Are you still a Christian if you think the nativity story is a myth?

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I don’t know how you can be? Either you think Jesus is the Son of God, born of a Virgin or you don’t…I don’t think Mathew ,Mark ,Luke, and John were liars…🤷
 
redrosetea said:
I don’t know how you can be? Either you think Jesus is the Son of God, born of a Virgin or you don’t…I don’t think Mathew ,Mark ,Luke, and John were liars…🤷
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I don’t, either.

What in the world brought this on? :confused:
 
I read that Rowan Williams has said the nativity story was a myth…it seems a strange position for a clergyman to take
 
I don’t think you can be Christian and doubt the virgin birth…if you did you would doubt God was the Father
 
It sounds weird to me…if Christ was just anyone’s son he wouldn’t be divine…they must doubt Christ’s divinity…if you do that how can you be a Christian?
 
redrosetea said:
I read that Rowan Williams has said the nativity story was a myth.
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Oh, I see.
it seems a strange position for a clergyman to take
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I am guessing he would say that it is a “myth” in the sense of being a story that people commonly tell to explain how Jesus came to be on the earth. (Which happens in this case to be a true story.)

However, I think that using the term “myth” simply confuses ordinary people. Even when everyone nods their heads and says, “Yes, we understand that a myth is a way of explaining something that happened, by using story-telling,” they still go home and tell everyone that “Pastor So-and-So said we don’t have to believe in such-and-such anymore, because it’s only a myth.”

So, I always think it is best simply to avoid using that terminology, other than with people who clearly understand what you are talking about.
 
No wonder they hold Mary in such low esteem, and mock her…I am so glad I am a Catholic

If Mary wasn’t a virgin you could never be sure that God was the Father could you?
 
I just looked at the article, and I’d have to say that Archbishop Rowan is not someone I would ask, if I had a question about the Scriptures. He doesn’t seem to be a believer.
 
redrosetea said:
No wonder they hold Mary in such low esteem, and mock her…I am so glad I am a Catholic
?
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In what sense ‘mock her’? Please give your sources. Otherwise that’s a scandalous thing to say, and a gross misrepresentaion of mainstream Protestantism, and especially Anglicanism/the Episcopalian church.
 
They say things like we worship her. They mock the esteem we show to her…they act like she was just a baby basket and nothing more…go to the non catholic forums if you don’t believe me
 
redrosetea said:
I read that Rowan Williams has said the nativity story was a myth…it seems a strange position for a clergyman to take
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Not at all. Many clergy both Catholic and protestant buy into a modernistic liberal view of the Gospels where everything miraculous is explained away. Where Christianity is reduced to the historical accuracy of the man Jesus, the existence of God, the dignity of man and his soul and ethical behavior. Where salvation is seen as the upraising of society in order to hasten the kingdom of God on earth and where Christs death wasn’t salvific at all, but mere martyrdom.

Liberal Christianity. It is murky, it is dirty it is impure and it is frightening.
 
palmas85 said:
Not at all. Many clergy both Catholic and protestant buy into a modernistic liberal view of the Gospels where everything miraculous is explained away. Where Christianity is reduced to the historical accuracy of the man Jesus, the existence of God, the dignity of man and his soul and ethical behavior. Where salvation is seen as the upraising of society in order to hasten the kingdom of God on earth and where Christs death wasn’t salvific at all, but mere martyrdom.

Liberal Christianity. It is murky, it is dirty it is impure and it is frightening.
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Yes, there are people who don’t believe Jesus was literally born of a virgin or that he literally fed a multitude on the pittance that his disciples had managed to round up for the project. There are also people on the not-so-liberal side who don’t believe that Jesus literally meant that it is harder for a rich man to enter heaven than for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle or that he didn’t really mean it when he referred to as evildoers whom he would order out of his sight the people who would ignore the imprisoned, the hungry, thirsty, naked, and the other “least of these”, that he didn’t mean that business about turning the other cheek, and so on. (Have you noticed that Jesus’ account of the Last Judgement is noticeably short on judgement based on adherence to doctrinal truths?)

Sin and denial is frightening, and it doesn’t confine itself to one part of the political spectrum.

I believe that Jesus also meant the part about being measured back to with the measure we have measured out with. May God have mercy on us all.
 
Atheists can be ethical can’t they? Will that get them to heaven if they deny Christ?
 
No to which? Atheists can’t be ethical, or they can’t get to heaven if they deny Christ?
 
redrosetea said:
No to which? Atheists can’t be ethical, or they can’t get to heaven if they deny Christ?
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Sorry - I meant that they can’t go to Heaven if they deny Christ.

Atheists can certainly be ethical - sometimes even more zealously than some Christians. 🙂
 
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