Any other atheists here?

[Sefo87]

I hear they love asshole grammar Nazi's too.

I never attacked you either. I just said I didn't care. I type fast and I'm not the best at punctuation or grammar. It doesn't matter to me. I think only dickheads realy worry about this sort of thing on a forum. Now if what I had typed was nothing but a mess you could barely read, I could understand.

 

[Ekserb]

I hear they love asshole grammar Nazi's too.

Actually, they do.

 

[Onanymous]

.....edited due to error.....

 

[flirty_but_nice]

<--- counts herself as an atheist.

 

[ATrueOG101]

Wow... thanks. I would have done that but I couldn't give two squirts of piss either way.

"Aww yeah man cuz im a rebel without a cause man"! Yeah

You all are probably gothic pieces of shit. I mean who am i to say choose this religion but i mean all i ever hear from atheists are how God isnt real and how stupid people are in believeing in him. I mean i want to know how does it feel to be so negative all the time? How does it feel to have no hope in an afterlife? I mean seriously grow up and move on. And so what this is a porn board big whoop. I mean what most people dont understand is when you do something wrong ( i mean something small like looking at porn thinking badly about someone or saying something wrong NOT like commiting a felony or anything of that nature) God isnt going to doom you to hell. I mean he has a sense of humor too.

 

[Lorali82]

"Aww yeah man cuz im a rebel without a cause man"! Yeah

You all are probably gothic pieces of shit. I mean who am i to say choose this religion but i mean all i ever hear from atheists are how God isnt real and how stupid people are in believeing in him. I mean i want to know how does it feel to be so negative all the time? How does it feel to have no hope in an afterlife? I mean seriously grow up and move on. And so what this is a porn board big whoop. I mean what most people dont understand is when you do something wrong ( i mean something small like looking at porn thinking badly about someone or saying something wrong NOT like commiting a felony or anything of that nature) God isnt going to doom you to hell. I mean he has a sense of humor too.

Yeah, but apparently when you do something hugely wrong, like "decide" you're a homosexual, he will doom you to hell. Never having read the bible, I didn't realize god had neatly ordered sin into a hierarchy of damnation like that. Learn something new everyday...

 

[trysail]

Agnostic


Agnosticism, not atheism, is the only rational choice:

"[Blaise] Pascal put together his thoughts about life and religion while he was at Port-Royal and published them under the title Pensées... This fragment has come to be known as Pascal's Wager (le pari de Pascal), which asks, 'God is, or he is not. Which way should we incline? Reason cannot answer.'

Here, drawing on his work in analyzing the probable outcomes of the game of balla, Pascal frames the question in terms of a game of chance. He postulates a game that ends at the infinite distance in time. At that moment, a coin is tossed. Which way would you bet- heads (God is) or tails (God is not)?

Hacking asserts that Pascal's line of analysis to answer this question is the beginning of the theory of decision-making. 'Decision theory,' as Hacking describes it, 'is the theory of deciding what to do when it is uncertain what will happen.' ...

If God is not, whether you live your life piously or sinfully is immaterial. But suppose that God is. Then if you bet against the existence of God by refusing to live a life of piety and sacraments you run the risk of eternal damnation; the winner of the bet that God exists has the possibility of salvation. As salvation is clearly preferable to eternal damnation, the correct decision is to act on the basis that God is. 'Which way should we incline?' The answer was obvious to Pascal."

_______________________________________
Peter L. Bernstein
Against The Gods, The Remarkable Story of Risk
New York, New York. 1996.

 

[Ekserb]

You all are probably gothic pieces of shit. I mean who am i to say choose this religion but i mean all i ever hear from atheists are how God isnt real and how stupid people are in believeing in him. I mean i want to know how does it feel to be so negative all the time? How does it feel to have no hope in an afterlife? I mean seriously grow up and move on. And so what this is a porn board big whoop. I mean what most people dont understand is when you do something wrong ( i mean something small like looking at porn thinking badly about someone or saying something wrong NOT like commiting a felony or anything of that nature) God isnt going to doom you to hell. I mean he has a sense of humor too.

Atheists are negative? Dude, we're just logical.

Paraphrased from Wikipedia:

Mortal sins include adultery, murder, lust, willfully missing mass on Sunday, perjury, incredulity, and the use of contraceptives. The willful and deliberate occurrence of any of these condemns a person's soul to Hell after death.

Nice, huh? Did you go to church last week? Better get your ass to confession.

