Now if Christ is preached, that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain. Moreover we are even found to be false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied.
1 CORINTHIANS 15:12-19 NASB
I can understand why an atheist does not believe in the Resurrection. First of all, it is an unusual event. Second of all, most unusual events like spontaneous combustion and Bigfoot turn out to be a bunch of lies. Third of all, in a world of misery and evil, it is hard to believe that God even exists or that His answer to it all is to come and get Himself killed and then rise from the dead. I agree completely with those who say that extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. The people I don't understand are the ones who live and work in the religious realm who try and reduce the Resurrection from a real bodily event to a symbolic spiritual event experienced purely in the minds of the Apostles. You can find these heretics in various places of liberal Christianity, but it is most disturbing when one of those places is among the members of the Society of Jesus and Catholic institutions of higher learning.
Belief in the bodily Resurrection of Christ is not an optional thing in Christianity. I won't go into the substantial evidence for the resurrection as others have already done this. Atheists may not believe, but they can't say it is for lack of evidence. They may not find that evidence compelling as I do, but I can say that no amount of evidence would ever suffice for them. As a former atheist, I can say that atheists are atheists for the simple reason that they cannot deal with the problem of evil. Then, they go and commit evil. Basically, God does not exist because He allows atheists to exist.
My main concern is with the religious heretics who deny Christ's resurrection. Why? To be more precise, why do these people work in a religious profession? Why are these people priests and prelates? To me, it is like a meat eater who works in a vegan restaurant. Why pretend to believe in what you don't believe? And why not avail yourself of the much easier life in places where the lack of faith and promotion of heresy are tolerated and supported?
I have already touched upon this issue in a previous post called The Episcopal Church. The reality is that the reason these heretics who deny the Resurrection and other doctrines like Transubstantion remain in the Roman Catholic Church is because of the most obvious reason. They are evil. They belong to the Devil, and they do the Devil's work which is the corruption of Christ's church. It is already public knowledge that priests, prelates, and religious violate vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience. Many of them are practicing homosexuals and others have preyed upon minors and children. I am currently reading a book that alleges that powerful priests and prelates in the past have engaged in satanic rituals, and my research on the matter has led me to the conclusion that these allegations were not idle speculations. It pains my heart to discover these things, but it does not diminish my faith. If evil can make such a target out of the Catholic Church, then the Church must truly be from God.
Back before Good Friday, I pondered to myself why Judas Iscariot did what he did. My view of the man was that he started from a good place and fell. St. John the Apostle dispels that silly notion.
Most people live in service to their own sin or evil. Others live in service to an evil greater than themselves. This distinction is an important one. Judas Iscariot lived in service to Satan. He did not betray Jesus merely for his own ends. He betrayed Jesus for the sake of the Devil.
This is controversial stuff because many people don't actually believe in the Devil. They believe people do evil because they are off in the head or weak in their character or adhere to an ideology like communism that leads to evil. Somewhere, the good got misdirected into evil. But to live in service to Satan and sacrifice oneself to a greater evil is the purest evil there is.
The reason we have such a distorted image of Judas is not because of what he did before his betrayal but what he did after. Overcome with grief and despair, he tossed away his pieces of silver and hanged himself. Had he held on, he would have been witness to the Resurrection. His life would have ended differently. He could have come back from the darkness. But as it stands, I agree with our Lord when He said that it would have been better if Judas had never been born. There is only one thing worse than not existing, and I will leave it there.
The selection of Judas as one of the twelve should serve as both warning and consolation. There have been other Iscariots after Judas, and the history of Catholicism is replete with these evildoers who have served the Devil while pretending to serve God. These people pretend to believe while doing what they can to undermine the faith in their subtle ways. One of those ways is to reduce the Resurrection to a mere idea devised by the Apostles in an act of pure fideism. What matters is not that Jesus rose bodily from the dead, but that you believe that His ideas of social justice rose from the dead. This is simply crap. Why would I ever allow myself to be tortured, mutilated, and executed for something as ridiculous as this?
