Religion to become extinct, says model of census data (Holy Spirit, Commandments, pray)

[SeekerSA]

Originally Posted by raison_d'etre

I love how everyone who is against deity based(christian) religion always points to the past for what they probably consider their biggest ammo. I don't know any people that claim to be christian that think what the church did in the past was right. I am sure there are a few nut jobs out there but I haven't met any that think the crusades were a good Idea.

I am sure they don't. It is just like the muslims that claim the religion of peace when all evidence tends to suggest otherwise. The reason this needs reminding of is that the christians always make claims to the past, the bible, the foundations of the Judaic faith etc. Were they allowed to form a theocracy in the USA they would do exactly what the muslim countries have done, what they did in the past with their conquests in the name of god etc. Current secular laws prevent this and only the gay and abortion debates remain. These two alone coupled with atheists woukld go the way of the axe and the way atheists have to hold their tongue in RL USA for fear of losing their jobs speaks volumes of the mindset of US xians.

However, have you seen any modern and I mean like in the past 20 years commit atrocities such as the crusades by the Christian church? And I don't mean a small group of nut jobs who drank something. I mean killed thousands? FYI, Muslims are not Christians. And technically the muslim religion is still going through its dark age.

How about Uganda where the Focus on the Family influence has resulted in persecution of gays? The atrocities of modern xianity may be less than islam but then again, more than 50% US xians support the war on terror which is nothing but a guise for oil. You lot are really pathetic at winning wars and have had your a$$es handed to you a number of times the last 50 years. All it is, is lust of empire and world domination, the rest of the world is getting tired of these antiques.

And honestly, IMO I think that people who believe in some form of spiritual religion are smarter then people who don't.

Like muslims that behead and flog people, I get it, your standards for smart and mine obviously differ greatly.

Didn't say that all science was not factual. But, a lot of science is guess work that is waiting to be proven. Some science is still in the study phase and therefore any hypothesis is not factual. You ever notice how science is always looking at things in at their smallest level to figure them out? I wish they would try looking at the bigger picture and study that.

There is a cartoon that answers this:

That is where theology and philosophy come in. Science looks at the smallest form, while theology and philosophy look mostly in larger form.

I disagree, theology is always trying to inject god into the scientific equation where he is not needed. You obviously do not understand the SM, it is looking at the big picture, form the hypothesis, this is not based on a conclusion, it is ordered speculation or prediction and research reveals the prediction is either true or false. It does set a target. It self corrects if new evidence is introduced.

Rifleman is better at explaining this than me.

Actually there are many active religions that are not based off Christianity or the god of the bible. Far too many to list. Just look up non christian religions.

Appeal to numbers argumentum ad numerum. Which means there are so many other doing it it must be true.


Science verses religion is NOT a popularity contest.


We may as well include aspects of harry potter, alchemy, the sorcerer's apprentice into science if you want theology included. Neither add value in the pursuit of knowledge. Science is not a belief. It is fact. Stuff in hypothesis mode just has not reached the level of theory yet.

I just find it weird that US theists see science as some axis of evil. Theists here tried introducing ID into the curriculum last year, they were outvoted in a poll 98% to 2%. We thankfully have true separation of religion and state, religion is not even taught in schools anymore except folk wanting to take it as a subject which are extracurricular classes. Everyone must do Math and Science, those subjects are not electable. It starts at junior school and follows through 10 years. 76% here still self identify as xian.

[MysticPhD]

Originally Posted by SeekerSA

I( addressed this in the other thread no need to repeat it here. Also see my previous post to GR

I do not agree, it is not the most sophisticated, it is the one that encompasses all the pagan religions that were banned. It was and remains a geopolitical tool.

The stagnation of 1600 odd years is anyway an oxy moron as if there was supposed to be newer revelations, one should the include that of islam and you and I both know you are NOT going to do that other than appeal to the concept that here we also have folk more or less on the right path or something equally lame. Where are these things that should have taken place? If they only started with the reformation, that is questionable as the reformers were still dealing with high illiteracy rates. Nothing came about till the 20th century when folk became literate as the norm and all we see is a plethora of varying theologies that really do not differ much. They all evolved from what was taken from the RCC. You had a flawed model to begin with. Thankfully they did not destroy everything and access to later findings paints a whole new picture of what the early folk thought like the gnostic gospels and other ancient manuscripts.

When the foundational document is tossed, what are you left with other than your own innate desire that god somehow still exists. I too held to the belief that in spite of the Romans, there was enough to hold onto but that diminished the more I researched.

The concept of the jewish scriptures being faithfully reproduced w/o error turned out to be a lie, there was a major rewrite and the merging of two separate beliefs to form one belief after the 1st diaspora. Then we get to the very questionable claims of the Hebrew scriptures and it turns out most of that was mere fabrication, yet we are expected to take this as the inerrant word of god OR accept that the scribes were not tuned in properly to the god orator. The fact is, it has always been man making crap up to control the masses, that theme is self evident throughout scriptures.

As has been amply demonstrated in this thread, there is still a need to make a connection to other theists for validation and that in itself proves that the version you adhere to differs very little from the other folk wanting their confirmation bias stroked.

