Comparative Religions and Denominations

Unitarian Universalism doesn't really have branches, it has been one religion since the 1960's.

Another Answer

If the question was, "What are the main branches of Universalism?"

then the answer could be, Universal Reconciliation, Trinitarian Universalism, and Unitarian Universalism.

Jehovah's Witnesses is the name of a Christian Group that worship the God of the bible, identified therein as "Jehovah". They are best known for their "Witnessing" or speaking about the gospel.
Jehovah's Witnesses are a Christian Group.

"Jehovah" is the English transliteration of the name of God found in the bible (YHWH) and a Witnesses is someone that testifies (speaks) about what they know or have seen, thus a Jehovah's Witnesses is someone that speaks about what they believe to be true about the God of the bible.

There are three orders of clergy : deacons, priests and bishops. Deacons conduct services, visit the sick, can baptise, take funerals and so on. Priests can do all of a deacon's ministry with the addition that he/she can absolve from sin, give God's blessing and bless the bread and wine at Hol Communion. Bishops can do all of a deacon and priest's ministry but can also confirm and ordain.

All other 'ranks' are administrative

A curate is a deacon or priest who is assistant to a parish priest either permanentl or as a trainee.

A vicar is a priest in charge of a parish - an area of the country that has a parish church - and has pastoral responsibility of everone in the parish whether church members or not. Some parishes have rectors instead of vicars. This is an historical title and refers to the different tithes that were paid to him - but basicallyy rectors are vicars in all but name.

A Chaplain is a lay-person, deacon or priest who has pastoral care of an institution like a school or hospital or army camp, or is a personal assistant of a senior member of thhe clergy such as a bishop.

Rural or Urban Deans are senior vicars who chair the deanery chapter of clergy. They are responsible for services in the churches in their patch (the dener) if there is a vacancy there, and organise the installation of new clergy.

A Canon or Prebendary (depending on the tradition of the diocese) is a vicar who has been given an honorary title for long or distinguised service. He is given a seat in the Cathedral chapter in return for preaching at the Cathedral once or twice a year.

The archdeacon is a priest who assists the bishop. He has overall responsibility of several deaneries in his archdeconry. Some call him the 'eyes and ears' of the bishop locally.

The Dean of a cathedral is the vicar of the Cathedral Church in which the Bishop is actually a guest. The dean, and not the bishop, is actually in charge of the cathedral.

The Bishop is the leader of a group of archdeaconries called a diocese. His throne - the 'cathedra' - is housed in the main church of the diocese - the cathedral.

The Chancellor is a priest on the Bishop's staff who is responsibility for teaching and theological study cross the diocese and for encouraging clerg to continue study whilst in service.

The archbishop is a senior bishop with oversight of a group of dioceses called a province. In England and Wales there are three archbishops - the Archbishop of Wales, the Archbishop of York and the Archbishop of Canterbury. The Archbishop of Canterbur is not just the archbishop of the Canterbur province, but is also the spiritual leader of the whole of the Anglican Church worldwide.

The reigning monarch (ie Queen Elizabeth II ) is the 'supreme governor' of the Church of England, under Jesus Christ, the head of the Church.

• Employees at a lower rank know who the boss is
• lower ranks can get promoted.
• Employees know exactly what position they are in and also know what job they have to do.

When the notion of hell was being developed, it was assumed to be a physical place, just as heaven is a physical place just above the sky. Gradually it was perceived that hell was a place of eternal fires, searing the souls condemned to hell. Science has shown that heaven and hell can not be located in any physical location in the universe. Religion has therefore adapted by saying that hell is not so much a physical place, but a spiritual state of eternal torment. If recent religious belief is true, then the dead can not suffer from heat, cold, pain, hunger or any other physical form of punishment.

Heat is a physical attribute that would have no meaning in a spiritual state. To be meaningful, we have to come up with new kinds of punishment for the condemned.