How's that for negative?

 

[Ekserb]

Agnosticism, not atheism, is the only rational choice:

"[Blaise] Pascal put together his thoughts about life and religion while he was at Port-Royal and published them under the title Pensées... This fragment has come to be known as Pascal's Wager (le pari de Pascal), which asks, 'God is, or he is not. Which way should we incline? Reason cannot answer.'

Here, drawing on his work in analyzing the probable outcomes of the game of balla, Pascal frames the question in terms of a game of chance. He postulates a game that ends at the infinite distance in time. At that moment, a coin is tossed. Which way would you bet- heads (God is) or tails (God is not)?

Hacking asserts that Pascal's line of analysis to answer this question is the beginning of the theory of decision-making. 'Decision theory,' as Hacking describes it, 'is the theory of deciding what to do when it is uncertain what will happen.' ...

If God is not, whether you live your life piously or sinfully is immaterial. But suppose that God is. Then if you bet against the existence of God by refusing to live a life of piety and sacraments you run the risk of eternal damnation; the winner of the bet that God exists has the possibility of salvation. As salvation is clearly preferable to eternal damnation, the correct decision is to act on the basis that God is. 'Which way should we incline?' The answer was obvious to Pascal."

_______________________________________
Peter L. Bernstein
Against The Gods, The Remarkable Story of Risk
New York, New York. 1996.

(I really hate that green shit, dude.)

So, this Hacking guy (or Pascal, or whoever - I didn't really follow all that, sorry) assumes that anyone who bets that god doesn't exist will by default live a life of debauchery and end up on god's "naughty" list? What the fuck?

Knowing there is no god doesn't mean I'm going to kill people and eat their babies. In fact, I'd say I'm a better human being than eighty percent of the population that consider themselves good Christians. I'm certainly better than Bill Clinton who continues to carry a bible into church every week after cheating on his wife who knows how many times.

 

[Dhalgren150]

hummm seems to me most think God is Male?

why?

if there is a god maybe a non gender.

we are our own higher being.

this is the way.

 

[ATrueOG101]

Atheists are negative? Dude, we're just logical.

Paraphrased from Wikipedia:

Mortal sins include adultery, murder, lust, willfully missing mass on Sunday, perjury, incredulity, and the use of contraceptives. The willful and deliberate occurrence of any of these condemns a person's soul to Hell after death.

Nice, huh? Did you go to church last week? Better get your ass to confession.

How's that for negative?

Wikipedia is written by people like you. Some atheist freak probably wrote that on wikipedia and sent it in. I could change that if i wanted to with the giant EDIT button on the wikipedia page-source unreliable

Also there are diffrent verisons of the bible. It depends how they are interupted. I my opinion i dont think if you dont go to church sunday youll go to hell. As long as you believe in God and live a good life youll be accepted into the promise land. Remember God is a good person so i mean i cant see him damning little Jimmy to hell because he missed church to many times.

 

[Ekserb]

Wikipedia is written by people like you. Some atheist freak probably wrote that on wikipedia and sent it in. I could change that if i wanted to with the giant EDIT button on the wikipedia page-source unreliable

Also there are diffrent verisons of the bible. It depends how they are interupted. I my opinion i dont think if you dont go to church sunday youll go to hell. As long as you believe in God and live a good life youll be accepted into the promise land. Remember God is a good person so i mean i cant see him damning little Jimmy to hell because he missed church to many times.

I think you just caused me to run out of red ink.

If you think any of that Wikipedia entry is wrong, please do correct it! I would think they would welcome a man of your wisdom.

If you think the evidence in the bible is completely up for interpretation (or is it interuption[sic]?), then who's to say my interpretation is wrong? I interpret all that crap as the mindless ramblings of a bunch of simple people who didn't know what lightning was or how un-flat the earth is.

 

[Kinky_Couple]

Couldn't resist

Actually, they do.

It's not extremely attractive to feel the need to point out every flaw, but attention to some detail is.

Mortal sins include adultery, murder, lust, willfully missing mass on Sunday, perjury, incredulity, and the use of contraceptives. The willful and deliberate occurrence of any of these condemns a person's soul to Hell after death.

Not all christians are Roman Catholic or believe in confessing to a man to free us from sin, pergatory, or mortal sins as preached by priests. Please don't lump us together. Prominent scientist often disagree on unproven theory, why is this not possible amongst christians without being considered contradictory by you? Many scientific discoveries began by following a hunch or instinct that first went through many trial and error experiments beforehand.

