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I don't exactly disagree, but IMO if a person is truly content and even happy in their beliefs, then who am I to disabuse them of something that seems to be working fine for them? If my idealistic notions of good and evil and justice and hope had panned out, or at least had been rationalizable, for all I know I'd still be a Christian. Would the abstraction have started leaking for different reasons? Probably, but maybe not.
My prior / late wife was a Christian to the end (rural Methodist) and her faith was a comfort to her. She didn't agree with my budding apostasy, but she understood why it happened. We loved each other anyway. [shrug]
I don't agree that a life of what I regard as belief in intellectually indefensible nonsense is necessarily a wasted life. When writing programs in the C language, some people put opening braces on their own line, and I don't -- I write my code the way the programming gods (Kernihan & Richie) intended, blast it! That is nothing more than my personal preference and it's not objectively right, but it makes me happy and doesn't offend my sense of decorum. Not everything in life needs an airtight justification. However, I understand that K&R bracing is my preference and I don't seek to shame people with different ideas. Indeed, for the past 15 years I've squinted at code at a company that chose a different standard. I did not choose to die on that hill. I followed company policy.
Thrill will doubtless reply that religious ideation can result in harms, and it can, and does -- but not invariably. If it makes you peaceful to think god is in his heaven and all is right on the earth, and you have some weird (to me) ability to selectively ignore your own perceptual equipment when it contradicts that, then so long as you don't hate or try to control people who don't agree with you, then you can make a positive contribution to other people's lives, and it's all good. Or put another way -- if you are advanced enough to understand that your thoughts are just thoughts and not avatars of capital-T Truth or that your thoughts trump actual evidence, then believe whatever you want, including being as logically inconsistent as you please. The problems only come when you start claiming to speak for God Almighty.
The great harms of religion aren't so much inherent in religion or even in the failed epistemology of religious faith, as in the lack of humility and high levels of ego investment in personal rightness. It's possible to hold religious faith loosely and humbly, to emphasize first principles over dogma. Even that is too crufty for me, but I can see how it can work for some folks.
So I don't regard myself as saving people from themselves. I can't do that anyway, people have to do that sort of thing for themselves, on their own terms, if and when they are ready and it they perceive that it will benefit them enough to justify the discomfort of change.
The religious should not confuse arguing against religious faith in a place where people come to discuss exactly that, with some sort of desire to persecute or crush people of faith. Even Thrill, if I don't miss my guess, doesn't want that. He might think the world would on balance be a much better place without Christianity, but I seriously doubt he hates Christians or would want to legislate against them, etc.
My evaluation is pretty much always the same: if the person has heard both sides of Christianity's story--the good, the bad and the ugly about Christianity and they still want to join it then by all means go ahead. Likewise, if a person has heard both sides and want to give Christianity a test run before committing body, heart and soul to it then I think that's a really practical idea. Don't get wrapped up in it to the point it becomes so much a part of your being that you cannot think of living without Jesus even if you hate the religion itself. This is like drug dependence--the addict wants to quit but is so physically dependent on the substance that (s)he cannot. Likewise again, if the person knows both sides of Christianity's story and the person comes to get comfort and fulfillment out of belief in Jesus i.e. the belief produces a good effect on the person then by all means continue believing in Jesus, real or imaginary. In the end all a person should want is a good benefit from Christianity that makes their life easier. Nobody sensible would object to that, not even myself. My only objection would be when this symbiosis with Jesus leads the person to desire to die to be with him--this dangerous nonsense of "All I want in my life is to leave this earth and be with my precious Lord and savior". I find that beyond heartbreaking. I think it's a form of mental and emotional sickness, and i wouldn't have believed this thing about wanting to be with Jesus could reach such a critical point that a person in their right mind could actually start longing for death to be with him if I hadn't actually seen it in here from one of our members, poor guy. Completely unacceptable unless a person were terminally ill or something.
I was speaking to another member in another thread about Ray Comfort, Christian fruitcake extraordinaire and about how he spends his life going onto beaches and into parks to harass people, asking them if they have accepted Jesus and do they know they are going to hell if they haven't. Imagine the temerity of this man party-crashing people's good times with upsetting questions about do they believe in Jesus and telling them they are going to burn for eternity if they don't. It got me to realizing how mentally sick this man really is, spending his entire life trying to make other people miserable. Is it Ray Comfort's fault he does what he does? No. He is only following what the Bible commands him to do. The gospels command every Christian to go out into the world and preach the gospel to every living creature. Ray is just doing what he is told.
