Why dont we all believe????

[livendive 8]

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I mean what person would not want there to be a glorious afterlife, because as I see it that is really the root of or ultimate reward for most religions.

I want to believe the lottery ticket in the console of my truck is a winner. However wanting to believe that won't make it so.

I don't particularly want to believe that there is some great self-absorbed ego in the outer limits of the universe who's obsessed with doing wonderful things for some people, giving trials and tribulations to others, and the whole time expecting to be worshipped by small organic lifeforms that can't even truly grasp the concept of him.

Blues,
Dave

"I AM A PROFESSIONAL EXTREME ATHLETE!"
(drink Mountain Dew)

[Andrewwhyte 1]

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Agreed. Its value lies in what it does for you and what you make of it - and for some people it does a _lot_ of good. Comparisons to the tooth fairy and Santa Claus miss the mark; the tooth fairy doesn't help people save themselves from a lifetime of addiction or debauchery. Often, religion does.

Yes, but often it proposes to do no such thing. The various agricultural gods of Paupa New Guinnea were treated as power without moral stipulation; possessing the secret of a particular god enabled one to force the yielding of good crops or fish or whatever. This belief structure is what enabled the formation of the Cargo Cults of the 1950s and 60s. The Greek Gods were not known as examples of moral rectitude, nor were (are) the Norse Gods or the wikkan gods in all cases. My knowledge of Hindu gods is not great, but Kali does seem to be someone more feared for her power rather than one adored for her righteousness.
If we are talking about the tendancies of religion in general and the human propensity toward it, we must look beyond the God of the old testament.

[billvon 2,990]

>Santa Claus is very much the same way; the children who believe
>in him cause him to be "real" in the same sense that God is.

In a way, yes.

The Santa Claus/God comparison is often seen as offensive by religious types because they think it's belittling God. I think that underestimates the Santa Claus thing. Santa is essentially a symbol for the generosity and love of one's parents; it's the embodiment in a single symbol of a lot of good things. The symbol helps people on both sides. It gives kids (who have simpler minds than adults) a single entity to focus on, and it gives adults an archetype, a framework in which to celebrate a holiday with their kids. In that way, while there is no actual fat man with flying reindeer posing a navigation hazard every December 24th, in a very real way he does exist; people see his acts every year.

Needless to say, Santa has become appropriated by corporate america as well, with predictable results. But that's a different thread.

God is similar, I think. Many worshippers (especially kids) have a very simplistic view of God. Pray for stuff, get stuff. He's a man on a big throne on a cloud. Needless to say, if they grow up, get their pilot's license and go hunting for that man, they won't find him. But that does provide a way to worship that makes sense for them.

Likewise, that belief provides a framework for the rest of the church (whichever church one belongs to) to assemble and worship. If you get far enough into the theology of _any_ church, there are profound disagreements on the details of what God is, and all too often that is used as an argument _against_ God.

But again I think that misses the point. Trying to find God in the details of your own religion, or trying to prove other religions wrong with those details, is like flying that airplane around looking for God. Instead, I think those details provide the framework people use for worship, and as such do a good job maintaining an image of God people can worship. It doesn't matter that much of what God is is unknowable; what matters is what one perception of him (say, the baptist version of who/what he is) accomplishes here on Earth.

And if that perception can accomplish as much as the myth of Santa Claus can, then it's doing a damn good job overall.

[Shotgun 1]

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The Santa Claus/God comparison is often seen as offensive by religious types because they think it's belittling God. I think that underestimates the Santa Claus thing. Santa is essentially a symbol for the generosity and love of one's parents; it's the embodiment in a single symbol of a lot of good things. The symbol helps people on both sides. It gives kids (who have simpler minds than adults).....

