believe that all of the Bible is true and literal. I find a lot of the OT to fall into this category.

Anyway, the point is, anyone who professes to be a Christian and advocates killing gay people is NOT a Christian, whatever they may think. Because killing people isn't loving your neighbour as yourself. It certainly isn't "judge not lest ye be judged".

If you are a Christian, you believe in the teachings of Jesus. Who did not say to kill gay people. But to love each other. Irrespective of what had been written in the OT, the NT surpasses it in terms of what Christians should be following in their life.

To give a personal example, my exMIL is a real fundamentalist creationist. My mum is gay. ExMIL came to her wedding and adores my mum and her wife. She said that even though it says somewhere in the Bible OT that man must not lay with another man, Jesus said judge not lest ye be judged. Which to ExMIL was far more important as it is a direct teaching from God in human form. Therefore what Jesus said is far more important than what any man wrote, hundreds of years before, in a time of little scientific understanding.

Christians believe that Jesus is God on the Earth. So what came out of his mouth is obviously more important than what random blokes wrote about him hundreds of years previously.

Anyway, the point is, anyone who professes to be a Christian and advocates killing gay people is NOT a Christian

Of course they are. They might not be a good one in your view, but if the believe in and worship Jesus they're still a Christian.

I'm sure some of the more militant fundamentalists out there would not regard you as a real Christian. But they'd be wrong too. It's the whole no true Scotsman thing.

All those examples are examples of humans betraying their religion. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that gay people shouldn't adopt

Unfortunately its not. Humans are just trying to interpret their 'Bible' and because 'God' is such a bad communicator, everyone who reads it comes to different understanding. That is why their are thousands of different denominations of Christianity.

If only their was some method of testing claims and determining what is actually true.

@SirChing "what came out of his mouth" You didn't hear what Jesus said. What you have is what random blokes wrote about him later. Just as random blokes wrote quoting what god supposedly said in front of many witnesses. Both are equally valid or not.

Worse still the only claim Jesus had to being anything other than an unemployed carpenter was that his coming supposedly matched prophecy in the OT.
Not that it did really without stretching and re-interpreting it, but if the OT doesn't contain the word of god then he had no support at all and there's no reason to be a Christian at all.

If you don't believe Genesis there's no reason to think God created the world at all. Maybe it was Allah after all or the Great God Arkleseizure.

Remember that Christians don't claim the god of the OT died. He is still god and makes no sense to have Jesus saying that god was wrong and being good to each other is what matters. Unless he had the old man committed to an institution?

The bible is so sure that the the slaughter of the firstborn in Eqypt took place that Jews still celebrate it now as the passover.

And every rainbow you ever saw was 'put there' by god to remind you of his promise not to drown men, women and children AGAIN.

So it's not like I'm quoting some obscure passages that are not generally accepted.

Of course it is fiction, but a lot of people think god is real and that his commands matter which is kinda the point.