Answer 1: to me as a christian it doesn't mean nothing. I do believe in a new and transformed glorious body, but not to be incorporated into someone else's body or any other type of body. Jesus was conceived by the Holy Ghost, but then again was God in a human body, his own body. Incarnation means "out of flesh born." Answer2: Incarnation literally means "the embodiment of a deity or spirit in some earthly form," or "a concrete or actual form of a quality or concept."

The Incarnation, to most Christians, refers to God coming down to Earth as a man, Jesus, also called the Christ. The Bible indicates that Jesus claimed to be God Incarnate, or in the flesh, on several occasions, although some segments debate this interpretation. The only way Jesus' death could be the once-for-all atonement for our sins is for Him to have been sinless, which would be impossible had he been a mere man. Only by being both God *and* man could His death on the cross substitute for our own.

I would presume that incarnation for a non-Christian would refer to the second definition above, or perhaps to the possession of a body or object by a ghost or spirit, depending on one's view of things spiritual.

Possible answer for non-Christians:

We are all incarnate using the definition of the previous answer. God is the father of us all. Jesus claimed to be the son of God, not the only one. Answer 3: Jesus never claimed to be the 'Son of God' - that title was given to him by others. He claimed much more. He claimed to be 'God the Son' - something very very different. By forgiving sins (only God could do that), by his miracles (only God could heal), by his teaching with authority (rather than second hand from the law) and by his claim to be 'I AM' (ja-whe, jehovah) - 'My father and I are one', Jesus claimed to be God incarnate. That is one of the reasons why Christians follow him.

This is a critical question. How do we modern Christians, post-Christians or non-Christians understand the Incarnation today and still be true to ourselves and our God? I think it comes down to the recognition in the prayer or meditation experience that we are part of the all, that we are not really separate from the dynamic flow of matter and energy that constitutes the Universe, but that we are a part of it, sharing in the dynamic transformations of energy and matter at a given time in phase space. In this way we are incarnations of God, the very Ground of Being. People who value Jesus see in Him that he recognized the incarnation in himself, and early on especially in St. Paul's writings the thought was that we all had the power to become sons of God. The early community believed that when they looked at Jesus, his life, his death and his resurrection, that they could see the saving power of God. At some point this got distorted and frozen in a somewhat lifeless formula that highlighting Jesus' breakthrough to God, forgot that the rest of us could also recognize that we too are a part of the divine mystery. Thank God that at least some of this was retained for us mere humans in the doctrine of the eucharist where the mystery of the incarnation is seen in the fact that the bread and wine are identical with Jesus and this becomes for us a portal where we can discover our own communion with God. This may be getting a bit fuzzy but what I'm trying to get across is that our connection to god is the true mystery, Jesus saw it and we honor that in him, and we can find it in ourselves too. Answer4: As a Christian this means at least three important things.

Firstly it means that Jesus Christ who was and is the eternal God and creator of the universe understands us (although He probably did anyway since He knows everything). At least we are able to see that since He became a man and walked and talked and saw and ate and slept etc that He knows what the human condition is about. Obviously He didn't need to experience absolutely everything but He did become flesh and blood as we are.

Secondly, He may have understood but we need to know that He cares. If He knew about things but was indifferent that would not be a God worthy of worship. But His every move showed compassion both for the lost sheep as well as for the sick and suffering, even though healing was not the main reason why He came.

Thirdly, He came to die. That says more than anything else, given the terrible pain and suffering involved. He did it for everyone on the planet, including anyone who reads this.

The answer is simplicity it's self There is nothing outside of god We man are as much a part of god as as rock or a beam of light or for that matter a pile of manure. God is omnipotent and there is nothing outside of omnipotence. Answer 5: As a Christian, I do not believe in incarnation. When you die, God will choose what your faith will be. The Bible does not answer many questions about after death such as, is there a Purgatory? I don't think God would reincarnate someone, but he could. Answer 6: This is my answer from the view of an Evangelical Christian.

