6C

Was it a master stroke to create the concepts that the Pope was infallible, and not capable of error, and the idea of heaven? What are your thoughts on these themes?

From the beginning of time there have been rich and poor, powerful and helpless.
The poor and helpless population is huge and the rich and powerful population much smaller. They need some way to control the larger population. Religion was the perfect way. Not happy with your life, poor little slave. Your reward will come in Heaven after we grind you down to nothing.

Infallibility is simply impossible for me to swallow.
If there’s a Heaven, then there presumably has to be a Hell, and I definitely don’t want to contemplate the existence of the latter, so I think I have to pass on both. I’ll settle for reincarnation at some point, (or maybe not, given the way mankind seems to be progressing! 🫣).

No such thing as an infallible person. It’s just a construct created to mollify the masses. >2 Olivermagnus: summed it up nicely.

In re to heaven. 🤷🏻‍♀️ i hope it exists. Sounds lovely. And it is incentive for people to do good works and not evil. I don’t want to think of the cynical side of the topic, so will stop here 🙈.

Agree with >3 Sergeirocks: about reincarnation. Now, if I could choose a specific time/place in the past, I’d go for that

These were most certainly master strokes. If you questioned the idea of infallibility, then you were condemned to an eternity of punishment. Agree with >2 Olivermagnus: most definitely on this one. And >3 Sergeirocks: yes, the idea of reincarnation is one that grabs me. There is supposed to be Christ's agreement with this idea in the Book of Thomas (not included during the Council of Nicaea).