I realize that it is usually seen as offensive, and I didn't mean for it to be that way in my post... For me, I was somewhere around 7-8 years old when I fully realized that I didn't believe in this God that everyone at my church worshipped, and so I started trying to understand why everyone else did believe in it. Being a child (with a simple mind), Santa Claus was the closest comparison I could find... The church seemed like a good place that did good things for people, so I sort of thought that most people just pretended to believe in it for the sake of the church (or something like that).

Of course I now realize what religion and the belief in God means to so many people, and even to society in general. (Though I have mixed feelings about whether or not our society would be better off without those beliefs.) I don't think that believing in God makes someone simple-minded. (Who am I to call anyone simple-minded? ;-) It's just not something that works for me personally...

[rehmwa 2]

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The church seemed like a good place that did good things for people, so I sort of thought that most people just pretended to believe in it for the sake of the church (or something like that).......Of course I now realize what religion and the belief in God means to so many people, and even to society in general. (Though I have mixed feelings about whether or not our society would be better off without those beliefs.) I don't think that believing in God makes someone simple-minded. (Who I am to call anyone simple-minded? ;-) It's just not something that works for me personally...

Why, that's kind, tolerant, and accepting of other people's needs.......Even if you don't agree with them. Especially since you don't agree with them, really.

I'd like to use that for myself too and won't change a single word. It's perfect.

thanks

...
Driving is a one dimensional activity - a monkey can do it - being proud of your driving abilities is like being proud of being able to put on pants

[Shotgun 1]

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I'd like to use that for myself too and won't change a single word. It's perfect.

Perfect except for the typo that you made me go back and edit.

I can never tell when you're being sarcastic on here...

[wmw999 2,439]

I'm gonna figure he's not being sarcastic. It's a very nice way to put it.

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[Mockingbird 0]

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Why are we not all believers?

My opinion, which I hope is based on a correct understanding of scripture, is that "believing" has both a mental ingredient (the use of Reason) and a volitional ingredient (the use of desire or Will). If one ingredient is missing, a person *can't* believe. A person may understand who God is and what He wants from us as human beings, but the person's Will may be in opposition to who God is and what God wants. So that guy can't believe. And, another person may want to believe, or have an emotional need to believe, but the bible doesn't make sense to him. So THAT guy can't believe either. For me, I've studied (and still do, because discovery is an ongoing process) the bible as best I can, and most of it makes sense-- who I am, why I'm here, why Jesus came, etc. It didn't always, but God has helped me understand. As for Will, I think God gave me that, too. I didn't always have it.

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If Christianity came with no afterlife promise I imagine there would be very few Christians around today, and there would be another dominant religion that does promise a glorious afterlife.

Even though the afterlife comes up a lot when a Christian tries to explain his faith to a non-Christian, in real life, the afterlife isn't a huge factor for us. It's a great *bonus* and everything, but most of us are more concerned with the present life: whether we are pleasing God by our attitudes and our actions, whether we are experiencing the deepness of relationship with God that we know is possible, etc. We're very happy for the promise of an afterlife-- to us, this present life is just the beginning; we have all eternity to spend with God and each other-- but what occupies most of our "religious" thinking is what we are dealing with in the present. Hope that makes sense. I don't know personally many people of differing religions; I can only speak for Christians... and if I'm misrepresenting them, I'm sure they'll speak up!

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I just am unable to except something that as of to date has no supporting evidence

Good for you that it NEEDS to make sense. Faith without evidence is worthless; it's just blind faith, like a desperate kind of hoping against all odds. That's NOT the biblical description of faith.

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However for some reason I can’t, it almost feels like there is no part of me, or my brain that needs or wants religion, in the same way a non-smoker doesn’t feel the need for a cigarette.

Have you ever sensed God asking you to love Him or give your life to Him? Did you ignore Him, or say No to Him, or choose something over Him? That's the only reason I can think of that He might remove whatever incentive to know Him that you once had. It's like if you ask the same girl to go out over and over but she always refuses, you'll stop asking. (I realize the analogy is lacking.) Jesus extended the invitation to many when he was here; the ones who refused Him weren't usually pursued, but given time and space to think and decide.

