Hold on to your faith. It's in for a bumpy ride.

The w3hole point of faith is that is is faith ,you, do not need proof because you know it in your heart/soul.

That to me is the whole point of faith,I'm sounding like a evangelist now lol

Why do people (believers and non-believers) find it so difficult to seperate God from the Bible?

Because for 2000 years now, god and scripture were one and the same. Religous teaching's were supposedly from god. All the stories are about god and his act's. It's only NOW in recent time's that people of faith are starting to realize that the bible is full of BS and now want to seperate god from the bible. The god in the bible is the same moron you people are trying to seperate from the bible. Those people who wrote about the thing's god did in that bible, believed god did those thing's. They didn't write that it was all a moral story crap. It's only in recent time's that you people (again) are reinterpreting your own religous teach's, picking and choosing to believe whatever suites you. Ignoring how god and religous teaching's evolved along with society and the discoveries made that show how previously held belief's were false. You only have faith in what you feel suites you. You have no faith in the original concept of god. YOU changed god! YOU reinterpreted your god!

'God still sitting on his fat lazy arse scratching his crotch doing absolutly nothing, well... probably getting it on with satan and planning the wedding ceremony.

So Mr spaceman... How would you personally explain all this?' Produkt

I admit that I have said things just as ignorant as that disrespectful insult you aimed at Christians, Produkt. It is shameful. You may have thick skin and be able to withstand any tongue lashing... I pretty much am there myself. But, I know some dear friends who are not so 'hard', and they are hurt by such unnecessary slams. Why hurt them? It might not be true for you, but in many cases I have personally witnessed, the verbal attacker got a kick out of it, an attitude I found very childish. I want to reiterate that I have said just as bad, and that there are no words that hurt my feelings.
To those who are the targets, remember that personal attacks are not about you, they are all about the offensive person who says them.

Produkt:
What are you trying to say? People shouldn't believe in God and religion, but if they do, they must believe in it exactly the way that christianity dictates?

That post was not aimed at any one partiular person or faith. It's the whole package together. The concept of a god and religion were created by man thousand's of year's ago. How many people would you believe in today's world if they claimed to have a direct message from god? Not many of you would. But those in the past sure did. Ate that stuff up like candy. How many people would you find it acceptable if they killed in the name of god in todays world? Or killed a member of their own families and claimed god told them to as a test of faith? If I recall correctly, there's a couple example's of this in the bible. People back then sure did find it okish. There is no indication of a god in today's world. The god as described in our past no longer exist's. The god described today is in constant change. Oh the bible really meant this, or that story didn't really happen, or if you look at this quote and that one and then this one you can see how it all means this instead. Or, let's disregard that they said thing's were told to them by god, they really had no other way to describe something so this is what we think it really means, despite the previously held beliefs.

It's all a damn joke.

Originally posted by Produkt
Because for 2000 years now, god and scripture were one and the same. The god in the bible is the same moron you people are trying to seperate from the bible. Those people who wrote about the thing's god did in that bible, believed god did those thing's. They didn't write that it was all a moral story crap. It's only in recent time's that you people (again) are reinterpreting your own religous teach's, picking and choosing to believe whatever suites you. YOU reinterpreted your god!

He is trying to convince you and me, (and himself for that matter), that there is no God. I also hear a little egocentrism in there, it sounds like he is pretty darn sure he's right (almost like he feels that he is God) .... I will only say he may not be correct in every claim he makes .....
I like his last sentence, and it is a general rule of life that I try to follow in all areas, but I don't know if God's real. I reinterpret all the time, and it's great. Each time is just like I learned something new.
Some people refuse to learn anything they don't already know.

Yes I think I'm god.

I'm not trying to convince anyone. Just stating the truth. Hard as it may be to accept for those of faith. I mean, of course they don't want to hear that primitive man made up the whole concept of GODS which later became the one main god worshipped today. Who they're still changing the nature of. If me posting the truth offends anyone ... well ... that just sucks.

I know what Produkt is saying too, but it has no relevance to spaceman's question of how did it all begin. Much of what Produkt says I agree with, but it is beside the point. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, it is when they try to pass off their opinion as fact that I take issue with.

It's relevent. In a way. He think's god made all this because he's unwilling to accept that perhap's the area of space prior to the big bang just always was. Those of faith refuse to accept this, yet they're willing to accept that their god existed in absolute nothingness and created everything in 6 short days ...

Ah no, scratch that. That was back when we were still primitive ... What's the belief now? He initiated the big bang, time traveled to the future earth and then created life on earth, wiped out the first dino like creature's, made the new dino's and decided to wipe them out too ... did this a few more time's then made us 6,000 years ago? Ack ... I think I'm too confused with how many time's they change the story and reinterpret it.