It is the provincialism of the separate religions that has abetted the stagnation of human understanding of God and our purpose. You continue to berate the understandings individually instead of trying to see the larger picture presented by their aggregate efforts to understand. We are all looking at the same world and trying to understand the same (and only) God. We have something to learn from all the efforts . . . and ONLY in such aggregate synthesis can we get a clearer picture of what we all see and have been motivated to record of our understanding over the long years of our recorded history. Provincialism is anathema to understanding God.

[SeekerSA]

Originally Posted by raison_d'etre

What cases would that be? Tell me, what does one who believes in something spiritual have to lose?

Do you understand pascal's wager? To simply believe as if there was a god is illogical, evidence suggests god does not exist as there are too many to have to apply this to "just in case". If your god is not one of the thousands we know, then it is merely a revised version or a new invention which seems to be the case of those arguing for on this thread.

As I said, (1)I didn't realize I was suffering until I began down my path. Every person chooses their own suffering, some without knowing it.
I am not saying that someone who is spiritual never suffers. But, they can realize this suffering and work to fix it. Call it a copout if you want, but belief that there is something more out there that can help us through our toughest times without cost, is amazing. (2)Tell me what nonspiritual activity do you know of that can create the same results and bring that level of hope to a persons life?

(1)This alone is a red flag for me and a sign you were perhaps duped. It is the typical bait and switch all theists use. They got me this way too.

(2)Hypnotism, psychotherapy etc. It does not seem like you really had issues to start off with but the details are lacking so I really cannot pass judgment. I went through a process of "inner healing" where you are encouraged to review your life, reopen old wounds face them address them and forgive whoever was responsible.

I was nearly molested as a youth but had effectively gotten over it w/o any negative effects, my parents did not even know, the neighbor's son was a pedophile and tried to rape me, it did not work as I managed to get out of there. He was 17 and I was 9. Now somehow this was supposed to be one of the things not allowing me to connect to god, well I went through the whole counseling session and nothing changed, just another scheme to sell books or get clientele. I was convinced for awhile that it had worked but really, I had no issues about this to start off with, I was not preying on little boys, was not being unfaithful to my wife, these were just all experiences of growing up. I really was not abused except a few thrashings by my father, but I got over that and actually beat him up, kicked him out the house when he tried to take a belt to my older sister, I was 16 and she was 23. He came back and apologized and life went on.

No, there is no hell card. I am talking about regular everyday suffering of humankind. Financial, relationship, career, and any other area of life.

Another red flag, I should take my woes of victim to the economic meltdown as a punishment from god 'cause I cannot get a job? I am too old for the market an thus have to survive in my own business which at present is uber quiet as folk do not have money to do home improvements. There is no god causing this, financial, relationship problems are in the same boat, you are a result of good or poor choices, there is no god micromanaging your life. If this were so, I would not have seen a business fold when I was a christian, it failed because of the economy downturn and I had not made plans for this and wasted money on fancy cars. Yet the advice I got at the time which I foolishly believed is that "god will provide" - I should have rather been focusing on stock market trends. Never mind, still have the car but I had to lose a house to settle the lease I could not get out of. It stands a monumental reminder of my own stupidity.

I have and hope that others one day will as well, no matter where or how they find it, spiritual or not.

No comment

I don't feel you think it is a joke. (1)How do you know you didn't have spiritual experiences? To get down to it, and put aside all arguments, for a person to have faith, (2)is not a lack of intelligence, it doesn't mean they are extremists or bad people. Same goes for nonbelievers. Honestly, most people on both sides of this debate are good people who just want to live their life as they see fit, without someone bashing their beliefs.

(1) I know now they were not, I was victim to my own imaginations

(2) I do not think it has anything to do with intelligence or not, I was duped and I have a pretty high IQ and consider myself reasonable intelligent and clear minded. I fell victim to the power of suggestion and wasted years trying to be what was unachievable. My path out dictated that I evaluate these "real" experiences and came to the conclusion after mush research, it was real because I made it real in my mind.

Both our experiences could benefit someone. As you, I too challenge and question things, but I am open to them and don't form an opinion before I do some digging.

I have an opinion already as I have been there with some dedication I might add and believe me I dug very deep.

And just to clear something up for everyone... I am not a Christian. However, I do support the right of others to practice their religion, no matter their religions past transgressions.

So do I but when positing an idea here one should expect to be challenged, plus if there is no debate what fun is there?

[raison_d'etre]

Originally Posted by SeekerSA

I am sure they don't. It is just like the muslims that claim the religion of peace when all evidence tends to suggest otherwise. The reason this needs reminding of is that the christians always make claims to the past, the bible, the foundations of the Judaic faith etc. Were they allowed to form a theocracy in the USA they would do exactly what the muslim countries have done, what they did in the past with their conquests in the name of god etc. Current secular laws prevent this and only the gay and abortion debates remain. These two alone coupled with atheists woukld go the way of the axe and the way atheists have to hold their tongue in RL USA for fear of losing their jobs speaks volumes of the mindset of US xians.

Actually the muslim religion is one of peace. What is happening in the muslim world is something that has been happening for thousands of years and by all accounts should have died off and will. Christianity went through this as well. People of power use religion as an egotistical tool to promote their ways. It is wrong and abusive towards the people that are sometimes forced to believe follow it.

