Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

Beta, I was pondering your question, and nearly as I can recall, the answer I was taught it the following:

Man fell into Sin, God cannot tolerate Sin but created us with the ability to choose (free will), and "we" chose poorly.  As humans are sinful, we could not be in the presence of God, who needed a "work around", another way to absolve us of that Sin, so He took human form and died for all of us sinners, he paid the debt so to speak, it we believe on Him.

That probably is worded poorly.

It's worded well enough for discussion. My question is:

Why would God need a "work around"???

God is God. Couldn't he just forgive us? And if not, what exactly is it about taking human form and dying "for our sins" that magically allows him to forgive us? Again, it seems neither necessary nor sufficient as a "work around"...

Yep, a bad weekend did the trick.  A god died, that can't die, but rose from the dead, but he can't be dead, and everything works out in the end.

Perfectly sane.  

It's funny, when you bring up stuff from the OT crhristians don't like, they harp about the NT and the new covenant, but when you ask them about the 10 commandments, they're all-in.  But wait, that's from the OT.  

Cherry-pickin' sons a bitches.  

And then some christians cite how could so many people be duped for 2,000 years (ignoring that the Bible isn't that old) - relying on fallacies of so many people believe it and people have beliieved it for so long.....but sorry Jews, your beliefs are too old, lol.  

FML

As noted, God cannot tolerate Sin.  And sinful beings cannot be in the presence of God, except for "unusual cases and manifestations".

Again, it's a statement without justification. Humans after the crucifixion are not without sin. We're still sinful beings. Yet after the crucifixion we can now be in the presence of God?

So God taking human form and getting crucified somehow makes God tolerant of sin? Why? How? 

Again, it seems like a rationalization added after the fact to explain Jesus' crucifixion, but it doesn't really explain anything. It doesn't make any sense, but we're just supposed to take it on faith. 

I don't feel the need to ridicule most people.  I do make a few exceptions.

It's fun that we can have thoughtful, in-depth conversations about all this and we're not even sure Jesus existed.  

Zero evidence of and gods in thousands of years.

Just a book.  The right book?  Sure.  Maybe.  Possibly.  Wait.  

No.

There's no actual reason to believe any of it.  Religion gets some sort of bizarre suspend-my-common-sense pass.  

WTF?!?

Low hanging fruit, the Egg Lobby pays me.

I still don't understand why a politician's religious beliefs causing them to vote a certain way is more alarming than the same politician's non-religious beliefs influencing them.

What's the difference?

There is no difference if he votes the way a person likes (or dislikes).  The primary thing is how he votes.  And most political topics are of course areligious.

A lot of topics Congress tries to deal with are apolitical, same with SCOTUS.  A 9-0 decision is second most common outcome.  But these things don't get media attention.