An introduction and maybe some questions

[aitm]

but to search for truth

I think you're doing it wrong, the idea is to search for the truth, not accept what your parents and pastor told you to believe. This is the crucial difference. You really should wonder where all the previous gods came from and where all the subsequent gods came from and ask yourself why did man invent all these gods if there really was only one true one eh?

[SB Leader]

viocjit, thank you for your answers.

aitm, did I say I accepted what my parents and pastor told me to believe? I have questioned and tested and doubted so much. Believe me when I say that I have wrestled and fought, but that time and again I have found the Truth to be in the God of the Bible.

As to your second point, I think man invented gods because we seek idols to fulfill our desires. There is an innate longing in humans and we will try to fill it with countless items. We search for happiness in this world: perhaps in power or money. But time and again men have found those to be insufficient...I believe the reason we have a longing which cannot be fulfilled in this world is because we are not made for this world but for another. :)

[stromboli]

A list of Christian accomplishments is roman times:
http://www.jesusneverexisted.com/darkness.html

Another list of christian accomplishments:
http://www.truthbeknown.com/victims.htm

Evangelizing hate in Uganda and elsewhere.
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/commentary/la-oe-kaoma-uganda-gays-american-ministers-20140323,0,2345261.story#axzz2zUHEQvOh

Christianity is a religion peace. so is Islam. just ask them.

We supposedly support the Jews in their conflict in the holy land, but in fact more Jews by far have been slaughtered by Christians than by any other group. Oh, and btw- Hitler was a Catholic.

[Jason78]

If you all are interested or able, I do have some questions, but if that's not your thing a simple "hello" will suffice. :D

I am currently working on a research project for college that includes these questions. But try not to think of this as research--I won't include any of your real names, but it really would help me if you could answer these as honestly as you can. If you do not feel comfortable answering these questions in public, you can also pm me.

In summary, I would love to open up honest conversations about some of these questions! While I am directing this at non-believers, I would welcome other Christians to interact with this topic as well. Here are the questions:

Ok, I'm feeling generous.

-How would you describe your religious background and church involvement?

None/none.

-To you, what is God like? Describe God. Or if you do not believe in God, then: what is important in life?

There's lots of stuff that can be important. 

-What do you think is important and unimportant to God? (Feel free to skip if you do not believe in God, or you are welcome to speculate as well if you are agnostic)

I think beetles must be really important to him.   Dinosaurs?   Not so much.

-What do you think it takes to be straightened out with God? (Same as above)

I don't think that is possible.

-Describe what the term Jesus Christ means to you.

Dead guy.

-From your perspective, what are the major problems of churches today?

They all seem a bit money obsessed.

[Jason78]

But my question is this: proselytizing is kind of inherent in every group, wouldn't you agree?

I would strongly disagree about that!

If we really believe that what we believe is true, wouldn't we want others to believe that too? :)

If you really believed what you claim to believe, you would act as if it were true.   

[Mr.Obvious]

-How would you describe your religious background and church involvement?

-To you, what is God like? Describe God. Or if you do not believe in God, then: what is important in life?

-What do you think is important and unimportant to God? (Feel free to skip if you do not believe in God, or you are welcome to speculate as well if you are agnostic)

-What do you think it takes to be straightened out with God? (Same as above)

-Describe what the term Jesus Christ means to you.

-From your perspective, what are the major problems of churches today?

Thank you all! I am pretty busy as of late, but I am going to try to interact with this community as much as I can.

Hello Zach, happy Easter to you too.

- I was brought up in a semi-religious environment. I live in Belgium, which is seen as a 'Catholic Country', though let me tell you, most people here don't take it too seriously. The believe in a vague 'something' rather than an actual defined and personal God. At least that's my experience with the average person from around here. My grandparents and great-aunts and -uncles were religious, though my parents aren't. But to appease my grandparents they had me baptized and take communian and 'religous' class in elementary rather than 'ethics'. When I was a kid I believed in the Christian God. I was very impressionable and didn't question much what authority figures told me. Though I'd never read the bible nor went to church (except for weddings and funerals and my communion at 12 years old), I conciderd myself a Christian. I was convinced this knowledge in Christianity was true, unquestionable, a force for good in the world and proven. I continued to be religious through puberty. Other things that I'd never been indoctrinated, like astrology or faith-healing and ghosts, seemed silly to me. And whenever someone tried to talk to me about anything like that, I told them how silly it was to believe in something so obviously false and unproven. But my own beliefs were something I didn't want to subject to that standard of proof, because I think, I was very self-centered kid in puberty and I couldn't even imagine being wrong. But after puberty, and during a time that you learn a lot more about the world (example biology in the middle-to-later-years of high school) I started to admitt to myself  that my religion could be dismissed with the same ease as astrology. That's when a long process started in which I became less and less convinced of the existance of God and more and more open to the possibility of a world without one. After I tried to read the Bible, I became calling myself an agnostic around the age of 18. I had to put the book away after the third of fourth book, and had no longer any trouble with calling myself agnostic. Throughout the years (I'm 22 now) I've grown less and less convinced of the positive influence of religion to the point that I'm a bit anti-theïstic; as in against religion itself. I now go by the lable atheïst though, agnostic atheïst if you use Dawkins' scale.