Is it possible, even remotely, that science and spirituality (not the same as religion) can not just co-exist but intermingle?

 

[Ekserb]

Is it possible, even remotely, that science and spirituality (not the same as religion) can not just co-exist but intermingle?

No.

These things are mutually exclusive. Science is the systematic study of the known world, while theology is the study of religious beliefs, which are by definition unscientific. Calling it spirituality doesn't change this.

 

[Lorali82]

No.

These things are mutually exclusive. Science is the systematic study of the known world, while theology is the study of religious beliefs, which are by definition unscientific. Calling it spirituality doesn't change this.

I don't know about that. We can use the scientific method to determine a lot of things, including the how, what, where, who, and when of any given predictable mechanism. And it's been more or less verified that everything as it exists in the universe abides by an unwavering set of scientific laws, sure.

But science can't answer the "why" questions. Some people, including you, Ekserb I'm guessing, don't believe there is a "why." Personally, I don't know and I'm not going to wager a guess one way or the other. But if someone wants to believe that some omniscient being is responsible for the laws of science as we understand them, and had some reasoning behind creating them, I don't see how this is excludes scientific theory as we define it.

Now if you want to get into religious dogma, that's something else entirely.

 

[forevervoyaging]

Interesting.


I'm not even sure where to begin...

First -- my new mantra: People believe what they want to. (That goes for religious people or scientific people or bizarre hybrids). How many people does one talk to about...well, almost anything!...who would rather explain his/her belief than look for the truth? So everyone happy with their beliefs, rest easy -- I don't care to change them.


Second -- correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't atheism "the belief that god does not exist" and agonisticism the "belief that knowledge of the existence or non-existence of god is unknowable"? I'm just making sure. So, arguing the particulars of any religious sect (or scientific sect for that matter) seems like Advanced Theory next to the philosophical "does god exist" question, doesn't it?


The side note on evolution was interesting, but doesn't seem to relate....although many people believe (there's that word again) that the truth or falsehood of evolution proves or disproves god (or vice versa), the two are distinct. A powerful god could evolve things if so desired...Things could have evolved (if that is possible) in a universe where a god existed. It seems that anything beyond that is interpretation.

Also, since no-one has seen anything evolve across species and no-one has a photograph of god, both are at lest 2nd order theories from that perspective (i.e. they require some "analysis" or "interpretation" rather than having observers. Unlike, say, Newton's laws of motion which can be determined by anyone anywhere...assuming they are travelling slowly. )

As for "proof"...proof can take many forms. 2+2=4 is easy to "prove" (and not subject to much interpretation). "You have a liver" is harder -- you have to use someone else's word AND conjecture to "prove" it. You can get to even more far-out things (like "neutrinos exist" or "pluto has methane on it" ) which require information or sophistication of reasoning that your avereage person doesn't have on the workbench. Note that none of these things can be interpretated (except maybe the last group: the more theories invoved in a conclusion, the more "interpretation" creeps in).

Then there are the subjective things like "stealing is evil" or "Greece is the best country on earth" or "peanut butter tastes good". These things really cannot be proven since they aren't statements of objective fact.

Then there are statements about "other" things, like, "Dopey was one of the dwarves" and "Alice chased a white rabbit". These things are true...but fictional. They can be proven to have been written, but are accepted not to happen.

So are we looking at god as science or god as morality or god as fiction? Or something I missed?

Maybe I'll stop with that and see how bad the retaliation is.

 

[figarojonez]

Interesting.


I'm not even sure where to begin...

First -- my new mantra: People believe what they want to. (That goes for religious people or scientific people or bizarre hybrids). How many people does one talk to about...well, almost anything!...who would rather explain his/her belief than look for the truth? So everyone happy with their beliefs, rest easy -- I don't care to change them.


Second -- correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't atheism "the belief that god does not exist" and agonisticism the "belief that knowledge of the existence or non-existence of god is unknowable"? I'm just making sure. So, arguing the particulars of any religious sect (or scientific sect for that matter) seems like Advanced Theory next to the philosophical "does god exist" question, doesn't it?


The side note on evolution was interesting, but doesn't seem to relate....although many people believe (there's that word again) that the truth or falsehood of evolution proves or disproves god (or vice versa), the two are distinct. A powerful god could evolve things if so desired...Things could have evolved (if that is possible) in a universe where a god existed. It seems that anything beyond that is interpretation.

