Believe me,your answers to this question will help to shape my life,and i kid you not. I am not a religious person in the slightest,but i would like to be!
I have watched this "Jesus of Nazereth" film and it is awesome and sometimes when i am alone at night i think about it.
It is a truly great story and none other can beat it,but is it for real?
Is there really a man in the sky that dominates everything we do and casts us down for our sins?
My parents are really religious,are they stupid or do they know something i don't?
This is 2007,Humans on this planet are wiser than we have ever been in history, including medical science DNA,space travel etc etc. Am i really expected to believe there is a heaven where we all go in the end?
This Heaven place must be a vast place to hold everyone that has lived on this tiny planet!
I have come to the conclusion that all religious people are really just scared of dying and this story of jesus is just something to hold on to.
Don't mis judge me, i'm not too happy about dying either, i just need more than a contraditory book (bible) to convince me!
Humans in the 21st century aren't as great as you make them out to be. There is still war, crime, greed, poverty, disease, famine, adultry etc. The same as it was 2,000 yrs ago.
The earth needed God then just as much as it needs him now. We all still die so why not believe that there is a live after death? It's all a matter of faith. No one can make you believe. Not even this film....but it sure helps.
My good freind you are asking a complex, theological question. your question can not be answered in an entry, but only with complex study, and devotion to it. Your question, not to debase, rings like this-I heard Bach the other day, how do you play it? There is a discipline and science to the study of scripture and you are asking the pocket version. You see you made an admission-something about 2007 and the greatness of our generation, well theres your problem-your bias prevents you from looking in depthly into your own question, faith can only strenghten knowledge, and you can find it-libraries are a great place to go, many great readings to discover-I wish you well on your journey, yet I do admit faith in heavean is earned by knowledge, and faith is true when it is embraced by it.
It is a truly great story and none other can beat it,but is it for real?
What is "real"/"for real"? Jesus probably existed, was a divine union mystic who claimed unity with the Spirit, was a religious reformer, an exorcist, a healer, a sage who taught a "Way" of spiritual transformation. All that's for real. You can believe it or not. Or, you can do an experiment: follow the "Way" that Jesus proposed...and see what happens.
Is there really a man in the sky that dominates everything we do and casts us down for our sins?
Christianity says that God exists, and is not a "man" in the sky or anywhere else in the visible/material world. The New Testament's book of James says that God tempts no one, and that we ourselves, not God, cast ourselves down by sinning.
My parents are really religious,are they stupid or do they know something i don't?
Educate yourself on religion in general, and on your parents' religion in particular, and then, armed with that knowledge, ask them respectful questions.
This is 2007,Humans on this planet are wiser than we have ever been in history, including medical science DNA,space travel etc etc. Am i really expected to believe there is a heaven where we all go in the end?
We are not wiser than we have ever been. We're just about the same. You're confusing knowledge ("knowing facts") with wisdom (knowing your soul and its relationship to the Divine).
This Heaven place must be a vast place to hold everyone that has lived on this tiny planet!
Heaven is neither large nor small, for the simple reason that Heaven is not a "place" at all in the conventional/materialist sense. Rather, Heaven is a state of being, a condition wherein the soul is eternally united with Spirit.
I have come to the conclusion that all religious people are really just scared of dying and this story of jesus is just something to hold on to.
If you've already figured all that out, what's the point of your coming here with your questions?
Don't mis judge me, i'm not too happy about dying either, i just need more than a contraditory book (bible) to convince me!
The Bible doesn't convince anyone in the sense you mean - i.e., intellectual certitude. Only your own personal/subjective/spiritual experience can convince you, and the only way to acquire that specialized kind of experience is to undergo spiritual practice. No one can do it for you.
I am Christian by birth and I love Jesus Christ, but I don't agree to the mainstream dogma. Heaven can only be achieved on earth by living things. Jesus can't save our sins, but He showed us the right way to follow. Imagine how the world would look if all of us would love all our neighbours and everybody else around, no cheating, no wrong doing. Isn't that heaven? Death is just the one sure thing of life, and there is no life after death. I don't want to talk about that as long as I am alive.
This Universe we live in a huge thing to to digest. Even our galaxy is small dot in it. Is God above this immensity, so above us or is It inside us. I'd rather think the second option is easier to grasp and admit.
This isn't the place to seek these answers, most people here aren't theologians, never studied or heard of Aquinas, nor studied biblical history. I highly recommend you talk to theologians and a priest rather than this board. It's like seeking answers to a mathematical question from those who can't even count.