Trust me, the theocracy you speak of would never happen, but if by some strange chance it did, there would be people who are religious that would stop such atrocities from happening. Trust me, a christian theocracy would die a few days after it had started. Most "Christians" are very flawed people and according to their own religion commit sins all the time. After all, according to them it is in our nature to sin. They would all realize that their own laws would cause them to be punished for their sins. See, it would never work. Give the muslim world time, it will find it's way, or destroy itself.

How about Uganda where the Focus on the Family influence has resulted in persecution of gays? The atrocities of modern xianity may be less than islam but then again, more than 50% US xians support the war on terror which is nothing but a guise for oil. You lot are really pathetic at winning wars and have had your a$$es handed to you a number of times the last 50 years. All it is, is lust of empire and world domination, the rest of the world is getting tired of these antiques.

Actually, the rest of the world could care less for the rest of the world. Their way of thinking is to leave a country to its own fate. The US is unfortunately a pillar of light for many people in other countries that are being persecuted by their own people. Also, just to note... If more countries were like America in getting involved and telling leaders who are killing their own people to stop and step down or be taken down. Sure, there are other reasons behind every war. The war on Terror is most certainly a war on oil, but do you think that taking down Saddam or finding Osama is not a good idea? These men have killed thousands of innocent people for what?

I honestly think that the only way for peace to happen is for it to be enforced by serious punishment or death. Commit a crime and lose a limb or die, no jail, just a trial and then depending on the verdict....take them out back and pull the trigger or cut of a body part. I bet there would be less crime. Oh, and repeat offenders...Death. No question about it. To be fair, maybe give all criminals time for a appeal.

Like muslims that behead and flog people, I get it, your standards for smart and mine obviously differ greatly.

Yup, because they are the top of the list for spiritual role models. Grow up will you. How about you stop using this as your only ammo. Seriously, let me get this into your head. NOT ALL SPIRITUAL PEOPLE ARE BAD PEOPLE, MOST AND I MEAN LIKE 80% ARE HUMANITARIANS AND HAVE NEVER HARMED ANOTHER PERSON. Do I need to increase the font size or make the words blink rapidly for it to soak in? Stop comparing a small number of idiots who do terrible things to people who most often just go about their day like everyone else.

Obviously you are in South Africa, that is clear. Some terrible things are going on in Africa. You cannot blame it all on religion. That is only a name evil people put on their campaign to justify it to others who are dumb enough to follow them.

There is a cartoon that answers this:

Yeah, umm... I don't think you understood what I was saying.

I disagree, theology is always trying to inject god into the scientific equation where he is not needed. You obviously do not understand the SM, it is looking at the big picture, form the hypothesis, this is not based on a conclusion, it is ordered speculation or prediction and research reveals the prediction is either true or false. It does set a target. It self corrects if new evidence is introduced.

Rifleman is better at explaining this than me.

As we have already established, I do understand SM. What we have not established is you understanding religion or spirituality. Let's face it, you don't. You have made up your mind about it and that makes you very close minded. To understand spirituality and religion you need an open mind. You would think the same goes for science, but it doesn't Science relies on "laws" and facts that are not to be questioned. If Science can't explain it, it can't be possible. Isn't that what we thought about flight and space travel at one time?

Yes, science adapts to a changing world. Guess what? So does religion. Most religious people accept scientific fact. They just include it into their belief system. How is this bad? It allows them to remain open minded.

Appeal to numbers argumentum ad numerum. Which means there are so many other doing it it must be true.

Science verses religion is NOT a popularity contest.

We may as well include aspects of harry potter, alchemy, the sorcerer's apprentice into science if you want theology included. Neither add value in the pursuit of knowledge. Science is not a belief. It is fact. Stuff in hypothesis mode just has not reached the level of theory yet.

If it hasn't been proven and it is still a hypothesis then it is still a "belief", put all the fancy wording to it that you want. I have a hypothesis that there is a higher spiritual essence than what we experience. I also hypothesis that there is a spiritual life after a mortal life and that it is only for a brief amount of time before you are given another mortal life. There according to your logic I cannot be proved wrong as my hypothesis has not reached the level of theory.

I just find it weird that US theists see science as some axis of evil. Theists here tried introducing ID into the curriculum last year, they were outvoted in a poll 98% to 2%. We thankfully have true separation of religion and state, religion is not even taught in schools anymore except folk wanting to take it as a subject which are extracurricular classes. Everyone must do Math and Science, those subjects are not electable. It starts at junior school and follows through 10 years. 76% here still self identify as xian.

And now the truth comes out. Yes, we US theists condemn science as magic and the work of the devil. HAHAHA, have you ever even been to the USA and studied with multiple theists? If you had, you would know that most of us theists do not find science as evil. We just feel that science cannot explain everything, yet. A true separation of church and state would be nice. Then I wouldn't have to worry about smoking Pot in my religious practices(that was a joke AKA I don't smoke pot). And true separation of church and state would mean that the state or government could not protect me and my right to practice religion. If my right to practice religion isn't protected then why should any other rights be? Why should the right to marry whomever you choose be protected? Why shouldn't the right to control your own body, ie. abortions be protected? And most of all, Why should anyone's right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness be protected?