Also, since no-one has seen anything evolve across species and no-one has a photograph of god, both are at lest 2nd order theories from that perspective (i.e. they require some "analysis" or "interpretation" rather than having observers. Unlike, say, Newton's laws of motion which can be determined by anyone anywhere...assuming they are travelling slowly. )

As for "proof"...proof can take many forms. 2+2=4 is easy to "prove" (and not subject to much interpretation). "You have a liver" is harder -- you have to use someone else's word AND conjecture to "prove" it. You can get to even more far-out things (like "neutrinos exist" or "pluto has methane on it" ) which require information or sophistication of reasoning that your avereage person doesn't have on the workbench. Note that none of these things can be interpretated (except maybe the last group: the more theories invoved in a conclusion, the more "interpretation" creeps in).

Then there are the subjective things like "stealing is evil" or "Greece is the best country on earth" or "peanut butter tastes good". These things really cannot be proven since they aren't statements of objective fact.

Then there are statements about "other" things, like, "Dopey was one of the dwarves" and "Alice chased a white rabbit". These things are true...but fictional. They can be proven to have been written, but are accepted not to happen.

So are we looking at god as science or god as morality or god as fiction? Or something I missed?

Maybe I'll stop with that and see how bad the retaliation is.

And the award for the best post I've read all year. Well thought out. Rational. Calm and collected. Are you sure you belong on the internet?

 

[forevervoyaging]

My keepers let me come to Lit when I'm good...




(and thank you!)

 

[monique1971]

Hey Ekserb,

Richard Dawkins was on NPR today, talking about his new book. You should look into it.

 

[dancing_monnkey]

Unfortunately, there are lots of people who seem to have all the knowledge in the world and these people have their own television shows with which to spread their word, thereby fucking everything up for the rest of us.

No war that I can recall has been started by atheists. In fact, I'd bet that all the wars ever fought were started by leaders claiming to be devout religious souls. Isn't that nice?

(I'm willing to stand corrected if anyone can disprove my last statement.)

If someone already brought it up, I apologize, but the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was a war started by atheists. I think the danger is in dogmatic ideaology, regardless of what higher concept powers it.

As for me, I was an atheist or an agnostic dependent on the day. But I'm also, pretty much absolutely fucking crazy. I tried dealing with this on antipyschotics that turned me into a zombie, but after studying how indiginous cultures dealt with mental illness and spending time among some of these groups, I decided it was easier to operate as though the things I see and hear are real. This led to a marked increase in the quality of my life, and it's just how I cope. I still identify with the atheist position for the most part, but I suppose that I technically don't apply any more. I accept that my spiritual nature "could" be the results of misfiring neurons in my brain. It's complicated I guess.

 

[Ekserb]

Hey Ekserb,

Richard Dawkins was on NPR today, talking about his new book. You should look into it.

When that comes out in softcover, Im gettin' it. Thanks for the head's up.

 

[Ekserb]

If someone already brought it up, I apologize, but the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was a war started by atheists. I think the danger is in dogmatic ideaology, regardless of what higher concept powers it.

While I'm sure the members of the ruling party professed Atheism as a means of keeping their asses out of the gulag, I'm not quite so sure they all actually believed it. Either way, you're right - the government was supposed to be based on Atheism and they did start a war of sorts.

 

[kittykateater]

I'm an atheist and proud of it. I'm just curious to see if there are any others on this site.

I don't like the word atheist...religious folks invented the word. Theist=belief in a deity and therefore normal, so atheist=abnormal, mentally ill, deserving of pity or condemnation for not "seeing the light".

I prefer to frame the debate in positive terms and not concede the debate to theists, so I prefer to call myself a freethinker: my mind is free to think for itself, to analyze information from whatever source and makes decisions, unencumbered by weird myths and fairy tales and brain-washing religious indocrination. I can take pride in being a freethinker and don't have to aopologize to anyone for being an atheist, the abnormal side of theism. It's just a more positive word, I think.

I love how religious conservatives keep shouting that evolution is "only a theory". They clearly misunderstand the principles of a scientific theory. It starts with a hypothesis to explain an observation. Then scientists exhaustviely test that hypothesis, seeking to prove the hypthesis is WRONG and doesn't meet all observable, measurable, and testable conditions. Only when no test finds a flaw in the hypothesis is it elevated to a theory. And even then, scientists compete to topple the theory with a better one. After more than 150 years of scientists and theists trying to DISPROVE the original hypothesis, the Theory of Evolution still holds up to all observations, all experiments, all measurements of results, so that's a pretty srong theory! "Only a theory" is high praise indeed!

