I don't get it

Quote: FrGamble

Actually you can and have basis for doing so. The only thing you can't do is say it is proof of nothing.

It's proof of coincidence. Maybe it is proof of the limits of human imagination. Maybe it's proof of preferred patterns of thought among certain personality types.

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Power? Have you read the teachings of Jesus?

Have you read the history of your own church?

[Added] I'm willing to believe Jesus did not foresee it, any more than Marx foresaw a repressive police state as a result of communism. But they both should have.

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I do enjoy it when we agree on something.

I don't think you're agreeing to my implication that Jesus wasn't a god.

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What would make you say this?

Did he ever have sex, or a lasting intimate relationship with a man or a woman? Did he have children? Did he marry? Did he try to balance earning a living and spending time with his children? Did he worry about who'd take care of his family and living if he should go to war? Did he worry maybe his sons would have to go to war? Did he worry about making his spouse happy?

If Jesus was a deity, then he was slumming with the mortals and claiming to be one of their own.

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Love for Jesus is the most intimate and true because it is unconditional and involves a willingness to sacrifice for the other.

Making.No.Sense.

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It also is not hung up on genital activity.

There's a lot more to sex than "genital activity." It's an uplifting experience, or rather it can be.

Quote: FrGamble

Power? Have you read the teachings of Jesus?

I really can't get over this.

As the old saying has it, it's all about what you can do with it. Now, granted any ideology can be twisted, altered, mangled, etc. to do things contrary to its intent. But even so, the power wielded by the church in Europe was amazing (and not in a good way). I'm sure you know who Ambrose was (Bishop of Milan). He pretty much dictated terms to the Roman Emperor. You must have heard about Richelieu as well. And I forget the hole litany of the renaissance Popes, but one of them even led armies in the fields of battle.

Prior to Christianity, I cannot think of a religious leader who commanded such power. True, Caesar was Pontifex Maximus, but first of all he was Caesar. After Christianity, religious leaders commanding great power were no longer unheard of, as noted above. And among the latter imitators, like Muhammad.