Just curious, how do you feel about religious missionaries being killed or having villages or towns that practice a certain religion being slaughtered because of their faith? Do you feel that is right? that they had it coming to them? Just trying to figure out your agenda here.

Ok, it is late. I am going to go meditate, pray and do some reiki then go to sleep where I will experience lucid dreams of another time or place. Good night all.

[raison_d'etre]

Originally Posted by SeekerSA

Do you understand pascal's wager? To simply believe as if there was a god is illogical, evidence suggests god does not exist as there are too many to have to apply this to "just in case". If your god is not one of the thousands we know, then it is merely a revised version or a new invention which seems to be the case of those arguing for on this thread.

Actually, evidence does not suggest this as there is no evidence. Lack of evidence does not equal evidence. Pascal's wager is unique to the individuals faith and beliefs.

(1)This alone is a red flag for me and a sign you were perhaps duped. It is the typical bait and switch all theists use. They got me this way too.

Nope, not duped. I read both sides of all things and make up my own mind, through study and experience.

(2)Hypnotism, psychotherapy etc. It does not seem like you really had issues to start off with but the details are lacking so I really cannot pass judgment. I went through a process of "inner healing" where you are encouraged to review your life, reopen old wounds face them address them and forgive whoever was responsible.

I was nearly molested as a youth but had effectively gotten over it w/o any negative effects, my parents did not even know, the neighbor's son was a pedophile and tried to rape me, it did not work as I managed to get out of there. He was 17 and I was 9. Now somehow this was supposed to be one of the things not allowing me to connect to god, well I went through the whole counseling session and nothing changed, just another scheme to sell books or get clientele. I was convinced for awhile that it had worked but really, I had no issues about this to start off with, I was not preying on little boys, was not being unfaithful to my wife, these were just all experiences of growing up. I really was not abused except a few thrashings by my father, but I got over that and actually beat him up, kicked him out the house when he tried to take a belt to my older sister, I was 16 and she was 23. He came back and apologized and life went on.

Hypnotism is actually in the spiritual real as well as psychotherapy. We call them tools to further understand life. I have gone through both. Trust me, I had issues. I would be more than happy to discuss them in a private message as some are fairly personal.

Another red flag, I should take my woes of victim to the economic meltdown as a punishment from god 'cause I cannot get a job? I am too old for the market an thus have to survive in my own business which at present is uber quiet as folk do not have money to do home improvements. There is no god causing this, financial, relationship problems are in the same boat, you are a result of good or poor choices, there is no god micromanaging your life. If this were so, I would not have seen a business fold when I was a christian, it failed because of the economy downturn and I had not made plans for this and wasted money on fancy cars. Yet the advice I got at the time which I foolishly believed is that "god will provide" - I should have rather been focusing on stock market trends. Never mind, still have the car but I had to lose a house to settle the lease I could not get out of. It stands a monumental reminder of my own stupidity.

I never said that a god was causing these things to happen. What I meant and you obviously misunderstood was that the things that I have learned regarding spirituality have helped my understand and except the things that where/are happening to me and way to make them better or be rid of them completely.

(1) I know now they were not, I was victim to my own imaginations

How did you discover it was your own imagination? Where you duped by someone else?

(2) I do not think it has anything to do with intelligence or not, I was duped and I have a pretty high IQ and consider myself reasonable intelligent and clear minded. I fell victim to the power of suggestion and wasted years trying to be what was unachievable. My path out dictated that I evaluate these "real" experiences and came to the conclusion after mush research, it was real because I made it real in my mind.

What exactly do you feel was unachievable? Enlightenment? Afterlife? What?

I have an opinion already as I have been there with some dedication I might add and believe me I dug very deep.

But, forming an opinion about something before digging deeper into it will only result in you coming to the conclusion of your initial opinion.

So do I but when positing an idea here one should expect to be challenged, plus if there is no debate what fun is there?

Why do you think I posted in this thread. I love a challenge and a chance to tell my story to others who are pretty much asking for me to share it. I must say that even though our opinions are quite different in some areas. I feel that you are a very wise person and I truly enjoy debating with you.

With that, again... I must say goodnight.

[SeekerSA]

Originally Posted by MysticPhD

It is the provincialism of the separate religions that has abetted the stagnation of human understanding of God and our purpose.

I disagree, if this god exists, then the provincialism would not have been an issue to start off with, your mysticism should have taken root and survived even orally. This did not happen as the masses were being told what to believe. Without literacy, how could you form an opinion? You dared not challenge the authority of the priest, only in an enlightened late 20th century did we see the advent of atheism becoming more transparent, the reemergence of UR and many other tangents to other beliefs. Even now many folk still have no cooking clue of the church history and the bible has been fluffed up to appeal to good emotions, the release of endorphins either by self or group hypnosis. Did you ever wath those vids I posted of an atheist converting non believers?

You continue to berate the understandings individually instead of trying to see the larger picture presented by their aggregate efforts to understand.

There is no aggregate effort other than what I term group think,

1. individuality = bad
2. group identity = good.

