Why Did God Create......

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
741

[quote]pat wrote:
Uh, why should God do anything special for you again? I didn’t realize you were that special. It’s not God’s job to convince you of anything. If you are genuinely interested there is troves and troves of information on God, religion and faith. Get to studying it if you really want to know. There’s just reams of info out there.
Have you lifted a finger to truly understand it? That’d be a hell no.

Instead you spend all your time looking on www.atheismismydaddy.com in order to debunk religion. You aren’t interested in faith unless your interest is to mock our inferiority, or to say something isn’t a religious tenet because science says so. All you do is look for information disparaging faith.

So tell me why should God come down and treat you special again? Why should he make a concerted effort to convince you when you haven’t done a damn thing on your own. Hell you won’t even meet him in the middle.

Oh wait you supposedly read the Bible, even though you have a weak grasp on the subject matter with in. Bet you couldn’t even tell me what Paul said about dominion and warring nations.

It isn’t God’s job to convince you of Him. If you want to know you’ll find him. If you are just going to be lazy and peruse atheist propaganda and ask dumb questions like why whales have a pelvic bone, then go on and be an atheist. God doesn’t owe you a fucking thing.

You can see all the gods you want to, but it’s logically impossible for there to be more than one.
[/quote]

Again, it’s not about me being special. I would expect God to do the same for everyone. Why would he create me to be sceptical if he didn’t want me to be sceptical?

Everything else you said is the old “the information is there, you just haven’t looked for it and I know this because if you had then you would OBVIOUSLY agree with me!” cop out.

As I’ve already said, there are Christians out there who don’t agree with your views on Christianity (as well as most Christians historically). Have they not read the bible either? Who’s to say what the correct interpretation is? You? Do you have the correct view and everyone whom disagrees must not have read the bible?

You suggest that genesis isn’t literal, but God never says this and he’s made no effort to correct those whom take it literally. Why is this? And why did God feel it necessary to give us such an incredibly vague metaphor to explain our creation? He could very easily of told us that he crated the universe knowing we would be the result, then waited billions of years to watch us emerge. What’s so difficult about that exactly?

He didn’t tell us this because he didn’t tell us anything. The story of genesis was made by man to explain our origins in a time where man new nothing of its own antiquity. And now that we do, instead of dropping these old folk stories you try to cram the universe into your own world view.

This is what I see;

  • A story of creation that doesn’t match up with what we now know to be true unless you’re willing to do ridiculous mental gymnastics that no rational human being would make for anything else in life

  • A God who has commanded the death of millions and has personally killed millions

  • A God who, at a time where nothing could be proven, had no problem showing himself, but now makes no effort to announce his existence

  • A God who knows exactly how to convince everyone on Earth he exists, thereby allowing them into Heaven, but doesn’t

  • A God who needs his followers to constantly make excuses for why things don’t match up between the bible and the real world, but makes no effort to correct anyone himself.

A personal story…

When I was ten I watched a movie about the story of Jesus. I wasn’t made to, I just found it in my house, popped it in and watched it. I believed in God as much as I possibly could at this time. At the end of the movie the guy who played Jesus came up (out of costume) and said he was going to run me through an exercise that would open my heart to the holy spirit, that by doing this I would feel God’s touch and be saved. I thought that was pretty awesome. All I thought I was just in for was a movie, but now I’m going to be part of God! What good luck! I’m going to get a spot in Heaven and be one with God and all I have to do is join this guy in a special prayer and open my heart.

I was in. 100%. I had absolutely no doubts about religion at that time. I was ready to receive the holy spirit. I repeated every word the guy said, did the whole silent moment of open-heartedness and waited. Nothing. The guy said I was now born again, then the movie stopped. I popped it out, put it away and sat back on the bed (I was in my mom’s room). Why didn’t I feel anything? Why didn’t I hear God speak to me? Did I miss a word of the prayer? Did I not listen hard enough? Was I not open enough? I had never been open to anything so much in my life!

I’ve met God half way, Pat. You can’t tell me I haven’t. As a kid I would talk to God every chance I get and wonder why he never said anything back. I would ask him a question then cover my ears as hard as I could so that no outside sound could drown out his voice, no matter how subtle it may have been. When my parents would give me a penny to throw down a well, or into a fountain, I would wish that God would talk to me. Fuck superpowers. Fuck dinosaurs. I just wanted God to talk back. Do you want to tell me why he didn’t, Pat?

I became an Atheist.

Five years ago, I came across some Kent Hovind lectures. That blew my mind. Here’s a guy who’s showing SCIENTIFICALLY that God both exists and is the very same God of the bible. I found my faith again. I still felt no different, but it didn’t matter. Whatever God’s reason was for keeping me in the dark, it didn’t matter because here is PROOF that he is real. Whatever the reason God didn’t want to talk to me, it must be my fault because now I see he does, in fact, exist. Well, after looking at some counter arguments, and Kent’s retorts to these counter arguments, my trust in Kent started to shake. But I wasn’t completely ready to give up yet. Then my grandpa died. I got his bible. I thought to myself “you know, I’ve never actually read this thing. It’s time to stop letting other people tell me what this book is about and make my own damn mind up about it”.

