The Big Big Thread of Religious Discussion

[42PETUNIAS]

Originally Posted by Bob the Mercenary

Well, why should God give anyone this gift if they don't even believe he exists?

Personally, if there does turn out to be a god, I don't really care if He doesn't send me to eternal monotony, it's the fact that he'll damn me just because I don't believe in him that makes me think he doesn't love me. I try to be a good person, I try to do good things, I want to be a doctor when i graduate. Next to all of this, I don't see why an Omniscient being wouldn't see the wisdom in rewarding those who help people, and overlooking the small fact of who's name I helped those people in.

Edit:

Originally Posted by Krylo

There's no REASON to believe that God exists over Vishnu, or Buddha, or Zeus, or Thor, or Allah, or The Eternal Tao, or any other deity.

Actually, that could definitly be argued. There is reason to believe that God exists over the I.P.U. It might me bad reasoning, but there still is reason there.

[Nikose Tyris]

I am a christian.

I chose christianity because I read about it. I researched it. I looked into different choices. I looked into many, many different choices. I looked at fucking XENU. I looked at Evolution. Something about Evolution didn't sit quite right with me. just... what are the odds of sentience?
Well, going entirely on our own planet, I'm going to say... roughly 1 in 290,000,000, if we include every bug type, tree, and animal.

I have no idea the true number of anything on this planet, so if someone has a chronicled number of every type of plant, fish, bug, pterodectyl, it'd be nice.

In the end, I chose Christianity in particular because I liked it the most. It made the most sense. It was a continuation and alignment that fit with older prophecies, and lined up with historical documents.

Does any of this constitute absolute proof? No. Anything can be faked and I could be beleiving in a lie. That's where I constitute faith.

I absolutely refuse to try and rationalize anything that happens in this world today, with one, and only one exception: in the first book of the bible, Genesis, God removed himself from the world. He took himself out and left man to die because he disobeyed. Therefore, the only way he can logically assist us, is if we ask for his intervention.

How many people ask?


And to end this, I'm not saying my religon is the 'most right one.' That's a retarded veiwpoint. What all this said was, this is the viewpoint most right for Me. I aspire to be a christian. no one should claim to be a christian, because that's a lie. To be a christian is to be 'christ-like.' and no one is flawless.

Except perhaps Bob the Mercenary, cause He still gets kick-ass presents from Santa.

So... there's my spout-off on this entire topic. I'm going to log off after typing this, and probably never read it again. Is that because I don't care about the refutes, or that I'm spouting off for the sake of spouting off? Or does it mean that I'm simply stating my faith, stating a mild defense of it, and my personal viewpoint, and don't want to be dragged into a war over it?

I'll leave that for you to decide too.

Edit: Quick Edit because one more thought came to mind.

Not everything claiming to be 'christian' or to represent 'christianity' is, in fact, christian. Many people are sheep, and many people are simply assholes. An asshole could be made pope. An asshole could be made President, or King. If the asshole makes the rule, then invariably, some people will follow.

An asshole can start up a 'baptist' church. an 'asshole' can start up just about anything he damn well pleases.

[P-Sleazy]

Originally Posted by Darth SS

You prove to me that all of those and the detail that the Church preaches about them aren't all just a blatent series of assumptions, and I'll acknowledge that this kind of statement has any kind of merit.

Originally Posted by Darth SS

Prove it happened.

Also, if the bible's right, doesn't Jesus bringing people back from the dead qualify as meddling?

Jesus bringing people back from the dead brought joy and happiness to the deceased and those around him did it not? As for the rest of the the stuff I listed. I'll list the passage in the Bible, won't quote, too many, too long. I'll put up explanations though. EDIT: Forgot to delete underlined when writing this post, leaving so the rest makes some sense.

As for the proof. Prove that something you cannot see, hear, touch, smell or taste exists. Thats how it is with faith. You have no proof. You just have your faith in it.

