Religious/Non-Religious thread

[cavaliereagle]

Great topic. Please post thoughts here.

[1 CAT FAN]

"Light versus dark, hope versus despair. And all the world's fate hangs in the balance."

Heard that from one of those nightmare movies, Slickster spoke of.

[DeCav]

Glad you started this thread.

We’ve always had a pretty respectful dialogue on this topic and I always learn a few things.

[cavaliereagle]

Glad you started this thread.

We’ve always had a pretty respectful dialogue on this topic and I always learn a few things.

I agree DeCav. Could you transfer the comments you and 1 Cat Fan made on the other thread to this one? I want to comment on those, but I don't know how to transfer stuff.

[DeCav]

No it's not. You got that right. I'm starting to learn that life is suffering and trying to live through it is basically a struggle against suffering. And all you can really do while you're here is try and find meaning which, as far as I can tell, has something to do with not causing more suffering and if you can trying to ameliorate and lessen the suffering that already exists.

"A life without meaning is hell and a state far worse than any suffering you think you can ever conceive."

I think I already mentioned this somewhere else.

I was listening to an English DJ on a radio station interviewing a washed-up rock star. The singer was talking about how much he helped people out when he was riding high and the world was his oyster. About how many people had their hand out when he had something to give and when he hit rock bottom there was nobody there for him.

And the DJ said something to the effect of, "Well look at how much good Christ tried to do and he was tortured and nailed to a cross."

No good deed goes unpunished. I never realized how Biblical that saying was until I heard the life of Christ put that way.

Don't know how this strikes anyone. Maybe it's crap.

AMEN VAMP, I AM SITTING HERE AT 71, AND MY SON IS SUFFERING AT 49, I WOULD TAKE HIS PLACE, BUT CANT, SO I AM HERE TO HELP HIM ANY WAY I CAN. BACK IN DECEMBER, ALL I WORRIED ABOUT IS WHO WOULD BE THE STAGS COACH. I AM LIKE PENGUIN, FIND IT HARD TO BELIEVE THERE IS SOME PERSON THAT CONTROLS AND GRANTS PRAYERS TO PEOPLE, BUT WHEN I AM LAYING THERE, I WILL ASK ANYONE TO GIVE ME ONE MORE YEAR.

I'll tell y'all fellows. I think it's all about love. We tend to kinda stick with the people in our little corner. Then, tragedy strikes, and we see folks that cared that we never imagined cared. I remember when my niece passed with cancer back in '08. I saw an unbelievable outpouring of love and support from our entire community. She was diagnosed 10 years before she passed. For me, that 10 years was an extra special gift from God. I know that not everyone is a believer, but I am. Too many times in my life, i've had experiences that confirms my belief. I do respect others beliefs. I'm not trying to convert anyone. I can tell you, as an adopted child that was once alone and homeless on the streets; and a combat veteran with extensive combat experience, love helps. I've always gotten more satisfaction by loving than by hating. In a way, it ended up being a blessing when my niece was diagnosed. It didn't feel like it at first, of course. However, we're all going to die. We've been dying since the day we were born. When she was diagnosed, it made me take notice. It drew me amazingly closer to her and her sisters. I appreciated everyday I had with her after the diagnosis. Of course, you appreciate everyday with folks. But, I mean a recognizable appreciation. She was diagnosed at 9 and died at 19. She was the epitome of something I read once, "some people are so afraid of dying that they never really live."
Slick, I said all this in an effort to convey something to you. I hope this turns into a blessing to you. That you can lay down each night, with a before, unreckonized appreciation of another day, although a hard one with your son. I hope you feel the loving support from me and others that I did. I hope, your grandkids especially, learn from your family how to really love someone when they are down. I hope your grandson learns that it is okay for men to cry. I hope your family learns to lean on others and let them love you all through it. I love you brother. I also appreciate seeing others show their love for you.

thank you, my brother. everything can change in a moment in life. all is appreciated in these dark times. there was a time, when you were in trouble and your wife texted me and told me your situation here, we had great conversation about you and your situation and gladly you are still here to share your courage and love with all. I just hope my son survives this hell and can be here for a long time.peace, slick

However, we're all going to die. We've been dying since the day we were born.

So true.

Death looks at us and smiles, all we can do is smile back.

Our future starts today, not tomorrow. Cherish each and every moment.