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At the end of the day religion has no place in my life, and I have no need for it, but for many life with out religion would be unthinkable.....

I, and I think others who are Christians, see it more as a relationship (one on one) with God, rather than a "religion" (which has to do with ceremonies, rituals, requirements, etc.)

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So if you believe, why, what is it about your particular god/religion that made you decide to embrace it?

And if you Don’t believe, why don’t you believe..

Would it be possible also to have the discussion with anyone quoting endless passages of the bible, or any other religious doctrine??? Please .... Pretty please.....

To be continued. (I'm really pooped from a hard week.)
--

Blue skies & happy jitters ~Mockingbird
"Why is there something rather than nothing?"

[Zenister 0]

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I find very little wrong with religion. Too many people think the way I USED to think - that religion is a crutch.

Organized religion IS a crutch..

however crutches are not bad things when used correctly.. they are simply external support, a means to help you recover to your own abilities.. the problem enters when the crutch(the Church) becomes its own thing, a self serving, self perpetuating structure, unwilling to be left behind when it is no longer needed by the individual or society as a whole..

it then becomes a dead weight. A weight that many people continue to carry, hypnotized by the whispers of the crutch that has convinced them they could have never accomplished anything without it and that any other 'walking staff' someone might have found along their own path is 'the enemy'

____________________________________
Those who fail to learn from the past are simply Doomed.

[zenkith 0]

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Agreed. Its value lies in what it does for you and what you make of it - and for some people it does a _lot_ of good. Comparisons to the tooth fairy and Santa Claus miss the mark; the tooth fairy doesn't help people save themselves from a lifetime of addiction or debauchery. Often, religion does.

Yes, but often it proposes to do no such thing. The various agricultural gods of Paupa New Guinnea were treated as power without moral stipulation; possessing the secret of a particular god enabled one to force the yielding of good crops or fish or whatever. This belief structure is what enabled the formation of the Cargo Cults of the 1950s and 60s. The Greek Gods were not known as examples of moral rectitude, nor were (are) the Norse Gods or the wikkan gods in all cases. My knowledge of Hindu gods is not great, but Kali does seem to be someone more feared for her power rather than one adored for her righteousness.
If we are talking about the tendancies of religion in general and the human propensity toward it, we must look beyond the God of the old testament.

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oh my...what would your daddy say??

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[br0k3n 0]

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Good for you that it NEEDS to make sense. Faith without evidence is worthless; it's just blind faith, like a desperate kind of hoping against all odds. That's NOT the biblical description of faith.

ermmm right so you consider the belief in chritianity does not require "blind faith"!!!!! how exactly did you come to that conclusion???

You believe in a god based on NO evidence what so ever, all you have a is book, that cannot be proven to be fact, and for which there is NO supoorting evidence for at all.

Therefore you have blind faith, and by your own definition blind faith is worthless, therefore your faith is worthless.

Or did I miss something????

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--+ There are 10 types of people in the world: Those who understand binary, and those who don't.. --+

[Lucky... 0]

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It’s funny how important perspective is.

All the reasons that scientist and non-believers bring up are more reason to believe in something. I am not saying Jesse, Allah, or Moses but something greater us.

I love watching documentaries on the planet and animals and all the wonderful life that inhabits this planet. To me there is no way it was just an accident.

To the non-believers I ask this?

According to the theory of evaluation life started, as bacteria now believed to have started at the bottom of the ocean where the earth’s molten crust meats the cold ocean water. Ok I am not saying that wrong but what I am asking is where did those bacteria come from? You say rocks ok where did the rocks come from? Where did the first two objects that are mention in the big bang theory come from? They have to have come from somewhere right?

I find science as more proof that there is a god. I don’t; believe in the descriptions of heaven or Adam and Eve, but I do believe in a god.

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According to the theory of evaluation...

