God doesnt exist

People don’t get on their knees to worship concepts.

You’ve made quite a leap from “God doesn’t exist” to questioning that Jesus was born of a virgin or rose from the dead. You are aware that belief in God ≠ Christian, yes?

It may well be true that in the mainstream of western culture Christianity occupies the overwhelming majority of the available spirituality thoughtspace. (And that not much actual thinking happens in it, for that matter). But in here that’s not really applicable. You’re on an atheist-friendly, skeptical, independent-thinking kind of message board. The theistic folks in here are not spectacularly more likely to be Christian than not, and those that are are not particularly likely to believe things without question just because those things were taught to them when they were growing up.

Get 10 SDMB Christians together and you’re likely to find 5 who either dismiss the virginity of Mary as a cute fairy tale with no bearing on the important truths of Christianity or else claim considerable warpage and mistranslation of the original Greek phrase that may have been intended to mean only that Mary was a young unmarried girl not previously wedded. And the other 5 will have interesting metaphysical and philosophical takes on what it might mean, or means to them, to say that Jesus was of virgin birth, things that aren’t necessarily incompatible with an everyday common-sense assertion that that’s not how human biology works.

So, again: are you here to try to see who you can rile up and shock, or do you want to explore such things with some of the folks here, considering our perspectives and elaborating on your own?

You met God? Well damn, good for you. Could you provide some details and proof for this newsworthy event?

That’s another interesting point. In order for me to believe something, is it necessary that I am capable of proving it to you?

Permit me to elaborate on that a little. I have a friend who claims she saw a large (panther-sized) black cat in a field from the window of a slow-moving train. She honestly and totally believes that’s what she saw.

She might be right or she might be wrong, but either way, she has no tangible evidence to support her belief. There’s nothing beyond her testimony that she could use to convince me. Should she abandon her belief that she saw a big cat, just because she can’t prove it to me? If so, how does one go about abandoning belief?

I appreciate there is again a difference between a big cat and a deity and although that’s important, it still doesn’t entirely dismiss the question of whether it’s reasonable to believe something without the means to prove it to others.

No, but lekatt said he met “God”. Did you ever make this claim?

Jim

I don’t see how it actually makes any difference. lekatt has experienced something that causes him to believe, and say he believes, that he met God. You or I may think that’s wrong, stupid, unbelievable or whatever, but that doesn’t make it any less compelling for lekatt - belief isn’t something we generally consciously choose to do.
Certainly it would be completely unreasonable for lekatt to insist that you should start believing in God because he believes he met him, but that hasn’t happened.

I cannot agree with you. I have to lump people that say they met God into the same category as those that they they were abducted by Aliens or talked to Jim Morrison recently. While it is possible, I do not think it is remotely likely.

Even in my little understanding of “God”, I doubt, he is meeting with anyone these days. :wink:

Jim

I could provide details, but not proof, and why should I, it was a very personal event. You will just have to look for yourself.

I’m not seeing any disagreement. You don’t believe lekatt met God, because lekatt hasn’t presented any evidence of that happening. That doesn’t mean lekatt has no reason for believing what he does (and it’s still a reason, even if he’s simply mistaken).

I maintain that believing something (even if you’re believing it quite mistakenly) is not contingent upon being able to prove that something to anyone else.

Other people disagree about this “fact,” so there’s little point in phrasing your argument this way. If you want to make any headway in a conversation, you generally have to make an effort to understand someone else’s point of view. To some people, this belief is both rational and supported by evidence, and from some viewpoints there is hard evidence.

Believing in or worshipping a god is not an alternative to doing good, or to doing much of anything.

Addressing Lenin’s Tomb, I would say rationality is neither good nor evil, it’s an approach to thinking - and it’s very subjective anyway. You seem to be using “rational” as a synonym for “wrong.” A great many good things could reasonably be called irrational.

What’s the YouTube link?

It’s ok to doubt. I did once also. In personal experiences there can be no proof.
How could I share my experience with you except by words, which you will call anecdotical. So is comes down to those who have experienced and those who haven’t. However, there are many who believe, yet have not experienced, they believe by faith. This world is big enough for the believers and the non-believers to live in peace and prosperity. No need to quarrell over such small differences.

You sure about that? Cause I beg to differ. That’s the difference between the child who believes in the Tooth Fairy (as a being) and the parent who knows the concept of the Tooth Fairy and utilizes it.

You said you met God. Was it at the top of a Mountain, in a Bistro or during a life changing event? Very few believers claim to have met God. Your claim is a little more out there than most. If you did not wish to be questioned about, than posting it in a thread like this was not a very good choice.

Jim

Unless you have an epiphany, death experience, or such, you will need to look within yourself to find God. Jesus said: “the Kingdom of God is within you” and so it is. Meditation is great for looking.

Why? And again why? What meaning to attribute to those phrases such that you consider the referenced experiences unlikely?

I’m not lekatt, but I’ve experienced personal & direct communication with God. I’m in no position to say that you don’t know what you’re talking about, but at the same time I’m not inclined to think it’s likely that you know what what I’M talking about.

And therefore are in no position to evaluate the likelihood thereof.

In a near death experience, it is estimated that more than ten million Americans have had near death experiences and most of them will tell you they met God.
Yes, it was a life changing event. Now if you want to know more about NDEs from the people who actually experienced them just put “near death experiences” in Gooogle and start reading.

Why am I in no position to evaluate? I admit that I am in no position to understand, as I have no faith in “God”. I place my “faith” in things that are more concrete, like concrete as an example.

If I look in myself, I will not find “God”. I will find a confused consciousness that has 10,001 questions and few answers. I also do feel a large hole in the fact that I missing “God” or “Faith”. I seem to function pretty well without them. I try to do good things in this world, while I am here. I try to raise my kids to be good citizens of the planet.

I also try to instill critical thinking to question that, which is not verifiable.

Those near death experiences are in all likelihood nothing more than chemical malfunctions of the brain as they are going oxygen deprived. Again, I may well be wrong, or tomorrow a report might come out increasing our knowledge of what is going on in the critical moments. Until then, I will stick to the likeliest explanation, not resort to the mythology of the past and proclaim it as more important that science or logic.

I have more trust in people that have found faith through simple belief, than those that have seen or spoken to “God”. Obviously, YMMV.

Jim

Although I can see why that is probably the case (the ones who claim to have met him are the scary ones, sometimes), logically, this seems to run contrary to your general stance. the people who ‘just believe’ are doing so for no particularly good reason, whereas the ones who claim to have met God are believing on the basis of (what they consider to be) compelling evidence.