The Faith & Religion mega Thread

Originally Posted by ntubski I think Nbiser confuses atheism with nihilism:

Hmm... that makes sense.

In that case, let me point out that Stalin was pretty much the furthest thing from a nihilist.

"what makes life worth living when, according to atheists, you only have 70 years or so on earth, and you will die, and become nothing but a pile of bones in the ground somewhere? If you have no higher purpose than life than to get and give pleasure, you should be highly depressed that you only have another 70 years or so to do that in, and then,, it is all over. I am sorry to have to put it so bluntly, but that is the truth."

Whats worth dying for in many cases? Religion. $ad...


T∞ scary...

Originally Posted by TobiSGD And Christians (regardless which flavor) and members of other religions have done also, so what is the difference?

These Christians may not have been true Christians; there are many wolves in sheep's clothing in the Christian community, sad to say.

What authority does the government rest on? The authority that is given to them by their people. And it are the people that set the morality and ethics the government has to defend. Can be seen very nicely in the USA, where more and more states allow same sex marriage and legalize Marihuana.

Hmmmm.. And then what about legalized killing? When the government whose authority is given to them by the people? What about when the people want the government to do something wrong like legalized killing of innocents? And what about when the peoples wishes are harmful to them? Such as with the legalizing of Marihuana, which is a harmful and addictive drug that leads to becoming addicted to even worse drugs.

And yes, humans are nothing more than cosmic dust (I personally prefer the word stardust, sounds more poetic), we are animals, but we are probably the most evolved animals on this planet, with highly complicated social structures. There is no reason for us to behave like our nearest relatives, the apes, they have different social structures than we have, much more primitive. Although, sometimes there seems to be not much difference between the other apes and us (especially when you look at teenagers).

Since we are so highly evolved, why did cannibals exist in the south sea islands only a little of a hundred years ago? It is interesting to note that it took the cannibals being reached by Christian missionaries to stop eating each other.

Cannibals still exist in areas of the world today, we are still discovering new pagan tribes sunk in darkness and ignorance all of the time. I guess that is why we are so highly evolved?

Religion may have been helpful in the past, to make it easier to keep the early civilizations together, but nowadays, at least IMHO, religion is not necessary anymore and more often than not it is religion that prevents that people live peaceful together (look alone at your insults against Catholics, which by the way will not be further tolerated, since there are members here that are Catholics and insulting them is a no-go). And that proves what Trotsky and Nietzsche have said, but not that the actions of Stalin or whichever dictator you accuse to be an Atheist were caused by Atheism.

I am not insulting Catholics at all; I am only pointing out that the pope is a false teacher. As a matter of fact I know some Catholics (one is my dentist), and I hold nothing against Catholics as Catholics.

Here are some quotes from Stalin and Lenin.


"You know, they are fooling us, there is no God...all this talk about God is sheer nonsense" in E. Yaroslavsky, Landmarks in the Life of Stalin, Foreign Languages Publishing House, Moscow 1940

“Atheism is the natural and inseparable part of Communism.” Vladimir Lenin

“Our program necessarily includes the propaganda of atheism.” (V.I. Lenin)


“There are no morals in politics; there is only expedience. A scoundrel may be of use to us just because he is a scoundrel.” (V.I. Lenin)

Here you can see that the some of the major killers of the earth were atheists. No truly Christian government has ever been guilty of mass murder on the scale that Stalin was

If you look at the European wars of religion you will see that the Protestants were not as innocent as you want to depict them here, take for example actions like the Iconoclastic Fury (less violent in the Netherlands, but many people died in these attacks in France). This looks neither like self defense, nor like some sort of higher morality. The total extinction of another nation, as a warning to other nations. And where is the higher morality that you claim manifested in such actions? Actually, this is exactly the same behavior that you link to criminals like Stalin and Pol Pot. You seem to have a double standard here.

The iconoclastic furry was condemned by most of the ministers of that day. The image breaking waves were normally conducted by the criminal and rough elements in life who were looking for trouble, of any kind.