I read it and I was shocked. God was sick and sadistic. He seemed more like Satan than Satan! This is not the God I spoke to as a kid. This is not the God my parents spoke of. This is not the God my priest spoke of. I was glad that the evidence suggested this monster doesn’t exist.

I’ve given your God every chance to save me. He’s given me no reason, whether it be logical, scientific, historical OR personal, to follow him.

Your God is imaginary.

744

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
So why are you bothering good people unless you just want to badger and mock?[/quote]

I knew that’s what I was getting into when I first engaged on this thread (I believe I even said so), but now it is pretty clear that that’s all he’s here for. Particularly after it became clear that I actually agreed with his view of human origins, scientifically anyway, and he decided to continue arguing anyway. [/quote]

If you agree that men evolved from a single celled organism, doesn’t that obviate the need for believing in a god in the first place? [/quote]

I know this is a bit of a cop-out, but I honestly do not have the time to get into this right now. So I will leave you with a link from newadvent.org and the money quote at the end. The article itself is pretty short.

To what extent is the theory of evolution applicable to man? That God should have made use of natural, evolutionary, original causes in the production of man’s body, is per se not improbable, and was propounded by St. Augustine (see AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO, SAINT, under V. Augustinism in History). The actual proofs of the descent of man’s body from animals is, however, inadequate, especially in respect to paleontology. And the human soul could not have been derived through natural evolution from that of the brute, since it is of a spiritual nature; for which reason we must refer its origin to a creative act on the part of God.

[/quote]

Thanks for the link. It sounds like they recognize evolution as the natural process through which men developed from a single cell organism, but they view it as insufficient because it doesn’t explain the existence of the human soul. Does that mean evolution sufficiently explains everything else, since only man has a soul? And doesn’t it beg the question on whether a soul even exists? Why couldn’t our emotions and thought processes evolve in the same way everything else evolved?

I know you said that you don’t have the time to discuss, but posting the question for anyone else that would Ike to address.

745

[quote]TigerTime wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
Uh, why should God do anything special for you again? I didn’t realize you were that special. It’s not God’s job to convince you of anything. If you are genuinely interested there is troves and troves of information on God, religion and faith. Get to studying it if you really want to know. There’s just reams of info out there.
Have you lifted a finger to truly understand it? That’d be a hell no.

Instead you spend all your time looking on www.atheismismydaddy.com in order to debunk religion. You aren’t interested in faith unless your interest is to mock our inferiority, or to say something isn’t a religious tenet because science says so. All you do is look for information disparaging faith.

So tell me why should God come down and treat you special again? Why should he make a concerted effort to convince you when you haven’t done a damn thing on your own. Hell you won’t even meet him in the middle.

Oh wait you supposedly read the Bible, even though you have a weak grasp on the subject matter with in. Bet you couldn’t even tell me what Paul said about dominion and warring nations.

It isn’t God’s job to convince you of Him. If you want to know you’ll find him. If you are just going to be lazy and peruse atheist propaganda and ask dumb questions like why whales have a pelvic bone, then go on and be an atheist. God doesn’t owe you a fucking thing.

You can see all the gods you want to, but it’s logically impossible for there to be more than one.
[/quote]

Again, it’s not about me being special. I would expect God to do the same for everyone. Why would he create me to be sceptical if he didn’t want me to be sceptical?

Everything else you said is the old “the information is there, you just haven’t looked for it and I know this because if you had then you would OBVIOUSLY agree with me!” cop out.

As I’ve already said, there are Christians out there who don’t agree with your views on Christianity (as well as most Christians historically). Have they not read the bible either? Who’s to say what the correct interpretation is? You? Do you have the correct view and everyone whom disagrees must not have read the bible?

You suggest that genesis isn’t literal, but God never says this and he’s made no effort to correct those whom take it literally. Why is this? And why did God feel it necessary to give us such an incredibly vague metaphor to explain our creation? He could very easily of told us that he crated the universe knowing we would be the result, then waited billions of years to watch us emerge. What’s so difficult about that exactly?

He didn’t tell us this because he didn’t tell us anything. The story of genesis was made by man to explain our origins in a time where man new nothing of its own antiquity. And now that we do, instead of dropping these old folk stories you try to cram the universe into your own world view.

This is what I see;

  • A story of creation that doesn’t match up with what we now know to be true unless you’re willing to do ridiculous mental gymnastics that no rational human being would make for anything else in life

  • A God who has commanded the death of millions and has personally killed millions

  • A God who, at a time where nothing could be proven, had no problem showing himself, but now makes no effort to announce his existence

  • A God who knows exactly how to convince everyone on Earth he exists, thereby allowing them into Heaven, but doesn’t

  • A God who needs his followers to constantly make excuses for why things don’t match up between the bible and the real world, but makes no effort to correct anyone himself.