That is any way not the message I got studying and of course we are inundated it is not a belief but a relationship. Such conflicting views that encourage both options above. How pray tell are the two compatible?

The group sets up the rules and then within those rules you are supposed to have a personal relationship, that in itself is not possible as relationships are part of (a) balanced formula(e) IOW a two way street.

To achieve the relationship, you have to enter into or think you are entering into a more receptive mode aka altered state of mind.

Why so complex?

A simple in person appearance will remove all doubt. Instead we are inundated with jesus icons, paintings and the like, 10 commandments posted everywhere boiling down to if you say it enough times people will believe it. It is the meme of the politicians and the religious alike.

We are all looking at the same world and trying to understand the same (and only) God. We have something to learn from all the efforts . . . and ONLY in such aggregate synthesis can we get a clearer picture of what we all see and have been motivated to record of our understanding over the long years of our recorded history. Provincialism is anathema to understanding God.

Please keep the language dumbed down, I do not want to have to google to try and figure out what you are trying to say.

From the word salad above, I can only surmise you are saying that all contexts of faith should be observed and a conclusion drawn from them?

If that is the case, then I agree and the default conclusion is thus atheism.

In your case and most of UR folk, the idea of finally dismissing this as BS is one step too far. You really are not doing anything much different to the ET folk and each have their own cherry pick reinvented bibles to work from. One is supposed to read the entire account and come to the conclusion god exists because a book written by men says so?

Yet we cannot ignore the obvious human nature of this god, mirror it to political escapades and you see it is but a control mechanism. Any god of merit should have attributes other than the failings of man, yet we see the bipolar nature of this god throughout the bible. Even the alleged son does not seem to have a good handle on the nature of god, goes from being very loving to very angry in a matter of a few short verses.

The crux of the matter is where do we draw the line to sift out the garbage, what formula is the correct one? Been away from her for over two years and returning nothing has changed, there are just a few more UR folk here and the old ETers are still all ETer's - ya know looking at the collective and all

Lastly, this whole premise of uber spirituality is spun by both camps and neither of them make sense, one camp pass off platitudes as you are where you need to be right now and the other you cannot understand w/o the infilling of the HS.

All of this is BS as I have operated in both camps and this uber spirituality still does not answer the question of how to get there, lots of words but little content. We are then left in exactly the same camp as the mainstream, you must have faith, god will reveal it to you in due season, simply believe. Criticize the source, the bible, it is seen as an attack on the believer. Yet no one even peeps out of their lil' box to attempt to rebut and simply give a link to an apologetic site which 99% of the time does not make sense.

Embracing UR, the contradictions do not go away, the apologetics just get more creative. In a nutshell, you ignore the stuff ET purport and visa versa, same myth, different spin.

[SeekerSA]

Originally Posted by raison_d'etre

Actually the muslim religion is one of peace. What is happening in the muslim world is something that has been happening for thousands of years and by all accounts should have died off and will. Christianity went through this as well. People of power use religion as an egotistical tool to promote their ways. It is wrong and abusive towards the people that are sometimes forced to believe follow it.

The signs of absolute power corrupting absolutely is what is in evidence. And yes they are forced to follow it, that is not going to change anytime soon

Trust me, the theocracy you speak of would never happen, but if by some strange chance it did, there would be people who are religious that would stop such atrocities from happening. Trust me, a christian theocracy would die a few days after it had started. Most "Christians" are very flawed people and according to their own religion commit sins all the time. After all, according to them it is in our nature to sin. They would all realize that their own laws would cause them to be punished for their sins. See, it would never work. Give the muslim world time, it will find it's way, or destroy itself.

Not really, a theocracy would rewrite the constitution and that in time will progress to what we see in the muslim world today. The moderate muslims in these countries are powerless to voice their opinion as they fear for their lives. Were xians prepared to abandon the archaic laws and rewrite the bible to exclude the stoning parts then maybe you would have a point.

Actually, the rest of the world could care less for the rest of the world. Their way of thinking is to leave a country to its own fate. The US is unfortunately a pillar of light for many people in other countries that are being persecuted by their own people. Also, just to note... If more countries were like America in getting involved and telling leaders who are killing their own people to stop and step down or be taken down. Sure, there are other reasons behind every war. The war on Terror is most certainly a war on oil, but do you think that taking down Saddam or finding Osama is not a good idea? These men have killed thousands of innocent people for what?

Countries like Britain and France and Belgium and Germany have learned from their colonial aspirations and failures, the USA however since WW2 has a woody for sticking their noses in where it is not required, hot on the heels of military are the religious peddling their wares.

Saddam was bad but what do you have now? Anarchy, it was all about oil anyway. Who did the USA support in the Iraq/Iran war? Saddam. Who did the USA support in the Russian Afghanistan war? The Taliban. You created a monster you could not kill. All that has happened is to wake a sleeping giant.

I honestly think that the only way for peace to happen is for it to be enforced by serious punishment or death. Commit a crime and lose a limb or die, no jail, just a trial and then depending on the verdict....take them out back and pull the trigger or cut of a body part. I bet there would be less crime. Oh, and repeat offenders...Death. No question about it. To be fair, maybe give all criminals time for a appeal.

