One of the reasons there is so much confusion and disagreement on these issues is that people keep going back to The Bible as their source of truth or fallacy instead of going back to the Church. The Bible was assembled from traditional writings by the Church in the fourth century. Prior to that, there was no Christian Bible. The Church didn't come about because someone read The Bible and said "Holy shit, do you see what it says here? We'd better start us a church pretty damn fast!"

The Bible is part of the Tradition (capital T) of the Church. It was assembled in faith by Ecumenical Councils of the Church and has no meaning outside of the Church. Like Alice's caterpillar, it means exactly what it is intended to mean, no more and no less.

The New Testament books known as The Gosples were composed to become part of Christian Liturgical practice just as Old Testament books were part of Jewish Liturgical practice. The followers of Christ weren't trying to change Judaism or break away from it, they saw Jesus as the fulfillment of Jewish prophecy, not a condemnation of it.

Prior to Saul/Paul, it was necessary to be a Jew to become a follower of Jesus—the originally pejorative term Christian had not yet been coined. Followers of Jesus went to Temple on the Sabbath with everyone else but stayed after in order to offer additional prayers and services. The Orthodox and Roman Liturgies, at least, still follow that scheme—Old Testament readings and Psalms followed by the New Testament Liturgy of the Word followed by the Celebration of the Eucharist.

Christian theology does not hold that non-Christians are bound to suffer damnation. Christian theology holds that no one can merit Salvation but recieves it by the Grace of God. And since no one knows how God bestows His Grace, no one living can say that another is rejected by God.

Christians were all pacifists until the time of Constantine and regularly declined to serve as soldiers. Even after the founding of Byzantium and the Eastern Roman Empire, Christians who served as soldiers and killed enemies in battle were required to confess those sins and seek forgivness for the killing before once again recieving Sacraments of the Church.

In recent times many people using the term Christian have departed so completely from what Jesus taught and what the Church believes that the term is often nothing more than a claim of divine right to do whatever pleases them today. It's often just a rationale for rejecting unwelcome knowledge.

      - Mark