A personal story…

When I was ten I watched a movie about the story of Jesus. I wasn’t made to, I just found it in my house, popped it in and watched it. I believed in God as much as I possibly could at this time. At the end of the movie the guy who played Jesus came up (out of costume) and said he was going to run me through an exercise that would open my heart to the holy spirit, that by doing this I would feel God’s touch and be saved. I thought that was pretty awesome. All I thought I was just in for was a movie, but now I’m going to be part of God! What good luck! I’m going to get a spot in Heaven and be one with God and all I have to do is join this guy in a special prayer and open my heart.

I was in. 100%. I had absolutely no doubts about religion at that time. I was ready to receive the holy spirit. I repeated every word the guy said, did the whole silent moment of open-heartedness and waited. Nothing. The guy said I was now born again, then the movie stopped. I popped it out, put it away and sat back on the bed (I was in my mom’s room). Why didn’t I feel anything? Why didn’t I hear God speak to me? Did I miss a word of the prayer? Did I not listen hard enough? Was I not open enough? I had never been open to anything so much in my life!

I’ve met God half way, Pat. You can’t tell me I haven’t. As a kid I would talk to God every chance I get and wonder why he never said anything back. I would ask him a question then cover my ears as hard as I could so that no outside sound could drown out his voice, no matter how subtle it may have been. When my parents would give me a penny to throw down a well, or into a fountain, I would wish that God would talk to me. Fuck superpowers. Fuck dinosaurs. I just wanted God to talk back. Do you want to tell me why he didn’t, Pat?

I became an Atheist.

Five years ago, I came across some Kent Hovind lectures. That blew my mind. Here’s a guy who’s showing SCIENTIFICALLY that God both exists and is the very same God of the bible. I found my faith again. I still felt no different, but it didn’t matter. Whatever God’s reason was for keeping me in the dark, it didn’t matter because here is PROOF that he is real. Whatever the reason God didn’t want to talk to me, it must be my fault because now I see he does, in fact, exist. Well, after looking at some counter arguments, and Kent’s retorts to these counter arguments, my trust in Kent started to shake. But I wasn’t completely ready to give up yet. Then my grandpa died. I got his bible. I thought to myself “you know, I’ve never actually read this thing. It’s time to stop letting other people tell me what this book is about and make my own damn mind up about it”.

I read it and I was shocked. God was sick and sadistic. He seemed more like Satan than Satan! This is not the God I spoke to as a kid. This is not the God my parents spoke of. This is not the God my priest spoke of. I was glad that the evidence suggested this monster doesn’t exist.

I’ve given your God every chance to save me. He’s given me no reason, whether it be logical, scientific, historical OR personal, to follow him.

Your God is imaginary. [/quote]

People have underestimated you in this thread, assuming that you were just another loud-mouthed hedonistic adolescent punk. You’ve proven yourself to be intelligent, well-spoken, and in fact more mature when discussing such personal issues than many of the “Christians” that immediately resort to name calling when someone disagrees with their world view.

Not to say this includes guys like Cortes and Pat, because I don’t think it does. It’s obvious that your views are informed by more sincere searching than people have given you credit for, and I applaud you for that. Whether or not you end up being a believer, at least you will have arrived at your destination under your own momentum, rather than blindly following what you were taught like so many lemmings have done, in the name of “faith”.

746

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]TigerTime wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
Uh, why should God do anything special for you again? I didn’t realize you were that special. It’s not God’s job to convince you of anything. If you are genuinely interested there is troves and troves of information on God, religion and faith. Get to studying it if you really want to know. There’s just reams of info out there.
Have you lifted a finger to truly understand it? That’d be a hell no.

Instead you spend all your time looking on www.atheismismydaddy.com in order to debunk religion. You aren’t interested in faith unless your interest is to mock our inferiority, or to say something isn’t a religious tenet because science says so. All you do is look for information disparaging faith.

So tell me why should God come down and treat you special again? Why should he make a concerted effort to convince you when you haven’t done a damn thing on your own. Hell you won’t even meet him in the middle.

Oh wait you supposedly read the Bible, even though you have a weak grasp on the subject matter with in. Bet you couldn’t even tell me what Paul said about dominion and warring nations.

It isn’t God’s job to convince you of Him. If you want to know you’ll find him. If you are just going to be lazy and peruse atheist propaganda and ask dumb questions like why whales have a pelvic bone, then go on and be an atheist. God doesn’t owe you a fucking thing.

You can see all the gods you want to, but it’s logically impossible for there to be more than one.
[/quote]

Again, it’s not about me being special. I would expect God to do the same for everyone. Why would he create me to be sceptical if he didn’t want me to be sceptical?

Everything else you said is the old “the information is there, you just haven’t looked for it and I know this because if you had then you would OBVIOUSLY agree with me!” cop out.

As I’ve already said, there are Christians out there who don’t agree with your views on Christianity (as well as most Christians historically). Have they not read the bible either? Who’s to say what the correct interpretation is? You? Do you have the correct view and everyone whom disagrees must not have read the bible?

