From: utzoo!decvax!harpo!ihnp4!ihuxu!klick
Newsgroups: net.misc
Title: Re: Religious Matters
Article-I.D.: ihuxu.132
Posted: Thu Jan 27 09:00:25 1983
Received: Sun Jan 30 05:04:31 1983
Reply-To: klick@ihuxu.UUCP (Vickie Klick)

In a recent submission, a person without first-hand
experience gave this explanation of Christianity:
	Christianity, with its focus on the first part
	(belief in an overbeing) is based primarily on
	faith. I don't know exactly how this works, but
	although you are encouraged to be a good person,
	you are forgiven even if you are a 'sinner', as
	long as you have faith. The idea here is that 
	with *true* faith, you would not sin as much.
No, that's *not* quite how it works!  Faith is the
first requirement, but there is another factor necessary
for forgiveness: true repentance.  This encompasses the sinner's
belief that the act committed was wrong and a resolution
not to commit the act again, as well as sorrow for having
committed an affront against God.  God's grace will give
you strength to fight the temptation to sin again.
It should be noted that in the Catholic Church, the only
Christian church with formalized confession (as far as I
know), the absolution given by the priest is conditional
upon the repentance of the sinner; going to confession
without true sorrow for the sins confessed is ineffective.
(It should be noted that committing the same sin again is
not regarded as an indication of an unrepentant sinner, only
of continued weakness in that area.)  Being of the Christian faith
means that you are required to follow Christian morality;
however, it is accepted that human beings are imperfect, so there
is a means of being reconciled to God after sin.
    This is necessarily an incomplete description, but it corrects
some misconceptions in the earlier submission.
		Vickie Klick - Bell Labs, Naperville
		ihuxu!klick