Ummm... Re-Read your post and then tell me you're not making an argument which puts you as an atheist 'in' (open minded and free of discriminatory bias) and religious folk 'out'.
Creation of in & out groups is a people thing sir; not religious.
Of course I constantly discriminate against green lights by driving right by them, vs red which I stop & stare at.
Ps- you do know that one of the most murdereous ideologies of the 20th century (Communism) was decidedly atheistic?
Stalin was Russian Orthodox.
Do not conflate communism with atheism. By definition, all communist are supposed to be atheist, but not all atheist are communist. In addition, as I've mentioned before, it's possible to make a good case that Marxism is a religion, as are other cults of personality.
Do not conflate being baptized into a church with being a Christian. There are many baptized atheists, Stalin among them. The system of Communism is avowed in its atheism. Seems more honest to say that your original assertion is a generalization based upon your observations of history than to redefine historic facts to suit?
Once again you are just denying your own. Stalin was the actual head of the Russian Orthodox church, the pseudo-Pope of the Russian Orthodox, yet you claim he was not Christian. What's next, are you going to start telling me various Popes were/are not Christian?
Perhaps I should ask this another way. Are Catholics Christian? What about Mormons, and Jehovah Witnesses, and 7th day Adventist, are they Christian? If a Christian Sect choose a different Sabbath then you do, are they no longer Christian? How about the Baptist, Methodist, Episcopalians with their gay and female priests? How about Anglicans, Pentecostals, Assembly of God, Calvinist, the Coptics, that various Eastern Orthodox, the Charismatics, the Lutherans, Presbyterians, Congregationalist, Anabaptist and the various Reform Churches?
Which of these do you not Christian enough for you?
AS,
You may want to consider that not all who say they are born of God are truly that. I have met Catholics who described themselves as born again. I have met some in evangelical denominations that later admitted they were not born of God; ie "born again"
I may call myself a retired police chief but that does not make me one. I would be "false," as was Judas. It seems to me that the other disciples did not recognize Judas for what he was. Jesus however did. Jesus saw his heart.
You seem to choose other ways to define what a "Christian" is but in fact, Jesus is the one who either 'knows you' or not. That will be the final judgment of "who is a Christian" or not.
TF
btw... I do not "know" but I suspect that Hitler was a "Christian" like Judas "was."
Let's deal with your silly strawman. Lets say for a moment you really were a Police Chief. Now there's another individual who wore a police uniform for 40 years, and was the head of a police department for 20 of those 40 years. It's discovered that this Chief was corrupt. Are you now going to say, "he's not a real police Chief"? Or would it be more honest for you to admit there are issues within the Police service and work to correct them.
In some ways your semantics go back to the OP's original question about the honesty of Christians as it relates to apologetics.
You didn't use logic or reason to get into this opinion, I cannot use logic or reason to get you out of it.
You cannot over estimate the unimportance of nearly everything. John Maxwell