You suggest that genesis isn’t literal, but God never says this and he’s made no effort to correct those whom take it literally. Why is this? And why did God feel it necessary to give us such an incredibly vague metaphor to explain our creation? He could very easily of told us that he crated the universe knowing we would be the result, then waited billions of years to watch us emerge. What’s so difficult about that exactly?

He didn’t tell us this because he didn’t tell us anything. The story of genesis was made by man to explain our origins in a time where man new nothing of its own antiquity. And now that we do, instead of dropping these old folk stories you try to cram the universe into your own world view.

This is what I see;

  • A story of creation that doesn’t match up with what we now know to be true unless you’re willing to do ridiculous mental gymnastics that no rational human being would make for anything else in life

  • A God who has commanded the death of millions and has personally killed millions

  • A God who, at a time where nothing could be proven, had no problem showing himself, but now makes no effort to announce his existence

  • A God who knows exactly how to convince everyone on Earth he exists, thereby allowing them into Heaven, but doesn’t

  • A God who needs his followers to constantly make excuses for why things don’t match up between the bible and the real world, but makes no effort to correct anyone himself.

A personal story…

When I was ten I watched a movie about the story of Jesus. I wasn’t made to, I just found it in my house, popped it in and watched it. I believed in God as much as I possibly could at this time. At the end of the movie the guy who played Jesus came up (out of costume) and said he was going to run me through an exercise that would open my heart to the holy spirit, that by doing this I would feel God’s touch and be saved. I thought that was pretty awesome. All I thought I was just in for was a movie, but now I’m going to be part of God! What good luck! I’m going to get a spot in Heaven and be one with God and all I have to do is join this guy in a special prayer and open my heart.

I was in. 100%. I had absolutely no doubts about religion at that time. I was ready to receive the holy spirit. I repeated every word the guy said, did the whole silent moment of open-heartedness and waited. Nothing. The guy said I was now born again, then the movie stopped. I popped it out, put it away and sat back on the bed (I was in my mom’s room). Why didn’t I feel anything? Why didn’t I hear God speak to me? Did I miss a word of the prayer? Did I not listen hard enough? Was I not open enough? I had never been open to anything so much in my life!

I’ve met God half way, Pat. You can’t tell me I haven’t. As a kid I would talk to God every chance I get and wonder why he never said anything back. I would ask him a question then cover my ears as hard as I could so that no outside sound could drown out his voice, no matter how subtle it may have been. When my parents would give me a penny to throw down a well, or into a fountain, I would wish that God would talk to me. Fuck superpowers. Fuck dinosaurs. I just wanted God to talk back. Do you want to tell me why he didn’t, Pat?

I became an Atheist.

Five years ago, I came across some Kent Hovind lectures. That blew my mind. Here’s a guy who’s showing SCIENTIFICALLY that God both exists and is the very same God of the bible. I found my faith again. I still felt no different, but it didn’t matter. Whatever God’s reason was for keeping me in the dark, it didn’t matter because here is PROOF that he is real. Whatever the reason God didn’t want to talk to me, it must be my fault because now I see he does, in fact, exist. Well, after looking at some counter arguments, and Kent’s retorts to these counter arguments, my trust in Kent started to shake. But I wasn’t completely ready to give up yet. Then my grandpa died. I got his bible. I thought to myself “you know, I’ve never actually read this thing. It’s time to stop letting other people tell me what this book is about and make my own damn mind up about it”.

I read it and I was shocked. God was sick and sadistic. He seemed more like Satan than Satan! This is not the God I spoke to as a kid. This is not the God my parents spoke of. This is not the God my priest spoke of. I was glad that the evidence suggested this monster doesn’t exist.

I’ve given your God every chance to save me. He’s given me no reason, whether it be logical, scientific, historical OR personal, to follow him.

Your God is imaginary. [/quote]

People have underestimated you in this thread, assuming that you were just another loud-mouthed hedonistic adolescent punk. You’ve proven yourself to be intelligent, well-spoken, and in fact more mature when discussing such personal issues than many of the “Christians” that immediately resort to name calling when someone disagrees with their world view.

Not to say this includes guys like Cortes and Pat, because I don’t think it does. It’s obvious that your views are informed by more sincere searching than people have given you credit for, and I applaud you for that. Whether or not you end up being a believer, at least you will have arrived at your destination under your own momentum, rather than blindly following what you were taught like so many lemmings have done, in the name of “faith”.
[/quote]

Thank you.

747

[quote]TigerTime wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
Uh, why should God do anything special for you again? I didn’t realize you were that special. It’s not God’s job to convince you of anything. If you are genuinely interested there is troves and troves of information on God, religion and faith. Get to studying it if you really want to know. There’s just reams of info out there.
Have you lifted a finger to truly understand it? That’d be a hell no.

Instead you spend all your time looking on www.atheismismydaddy.com in order to debunk religion. You aren’t interested in faith unless your interest is to mock our inferiority, or to say something isn’t a religious tenet because science says so. All you do is look for information disparaging faith.