Have you read the book or only the summary? I assume that it was only the summary, but anyways, if you read the book you will see that these explanations work in the real day-to-day world, because they are based on observations that are made in the day to day world, and you will see that there actually are no contradictions.

Hmm, judging from the summary and from the reviews, it doesn't make sense, but I won't say anything until I read the book.

I have never claimed that the writers of the Gospels were liars, I said that they were well aware of those prophecies and may have adapted their writings to those prophecies. This can have the reason that they were liars, but it doen't have to. As I stated, these people believed that Jesus was the Messiah and that may have led to unintentional tampering of the truth, based on the wishes of these people that Jesus was the predicted Messiah. After all, from what we know, the Gospels were written long after Jesus' death and at least for John it is unlikely that he ever has seen Jesus alive. And if they believe what they have written, regardless if this believe is based on truth or wishful thinking, they will die for it.

You are way off. It is generally recognized that the apostles lived and walked with Christ himself! And wrote their Gospels soon after his death.

This was not directed at me, but I will give an answer to that nonetheless:You really should learn something about the history of your religion. There are religions that are much older than the Judeo-Christian religion and from what we know this monotheistic religion developed from an older polytheistic religion, in which Jahwe, the Judeo-Christian god, was only one of many (and he was not the nicest one, easy to see if you read the Old Testament, not someone I would base my morals on).

You are wrong here as well. The Christian Religion is the older religion, as a matter of fact, most other religions took things from the Judeo-Christian Religion

Seeing that you seem to be a young earth creationist I doubt that anything what I say will make any difference, so I will stop my participation in this discussion right here.

I agree. I will not post on this subject again because we are getting nowhere on either side in this debate.

Originally Posted by Nbiser And then what about legalized killing? When the government whose authority is given to them by the people?

that's wrong t∞...

Originally Posted by Nbiser I agree. I will not post on this subject again because we are getting nowhere on either side in this debate.

both sides are +\-(like protons!) it doesn't matter but EDUUUU!

Originally Posted by Nbiser I agree. I will not post on this subject again because we are getting nowhere on either side in this debate.

Same here.

You have an obvious prejudice against atheism, and no rational argument will convince you otherwise. You do not understand how anybody can recognize right vs wrong or have any sense of morality or ethics without recognition of a God (not just A God, but the same God that you recognize), which is just laughable.

You claim that any atrocity committed by a self-proclaimed Christian is due to the individual just being a "bad person" who's power hungry and willing to do anything to increase their position, yet you claim that any self-proclaimed atheist who does exactly the same thing is simply carrying out the "logical end" to their beliefs. Double standards much?

I spent the first 18 years of my life living with people like you - Christian elementary school, Christian high school - "young earth" individuals who were completely blind to the world around them. They would claim that atrocities committed by Christians were due to the "devil's influence" or simply that the individual was a bad egg...or better yet, that it was a holy person carrying out God's "mysterious plan".

After all of that time objectively learning about what the Bible claims that Jesus Christ stood for, I firmly believe that if it were all true, and Jesus were to come back today, that He would be absolutely appalled by the Christian Church in its current standing...all denominations. If Jesus were to come back today, He would be a hippie Democrat. In all likelyhood He would be called a leftist socialist and would be rejected by the entire Christian community. What does that say about where you've come in the last 2,000 years?

I have no patience for irrational people with double standards, so I will be bowing out of this conversation as well.

Originally Posted by suicidaleggroll Same here. You have an obvious prejudice against atheism, and no rational argument will convince you otherwise. You do not understand how anybody can recognize right vs wrong or have any sense of morality or ethics without recognition of a God (not just A God, but the same God that you recognize), which is just laughable. I have no patience for irrational people with double standards, so I will be bowing out of this conversation as well.

As far as prejudice goes, the same could be said for you.....you refuse to see my arguments.

