Since I’ve been open about my doubts and not going to church anymore, I’ve heard from a few Christians expressing concern for my soul.
I got a long e-mail from a stranger yesterday. I don’t publish private correspondence without permission, but hopefully it’s ok to mention his stated reasons for writing to me:
- “I write because if I’m to stay true to my convictions, than I should write out of loving concern as opposed to indifference to the well-being of someone’s soul.”
- “I would be an unloving person if I didn’t say anything.”
So basically he had the choice imposed on him by his belief system: “Write to her – or you are an unloving person who is not true to their convictions”.
This doesn’t seem fair to me, because the belief system never asked me if I’d like to volunteer to receive e-mails from Christians who it has imposed this choice upon.
So here is this belief system, making one person spend a while writing out a long e-mail, and causing someone else to receive it, who never asked for it.
Please don’t tell me a good God who loves human beings invented this particular belief system!
should I be concerned about your soul, Helen??? 😉
Paul, I don’t see the upside for either of us in you being concerned about my soul.
But I guess if you already are there’s probably nothing I can do about it 😉
well i guess i’m no more concerned for your soul than I am for any other part of you 😉
That’s ok then!
What frustrates me is people who wouldn’t care if everything is going really horribly badly in my life as long as I am ‘saved’. People who don’t even bother to ask about my life, family, etc. because all they care about is whether I am ‘saved’.
yeah i know what you mean, it’s a pretty rubbish defination of saved if you ask me, i think Jesus was as much concerned about how people are not just whether they happened to believe in him or not – so i try to be a lil like that too 🙂
Thanks Paul – that makes sense to me!
Helen, it would bother me as well to receive an unsolicited email from a stranger about such deeply personal matters. Why would anyone be expected to listen to someone with whom they have absolutely no relationship?
He was responding to what I had written about not going to church anymore. So, he did have some information about me.
But, from my point of view, I’ve already been around the block that most Christians who read that or something else I’ve written about my change in faith want to take me around. So I’ve been there, done that already. And rather than have them try to entice me around it again, I’d like them to maybe – just ask me questions like “Is there anything I can do to help?” or “Would you like me to explain what I believe/why I believe it?” Why don’t these Christians do more asking and less telling?
here’s to asking questions–a lost art.
Where exactly is one’s soul?
I’m in the process of trying to converse with a … correspondent who comes across the same way–concerned for my soul, and … repeating in paragraphs things he’s heard which I’ve already heard a thousand times. So I decided to ask *him* questions, and he seems a bit taken aback. Asking questions was actively discouraged in the church I grew up in, and slightly less actively discouraged in the last church I went to.
Benjamin, I’ve often found that asking the other person questions is a great way to get the focus helpfully off me.
I don’t know where a person’s ‘soul’ is. In the Old Testament as best I can recall, ‘soul’ means the whole person, rather than something like the ‘immaterial eternal essence of the person/their consciousness’ – which can be a bit confusing.
Hello Helen, do you remember me? I used to work with your husband many years ago and we had an e-mail correspondence on this very topic. Only then you were the one trying to convince me to return to Christianity. You were very respectful and it was an enjoyable dialogue. I just find this ironic.
By the way, whenever I see a bumper sticker or hear someone say “Jesus died for your sins” I think to myself “Fine, but I didn’t ask him to. He should mind his own business!”
Hi Kevin,
Yes I do remember you and yes it is rather ironic, isn’t it?
I’m glad I was respectful – that’s good to hear!