You say that others are damned for their sins. You seem to think that you are not damned. How can that be, if you sin? If your sins don’t condemn you, how do someone else’s sins condemn them?
They must know the Lord to seek his heart. I shall tell them of His love, and let Him tell them of his plans for their lives. I will not begin by telling them they are going to hell. I will not end with that, either. I will let the Lord decide all such things, and I will assume that each child of His that I meet is precious to Him, and worthy of divine love. If they are worth of that, then my poor bit of love is certainly due to them, without ransom.
But the real difference between us is that I will not worship a book. I do love the Lord, but He is not a book. If the bible is all lies, still my faith is unchanged. I don’t think it is lies, but I don’t think that your understanding of the words in the book is the will of God.
Because the Love of God is what made Jesus Christ the Savior of Man. Nothing else is sure, to me, so I will preach no other message than this. Love God with all your heart, and all your soul, and love your brother as you love yourself.
And, by the way, what about all my stupid friends, who think that God is in heaven, with Santa Claus and Superman? Are you sure that they are going to hell too? I can’t go to heaven without them, for they are too precious to me. I am not worried about it, though, because my love is but a dying ember, beside the glory that is the Love of Christ.
Calm down, Saen. Where’s the peace that passes all understanding? The way things are going, I think your diction will shortly pass all understanding.
**
You’re joking, right? If that were true, FC’s would consider remarriage after divorce to be a sin, except in cases of adultery. They’d also be geocentrists.
Anyway, Fundamentalist Christianity is, as anyone with a lick of sense can see, a particularly disgusting form of demon worship. Why?
Let me tell you a little story. Hold on to your bladders, folks, because we’re about to take a TRIP STRAIGHT TO HELL!!!
(BTW, I feel obligated to remind everyone that I am not a sicko. If I seem particularly imaginative on the hell issue, let me remind you that I recently visited a torture museum hosted by Amnesty International. If you want to suspect anyone of being a sicko, I’d suggest that you look to the people who actually believe in this stuff, and believe it to be a good thing, and even, at times, seem to delight in the idea that people who disagree with them will go to hell.)
Let’s say you have two coworkers living in 1930’s Germany. One is a Christian, and the other is a Jew. The Christian tries to convert the Jew (let’s call her Miriam,) but he’s an ignorant dork and doesn’t do a very good job of it. Miriam (who is, by the way, very orthodox and observant, and loves God with all her heart,) listens with an open mind, but isn’t convinced. Miriam concludes that God made a covenant, and that He would never break it. Besides, Christianity just seems blasphemous to her, and the supposed proof that she was presented with just doesn’t hold up. In her mind, Christianity is tantamount to an insult to God, and she would never insult the God whom she loves so much by believing that He would break His word- at least, not without damned good reason. The Christian shrugs and tells himself the typical excuse: “Oh well. The good news is that my skill at proselytization doesn’t matter one whit as to whether someone goes to heaven or hell. She chooses to reject God, and that’s not my fault.”
Then the Nazis take over. The Christian manages to keep his head down and stay out of trouble. He dies of old age, and spends an eternity of bliss with God in heaven.
Miriam, who has spent all her life working for charity, has a chance to get out but stays behind to help others, and is sent to a concentration camp. And now, we apply the spoiler tag:
While in the concentration camp, she sees her baby, still twitching as it is skewered on a bayonet, tossed into a vat of boiling lye and hears it scream as its flesh is boiled from its bones. She herself is brutally gang raped until the ligaments supporting her uterus tear loose, causing her vagina to flop inside out and dangle bloodily between her legs. She dies soon of blood loss, much to her relief, because her great faith in God tells her that she can rely on God to keep His promises.
Then she finds that she’s in Hell. Whups! I guess God can change his mind after all.
The demons rip away Miriam’s eyelids, so that she cannot avert her gaze as she sees her baby thrown into a vat of lye. His cries cut her to the core of her soul as his skin is stripped from him, his flesh eaten but not consumed, burned for all eternity. Maybe Christians no longer believe in infant damnation- but the demons are masters of illusion, and are clever in their tortures.
With wheels shod in red-hot iron the demons smash Miriam’s limbs to pulp, reducing her to a bloody, squirming, shrieking thing like some boneless sea creature hauled up in a fisherman’s net. They weave her limbs into the fence of the City of Dis, where she must watch as over and over again ravens smash their beaks of broken glass into her lidless eyes, only to have them grow afresh so that they might be ripped in bloody gobbets from their sockets without end. And over and over, without pause, the demons use her in unspeakable ways until her violated flesh is no more than bloody tatters quivering with pain.
