Dear Victor, The last sentence "there's room for everybody who lives a good life" is your own interpretation. That is not part of the passage.
The reading is : In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you (King James version). Now my point is that however much I am loathe to say this, Bhandare is right. The bible does say that the only way to salvation is through faith in Jesus Christ. As to your "no longer the official view of the church", the truth is always the truth. The church cannot change it to suit the times. In that Selma had hit a bull's eye when she said that the church was never enough of a leader to rise above the moral temper of it's times. One truth for yesterday another for today. Personally, I do not hold any brief for the claim that the holy books were "divinely inspired" as in the case of the Bible or "dictated by the angel Jebrel (Gabriel) to the prophet" as in the case of the Quran. Both hold several irreconciliable contradictions, the Quran more so. Many of these are attempted to be explained away by doctors of divinity and other scholars but to my mind, the bible was meant to be a message to the most simple people, among whom I count myself. In any case those erudite explanations cause more disbelief than explanation. There is more and more widespread historical evidence that the Bible as a message has been severely tampered with over the ages to suit particular thoughts and views. Many of the chapters have been removed as they did not suit specific agendas of the reigning popes or princes. Archaeology has now dug some of those up. One of them being that Jesus may have married Mary Magdalene who was his number one apostle. Roland 416-453-3371 On Dec 21, 2007 11:59 PM, Victor Rangel-Ribeiro <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > And I say to you, Mr. Bhandare, that that view no > longer is the official view of the church. According > to the New Testament, Christ said: "In my father's > house there are many mansions." There's room for > everybody who lives a good life. > > Warm regards, > Victor > > >