Reply #15: I'm not one who feels drawn to an "apocalyptic" view myself [View All]

[JerseygirlCT]

Which also doesn't mean I only see the "ethical" Jesus, either.

I have a less orthodox understanding of the meaning of the resurrection - I don't believe Jesus died for our sins. I think Jesus' death was a demonstration, a supreme act of love by God when all the other ways to show us the way still had us missing the main point. I am not an exclusivist: I do not believe that belief in Jesus is necessary for salvation. In fact, I belief we are all, every single one of us who wishes it, saved. No loyalty oath required.

I still grapple with the trinity and the idea of Jesus as God with us - once you move from the symbolic (which is easily enough grasped) to the real, the tangible. But mystery is also part of it - maybe just a part I'll have to live with.

I think there's a side to this that definitely reaches for the divine, that goes beyond the safely digested ethics of behavior. There is that ineffable side of Jesus - the point where God and man are joined, the flesh and blood demonstration of love that not only told us how, but showed us. I think somewhere in all that is the idea that God is immanent - not separate from humanity, not "other", but in us, with us. That's pretty powerful, but again, pretty mysterious.