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Ok I am not saying that wrong but what I am asking is where did those bacteria come from? You say rocks ok where did the rocks come from? Where did the first two objects that are mention in the big bang theory come from? They have to have come from somewhere right?

And since we now cannot, and may never be able to "proove" where these things came from, we mist subscribe to the default theory where we simply default to a god if nature is yet unexplainable. Do you see how your theiry is as out there as those who guarantee Jesus, evolution, big bang, etc..?

[Lucky... 0]

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I don't really believe because I am naturally skeptical of things. This makes me an agnostic, because I apply the same skepticism to anyone who says that there isn't a God.

I believe that religion is deeply imbedded within human nature. It's why every culture from around the world throughout history has gods and religion.

We humans want an explanation for everything. In the past, and even at present, there are things that we simply cannot fully grasp and comprehend. But we want an explanation. The easiest explanation is one of God or of Gods.

I find very little wrong with religion. Too many people think the way I USED to think - that religion is a crutch. In the past decade I have concluded that it is not only a coping mechanism for people (and a better one than drugs or alcohol), but it is also a roadmap.

As with anything, it can be perverted. Like a loaded gun, it can be used for purposes both good and evil. But those are exceptions - highly visible exceptions that have little to do with the reality of the vast majority of religious.

Much as it is unfair to label all whites as racist because of the activities of a few white guys in Jasper, Texas, or even the activities of a million white guys spread throughout the country, so is it also unfair to label Catholics as child molesters. How many child molesters are teachers? Way more teachers molest kids than priests, and I'm not about to go cracking teacher jokes.

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Way more teachers molest kids than priests, and I'm not about to go cracking teacher jokes.

Teachers molest priests?

Seriously, I totally agree with your logic...

[shropshire 0]

<> - could be because there are more teachers than priests?

(.)Y(.)
Chivalry is not dead; it only sleeps for want of work to do. - Jerome K Jerome

[br0k3n 0]

where you born a christian? No you weren't, when you were born, you like every other person on this planet was born an athiest......

Babies do not believe in God. Your religion often depends on your upbringing, I suspect that if your parents had been mulslims, then you would not be on this forum today preaching about the christian god and the bible, but about the Koran and Allah.

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--+ There are 10 types of people in the world: Those who understand binary, and those who don't.. --+

[Mockingbird 0]

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ermmm right so you consider the belief in chritianity does not require "blind faith"!!!!! how exactly did you come to that conclusion???

You believe in a god based on NO evidence what so ever, all you have a is book, that cannot be proven to be fact, and for which there is NO supoorting evidence for at all.

Therefore you have blind faith, and by your own definition blind faith is worthless, therefore your faith is worthless.

Or did I miss something????

Skeptics have been trying to discredit the book you mentioned for many years now, but other histories from that time, as well as archeology, continue to prove its authenticity. (The so-called "gospels" that have popped up and been in the news lately were written hundreds of years after Christ.) Broken, I'm not an idiot, and I wouldn't waste my time studying and believing in myth.

(Remember that the "book" is actually a collection of books, written by over 40 authors who had first-hand experience and knowledge of God, and in the N.T., Jesus Christ. They back each other up, too, even tho' they were written in different places and at different times, over several centuries.)

It isn't "blind faith" to believe it. Do you believe Homer's Ilyad to be a genuine work? Or any other ancient writings? Shakespeare's sonnets and plays? or is it just the bible that you doubt? There is more supporting evidence for the Bible than there is for Homer's and Shakespeare's works, and I'll be glad to tell you why this is so if you don't believe it.

"...His purpose in all of this was that the nations should seek after God and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him, though He is not far from any one of us."

Blue skies & happy jitters ~Mockingbird
"Why is there something rather than nothing?"

[shropshire 0]

<> - These are works of fiction and not intended to be taken as gospel, so I (for one) dont understand your comparison.

