Caution! Jesus was letting the man know in a backhanded fashion that it was impossible to earn himself into heaven by keeping the commandments!
I never said it was possible to "earn" your way into heaven. Read the first post. I said the ten commandments were all repeated in the new testament, with the exception of one. If this is wrong please state verse and chptr where it can be refuted. The guy was telling Jesus, what laws he had kept and asked what he lacked. Jesus told him, he did NOT tell him the things he was already doing were futile. Remember, since Jesus was still alive those around him were still bound by Jewish law, they weren't Christians yet, just disciples. John also had disciples, this did not make them "Christians", since Christ had not died yet to fullfill the prophecy.
What he is refering to is simply this Religion is the perversion of Christanity by men. In the original Church, there were no religions, only Christians. followers of Christ were first called Christians at Antioch, most were originally Jews, but now they worshiped differently, preaching the teachings of Christ, hence they were called " Christians" But any name would suffice. "The church" , The body of Christ, saved group of people, God's church, etcc it isn't the name that "saves" you. Your name could be anything and you'd still be the same person. It's the method not the name. the "church" is not a building, it is the body of Christians, the people themselves. if you are Christian and you are alone in a country full of Muslims, or Atheists, YOU ARE the church. Regardless of where you are. Home, work etc... The church BUILDING is just WHERE the church, ie saints, go to worship.
I don't think that last part is true. We were instructed to take not even one letter from the law. We are still bound by alot of the law. We are just now required to go beyond it. Religion is a necessary tool of Salvation which is why Christ himself gave us the basic hierarchy of the Church, and left us the Holy Spirit to give the appointed leadership strength and guidance.
The verse says not one jot or tittle would be taken from the law until it was fulfilled, which happened in Christ Jesus according to the apostle Paul. Believers have died to the law and are alive in Christ. This is verbatim in Scripture. This is where as I disagree with you as you are a Roman Catholic. I believe salvation is in Christ Jesus alone, in accordance with the scriptural guidance given to the various church bodies in Rome, Galatia, Corinth, Philippi, etc. I do not believe in the abstract of a Universal Christian Church springing from Rome because of that very scripture which fails to mention any of the dogma or hierarchy which now exists and has existed since around 400 AD. I believe it is man-inspired and invented. Also I believe the dogma of the Church in many places contradicts that very scripture in which the Catholic Church met and canonized. EDIT: I want to make clear to you that the concept of an earthly head of a church (Peter was the rock) instituted by Jesus himself does not cause me any difficulty. I simply believe all of the dogma invented by men in the Catholic Church over the years simply contradicts what Paul taught to the early Church as seen in Scripture.
Religion is much more than a concern for the physical or spiritual. It is an approach to structuring and articulating the faith experience of a community. Religion is fundamentally a communal approach to faith. As such, it should not be seen as, in any way, being antithetical, or as being as any kind of a hinderence, to the individual faith experience. Rather, it provides the individual with a means of expressing that experience within a faith community. Organized religion really contributes significantly to the faith experience of the individual.
I disagree. The problem with organized religion is that the majority of individuals involved therein get into a pattern of church attendance and ritual following which distracts them from the true individual faith calling. In the worst cases, they believe that it is those rituals, church attendance, and sacrament following that actually earns them good standing with the Creator. This is the crux of the New Covenant. The Jewish hierarchy at the time of Jesus was so self-important and prideful in their religious undertakings that they missed the message entirely. Unfortunately, this continues today. Not that this isn't a problem in fundamentalist Protestant churches either... or even in the church that I happen to attend.
Religion is not a perversion of Christianity. Reference my previous post. As a matter of fact, if you read the book of Acts you will find that the Apostles began to organize themselves into a structured community almost immediately. They established individual churches in many cities and at the same time began to establish a priesthood to minister to the needs of the faithful. They also immediately began to theologize and build a body of beliefs concerning Christ and who he was, and they set out preaching those beliefs for the purpose of bringing more people into the universal Church which they referred to merely as "The Way." All these things - hierarchy, theology, dogma, individual communities linked by a single faith - are essential elements of a religion.
Ritual is merely a symbolic way of expressing your faith. As such, ritual or church attendance or receiving the sacraments do not distract the faithful from the calling of their faith. All these things are a means of expressing their faith. As such, rather than distracting them, the Church and all that it is composed of draws their attention to their faith and allows them to express their individual faith experiences. Certainly it is possible for someone to be faithful in their church attendence for the wrong reasons, but for the most part I believe, based on my own experiences, that most people are sincere in their faith and participation in their individual churches have meaning for them. I feel that belonging to a church is extremely important because it places the individual with a faith community that will nourish his or her faith by sharing its communal faith experience with the individual beleiver through preaching, teaching, the sacraments and its own unique spirituality. I am not saying a person has to belong to a church or religion to be saved, but I guess it is important because whenever the bible speaks of salvation, it seems that it almost always does so within the context of a community. So I thing the Apostles and early Church leaders were very much aware of the importance of religion and community.
To further add to this we need a central teaching body to interpret the faith. One thing you see in the protestant community is a continuing fracturing of churches because of disputes over what things in the Bible mean. This is extremely rare in Catholisim. I am not aware of any discrepencies between what the Church teaches and the Bible. In fact the Cathechism stats that Tradition must be in keeping with scripture.
