Okay, and to quickly deal with some of the other tangential topics that interest me:
lordjedi said:I'm very aware that Jesus was tempted by the same things as every other man, but he also happened to be God incarnate. He could read other peoples minds. He knew what they had done before and he knew what they planned to do. This gave him a much better ability to do what needed to be done.
Real purity, much like real perfection, is completely unattainable. If you really believe you, or anyone else, can attain real purity, then I'm sorry for you. Jesus was perfection. God is perfection. No one else can hope to come close. Purity of mind, body, and soul is a daily exercise. We can hope to come close to it in our lifetime, but we will likely never reach it. I don't think Mother Theresa ever reached real purity either.
According to Christian orthodoxy, Jesus did not use any of his powers as God to make the moral work of his life on this earth any easier. If Jesus had done that then his life of moral perfection would have meant nothing as a sacrifice. Jesus did not use his power as God to make morality easy for himself. Every version of Christianity that I know of keeps Christ's perfect life as a sole work of his human nature (which would therefore be distinct from his divine nature).
Otherwise, I see no reason for you to express the point your second paragraph there is making. Are you trying to say that because we can't be perfect in this life, human beings should not bother to seek moral purity?
As for Mother Teresa, yeah (yuck), she was not anywhere near moral purity.
lordjedi said:
How does talking about it on an Internet forum help? Seriously, explain that to me. I know that sending money helps. I know that prayer helps because I've seen it work. But how does blabbing about it on an Internet forum do anything? As far as I can tell, it does nothing. Our elected officials don't read it. Maybe a passerby sees it from time to time, but for the most part, it's just a bunch of guys talking about it. It's almost no different than a bunch of guys in a room talking about it. After they're done talking about it, they go home and nothing changes. Perhaps someones mind is changed, but beyond that, nothing has really been done. It all ends up being a bunch of hot air.
Talking about things doesn't help unless the talk allows someone to change. But if nothing is changed, then no help can come about. I'm sure most of us read or heard about Mumbai. If we were going to help, we would've done something. Coming here and saying "So, what do you guys think about this terrorist attack" doesn't help anyone. It's a mental exercise, nothing more.
Blabbing on an internet forum can help with all sorts of things. In no particular order: It can help your own thinking and the thinking of others. It can help raise awareness. It can help convince people of taking little or big actions. It can help accomplish lots of other things too (like how Obama had a lot of internet support that helped him when all was added up).
Just as we talk about the 911 attacks, or the death of an actor, or George Lucas destroying Star Wars, there can be good things that come of those actions. As such, I personally believe I should have expressed concern about the Mumbai attacks. I don't know if that's something you should have done, and if you believe that talking about Mumbai on the internet or in real life is worthless for you then that's not for me to judge. I just find it odd you think there was nothing you could have possibly done to have acted a little better and wanted you to clarify if that's what you actually believed (since I'd find that a very interesting insight into how you see yourself).