- I'm not religious. So God (in the personal deity sense) is nothing to me but an unfalsifiable hypothesis, and an unlikely one at that. What is important to me are my family and friends and girlfriend foremost. But also my greater community and society itself. Without trying to sound cheesy or chauvinistic I would say I'm invested in the path humankind has taken and will take. Humanity and it's potential is very important to me. (And beer, naturally.)

- Hypothesing there is an allmighty, allknowing and allpowerfull deity: If something was important to God, I do not think I could know. He has, for as far as the evidence show, not revealed his will or commands to anyone ever, on this planet. For as far as I know, he would not be concerned with life on this planet. And if his mind greater than any of ours, as many theïsts have claimed, I would not know and neither would they. If there were a God with an infinite mind, a finite mind (no matter if it were theïstic or non-theïstic) could not know how the infinite mind worked nor what it wanted. It would be an act of outreagous self-importance to claim to know the mind of God.

- I have no idea what you mean by this question.

- Jesus Christ is a Mythological figure, probably based on a real person in the past. (See Hitchen's arguments for the probability of the existance of Jesus Christ.) But due to the lack of sources outside of the Bible this can not be ultimately confirmed nor does it imply he was a well-known and important figure. He most certainly didn't have supernatural powers and was not the son of God, such claims would require proof that does not exist. Or at least has not been shown to exist.  All in all, Jesus Christ is not of much importance to me.

- Very wide selection you use there. Only Christian churches, or other religions too? All in all they share a few problems: they instruct people not to think critically and accept dogma and they control peoples lives in destructive ways (though the matter of destructivity fall in a scale with some more dangerous than others).

[aitm]

I have found the Truth to be in the God of the Bible.

Then again. You're doing it wrong. There is no truth in the babble.

I think man invented gods because we seek idols to fulfill our desires.

But you are unable to connect the dots eh? Yeah, your doing that searchy thing wrong.

But time and again men have found those to be insufficient

an opinion by someone who has neither power or money

I believe the reason we have a longing which cannot be fulfilled in this world is because we are not made for this world but for another.

which explains why you're not genuine in your search for the truth. You were successfully indoctrinated by your parents and friends and pastors and are no simply too embarrassed to admit all this lost time and devotion is for the same made up gods that the rest of humanity invented. There is not one bit of difference in your fantasy god and theirs.

[Berati]

I

don't know if this is entirely true, Berati. Christianity has historically been a harbinger of peace and freedom when brought to a society.

This is incorrect. Christianity has murdered and tortured it's way through history. The constant use of inquisitions and wars in the name of Jebus. The repression of knowledge, the subjugation of women, the use of the bible as a validation of slavery etc... will attest to that. Christians are quick to point out that they are much better now (unless your a choirboy or an unwed mother in Ireland) but that is only because godless heathens removed them from a position of power.

Once again, why is it that we have had to defang christianity and remove it from a position of political authority in order to make any moral progress in society? If the myths you take as true were actually true why wasn't the world better off under your sway instead of under that of secular democracies?

The answer is obvious.
The question is, do you have the intellectual honesty to admit it to yourself or is the allure of the myth to strong for you? I'll bet you selfishly stay with the myth because it makes you feel good no matter what it does or has done to anyone else.

You seem like a nice guy so sorry to have to be so blunt, but the world needs to move away from these ancient paternal myths and adopt a more adult outlook.

[Berati]

I think man invented gods because we seek idols to fulfill our desires.

The problem appears to be that you refuse to apply this to yourself.

[the_antithesis]

But just because you have not known or visited a god does not mean that one does not exist.

Again, what's a god?

Others have known and experienced God, they have talked with Him and He has talked to them. And they have written books about him--or I should say a Book. :)

1) Unnecessary capitalization is childish, or should I say Childish

2) That is just hearsay. It's not evidence.

I fucked your dad. I fucked so hard in his puckery little asshole he bled and then begged for more. Others had seen me do this. One even wrote a book.

Do you believe me? By your logic, you must or at least entertain the possibility.

I had it on good authority that God existed and when I put my faith in Him,

No you don't. Your faith is in yourself. You have decided that you believe this and because it is a thought that has entered your head, it cannot possibly be wrong. Faith is an act of pride.

[stromboli]

You have what is called an inside the box viewpoint. Everything you see is based on a worldview that is colored and shaped by a Christian mindset.

The only way you can truly judge the truth is to see it from as objective a viewpoint as possible. You are indoctrinated on one hand and warned of the dangers of stepping outside your faith on the other. The only difference between a cult and a religion is a matter of how society accepts it. Christianity was a cult until it became a state religion. Mormonism was a cult until they became wide spread and politically powerful enough to be accepted as mainstream.

Until you step outside that box and truly look at things objectively, you really can't weigh the evidence impartially.