To be Human:
"Mr. Singerman, why are you crying?" asked twelve-year-old Albert as he watched the master craftsman construct a wooden box. "I cry" he said, "because my father cried, and because my grandfather cried." The woodworker's answer to his young apprentice provides a tender moment in an episode of Little House on the Prairie. "Tears," explained Mr. Singerman, "come with the making of a coffin."
"Some men don't cry because they fear it is a sign of weakness," he said. "I was taught that a man is a man because he can cry."
Emotion must have welled up in the eyes of Jesus as He compared His concern for Jerusalem to the care of a mother hen for her chicks (Matthew 23:27). His disciples were often confused by what they saw in His eyes or heard in His stories. His idea of what it meant to be strong was different. It happened again as they walked with him from the temple. Calling His attention to the massive stone walls and magnificent decor of their place of worship (24:1), the disciples noted the strength of human accomplishment. Jesus saw a temple that would be leveled in AD70.
Christ shows us that healthy people know when to cry and why. He cried because His Father cares and His Spirit groans for children who couldn't yet see what breaks His heart.

In what situations in your life might you be avoiding grief? How can your faith in a Savior who cries (John11:35) help you express your grief in a healthy way?

Father, please replace any cold illusions of strength I cling to with a growing understanding of the cares and concerns that break Your heart for children like me.

I LIKE YOU CATTY, BUT SOME OF YOUR VIEWS ARE A LITTLE TOO RELIGIOUS FOR THIS SINNER, GLAD YOU CAN GO AND FEEL GOOD, I CANT.

Take comfort SLICK.

I would never claim it. But I've heard it said that some atheists are better Christians than most Christians.

I LIKE YOU CATTY, BUT SOME OF YOUR VIEWS ARE A LITTLE TOO RELIGIOUS FOR THIS SINNER, GLAD YOU CAN GO AND FEEL GOOD, I CANT.

Take comfort SLICK.

I would never claim it. But I've heard it said that some atheists are better Christians than most Christians.

For once, we agree liberal.

For the record, I'm headed to church for the first time in about 3 years as a result of your boy SLICK.

Contacted an old friend from my Lutheran youth group who is preaching now. He has his whole congregation praying for Sean now. Not being one to just ask for a favor without returning it, I offered to pay his church a visit tomorrow. So, we'll see where that goes.

I guess it's been about 35 years since I last saw him.

I LIKE YOU CATTY, BUT SOME OF YOUR VIEWS ARE A LITTLE TOO RELIGIOUS FOR THIS SINNER, GLAD YOU CAN GO AND FEEL GOOD, I CANT.

Take comfort SLICK.

I would never claim it. But I've heard it said that some atheists are better Christians than most Christians.

Sad but true!

As a teenager, I lost my father to cancer. Few years later, I lost my older brother to a boating accident where he drowned.

DeCav knows my Testimony.

I'm still a sinner, Cityslick. I still have to ask for forgiveness.

SORRY, CATTY, I APPRECIATE YOUR THOUGHTS, AND HOPE YOU LOSE NO ONE ELSE, I SEE MY SON AND HOPE THE SAME.

As a teenager, I lost my father to cancer. Few years later, I lost my older brother to a boating accident where he drowned.

DeCav knows my Testimony.

I'm still a sinner, Cityslick. I still have to ask for forgiveness.

I had no idea. Very sorry for your losses. The message I'm finally hearing that has been ringing true for me after 48 years is that it might not be enough to just ask for forgiveness. Not speaking to you CAT FAN but just about a lot people that kept me from faith with their ways all these years. I was having dinner with a good friend a couple years back. He's always been a very strong Christian and he's a smart, intelligent, kind and patient guy.

The subject of faith came up and since my own recent losses, I had come to the conclusion that I'd been playing footsie with the subject my whole life. Not able at all to be a very outwardly Christian person. I've had a strange relationship with the truth my whole life. Maybe it's my lazy nature? Not being content with orienting my mind with a task that didn't interest me or show some reward?

I've always been capable of lying but only against great internal stress and only when it really mattered in some important way to be able to pull off a lie. But when faced with that moment we all have when I can lie or tell the truth, my mind has always quickly assessed the resource to reward ratio, with emphasis on the resource part of it. What I mean is my mind quickly works out how tangled and sticky the web is likely to get and how much brainpower it'll take to maintain a lie. How solid is the foundation that can support that lie and how quickly will that lie start to crumble?

