Does hell really make sense?

[Barnabas]

The bible says that if you eat the bread or drink the wine in an unworthy manner you will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of Christ.
All of the early church fathers, some who would be second or third generation Christians, people who met the apostles, or were "trained" by people who met the apostles,seem to have believed in the real presence too.

St. Ignatius became the third bishop of Antioch, succeeding St. Evodius, who was the immediate successor of St. Peter. He heard St. John preach when he was a boy and knew St. Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna. Seven of his letters written to various Christian communities have been preserved. Eventually, he received the martyr's crown as he was thrown to wild beasts in the arena.

"Consider how contrary to the mind of God are the heterodox in regard to the grace of God which has come to us. They have no regard for charity, none for the widow, the orphan, the oppressed, none for the man in prison, the hungry or the thirsty. They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they do not admit that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, the flesh which suffered for our sins and which the Father, in His graciousness, raised from the dead."

"Letter to the Smyrnaeans", paragraph 6. circa 80-110 A.D.

"Come together in common, one and all without exception in charity, in one faith and in one Jesus Christ, who is of the race of David according to the flesh, the son of man, and the Son of God, so that with undivided mind you may obey the bishop and the priests, and break one Bread which is the medicine of immortality and the antidote against death, enabling us to live forever in Jesus Christ."

-"Letter to the Ephesians", paragraph 20, c. 80-110 A.D.

"I have no taste for the food that perishes nor for the pleasures of this life. I want the Bread of God which is the Flesh of Christ, who was the seed of David; and for drink I desire His Blood which is love that cannot be destroyed."

-"Letter to the Romans", paragraph 7, circa 80-110 A.D.

"Take care, then who belong to God and to Jesus Christ - they are with the bishop. And those who repent and come to the unity of the Church - they too shall be of God, and will be living according to Jesus Christ. Do not err, my brethren: if anyone follow a schismatic, he will not inherit the Kingdom of God. If any man walk about with strange doctrine, he cannot lie down with the passion. Take care, then, to use one Eucharist, so that whatever you do, you do according to God: for there is one Flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup in the union of His Blood; one altar, as there is one bishop with the presbytery and my fellow servants, the deacons."

[Lorizael]

I was thinking in particular of the time I was away at college, attending a pan-Christian prayer meeting since there was no Orthodox church nearby. We went around praying for this and that, and it's all fine, when suddenly somebody addresses God with: "Wow, Jesus, what can I say, man? You're the ****." And nobody blinks.

I didn't say anything since he plainly meant well and all, but really? "You're the ****"? Who addresses the creator of heaven and earth like that?

It's God's fault for destroying the Tower of Babel.

[Jon Miller]

The bread being bread and not being the literal flesh doesn't mean it is not sacred.

JM

[kentonio]

Could it be that people are reading too much into this, and he was just kinda saying 'remember that nice dinner we had together when you eat food in future' rather than all this bread = sacred stuff? When you step away from the huge thing it's been built up into, what sense does it actually make that bread/wine somehow becomes sacred and you have to be in a certain state of mind and suchlike?

This is one of the things that made me reject religion in the first place, the core message of most religions is pretty good (within limits) but a couple of thousand years of theologians putting their own interpretations on things and you end up with all this crazy ****. Seriously, if there was a creator and he came to earth to try and get people to live better lives, isn't it a bit more likely that he'd have just said what he wanted people to do and how they should act, rather than going to all that bother and leaving insanely tenuous clues that people then spend thousands of years misunderstanding?

How many christians are there at Poly, a dozen? More? Do any of you actually agree on anything to do with religion?

[Elok]

How many christians are there at Poly, a dozen? More? Do any of you actually agree on anything to do with religion?

We all agree that you're wrong.

[Elok]

It's God's fault for destroying the Tower of Babel.

On the contrary, the Babel incident provided us with a much larger vocabulary to choose from. He could have said something cool in English, Greek, French, Swahili, Farsi, Japanese or any number of other languages.

[Lorizael]

Seriously, if there was a creator and he came to earth to try and get people to live better lives, isn't it a bit more likely that he'd have just said what he wanted people to do and how they should act, rather than going to all that bother and leaving insanely tenuous clues that people then spend thousands of years misunderstanding?

There is no more or less likely when it concerns supernatural entities.

[kentonio]

We all agree that you're wrong.

That's fine, I don't expect agreement on the existence or not of god, but why is there so much disagreement over stuff that really isn't even vaguely important in the grand scheme of things? Is there really a single issue important enough to have caused the church to schism into so many parts? It just seems like people care so much about the details that they overlook the entire point of the thing.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Could it be that people are reading too much into this, and he was just kinda saying 'remember that nice dinner we had together when you eat food in future'

Anything "could" be possible, but He was likely making a greater point about the bread being His body broken for you and the win being His blood shed for you. The fact that it is memorialized doesn't minimize anything.

[kentonio]

There is no more or less likely when it concerns supernatural entities.

I disagree, I think you can look at it logically. What possible benefit would there be to an omnipotent being manifesting themselves to pass a message to humanity but then doing it in such an ass-backwards way that it pretty much guaranteed several millenia of disagreement, schism, misunderstanding and religious warfare?

[kentonio]

Anything "could" be possible, but He was likely making a greater point about the bread being His body broken for you and the win being His blood shed for you. The fact that it is memorialized doesn't minimize anything.

That makes sense, but doesn't it then sound even more like a 'remember my sacrifice' thing rather than a 'this bread is literally sacred' thing?

[Jon Miller]

That's fine, I don't expect agreement on the existence or not of god, but why is there so much disagreement over stuff that really isn't even vaguely important in the grand scheme of things? Is there really a single issue important enough to have caused the church to schism into so many parts? It just seems like people care so much about the details that they overlook the entire point of the thing.

Hey, we all agree that people should work.

I guess that means all economics threads and discussions and study and so on are worthless...

JM
(Or even, we all think that free markets are good, .... )

[kentonio]

Hey, we all agree that people should work.

I guess that means all economics threads and discussions and study and so on are worthless...

JM
(Or even, we all think that free markets are good, .... )

Why should people agree on those things? You could argue about the existence of a church of capitalism I suppose, but surely one of the big tenets of christianity is that the message has already been provided by god, not that you can make up your own version of it?

[Jon Miller]

That makes sense, but doesn't it then sound even more like a 'remember my sacrifice' thing rather than a 'this bread is literally sacred' thing?

God made many things sacred, in the history of the human-God relationship.

My church does have the foot washing before communion, but only has communion 4 times a year and is quite protestant (although conservative now).

I do think that the sacred has relevance in Christianity.

JM

[Imran Siddiqui]

That's fine, I don't expect agreement on the existence or not of god, but why is there so much disagreement over stuff that really isn't even vaguely important in the grand scheme of things? Is there really a single issue important enough to have caused the church to schism into so many parts? It just seems like people care so much about the details that they overlook the entire point of the thing.

People like arguing (witness this site). However, for the most part, Christians believe they are all a united whole which little differences which make up denominations. So you get the best of both - a baseline of belief and then a whole host of denominations (or you could just be a free agent really) to plug into.