And this ladies and gents is exactly the type of thinking that has to be opposed. Hint of a theocracy? You actually seem to like the way the muslim govts do it, thankfully your type remain the minority.

Th death penalty NEVER prevented murder there are always mitigating circumstances.

How about a murderer kills a wife and possibly an accident, give the bereaved widower a gun and let him kill the murder's wife. That sounds fair? See when you enter this slippery slope, anything is possible.

Yup, because they are the top of the list for spiritual role models. Grow up will you. How about you stop using this as your only ammo. Seriously, let me get this into your head. NOT ALL SPIRITUAL PEOPLE ARE BAD PEOPLE, MOST AND I MEAN LIKE 80% ARE HUMANITARIANS AND HAVE NEVER HARMED ANOTHER PERSON. Do I need to increase the font size or make the words blink rapidly for it to soak in? Stop comparing a small number of idiots who do terrible things to people who most often just go about their day like everyone else.

I blame the religion, there is no excuse for it. We see absolute power corrupting absolutely under the guise of an invisible non existent god.

Obviously you are in South Africa, that is clear. Some terrible things are going on in Africa. You cannot blame it all on religion. That is only a name evil people put on their campaign to justify it to others who are dumb enough to follow them.

Most of it is due to religion. And yes you answered your question yourself, the gullible follow those that are able to influence their people. The muslim is the threat, the xian is the threat, the gay is the threat. We still have some residual the white man is the threat here in SA but barring a 80% majority, the constitution cannot be changed. Even then it has to be passed by our Constitutional Court, they have the final say, not the President and not the lawmakers.

Yeah, umm... I don't think you understood what I was saying.

No I understood very well, you want to include the big picture of theology.

As we have already established, I do understand SM. What we have not established is you understanding religion or spirituality. Let's face it, you don't.

Possibly this spiritual fossil record garbage yes. As for what you think I know, self projection again

You have made up your mind about it and that makes you very close minded. To understand spirituality and religion you need an open mind. You would think the same goes for science, but it doesn't Science relies on "laws" and facts that are not to be questioned. If Science can't explain it, it can't be possible. Isn't that what we thought about flight and space travel at one time?

No I have sampled both sides of the divide, come to my conclusions which leave no room to return unless I have a brain hemorrhage and forget everything I have learned. I am free from the lies and deception.

Yes, science adapts to a changing world. Guess what? So does religion. Most religious people accept scientific fact. They just include it into their belief system. How is this bad? It allows them to remain open minded.

No they don't they do not amend the texts, they simply try to make the facts fit into their fantasies. That however does not work. Some may not belabor the articles of creation or noah's flood however, one is then told to take this allegorically, that is fine then future prints shoulod gret this out as superseded by science, that never happens

If it hasn't been proven and it is still a hypothesis then it is still a "belief", put all the fancy wording to it that you want. I have a hypothesis that there is a higher spiritual essence than what we experience. I also hypothesis that there is a spiritual life after a mortal life and that it is only for a brief amount of time before you are given another mortal life. There according to your logic I cannot be proved wrong as my hypothesis has not reached the level of theory.

Now test that hypothesis using the SM, you can't because you earlier admitted it cannot be tested that way. Your's is a belief that only you can ratify, an scientific hypothesis is a prediction. If the research fails to reach the prediction, the hypothesis is abandoned or adjusted and the process begins again.

Evolution is accepted as a fact, theory is another name for it just like the theory of gravity is. That theory is amended if any new data comes to the fore, it is not cast in concrete. Theology however and specifically has the bible cast in concrete, you have 3800+ results of research and they all fail to agree on what is truth what is correct doctrine etc. The only thing that unites them is the gay, abortion and evolution/ID debate because these are red meat issues.

And now the truth comes out. Yes, we US theists condemn science as magic and the work of the devil. HAHAHA, have you ever even been to the USA and studied with multiple theists? If you had, you would know that most of us theists do not find science as evil. We just feel that science cannot explain everything, yet. A true separation of church and state would be nice. Then I wouldn't have to worry about smoking Pot in my religious practices(that was a joke AKA I don't smoke pot). And true separation of church and state would mean that the state or government could not protect me and my right to practice religion.

Our constitution does just that. No one is prevented from practicing their religion in their churches, no one may bash other religions publicly and that includes telecasts. Street evangelist must obtain permission from the municipality or landlord to perform this, one cannot simply walk into a mall and start handing out tracts and approaching people, if someone objects, they can be asked to leave. Churches may only post service times on their billboards with appropriate positive messages, nothing like atheists are agents of the devil or gays are an abomination unto the lord etc. Churches are not obliged to marry gays but that has to already be in their articles of faith. Door to door salesmen aka evangelist are not allowed on your premises w/o your express permission that means even if you have no fence they are not allowed to set foot on your property and go knock on your door. They shout from the gate and that is about as far as they are allowed. Entering a cluster complex they have to get past the security, in apartment complexes they can only go to one apartment and sell their ware then they must exit and ring another doorbell from outside, failing to dod so they are guilty of trespassing.

If my right to practice religion isn't protected then why should any other rights be? Why should the right to marry whomever you choose be protected? Why shouldn't the right to control your own body, ie. abortions be protected? And most of all, Why should anyone's right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness be protected?

