~why johnny (atheist) can't beleive ~ and the cure~

Excellent post.

 

I'm an atheist because I have yet to see any convincing evidence for the existence of any gods. Also, although they were theists, my parents didn't care enough about their respective flavors of Christianity to take me to church. The handful of times that I have been to a church (with friends after a Saturday night sleepover), the supernatural stuff the guys talked about never sounded believable. I consider myself lucky to have avoided religious indoctrination.

 

That's your evidence for God, William Craig, far more educated people than me have debunked Craig. My favourite is his idea that nothing can come from nothing, therefore only God could of created nothing from nothing.OK but if there was a god there was something! Craig has not successfully defended that. Craig constantly uses model for the big bang that are out of date. As a Christian I presume you seek the truth, well here is a simple truth, no one knows how the universe began. And possibly we never will. Craig is a clever user of god of the gaps. So no evidence just a bit of clever conjecture.
http://debunkingwlc.wordpress.com/

As I said a lot of Christians got it wrong for a very long time, but you are trying to side step that. You want examples of Jewish persecution, start at the King of England expelling the Jews(first time the yellow star appears) and end with the Ustashe in WW2
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edict_of_Expulsion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ustaše
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Story-Jews-Finding-Words/dp/1847921329

That's right Christians murdering Christians, the church might not of burnt heretics, no that's far to much like work for clergy, they handed over the heretics to the secular authorities who burnt them. Nice distinction! Those would of been the secular authorities which were to a man Christian.

So when you do not like what other people who call themselves Christians do, just call them false prophets. Let me guess, you by happy chance know the real TRUTH!

Well I guess that a first year college course is better than "the Catholic Apologist" but the really funny thing here is that your saying to an atheist, it wasn't my religions fault it was the other religion, they started it! I couldn't make it up! Seriously try reading some real history books on the Crusades, who started it is pretty much immaterial it was what was done.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Crusades-War-Holy-Land/dp/0743268601

Spleen vented is it, shall we continue?

Your defence seems to consist of a consist of a couple of articles by the Catholic "it wasn't us that done it" rag or claiming that the people who did do it were not "proper Christians like wot I am"

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Well first of all I live in a country where the Head of State is also the Head of the Church. Bishops are part of our government. The state provides funds for "faith" schools. A country where within my lifetime many have died because of Christian terrorists and many at the hand of other religions. Religious hate infuses everything from where you live to what football team you support. Religion closes the mind, it creates division, it stifles progress and slowly its relevance is being reduced. People are growing up, the do not need a bogey man in the sky any more.

At last you are starting to get it, there is no god, so all your worry about peoples souls has about as much relevance as if you said you were trying to save "pink dragons", you cannot save what does not exist. Asking an atheist why he does not believe in God is like asking why he does not believe in the Lockness Monster.

Of course!

Not brave at all, it is exactly the same to me as saying I would fight a Welsh dragon, neither a dragon nor a god exist.

Rubbish you have no idea what I have seen or what I could handle, do not flatter yourself. Come on Christian, do you know or are you guessing? The truth now! And you were defending clergy who stick there noses in other peoples grief, they do it for looooooove! No they do it because they are arrogant enough to think they know best because of some 2000 year old book.

Not brave at all, just defending my family, specifically my mother at a time of great grief for her. Nothing brave about that any man would.

It does not require learning, it requires the suspension of reason and logic!

I was paraphrasing your answer but you ........oh never mind

And please don't get your non existent god to, send a flood, kill my first born, smite me or any other violent things he does when he is trying to settle his emotion conflicts!






PS, what flavour soup, I only like tomato

 

So are you saying that one can come to the God of Christianity without going through Jesus? If not then how do you come by the idea that it is your God who saved me?

Thank you.

 

Again, the God of the Bible is bi-polar psychotic. The Koran's no better (or worse).

Not real interested in Vishnu or Shiva. If I meet the Buddha on the road, I am going to go to the other side of the street. I'm not a Chinese bureaucrat, so no appeal from Confucianism. And I don't care enough about my great-great-grandfather to become a Shintoist.

If God exists, he seems to smite or reward on a whim or temper....so it seems to stay off His radar.

 

Provide your own link then. The Universe is accelerating in expansion. It will not collapse by it's own mass. Whether it rips itself apart or evolves into a cold, dark entropic state some call "the Big Freeze" remains to be seen.

http://www.universetoday.com/36917/big-freeze/

http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/universe/uni_fate.html

 

Time came with the beginning of the Universe, but that doesn't explain the causal factors in the Big Bang. I don't know the answer and no one else does either. All I'm pointing out is that Atheists who say it isn't this or isn't that are acting on belief because they sure as heck aren't acting on science.

 

It's sad how theists keep trying to make atheism out to be a positive belief system of some kind in order to attack it.

Not believing in other people's petty gods of choice is just a sane, logical, reasonable position to take, same as not believing in someone's imaginary friend.

 

For some it is. They believe there is no God, gods, afterlife or any form of existence beyond the physical universe. They can claim "disbelief" all day long, but when they push and proselytize their beliefs onto others, it's a "positive belief system".

