My case for why there is no conscious, seperate entity such as God (Bible-like God, that is)
POSTED BY: chrisisall
UPDATED: Sunday, March 19, 2006 08:14
VIEWED: 18094
PAGE 7 of 11
Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
So, tell me- other than not 'burning in hell', why should I believe?
As shortly and as honestly as I can put it -- the best reason I can give is because we were made to believe, and we won't ever fulfill the reason for which we were created if we don't.
But, as you said, no one can be forced to believe.
No one else can cash the check in my name. I have to take it and cash it, myself.
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Say that the case against God is Pseudo intellectual...
Fine. But its a harsh generalization to suggest that everybody is trying to hack away at your faith if they are discussing it from a sceptical standpoint. I'm a little dismayed by the whole "just do," or "just don't" door slam on conversation that you advocate. That's not even pseudo intellectual...that's a lack of curiosity, a vanity even, that you cannot learn more about your own religion by talking to a doubter.
And I know too many people who "just do." What I mean by that is that they have no honest understanding of what it is they believe. They believe in the bible. They know that truth is inside..but they've never read it.
I think its important to understand your own beliefs or your own doubts. There's a whole crap load of inconsistency out there on the bible...One can turn it into a tool for whatever he wants. As Jon Stewart said about it, "it's like an atom. Split it one way you get nuclear power, split it another, you get a bomb."
People who don't know their own faith often allow somebody else to interperet it for them. That allows for a vast degree of inconsistency even in their own living. The cohesiveness gets lost.
In my opinion, True Christians are those who have asked questions, have had discourses, have doubted, despaired, and have yet, come out of it all with a stronger faith than ever. They are not told by their religious leaders where they stand on an issue...that Michael Schaivo is in cahoots with the devil, or that God is killing our people in Iraq because of our tolerance for Homosexuality.
There's a lot to reconcile in the bible. The journey, I would guess, is a rewarding one, but its one that must be taken, and that means suffer some slings and arrows for your own good.
I'm out of my depth, I freely admit, but one of those deadly sins that are apparently the reason for all of our suffering here on Earth(according to those readers of the bible who have conveniently ignored Job)is Sloth. Laziness, when it comes to invoking God's name, has got to be a particularly heinous sin then.
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SignyM:
I appreciate your background and understanding and you personal philosophy. (Nice run on sentence? )
I hope you didn't think I was talking directly to you, I wasn't.... I was talking about what people say....
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I don't need to rationalize to myself (and others) why this God who loves us all seems to want to rather capriciously plunk us into eternal damnation or eternal gratitude for being as we were created to be.
See, it's comments like that, that make me realize that the knowledge of what you claim has major errors.
If someone at least brought up an argument with understanding that was correct about Religious philosophy and catechetical understading that didn't contain absurd ideas (like God just damns people for the hell of it), then both you and I would be much better off for it.
I truly respect 90% of the people who have had the dissenting opinion about religion. Some people have been willing to know and wanted to understand it from both sides...as I truly want to understand it from those who have left or don't believe...but when people tell me why they don't based on certain ideas that are NOT Christian but claim 'this is the case, and it doesn't make sense' I have to reply, your right it doesn't make sense because that ISN'T THE CASE!
I just find it rare when someone presents the right information and the CORRECT understanding of it and simply says I don't believe... then that person is much farther ahead that those who give false reasons to false ideas that are misconstrued and falsely placed inside the structure of 'Christianity'. The person who knows yet doesn't believe is much more respected...and is much more liable to believe
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You seem to create your opinions out of whole cloth. I was raised Catholic. I went to Catholic school and had catechism as part of the curriculum, attended Mass every day, even sang in the choir (badly)
What makes you a follower of Christ is in your Mind, on your tongue, and in your heart....being baptized, etc etc etc is only the start...and you can learn until the cows come home, but until you have FAITH, all your actions are just that....action
Tat Tvam Asi
you just have to believe it
- OD
Prov 26:4
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Quote:
Originally posted by cartoon:
Actually, if you were referring to my previous posts, knowing that God loves us should do just the opposite than cause us to harbor "profound self-hatred", etc. I mean, who wouldn't feel "great" that the eternal, creator God personally loves them?
Heya Cartoon,
Y'know...we're talkin' turkey here, right? See, what you say here, right here about God's love and the self tells me you really (I mean really) don't know what I'm talking about. Trouble is, this stuff, this emotionally perceived stuff, is experiential: very hard to explain to someone who hasn't experienced it themselves--y'know, like mystical experience.
See, self-esteem is about your self, about you and your accomplishments and your potentiality. It's not about an external source of validation, whether it be a paternal God, or a loved one. Getting personal validation from how someone else loves you, is the opposite of self-esteem. That kind of self worth makes you helpless, it makes you a slave. You can be perfectly happy being helpless or being a slave (as long as you can ignore a few facts), but if that goes on too long it isn't healthy.
You know about the baby elephant that get's tied to the post? The baby elephant tries and tries to free himself from the post, but he's not strong enough and eventually gives up. And then when the elephant's grown up, and can pull whole trees out of the ground with its trunk, it never tries to escape when it gets tied to the little post, because it "learned" that it was "helpless" against the post ("learned helplessnes" we call it).