And what is evolution, anyway? it merely says that one living thing transforms into a different living thing in response to environmental pressures. Why is that SUCH a threat to religious fanatics? Because only their god can create a living thing? Have you ever seen a beefalo? I have. Farmers coss-bred a cow and a buffalo to create this new creature that never existed before. Does that make these farmers gods, too, for creating a new life form? If you say there's no such thing as evolution, does that mean you must deny the existence of the beefalo even when staring one in the face?

In school, we sterilized a beaker so there was no organic matter in it. And we sterlized three chemicals: methane, ammonia, and water. By measurement and observation, we were 100% sure there was no living matter in the beaker or the chemicals. We then mixed the methane gas, ammonia, and water -- the original 3 chemicals of the early earth's atmosphere -- in the beaker, and shot electricity (representing a lightning storm, which was much more common on early earth than today). The result: the inside walls of the beaker got coated with gobs and gobs of DNA, the building-blocks of life! We had just created life from inorganic chemicals! This is called the Miller-Brown experiment, after the first two scientists who ever did this. So I must also be a god, as I created life! Or is it more logical to say that methane, ammonia, water, and electricity (lightning) automatically generates life as a normal, natural chemical reaction, without any intervention by human or deity?

Then there's the age of the earth. If the earth is really only about 6000 years old as the bible says, how do you explain the ancient age of rock layers and fossils that point to teh earth being about 4-1/2 billion years old, and the universe about 8 to 9 billion years. God planted false evidence of the age of the earth to confuse non-believers so they'll spend an eternity in hell for their non-belief. So let me get this straight. God loves us, he lies to us by creating false evidence of the age of the earth, then if we actually BELIEVE his deliberate lies, he punishes us for all eternity for believing his lies? And this decption, trickery, and unjust punishment somehow makes him worthy of our fawning worship of him?

Let's put a belief in an all-loving, all seeing, all knowing god to that same rigorous testing that the theory of evolution has so beautifully and powerfully withstood for a century and a half, and see how well that hypothesis holds up. God knows everything that is going to happen before it happens, and has infinite power to do anything, and is sverywhere at once. That means he was with the Oklahoma City bombers who took the lives of so many innocent children, he had the power to stop it, but chose to do nothing about it. I love my children and would do anything and everything in my power t protect the from harm. Yet this all-powrful god who supposedly loves us all so much let over 300 New York City firefighters who were trying to aid their fellow man, die horrible, painful, tortured deaths at the World Trade Center on 9/11/2001. So how is this hypothesis of an all-knowing, all-powerful lovingv god holding up to scientific scrutiny so far? Can it be elevated to the level of a theory yet? Or should the Bible be moved to the FICTION shelf along with Harry Potter?

Who is this god and where does he live? Is he really the bearded man in the clouds portrayed in medieval paintings? Then why did the astonauts not see him as they headed off toward the moon?

"Oh, but you must believe such things on faith with no proof." Sorry, but that's not even the basis for a good hypothesis, let alone a theory. How can you believe this with NO proof and attack the theory of evolution that has 150 years of testing and proving behind it?

It amazes me how much religion permeates everything in America. Yesterday, I was listening to National Public Radio, which is politically liberal on most issues, and they were talking about how we should study the bible in school, not as religious indocraniation, but as good literature. Have they actually read the bible? It is not particulalry good litreature. Look at Genesis: it has two completely different and contradictory creation stories. Or the New Testamant four different accounts of what Jesus's very last words were supposed to have been (Hollywood solved that dilemma by having Jesus speak all four as his last words). Any modern book editor would reject tales with such internal inconsistencies, and insist that the author hire a good editor to rewrite it to make more sense and be more believable!

What is the bible? Primitive superstitous cavemen looked around at a bewildering and terrifying world and made-up stories to explain it all. Earthquake? Fire? Flood? Volcano? We must have done something bad to make god so angry. These tales got passed down verbally from generation to generation for thousands of years...and political authority encouraged it! "We are the human reprsntatives of god on earth, so you'd better do what we say, pay your taxes to us, obey our caoricious self-serving edicts, or we'll send you a plague of locusts or burn you foever in hell-fire. Th oldest original bible ever found dates form around 300 AD! So the New Testaent stories were either in vented in 300 AD, or passed down verbally for 300 years before anyone thought to write down these tales...either way, how much confidence does that give you in their historical accuracy? Isn;t it odd that Jesus was such a threat to teh Jews and to teh Roman Empire that they conspire to execute hom...yet contemporary Hebrew and Roman historian and government documents make NO mention of Jesus! In fact, the bible stories...written 300 yars after teh events they describe are supposed to have happened, are the ONLY evidence we have about him......

