I think another take on the issue is also:
Of course organized Christian churches say that you need organized Christian churches - if not adding that it should be their kind of church (for ex. Catholic) to be a true Christian. If one does not need them, what are they? Possible motivations include money, status, authority, the continuation of traditions - ones that were made up quite long after Jesus - and competition with other churches and authority figures. These likely were motivations, for example, underlying some of the terrible decisions the Catholic church made when it discovered, no doubt again in history, that sexual abuse was widespread amongst its priests. Can we really take, for example, the Catholic Church as an authority on what a Christian should be? Did it gain this authority after it dropped the Inquistion? Which year? And what do we do with the trend to no longer ruling out, for example, Muslims getting into Heaven or that they worship the true God`?
We have the human habit of giving away power and of taking on power in organizations, often at the expense of the people who actually inspired the original purpose of the organization.
Appeals to the Bible are also problematic. Not just because it is incredibly complicated to determine things like: the metaphoric or literal intention of a particular section, why this or that section was included or excluded from the Bible by this or that committee, accounts of Jesus were written long after Jesus was alive at times when organizations saying they represent Jesus’ teachings were already struggling for power and authority, there are contradictions in the Bible and not just between the NT and the OT, there are external texts like the Gnostic gospels that have a very different idea about what Jesus meant which has implicatoins related to ‘being a true Christian’, and we have a religion based on a mystical figure who himself
broke with tradition.
All the churches considered major by Prismatic and in general have shifted their positions on core issues and it is precisely these kinds of organizations that decided what was the Bible and then how we should interpret it. A fairly confused set of texts, written by fallible humans, those relating to Jesus not during his lifetime, has hardened by these people into rules.
IOW fallible power hungry organizations generally with incredible sins in their history are being granted authority to decide who is a follower of Christ, despite their histories, and despite the fact that their policies are determined, in large part, based on differing interpretations of texts written by a wide range of fallible individuals, who did not have direct knowledge of Jesus, and even if they did, this does not mean they would be right.
As a non-Christian, I am being told that I can determine, via this mess, that what I need to take a poll so to speak of these fallible people in organizations with horrible histories and the most common answer they produce is the one I, a non-Christian, should use to
deny someone claiming to be Christian is one, if they do not meet the criteria of these people.
Regardless of whether Jesus was in fact the deity or just a very spiritual guy,
I have no way of knowing…
let me repeat that…
I have no way of knowing if in fact Jesus would have thought that the only people who are actually following his path are not participants in the organized religions, and are those who do not think this or that ritual is essential or even necessary to being his follower. Nor can I weigh in about who will be getting into Heaven or whom Jesus would think is the kind of believer who should - be there a heaven or not.
The Churches have considered all kinds of monstrous behavior Christian. They have all blessed horrific enterprises, except perhaps the Quakers and a few other smaller denominations. The Bible has been used to justify monstrous behavior against children, native americans, other nations and peoples, the earth.
I find absolutely no ground to stand on to say, I a non-christian, think we should see if most Christian organizations would consider you, Shirly, as a Christian and if not, then you are not. Or I, a non-Christian, think I can use the Bible - given what I know about the history of that set of texts - to determine if you are a Christian.
I can’t.
If I were a Christian, I could then refer to whatever Christian authority I believe is the right one and their interpetation of the issue, Jesus, the Bible and so on.
I might be wrong, but that act of referring to an authority would be consistent with my belief that they are a valid authority. I would be consistent, though perhaps wrong. It would make sense for me to refer to that authority. I might be wrong, but the act fits with my other beliefs and assertions.
A non-Christian cannot know if the popular idea in Christianity is the right one. And he or she cannot turn to any of the extremely tainted authorities out there and say, I will listen to this one or the most popular rules they make up as a whole. He or she cannot know if a minority position is the right one or not. But more than he or she not being able to know if it is right, he or she has already asserted that none of these authorities can be trusted. So appealing to them makes no sense, especially given the evolution of these organizations postions on many important issues. Who knows where they will weigh in on the issue in a hundred years.
And let me make that more precise. The non-theist knows that these organizations are more than just fallible, but that non-theist does not know if an individual outside of the churches, with their own take on what it is to be Christian is fallible or has a bad history and a history with shifting position on important issues.
The non-christian can tell that the various churches have supported horrible activities and changed their minds on important issues.
The non-christian generally does not know if this is the case with the independent non-affiliated person asserting they are a Christian.
So not only can the non-theist have no good grounds to weigh in on the latter’s status,
but…
the non-theist has better grounds for ignoring the so called church authorities on any issue at all.