So tell me why should God come down and treat you special again? Why should he make a concerted effort to convince you when you haven’t done a damn thing on your own. Hell you won’t even meet him in the middle.

Oh wait you supposedly read the Bible, even though you have a weak grasp on the subject matter with in. Bet you couldn’t even tell me what Paul said about dominion and warring nations.

It isn’t God’s job to convince you of Him. If you want to know you’ll find him. If you are just going to be lazy and peruse atheist propaganda and ask dumb questions like why whales have a pelvic bone, then go on and be an atheist. God doesn’t owe you a fucking thing.

You can see all the gods you want to, but it’s logically impossible for there to be more than one.
[/quote]

Again, it’s not about me being special. I would expect God to do the same for everyone. Why would he create me to be sceptical if he didn’t want me to be sceptical?

Everything else you said is the old “the information is there, you just haven’t looked for it and I know this because if you had then you would OBVIOUSLY agree with me!” cop out.
[/quote]
It’s the truth, period.

I can tell who has a good grasp on the subject matter and who does not, whether they agreed with me or not. Agreements or disagreements are not the same as not knowing or understanding the contents of said book. I got through school skimming books, I know a skim job when I see one.

There are many ideas on the metaphoric contexts of the creation stories. There is no direct reference of elapsed time except for ‘days’ which technically did not exist day and night came into play. Plus there are other references though out scripture referring the the creation of the universe different than chap 1 & 2 Genesis. I don’t know why God chose to do what he did. But if you were an uneducated farmer 2000 years ago, that wouldn’t make any sense any damn way.
The important pieces of the story have to do with basic facts, creation and sin. It’s not a scientific account.

And that is proof positive that everything you know about scripture came from atheist blogs and not from an honest reading of scripture. If God made it, why can’t he choose to destroy it? Does he need your permission?

All you are is all pissed off that God doesn’t act the way you think he should, period. That’s all there is to it.

You watched a single kids movie at 10 years old, and God didn’t come down and talk to you so you just said fuck it because you didn’t feel anything? And this was your effort? This was your research. Oh brother.

I find it very difficult to believe that you read the whole Bible and that’s what you got out of it? Sounds like you read a part of Joshua only. Believe it or not, God did not spend most of his time destroying or killing people.

No, you saw a fucking movie at 10 and heard a lecture at 13. That hardly constitutes giving God every chance to save you. If you did spend any time with it at all and did in fact read the bible, you’d know that’s not how it works.

[quote]
Your God is imaginary. [/quote]

I really hope this was a sarcastic joke. You saw a movie at 10 and a lecture at 13 and this is your hardcore discovery of faith? God didn’t pop down and talk to you face to face so you just decided he doesn’t exist?
So if I got this strait, if God comes down and bullshit’s with you for a few minutes, you will ‘allow’ Him to save you?

God doesn’t owe you anything and you clearly don’t know anything about faith. Salvation is there if you want it, if you don’t well then you don’t. You’re not owed anything and God doesn’t have to anything you think he should. What it isn’t about is miracles and God acting like a traveling magician. But that’s what you want Him to be.

You want you own personal divine revelation, just look of some people who had divine revelation and see if that’s what you really want. Because, if God is paying you a visit then what he’s going to ask of you will be very difficult. People have had apparitions, see what they were asked to do and what they had to endure for it.

748

[quote]pushharder wrote:
Have I not warned you Catholic boys, and others, what happens when you “play” with Genesis?

Tigger makes some good points.[/quote]

Yeah, don’t give me any malarkey that you take the bible literally. I can bring up several scriptures off the top of my head you would say weren’t literal because you don’t practice them.

749

[quote]pushharder wrote:
The rest of his “points” are skeptical yapping that has been going on for centuries. There’s nothing new under the sun.[/quote]

Dude, he saw a movie when he was 10 and a lecture when he was 13. the whole “Why doesn’t God act like I want him to?” argument is fallacious. God not acting like you personally think he should doesn’t make a good argument countering the existence of God.

751

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]TigerTime wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
Uh, why should God do anything special for you again? I didn’t realize you were that special. It’s not God’s job to convince you of anything. If you are genuinely interested there is troves and troves of information on God, religion and faith. Get to studying it if you really want to know. There’s just reams of info out there.
Have you lifted a finger to truly understand it? That’d be a hell no.

Instead you spend all your time looking on www.atheismismydaddy.com in order to debunk religion. You aren’t interested in faith unless your interest is to mock our inferiority, or to say something isn’t a religious tenet because science says so. All you do is look for information disparaging faith.

So tell me why should God come down and treat you special again? Why should he make a concerted effort to convince you when you haven’t done a damn thing on your own. Hell you won’t even meet him in the middle.

Oh wait you supposedly read the Bible, even though you have a weak grasp on the subject matter with in. Bet you couldn’t even tell me what Paul said about dominion and warring nations.

