God and stuff

[Guest godthedog]

i came into college a quasi-devout lutheran who had a few doubts, & chose philosophy as a major mainly to work out those doubts i had. since then, i've learned 2 things:

 

1) nothing should be taken on faith, emotions or rhetoric

 

2) there exist no sound logical proofs that either confirm or deny god's existence.

 

so i remain undecided about the matter until i see sound evidence one way or the other. my opinion may change though, as i'll be taking a philosophy of religion class next semester that goes into these issues in more depth. maybe i'll dig this thread up after the class is done to tell what i learned (if anything; philosophy classes have this tendency to leave you knowing less than you knew before you took the class).

[Guest Vern Gagne]

Man cannot physically prove God's existence it's a matter of believing in you heart that their is a God. I'm not a devout Catholic but believe deep down that my Grandparents, Cousin and Aunt are in a better place.

 

Why does not liking organized religion make you a non-believer. A belief in God is about Faith and Spirituality.

[Guest Will Scarlet]

I, too, am an atheist, basically. I actually went to a Catholic school from 3rd grade to 12th grade. And, always having an interest in history, I found it hypocritical of a religion to say "Love your neighbor!" "Thou shall not kill!" and then go burn a heretic on a stake. It was especially silly when they were killing people who worship the same god, but worship him differently.

 

My atheist beliefs were furthered cemented when I went to university, and took a series of classical civilization classes. One of which, talked about why Greek mythology was considered a myth and not a religion. Basically, showing how the Greeks loved being human so they created these gods who were adulterers, murderers, rapists, etc., to show that being human and mortal is better than being perfect and immortal, and how the Greeks should be thankful that they are human and not gods.

 

I am not sure how true it is, but it fascinated me, and I have been searching for more logical reasons why the Christian religion was the way it is. For instance, the Israelites of the Bible seemed to be a rather rebellious lot, so if I was a leader, I would probably say that this god had chosen me, so if the people rebelled, it would anger the mighty God, and they would feel his wrath. Nice way of keeping the people in line.

 

To me, Christianity was a cult that was fiercely loyal because they were more concerned with the afterlife, as opposed to this life. Plus, if they die for their beliefs, then they are just like their leader, Jesus. I actually believe Jesus was an intelligent and charismatic guy who set out to reform Jewish religion, and eventually died for doing so. Eventually, Emperor Constantine was trying to unite his people by religion, and the Cult of Isis was not exactly achieving that goal. He sees this religion that had been a thorn in Rome's side and notices that the members are fiercely loyal. He decides to try it out, and give people advantages for converting. The nobles fall in line wanting to gain more favour with the Emperor or whatever, and the peasants are like, "More festivals! Cool!" And everything works out nicely.

 

Oops. I guess I ranted a bit much there, and was probably wrong about a lot of things. My point is that Christianity is, to me, a lot like any other religions in that it has logical reasons for why it existed and became so successful. Certainly, it's adaptability aided it's rise, as less serious paganists were probably willing to believe in Christianity when Christians made Christian festivals a lot like pagan ones(Christmas, for instance.) Plus, a lot of other things worked in its favour ,like barbarians who lived in small villages seeing these magnificent cities and being willing to convert because they felt God would live in such a magnificent city. It was a religion that benefitted a lot people, and I find it rise from small Jewish cult to a huge religion to be quite fascinating.

 

Of course, I have no problem with anyone who worships religion as long they do not persecute me for not doing so. I hate bible thumpers with a passion though. To me, the Bible is a nice story, but is probably as revelant from a truth as the Greek myths. Of course, much like the Iliad or the Odyssey, you could find some nice moral messages in there.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

I was raised by an agnostic and an atheist, but both of my parents are a hundered times more religious than I am. I've never once been to church, I have a daily regimen of sin and blasphemy, I do not understand and do not have faith, and were I to walk into a church with a religious service in progress, I would most likely burst into flames.

[Guest papacita]

My mother's a Baptist and my father's Muslim (somewhat), so I'm kinda floating somewhere between the two religions. Basically, I believe in God, and to an extent I believe in an afterlife, but on the whole, I see organized religion itself as nothing but propaganda and bullshit. Most Christian preachers I've known are corrupt, greedy and self-serving, and while I haven't had much experience with Islam, my father has told me about some of the corruption that goes on in mosques. And it really pisses me off to see churches thriving in poor communities and not giving anything back. And I'm just scratching the surface of my issues with religion.

[Guest Spaceman Spiff]

I was raised Catholic, going to Catholic school from grades 2-7, baptized & confirmed. Would attend church for about 1/2 way through that period, then it became just Easter & Christmas, but then just stopped. Last time I was in a church was for my grandfather's funeral about 4-5 years ago, and before that it was probably another 5 years at least.

