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Now the Bible does record an account of a talking snake. We know that snakes don't talk. It's a fantastical notion. It's magic. Fantasy. Fiction, right? But if you believe in evolution 100% all the way, how can you really make this claim? Specifically, I'm talking about the belief that human beings are nothing more than just another species of animal descended from a primate ancestor. Yet we are the ONLY species that talk.
The biblical lesson *I* was taught growing up was that one particular snake in the Garden of Eden was actually Satan, in the guise of a snake. It wasn't representative of all snakes being able to talk.
I was going to ignore this, but silence infers complicity, and I refuse to be complicit in this ugliness.
How dare you. How effing dare you use what's meant to bring love and healing for something hateful and ugly? You might label yourself a Christian, but you're a Pharisee, Jeff. You pore over scripture, and think you have eternal life, but you deny Christ with every post like this.
My atheist brothers and sisters:
We disagree on the existence of God, we disagree that Christ was His son. But you are my family too, and I love you. I really do. I'm so very sorry. The post Jeff wrote is so disgustingly ugly, and ugliness isn't what Christ is about.
Show me just one good solid piece of evidence that proves God does not exist.
I do agree it is wrong to say there is overwhelming evidence that a god or gods don't exist. More accurately, we can simply say there is no evidence to support the existence of a god or gods. To me, that is not proof that such a being or beings absolutely do NOT exist; it merely reinforces my view that I do not automatically default to the belief in god(s). I acknowledge I could be wrong. There may BE a god, or an infinite number of them for all I (or anyone else) knows.
What I do think there is good evidence of is that gods are the product of the human imagination. Again, this isn't proof-positive that there are no gods, but what it means is that one can actually examine and study the religious rituals, beliefs and scriptures of ancient cultures (which to me is incredibly fascinating) and see how different myths have changed and moved and "evolved." One can even look to The Bible and see the evolution of various myths and deities. Egyptian, Mesopotamian and (to a lesser extent) Greek myths, legends and deities...one can read The Bible and see precedents for many of the things therein in the texts, sculptures, etc of other, older cultures.
Again, at least to me this in no way diminishes the worth of The Bible which I still argue is in many ways the greatest culmination of the human mind and heart in the history of the world.
However, I feel comfortable saying that there is no reason whatsoever to claim that Yahweh--patron deity of some sects of ancient Hebrews--is real and actually exists but deny the existence of any other gods or the validity of any other scriptures or holy texts.
But as far as evidence goes, the complete lack of any evidence of any kind to support the existence of god(s) is also not any kind of proof FOR their existence.
There is no evidence that Cthulhu exists, or invisible unicorns. We shouldn't take that lack of evidence as an indication that those things are real.
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OTOH, I have no problem admitting that I don't know it all or could be wrong.
Come on now. You don't mean this seriously do you?
I was going to ignore this, but silence infers complicity, and I refuse to be complicit in this ugliness.
How dare you. How effing dare you use what's meant to bring love and healing for something hateful and ugly? You might label yourself a Christian, but you're a Pharisee, Jeff. You pore over scripture, and think you have eternal life, but you deny Christ with every post like this.
My atheist brothers and sisters:
We disagree on the existence of God, we disagree that Christ was His son. But you are my family too, and I love you. I really do. I'm so very sorry. The post Jeff wrote is so disgustingly ugly, and ugliness isn't what Christ is about.
And your post is ripe with judgement and venom. You call yourself a Christian, yet align with God haters and people who celebrate sin. My Bible says I should not even eat with such people. But maybe you hate the Bible too.
Here's a simple question for you. The atheists that you praise as your brothers and sisters, yes or no, have they EVER showed ugliness towards me? Do you think calling me a cry baby (and that is just a recent example off the top of my head, I've been called much much worse here) is demonstrative of good people?
"But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people."
1 Corinthians 5:11
Lead people to Christ. Don't celebrate their sin. You seem incapable of separating the two.
And your post is ripe with judgement and venom. You call yourself a Christian, yet align with God haters and people who celebrate sin. My Bible says I should not even eat with such people. But maybe you hate the Bible too.
Here's a simple question for you. The atheists that you praise as your brothers and sisters, yes or no, have they EVER showed ugliness towards me? Do you think calling me a cry baby (and that is just a recent example off the top of my head, I've been called much much worse here) is demonstrative of good people?
"But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people."
1 Corinthians 5:11
Lead people to Christ. Don't celebrate their sin. You seem incapable of separating the two.
She calls you out for saying 100% of atheists are rude all the time. This is impossible. You ignore this and just say she's a bad Christian because she thinks showing kindness and understanding to others is a better method of fulfilling Christ's message then calling them sinners or whatever it is you do.
Let me ask you this: do you sincerely believe that your methods of evangelism are more likely to bring in someone who's on the fence about religion than hers? You can say she's not a real Christian, but there's a reason theology exists. There's no such thing as a real Christian when you really start looking at the world.
This is why people don't like you. This is why people reject your ideology.
Call me hateful or whatever you want. You reap what you sow.
The thing is, it's not. Very few broad statements are ever true and an outlier almost always exists. I know several atheists who have gotten in discussions with religious friends of their and have had no problem being civil during the discussion and remaining friends after. Even if that handful of people only represents 1% of atheists, you're broad statements that they can't be kind to Christians are simply not true.
Are we really going to be this anal? Of course, there are exception, there are exceptions in any category. My opening statement is a general impression of atheists based on my observations. If the mass majority treat Christians like crap then my point stands, and you have to be willingfully blind to sit here and tell me that the vast majority of posts on this very forum are not anti-Christian and mean spirited. We still have a massive thread going on bashing Ken Ham over his attendance numbers. That's a little over the top if you ask me.
I've had people contact me privately to tell me that they had to leave this forum because of the way Christians get treated. You gotta do better than this post if you are going to convince me that atheists are not doing the things I mentioned in my OP. Again, the purpose of my OP was to point out an inconsistent belief.
Are we really going to be this anal? Of course, there are exception, there are exceptions in any category. My opening statement is a general impression of atheists based on my observations. If the mass majority treat Christians like crap then my point stands, and you have to be willingfully blind to sit here and tell me that the vast majority of posts on this very forum are not anti-Christian and mean spirited. We still have a massive thread going on bashing Ken Ham over his attendance numbers. That's a little over the top if you ask me.
I've had people contact me privately to tell me that they had to leave this forum because of the way Christians get treated. You gotta do better than this post if you are going to convince me that atheists are not doing the things I mentioned in my OP. Again, the purpose of my OP was to point out an inconsistent belief.
The mass majority do not even self-identify as "atheist", much less bother to "treat Christians like crap".
Has it never occurred to you that people treat you poorly because that is how you treat them?
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