[Darth SS]

That's...that's acutally something I adressed with someone else.


But ANYWAYS, quoting the bible doesn't satisfy me. It's been translated and editted far too many times, and there are far too many instances where it could be that someone saw something, didn't understand it, and said "It must have been God!"

And, your description of what bringing people back from the dead did is a fruitless argument.

God stepped in, look at something that was supposed to happen, and in fact had already happened, and changed it. He meddled.

Death is natural. To defy it is unnatural, and if a higher being decides to ignore the laws of nature he is meddling.

[Bob The Mercenary]

We weren't supposed to die in the first place. So in effect, death isn't natural. And if that were the case, Jesus' death and resurrection would all be classified as meddling.

Also, somewhere (I'm not looking it up because it's too late), but somewhere it was researched and concluded that even after all of the hundreds of times the bible was translated and edited it has always come out around 99% accurate to the previous copy.

[Edit] Going to bed to recharge for pages 14-20.

[P-Sleazy]

Actually, I was gonna list off all the passages and I had about 3 of them done when I realized that quoting the bible isn't necessarily going to help. And I took them out and replaced them with that because it does the job better.
So, can you prove to me, or yourself for that matter, that a rock exists if you can't see, touch, smell, feel, or taste it? No, you can't because your senses don't sense the rock, and the rock itself could be a fabrication you created and beleive in.

[Lady Cygnet]

Originally Posted by krylo

I'm sorry, but no.

Killing some guy's wives and then giving him twice as much pussy as he had before is NOT an equal trade, nor does he come out on top. There is no equivalent exchange for a human life. There is no replacement for the women and children that Job lost.

If someone came into your house and killed your entire family and then was like, "But no, it's TOTALLY alright, because, like, I got you TWO NEW FAMILIES!" how would you feel?

Especially if the whole thing was some stupid bet?

No, krylo. At no point in the Book of Job was Job's wife killed. In fact, Job's wife urged him to "Curse God and die." (Job 2:9) Job's ten children died (seven sons and three daughters), and after all was said and done, he was given ten more children (also seven sons and three daughters).

You are right that there is no replacement for the human life, though. I have lost a child myself, and I can understand the anguish that Job must have suffered after learning of the deaths of his own children. God did not kill Job's children, though, and there was no bet involved in the experiences that Job had as a result of Satan's fraudulent claims about Job's integrity and faith.

If someone came and killed my entire family again, I would be utterly devastated. I would not blame God, though. I would accept that my family was slaughtered because there is evil in the world, just as I accepted the death of my daughter on April 27, 2005. I might even wonder why they were killed and I was spared, but I would accept it. My family and I are all of the same faith, and I would take comfort in knowing that they are in a better place than what we have on earth. There would be no sense in abandoning my faith if my family were to die--after all, my faith would be all that I would have left.

[Darth SS]

We weren't supposed to die in the first place. So in effect, death isn't natural. And if that were the case, Jesus' death and resurrection would all be classified as meddling.

That statement has two downfalls.

1) For it to be true, God has to be real. Since you can't prove the basis for your argument, you can't prove your argument. I could argue that the flow of electrons that is electricity flows because little creatures called Elebits carry them on their back. That logical fallacy is circular reasoning.

Be careful though, the moment you say "You can't prove God doesn't exist," that's an Ad Ignorantiam fallacy.

2) God is the one who made us able to die. Was that unnatural? Can God do something unnatural? Well, if he does, then he meddled with our life-cycles. And...you prove my point.

Also, somewhere (I'm not looking it up because it's too late), but somewhere it was researched and concluded that even after all of the hundreds of times the bible was translated and edited it has always come out around 99% accurate to the previous copy.

And somewhere it was shown that the Invisible Pink Unicorn exists.