 

Right now I'm pretty apathetic towards religion.

 

Where's RobJohnstone in this discussion?

[Guest cynicalprofit]

I used to care, but I no longer do, about religion that is. To many choices and options, its all so diluted that its really kinda pointless.

 

I mean suppose ur a taoist, who grew up in some small region of tibet, can god truly punish you if the correct religion was some in america that he never heard of? Relgion no longer makes any sense to me. I tried to hard to get it, but looking for answers only gets you lost.

 

Its all about ones indiviual faith of what gets them through the day, some do it with physical things, some do it with faith, but in the end, its only what you want and you believe in.

[Guest big Dante Cruz]

I want to make a point first off that most of you have made it clear that you are against "hardcore Bible thumpers" or something to that extent. You don't find near as many as those as you find people like SpiderPoet or myself. You see those people b/c they're loud and easy to make fun of.

 

Second, if you're going to start throwing around garbage arguments with a Christian, or someone of any faith, then pick someone who knows how to do it. Yeah, it's real funny to pick someone that never thought about a topic before you try to totally discredit their faith, isn't it? It's like making fun of a college freshmen for not knowing the intricacies of Descartes, Boethius, Aristotle and John Stuart Mill.

 

Finally, by saying you don't believe b/c you don't like organized religion, honestly, try to find a better reason. Don't blame God because you don't like the Pope. Yes, I'm a Southern Baptist and I find some things the South Baptist Convention says to be fairly close-minded and sometimes stupid, but I'm not tossing away my faith on it.

[Guest SP-1]

The thing also to remember about organized religion was . . .

 

. . . get ready for this . . .

 

. . . Christ himself was opposed to rules and regulations getting in the way. It was part of the reason the jews of his time hated him and ultimately, I think, what got him nailed to the cross as far as Earthly matters go. The organized church is different than organized religion. An organized church is generally fine, it's when the rules and Dogma get in the way of knowing God and letting that fellowship with God change you that the problem comes in.

 

That's what Christianity is about, really. It's good to worship with others, to have peers to talk with and fellowship with. Ultimately, though, it's about a personal relationship with God, through faith in Christ. Applying how God wants us to live to yourself flows from that relationship over time, and the changes come in somewhat of a process, I believe.

 

So . . . yeah. For some reason felt like I should point that out.

[Guest Incandenza]

I hate organized religion. I hate it hate it hate it. However, I can assure you my agonosticism is unrelated. Anyone who automatically assumes a dislike of the church and a lack of faith go hand in hand is foolish.

[Guest Kotzenjunge]

I am neither a proponent of any organized religion nor spiritual at all. I've been like this for two years now, and it's been working pretty well to just see and understand everything as I perceive it and little else, since, as far as I'm concerned, all that there is is that which we KNOW exists.

 

I won't go out of my way to blast religious people though. I'm really nice to the Jehovah's Witnesses who show up here once a week. I hope I'm not leading them on.

[Guest Fook_Hing_Ho]

Both my parents are hardcore Catholics, so I was raised that way too. Went to a Catholic elementary and high school, got baptised, confirmed, the whole lot. But by age 13 or 14, my views changed and I decided to stop going to church. I still go at Easter and Christmas, but that's just to appease my folks who still go every week.

 

Anyways, the reasons I stopped believing in God is the basic hypocracy of the Catholic faith. I mean, according to them, there are parts of the Bible you take literaly and some you take symbolically. The question is, who decides this? Who is it that says "OK, the Tower of Babel story is just a myth used to explain the different languages around the world, but Judas' betrayal of Christ happened exactly as it's stated in the New Testament"?

 

The main reason I don't believe in God though, is because in school I did a project on the ancient Egyptians and learned about a pharaoh called Akenaton. For those who don't know, during his reign, Akenaton tried to forcefully change ancient Egypt's religion from a polytheistic one to a monotheistic one that worships a single god called Aton. It didn't have any impact on the Egyptians, as they changed back to their polytheistic system as soon as Akenaton died, but his system did influence some neighbouring countries, namely the Jews, who formed their religion soon after Akenaton's death. If you look at one of the hymns to Aton and a certain psalm of the Bible (psalm 108 i think), they are too similar to be a coincidence. So Akenaton's views led to Judiasm, which in turn led to Christianity. So I just figure that monotheistic religion as we know it was influenced by an Egyptian pharaoh with a warped view on faith instead of a sacred divinity.

[Guest El Satanico]

My dislike of organized religion also has nothing to do with why i don't believe in a god.

 

When I said I'm more anti Organized Religion than anything I wasn't saying that's why i don't believe. I just meant that if people want to worship a god then fine by me, but I don't agree with organized religions.