But is this normal behavior? Or is there something seriously wrong with the entire Christian paradigm that turns normal well-balanced happy people into vectors infected with the Christian contaminate who then go around infecting other people with their contagion? Watch the video below and see if you don't recognize how Ray Comfort is out there spreading his Jesus virus to otherwise normal happy individuals, exactly like a person infected with influenza spreads their virus to other otherwise healthy people.
Are people watching Ray Comfort beginning to catch on how Christianity has been engineered to behave exactly like a virus that makes people sick and often kills them?
A virus has been designed by nature to carry just a single thread of double-helix DNA called a genome. This thread is pure information that is designed to do only one thing and that is to deliver instructions to its host cells how to duplicate itself endlessly once the virus is able to penetrate the cell host as shown in the diagram below
Once inside the cell the virus hijacks the cell's ability to replicate itself by splicing its DNA into the cell's DNA with instructions how to replicate the virus. Eventually the cell produces billions of viral genomes and swells so large it bursts, killing the cell and spreading billions of viral particles to infect other cells until eventually the host dies of the viral infection.
Christianity works on exactly the same mechanism in this way: the gospel is the virus shell. The double-helix inside the virus shell that infects humans is two Bible verses that intertwine like the double helix below:
John 3:16
"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life."
and John 4:16
"Jesus answered, “I am the (only) way and truth and life. No one comes to the Father except through me."
Christianity's viral double helix message spreads from human to human because one Christian splices John 3:16 and 4:16 into people's normal healthy carefree DNA exactly like viruses splice their DNA into normal healthy cells. This replicating device in Christianity has been encoded into the last lines of each gospel. It is
"Go into all the world a preach the gospel. All who accept it shall be saved and all who reject it shall be damned (to eternal fire in hell)." Mark 16:15
This verse was never found in the original manuscripts of Mark's gospel. It was inserted in there by devious churchmen centuries later who wanted Christianity spread around the known world at that time.
By ordering Christians to continue spreading the words of Jesus found in John 3:16 and 4:16 the church is thus able to insure its perpetual existence. Like a virus hijacking a normal cell, Christianity's insidious message that only Jesus can save you from hell is passed from person to person--infecting them, then hijacking and warping their normal thinking processes into becoming robot-like vectors for Jesus' message that only he can save them from hell.
It's easy to observe how once-ordinary psychologically well-balanced young adults slowly turn into slaves for Jesus just as a virus slowly turns ordinary cells into replicating devices for the virus. These infected individuals abandon their former ambitions to become doctors, scientists, educators, social workers, etc. occupations which benefit society and instead go into missionary work and Bible universities for the sole purpose of spreading Christianity's virulent message around the world "to every living creature" according to the command in the gospels.
The really sad thing about all this is these corrupt churchmen planned all this from the start as a means of perpetually insuring that fortunes in land and money would continuously pour into their coffers to finance their lavish extravagant lifestyles. Without the money, and the the power and prestige that accompanies that money Christianity would have died out long ago. The church sells its devious message that Jesus is the only way to heaven to dupes and rubes who fall under the church's guile that they are doing God's work to save souls. Nothing could be further from the truth. None of this is about saving souls--Christian leadership at the top couldn't care less about saving souls. It's all about getting more money to buy more mansions to live in, more luxurious automobiles to drive around in, more private jets to fly to more exotic locations for more lavish vacations under the pretense they are doing God's work spreading the gospel.
And thus the disease goes on and on bringing wealth to those at the top of the food chain and misery and despair to those at the bottom who often give their last pennies and then go unsheltered and hungry, unable to pay the rent and buy food for their children. Truly Christianity is a virus spreading its contagion throughout the world with the sole intention of infecting every last "living creature" on earth.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TMSRetired
Don't all organized religions do that though ?
Yes, they all do. But over the centuries Christianity has fine tuned their reward/punishment brainwashing system to be one of the most effective.