[La Dolce Vita]

I would say that natural evil is still a result of man's wrongdoing. Man, being God's image bearers, was over all creation. When man sinned he separated his connection with the creator and creation, connected with man, fell along with him. The ground became filled with thorns, pain became part of our lives and natural disasters became part of our world. That is an attempt at an answer, but it is a difficult question to be sure. I apologize if I presupposed too much in my answer.

And again, if true, it shows that your god is evil. He is judging and torturing little babies because something their ancestors did. That's really absurd, and frankly asinine.

I would say a "protected" free will is not a free will at all. If we are conditioned to choose what the Creator wants us, then we become robots. God does not want machines, he wants humans and I would say that a fundamental part of our humanity is our free will. One does not give three sides to a triangle, one cannot give free will to a human. The  alternative to free will is not being a human but an animal or machine. But I feel like this is a bit outside the topic, so I will stop there.

But like I said, even if we had free will at this point, we still can't kill people with our minds or teleport. There are many things humans cannot do. Why not limit further. Why not create a better design that's not so horrible and useless? If it's a test for example, how can a baby that dies of a swollen head be judged?

And while we are on free will, why not come down here and show himself to be true? Then we would actually have a choice. Currently all religions seem equally invalid, and to the believers they all seem valid. Why not set the record straight? That wouldn't remove free will (if it existed). I for one could never have followed your god, at least not honestly, because I know "in my heart" that the character described in the bible is a disgusting monster with horrible moral, and is inferior to me in every way aside from muscles. Like the mob boss he could probably have tortured me till the point I cracked, but in my mind I would never respect or consider him good.

But just because you have not known or visited a god does not mean that one does not exist.

I have already stated that I'm an agnostic and am open to the existence of gods. (Save yours and many other specific gods we know for a fact aren't real)

My point was to illustrate the distinction between a demonstrated fact that does not need to be taken on faith, i.e. Australia, and the fact that I have experiences countries, etc. while never having experienced a god. A god has never been demonstrated to exist. Nothing implies any gods exist. We cannot study them in a scientific manner. I was trying to illustrate why one can be accepted as fact and how one is yet to even be implied as a plausibility.

Others have known and experienced God, they have talked with Him and He has talked to them. And they have written books about him--or I should say a Book. :) I had it on good authority that God existed and when I put my faith in Him, I knew for certain that He existed. When you have experienced His presence and seen His work you cannot help but believe! I guess this is difficult to describe--I am arguing from experience which I suppose is pretty subjective. But I have found the most reasonable thing to do is to believe in God and from there I have seen all the proof I could need.

A muslim would say the same. A jew would say the same. A hindu would say the same. There are legions of books. Some have felt the presence of Odin. They have all had the experiences you have had. Don't you see that? And don't you see how the existence of all these other religions that claims exactly the same as yours invalidates your experience as evidence? If you had been born to a family of a different faith, you'd likely have had the same experiences and credited them to their god(s).

[stromboli]

The concept of sin is a religious one

Quote:  "an offense against religious or moral law" the "moral" being defined by the religion.

Read the 10 commandments. There is no commandment against rape or slavery. Because by Abrahamic law, slavery was allowed and rape was a property crime and dismissable by actions of the perpetrator. Ask a rape victim if they thought it was a property crime.

The Codex Hammurabi is dated at about 1770 B.C.E.. The 10 Commandments about 1400 B.C.E.. They are very similar. Since the Babylonians were easily the big influence of that period, it is not a stretch to guess that some ideas were borrowed.

There is also a massive debate about when Jews became monotheistic. Some claim that the instillation of Abrahamic Law was the beginning, but there is a lot of evidence to the contrary. For sure the first Torah verifying monotheism doesn't exist until about 500 B.C.E., after the Babylonian Exile, so any claim that Abrahamic Law came before that is a bit clouded, and some historians believe that the Jews became monotheistic in part by way of rebellion from the Babylonians, who actually worshipped some of the same gods. 

We have a debate here on morality about every 6 months. The upshot is that what we define as morality is a common understanding between members of a culture or society, and is subjective. The religious claim of an objective morality given by god is, quite frankly, bullshit. You need only read some history to see how various moral codes like allowance of homosexuality, rape, slavery, and so on are administered.

Oh, and by the way- Jesus said he didn't come to replace the laws of the Old Testament, which is why preachers today can still denounce homosexuality, even though it is not mentioned in the New Testament. By that same logic, you can be stoned to death for failing to attend church or eating a ham sandwich.

[aitm]

and remember the babble also prohibits those the mentally ill or emasculated, or bastard children from attending church....nobody ever keeps them out though...makes god angry and tornadoes hit churches.

[La Dolce Vita]

Oh, and by the way- Jesus said he didn't come to replace the laws of the Old Testament, which is why preachers today can still denounce homosexuality, even though it is not mentioned in the New Testament. By that same logic, you can be stoned to death for failing to attend church or eating a ham sandwich.

Been a long time since I read the new testament, but I thought Paul in particular had a lot to say against it.