When it came to faith and my concern about the way other people saw me or what I thought they thought of me, I knew that going to church and professing my faith would be an act unless somehow, someday it was not an act. The fake it till you make it strategy that Pascal's Wager proposes was something I put time and effort in for a great deal of time in my life. Many years of going to church. Periodically trying different churches and different faiths on the off chance that something stuck.

I guess it's why I'm willing to go again tomorrow though at this point I pretty much know it's a social call at best and who knows? Just touching base with God? I'll do anything that resonates with me like, say...posting on football boards for a decade now.

But a lifetime of not really professing or acting outwardly to be something I wasn't didn't mean that I was ever really all that honest either. Somehow I've always been able to sidestep the question or maybe use some mental sleight of hand with a philosophical approach to faith that threw off all but the most persistent of inquiries. I never suffered the illusion that anyone of faith was fooled into believing I was also that way inclined. I guess my open-minded approach and willingness to engage anyone in a conversation and even accompany them to a service if offered kept me safe from confrontations with the type of person who might accuse me of being damned to Hell if I didn't change my ways.

But I never was strong enough or prepared enough to just come out and say that I was pretty sure I wasn't saved because I was damn sure that I had too many doubts and as equally sure that there wasn't any kind of a detectable feeling that there really was a God and that believing that Christ died for my sins meant I was going to Heaven. I knew that I couldn't lie to myself about that and wasn't inclined to lie to anyone else about it but with other people I engaged in a lie of omission maybe? I hate confrontation or at least I used to hate it a lot more than I do now and I never opted to be completely honest about it.

But I guess we call it my mid-life crisis brought me some clarity on some issues. All of a sudden I just wasn't as afraid to just tell people where I stood with faith. I found out that there hadn't been anything to fear. No one damned me to Hell though some hid that thought well.

During dinner that night I just came out and told the person matter of factly that I just can't make myself believe. I'd tried lots of different routes and approaches to faith and it seemed to elude me. The dude held his head and said he'd failed me. It seemed a little dramatic at the time. I wanted to tell him that other than him voting for Trump, I couldn't see any way he'd discouraged me from Christ.

I'm laughing now because the thought just crossed my mind that Biden goes to church every Sunday and nobody gets pepper gassed on the way.

But my friend was a really good example of a Christian. Much better than the hate I've seen recently veiled under Christianity. And when I came across that phrase in the book of Matthew it made a lot of sense to me.

“Not everyone who calls out to me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven will enter."

That passage seems to me to indicate there's more to salvation than believing you're saved even though other passages say otherwise. Especially since it was Christ who said that. I dunno.

So many people who professed to be saved seemed as if they were more concerned about the souls of the dead than they were the souls of the living, whether it was their own or the soul of a stranger. It's hard to put my finger on it or find a good way to express it but it's as if some people that I've known over the years decided or were convinced or persuaded that as long as they secured their eternal soul after death and as long as they knew they were always forgiven by the blood of Christ that they could just write it all off on this side of Heaven. A lifetime of mulligans. Like thinking that as long as I show up in court after every crime, I'll be told all is forgiven and avoid jail in this life or a word that rhymes with jail in the next.

I remember asking the pastor of my church during a Bible camp meeting about forgiveness. Asked him how it was that a man could rape and murder his whole life and then say a prayer before the electric chair and go to Heaven. I told him that just doesn't seem fair. Never will forget what his response was...

"The Bible doesn't say anywhere that life is fair."

I always admired the way he put a positive spin on the notion that life isn't fair. That guy was about as good of a person as I've ever met. That answer he gave resonates with me today. That seems like the least you have to do to go to Heaven. Just accept Christ as your savior and know that he died for your sins. But it begs the question: What's the most a person can do? Can anyone even conceive of the upper limit of that? What would Christ have done with all the riches in the world? You'd have thought he would try and acquire as much wealth as possible back in the day so that he might've done as much good as possible but there's something nefarious about that notion.

It's funny. The guy I contacted about Sean's fundraiser and who's sermon I'm going to see tomorrow is the same guy who's father's use of the N-word really sent my faith into a death spiral when I was young. I never told him that. I really doubt there'd ever be a reason to bring it up either.