After countless ages of her torment, when her entire existence seems nothing more than pointless suffering extending without end into past and future, just as her last, faded memory of her earthly existence flickers before being extinguished forever and she is cast into an eternal darkness in which suffering is all she knows, all she has ever known, and all that will ever be, at that moment she knows true despair, for she knows that she has no hope.
And she wonders: why has God turned his back on me? Didn’t we have a covenant? Have I not kept His commandments?
But we all know the answer. There’s no point in blaming God. She turned her back on him. All her fault, really, so no use whining.
And then that last memory of life is put out, and she truly becomes a creature, a native, of hell. For hell consumes her entire consciousness. She knows nothing of anything but foulness and degradation and pain, and never will.
Oh, BTW, you can find a recent photo of Miriam at the bottom of this page.
Frankly, I didn’t enjoy writing that. But Fundamentalist Christianity disgusts me. I hate to see FC’s piously declare that they love their neighbor, and gosh darn it, people just need to understand how just it is for God- who loves you, btw, and this is for your own good- to send unbelievers to hell. Too many FC’s relegate hell to some sort of vague abstraction, and they never seem to admit just how gut-wrenchingly foul their beliefs really are. I’ve decided it’s high time someone took the lid off and made them take a good whiff. (At least the nutcase at the website I link to is willing to look hell in the face. But then again, that’s what makes him so disgusting.)
So I’d like you FC’s to stand up and be counted. I want to hear some hallelujahs. I want you to declare that hell for unbelievers is just, and that Miriam fully deserved what she got. In fact, I want to hear you declare that Miriam would be getting off easy in my scenario, and that hell is really unimaginably worse, and that it’s a good thing too.
I ask God for frogiveness. He is forgiving. I don’t go out knowingly sinning saying I don’t care about the consequenses. Forgiveness is for everyone. All they have to do is ask.
That is where you are wrong. We are not worthy.
God has proved His love for us, but He doesn’t have to prove anything. He is the Creator, we are the creation. Most of the “Christians” on this board lets everyone know that God loves them, and that is very very good. Now let’s tell them what they must do for God.
You ever get those telemarketers that call and say you won a trip.
I am not stupid. I know there is more to it. I say, “what do I have to do?” they continue to tell me how beautiful the Virgin Islands are this time of year, and how clear the water is, and I say, “what do I have to do?”, they continue to tell me about scuba diving and how beautiful my free hotel will be…
Well, you know what? I have to buy a subscription of their magazines for 12 months. Why not just tell me you want to to buy a subscription, and along with the subscription you will give me a free vacation? I will ask you about it, I will decide if I like what it is about, and maybe I will do a little more research on your company.
I think the real difference is that you worship love and forget that the bible is the word of God and is to be followed. God is to be worshipped and the bible is to be followed. Love is one of His commandments, not something to be worshipped.
And ultimately, this is why I left Christianity. I realized that FCism is really a demon-worshipping cult. The demon in question is Azathoth, the gibbering, tentacled idiot-child at the center of the universe, squirming to the shrill pipings of his misshapen servitors, periodically lashing out to destroy just because he can.
Mind you, this isn’t immediately apparent, because FC’s cloak their beliefs in so many layers of self-deception.
Layer #1 is that God loves you, and FC’s know that God is real because they can feel his loving presence. I never felt that, so that layer of deception was stripped away from me. It’s called the “glitch effect.” We see it stripped away all the time in GD. Once you tell an FC that you experience the glitch effect, we move to…
Layer #2: any attempt to make FCism make sense, and explain why it’s perfectly just to send nonchristians to hell. Of course, these arguments don’t make sense. I knew they didn’t make sense, so that layer was stripped from me. It just didn’t make sense to me that my nonchristian friends would be sent to hell just because they had an honest, but incorrect, opinion on a matter of historical trivia. This is a matter of little concern to most FC’s, since, after all, they’re not the ones who will get BF’ed with a broken bottle for eternity. But they do love you. Did I mention that? Anyway, in GD we periodically strip away that layer too, since it’s childishly easy to overturn FC arguments.