My evaluation is pretty much always the same: if the person has heard both sides of Christianity's story--the good, the bad and the ugly about Christianity and they still want to join it then by all means go ahead. Likewise, if a person has heard both sides and want to give Christianity a test run before committing body, heart and soul to it then I think that's a really practical idea. Don't get wrapped up in it to the point it becomes so much a part of your being that you cannot think of living without Jesus even if you hate the religion itself. This is like drug dependence--the addict wants to quit but is so physically dependent on the substance that (s)he cannot. Likewise again, if the person knows both sides of Christianity's story and the person comes to get comfort and fulfillment out of belief in Jesus i.e. the belief produces a good effect on the person then by all means continue believing in Jesus, real or imaginary. In the end all a person should want is a good benefit from Christianity that makes their life easier. Nobody sensible would object to that, not even myself. My only objection would be when this symbiosis with Jesus leads the person to desire to die to be with him--this dangerous nonsense of "All I want in my life is to leave this earth and be with my precious Lord and savior". I find that beyond heartbreaking. I think it's a form of mental and emotional sickness, and i wouldn't have believed this thing about wanting to be with Jesus could reach such a critical point that a person in their right mind could actually start longing for death to be with him if I hadn't actually seen it in here from one of our members, poor guy. Completely unacceptable unless a person were terminally ill or something.
This sounds very, very severe. I literally don't know anyone like this.
With that said, I do agree that it's best to really check out a religious system before committing to it - although unless it is a literal cult where they lock you in a room and don't let you leave, there probably isn't much danger.
I don't mind letting it be known that I pray for many posters here on city-data regularly.
The fact is that as far as it goes with you thrill, you've been given an extraordinary gift that is yours for the taking. You've already been given everything you need, and you didn't have to lift a finger for it since you were born into it. It's your inheritance, and is rightfully yours. Your reconciliation with God is as simple as a short trip to the nearest confessional.
Only the most humble people get "miraculous intervention" from God, precisely because they are keenly aware of the fact that they are so undeserving of such an extraordinary grace. How are you working to excel in the virtue of humility so that you can one day see God?
The ONLY part of all the above silliness that is true is:
"you've been given an extraordinary gift that is yours for the taking"
Although it's not what you've been told to believe.
Everybody already has their most precious gift from God, their very soul. But sadly most people are so deceived by spiritually clueless religions that they know nothing about it, let alone learn how to use it's direct connection to the real God. It's his lifeline to each and every person, to give them the true spiritual answers to all of their questions, to even meet God himself. But that will NEVER happen for most of the people trapped in all of the spiritually void man made religions.
That's some serious grasping at straws. Spiritual forces aren't real and prayer is pointless and fake, but the gods will be angry and make the person sicker if you pray for them. LOL
That's a total distortion of his statement and you know it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by EscAlaMike
The only "tangible results" I'm hoping for when I pray is a better conformity of my will to God's.
If you pray/talk to yourself, that's only you telling you to conform to what you tell yourself.
Quote:
Originally Posted by EscAlaMike
You're conflating "lust" and "sexual desire", which is a common mistake people make. Your first sentence, what you rightly condemn, is actually the very definition of lust in Christianity. The "feeling" you described in your second sentence is just sexual desire. It's biological and is not sinful at all, though it can of course lead to sin or become disordered.
I see that you like to play word games.
Quote:
Originally Posted by EscAlaMike
If you made an effort to understand these nuances and distinctions, you may be able to overcome your confusion and psychological hang-ups with regard to sex.
Isn't it against the rules to insult others?
All you seem to get out of your religion is hatred towards anyone who disagrees with your mythology.
The ONLY part of all the above silliness that is true is:
"you've been given an extraordinary gift that is yours for the taking"
Although it's not what you've been told to believe.
Everybody already has their most precious gift from God, their very soul. But sadly most people are so deceived by spiritually clueless religions that they know nothing about it, let alone learn how to use it's direct connection to the real God. It's his lifeline to each and every person, to give them the true spiritual answers to all of their questions, to even meet God himself. But that will NEVER happen for most of the people trapped in all of the spiritually void man-made religions.
Sadly there is so much more WRONG within the man-made religions that any spiritual validity is well-hidden and masked by the virtually complete ignorance of God that has endured for over two millennia, IMO.
I was speaking to another member in another thread about Ray Comfort, Christian fruitcake extraordinaire and about how he spends his life going onto beaches and into parks to harass people, asking them if they have accepted Jesus and do they know they are going to hell if they haven't. Imagine the temerity of this man party-crashing people's good times with upsetting questions about do they believe in Jesus and telling them they are going to burn for eternity if they don't. It got me to realizing how mentally sick this man really is, spending his entire life trying to make other people miserable. Is it Ray Comfort's fault he does what he does? No. He is only following what the Bible commands him to do. The gospels command every Christian to go out into the world and preach the gospel to every living creature. Ray is just doing what he is told.
