Faith Not "Enough" in Chritianity?

[David Sklansky]

I have a feeling that critics of Christianity, including myself, as well as members of some other religions, and athiests, sometimes make a statement (regarding what it takes to be "saved") that they kind of figure is obviously exaggerated. Christians, however often assume that there is no exaggeration in those statements.

Speaking only for myself (but thinking that most Christian critcs would agree with me) my actual understanding is this:

The Christian god wants two things from humans. That they be good and that they believe in him. If they do, they are "saved". There seems to be some difference of opinion among Christians if the "being good" part should be considered only a indication that you believe, or is in fact relevant in and of itself. But it doesn't matter for the purposes of this discussion. Because all Christians seem to believe that beleiving in Jesus while SIMULTANEOUSLY doing bad things or PLANNING to do bad things is AUTOMATIC evidence that you don't believe. (What I am not sure about is the case where the capitalized word is changed to EXPECTING.)

So when critics say that a Christian can be a scoundrel and still go to heaven if they have the right faith, I think most of them realize that the scoundrel has to have changed his ways before his proclamation of belief holds any water. I'm guessing that if he just had been shot after molesting a child, and using her as a shield against police he was firing at, and now professes his new found faith and his desire to be good ten seconds before he dies, he has a problem as far as Chritian belief goes. And that most non Christians have the same opinion about Christian belief in this case.

A less dramatic example is the fellow who attends Church, does all the necessary preliminaries, truly believes that Jesus exists, and is planning to get the last rites and repent before he dies. But he is also planning to have way more fun than he should before that happens. Most non-Christians, again assume this guy will run into a problem according to Chritianity.

Now even if all the above is correct, there are still a lot of things about the way Chritianity overemphasizes faith that I, and others don't like. But it isn't as extreme as our statements sometimes appear. That subject is for another time.

For now I would just like to know if I accurately described the Christian position and also if I have accurately described the way most non Chritians think of Christianity as regards to this subject.