[Guest SupaTaft]

Well, I wouldn't call religion a crutch. It would be more acurately displayed as a fancy cane. It can give you stability if you need it or it can be just for show. Either way, people see it and know that you belong to a certain thing.

 

Religion is a walking assistance tool, and it could be for the weak, but the majority of the people need some extra assistance walking.

 

Myself, I loosely follow the old Norse faith. The afterlife of my ancestors just appeals to me more than the usual "One God in heaven" idea. Kicking ass all day, eating all night for eternity (or at least till Ragnarok) sounds right up my alley.

 

I suppose the idea of something more powerful than yourself is just appealing to man I guess. I don't believe that there is anything more powerful than me though, I'll just have to wait for Odin to prove that to me himself.

 

-Taft

[Guest EricMM]

If Jesus were born today, what do you think it would be like?

[Guest SP-1]

Probably the same as it was back then. A few people would know about it and be there but the world at large wouldn't find out about it until he started his ministry.

[Guest EricMM]

what if he was born in America. Would he make it on the news before he died?

[Guest converge241]

Im not religous per se

 

but i believe there has to be something above us or have created us.

 

i dont think it should ever be dictated what it is, nor do i think i could transcribe it into a full belief

 

best belief i ever head was an ex who thought that God was the sun

[Guest LooseCannon]

I hate organized religion. I hate it hate it hate it. However, I can assure you my agonosticism is unrelated. Anyone who automatically assumes a dislike of the church and a lack of faith go hand in hand is foolish.

Exactly. In fact, I believe organized religion is just swell and I'd love to be a part of one. It's just the whole certainty that there is no god kinda affects your status among these organizations.

[Guest Incandenza]

I had to re-read that three times before I finally got it. Goddamn finals have fried my friggin' brain.

[Guest Angle-plex]

best belief i ever head was an ex who thought that God was the sun

Well, the sun does give you everything you need: heat, light, and food.

[Guest El Satanico]

If Jesus were born today, what do you think it would be like?

He'd either be rotting away in prison or an Insane Asylum. He'd either go to prison for being a con man or be arrested and then sent to an Asylum when he talked about being "son of god".

[Guest The Czech Republic]

What if Christ returns to earth? Would CNN and Fox News be there to cover it?

[Guest The Camel]

Would he wear a Rolex on his television show?

[Guest Vern Gagne]

What if Christ returns to earth? Would CNN and Fox News be there to cover it?

They would both try to take credit for the news and Bill O'Reilly would have a talking points memo about Jesus Christ and how he's dodging O'Reillly. Instead Jesus would appear on Larry King were he'd get tossed softball type questions.

[Guest Kotzenjunge]

Does one confront the F-ing son of the universe's omnipotent ruler with hard questions in a confrontational manner or treat him like a nice guest?

 

If you answered the former, there's a lightning bolt with YOUR name on it.

[Guest J*ingus]

I was raised Church of Christ (can't just say Protestant in this church, cuz them Baptists are goin' STRAIGHT TO HELL, kids!), but am now somewhere between apathetically agnostic and thoroughly atheistic. I admit that the possibility of a higher power exists, but damned if I've ever, and I mean EVER seen any evidence of it at all.

 

As for religions themselves, I find them fascinating in theory, but once they get into the details they always turn goofy and lose me. I mean, how many people here have actually read the Bible, especially blood-soaked slaughters like Deuteronomy, long lists of completely nonsensical laws and regulations like Leviticus, and complete drugged-out hallucinations like Revelation? The people who preach literal biblical infallibility are damned fools in my view, because this confounded book seems to contradict itself on damn near every page.

[Guest SP-1]

The former is pretty much what happened to Christ.

[Guest SP-1]

Revelations wasn't a hallucination. Paul wrote it in coded illustrations because he was in prison.

 

EDIT: It's 5 AM and I just got in from a screening of Nemesis a friend let me come to at the theater he works at. There were only a few of us in the theater and it was awesome getting to see it a day before the general public did. Good movie. But anyway, it's too late for logical thought and I'm going to bed. I'll try to follow up on this if need be later on.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

I mean, how many people here have actually read the Bible, especially blood-soaked slaughters like Deuteronomy, long lists of completely nonsensical laws and regulations like Leviticus, and complete drugged-out hallucinations like Revelation? The people who preach literal biblical infallibility are damned fools in my view, because this confounded book seems to contradict itself on damn near every page.

Well, I have. Damned if I'm an expert or anything, but the little tidbits fascinate me more than the big picture. Gory battles, tales of salvation, the seven seals, plagues, etc.

 

What loses me are things like faith, forgiveness, sin, and all the other ideals and big concepts. I've got no use for that kind of stuff.