Last night I fearlessly led the discussion at iMMERSION - our alternative service on Wednesday nights.
The discussion for this week and the next are on Sin, and it was up to me to present the sides of the debate, open up the table to some dialogue, and hopefully get them thinking in ways they may not have imagined.And I think I did it.
For Original Sin, I wanted to start at the beginning and discuss what exactly happened in Eden. It was the beginning of things, wasn't it? So we started off with the Genesis 3 passages, followed by (thank you, YouTube!) a Born Again instructional video, whose bible verse reader sounded like Sideshow Bob from The Simpsons actually.
I could tell that their first impressions to the video were similar to my own - heads were shaking at the arrogant parts, corners of lips were twitching at the overly dramatic music. So I let them get their thoughts off their chest, then plunged straight into An Athiest's View On Original Sin - another YouTube find.
Only I read it out loud instead of playing the video (which was really just a voice and floating pictures). I saw more heads shaking and lips being nibbled in thought with this one. It asked a lot of tough questions that made you think for a second.
With the readings over with, we headed right into discussion. Thank you to all the contributors over on the Original Sin Questions topic - I got a fantastic response to all of them! I recommend popping over and reading all the suggestions, but in the end I chose these six:
1. How much of Christianity rests on the concept of Sin?
2. What is Original Sin? What was the original sin?
3. Does sin pass down through generations?
4. Is it our (humankind's) fault, God's fault, or no one's fault?
5. Does "Original Sin" mean we are inherently bad, or are we just inherently lacking something? What do these possibilities say about God?
6. Is it healthy for humans to hold the view that all people are born as sinners? How does this worldview affect our lives?
Our dialogue was great - we actually went naturally from some questions into others, and the ideas kept flowing. We wondered if God had designed us to be rebellious, or if Sin was just a human concept, or if Jesus died to remind us that we should not fear God... not to instruct what was Good or Evil.Finally, I read the story of the Garden of Eden from one of my favourite books: "Ishmael" by Daniel Quinn. It was an incredible feeling, as I read nearly four full pages from the book, of everyone's eyes captivated on me. Well, not on me, but on the words. I could see the ideas unfolding new ideas in their minds as I spoke. I had feared that it might be boring, to sit and listen to me read page after page, but that fear vanished quickly as I read on. A bit of stunned silence hung in the air when I had finished. But it quickly turned back into refreshed discussion, and I actually ended up lending the book out after everything wrapped up.
All in all, a surprisingly successful night. We'll see what happens next week, when we start discussing the kind of Sin we see everyday, and whether or not God keeps track of points.