(.)Y(.)
Chivalry is not dead; it only sleeps for want of work to do. - Jerome K Jerome

[Mockingbird 0]

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There is more supporting evidence for the Bible than there is for Homer's and Shakespeare's works>> - These are works of fiction and not intended to be taken as gospel, so I (for one) dont understand your camparison.

Hi. I'm talking about their authenticity as works of literature (not their genre).

Blue skies & happy jitters ~Mockingbird
"Why is there something rather than nothing?"

[shropshire 0]

Hi back,

Please excuse my ignorance... but is the authenticity of the books of the new testiment in question? I know that the message is and some of the translations but are there questions around who penned them?

.

(.)Y(.)
Chivalry is not dead; it only sleeps for want of work to do. - Jerome K Jerome

[narcimund 0]

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Hi. I'm talking about their authenticity as works of literature (not their genre).

Could you explain what authenticity means? Are you talking about some official stamp of approval?

By the way, the "Iliad" wasn't written down until centuries after it was first told (presumably by a man named Homer although that's not certain.) It's possibly fiction and possibly based on an actual battle at an actual city, although very few people think the details are accurate.

And regarding Shakespeare, again there's significant dispute about WHO wrote these works. And nobody believes they're histories. They're stage plays!

So again, what do you mean by "authentic"? What exactly are you comparing the Bible to again?

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[vortexring 0]

Infinity - this is someone else's theory;

The solar system; the sun, 9 planets orbiting, some with moons, orbiting the planets.
An atom, consisting of a nucleus, varying electrons orbit the nucleus depending on the element, and apparantly tacheons orbit the electrons... hmmm, that seems like a miniture version of something.....spilt an atom/split a star? Wormholes?

How about greater beings than us put us all down together here on earth with perhaps the goal of us all achieving peace and tolerance between all our diffrent cultures and religions? Perhaps there's actually lots of different Gods? Perhaps when we die we go to our own particular God in accordance with race/religion?

Coming from a Christian country I think this theory according to the bible is wrong - but it makes more sense to me. Going by what the bible says doesn't make sense considering its generally a collection of fables.
Turned into a pillar of salt?
Forever merciful and loving?
Infinite time in Hell?
Repentance?
Seems a bit of a contradiction going on......

'for it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "chuck 'im out, the brute!" But it's "saviour of 'is country" when the guns begin to shoot.'

[hairyjuan 0]

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I find very little wrong with religion. Too many people think the way I USED to think - that religion is a crutch.

Organized religion IS a crutch..

however crutches are not bad things when used correctly.. they are simply external support, a means to help you recover to your own abilities.. the problem enters when the crutch(the Church) becomes its own thing, a self serving, self perpetuating structure, unwilling to be left behind when it is no longer needed by the individual or society as a whole..

it then becomes a dead weight. A weight that many people continue to carry, hypnotized by the whispers of the crutch that has convinced them they could have never accomplished anything without it and that any other 'walking staff' someone might have found along their own path is 'the enemy'

religion is more than a crutch, religion is the most insidious mind -control method known to man. Religious "belief" causes dopamine to be released by the brain (the drug that believers are addicted to). the body of factual proof that christ is a myth is undeniable, hence "belief".

GOD IS BORG---RESISTANCE IS NOT FUTILE

we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively


wishers never choose, choosers never wish

[Zenister 0]

wow. do you have any original thoughts?

that entire post is sadly regurgitated, inane christian assertions that are NOT backed by any objective evidence..

literature? absolutely. history? hardly.. they are and always have been Myths.

____________________________________
Those who fail to learn from the past are simply Doomed.

[pajarito 0]

"Man will believe anything as long as it's not in the Bible." - Napoleon

[br0k3n 0]

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"Man will believe anything as long as it's not in the Bible." - Napoleon

*YAWN*

"Man will believe all sorts of crap with out questioning it, so longs as it makes them feel better" - Br0k3n

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--+ There are 10 types of people in the world: Those who understand binary, and those who don't.. --+