steve wrote:I see no God in any of it -- no "maker," only a huge web of existence that could only have come into being from eons making incremental changes in everything.

I know my makers: Frank and Gina, fine people. I know my world and its enormity -- I am overwhelmed by it -- and think it astounding that anyone could see the same world and think it lacks something, that there must be something more. I love my fellow men, even those I detest. I have no need for anything supernatural, because the real world is plenty, and I do not feel cursed.

Why do you hate America? Why do you hate our freedom and our Christian way of life?

steve wrote:

chauncey wrote:Why wouldn't one want to have some kind of understanding of their maker? Read the book of Job. We are cursed, as is the ground we walk on. The OT certainly makes sense in light of this. This life is far from fair. The good don't get what they deserve, nor do the bad. The first will be last, the last will be first. That refers to the world not as it is now, but as it will be after the day of judgement. Christ was here for redemption - to redeem the world. One day it will be redeemed and the meek will inherit the earth, but not as it is now, it will be a much finer home than it is now.

People die, get riddled with disease, swept out to sea on titanic waves, burned by fire, etc. This seems to be the luck of the draw. People can be imprisoned, tortured, lied to, etc. This seems to be the work of evil men. Blaming this on curses (devised by God? he clearly hates us then) is such a colossal, childish cop-out that I cannot take it seriously as a rationale for seeking guidance outside my own sense of things.

I too look around this earth and think it a beautiful place that is home now, and will eternally be home to me, hopefully. It is also a place that was made beautifully but corrupted by the choices we have made and continue to make. Just like you and I could feel shame for slavery though we have had no personal part in it, we have the shame of the corruption of God's creation on our shoulders. A corruption that we continue to take part in, directly and indirectly.

As a child you have no idea how things work or came to be. Gradually you learn things and begin to dissect ideas on your own. At some point the question of God arises - does a sole creator exist? You decide that's a bunch of malarkey or you look into it further.

Let's pretend God exists (which obviously I believe he/she does). A loving God that wants acknowledgement from his creation made in his image with a free will to decide whether to acknowledge God and reciprocate love, or develop a worldview that doesn't have a place for God. Do you think what we choose to believe justifies God's existence? It's humbling that this God that made the seas, the skies, and the harmonics resonating from a single vibrating open string would still want that faith and love from a creation that rejects him.

If a belief in God and the idea of sin as something to overcome in a transcendent sense is childish, then indeed. As much as I have questions, I have found that the soul remains a question that doesn't have an answer from any man. Particularly because we can only understand so far as our personal experience lets us. Life is quite simple, really. We make it complicated for ourselves.

"I travelled different places / I've travelled in farthest lands / I've found nobody could tell me / just what was the soul of a man."

-"Blind" Willie Johnson, The Soul of a Man

"Let the children come to me. For the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I assure you, anyone who doesn't have their kind of faith will never get into the Kingdom of God."

- Jesus, Mark 10:14-15

shagboy wrote:fuck the bible... golden rule, baybee!

Do you know what you're fucking?

"Do for others what you would like them to do for you."

-Jesus, Matthew 7:12

That is the golden rule, my friend!!!

Let's pretend God exists (which obviously I believe he/she does). A loving God that wants acknowledgement from his creation made in his image with a free will to decide whether to acknowledge God and reciprocate love, or develop a worldview that doesn't have a place for God. Do you think what we choose to believe justifies God's existence? It's humbling that this God that made the seas, the skies, and the harmonics resonating from a single vibrating open string would still want that faith and love from a creation that rejects him.

That rests on the belief that God: A.)Exists, B.)Created Everything, C.)Is Loving, and D.)Needs faith and love like a zombie needs brains. If one pretends God doesn't exist, his concepts of pain, failure, torture, free will, and love become stupid rules in a game.

chauncey wrote: As much as I have questions, I have found that the soul remains a question that doesn't have an answer from any man. Particularly because we can only understand so far as our personal experience lets us.

I have ignored your suggestion of what God wants from us (adoration, apparently, in your estimation), because he isn't registered to the forum, and probably won't post his thoughts. If there were any way to ask him, then surely someone would have used it to do something more important, like prevent 300,000 people from being washed out to sea.

If by "soul" you mean "mind," then I believe it is basically the same biological processes that inhabit the brain of a cat or dolphin. The content, if expressed, is probably more complex and abstract, but the mechanism is basically the same. This makes sense, as our biology is similar. We are related, after all. None of this requires or implies a creator.

If I accept that some things are un-knowable (what happens when I die, etc.), and I think the real world and its obvious truths are enough, then I don't posess the ennui, fear of the unknown and yearning for an answer to the unanswerable that are pre-requisites for anyone interested in acquiring a God.

I believe you said it best:

Life is quite simple, really. We make it complicated for ourselves.

chauncey wrote:Without applying Christ's teachings, I am not a christian. I would question those that claim to be christians without exercising love for their fellow man. The most important teachings are love for God and our fellow man. Everything worth doing on this earth stems from this.

Sorry to sound facetious, but I like to indulge in the sins of my own flesh sometimes - you know, to unwind and relax - and I fail to see how that's for the love of my fellow man or indeed the Big Man.

