Prophet Muhammad vs Jesus Christ

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If Christianity and Islam was not ENFORCED BY church AND STATE, WE WOULD NOT HAVE IT IN THE PERCENTAGE OF NUMBERS OF FOLKS IN THE WORLD that we have today, obviously.

This line of thinking does not explain how the Christian church is growing so quickly in China where it has been suppressed for decades. Neither does it explain how Christianity stayed alive (though it slowed down a bit) in the USSR. Neither does it explain how Christianity remains worldwide the fastest-growing religion, though the last century saw the growth of governments (primarily atheistic/communist) that were the most oppressive to Christianity (and religion in general.)

If the growth of Christianity was explained by government enforcement, we should see by corollary that government oppression should wipe it out. But this just isn't so. If that were true, Christianity never would have survived the first couple of centuries when Christians were thrown to the lions and such.

Dare I say I am <cough, cough> a Baptist?

I *MUST* qualify this!! !

I attend an *unafiliated* Baptist church. We do not belong to a larger denomination. We are not fundamentalist. We do not subscribe to a bunch of rules. Anything that you think is "Baptist" must be thrown out. The only way in which we are "Baptist" is in our understanding of baptism, and even then other Baptist pastors will disagree with my husband because he is willing to baptize children who profess to be believers while many will only baptize adults. (Our church subscribes to a Baptist view of church polity, and we put up with it.)

Our church is more like a "non-denominational" church and has been in existence for 150 years, so we aren't going to change the name.

My husband and I are open to different views and thoughts across denominations, even Catholic. The Christian faith boils down to personal faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, and I think the splitting up among denominations is really problematic. I would say that I am in great agreement with Bonhoeffer regarding his views on ecumenism.

In summary, we are theological conservatives but find that there's a lot of gray areas and room for "agreeing to disagree" when the issue at hand is not a primary-level, essential tenet of the faith. These are the four essential tenets my husband uses to explain things at church.

1. Jesus Christ is the Son of God
2. Jesus paid the penalty for sin on the cross in a substitutionary atonement personally applied to believers.
3. Jesus rose from the dead physically.
4. Jesus will return again to judge the living and the dead.

I follow Christ first, as a non-denominational Christian, but I also have only respect and reverence for Muhammad. I don't doubt that Muhammad was the closest person to God after Christ.

Abraham and Moses ring any bells?

I don't see how you can be a Christian, and still believe that Muhammad was second to Christ. It makes no sense to me.

Each person follows their own logic, to a degree. Especially when free thinking. Some believe that Jesus and Mohammed were cousins through Ishmael and Isaac, Abraham's sons, whether by bloodline, tribal connection, religion or ideology, or a combination of the above. The connection is held with skepticism though. But it's understandable that some would have regard for it.

So Muhammad has influenced people to kill those accused of apostasy, war with anyone who disagrees with his view, have multiple wives (and underage ones at that), the subjugation of women, etc?

I fail to see how that is positive.

As much I am a Catholic man and a believer, I don't think it had any "divine support" for lasting this long. Fear mongering and fundamentalism is the major reason why it is still here today, at least to me.

My God wouldn't allow an unrighteous religion to flourish for so long. Fear-mongering isn't a path to long-term success. Christianity has also been guilty of the crimes you list, especially killing apostates. That's because there is room for personal interpretation of God in both religions, so these crimes, awful as they are, don't illegitimize the positive influence they have in the world.

But Christianity doesn't do those things anymore.

That doesn't mean it never did. Christianity went through a slow, drawn-out process of living up to its rhetoric as a belief system built on acceptance and humility. Islam is currently going through a similar process. It brings the same kind of inspiration to Muslims in the West as Christianity brings to us. Attacking Muhammad and Islam as a whole delays this system, since it creates the wrong dichotomy; Islam vs. Christianity instead of freedom vs. oppression.

A big part of that has to do with the period Christianity was at it's worst, which had been the Dark Ages of the western world, a time of ignorance, superstition, and warlords. The Islamic world is going through it's own Dark Age these days.

I agree, so it will in time overcome it and the Islamic theocracies will fall, but the positive aspects of Islam will remain, as happened with our religion

I haven't seen any positive aspects yet.