Layer #3: maybe it doesn’t make sense, but God is so far above our level that we can’t understand his justice. Nonetheless, God clearly stated his plan in the Bible (or the genome proves that Jesus is God, or whatever) and if you just listen, you’ll know how to escape hell, even if you don’t understand why things work that way. Being a devout Christian, I read the Bible intensively and saw that Christianity simply isn’t based in the Bible. It just doesn’t hold up to scrutiny. So that layer was stripped from me, too. We strip it away here in GD, too. So often when you argue an FC into a corner, when they realize that their arguments just aren’t holding up to the nonchristian assault, they reveal…
The Ultimate Truth: God doesn’t have to make sense. His plan doesn’t have to be just. He doesn’t have to make His warnings convincing, or even make them coherent. God has the ability to send you to hell, and he will do so if you don’t bow to him. None of your fancy arguments will matter in hell. The fact that the Bible doesn’t add up won’t matter in hell. All that matters is that God is powerful enough to send you there.
And there you have it. A being so powerful that he can lash out in destruction for whatever reason he wishes, without having to make sense, without having to be just. Azathoth, the Demon Sultan, idiot-child at the center of the universe.
Mind you, even when FC’s tell you that all your fancy arguments won’t do you any good in hell, they still are getting the warm fuzzies from their brain glands. As far as they’re concerned, Jesus is still the loving, pastel soft-focus hippie. They don’t have to live with the ultimate truth.
But me? I didn’t get the warm fuzzies. Hell for unbelievers didn’t seem just. The Bible didn’t add up for me. But fundamentalist Christianity is a cult, and they had me brainwashed. I had to keep believing. You see, it didn’t matter whether I could feel God’s presence. It didn’t matter that it didn’t make sense. It didn’t matter that the Bible didn’t support it. All that mattered was that might makes right. God can send you to hell, and he is under no compunction to give you any good reason to believe. You are the created, and he is the creator, and he will do as he pleases.
So, you see, I was stuck for quite some time there believing that Azathoth (whom the fundamentalists call by the name “Jesus”) really did run an amoral, meaningless, nonsensical universe powered by blind might and naked fear.
Strange, isn’t it? FC’s keep saying that atheists are the ones who believe in an amoral, nonsensical universe. But then again, they’re masters of doublespeak.
God knows what you need more than anyone else.
If you are in need and you have faith in the Lord, He will give it to you, if it is His will.
If you align your will with God’s, and ask for his will, then you’ll get what you ask for.
Jesus asked for his cup (crucifixion) to pass from him, but it didn’t. He asked for the Father’s will, not his own, to be done. He got that.
I don’t think Diogenes believes, so I guess it wouldn’t matter if he had a special request.
If he doesn’t believe, then he wouldn’t be talking to God at all because in his mind he would be talking to air…
If he does believe, and is face to face with God, he will not want to be out of the presence of God.
Now, if he were face to face with God as a ‘now that I see you I believe’ person, it would be like giving medicine to the dead.
The dead are already dead. Medicine will not help them now. They knew what they needed when they were alive, but someone told them not to worry. To late.
Yes…all of that. But if you choose to limit “mental state” to a function of the brain, then that is not what I am talking about.
Can you give a visual image of the feelings that one would have during sexual orgasm – a visual image that would actually convey to the inexperienced what it feels like? (Please, this is a rhetorical question…)
I think it is wonderful that your idea of perfect bliss is playing with your daughter! (I was lucky enough to have a dad like that.)
But I am speaking of an experience that, like an orgasm, is not a matter of vision. The blind could experience this as easily as a sighted person. (The analogy I’m using is limited. After seeing the movie Brainstorm, I’ve never been able to imagine even eternal sexual orgasm as perfect bliss.)
In a state of complete happiness, there would never be a need or desire to stop. If playing with your daughter is actually perfect bliss, then why do you stop? (I am serious in asking this.)
Thanks for you explanation of the after-samsara state. I was unfamiliar with any state beyond the “snuffed out.”
Ah! Unintentional sins. If your sins are unintentional, here’s what you must do:
If a member of the community sins unintentionally and does what is forbidden in any of the LORD’s commands, he is guilty. When he is made aware of the sin he committed, he must bring as his offering for the sin he committed a female goat without defect. He is to lay his hand on the head of the sin offering and slaughter it at the place of the burnt offering. Then the priest is to take some of the blood with his finger and put it on the horns of the altar of burnt offering and pour out the rest of the blood at the base of the altar. He shall remove all the fat, just as the fat is removed from the fellowship offering, and the priest shall burn it on the altar as an aroma pleasing to the LORD. In this way the priest will make atonement for him, and he will be forgiven. — Leviticus 4:27-31
Of course, if you prefer, you may sacrifice a lamb:
If he brings a lamb as his sin offering, he is to bring a female without defect. He is to lay his hand on its head and slaughter it for a sin offering at the place where the burnt offering is slaughtered. Then the priest shall take some of the blood of the sin offering with his finger and put it on the horns of the altar of burnt offering and pour out the rest of the blood at the base of the altar. He shall remove all the fat, just as the fat is removed from the lamb of the fellowship offering, and the priest shall burn it on the altar on top of the offerings made to the LORD by fire. In this way the priest will make atonement for him for the sin he has committed, and he will be forgiven. — Leviticus 4:32-35
Well, I’m afraid I can’t argue Greek translations or select Bible verses with the likes of you, so in my small way, I’m gonna be over here raggin’ on the whole “eternity” thing again.
