scottstall

"I can't say I'm surprised. I've gotten the 'Unitarians can't be Christians' thing before, but never actually been accused of lying about my religious beliefs."

Ok. First off... never said Unitarian's can't be Christians. I never would say that either. My experience with the word Unitarian comes from my experiences with our local branch of the Universalist Unitarian Fellowship.

As for stating that your lying about religious beliefs, it has alot to do with my definition of lying. To me, lying is letting the other person walk away believing "something that is wrong, because you either filled in the blanks wrong (by their definition), or failed to fill them in. You can lie intentionally, which is wrong, or unintentionally, which is bad but can't be helped. I suspect you just don't agree with other people's definitions of christians, you know them, you just don't care.

To the great majority of people, being Christian means you believe in the divinity of christ. There is no if's and's or but's. Adding denominations to that doesn't change the fact that Jesus is the son of God in their beliefs. I suppose it's a question of degree's. If 99% of people believe that saying your Christian means you believe Jesus is the son of God, as in, divine birth, and you don't, when you tell the other people your Christian, are you lying?

Another issue of who makes the definitions...

As for the UUA... I'm fairly sure they don't even consider themselves a church. Our local branch goes by "fellowship." and the association name goes by Unitarian Universalist Association.

"Many Christians are fine with hmosexuality and gay weddings. UUA, MCC, and Episcopaleans, for example."

And by this sentence, you are actually literally meaning that the UUA is a christian. You can actually replace the organization names with proper names. Since that doesn't make sense, the next logical assumption is that the UUA is a christian organization. Ask yourself that if you've never heard of the UUA, and you read that, would you walk away believing that they're a christian organization? I would. Hence, I feel the need to speak up, to prevent them from being misrepresented. I know alot of people that wouldn't be going to the local fellowship should they believe it was a christian organization. I know alot of people that go because they aren't trying to make them believe in anything Jesus said, much less, he is the son of god. Those people, should they have read that sentence, wouldn't be going to our local fellowship, if they made the same inference that I did.

The funniest part of this whole thing is this.

"I believe in a supreme force, maybe not a being, but not in Christianity any more. We're all connected through some kind of energy, religious, agnostic or atheist. And I certianly think you can believe what you do and that's fine as long as you're a nice person."

"We are in agreement here as well."

You just stated that you don't believe in Christianity. Is it safe for me to assume by saying that, your not christian?

The thing I've learned about religion and declaring yourself as any such is that you have to play by other people's definitions, the popular definition, or the definition of the founder. Step lithely and carry a big stick...

And just for context, Muslim's believe in the teachings of Jesus but not his divinity. I'm fairly sure a significant number of Jewish people believe in him as a prophet, but not as a messiah.

Anyways, it appears my purpose of speaking has been met. Fix the misrepresenting of the Universalist Unitarian Association, and point out that you aren't exactly a Christian by most any Christian's standards. I believe the definition of a religion to be established by it's founder(s), or democratic. Christianities definition has gone to democratic in my opinion, and I suppose thats the point I'm trying to make.

And to the moderators, and readers, I do apologize for not knowing where the quote button is or the syntax for it... I promise to find it before I post more quotes...

edit: if you'd like to continue this discussion, I'd like to move it to private messages, so as to avoid threadjacking.