Watched a video tonight. Never seen it before but there's a message about the things we do that we know we shouldn't do. The person we are and that we cling to and the person we can become in this life. We are the person we are. We are also the person who can change the person we are. And we'll become whatever we choose to become in this life and given the choice between choosing to become the person we already are or the person we could become who might be a better version tomorrow, we should probably not sacrifice who we can be in the future in order to hold onto the person that we are today.

I also like the idea of the dragon of chaos. The dragon that exists outside your walled in city where each one of us is safe. It's dangerous outside that wall where the dragon lurks. But imagine the treasure of gold and riches that he hoards and protects. If you can defeat him you can have that reward. The reward of becoming something more tomorrow than you are today. Confronting the chaos of the things about us that make us anxious and unfulfilled. There's so many things I know I must do. But I keep putting off doing them because I feel safer just pacing around the same old ground.

Another quote I love..."You tell yourself you're definitely going to do something and then you don't do it. What the Hell is that?? Who exactly is in control of you anyway? Is it you? Apparently not."

I don't think there's a single one of us who ever lived who couldn't have done it just a little bit better. I imagine I'm about exactly halfway through given that my two grandmothers lived to be 95. There's still time. 100% as much time as I've already had. It's so strange. I told a friend I'd taken an axe to the tree of my life and chopped it down. And then chopped it into pieces. And then had a big bonfire. And after all that I was asked why I did it and I didn't know. And then I discovered this notion of having to burn off the parts of you that just have to go if you're going to transform and that's it's incredibly painful.

Also I'm reminded of that apology B1 wrote back in the day. The one I begged him to make instead of starting WW3. And this video talks about that. Someone does a little something good, and then they retreat back into themselves and they wait to be punished for it and if they are then the Hell with that. They'll never do that again. But someone might notice and say, "Hey, you know that was pretty good." and then maybe they do more of that.

B1 thought making a full-throated apology for one of his classic fights would humiliate him and cause people to deride and jeer at him and it had the opposite effect but damn that kind of thing is scary and not someone, not anyone wants to ever do. The right things are always often the scariest and most difficult.

I hope I'm not a coward tomorrow. I have a list of things I need to get done that I've been putting off. Things that I know will greatly improve things for me. I just hope tomorrow doesn't arrive and I decide to let future me pay for the sins of tomorrow's me.

SLICK. All I can say now dude is that you've got one Hell of a task ahead of you. Hope or the best. Prepare for the worst but I do believe there is tragedy and then there is Hell. Death is a tragedy. It never is not that. But it doesn't have to be sheer Hell. Hopefully you won't have to be the man your whole family needs and a father should never bury his son. I've seen my grandmother bury her daughter. And my dad bury his son.

But like someone else said, we're all living on borrowed time and each day is a gift. How miserable can each day be? How good can each of those days be? We know what the limit of how much Hell there can be in life. A history book will teach anyone that. There are less examples of how wonderful each day can be. Hell all I can do is think about you and your family and share thoughts.

Peace and Love,

A lot of the old TV programming seems now like it was just too deep for kids. Anything on TV these days with the same kind of message? And why didn't my parents hold more reverence for some of the messages from my childhood?

"If we don't teach kids to live in society today, what's going to happen to them when they grow up."



I was a "naughty cat" at times growing up too.
Temptation was especially strong during those teenage years.

[1 CAT FAN]

Opie - "Johnny gonna get spanked, Pa?"

Andy -"Don't you think he deserves it?"

Opie - "I don't want to say, after all he is one of my own kind."

Never really had to spank my kids, guess I was blessed that way.

[1 CAT FAN]

Master Vampire: Why spill blood if not for the pleasure of it?

Vlad: Because men do not fear swords. They fear monsters. They run from them. By putting one village to the stake, I spared ten more. Sometimes the world no longer needs a hero. Sometimes what it needs... is a monster.

Master Vampire: And you believe you know what it means to be a monster? Hmm?... You have no idea... but I'm going to show you.

Striking a deal with the Devil, desperate men do desperate things. I have heard of fighting fire with fire, can the flame be extinguished after the danger has ceased?

[cavaliereagle]

[1 CAT FAN]

An Intelligent Faith?