You probably need new amendments, that however will not happen in light of recent developments where the three key issues are being changed in many states, as a culture, your religion is making you devolve. Our constitution is totally secular, we have no founding document other than the one drawn up in the early 90's. Prior to that gays had no rights, there was freedom of religion that carried over with provisos as explained earlier. We do not see gay parades anymore apart from gay pride carnivals that are sparsely supported, usually the more loud cross dressers that want to make a statement, there are no longer preachers telling them they are an abomination as that is not allowed. Schools may only have assembly opening prayers and scripture reading, no hymns, if the PTA agrees to this. Usually this is not a problem as 76% self identify as xian, there are no posting of 10 commandments or other biblical literature allowed. Students are allowed to skip the religious part of assembly with a letter from their parents.

It has worked fine for 17 years most of which I was still xian and it did not affect me adversely in any way. We have a xian democratic party but they are a nominal party holding only a few seats.

Just curious, how do you feel about religious missionaries being killed or having villages or towns that practice a certain religion being slaughtered because of their faith? Do you feel that is right? that they had it coming to them? Just trying to figure out your agenda here.

No Barbarism in any form has no place in civilized society. That said one need to see why they were attacked, if xian missionaries are going into a predominantly muslim nation, based on stats, one has to realize they are setting themselves as martyrs. Like you said earlier, it does not take much to coerce the gullible and mostly illiterate. Tribalism is still pretty strong in Africa too.

[SeekerSA]

Originally Posted by raison_d'etre

Actually, evidence does not suggest this as there is no evidence. Lack of evidence does not equal evidence. Pascal's wager is unique to the individuals faith and beliefs.

By evidence I mean contradictory evidence that cannot be empirically trusted or proven. The whole concept of theism is faith and belief w/o tangible evidence, this goes throughout scripture.

Nope, not duped. I read both sides of all things and make up my own mind, through study and experience.

Well then we came to different conclusions.

Hypnotism is actually in the spiritual real as well as psychotherapy. We call them tools to further understand life. I have gone through both. Trust me, I had issues. I would be more than happy to discuss them in a private message as some are fairly personal.

No that is not necessary TMI may not be beneficial. Suffice to say if it works for you good, but that does not mean it will for the rest.

I never said that a god was causing these things to happen. What I meant and you obviously misunderstood was that the things that I have learned regarding spirituality have helped my understand and except the things that where/are happening to me and way to make them better or be rid of them completely.

No you did not say it but it is there. Circumstances are of our own doing and sadly in my experience the church is not really a place to seek solace of solutions to your perceived problems. You said you did not realize how bad you were or something like that. You had to join and adapt to a code of rules and in that process, these apparent deficiencies highlighted. In fact all you really need was a support group and if that is what you found best of all to you.

How did you discover it was your own imagination? Where you duped by someone else?

The stuff I perceived as real were not. E.g. I can still invoke tongues at will. This sis not because my gift is irrevocable, as I lost my faith too which is a gift. On my step out I was still very into xian music and had to force myself to abstain. Only then was I able to get free of the crap. This was many years after leaving the church. I still held onto the notion of this imaginary personal relationship. It was exactly like the BA experience only this time I was free indeed.

What exactly do you feel was unachievable? Enlightenment? Afterlife? What?

Trying to be the perfect person, see I never gave up smoking and this was always thrown in my face. Other things too many to mention but I spent much time beating myself up over this. Oh it was fine as long as I led the P&W, cause I was the best musician they had. There were 3 pastors in that time I was there and you have to spend time with them and though they personally had no issue with it, they always came from "what the people would think" or "why are you letting this smoker minister" so yeah I was all entrenched trying to achieve the impossible. Oddly there was no majik fix that they promised. You are really pretty much on your own.

When I joined I was at a vulnerable stage in my life and this played just nicely into their hands, the rest as they say is history, I was duped.

But, forming an opinion about something before digging deeper into it will only result in you coming to the conclusion of your initial opinion.

I already told you I dug VERY DEEP. That digging led me out as I explored everything, all predominant doctrines.

Why do you think I posted in this thread. I love a challenge and a chance to tell my story to others who are pretty much asking for me to share it. I must say that even though our opinions are quite different in some areas. I feel that you are a very wise person and I truly enjoy debating with you.

Thanks, I am reasonable to talk to if not shouted at, you will need to learn when I am simply pulling the Micky out of you.

[SeekerSA]

Originally Posted by MysticPhD

My roots as you call them are Buddhist atheist despite my early Catholic upbringing . . . which I abandoned in my pre-teens. Apparently I was unable to remain "lost" to Jesus . . . He found me . . . and in a spectacular way.

Well now we see it is a merging or two kinds of theology.

You fail to see the significance of the evolutionary record presaging what Jesus accomplished in its most sophisticated and elegant version that has had 2000+ years of validation without replacement.

This is going in circles, it remained that way because of illiteracy, folk being told what to believe, and preying on the superstitions of the forced converts.

I am very familiar with the religions involved, Seeker . . . but the RCC did not produce a complete fabrication . . . they embellished for control purposes a stagnant understanding and refused to evolve their understanding beyond the 1st century carnal ignorance that Paul referred to as "milk" instead of "solid food."

