Dreamer and other fundamentalists, a few comments

The BBQ Pit
81

I’m printing that out for future refernce Podkayne :). I do have a question or two for you.

  1. If I believe demons are real and someone else does not but wants to debate it with me, how can either side possibly prove either view is right? The same goes for the whole God issue. No one can prove God, but yet the debates seem to continue on and on.

If I were to attempt to prove the existence of demons and give all the reasons why I believe they are real and what experiences I have had, bible scriptures etc… That still won’t prove a darn thing. So basically your saying just do that and at least you’ll be “debating” since that would be trying to convince the other side of your beliefs?

Since “everything is subject to debate” then so are my beliefs, and theirs. The point of GD IMO is to discuss. The definition for debating is “to discuss or examine a question by presenting and considering arguments on both sides”. My point is that there are debates in which things can be proven and debates in which nothing will ever be resolved. So why can’t I say “this is what I believe and that’s it”? If I added in “prove me wrong” then that would make the difference?

82

lel, I just wanted to say that I am much better at being a loving, kind person and interacting with others on a personal level, then I am at debating. Obviously ;). But still I want to grow as a person. I’m an incredibly social human being and I enjoy very much interacting with new people. The reason I’m addicted to this place (as much as anyone else) is because there are so many different people here that I would not have the opportunity to communicate with IRL. If I can learn from you or anyone else, something that I would of never thought of or learned before, then that’s a blessing to me. I’d like to become a respected debater, (or a blessing to anyone else) though I’m okay with the fact that that may never happen, but I’m still gonna throw my 2c around in there. Well, maybe not “throw it around” quite as much as before :D.

83

[quote]
For those of you who think our God is hateful because He “wants to torture people 4ever”, you need to realize that we are all sinners.

[quote]

You mean this omnipotent being created us likely not to follow his will and at the same time planned a place to roast forever those who won’t obey his will, knowing perfectly well some at least will? Seems pretty much fucked to me.

But well…we’re sinners (it means we don’t necessarily follow the arbitrary rules set by god). Likewise, children are disobedient.

Yep…that’s fine…since he’s all loving, certainly everybody without exception will make it to Heaven. He certainly want us to all be happy…doesn’t he?
Similarily, daddy gave us a way not to be punished : don’t eat the cookies.

[quoteIf we keep rejecting it over and over, we send ourselves to Hell, its our own fault. [quote]

Our fault? You mean that actually people want to go to hell? Or do you mean that god created hell, decided what category of people deserve it, and will throw them in the eternal fire? Can you explain in what way he isn’t responsible of this awful fate.
Pursuing my analogy : if the child nevertheless eat the cookies, he will have chosen to have all his bones broken and to be skinned alive by daddy. It’s his own fault.

Daddy didn’t like to beat his children, but he beat them to death nevertheless. Once again…will you acquit this dad when you’ll be in the jury?

So, it seems he was unable to prevent people from going to hell, despite all his efforts? Do you mean he’s unable to prevent someone to go there? That he can’t just say : there will be no hell? Is there some superior malevolent deity above him he can’t oppose despite his best efforts?
By the way, why diud he have to die? Remember he’s omnipotent. He could have just snapped his finger, and the result would have been the same. Or if he really wanted to pay a visit on earth, he could have decided to throw a big party instead of being crucified. The result would have been the same. Why do you think god would need to be crucified, exactly? Is there any rational explanation which could have make necessary that he would die to avoid people going to a hell (that he himself choose to create at the first place, mind you…)?

[quote]
Doesn’t sound like a monster to me!

[quote]

So he make some creatures. He makes sure they’ll are susceptible to disobey him. He then choose a set of rules they shouldn’t disobey, knowing full well that they are unable not to disobey (they’re all sinners). He creates a place where these creatures (all of them) will be tortured forever (like in forever) if they disobey to his rules (and he know they will). Until know he seems incredibly fucked and cruel.