Before I bow out for good, I would like to make several things clear:

1. I hold no prejudice against atheists; I only disagree with their beliefs. I consider them to be human beings just like myself.
2. I have not launched any personal attacks on individuals, whether they be catholic or atheist. I have only attacked their belief system.
3. Although I haven't used personal attacks on others, I have been called a nut; which I consider a personal attack.
4. Finally, I am holding no bad feelings or grudges because of this thread, and I hope than no one else is either.

Nbiser

Originally Posted by Nbiser Since we are so highly evolved, why did cannibals exist in the south sea islands only a little of a hundred years ago? It is interesting to note that it took the cannibals being reached by Christian missionaries to stop eating each other. Cannibals still exist in areas of the world today, we are still discovering new pagan tribes sunk in darkness and ignorance all of the time. I guess that is why we are so highly evolved?

The biological evolution of humans has nothing to do with how cultures develop.

Originally Posted by Nbiser Yes. That is the only thing keeping me from murdering. If there is no absolute God, there are not absolute ethics.

So, why are you all feeding someone who says this ?

I also don't believe for a second that any of the Communists or Fascists of old were atheists, even if some misinformed people say they were. If you know things, you will who they actually were.

I have lived under Communism and I can say that nobody was atheist even if they said they were. People said they were atheist so they wouldn't get taken to the gulags or shot. Communism was just to see how much s**t people would take ... it turns out they can take as much as you throw at them.

I admit that I am weary of religious people. Knowing that they abide by group dynamics makes them dangerous. However, I am not too fond of "atheists" either. I've met a few and I must say that they severely disappoint me.

I know I voted for atheist, but I should have voted for non-religious or non-believer as these are far more appropriate. I now consider atheism to potentially be a religion, especially if no mistake was made as I have made.

""Damned" if we do "damned" if we don't": Educate!!!

Originally Posted by H_TeXMeX_H I know I voted for atheist, but I should have voted for non-religious or non-believer as these are far more appropriate. I now consider atheism to potentially be a religion, especially if no mistake was made as I have made.

Yes, I would go along with that. I don't want to be labelled as part of a movement against religion, I would rather it all just didn't exist, Including all the arguments against it.

Originally Posted by H_TeXMeX_H I now consider atheism to potentially be a religion, especially if no mistake was made as I have made.

That's like saying bald is a hair color though.

Atheism is not a religion simply put, it's just a word to define someones stance on whether or not they believe in a god, supreme being, flying spaghetti monster, celestial all knowing teapot, etc. But it is far from a religion. Now individuals may bring up their other own beliefs, facts, etc that surround their atheistic stance but I wouldn't lump those together to call atheism a religion, since it is not.

Religious fundamentalism could soon be treated as mental illness

15 Classic Children’s Books That Have Been Banned In America "Talking animals are somehow considered an “insult to god,” resulting in this book’s banning throughout random parts of the United States."

Can't control the past,,, only oUr thinking now...

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Originally Posted by trickykid That's like saying bald is a hair color though. Atheism is not a religion simply put, it's just a word to define someones stance on whether or not they believe in a god, supreme being, flying spaghetti monster, celestial all knowing teapot, etc. But it is far from a religion. Now individuals may bring up their other own beliefs, facts, etc that surround their atheistic stance but I wouldn't lump those together to call atheism a religion, since it is not.

see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atheism...and_irreligion

People who self-identify as atheists are often assumed to be irreligious, but some sects within major religions reject the existence of a personal, creator deity.[77] In recent years, certain religious denominations have accumulated a number of openly atheistic followers, such as atheistic or humanistic Judaism[78][79] and Christian atheists.[80][81][82] The strictest sense of positive atheism does not entail any specific beliefs outside of disbelief in any deity; as such, atheists can hold any number of spiritual beliefs. For the same reason, atheists can hold a wide variety of ethical beliefs, ranging from the moral universalism of humanism, which holds that a moral code should be applied consistently to all humans, to moral nihilism, which holds that morality is meaningless.[83]

So, everything will mean everything in "time" or still nothing?? lol.edu!