I think most the people are confusing the word incarnate with reincarnation. which would be a very easy mistake.

the word incarnate simply means ( embodied in flesh; given a bodily, esp. a human, form: a devil incarnate.)

In the view of a christian the anti-Christ would actually be Satan incarnate. More importantly Jesus took human form here on earth so at that time he would be God incarnate.

I'll explain reincarnation after reincarnate so i can teach the difference, there actually two different words.

Answer 7: Now Christians believe in being reincarnated. They may not know it but they do. you see reincarnate means ( to give another body to; incarnate again.)and, another definition says (To cause to be reborn in another body; incarnate again.) and one more (To cause to appear in a new form; refurbish or revitalize) any of these sounding familiar now guys?.

once again i believe people would be confusing words. reincarnation means (the belief that the soul, upon death of the body, comes back to earth in another body or form.)

When you become a Christian your born into the family of God, you become one of his children. then when you die you go to heaven and take on a new glorified body.

Answer:

Christians do not believe in reincarnation. but however believe in being reincarnated. and the incarnation of Jesus Christ when he walked here on earth.

non-Christians? Some people believe in reincarnation and some may not believe in incarnation or being reincarnated.

References:

Christians go to heaven.

(NIV) John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son,that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life."

Clarifying:

this may be a little hard to understand because of all the similar words. Just keep in mind that reincarnation is different from incarnation,reincarnate and reincarnated.

I found the good answer.
Almighty God says,"God become flesh is called Christ, and so the Christ that can give people the truth is called God. "
"The meaning of incarnation is that God appears in the flesh, and He comes to work among man of His creation in the image of a flesh. So, for God to be incarnated, He must first be flesh, flesh with normal humanity; this, at the very least, must be true. In fact, the implication of God's incarnation is that God lives and works in the flesh, God in His very essence becomes flesh, becomes a man. His incarnate life and work can be divided into two stages. First is the life He lives before performing His ministry. He lives in an ordinary human family, in utterly normal humanity, obeying the normal morals and laws of human life, with normal human needs (food, clothing, shelter, sleep), normal human weaknesses, and normal human emotions. In other words, during this first stage He lives in non-divine, completely normal humanity, engaging in all the normal human activities. The second stage is the life He lives after beginning to perform His ministry. He still dwells in the ordinary humanity with a normal human shell, showing no outward sign of the supernatural. Yet He lives purely for the sake of His ministry, and during this time His normal humanity exists entirely in service of the normal work of His divinity; for by then His normal humanity has matured to the point of being able to perform His ministry. So the second stage of His life is to perform His ministry in His normal humanity, is a life both of normal humanity and of complete divinity. "
" The Christ with normal humanity is a flesh in which the Spirit is realized, possessing normal humanity, normal rationality, and human thought. "Being realized" means God becoming man, the Spirit becoming flesh; to put it plainly, it is when God Himself inhabits a flesh with normal humanity, and through it expresses His divine work-this is what it means to be "realized," or incarnated. "(from The Word Appears in the Flesh)

Another answer from our community:

I Believe That The Only Way To Get Into Heaven Is Through doing good deds like giving charity and praying. The Only Exception Is If You Are A Very Young Child When You Die, You Are Too Young To Know The Difference Between Right And Wrong.

Another answer

To get into heaven you have to be a faithful Muslim and belive in Allah. You have to pray to Allah five times a day and fast the month of Ramadan and give Zakat which is charity. Also you have say Al-Shahada, saying "I believe that there is no god but Allah and Mohmmed is his prophet" and go to makkah to do Pilgrimige if you have enough money for it. You have to be a good person and follow the lead of the prophet Mohammed peace be upon him and read the holy Quran.

Its no worse than being a gay Protestant.

actually, being a gay Jew is bad if you are a homophobic antisemite. Otherwise, its fine.

Answer

As religions go, Judaism is one of the most pro-gay religions in the world. Aside from Orthodox Jews, all Jewish denominations accept gay people and recognize same-sex marriage and full inclusion of LGBT people.