I have a plan:
I’d wonder if it were real or a stunt, and conclude most likely a stunt.
I’d try to catch a glimpse of Der Trihs in the background of the coverage, as he’s on record as being willing to try to bump off God using the patented SDMB Spear of Destiny mistletoe sabot bazooka. Then I’d say to Ms. Attack: “Hey, I know that guy! I helped design that widget!”
I’d be glad that I’m a buddhist.
I’d say “Wow, this is really fucking weird.” There is no other plausible reaction.
Standing ovation!
How do you tell the difference between the leading of the Holy Spirit and the leading of your fallen sinful nature (and/or Satan)?
Night before last, I went to see the Cirque de Soleil show KA. So if I were to see this stadium thing you described first-hand, I’d probably think it was cool engineering of the special effects, almost as good as the KA show.
Let me ask you something: how much time do you spend thinking about the possibility that Zeus will appear out of the clouds and strike you with a thunderbolt?
Well, that’s probably more than we atheists spend thinking about the Jesus story actually being true. It’s just not on our radar.
Oddly enough, kanicbird’s got the best answer. Just because someone shows up claiming that they’re God, and able to exhibit what appears to be god-like abilities, it does not automatically follow that they’re the deity mentioned in the Bible. Even if we are able to completely rule out human charlatans, there’s still the possibility that we’re dealing with A) aliens running some sort of scam B) supernatural, but not deific, entities misrepresenting their nature, C) actual gods, but not the god of the New Testament, trying to mislead us about the nature of the NT god, or D) the actual God of the New Testament, trying to mislead us about the nature of the universe.
Sure. There might be people online who would be interested in watching. Or in discussing it while it unfolds.
I can see the TV from the computer, if that’s what you’re worried about. Althought, really, I’d assume it was some sort of scam and that it would eventually get worked out without my help.
Well, I don’t watch soccer and neither does anybody else I know, and I don’t watch the news or any broadcast TV at all, so either I’d hear it secondhand (possibly the next day, believe it or not), or judgement would kick in before I found out.
If I heard it second hand, I wouldn’t believe it at first, for obvious reasons. It probably wouldn’t take too long to convince me though, making reasonable assumptions about this making the internet news.
Given that I would have necessarily had time to get used to the idea as I was being convinced of it, I would be shocked, but not scream and run. I mean, what’s the point? There’s nowhere to run to, after all.
As the first blush of shock wore off, I would start to settle into a grim fatalism - “Dammit, the evil god of the christians is real, and is coming in with his barbaric stone-age mockery of justice to pointlessly destroy everying”, basically. I wouldn’t feel any guilt or regret over the way I’d lived my life; all that would happen to me would be God’s fault alone, very similarly to the situation if terrorists stormed into my house and shot me for not keeping the right brand of mustard in the refridgerator.
Of course, if I didn’t find out all this was happening until I was suddenly teleported to hell or something, my first response would be "what the fuck!?!", followed by the above, assuming I wasn’t too busy being tortured into insanity by that sadistic bastard God. (Or his minion Satan; same thing.)
Man, that’d make an awesome premise for a book. Chapter 1: Jesus rises again, tells us the rapture is upon us, asserts that he can lead us to heaven…and an angry atheist kills him before he can finish. Now what?
Or they could make it a disaster movie–sort of a Christian 2012.
No, because it’s sufficiently ridiculous that hallucination, special effects or a prank by aliens are all more plausible. What would it take to convince you that the Flying Spaghetti Monster is the One True God?
And so, no I’m not worried about anything like this happening. Christianity is physically impossible and full of logical contradictions. There’s a better chance my left arm will spontaneously turn into a snake and bite me.
lines up crosshairs on the back of God’s head
Ah, you’d only have to do it again three days later.
Wait! That’d make one hell of a filibuster (pun intended). We can take bazooka duty in rotating shifts! See how long we can stall the rapture/judgment/Armageddon/whatever.
I’d just like to clarify that I am an atheist - my presumption would be that this God has told a hell of a lot of lies to people, and/or they completely misinterpreted/elaborated on/fanficced up the bulk of the doctorine, such that all the really really impossible stuff God’s supposed to do/have done didn’t happen. Demonstrably starting with omnibenevolence and moving on from there.
Of course, this is sort of explicitly the case in the OP when Jesus clarifies that no, he’s not the son of God, so maybe this post went without saying.
Jesus Christ at a soccer game, I can’t stand it. Good Damn Grief.
Suppose tomorrow a company starts selling tachyon viewers that allow you to see any event in the past. You buy one and set it to observe the life of Jesus/Muhammad/Buddha/etc. Instead of the narrative you have always believed, you see that either a) They didn’t exist, b)They didn’t do any of the things they were supposed to have done, or c)They actually preached something totally at odds with what has come down through history as their message.
What do you do then?
“How can you still be an atheist when everyone saw him show up?!”
“Wait for it…” BLAM "; “OK, now I’m sure there’s no God. For the next three days at least.”
Der Trihs bought us 3 days! I say we party like Babylon!
Be completely unsurprised?
Oh, wait, apparently I’m supposed to believe they existed and did and/or preached the exaxt things people nowadays claim they did, at least in scenarios b and c. I can’t answer this, then.
I would have to conclude thst extraterrestrials with a sufficiently advanced technology and an understanding of Earth’s mythology were trying to subdue the world’s population.
Guys - it wasn’t three days. Friday afternoon to pre-dawn Sunday morning is more like a day and a half.
As Mr. Deity said, “Thirty-six hours tops. Thirty-five if we do it on a weekend when the time changes.”
We’re gonna need more bullets.
I want to see the look on Talibaptists’ faces when they realize he’s not caucasian. 