It isn’t God’s job to convince you of Him. If you want to know you’ll find him. If you are just going to be lazy and peruse atheist propaganda and ask dumb questions like why whales have a pelvic bone, then go on and be an atheist. God doesn’t owe you a fucking thing.

You can see all the gods you want to, but it’s logically impossible for there to be more than one.
[/quote]

Again, it’s not about me being special. I would expect God to do the same for everyone. Why would he create me to be sceptical if he didn’t want me to be sceptical?

Everything else you said is the old “the information is there, you just haven’t looked for it and I know this because if you had then you would OBVIOUSLY agree with me!” cop out.
[/quote]
It’s the truth, period.

I can tell who has a good grasp on the subject matter and who does not, whether they agreed with me or not. Agreements or disagreements are not the same as not knowing or understanding the contents of said book. I got through school skimming books, I know a skim job when I see one.

There are many ideas on the metaphoric contexts of the creation stories. There is no direct reference of elapsed time except for ‘days’ which technically did not exist day and night came into play. Plus there are other references though out scripture referring the the creation of the universe different than chap 1 & 2 Genesis. I don’t know why God chose to do what he did. But if you were an uneducated farmer 2000 years ago, that wouldn’t make any sense any damn way.
The important pieces of the story have to do with basic facts, creation and sin. It’s not a scientific account.

And that is proof positive that everything you know about scripture came from atheist blogs and not from an honest reading of scripture. If God made it, why can’t he choose to destroy it? Does he need your permission?

All you are is all pissed off that God doesn’t act the way you think he should, period. That’s all there is to it.

You watched a single kids movie at 10 years old, and God didn’t come down and talk to you so you just said fuck it because you didn’t feel anything? And this was your effort? This was your research. Oh brother.

I find it very difficult to believe that you read the whole Bible and that’s what you got out of it? Sounds like you read a part of Joshua only. Believe it or not, God did not spend most of his time destroying or killing people.

No, you saw a fucking movie at 10 and heard a lecture at 13. That hardly constitutes giving God every chance to save you. If you did spend any time with it at all and did in fact read the bible, you’d know that’s not how it works.

[quote]
Your God is imaginary. [/quote]

I really hope this was a sarcastic joke. You saw a movie at 10 and a lecture at 13 and this is your hardcore discovery of faith? God didn’t pop down and talk to you face to face so you just decided he doesn’t exist?
So if I got this strait, if God comes down and bullshit’s with you for a few minutes, you will ‘allow’ Him to save you?

God doesn’t owe you anything and you clearly don’t know anything about faith. Salvation is there if you want it, if you don’t well then you don’t. You’re not owed anything and God doesn’t have to anything you think he should. What it isn’t about is miracles and God acting like a traveling magician. But that’s what you want Him to be.

You want you own personal divine revelation, just look of some people who had divine revelation and see if that’s what you really want. Because, if God is paying you a visit then what he’s going to ask of you will be very difficult. People have had apparitions, see what they were asked to do and what they had to endure for it.[/quote]

You’re so caught up on the numbers that you miss the meaning entirely. Ageism - Wikipedia

How old are you, exactly?

The truth doesn’t need its tenants to offer excuses for it. The truth doesn’t need apologetics. The truth doesn’t fear questioning and it doesn’t bash those who question it.

So far, your arguments have only solidified my belief that Christianity is little more than mythology.

If there is a God, he is ashamed at what has been said and done in his name.

752

[quote]pushharder wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]pushharder wrote:
Have I not warned you Catholic boys, and others, what happens when you “play” with Genesis?

Tigger makes some good points.[/quote]

Yeah, don’t give me any malarkey that you take the bible literally.

[/quote]

I believe that the Bible should be taken literally where it is obvious it was meant to be taken literally. It’s relatively simple. Not precise but simple.
[/quote]
Agreed, we just disagree on where.

In or out doesn’t bother me. I don’t make scripture bend to my will, I assume all things in context. That’s why I always check the context when people throw scriptures at me.

I am sure we’ll get our chances. I am not interested in derailing the discussion, I only intended to make a point.

and
Grassy-ass.

753

^ This is exactly what I’m talking about. Why does God leave his followers to argue amongst themselves about what God means in a particular passage? Don’t you find it strange? You all already believe in him, so why doesn’t he at least tell his followers how to interpret his book?

755

[quote]
So far, your arguments have only solidified my belief that Christianity is little more than mythology.[/quote]

maybe.

but mythology is an attempt to express deep,intuitive truthes about the cosmos and the human condition in a narrative and metaphorical way.
and that, my fellow atheist, is definitely not worthless.

no amount of science and reason will ever abolish our mythological tendencies. And when we try to repress or supress these tendencies, we usually fall from mythology into ideology.
which is horribly worse.

756

[quote]TigerTime wrote:

^ This is exactly what I’m talking about. Why does God leave his followers to argue amongst themselves about what God means in a particular passage? Don’t you find it strange? You all already believe in him, so why doesn’t he at least tell his followers how to interpret his book? [/quote]

All we disagree on is whether or not it’s a historically accurate account, which in faith is minutia. We don’t disagree on it’s meaning or it’s place in salvation history with is more important.