But is this normal behavior? Or is there something seriously wrong with the entire Christian paradigm that turns normal well-balanced happy people into vectors infected with the Christian contaminate who then go around infecting other people with their contagion? Watch the video below and see if you don't recognize how Ray Comfort is out there spreading his Jesus virus to otherwise normal happy individuals, exactly like a person infected with influenza spreads their virus to other otherwise healthy people.
Sorry, just have time for the first part of this. Yeah, I don't see the point in bashing people over the head with Jesus and hell when they don't ask you about it. I'm for standing on the corner maybe, preaching to everyone who cares to listen. But not going up to people directly (preach the gospel to all people, yes--but wisdom must be involved in that; there is the verse which says not to cast your pearls before swine); that's trying to shove God down someone's throat and God's word teaches against that (as I mentioned about the pearls/swine; there's other verses I can get to when I have the time just can't bring them to mind now). That's for people in the church (and it's not like you're supposed to do that either--all things are to be done in love not in like a threatening, hateful, you-better-listen-or-else-I'm-going-to-personally-get-you-for-it manner) not outside of it.
It's insane to think that people outside the church are supposed to embrace the Biblical morals and values I've espoused. They're just not. So, stop wasting your time and do something more fruitful. You may be doing more harm hammering people over the head with Jesus. But who am I to judge another's servant? They'll have to answer to God for their actions. Just my thoughts and opinions which by no means I expect others to have to share. Peace to you.
Sadly there is so much more WRONG within the man-made religions that any spiritual validity is well-hidden and masked by the virtually complete ignorance of God that has endured for over two millennia, IMO.
And yet only you in those two millennia has figured out the truth. And god has sent you here to City-Data to spread the correct word. Praise be to ego.
Sadly there is so much more WRONG within the man-made religions that any spiritual validity is well-hidden and masked by the virtually complete ignorance of God that has endured for over two millennia, IMO.
Quote:
Originally Posted by phetaroi
And yet only you in those two millennia has figured out the truth. And god has sent you here to City-Data to spread the correct word. Praise be to ego.
People like you who have rejected the stupidity of retaining such a primitive, barbaric, and ignorant view of God have also figured it out. Unfortunately, they have MISTAKENLY rejected belief in God because of it, Phet. Praise be to primitive ignorance and superstition.
Most Christians are BIBLE believers (which is good, but ONLY in the spiritually flexible Hebrew language). Sadly, they are NOT believers in the God CHRIST represented and demonstrated, IMO. I consider that a tragedy and am simply trying to correct it.
Frankly, my ego is tired of "enduring" this world's grossly messed-up life, but it does have a majority of good and decent people and experiences in it. Jesus "endured" far worse savagery so who am I to do otherwise? Our "crosses" today are easier with Him as the Comforter, IMO.
This sounds very, very severe. I literally don't know anyone like this.
With that said, I do agree that it's best to really check out a religious system before committing to it - although unless it is a literal cult where they lock you in a room and don't let you leave, there probably isn't much danger.
JMO.
One doesn't have to be physically locked in a room to be a victim of a cult. Many sects of Christianity lock their members in a psychological room by preying on their sense of guilt and shame by saying,
"You are a filthy sinner and all your acts of goodness that you believe are righteous are nothing but filthy rags in God's sight. You're nothing in God's eyes without Jesus. Only Jesus makes you pleasing in God's eyes. That's why without Jesus Jesus you are headed to hell to burn forever. So give your heart to Jesus and save your soul from burning in fire for eternity."
"All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags" Isaiah 64:6
It's a horrible think to teach people because they are like dumb animals not know up from down so they are very easily brow-beaten by unscrupulous church people.
The worst thing is that children are being taught this kind of filth. It's child abuse worse than physical child abuse, but the separation of church and state make it possible for fanatical Christian parents and pastors to psychologically beat their children senseless to the point they want to commit suicide because of mental torment like this.
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That's some serious grasping at straws. Spiritual forces aren't real and prayer is pointless and fake, but the gods will be angry and make the person sicker if you pray for them. LOL
Sadly there is so much more WRONG within the man-made religions that any spiritual validity is well-hidden and masked by the virtually complete ignorance of God that has endured for over two millennia, IMO. 