........except..........

Some unknown American Indian supposedly gave Joseph Smith an ancient native Ajerican text about the arisen Jesus appearing in ancient America. But Smith could not produce the native American text, or the "Indian" who supposedly gave ot to him, or even teh Indian's name......he had only the English translation in Smith's own handwriting! How gullible do you have to be, to be a Mormon and believe this account? How much of a heathen do you have to be that the appearance of Jeses in the New World was something he invented whole-cloth in his own mind to gain wealth and power and infuence as founder of the Mormon faith?

And do we really want our school kids reading Old Testament morality, where just because a few people don't fall down in fawning worship, "god" sends a flood to destroy all life, not just the few people who dont adore him? I remember one tale where a father sells his daughter into prostitution to appease a mob that wants to kill him, and because this man worships "god" he is portrayed as a moral man! The Old Testament also speaks of the sins of the father shall be visited upon the sons, even unto the seventh generation. Would you be willing to be punished for the misdeeds of your great-great-great-great-grandfather? Would you want your great-great-great-great-grandchildren to be punished for somethong YOU did wrong? This book is NOT good literature and is certainly NOT a guide to how to live a moral life!

Is an egomaniac who demands constant fawning worship of himself, who has a nasty temper, who punishes the innocent along with the guilty, and who sacrifices his own son in place of punishing the truly guilty, really worthy of our worship? I think this "god" character is monstrously evil, and the misdeeds done in his name over the centuries are horrible!

And Jesus dies for my sins? Who asked him to? I accept punishment for anything I might do wrong, but mostly I live a life of morality to NOT do wrong...and I think it MOSTROUS for anyone to be punished for the misdeeds of someone else. I reject the whole notion of punishing the innocent for the crimes of the guilty! Again, not good literature nor good morality!

I neither hope for an internal reward in heaven nor fear a punishment in hell, because all the evidence points to, this is the one and only life we get! Life is NOT a dress-rehearal, you cant do evil on this earth and then repent on your deathbed and be eternally rewarded. What you do here on earth is ALL there is, and getting it right is essential.

I think being a freethinker imposes a HIGHER morality on you than religion does. You have to do right ONLY because it's right. Not because somebody in this life or another life might reward you. Not because someone on earth or in heaven or hell migh punish you. Not even because doing good makes you feel good about yourself, and doing bad makes you feel rotten inside. You just do right BECAUSE it's right. Period! That takes a great deal of moral integrity, to live your life in this way. I dont think religious folks HAVE that much moral fiber, or they wouldnt NEED the crutch of religion to guide their actions.

Isn't it interesting how so many criminals "find god" in prison? It's very attractive. Jesus was already punished for their crimes, so they are off the hook for it morally, and if they only mouth the words of repentance (even of they donlt really fell sorry for what they did), they shall live in paradise for all eternity. Very attractive to a criminal mind! But if you live a moral life, not hating anyone, not causing harm to life or proprty, but DON'T believe in and worship god: straight to hell with you...forever!

Look at the 10 commandments:

No other gods before me
No images of other gods
No worsdhip of images of other gods
Not misuse god's name
Set aside one day every week to worship and prasie god

5 commandments that are all about this egomaniac!

Honor thy mother and father......agina biut biw down to authority without question......no wonder politicians love religion so much! Absolute power and unquestioning devotion from the masses!

And oh yeah, now that we've got 6 commandments about surrendering ALL of your power to god and his human ploitical and religious representatives on earth, maybe we should also say something about morality, too. Oh, ummm, OK....don't kill each other (let our armies make soldiers of you and your loved ones, and we'll kill you, just dont kill each other first, so we have plenty fo cannon-fodder for our armies!), don't commit adultery, steal, lie, or envy what your neighbors have.