 

"Believe there is no ..." = "Don't believe there is ...", seems to me, such that it's not a matter of advocating a belief so much as arguing against beliefs in deities and afterlife mythologies. It's a far cry from telling people "believe or be damned!"

 

I'm honestly much more interested in hearing your specific reasons for becoming a Christian and a Zionist. As a religion, this means that God is real, that the Hebrews are the Chosen Race, and that eventually, the Hebrews will be granted a holy city. (is that correct...I am not sure)

I'm really curious as to why you have not only come to accept the existence of a God, but that you accept this particular version of a God. There are many to chose from so I wondered how you made your choice as to the right one. What about the others proved false?

I'm also interested in how your reasoning and your education allowed to you accept the religion as valid- both Christianity and Zionism.

Also, have you had any religious experiences or encounters that can be definitely attributed to a God? (by this, I mean unambiguous things. Like a direct vision of God or something. Not something like "he helped me wake up today", "or he helped me climb the mountain")

For me, God was an initial belief I had. I read the bible twice for myself because I loved the stories. But my belief began to wane under reason...seriously, it sounds cliched, but that's exactly how it is. You learn to ask questions about the world as an adult and God did not fit those questions. I learned about the vile history of the Church and what it has done directly and indirectly to people and I find it one of the most repulsive institutions to date. To be specific, I do not rebel against the concept that there may be a God, but beyond that I do not assign any value or facet and give, so to speak, false testimony to something I have never experienced.

I won't criticize or belittle your anwers, I just wanted to know why, and I'm telling you my opinions directly so you know I'm skeptical.

 

When there is no time, there is no causality to explain. Cause and effect require time which didn't exist until the universe did.

I totally agree. Whether or not God exists is a philosophical question, not a scientific one.

 

i was indoctrinated(mom) but also lucky to have a father who had no respect for the church and taught me to trust no one, question everything you're told and then question it some more...I didn't like my father but I'm grateful he taught me to think for myself...

 

You're arguing and telling people not to believe in things of which you have zero knowledge. What do you call a person who does that? Besides militant atheist, that is.

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So, in your opinion, the Universe just magically appeared out of nothing and there is no reason to look any further?

 

So, in your opinion, the god just magically appeared out of nothing and there is no reason to look any further?

 

Evangelists are arguing and telling people to believe in things of which they have zero knowledge. What do you call a person who does that? Besides militant proselytiser of religions, that is.

okay, now that that little demo is over with, we can move on. do you think it's a good idea to encourage belief in the tooth fairy? unicorns? leprechauns? Odin? Zeus? what do you say about someone who would actively promote such beliefs, given there is absolutely zero evidence any of them are real?

 

very good question! hope you get an answer

 

There are far far more people claiming to know it is God without any better knowledge than atheists making some claim.

 

So then christians who tell how one should believe are militant christians?

 

Logic says the Universe came from somewhere. Who or what, I do not know. All I'm saying is that atheism is a belief just like believing in a God on a throne or a force outside the natural universe.

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Yes, when they are pushy about it. Having a discussion or offering a path to enlightenment is one thing. Telling a person they are a (*)(*)(*)(*)ing moron if they believe one way or another is "militant". Worse when they try to pass laws making it that way.

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A pushy (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*).

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True. I think most people realize, innately, that there is a spiritual side to their existence. They just can't figure out what it is with their physical and psychological sides.

 

There's a difference between someone arguing why a particular belief is correct and them telling you what to believe.

Where did you get that idea? There is always a reason to keep looking further. That's the nature of curiosity.

Logic says that introducing the concept of God to explain the universe simply moves the problem of causation, it doesn't solve it.

Debate, no matter how heated it may get, is a far cry from "militant". You are always free to push back or leave the discussion. "Militant" would be incarcerating or killing others for their beliefs.

When you realize that life naturally emerges from complex chemical reactions, and intelligence naturally emerges from complex living organisms, it's not difficult to figure out that spirituality can naturally emerge from complex intelligence without the need to introduce supernatural concepts.

 

I am sorry but there is very solid evidence to support belief in the tooth fairy. Many, many, quarters the tooth fairy left under my pillow.

 

I always like the line "If atheism is a 'religion' as some claim....does that mean NOT collecting butterflies is a 'hobby'?"

 

That really doesn't answer the question, Max.

You belittle atheists as people who believe "The Universe just came out of nothing (or always existed); it created itself."

Yet don't the theists believe that "God came out of nothing (or always existed); He wasn't created by anything else."

 

I tend to disagree. You believe there is nothing beyond the physical Universe. It just suddenly popped into existence and, at some point, so did we. When we die, we die. I think there's more to it than that. I do not what it is, but something doesn't jive. We are each attempting to correct the other's belief and, by virtue of that fact, tell each other what to believe. What we are not doing is forcing it upon each other.

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Again, I don't have the answer. I'm not saying there is a "God", certainly not the one depicted in the Bible, but unlike some atheists and theists on this forum, I'm not claiming to know what is or is not.