Without self-esteem we don't test our personal limits, without self-esteem we may find contentment with our apparent "lot in life" but the longer we stagnate in that way, our spirit atrophies.
People find a lot of contentment in the illusion of control. The Christian God, popularly conceived, creates a comforting perfection to sooth our restless awareness. But the God Captain Kirk and I talk to made our spirits restless for a reason. It's something in the nature of being human to test limits and so surpass ourselves.
Quote:
And we don't have to have low self-esteem or hate ourselves to approach God. We do need to realize that (as He said) we have wronged Him, admit it to Him, and gratefully hold our hand out to accept the free gift. How does that invoke depression?
Okay, good question. To give you an adequate answer, I'm gonna have to go a little in depth here, be merciful: whether you are very conscious of it or not, original sin is a central underpinning of mainstream Christian thought. The inherent evil of Man after the Fall is hard to get around. A lot of Christians, like a lot of the folks posting on this thread, tend to conveniently blank it out when it suits them. But because of Eve we are all inherently evil, even little babies straight out the womb--that's why they need baptizin'. Evil. You, Cartoon, are evil. I am evil. Everyone you have ever known and ever loved has been evil. And you come along, "But I'm happy about it! Praise the Lord!" I think you may be happy 'cause you've mastered the art of cognitive dissonance.
And no one's gonna choose Christianity unless the Crucifixion appeals to them in some way. You gotta admit, the Crucifixion is a pretty dire symbol, not reflective of a happy-go-lucky experience of life. Conversion stories are fraught with darkness and despair that could only be cleared by the Savior's love. Belly-button Christians may not have such dramatic stories, but they're told often enough where they'd be without Christ.
Here's the thing: all dualistic religions (the ones that believe in good vs. evil) amount to spiritual crisis management. The crisis resides in the fact that nothing in a dualistic world view can "just be." Everything is either/or. The central question becomes, "Am I doing the right thing?" And uncertainty is generally assumed to imply a negative; sor
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SignyM:
I appreciate your background and understanding and you personal philosophy. (Nice run on sentence? )
I hope you didn't think I was talking directly to you, I wasn't.... I was talking about what people say....
Quote:
I don't need to rationalize to myself (and others) why this God who loves us all seems to want to rather capriciously plunk us into eternal damnation or eternal gratitude for being as we were created to be.
See, it's comments like that, that make me realize that the knowledge of what you claim has major errors.
If someone at least brought up an argument with understanding that was correct about Religious philosophy and catechetical understanding that didn't contain absurd ideas (like God just damns people for the hell of it), then both you and I would be much better off for it.
I truly respect 90% of the people who have had the dissenting opinion about religion. Some people have been willing to know and wanted to understand it from both sides...as I truly want to understand it from those who have left or don't believe...but when people tell me why they don't based on certain ideas that are NOT Christian but claim 'this is the case, and it doesn't make sense' I have to reply, your right it doesn't make sense because that ISN'T THE CASE!
I just find it rare when someone presents the right information and the CORRECT understanding of it and simply says I don't believe... then that person is much farther ahead that those who give false reasons to false ideas that are misconstrued and falsely placed inside the structure of 'Christianity'. The person who knows yet doesn't believe is much more respected...and is much more liable to believe
Quote:
You seem to create your opinions out of whole cloth. I was raised Catholic. I went to Catholic school and had catechism as part of the curriculum, attended Mass every day, even sang in the choir (badly)
What makes you a follower of Christ is in your Mind, on your tongue, and in your heart....being baptized, etc etc etc is only the start...and you can learn until the cows come home, but until you have FAITH, all your actions are just that....action
Tat Tvam Asi
you just have to believe it
- OD
Prov 26:4
Quote:
People who don't know their own faith often allow somebody else to interpret it for them. That allows for a vast degree of inconsistency even in their own living. The cohesiveness gets lost.
boy you said it!!!
Quote:
In my opinion, True Christians are those who have asked questions, have had discourses, have doubted, despaired, and have yet, come out of it all with a stronger faith than ever.
THANK YOU!!!
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There's a lot to reconcile in the bible. The journey, I would guess, is a rewarding one, but its one that must be taken, and that means suffer some slings and arrows for your own good.
You said it....
Quote:
But its a harsh generalization to suggest that everybody is trying to hack away at your faith if they are discussing it from a sceptical standpoint. I'm a little dismayed by the whole "just do," or "just don't" door slam on conversation that you advocate.
I NEVER said everyone, just those who don't care to learn or truly want to have a discussion, but those who are just hacking for it's own sake...
You're preaching to someone who agrees with you...if you take time to read my past posts and then to read this one, you will see what I am getting at, to read just this one, is an awfully out of context view of what I say....
Quote:
And I know too many people who "just do." What I mean by that is that they have no honest understanding of what it is they believe. They believe in the bible. They know that truth is inside..but they've never read it.