Now, the second part. He changes his mind (even an all-knowing and omnipotent being can make mistakes, isn’t it?). He decides that some of the creatures (not all…some…how generous is it to spare some of them from the eternal tortures he set himself) won’t be tortured forever. He doesn’t just makes the hell dissapear or decide that everybody will go to heaven, finally…I assume that he really wants to have some victims to keep him busy.

At this point, he discovers that he can’t just decide that some will be saved (those we will follow some new rules…you don’t seriously expect to get something from nothing from this kind of god, do you?). For some mysterious reason this omnipotent god has to have himself killed (which honestly is no big deal for an eternal being) before he can undone what he did himself. so he does.

May i know why exactly I should think that this story makes sense? Assuming that this god exist, why I should respect him (I mean ; apart out of fear) for having arbitrarily (and in a weird and totally unecessary manner) given me a chance not to burn forever in a place he choose to create in order to have me burn forever? And not only that, but I should believe that he loves me??? That he would want me not to be tortured forever but really can’t help torturing me forever? Is it a compulsive behavior, like a child abuser who can’t help himself? Can you explain to me why this loving god doesn’t just send us all to Heavens?
And why i should beleive this incredible and totally contradictory story instead of one of thousands of other myths which exist or have existed, and which quite often make more logical sense?

Possibly the person meant that there are christians who think that other people having sex outside of marriage is okay with them (as in : it’s an issue between the people having sex and god). But anyway, I know more than one christian who think that sex outside of/before marriage (as long as it doesn’t include cheating) is OK. Probably because their brand of god is actually benevolent and couldn’t punish people who did no harm to nobody (but then they tend not to believe that a benevolent god could actually have created a hell…so possibly they aren’t real christians in your book.)

84

This god isn’t the only one to be incredibly fucked…my previous post is too…
Seems I should sleep from time to time…

85

What’s the Chick parody quote?

“Why would God sacrifice Himself to Himself to change a rule He made for Himself?”
:wink:

86

Anita Bryant (extracted from God’s Bullies, Perry Deane Young, 1982, Holt, Renhart and Winston, New York. pp50-51; ISBN : 0-03-059706-4)

Anita Bryant may not have entirely recanted gobear, but her split from Anita Bryant Ministries was followed by some very public statements in which she questioned many of the actions of the organisation and her own role in them.

87

cough Ahem, moving on :smiley:
**

Well, I think I was being ambiguous, although it wasn’t intentional. You could call me a sinner in the sense that you could say that I’m not kosher. I eat bacon, ham, and lobster is my favorite food. But the point I’m trying to make is that you’d (hypothetical you) carry no weight if you “accused” me of not being kosher. A 27-armed Neptunian named Phil could accuse me of not being Grzziflinniwerizan, and I’d feel the same way: “Meh.” I certainly wouldn’t fall to my knees and beg redemption and despise my entire being, in either case.

Again, just as you feel “OK,” for lack of a better word, about eating meat on Fridays (I presume, given what I know about you), I feel “OK” about rejecting the divinity of Jesus. You don’t consider your anti-Catholic carnivorism a “sin,” and I don’t consider my lack of faith a sin either.

Maybe you could start a thread in GD. This thread s’posda be about that lovable lil scamp dreamer. My bad for hijacking it.

Quix

88

No, that’s the second greatest. Read your damn book again Jarbabyj, and it wouldn’t hurt to oil that CAPSLOCK key a bit either - I think it got stuck.

Since I’m a little bit of a sorehead after this week at work, and this is the pit, I’ll rant a bit. Besides, all indications are that it’s “Xtian Hunting Season” on the board again.

There’s a reason why atheists typically know the bible and its implications better than Xtians. After studying the history and philosophy of the world’s religions (both active and dead), the inescapable conclusion is that religion is absurd.

