Identifying as christian

This came up in another thread, quoting myself from there:

Question about religious identity is very interesting. Not least because I myself happen to struggle with my religious identity more than often.

I feel it would be much easier if people would be allowed to describe their relationship with christianity by something more complex than "yes/no". The question is not that simple for many of us, because "christian" is so loaded word, and there are zillions of assumptions related to it.

I would prefer some "100 christian questions" - test and then tell the raiting, like "I'm 86% christian" etc. If I simplify this complex issue down to summary like "no I'm not christian", I end up denying rather many things I actually hold true, and by saying "yes" I end up confessing too many things I don't.

- Thoughts?

KitKatMatt said:

I wonder how those who would be rated lower on the 100 question scale would be taken by people who rated higher.

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Likely it wouldn't make much difference on that. At best, it could help to soften attitudes slightly when some strict christians would realize they themselves are not 100% orthodox. But I think even that might be hoping a bit too much. I believe that most strict people would refuse to even make such tests.

About identifying, my religious views are most certainly either "Christianity-based" or "Christianity influenced", but when I have to simplify the question to "is my religion christianity" it gets more complex. Right now, since I'm not allowed to answer "79%" I have to stick with "no". But its sometimes wierd to realize that many people who identify as christians actually hold much less classic christian opinions / positions than I do. It makes me wonder which one of us is misidentifying ourselves, or is the whole thing of identifying bit biased?

goofypusher837 said:

As far as I'm concerned a Christian is someone who has accepted Jesus as their one and ONLY savior. If ,by these standards, someone declares themselves a Christian then who is to say they are not?

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What about if this person robs banks, smokes pot daily and prays for Zeus and Aphrodite (not for salvation, but for something else) once in a week.

Rhamiel said:

well the polytheism seems a bit problematic
and this is coming from someone who talks to saints and angels every day

but you can be a Christian and smoke pot and rob banks
you would be a BAD Christian
but you would still be a Christian

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My point with those examples was to demonstrate my claim that being christian has many other levels in most peoples mind than just believing that Jesus is their savior. And that's what makes the dualistic question of "christian or not" insufficient for some peoples.

And we could further ask that if someone doesn't believe in hell, then how they think about that "savior" part... For example, I do believe in some sort of afterlife, but lately it has played rather secondary role in my religious views. So, if I say that god is my savior, I likely mean him being my savior from something that's going on this side of grave.

keith99 said:

Who gets to decide what counts in that percentage and what is a real Christian?

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I have no illusions of solving that sort of cosmic problems with my idea I was thinking more about some alternative way to explain my relationship with christianity, instead of picking "yes" or "no". There are people like me who find themselves rather close to many things christian, but see too many obstacles to answer "yes".

So, for me it wouldn't be a problem if every single denomination had their own 100q list. That would still be much more accurate description than 100 or 0 which comes by answering yes or no. Obviously people who can come up with clear yes/no wouldn't find it useful at all, but religious mutants like me would.

Fixed! My quote sometimes acts up so I cut and paste manually the quote marks. Messed up with them this time.

redblue22 said:

so you cut your faith in order to act unfaithfully. Once done, you hope to reclaim your faith of once before. Not so easy. Do you think you will act faithfully standing on the holy Spirit for the next temptation to sin? good luck with that.

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Wrong thread perhaps?

I feel I should probably mention that I don't rob banks, that was hypothetical statement.

redblue22 said:

jack--I was only saying that sin required a failure in faith that isn't brought to home easily again.

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Oh. I wish I could see it being that simple. Then I would have much simpler solutions than I have with my current problems.

r035198x said:

I don't know why it matters what the exact label is.

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It doesn't matter until you're forced to assume label that doesn't fit. Like, if I was called "criminal" for some bureaucratic reasons without actually committing any crime, I would have problem with that label because the word happens to have some meaning and associations.

r035198x said:

My opinion is do what you believe in without trying to categorize yourself. Getting into a category more often than not forces stereotyping, expectations and in some cases imposes restrictions on the mind.

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I think there is difference with using labels for descriptive purposes and using labels as replacements of your actual self and trying to forcibly fit into them. I think labels are useful tool, but I get what you're saying. They can have a dark side too.

Good example of this is personality type tests, I think there can never be enough personality type categories to fully cover complexity of human mind but if this is properly taken into account, they can be used as indicative tools.