Once Jesus has been reduced to a mere idea, that idea can be changed. And that is the poison the Iscariots pour into the lives of the faithful. The body and blood become mere bread and wine again. The miraculous becomes myth. Death is still death. And Heaven is merely the last pleasant thought you have before your life is extinguished forever. If that is all Christianity amounts to, I don't want it. I'd rather be a bleak atheist again. Fortunately, I do believe that the Apostles died for a real event and a real Savior. Christ is truly risen.
I have already touched upon this issue in a previous post called The Episcopal Church. The reality is that the reason these heretics who deny the Resurrection and other doctrines like Transubstantion remain in the Roman Catholic Church is because of the most obvious reason. They are evil. They belong to the Devil, and they do the Devil's work which is the corruption of Christ's church. It is already public knowledge that priests, prelates, and religious violate vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience. Many of them are practicing homosexuals and others have preyed upon minors and children. I am currently reading a book that alleges that powerful priests and prelates in the past have engaged in satanic rituals, and my research on the matter has led me to the conclusion that these allegations were not idle speculations. It pains my heart to discover these things, but it does not diminish my faith. If evil can make such a target out of the Catholic Church, then the Church must truly be from God.
Back before Good Friday, I pondered to myself why Judas Iscariot did what he did. My view of the man was that he started from a good place and fell. St. John the Apostle dispels that silly notion.
But Judas Iscariot, one of His disciples, who was intending to betray Him, said, “Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and given to poor people?” Now he said this, not because he was concerned about the poor, but because he was a thief, and as he had the money box, he used to pilfer what was put into it.
JOHN 12:4-6 NASBKnowing a bit about John's Gospel, it was written last of the Gospels and didn't waste time with a simple retelling of events like the other three. John gives us information the others leave out, answers certain questions, and is written with a different purpose in mind. With this passage, he answers my question. Judas was not a good guy who became bad. He was bad from the start. He was an agent of the Devil, and his intent was to destroy Jesus. He was a like a spy or a double agent.
Most people live in service to their own sin or evil. Others live in service to an evil greater than themselves. This distinction is an important one. Judas Iscariot lived in service to Satan. He did not betray Jesus merely for his own ends. He betrayed Jesus for the sake of the Devil.
This is controversial stuff because many people don't actually believe in the Devil. They believe people do evil because they are off in the head or weak in their character or adhere to an ideology like communism that leads to evil. Somewhere, the good got misdirected into evil. But to live in service to Satan and sacrifice oneself to a greater evil is the purest evil there is.
The reason we have such a distorted image of Judas is not because of what he did before his betrayal but what he did after. Overcome with grief and despair, he tossed away his pieces of silver and hanged himself. Had he held on, he would have been witness to the Resurrection. His life would have ended differently. He could have come back from the darkness. But as it stands, I agree with our Lord when He said that it would have been better if Judas had never been born. There is only one thing worse than not existing, and I will leave it there.
The selection of Judas as one of the twelve should serve as both warning and consolation. There have been other Iscariots after Judas, and the history of Catholicism is replete with these evildoers who have served the Devil while pretending to serve God. These people pretend to believe while doing what they can to undermine the faith in their subtle ways. One of those ways is to reduce the Resurrection to a mere idea devised by the Apostles in an act of pure fideism. What matters is not that Jesus rose bodily from the dead, but that you believe that His ideas of social justice rose from the dead. This is simply crap. Why would I ever allow myself to be tortured, mutilated, and executed for something as ridiculous as this?
Once Jesus has been reduced to a mere idea, that idea can be changed. And that is the poison the Iscariots pour into the lives of the faithful. The body and blood become mere bread and wine again. The miraculous becomes myth. Death is still death. And Heaven is merely the last pleasant thought you have before your life is extinguished forever. If that is all Christianity amounts to, I don't want it. I'd rather be a bleak atheist again. Fortunately, I do believe that the Apostles died for a real event and a real Savior. Christ is truly risen.
