I disagree. There are saints and MLK was/is one of them. All the saints of the various denominations were also human beings who stepped up with courage and conviction in a time and place that made them special.
I disagree. There are saints and MLK was/is one of them. All the saints of the various denominations were also human beings who stepped up with courage and conviction in a time and place that made them special.
So are you saying that they weren't human? When we single out human beings as saints, are we drawing on the supernatural? MLK was certainly a man of courage and vision, but he was also a flawed human being. It seems much more realistic to see these people who step up to do the right thing as human beings, because it makes clear that we all have the option to be that courageous, despite our flawed natures. When we call them saints it lets the rest of us off the hook.
Just curious… do you not think of saints as human beings ? it has always been my understanding that they were saints because ,being human, they reached a higher level by means of a lot of hard grunt effort.
The word saint has a religious connotation so it doesn't reflect what I understand is happening. People who have such profound impacts on our world, because of their courage and vision, remind us of what being human can be, just as those who wreak havoc on our planet tell us how low we can go. Putting them into some kind of special category actually lets the rest of us off the hook. But, it also may be that many of these people who are named saints, were driven to do what they did, with not much actual choice. There are many factors, both conscious and unconscious that go into who we are and what we do. There's even some question about whether we actually have free will or not. Who knows. But, I tend to stay away from any religiously tinged language, because it's pretty clear that none of that stuff is true.
I disagree. There are saints and MLK was/is one of them. All the saints of the various denominations were also human beings who stepped up with courage and conviction in a time and place that made them special.
So are you saying that they weren't human? When we single out human beings as saints, are we drawing on the supernatural? MLK was certainly a man of courage and vision, but he was also a flawed human being. It seems much more realistic to see these people who step up to do the right thing as human beings, because it makes clear that we all have the option to be that courageous, despite our flawed natures. When we call them saints it lets the rest of us off the hook.
Just curious… do you not think of saints as human beings ? it has always been my understanding that they were saints because ,being human, they reached a higher level by means of a lot of hard grunt effort.
The word saint has a religious connotation so it doesn't reflect what I understand is happening. People who have such profound impacts on our world, because of their courage and vision, remind us of what being human can be, just as those who wreak havoc on our planet tell us how low we can go. Putting them into some kind of special category actually lets the rest of us off the hook. But, it also may be that many of these people who are named saints, were driven to do what they did, with not much actual choice. There are many factors, both conscious and unconscious that go into who we are and what we do. There's even some question about whether we actually have free will or not. Who knows. But, I tend to stay away from any religiously tinged language, because it's pretty clear that none of that stuff is true.