Well, that's a tough line to draw, some people don't have the capacity to break things down and understand it, I have met some people who have no intellectual ability in the case you discuss and yet are very very very very good people...amazingly s
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Okay- let me reiterate/ expand part of my post and rephrase part of it.
To reiterate/ expand: If it's impossible to even prove "reality", then the whole notion of believing in something that isn't manifest kind of goes down the drain. I have three a priori assumption that underpin my view: The universe exists, we are a part of it, and we come to know it through our senses. That pretty much does away with subjectivism, idealism and religion right off the bat. Given those assumptions, everything else is subject to enquiry. Open-ended enquiry is, in my view, a healthy thing. Enquiry in which one simply seeks to prove an already agreed-on concept is a dead end.
So, to rephrase the other part: I don't need to rationalize to myself the workings of ANY god, whether s/he/they be warm and fuzzy, capricious, consistent, just, or satanic. IMHO following Harvey might get you locked in the looney bin, following Moloch should land you in jail, and following the Xtian God is socially acceptable but in terms of "proof" they are all on the same plane: can't be done.
In other words: I don't believe.
---------------------------------
Free as in freedom, not beer.
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See, Cartoon, I told you, my posts are invisible. You are the only one with the miraculous ability to read and reply to them. But, I'll post all over again, just because I can.
My question to Chrisisall (and anyone who uses this argument) is what makes the suffering of a small child so much more important than the suffering of anyone or anything else? Because they haven't lived their full life yet? But who has? Is the suffering of the 45-year-old woman dying of breast cancer deserved more than that of the small child? Why? Who says so? At what age does that suffering become more acceptable? 10? 15? 20?
It is my understanding that God loves us all equally. So, therefore, he wouldn't feel obliged to ease the suffering of a baby over that of an adult. It's us humans that are saying he should, essentially telling him what to do. Supreme arrogance, that. So then, should he ease all suffering? That would give us heaven on earth, wouldn't it? We've already dropped the ball on that one, so we aren't getting a second chance at it. Our second (and last) chance is heaven after death. I don't think the bible-like God is going to give us a free ride until then. But that's just my invisible opinion.
"I'm having one of those things - a headache with pictures."
"Of course I'm right. And if I'm not, may we all be horribly crushed from above somehow."
Like books? Go to this thread: http://www.fireflyfans.net/thread.asp?b=2&t=14862
to find out how to buy mine!
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I think it's because children are deemed more innocent, or less culpable, than adults and don't "deserve" to suffer.
---------------------------------
Free as in freedom, not beer.
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Quote:
Originally posted by HKCavalier:
See, self-esteem is about your self, about you and your accomplishments and your potentiality.
Okay. I agree with that. But, it didn't sound like that's what you were trying to say. I apologize if I misinterpreted your previous statement.
As a Christian, though, I'm also a bit concerned about what you said above, because there's a fine line between "self-esteem" and "pride" (the latter which is a sin). While I agree we should not be unduly down on ourselves, neither should we think of ourselves more highly than we should. Where to draw that distinction (at least to me) is a fuzzy one.
Quote:
Originally posted by HKCavalier:
Evil. You, Cartoon, are evil. I am evil. Everyone you have ever known and ever loved has been evil. And you come along, "But I'm happy about it! Praise the Lord!" I think you may be happy 'cause you've mastered the art of cognitive dissonance.
I entirely agree with your first three statements above -- but, by your 4th statement, I'm lead to believe that you misunderstood (or I didn't adequately explain) my position as a believer.
No, I'm not the least bit "happy" about being evil. The Lord never wanted us to be "happy" about evil. He wants those who have accepted His free gift of salvation to be happy and gracious (unlike Sproul's entitlement-minded, arrogant students who presumed upon grace) that He's rescued them from that "evil" state into which we were born. Believe me, I never even meant to imply otherwise.
Quote:
Originally posted by HKCavalier:
And no one's gonna choose Christianity unless the Crucifixion appeals to them in some way. You gotta admit, the Crucifixion is a pretty dire symbol, not reflective of a happy-go-lucky experience of life.
The only thing appealing about the cross is that God loved us enough to go through that horrible, humiliating death to pay the price for those who would freely receive it. If anything, the horror of the cross should show us how bad our sin must be in God's eyes that this was the price it cost Jesus to pay for it.
I have to say I disagree with much of your final paragraphs, and we'll have to let it go at that -- because space and time won't allow me to cover where I disagree on the inerrancy of the scriptures, and my at-hand knowledge won't allow me to go into where the early church (which was adhering to the scriptures) got turned aside (shortly thereafter -- but not during Paul's time on earth, as I believe you were implying.) (I'd say the church was fine for the whole first century. It was after those who had actually walked with the Lord had gone, that those coming after them had a tendency to add and subtract things.)
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I didn't respond to your question, Queen, because (aside from the fact that I like to pretend that I don't like you) I don't have any qualms with your statement.
Regarding why everyone else ignores you, I can only assume that they genuinely don't like you.
You know, it would go a long way towards endearing others to you if you lost that "I can kill you with my brain" thing next to your name. Believe it or not, that does tend to frighten some folks off.
You know how it initially scared me. 
(I'm still not fully recovered.)
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