, Please So a basic rule of thumb is, if you can handle your drink and remain the same responsible person you were before hand, it's ok for the most part?
That's pretty much how I see these kinds of things, aside from the fact I don't follow anything like religion or anything like that.
For the record, I did not say any such thing nor do I see that as any kind of accurate summation of what I said.
Common sense is certainly applicable to this issue as it is applicable to many issues and so if your point is that God is not required for the use of prudence in these things then I will second your affirmation. However the fact is that people quite often do continue to drink even though they cannot "handle it" and even though they do not remain the same responsible person when they do so. This is in fact why many people turn to God in desperation, because they experience the fact that by themselves they do not have the ability to live up to their own ideals of what is sensible, but find that like the majority of people in this world they have the rather strong inclination to adjust their ideals to match their behavior in order to maintain a good feeling about themselves. Some people, however, to do not feel comfortable about following this inclination at all, seeing as this leads quite clearly in the direction of the long slow slide towards evil. Thus many people when confronted by God with a choice, rebel against this well established pattern of human behavior and decide that they would rather endure the ministrations of God at the price of repentance in order to reach out for the hope of being a better person than they might be otherwise. And the plain fact is that for a great majority of people this does seem to work well enough to be worth it.