To claim one religion is better than another (or none) is so completely off the rails that it’s beyond humor. You might as well worship the letter “L”, while condemning the people on the next continent, who have a different alphabet and therefore have never heard of the letter to H-E-DoubleHockeySticks! Naturally, to our hypothetical L worshipers, it is forbidden to write the letter on any perishable media. Hence the euphemism so as not to offend. :rolleyes:

But through selective reading, cognitive dissonance, and a dash of ignorance, any belief is possible. To claim to be a christian while being off-base in such central tenets is unbelievable. It’s like living in a country all your life, without knowing what they use for currency! And then giving advice to potential visitors based on it.

89

Sometimes I wish I wasn’t an emotional woman because then I’d be able to read that comment and know there has to be some ulterior motives in those few small words. :wink:

90

I’m going to say something that may shock some of you. I’ve been doing some thinking. Yes, using that logical side of my brain (Lord, have mercy), and I think I’ve realized something that has probably been the main souce of my problems here, not intentionally on my part, I would rather call it a misunderstanding I’ve had with myself. I’ve come to the realization that I don’t know 100% for sure that God exists. ::taking deep breaths:: That’s not something easy for me to say since I’ve believed for so long that I knew for sure the God I love is real. The reason I’ve come to this conclusion is not only because of the insight of some of you, but because I realize that there have been and most likely will be again, times when I may doubt my faith. Times when I ask myself how I have the right to say that I know for sure though I cannot prove that to myself or anyone else. Times that I wonder the same questions you do and though I have no answers or understanding, the bible tells me to just “trust God”. Times when life sucks so bad that I wonder if there really is a God etc. You get the picture. Mind you, it doesn’t take long in those periods of doubt for me to be reminded of the reasons why I believe so strongly, but I am here to humbly admit that there may be some possibility that he doesn’t exist. Though I’m still 99% sure that he does :).

91

There lives more faith in honest doubt,
Believe me, than in half the creeds.
–Lord Tennyson

92

I agree about the existence of God issue . . . but sometimes a debate on the subject can be fun. Someone will trot out a line of reasoning that you haven’t seen before. (I think it’s pretty unlikely that they’ll come up with something new . . . the debate is far too old for that.) But you can’t get all emotionally wrapped up in it. Better to approach it as an amusing exercise–like running laps for the brain. :slight_smile: You just go 'round and 'round and never get anywhere, but at least you get a workout.

If the only evidence that you can present is matter of personal, subjective experience, something that you feel you cannot share in any way that would be meaningful to the skeptical reader, then IMHO it’s best to leave the subject alone in this forum. There are other boards that would be more receptive to that sort of thing. I’ve never been to Pizza Parlor, but perhaps there?

If you want to debate the topic at the SDMB, you could try to recast the debate, something along the lines of “Is there biblical support for the existence of demons?” Keep it a matter of textual analysis, something where everybody’s on a level playing field, and see what people have to say–and you can leave your personal experiences out of it, because they aren’t relevant.

Uh, not so much. It’s not “Great Discussions.” I think of a discussion as a conversation where people agree that people will hold different opinions, and they share them. In a debate, people are out to not just share opinions, but to challenge other people’s opinions, and attempt to persuade them to their point of view, often by strenuous argument.

Unfortunately, all “religious” topics are quickly whisked off to GD to be torn to piecey-parts by the circling sharks, so there’s no place for a religious discussion here, really. Sometimes a thread manages to skate the line in MPSIMS or IMHO, but they have to be incredibly mild to do it!

Because “this is what I believe and that’s it” isn’t part of a debate. It’s a piece of information–and some people will be interested in it just for its own sake. However, if you post it in a forum that’s meant for debating, people will jump all over it and try to pick it apart, and start asking hard questions and expecting straight answers. If that is not the reaction you’re looking for, I think the only option is to not post such sentiments in GD.

But, I suspect that you do not want to be proved wrong. :slight_smile: If you feel that there is nothing they can say that will prove you wrong, then saying “prove me wrong” isn’t really fair to the other posters, is it? You’re setting them up to go to a lot of effort trying to convince you when you know that they’ll just end up frustrated.

Again, if you don’t think that there is a possibility for anyone to be proved right or wrong, you might want to think of a smaller element of the debate that could be proved or disproved. Otherwise, IMHO, you should let sleeping dogs lie.