I have no doubt that the bible is 99% accurate going from paper to paper, word for word. What I do doubt heavilly is A) The connotations in the translations, B) The lack of bias from the person who wrote it, C) The lack of editting of the original, D) The lack of bias from the edittor (see A) E) The veracity, and F) The selection of books. The books were chosen at the council of Carthage by the church, and they were a bunch of books that were decided to be "divinely inspired."

We have no reason to believe that they really were divinely inspired, and that they weren't just the books that told the council what they wanted to hear.

So, can you prove to me, or yourself for that matter, that a rock exists if you can't see, touch, smell, feel, or taste it? No, you can't because your senses don't sense the rock, and the rock itself could be a fabrication you created and beleive in.

Proving the existance of a rock is much different from proving the existance of God. Some people would say you insult God with this comparison.

The rock's existance can be proven by me simply turning around and looking. I can ask someone trustworthy. I can lick the rock, smell it, poke the rock. However, the existance of a rock doesn't change anything.

The existance of God changes everything. And, his existance can't be proven because I can't turn around and see him. If I ask someone trustworthy, it doesn't matter if they say yes or no. With a rock, it's hard to be wrong. It's either a rock, or it's not. No belief needed. With God, they can say "Yes", completely mean it, and be wrong.

[P-Sleazy]

But my scenario is exactly the same. Because, in this case, just like with God, you can't see, feel, smell, taste, or hear the rock. I did not say where the rock was, in correlation to you. As far as you're concerned your 5 senses don't sense the rock. Can you prove to me that the rock exists? This goes exactly with God. I can't prove him to you, but I beleive he exists, just as you can't prove the rock to me, just as you beleive the rock exists.

[Tydeus]

A Question to the theists here: Why do we have viruses?

I can understand human evil -- it is an unavoidable product of free will. If we cannot do evil, then we are not truly free.

I can even maybe understand natural disasters -- unavoidable consequences of the physics of this universe. For example, the only way to avoid hurricanes would be to have an inhospitable world (either too cold, too dry, or with no atmosphere), given current laws of physics. Now, I could ask why God would create a universe as psychotic as ours in the first place (I mean, entropy? Seriously? How fucked up is that?), but I'll stay simpler.

I can understand pain in general -- to challenge us, teach us, etc.

But why in the fuck do we have viruses? They serve no purpose other than to destroy. Some of them are incredibly vicious -- you would think a sadistic psychopath had designed their effects. Ebola/Marburg? Really? Do we need a virus that liquifies people's insides? Is that really fucking necessary? Or how about smallpox? That's not a very fun disease. 1918 Flu. Herpes. Hepatitis. AIDS. And so on.

Viruses only serve to harm and destroy. They only make sense from an evolutionary standpoint. Otherwise, they're just twisted. Isn't there enough pain in the world without that kind of shit?

Further, what about the really fucked up diseases? Like the parasitic worm that breeds in your skin, and its progeny eat their way through your skin, causing it to wrinkle and hang loosely (making you look pretty horrible), only to burrow into your eyes and slowly blind you? How fucking twisted is that? Did God really decide he just had to create that? Flesh eating bacteria? That's pretty twisted too.

It's one thing to have pain in the world -- it's another to have pain that intense and grotesque. That is not a loving God. It's one thing to learn from pain, it's another to go blind and become hideously deformed for no fucking reason other than that you're poor, you live in the Third World, and your life is already really shitty.

And while we're discussing some of the twisted stuff out there -- Hell. How insane is that? Eternal torture? Fucking eternal!? What could possibly warrant that? That's incredibly twisted and sadistic. Punishment is only useful to teach people something -- otherwise it's just sadism, power-lust, revenge, and general insanity. Hell and a loving God are 100% incompatible. If you can rationalize Hell's existence, then you have less humanity and conscience than me, the resident Forum Sociopath. Nice going.

P.S. -- I moderate a forum on Bungie.net that allows religious discussion, and it's really not all that bad. You guys worry too much. We're all civilized, or at least more than B.net people.