NobleSavage,
Life is not fairly trivial for Christians. We have a well-known "Thou shalt not commit murder" rule, plus a teaching to the effect that we are responsible to serve God for as long as He sees fit to give us life upon the earth. (That's part of why some of us work with food-for-the-hungry programs, pro-life shelters, hospitals, etc.) Death is indeed a transition to the afterlife, but knowing that we will have a new mission tomorrow, so to speak, does not relieve us of our responsibilities today.
NS: . . . "since Yahweh has asked for your son, that means your son is going up to be with him. You'll spend another few decades on earth . . . and then go to join your son later."
That wasn't what was going through Abraham's head. God had already promised Abraham that through Isaac, God would bring forth a great nation upon the earth. Now ~ with Isaac still unwed ~ God seemed to be demanding Isaac's death! That was the crisis for Abraham that day. Kind of confusing, wasn't it?!
NS: "This underscores the danger of believing in the Christian paradigm."
Rather, it underscores the danger of not realizing the background of a particular text, and of ignoring rather obvious Christian teachings to create, in one's imagination, a disfunctional "Christian paradigm" in order to convince oneself that Christianity is some sort of delusion.
NS: "Life is trivialized by the prospect of an eternal afterlife."
Frankly that seems a little absurd. Is childhood trivialized by the prospect of adulthood?
NS: "When you see the universe from a naturalist perspective, life is precious because it may be all we get."
As precious as human life is (being a gift from God), it is yet more precious when one has something to live for. And there, I think, a purely naturalist perspective will let you down. Survival for survival's sake is not spiritually fulfilling. As the captain says in Wall-E, "I don't want to survive; I want to live!"
Yours in Christ,
Waterrock
Life is not fairly trivial for Christians. We have a well-known "Thou shalt not commit murder" rule, plus a teaching to the effect that we are responsible to serve God for as long as He sees fit to give us life upon the earth. (That's part of why some of us work with food-for-the-hungry programs, pro-life shelters, hospitals, etc.) Death is indeed a transition to the afterlife, but knowing that we will have a new mission tomorrow, so to speak, does not relieve us of our responsibilities today.
NS: . . . "since Yahweh has asked for your son, that means your son is going up to be with him. You'll spend another few decades on earth . . . and then go to join your son later."
That wasn't what was going through Abraham's head. God had already promised Abraham that through Isaac, God would bring forth a great nation upon the earth. Now ~ with Isaac still unwed ~ God seemed to be demanding Isaac's death! That was the crisis for Abraham that day. Kind of confusing, wasn't it?!
NS: "This underscores the danger of believing in the Christian paradigm."
Rather, it underscores the danger of not realizing the background of a particular text, and of ignoring rather obvious Christian teachings to create, in one's imagination, a disfunctional "Christian paradigm" in order to convince oneself that Christianity is some sort of delusion.
NS: "Life is trivialized by the prospect of an eternal afterlife."
Frankly that seems a little absurd. Is childhood trivialized by the prospect of adulthood?
NS: "When you see the universe from a naturalist perspective, life is precious because it may be all we get."
As precious as human life is (being a gift from God), it is yet more precious when one has something to live for. And there, I think, a purely naturalist perspective will let you down. Survival for survival's sake is not spiritually fulfilling. As the captain says in Wall-E, "I don't want to survive; I want to live!"
Yours in Christ,
Waterrock