Religion is always held up as more moral than lack of religion. But is it? Jesus advises his married disciples to leave their wives and children and live their lives in total devotion only to him. How moral is it to shed your responsibilities to family? Read sermons from American pulpits of the 1840s and 1850s, they all defended slavery as GOOD for the African soul! So many great crimes of history committed in the name of one religion or another: the Crusades (kill all Moslems), the Spanish Inquisition (kill all Jews...but first torture them with thumb-screws and stretch them on the rack), Northern Island (Catholics vs. Protestants), the Middle East of today (Jews vs. Chistians vs. Moslems), the witch trials (women's sexual allure keps men from slavish devotion to church authority, so let's call them witches and murder them by the millions), even the Holocaust (eliminating Jews and trying to re-establish an ancient Aryan mysticism).

Religion pays lips service to love thy neighbor. But a few years ago, I was at a tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. --held at a church. The preachers quickly moved away from the great things Dr. King did for Black Americans, to how there are groups today who are NOT deserving of the same love and the same rights African-Anericans fought so hard for and Dr. King helped them win. Specifcally, gays should NOT be granted the same human rights the rest of us enjoy (see, I happen to think we HAVE these rights, it is not up to government or religion to GRANT us those rights!), because being gay is an abominaton in the eyes of god (the same god who created gay people in the first place, since he supposdly created EVERYTHING?). In what was supposed to be a tribute to Dr. King, this preacher turned every tradiotional argument that was used fr 200 years to deny civil rights to black people, to show why gays should have no rights! This wasn't a tribute, but a deep insult to the memory of Dr. King, and I walked out, disappointed, upset, and very angry. My mom used to march for civil rights in the 1960s, and I have an adopted son who is black, plus the most loving and loyal and devoted couple among ALL of my closest friends are two lesbians! So this preacher was disresepcting not only Dr. King, but my mom, my son, and my friends, with all this spewed hatred! "Love thy neighor!"

I live by Dr. King's words: "judged not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character." I can honestly say I dont look at someone by their skin color, ethnic origin, or religion, to me there's only ONE race: human! My family includes nearly every European nationality, plus South American native, Hawaiian native, Japanes-American, etc., and I love them all....except my white Christian relative who has a long history of racial hate crime, violence, drug abuse, drug dealing, reckless driving, swindling......he also slept with his best friend's wife....oh but he's moral because he worships the Christian god! I have no love for him...I don't hate him, that would be allowing him to have control over my thoughts and emotions, I just choose not to have him in my life, not to let him be around those I love where he might physically or emotionally harm them, and he's rarely in my thoughts at all!

Come to think of it, I could say the same thing about god. I don't let him around my family to cause harm, or give him much thought!

Name ONE war or ONE historical atrocity started by those "immoral atheists" to whom religious folks like to feel morally superior!

I am PROUD to be a freethinker!

KKE

 

[monique1971]

I'm hesitant to revive this thread (it's too time-consuming), but something i heard on the radio this morning reminded me of it. A pastor who serves at a church near Virginia Tech was talking about how some of his congregation have been asking, "How could God let this happen?" The pastor's response was that God didn't let this happen. God had nothing to do with it. God is love.

So then, where does human evil come from? Satan? Free will (i.e., people willfully choose not to obey God?) If God is omnipotent (and he isn't, then how can he be God?) then why does he allow bad things to happen?

I know that this is one of the great theological questions of all time, and that if I really want an answer, I can get myself a reading list and try to work through it methodically. So I'm not asking this question --on Lit, of all places -- so that someone can enlighten me. It's only because this was on my mind, and I feel as if I have to tell someone, somewhere, about it. Otherwise it will nagging at a corner of my mind, all day.

 

[Ekserb]

I'm hesitant to revive this thread (it's too time-consuming), but something i heard on the radio this morning reminded me of it. A pastor who serves at a church near Virginia Tech was talking about how some of his congregation have been asking, "How could God let this happen?" The pastor's response was that God didn't let this happen. God had nothing to do with it. God is love.

So then, where does human evil come from? Satan? Free will (i.e., people willfully choose not to obey God?) If God is omnipotent (and he isn't, then how can he be God?) then why does he allow bad things to happen?

I know that this is one of the great theological questions of all time, and that if I really want an answer, I can get myself a reading list and try to work through it methodically. So I'm not asking this question --on Lit, of all places -- so that someone can enlighten me. It's only because this was on my mind, and I feel as if I have to tell someone, somewhere, about it. Otherwise it will nagging at a corner of my mind, all day.

Ah, but your question is easily answered: There is no god.

There. Now wasn't that easy? My work here is done.