For someone that would be best described as a 'secular humanist' (because it probably does need to be clarified here) I have a problem with the basic principle being propagated by the religious folk here: that only submission to a godly creator can bring about a valuable and worthy existence.
I would like to see people of whatever faith (but let's focus on the triumvirate of intolerance and contradiction that are the Abrahamic faiths) acknowledge that you can 'love your fellow man' and lead a fulfilling existence without needing a god.

As a child you have no idea how things work or came to be. Gradually you learn things and begin to dissect ideas on your own. At some point the question of God arises - does a sole creator exist? You decide that's a bunch of malarkey or you look into it further.

Religion is notoriously intolerant to the idea of free and critical analysis. Be prepared to accept that when people decide to call it 'malarkey' AND look further into it what they say may not be to your tastes.

why is it that no one considers the idea that perhaps we are looking at it wrong? what's so "wrong" about God intending for us to be able to be happy and the idea that nautre is the way God designed the world.

But then, how is it that we blame God for innaction or say that he directly causes horrible things. If he did pull strings like that doesn't that undo all that we claim is so wonderful about the world and God? Perhaps Adam and Eve were supposed to get kicked out of the garden of eden.... Just like any parent that tells their kid to go do something with their life instead of mooching off the parents.

How is it that "christian" people don't recognize that choices and individuality were the first things that God commanded of man? Believe what you want about the literalness of the story, but isn't living the purpose of life. God doesn't need us for anything.....he's giving us the chance. Isn't the point that despite the flaws of existence, we should get over it and make the best....and do the best we can. Evil and horrible things happen because they happen.....maybe we need to get over ourselves and do what we can to influence good, instead of running around telling everyone what is so bad about the world. Maybe God is giving us the chance to be happy, but we sometimes choose to be miserable and to make others lives equally miserable?

oh....but then we get to blame the devil....or God (whichever is more convinient for us)

To each person, shouldn't we leave it to them to move through their life trying to find whatever it is they think they feel a need to search for. The existence of God can't be "confirmed" through the means of debate. I think even God would say to do what you beleive and things will work out how they are going to work out, but....of course I don't believe that God is sitting around waiting to smite people for not having been born/raised/able to come to a realization about his existence....I believe that God does love us. I think he will "judge" us on how we carry out whatever we truly know and believe, not on following rules based around what we're "supposed" to know or how we're supposed to believe.

In most of the modern world of Christian interpretation, God has become someone that we should all be ashamed to love. Lucky me....I don't subscribe to that train of thought. But lucky me again....my beliefs allow me to decide for myself.

chauncey wrote:Read the book of Job.

My favorite Book in the Bible!

We are cursed, as is the ground we walk on.

Christ was here for redemption - to redeem the world. One day it will be redeemed and the meek will inherit the earth, but not as it is now, it will be a much finer home than it is now.

Hold on there, my friend. You just hold on a minute, pilgrim. Why all this focus on the Second Coming? This is something I never understand. Wasn't the first one good enough?

Let's look at the visit Jesus has already made. It was a pretty good one. Did he want you to be cursed? Did Jesus want pain and suffering? He was a healer, above all. He cured non-believers, too. How could such a healer as Jesus want you to suffer and be cursed?

Cure of centurion's son Mt 8:5-13 Lk 7:1-10 Jn 4:46-54
Cure of a demoniac Mk 1:23-28 Lk 4:33-37
Peter's mother-in-law Mt 8:14-15 Mk 1:29-31 Lk 4:38-39
A leper Mt 8:1-4 Mk 1:40-45 Lk 5:12-19
A paralytic Mt 9:1-8 Mk 1:40-45 Lk 4:12-19
on and on and on...*

If both we and this land are cursed, what did Jesus die for?



*This first visit was good enough. Jesus wanted to heal in this world as it stands now. He was not waiting for his Second Coming to make this world better.

Cure of a sick man at Bethesda
Healing of a man's withered hand
Raising of the son of the widow of Nain
Healing of a blind and dumb demoniac
Expulsion of demons in Gadara
Raising (curing) of Jairus' daughter
Healing of a woman with a hemorrhage
Restoration of two men's sight
Healing of a mute demoniac
Feeding of the 5000
Exorcism of a Canaanite (Syro-Phoenecian) woman
Healing of a deaf-mute
Feeding of the 4000
Restoration of a man's sight at Bethsaida
Exorcism of a possessed boy
Healing of the blind man Bartimaus
Healing of large numbers of crippled, blind and mute
Healing of a woman on the Sabbath
Raising of Lazarus from the dead
Healing of a man with dropsy
Healing of ten lepers
Healing of two blind men at Jericho
Healing of High Priest's servant's ear

Wow, this thread has drifted. I have entered it 2 times in a row thinking I had not caught up with the racism conversation yet.

bumble wrote:

only here wrote:

laslo wrote:

unarmedman wrote:A woman can make a decision before she gets pregnant. A child never gets to make the choice.

What choice is that? To have sex?

that's the choice exactly, yes.

Because accidents do happen. Birth control does fail. I guess no woman should ever have sex until she is ready willing to give birth to a child. Egads.

any woman or man who chooses to wait for the reasons you listed has made a rational decision and i have no problem seeing the value in that. i can even respect it. egads nothing.

No, please no, not again.
LOOKY OVER HERE: http://www.electrical.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=3804&highlight=abortion

yes, that poll was beaten to death before anyone ever got to clarify what we were actually voting on. let's hope that was not the end of the discussion. bring it up if you want to. been there, read that, crap.