I disagree. My research shows pauls writings not to be anything more than a fake penned by Luke mostly who was not an eyewitness to jesus and we are told as a doctor, his integrity should be trusted. Doctors of that era are not the uber upper-class we have today, they were more in a servitude role and no reason to assume his understanding were any better than the average literate of the day, the writings dating do not coincide with the chronological order of the NT. Paul's alleged stuff should come first See this link for the table on dating.

As you can see, the alleged writings of paul predate the gospels quite a bit and even these are well after the fact of jesus' demise. This poses the question of how reliable the word of mouth was and just who started the religion. It seems pretty odd that the first gospel of Mark lags pauls earliest by 10 years and almost 30 years after jesus' death. The whole angle of him being a roman citizen and a pharisee and the whole legend of his escapades leaves more plausibility in the camp of a Roman plant to reinvent the Judaic religion which by all accounts seemed to have been almost extinct at the alleged time of jesus. The authenticity of these accounts leaves much to be questioned. Hell when I relate to my own past life, I find it hard to remember everything, I have forgotten many people's names I was intimate with and that is picking my own brain. Once I tried to list all the girls I had been out with and at least remember their names, I remember the dates/encounters and stuff but the names? 50% I have no clue, then I had many gf's (not boasting).

So here we are expected to believe the orated version of 30 odd years was not embellished in any way at all? If there were texts, where are they now? That gap which I was not aware of as a new believer, led to more and more investigation. And of course when posing the question, the answer is they were very thorough to pass down the story accurately, I mean that is total garbage. In 30 years no one to write it down, no one that took notes at his many sermons? We know from the accounts, the religious were in attendance. Some of them converted.

Even the OT stories are highly embellished. That ol' faithful hand-me-down rule was a bucket full of holes and held no water. Likewise the alleged accurate copying of the scribes, that to was a lie.

Everything is encrypted into Latin a language only the privileged were able to learn and exclusive for the priestly hierarchy. One also has to assume that NOT all preists were literate either, your local village priest was probably trained in the rituals derived from emperor worship and a book of chants/prayers that was used to conduct services with. The bishops were the holders of the truth, couldn't have a lowly village priest discovering that there may be contradictions. His prime job was to fleece the flock and keep them in control through fear of the pope in Rome who for all intents and purposes was the god of that time.

Whats that saying, follow the money?

There is nothing "new agey" about my Christianity. I just understand Christ's true significance and role in humanity's path to understanding and relating to God. It involves structural scientific understanding of the composition of reality and Christ's role in altering humanity's collective consciousness output to resonate with God's . . . creating a literal "path" to God through resonance with Jesus in "Love of God and each other." It also involves the societal dynamics and acceptance of a belief system necessary to drive human understanding to the point where this would become clear eventually . . . as it has for me.

That in a nutshell boils down to the do no harm golden rule. That is fine but to pretend that what I have stated is wrong still misses the entire argument of 2000 year stagnation, actually only 1200 years if you want to be honest, even 1200 years of tradition, by now what was the original truth if there ever was one to begin with? So many political conquests, the Roman empire went from military to psychological in a few short years and managed to accumulate a crapload of wealth. Their huge cathedrals bear testimony to this.

The reformation was not even a threat to them as they still are the single biggest denomination in the world. Most of the reformers did exactly as the RCC did, they followed the same basic formula, huge churches and raking in the money from the gullible.

Today you see the same principle in operation, you start a church, get some sheep from another flock raise money build a fancy church, and rake in the money, the grander the church, the better for patronage.

It went from this

to this

or this
or

In luxury like

Crouch Estate

Vatican City

St Paul's Cathedral London

Not to mention this eyesore
Crystal cathedral

In this there is a fossil record? Methinks not. There are just more paid pied pipers.

Why change a recipe that has worked for eons? These folk have buit their versions of heaven on earth as they probably know deep down, this life is all you get.

[MysticPhD]

Originally Posted by SeekerSA

Well now we see it is a merging or two kinds of theology.
This is going in circles, it remained that way because of illiteracy, folk being told what to believe, and preying on the superstitions of the forced converts.
I disagree. My research shows pauls writings not to be anything more than a fake penned by Luke mostly who was not an eyewitness to jesus and we are told as a doctor, his integrity should be trusted. Doctors of that era are not the uber upper-class we have today, they were more in a servitude role and no reason to assume his understanding were any better than the average literate of the day, the writings dating do not coincide with the chronological order of the NT. Paul's alleged stuff should come first See this link for the table on dating.

Your 21st century linear time-oriented mindset is completely inappropriate for evaluating our early ancestors who were event-oriented . . . not linear sequence oriented. It is a major contributor to the confusion and misinterpretation of these oral/written/hearsay records.
We agree about the RCC and the hierarchical perversions and exploitations of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We do not agree about Paul.
::Snip::

In this there is a fossil record? Methinks not. There are just more paid pied pipers.

You misunderstand yet again. The spiritual fossil record predates ANY of the RCC corruptions beginning with Constantine . . . and in fact begins prior to much of written human history. I am completely in sympathy with you about the evils perpetrated and perpetuated in the name of Christ through the centuries up to this very day. They are not Christ's fault.