Joel and Mark were two friends with very different beliefs. Joel believed in God as the all–Sovereign King that created everything in the world.
Mark was a devout atheist who scoffed at religion and thought the whole world – including himself – came about by accident, a biological mischance.
“How do you know that God exists and the Bible isn’t just a book of fairy tales?” Mark often challenged.
“God exists because the Bible says so and you can trust the Bible because it’s God’s Word,” Joel would reply.
Mark would then chuckle at this illogic and say, ”That’s like saying, ‘I am a good worker because Frank says so.
How can we trust Frank? Simple: I will vouch for him.’”
The circular logic exhibited by Joel is faulty and will not convince anyone of the existence of God or that the Bible is true.
Yet many today have no better reasoning for their belief in the Bible.
Is there hard evidence in favor of the Bible’s validity?
Do intelligence and reasoning go out the window when people become Christians?

One way to test the validity of the Bible is to look at its prophecies. One of God’s claims is that He, through the Bible, can tell the future (Isaiah 46:9, 10) NKJV. Examining the historical records of ancient Babylon in the book of Daniel will help answer the question of the Bible’s validity. Here we find a king named Nebuchadnezzar, a ruler written about not only in the Bible, but also in other historical records.(1) One night he had a troubling dream. When he awoke, however, he could not remember the dream – only that it haunted him. He summoned his wise men and commanded them to tell him his dream and its interpretation. His wise men were baffled at this request. They said, “There is not a man on earth who can tell the king’s matter…” (Daniel 2:10-11). The king was infuriated and commanded that all the wise men in Babylon be killed (Daniel 2:12). This is where a Hebrew man named Daniel comes on the scene. Daniel had been taken as a captive to Babylon when he was only a teenager. Daniel was a believer in God. When the king’s court official, Arioch, told Daniel about the decree, Daniel went to the king and requested time to tell him his dream and the interpretation. The king agreed. Daniel went home and earnestly sought God for wisdom. God answered his entreaties and, “the secret was revealed to Daniel in a night vision” Daniel 2:19.

The next morning Daniel went into the king’s throne room and revealed to him the dream. The king had seen a large statue. It was composed of five different sections. The head was of gold, the chest and arms of silver, the belly and thighs of bronze, the legs of iron, and the feet partly of iron and partly of clay. Then, a great stone struck the image and smashed it to pieces so it became like chaff, which the wind carried away (Daniel 2:31-35). Daniel then told the king the dream’s meaning. The head of gold represented Babylon (Daniel 2:38). The silver signified Medo-Persia; the bronze symbolized Greece. The legs of iron represented Rome.(2) The feet and toes of iron mixed with clay represented the divided power of Rome, partly weak and partly strong. Just as iron does not mix with clay, these nations would not adhere together. The great stone that smashed the image represented the kingdom of God. “And…the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed; it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever” (Daniel 2:38-44).

Each of these predictions of the kingdoms represented by metal came true with unfailing accuracy. The first kingdom, Babylon, ruled the world from 605 to 539 B.C. The nation of the Medes and Persians governed from 539 to 331 B.C. The next empire, Greece, dominated from 331 to 168 B.C. The iron power of Rome ruled from 168 B.C. until A.D 476. The last kingdom, divided into many smaller kingdoms, represents the divided power of Rome, the modern nations of Europe, which still remain separate today. The Bible was correct in its identification of all five kingdoms and the time that they would arise!

Skeptics have suggested that Daniel’s predictions are false, his book being written at a much later time in history. Even if this were true, the fact that the Dead Sea Scrolls contain eight manuscripts from Daniel, the oldest dating to 125 BC (3) (which itself is a copy of an earlier edition), shows that this prophecy was written hundreds of years before the dividing of Rome into the nations of modern Europe. This prophecy is just one example of hundreds which could be cited proving the Bible’s inspiration. Another concrete example is seen in the prophecy of Daniel chapter nine where the exact timing of Christ’s baptism and death were foretold hundreds of years in advance.(4) Indeed, after an examination of valid evidence such as we have in the Biblical prophecies, we may conclude that God and the Bible can be trusted! Daniel chapter two shows us just how true and accurate just one of these predictions is, which gives us the grounds to hold an intelligent faith. The Bible is the inspired word of God and can be trusted as our guidebook in every circumstance.

However, merely believing this information will make it just that – information. Belief alone has no saving power over our lives. We must be changed by our belief. It is of eternal importance to not only believe the Bible, but to allow it to change us as well. The Bible says that “even the demons believe—and tremble!” James 2:19. God will take our lives and transform them into something beautiful if we let Him.

Read this from a book in our hospital Chapel today. Also found it online: https://www.glowonline.org/glow_tracts/ ... ent-faith/

I particularly like this part.