But I am not the boss of SDMB. :slight_smile: Perhaps others disagree.

93

Faith: the exact opposite of dogmatism.

  • John Ralston Saul
94

Faith: the exact opposite of dogmatism.

  • John Ralston Saul
95

You’re most definitely not supposed to take a debate personally. Certainly many of us–including myself–fall into that trap from time to time.

I don’t dislike you, personally, but I have issues with some of your comments.

My issue with your original comment was that your demons can hurt “all of us” (your italics). That remark in italics was what I was debating with you in the original thread–much like quix’s argument here re: sin.

This is my other big gripe with you. You have stated many times “the Bible says” and that you believe the Bible to be the word of God–and yet you haven’t read it. At least, you seem to have not done more than skimmed it. Even my ex-Pentecostal boyfriend commented on what I’ve just quoted as, “that’s ludicrous.”

I don’t hate Christians as a whole, though I believe they’re misguided. FWIW, about every month my boyfriend and I visit his parents and we bounce up a 30-mile dirt “road” (it’s down to rutted bedrock in most places) to the little mountain town he grew up in and attend their Pentecostal church. I bow my head and fold my hands in my lap politely and sit through the service, then we walk around town and then bounce back down the road. My boyfriend and I do this because his parents are wonderful people.

What I object to, as I said in the OP, is your debating style, your snide remarks, and your ignorance of the basic and most important text of your religion.

(SisterCoyote, the weekend before Lughnassad we drove past a local farm that was having a “Sweet Corn Festival!” As my aforementioned b/f’s mother was driving, I refrained from saying, “perfect timing!” :slight_smile: )

96

Who says that all of this religious debate accomplishes nothing? Nice to see you open your mind to the possibilities, dreamer. Accepting one’s own potential to be incorrect is a major step on the road to enlightenment in my book. I respect it so very much when people let reason and intelligent discourse sway their opinions.

Honestly, I would not have expected to hear those words out of your mouth. Couldn’t have been easy. Impressive. Since you have opened yourself to the possibilities, I now ask you to consider the idea that any creature who would create something as horrible as hell (a place of eternal torture), is not worthy of love, even if he did create us. I have a pet, and I don’t want him to mess up the sofa, but if he does I won’t torture him for even a moment, never mind an eternity. Anyone who would is evil in my book.

Any sufficiently advanced technology appears to be magic to those with more primitive technology. Just because a god had the skills and tools required to build us and the Universe does not automatically make him a kind and caring entity (even if he would have you believe that he is just that). His actions are what would make him worthy of love, not just his ability to create. If he made a hell then he’s an evil somofabitch. Reject him if you believe that. There are some Christians who don’t believe in hell, but I think they stand on pretty shaky ground scripturally.

DaLovin’ Dj

97

First of all you did not include the second statement there which took the first out of context. To know him is love him. God never said you must know all my scripture to know me. I’ve never said I did not read the bible. I should of made it clearer but what I meant was I do not have the immediate recollection and memory of scripture. My memory is not as good as it should be.

I can’t change the fact that you don’t like my debating “style”, I’ve apolgized for my snide remarks and I am not ignorant of bible text. I hope that’s satisfactory enough for you, if not then I don’t know what else to say.

98

You can’t patent stupidity, but you do seem to have a license for it.

:smiley:

99

Now that’s open to debate! :wink:

I don’t have immediate recollection or memory of the whole danged thing either, as far as chapter and verse–but I know the plot. God is omniscient and omnipotent. Therefore, there is nothing Satan can do that is unknown, uncontrolled, or unpreventable by God.

Podkayne’s given you some good tips, as have others.

The point of my last, inept post was to say that I don’t dislike you personally, or Christians as a whole personally, and to say that the only issues I had with you were the ones I stated.

Don’t take GD personally, by all means! Don’t let it upset you unduly.

100

Well, if it makes you feel any better, I’m not 100% certain that God is a fabrication. Only 99% sure :wink:

Quix