An eternity of anything will eventually get boring. A conscious mind- IE, one which thinks (I’ll pass on the obvious Fundie joke here) simply must have some form of input, and that input has to be somewhat varied and new.
As I asked earlier- what is an eternity? Pass on the quick reply of “It’s forever” and wrap your mind around that. Not just a hundred years, or a thousand or a mere million, but endless quadrillions of centuries. To interpret “Eternity” literally, the twelve thousand million years the Universe has already been in existence is just a drop in the bucket compared to the uncountable hundreds of sextillions of millennia that supposedly stretch ahead of us.
I’ve gotten bored on a thirty-minute lunchbreak. What would I do for thirty times ten to the infinite minutes? What about those who can’t even go to the crapper without a magazine?
Does Heaven get regular magazine and newspaper deliveries? Contrary to what I postulated earlier, does Big Daddy allow those poor souls to watch TV? Does He produce all the latest CDs and DVDs for his loyal flock? If so, can He get them before they’re released? Is Jimi Hendrix up there right now using a Playstation Sixteen with Elvis?
Speaking of music, sure, a musician might finally have all the free time he needs to compose all his works he never got around to… But given an infinite amount of time, there’s a finite number of combinations of sounds an instrument can produce. Even mixing instruments, and toss in a few Godly instruments the likes of which us mere mortals can only dream… again, there’s a finite number of combinations. (And musically speaking, not all permutations produce “music”, or pleasing sounds.)
And given sixty quintillion generations, even all that will eventually ring hollow.
Someone above mentioned that when you’re in Heaven, you become all-peaceful, have perfect happiness (whatever that is) and perfect knowledge. What? You all of a sudden know everything? Then Heaven must be boring from just after brunch on Day Two. If you know it all, what’s the use in reading/watching/exploring/doing/testing?
You can’t even look up Moebius and have a rousing discussion of illogical mathematics- if you both have “perfect knowledge”, you both know what the other will say, has said or could say. Replies to any argument, retorts to any jab. It would be like arguing with a mirror.
Why bother locating Sam’l Clement- you know what he’d say, what he’d reply, what he wrote, what he wanted to write.
Heaven is a lecture hall full of quiet, sleepy people, you’ve heard this guy give the speech a thousand times before, and you apparently can’t even get up and head for the bathroom.
Jersey, does God ever speak to you through your heart? In the listening part of your prayers? Through the majesty of nature? Or is the only way that God communicates with you through the Bible?
Also, what was this about fundamentalist Christians forming a “consensus” of what the Bible means? If there were a consensus, why are there so many denominations?
Are your beliefs contingent upon the opinions of other fundamentalists?
Would you have a judge set free everyone who comes before him jsut cause he loves them?
Would that be just?
You know it wouldn’t.
Justice must be served.
It was-when Jesus died for your sins.
However, repentence must also happen.
Hell did not exist as a word in those languages because it did not exist as a concept. Every reference to Gehennon, Hades or Sheol is either a reference to death or a metaphor for oblivion. As I’ve already explained, destruction by fire was horrible because it represented utter obliteration. It prevented any chance for the expected resurrection and subsequent eternal life. Let me also repeat that even if Jesus had referenced a modern fundie concept of Hell, the disciples wouldn’t have known what he was talking about since no such idea existed in their religious culture.
Yes.
What’s unjust about it? Why do you need other people to be excluded from Heaven in order for you to enjoy it?
And if someone doesn’t believe that, they get the same punishment as Hitler? How is that justice?
I disagree. I think that is a passive aggressive attempt at controlling others.
This is exactly what I was talking about in this thread about people who wish to take an objective scope on personal truths. It is a great evil when subjective truths are forced down the throats of others as objective truths.
Nicely said, Mange.