If the bible were a super simple spelled out book, it would be about 3 -4 times longer to accommodate all the rich subtleties woven in and out of the pages. I wish God were more obvious too, but he isn’t. It’s a complicated, intricate, meticulous collection of books each has their own purpose of a people and how salvation came through a bunch of loose nuts like the ancient Hebrews.
If he wanted to reveal himself through an educated sophisticated society he would have picked the Egyptians. Hell, for His own ‘sanity’ it would have been much easier dealing with them.

You can look at it another way, God took the humblest, most unsophisticated, most uneducated loosely bound together folks and changed the way the world works completely. Whether you are an atheist, Christian, Muslim, Jew or otherwise there are 2 undeniable facts:

  • Jesus was the most influential and important person in the history of the world.
  • The Bible, is the most influential, most important book in the history of the world.

Jesus’s existence even changed the way we kept time, it changed the whole entire world. The bible, His story carried the message and was the conduit.
It still is the best selling book in history by a wide margin…Not bad for a fake magician dude and a book of fairy tales, eh?

757

[quote]TigerTime wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]TigerTime wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
Uh, why should God do anything special for you again? I didn’t realize you were that special. It’s not God’s job to convince you of anything. If you are genuinely interested there is troves and troves of information on God, religion and faith. Get to studying it if you really want to know. There’s just reams of info out there.
Have you lifted a finger to truly understand it? That’d be a hell no.

Instead you spend all your time looking on www.atheismismydaddy.com in order to debunk religion. You aren’t interested in faith unless your interest is to mock our inferiority, or to say something isn’t a religious tenet because science says so. All you do is look for information disparaging faith.

So tell me why should God come down and treat you special again? Why should he make a concerted effort to convince you when you haven’t done a damn thing on your own. Hell you won’t even meet him in the middle.

Oh wait you supposedly read the Bible, even though you have a weak grasp on the subject matter with in. Bet you couldn’t even tell me what Paul said about dominion and warring nations.

It isn’t God’s job to convince you of Him. If you want to know you’ll find him. If you are just going to be lazy and peruse atheist propaganda and ask dumb questions like why whales have a pelvic bone, then go on and be an atheist. God doesn’t owe you a fucking thing.

You can see all the gods you want to, but it’s logically impossible for there to be more than one.
[/quote]

Again, it’s not about me being special. I would expect God to do the same for everyone. Why would he create me to be sceptical if he didn’t want me to be sceptical?

Everything else you said is the old “the information is there, you just haven’t looked for it and I know this because if you had then you would OBVIOUSLY agree with me!” cop out.
[/quote]
It’s the truth, period.

I can tell who has a good grasp on the subject matter and who does not, whether they agreed with me or not. Agreements or disagreements are not the same as not knowing or understanding the contents of said book. I got through school skimming books, I know a skim job when I see one.

There are many ideas on the metaphoric contexts of the creation stories. There is no direct reference of elapsed time except for ‘days’ which technically did not exist day and night came into play. Plus there are other references though out scripture referring the the creation of the universe different than chap 1 & 2 Genesis. I don’t know why God chose to do what he did. But if you were an uneducated farmer 2000 years ago, that wouldn’t make any sense any damn way.
The important pieces of the story have to do with basic facts, creation and sin. It’s not a scientific account.

And that is proof positive that everything you know about scripture came from atheist blogs and not from an honest reading of scripture. If God made it, why can’t he choose to destroy it? Does he need your permission?

All you are is all pissed off that God doesn’t act the way you think he should, period. That’s all there is to it.

You watched a single kids movie at 10 years old, and God didn’t come down and talk to you so you just said fuck it because you didn’t feel anything? And this was your effort? This was your research. Oh brother.

I find it very difficult to believe that you read the whole Bible and that’s what you got out of it? Sounds like you read a part of Joshua only. Believe it or not, God did not spend most of his time destroying or killing people.

No, you saw a fucking movie at 10 and heard a lecture at 13. That hardly constitutes giving God every chance to save you. If you did spend any time with it at all and did in fact read the bible, you’d know that’s not how it works.

I am to understand by this that you had full and mature wisdom enough at both 10 and 13 to have rational understanding of faith and it’s tenets? Give me a break. You saw a movie and a conference, big deal. I have studied it in one way or another, from diffenrent angles, differnent faiths and different point’s of view. I have spent thousands of hours on it you spent some where around 5-6, total. I can defend my faith with scripture without it, or from a completely deistic point of view. Doesn’t much matter to me the method. I have made myself well equipped to handle it.
If you are making life long decisions on matters of faith as a child in such a way that you are committed to not revisit them; it’s plain foolish. If you think that’s age discrimination, so be it. You’re only 18 now, you haven’t even begun to live.
I am not attacking that anyhow, I attack the notion that you put forth.
I attack that God doesn’t act the way you think he should, therefore you refuse to believe in Him. You rely on science and nature both of which demand the existence of God for there very existence. Deists were able to figure out not only God’s existence, but His nature by observation of nature and the sciences. The posit by this that it’s impossible for God not to exist. I very much agree.