The Bible says that “even the demons believe—and tremble!”

[DeCav]

Master Vampire: And you believe you know what it means to be a monster? Hmm?... You have no idea... but I'm going to show you.

Striking a deal with the Devil, desperate men do desperate things. I have heard of fighting fire with fire, can the flame be extinguished after the danger has ceased?

This quote perfectly frames the average Trump voter in my mind.

The following is a pretty good commentary on Trump from 2016. As bad as I and an awful lot of other people thought Trump would be, we honestly never imagined the horror of how bad he actually was. To have ignited a completely irrational fear of voter fraud and a stolen election and been the sole cause of the Jan 6th riot was not possibly on the radar of even his most ardent critics.

A very nuanced assessment in the video. Listen to how well the speaker actually defends the Trump supporter's reason for liking Trump. He also indicts the left-wing of the country for their obsession with political correctness and compulsory speech. He also manages to defend the President for suggesting an American born Federal judge with Latino heritage couldn't possibly rule fairly in a case involving Trump.

And then he tries to comment on the Zika virus outbreak and what it would look like for Trump to be in charge of a worldwide medical emergency.

I suppose America dodged a bullet simply because Trump was so amazingly stupid and offensive that he still managed to lose even after getting more votes this time than he got in 2016. I'd be curious to hear reactions to this video. I'm shocked at how Republicans have self-immolated themselves in four years and what they're willing to not only forgive but actually adore in a President. Kind of amazing when you consider the worst thing Fox news could think of to criticize about Obama was that he played with a selfie stick in the Oval office and had the audacity to ask for spicy mustard on a burger in a restaurant.

The ridiculous irony of the last four years is that if Hillary Clinton had done and said all the things that Trump did, I would have been sympathetic to Republicans who wanted to storm D.C. had she been re-elected.



Some will ask what this video has to do with religion. I forget who it was back in 2016 but someone on SCPreptalk wanted to open back up political discussions on this site again. I offered to open up the debate on the current politics as an experiment. The person I was corresponding with actually admitted that Trump behaved on TV and on Twitter like Victory6 but after I made the comparison but retorted with a comment about how God and the Bible come first in his life as if Trump's behavior was secondary to Trump's own faith. When I pointed out how inconceivable it was to me that an outspokenly avowed Christian could listen to Donald Trump say he doesn't believe he's ever done anything in his life that he had to ask God's forgiveness for and then say they're going to vote for him for President, that thread stopped in it's tracks. The same person who'd wanted so badly to talk politics suddenly had nothing to say on the matter anymore.

Did you guys know that there is an intellectual organization of atheist thinkers who formed a "President's Club" for former American presidents to "come out" after holding office that they are not actually Christians? Interesting subject to read about with respect to faith and American presidents.

I've heard a bit about Thomas Paine and Jefferson's religious beliefs. All I'd ever heard about Jefferson was that he was a Deist and a believer in the Prime Mover which basically means he believes that the universe was created by God and then set in motion by Him but after that God was hands-off, doesn't interfere with our daily lives, and if he ever does hear our prayers, doesn't answer them.

Jefferson published his own version of the Bible where he basically edited out all the supernatural references.

But I've read some quotes from Jefferson just now that are really rather profound, especially given what I've been exposing myself to lately in terms of a belief in God and Christ. It's remarkable how well Jefferson's belief system maps onto my own current belief.

(President Jefferson to Benjamin Rush) 1803 April 21.
I am a Christian, in the only sense in which He wished any one to be; sincerely attached to his doctrines, in preference to all others; ascribing to himself every human excellence, & believing he never claimed any other."

(Jefferson to Charles Thomson) 1816 January 9.
"I am a real Christian, that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus, very different from the Platonists, who call me infidel, and themselves Christians and preachers of the gospel, while they draw all their characteristic dogmas from what it’s Author never said nor saw."

(Jefferson to Timothy Pickering) 1821 February 27
"No one sees with greater pleasure than myself the progress of reason in it’s advances towards rational Christianity. when we shall have done away the incomprehensible jargon of the Trinitarian arithmetic, that three are one, and one is three; when we shall have knocked down the artificial scaffolding, reared to mask from view the simple structure of Jesus, when, in short, we shall have unlearned every thing which has been taught since his day, and got back to the pure and simple doctrines he inculcated, we shall then be truly and worthily his disciples."