" Karl--who are you trying to impress? All I see is blah blah blah. The deal is that if you believe that Christ is the messiah, and you follow him, you will go to heaven. Good works alone do not get you in. The good works, and resisting sinful behavior is a by-product of following Christ. Simple. "

" It is difficult to understand exactly what “sound Bible teaching” has led Larry Maguet (in his latest letter) to argue that it is only in the blind faith in Jesus which qualifies a person---apparently good or evil—for salvation, and that good works and deeds are apparently without merit to that end. In order to illustrate the proclivity of the Biblical-quoting crowd to selectively choose only those verses which support their assertions I shall “break my own rule” and offer the following two verses from James 2: 21. “Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered Isaac his son on the altar?” 25.”Likewise was not Rahab the harlot also justified by works…?” etc. Furthermore, it is profoundly disturbing to contemplate the ramifications of Maguet’s contention that “works” matter not, as evidenced by his further disapprobation of the almost universally-taught childhood maxim which teaches that the weight of good works vs. “sins” opens the gates of heaven to a good person. For if “works” are ultimately inconsequential, then what ultimately is the point of adopting a personal moral compass if all that’s needed is to simply “believe”; i.e., to profess “faith in Jesus”?! So the real point of Christianity is to simply fawn and “give props” to an insecure god?! If this is what Maguet’s Bible teaches, then better it would be for Maguet to throw his Bible away! Perhaps the prevalence of this dubious proposition explains the hypocritical behaviors indulged in by some of the more ardent “believers” in the press these days, or the nauseating predilection of disgraced celebrities to tote around a Bible and to profess having “found Jesus”! Additionally, despite Maguet’s preference for attributing Mother Theresa’s perseverance of Charity to a “relationship with Jesus”, her own words debunk this fallacy: “…….if there be no God—there can be no soul…if there is no Soul, then Jesus—you also are not true” I would argue that what drove Mother Theresa was the empathetic love and concern for the very poor amongst which she ministered her whole life; that is, an Enlightened Humanism—which, significantly, is the guiding philosophical force behind Atheism! "