• Right on, dude.  8-)


  • Faith is an impediment to the growth of our abilty to understand the true circumstances of our existence,from our biological origins all the way to how our government spends money and applies social policies…To have faith in something that cant be seen is childish.And dangerous…The arguments about Muslims this, Christians that,as far as their morals are concerned,are pathetically weak–They believe what they read in outdated books and think each other group is favored and the other is going to hell…You CANNOT be a Christian or a Muslim and NOT be a fundamentalist–to not be is the very anthesis of what it means to have absolute faith…Remember,if you arent a “Christian”,whatever that means,you go to hell.If you dont practice whats in the Koran,a masochistic read,you go to hell… End of argument…It is impossible to argue otherwise because thats what these books say.These old religions are becoming the tipping point for a nuclear attack somewhere…I know the Christian nuts would love that–the Apocalypse!! Hooray!  …The Europeans would probably get hit first because of their liberal policy of letting Muslims emigrate to countries there that are largely agnostic( a mixture that CANNOT work)…The Koran TEACHES Muslims to kill infidels…They hate you as much as you hate the US…This is the reason you dont see a large outpouring of contempt by Muslims for attacks against foreigners–they read it constantly in their fairy tale book that its ok to do it…Islam was spread by the sword and is a horrible way to look at the world…Christianity has spawned more,by light years,more misery than solice…Jews believe they are the "chosen"people…How conceited is that?  Faith is the “consoling lie”…

  • Moderator

    as far as faith being simplistic and childish dead on… good guess… and I am guilty of being a fundamentalist christian… If you want to be a atheist fine with me…

    end of story…

    GG


  • As a Christian, I was taught that there are several ways to get into Heaven / avoid Hell.

    The methods depend on
    (1) whether you have heard or read or otherwised observed the Good News. and/or
    (2) whether you are a devout Jew.

    The pagan way:
    Lack of meeting either condition means that you are judged on your own inherent goodness (innocence) according to whatever standard God imposes.  I was not taught the specifcations of this standard, but the Bible indicates that it would follow the lines of the 2 greatest commandments Jesus speaks of in Mat 22:34-38.  This is why Jesus performed miracles for Romans and Samaritans and not only for other Jews as performed through the prior prophets in the Old Testament.  God wanted more people to make it to Heaven.  This is not easy, but doable for pagans who have been denied the Good News of Salvation through Christ.  It is also considered much easier for children and babies to enter Heaven because willful sins are the realm of adults who are assumed to have inherent knowledge of good and evil.  Innocence is considered to fade as the child reaches adulthood.

    The Jewish way:
    Grown up Jews can make it into Heaven by keeping the entirety of the Jewish law.  This is considered an impossibility, accomplished only by Jesus.  Even some of the prophets were unable to keep the entire law, yet they are widely considered to be in Heaven for faithfully bearing witness to Israel and then getting soon killed by the mobs and/or kings who refused God’s message.  They are considered by Christians to be honored messengers of the Lord.  Keeping all of the laws also involves massive sacrificial offerings on a regular basis to redeem a lifetime of sins.  The heart behind the sacrifice must show a tremendous love of the Lord.  The sacrifice can not just be something you were about to throw away.  It should be something you really wanted to keep or use, but your giving it to God means you really loved God.  Genesis 4 highlights this; Abel gave the the best of the firstborn of his flock while Cain only gave “some fruits of the soil”.  We infer that while giving fruit is nice, the Lord wants our best, and that is why Cain’s offering was disfavored.  It is widely believed that King David is in Heaven for having the right heart for the Lord, while most others are not, notably King Solomon, who was a wiser ruler, and wrote more of what was compiled into the Bible.  Both kings committed great sins, but David gained mercy from the Almighty.

    The Christian way:
    Christians meet all of the following:
    1>  They have received the Good News of God giving his only begotten Son Jesus as the ultimate sacrifice for their individual sins.
    2>  They realize the weight of their own sins, and repent of them, or at least strive towards the repentance.
    Sins include things not done when they should have been.  The same applies to the Hebraic sins where inaction can be sin where action is required. 
    3>  They accept Jesus’ sacrifice to wash them of their past sins.  This is to show faith that Jesus has the power to do so.
    4>  They accept Jesus as Lord and Savior.  This means giving up the old life and faithfully taking up the new one of honoring Jesus.  They share the Good News with others as an act of love.

    The Christian way of reaching heaven is considered to be much easier than the other ways.

    Christians also believe that Armageddon will happen after all of the world has heard the witness of the Good News.  There are communist and heavily Muslim parts of the world where this is denied to the children.  We can also include certain sects even in the USA, where media restrictions allow a charismatic cadre to dominate the affairs of the group.


  • The Book of Revelations says there will be 144,000 of the Jews saved on Judgement day.


  • Missionaries to Central Asia in parts of the former USSR reported that these were traditional Muslim areas.

    Mosques there these days rule by slander. 
    Messages there against the Christians follow the line that Christians eat children and drink raw blood.  Muslims meeting the Christians first hand quite astonished that the missionary families have their kids with them and don’t seem to do any of the heinous things that the imams describe.


  • @Linkon:

    Messages there against the Christians follow the line that Christians eat children and drink raw blood.

    [sarcasm]
    And we all know that it is of course the muslims that eat children and drink raw blood, don’t we
    [/sarcasm]

    … Christian … missionary families

    THAT is asking for trouble… and then probably being surprised or using the it as a cheap argument against muslims (as any missionaric activity is forbidden by the shariah. It is highly insulting to a faithful muslim to “suffer” christian “missionaric” work. Any response would be misinterpreted by the christians as “they did nothing” …except for a massive “unkown”, “unwanted” provocation of the muslim believe).[


  • faith is belief without evidence. stupidity is unreasoned thinking. is belief without evidence a form of unreasoned thinking?


  • @Janus1:

    faith is belief without evidence. stupidity is unreasoned thinking. is belief without evidence a form of unreasoned thinking?

    . . .
    and therefore stupidity?

    Love, hope, joy, fear, anger . . . just about any emotion applies TO SOME DEGREE here.

    Also i think that it will be interesting those anti-religious types - comparing your outlook on your deathbed vs. those “stupid” religious types.  From what i see, one might be careful with certain assumptions.


  • @Janus1:

    … stupidity is unreasoned thinking.  …

    You should look up the latest results of neuro-biologists. It seems like all reasoning we do (for all decisions) happens after the decision has been made (without you “knowing” that it has been made). That would mean, either all thinking is “reasoned, but unconscious”, or all thinking is “unreasoned because unconcious”.

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