To old. check the profile.

Hey don’t put that shit on me. Your whole argument is “God doesn’t do what I think he should. Because he’s God and can do anything. Because he claims he wants me to be saved, he should take the time to prove it to me the way I think he should.”
Horseshit. What’s there is there. 2000 years of Christian history. 5000 years if you go in to Jewish antiquity.

5 hours of movies and seminars wouldn’t convince me of shit either. Put some effort into it. Look things up. Do some research. God didn’t disappear in the 1rst century.

[quote]
If there is a God, he is ashamed at what has been said and done in his name. [/quote]
No doubt man has screwed up. No doubt there has been great evil done under the pretense of being religion. But see the good stuff, the charity, the millions saved through various means, the hope provided to millions all in the name of Christ just isn’t as sexy as a good scandal. Good doesn’t make headlines.

758

TigerTime’s journey remind me of this little story :

[quote]
A terrible storm came into a town and local officials sent out an emergency warning that the riverbanks would soon overflow and flood the nearby homes. They ordered everyone in the town to evacuate immediately.

A faithful Christian man heard the warning and decided to stay, saying to himself, ?I will trust God and if I am in danger, then God will send a divine miracle to save me.?

The neighbors came by his house and said to him, ?We?re leaving and there is room for you in our car, please come with us!? But the man declined. ?I have faith that God will save me.?

As the man stood on his porch watching the water rise up the steps, a man in a canoe paddled by and called to him, ?Hurry and come into my canoe, the waters are rising quickly!? But the man again said, ?No thanks, God will save me.?

The floodwaters rose higher pouring water into his living room and the man had to retreat to the second floor. A police motorboat came by and saw him at the window. ?We will come up and rescue you!? they shouted. But the man refused, waving them off saying, ?Use your time to save someone else! I have faith that God will save me!?

The flood waters rose higher and higher and the man had to climb up to his rooftop.

A helicopter spotted him and dropped a rope ladder. A rescue officer came down the ladder and pleaded with the man, “Grab my hand and I will pull you up!” But the man STILL refused, folding his arms tightly to his body. ?No thank you! God will save me!?

Shortly after, the house broke up and the floodwaters swept the man away and he drowned.

When in Heaven, the man stood before God and asked, ?I put all of my faith in You. Why didn?t You come and save me??

And God said, ?Son, I sent you a warning. I sent you a car. I sent you a canoe. I sent you a motorboat. I sent you a helicopter. What more were you looking for?? [/quote]

759

[quote]kamui wrote:

Mythology is art alone it’s a comment on current event and eternal human struggles. Whoop-tie do. Religion is not that, religion is a way to communicate with God, not just a bunch of irrelevant old stories. It’s a way to communicate to the universe’s or existences’ creator. Religious texts offer back ground and information into that relationship.
You cannot simply relegate it to mythology because mythology is irrelevant. But whether you like it or not, religion is damn relevant.

760

[quote]kamui wrote:
TigerTime’s journey remind me of this little story :

[quote]
A terrible storm came into a town and local officials sent out an emergency warning that the riverbanks would soon overflow and flood the nearby homes. They ordered everyone in the town to evacuate immediately.

A faithful Christian man heard the warning and decided to stay, saying to himself, ?I will trust God and if I am in danger, then God will send a divine miracle to save me.?

The neighbors came by his house and said to him, ?We?re leaving and there is room for you in our car, please come with us!? But the man declined. ?I have faith that God will save me.?

As the man stood on his porch watching the water rise up the steps, a man in a canoe paddled by and called to him, ?Hurry and come into my canoe, the waters are rising quickly!? But the man again said, ?No thanks, God will save me.?

The floodwaters rose higher pouring water into his living room and the man had to retreat to the second floor. A police motorboat came by and saw him at the window. ?We will come up and rescue you!? they shouted. But the man refused, waving them off saying, ?Use your time to save someone else! I have faith that God will save me!?

The flood waters rose higher and higher and the man had to climb up to his rooftop.

A helicopter spotted him and dropped a rope ladder. A rescue officer came down the ladder and pleaded with the man, “Grab my hand and I will pull you up!” But the man STILL refused, folding his arms tightly to his body. ?No thank you! God will save me!?

Shortly after, the house broke up and the floodwaters swept the man away and he drowned.

When in Heaven, the man stood before God and asked, ?I put all of my faith in You. Why didn?t You come and save me??

And God said, ?Son, I sent you a warning. I sent you a car. I sent you a canoe. I sent you a motorboat. I sent you a helicopter. What more were you looking for?? [/quote][/quote]

I have heard it before, but it’s timeliness and relevance couldn’t be more on. Good Job kamui. Ephrem was my favorite atheist but you give him a run for his money :wink: