User:Ian.thomson/ChristianityAndNPOV

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The neutral point of view and reliable source policies seems to frustrate a lot of people that strongly hold to any given worldview. Since I'm more familiar with Christian worldviews, I'll address those. I've encountered a lot of people that have tried to push their POV into different articles because they thought it was the Christian thing to do. Since I've learned that many of my brothers and sisters don't share my attitude towards evangelism ("Preach the Gospel at all times, but only use words when necessary" -- St. Francis of Assisi, [apocryphal] ), I've decided to take an approach they'll be more familiar with.

Wikipedia's policies, particularly the neutral point of view policy and sourcing policies, are not just acceptable to Christianity, but (if you believe Christianity is true) to Christianity's advantage.

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A basic explanation of some important policies

 * Always cite a source for any new information, using, containing the name of the source, the author, page number, publisher or web address (if applicable).
 * "Truth" is not the criteria for inclusion, verifiability is.
 * We do not publish original thought.
 * A subject is considered notable if it has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject.
 * Reliable sources typically include: articles from magazines or newspapers (particularly scholarly journals), or books by recognized authors (basically, books by respected publishers). Online versions of these are usually accepted, provided they're held to the same standards.  User generated sources (like Wikipedia) are to be avoided.  Self-published sources should be avoided except for information by and about the subject that is not self-serving (for example, citing a company's website to establish something like year of establishment).
 * Articles are to be written from a neutral point of view. Wikipedia is not concerned with facts or opinions, it just summarizes reliable sources.  Real scholarship actually does not say what understanding of the world is "true," but only with what there is evidence for.  In the case of science, this evidence must ultimately start with physical evidence.  In the case of religion, Wikipedia only reports what has been written and does not take any stance on doctrine.

We are told not to judge, because we cannot do so accurately
Jesus commands us to not pass judgement -- Judge not, that ye be not judged. -- (Matthew 7:1)

He commands us this because we are imperfect -- And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? (Matt. 7:3) and Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. (Proverbs 3:5)

We should not lash out against someone if we think they're hiding the truth of Christ with the NPOV policy -- Do not be overcome with evil, but overcome evil with good (Romans 12:21)

Indeed, going along with the NPOV policy is a good idea: it allows us to prevent truely anti-Christian points of view from dominating articles -- ''If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.'' (Matt. 5:39-41) -- Presenting the other cheek presented the person that slapped you with three options: strike you with their unclean left hand and make themselves unclean, strike them with the palm of their right hand (you saved the palm for your equals), or not strike you and show themselves to be cowards. Giving someone your tunic in addition to your cloak shamed them because they had to look at your naked body, and everyone could say of them "wow, he's so mean, taking that guy's clothes." Roman soldiers could command people to carry their stuff for a mile, but were responsible for those people the entire time. By going the second mile, one forced the soldier to take care of them even longer. The soldier also risked disciplinary action.

After all, you don't want anti-Christian POVs pushed into articles, and you wouldn't want such POV pushers to lash out at you for stopping them -- Do to others what you would have them do to you (Matt. 7:12)

Christ doesn't need us to protect His truth, anyway, God will do so. -- ''The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.'' (Psalms 12:6-7)

Still:

We should not idly accept someone's claims simply because they're Christian
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world - 1 John 4:1

One problem I see in the articles like John Todd (occultist) and (before it was deleted... again...) William Schnoebelen is that people assume that because these men claimed to be inspired by God that they couldn't be wrong, they couldn't be lying, and the secular sources exposing their stories as completely false must be wrong.

This is nothing short of giving in to false prophets. Under Old Testament law, the Israelites would have actually killed those two men for objectively lying in the name of God.

How would Christianity use the NPOV policy?
Well, when it is relevent, we can present what the Bible says, and what people have said about the Bible.

This can be tricky, because it's not the same as pious Bible study. We don't cross reference with different verses, we don't engage in our own exegesis, we can't present our own interpretations. Instead, we can repeat the text. If we have sources to cite, we can also present notable interpretations and historical considerations.

There are actually a lot of things in Christianity that aren't necessarily in the Bible. There's actually nothing wrong with that, the entire point of Christ's forgiveness is that we don't have to worry about every detail in our religion. When it comes to this stuff, we don't need to jam the Bible into the article. If a notable theologian engages in some eisegesis to find a connection to the Bible, fine, we can include that. There are also non-Christians that have a lot to say about the Bible, and Christians that have things to say about the Bible in a non-theological context. These are important too, and can inform one's own theology outside of the encyclopedia. I personally found Revelation more informative after reading about some of the symbolism in other religions at the time, and I find that a lot of Jewish interpretations of the Scriptures are quite interesting, even enlightening. In each scenario, we present sources showing that this theologian said this, that historian said that, and so on.

There are also different interpretations of different parts of the Bible among Christians. This is fine as long as we worship Christ instead of those interpretations. -- ''each one of you is saying, "I am of Paul," and "I of Apollos," and "I of Cephas," and "I of Christ." Has Christ been divided? Paul was not crucified for you, was he? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? (1 Corinthians 1:12-13) and John said to him, "Teacher, we saw a man casting out demons in your name, and we forbade him, because he was not following us." But Jesus said, "Do not forbid him; for no one who does a mighty work in my name will be able soon after to speak evil of me. For he that is not against us is for us. For truly, I say to you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ, will by no means lose his reward.'' (Mark 9:38-41)

Even if an article has nothing to do with the Bible, collecting and codifying knowledge about God's creation or what some of His creation has created in imitation of Him is a noble work in itself. -- Leave your simple ways and you will live; walk in the way of understanding. Instruct a wise man and he will be wiser still; teach a righteous man and he will add to his learning. Listen to advice and accept instruction, and in the end you will be wise. (Prov 9:6, 9; 19:20)

About science and scientists
The Bible is the voice of God, not the voice of scientists. If we want the voice of scientists, we ask the scientists. Most of them do advocate the Big Bang, abiogenesis, and evolution as the most visible means of how the world came to be. Whether or not this was God's doing is up to the reader to decide. If the scientists are mistaken, this has to be shown to them on their own grounds, which anti-evolution folks are not really doing, because they are not reading up on the same literature, they are not using the same standards and experiments, and they are not speaking in the same circles nor getting published in the same journals. If it does not walk like a duck, does not talk like a duck, and avoids ducks like the plague, there is little reason to assume its a duck. Or scientist, in this case. I'm not saying the anti-evolution folks are wrong, I'm just saying that they are not mainstream scientists. This is why they're not consulted for the voice of scientists. Now, they can be consulted for what they think if their views are notable.

St. Augustine of Hippo wrote that "It not infrequently happens that something about the earth, about the sky, about other elements of this world, about the motion and rotation or even the magnitude and distances of the stars, about definite eclipses of the sun and moon, about the passage of years and seasons, about the nature of animals, of fruits, of stones, and of other such things, may be known with the greatest certainty by reasoning or by experience, even by one who is not a Christian. It is too disgraceful and ruinous, though, and greatly to be avoided, that he [the non-Christian] should hear a Christian speaking so idiotically on these matters, and as if in accord with Christian writings, that he might say that he could scarcely keep from laughing when he saw how totally in error they are. In view of this and in keeping it in mind constantly while dealing with the book of Genesis, I have, insofar as I was able, explained in detail and set forth for consideration the meanings of obscure passages, taking care not to affirm rashly some one meaning to the prejudice of another and perhaps better explanation."

As 2 Peter 3:8 points out, a day is as a thousand years to God, and a thousand years as a day - God invented time, not the other way around. To pretend that Young Earth Creationism is the only thing a Christian can believe in is rather Pharisaical -- Old Earth Creationism/Theistic evolution is accepted by most Christians outside the United States. Believe whichever you feel lead to, but don't dismiss your brothers and sisters as less Christian over so trivial an issue (we're not baptized in young earth creationism, after all).

Also, one thing about science is that it is provable to anyone regardless of their religion (if they don't stick their head in the sand, that is). The only individuals advocating YEC are followers of the very closely related Abrahamic religions (and the Jewish and Muslim membership would realistically be described as "token"). No atheists, Buddhists, Hindus, Sikhs, agnostics, or anyone else supports YEC. If the world was observably only 6000 years old, then you'd have Buddhist and Hindu YECers who would claim that YEC proves that our world is an illusion, Shintoists fitting the Japanese creation myth and Taoists fitting Chinese creation myths within that time frame with no difficulty, UFO religions arguing that that's when Ancient astronauts created an old looking earth wholesale 6000 years ago -- but it's mostly Fundamentalist Christians and a few token Jews and Muslims who argue that the world is only 6000 years old. Atheists who accept evolution would be balanced out by YECer deists and even atheists who regard The World as Will and Representation. The reason that non-Abrahamic religionists reject YEC is not religious bias, it's the same reason that many followers of Abrahamic religions accept Theistic evolution...

About the apocalypse
...the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night (1 Thessalonians 5:2) and No one knows about that day or hour (Matt. 24:36)

Consider this, and remember that noone on earth knows when or how the world will end. Even if you did know, it wouldn't do any good. Best practice is to just be ready for the world to end tomorrow but don't mess up your life in case tomorrow does come.

About notability
If you think that being a Christian makes you or your business, band, book, movie, etc, noteworthy, no, it does not. In Acts 8:18-21, Simon Magus tries to exchange money for the Holy Spirit, but is rebuked because the Holy Spirit and money are not equal. One cannot be exchanged for the other (Matthew 6:24).