Well ... this is the god you all believe in. So loving and caring... yea right.

www.godlessgeeks.com...

Based on the trailers, there really is nothing new in the movie that Christians haven't heard before. About the only thing revolutionary about it is the MTV/Michael Mooresque approach. True faith is not shaken by these kinds of attacks. In fact, throughout the history of Christianity such attacks have, paradoxically, increased interest in Jesus of Nazareth. Besides, the message of Christ is not fixed in the sketchy details of his earthly existence. The message is to be found in the totality of his acts and the impact of his short life.

Jesus does not require his disciples to believe in him but rather to believe with him, believe in the reality of the love of God and in full confidence accept the security of the assurance of sonship with the heavenly Father. The Master desires that all his followers should fully share his transcendent faith. Jesus most touchingly challenged his followers, not only to believe what he believed, but also to believe as he believed. This is the full significance of his one supreme requirement, "Follow me."

To "follow Jesus" means to personally share his religious faith and to enter into the spirit of the Master's life of unselfish service for man. One of the most important things in human living is to find out what Jesus believed, to discover his ideals, and to strive for the achievement of his exalted life purpose. Of all human knowledge, that which is of greatest value is to know the religious life of Jesus and how he lived it.

In the Master's life on Urantia, this and all other worlds of the local creation discover a new and higher type of religion, religion based on personal spiritual relations with the Universal Father and wholly validated by the supreme authority of genuine personal experience.

www.urantia.org

[edit on 2006/2/17 by GradyPhilpott]

Originally posted by trIckz_R_fO_kIdz

Yeh I get what your saying also, Religion (Faith, Belief) is fairly new to mans history. Long before Islam, long before Christianity, there was Zoroastrianism!

Certainly not before Noah, very unlikely before Abraham (circa 2,000-1,800 BC), probably no more than four hundreds years before the time of Moses (circa 1,500-1,300 BC), possibly as late as "the 6th century BC" which is getting close to the time of Daniel, who was put in charge of the Persian Magi (Daniel 2:48) and he no doubt brought it much closer to Judaism than it had been prior, which is why the three Magi (the "wisemen/kings" from the east) knew what to look for in the star of Bethlehem.

en.wikipedia.org...

Scholarly estimates are usually roughly near 1700 BC. Others, however, give earlier estimates, making him a candidate as the founder of the earliest religion based on revealed scripture, while still others place him in the 6th century BC, which would make him contemporary to the rise of the Achaemenids.

Originally posted by trIckz_R_fO_kIdz
But before that alot of things were common to man like God, and way of life and how you lived was more important for example was nothing new he was just there and everyone knew since who knows the Garden (Bible, Kolbrin.ect)

The Kolbrin is a joke of a forgery.

[edit on 17-2-2006 by Paul of Nisbis]

Originally posted by trIckz_R_fO_kIdz
I think this personally is wrong. This will damage some peoples faiths that they hold dear to there hearts.

So? It's about time. An institution as powerful as Christianity should be able to stand the most severe criticism regularly, and if it doesn't, it needs to be done away with immediately.

Originally posted by junglejake


Don't forget "Fahrenheit 9-11 did it to the World Trade Center attack".

Fahrenheit 9-11 was a puff piece to encourage people to think Bush was merely incompetent and corrupt.

www.infowars.com...


[edit on 17-2-2006 by Paul of Nisbis]

So? It's about time. An institution as powerful as Christianity should be able to stand the most severe criticism regularly, and if it doesn't, it needs to be done away with immediately.

Man, I don't think I could have said that better!

I personally believe that if something cannot be proven true, it shouldn't be believed at all.
What if Jesus was not the son of god? What would be the point in believing he was.
To me, it is a great and powerful story that is a great template for a moral and just humanity, to bad it's been soiled so badly by psuedo christians who believe in Jesus, but not his teachings, 'oh, it's faith', that's your ticket to heaven, not what you do, be it right or wrong.
I believe in the Jesus teachings, I just don't think he was the son of god, assuming there is a god.
I still believe this is a mysterious world, I tend to believe there may be an afterlife? I believe the Universe recycles itself, I think there may be more than one 'big bang', therefore I believe the Universe always was, and always will be.
From no beginning, to no end.

Okay you God/Jesus bashers........don't you DARE call on God/Jesus when you have but a couple of breaths left in your pitiful selves. Statistics show that people who were "non-believers", indeed have called on God/Jesus to forgive or save them when, for whatever reason, thought they were about to look death right in the face. Chew on that for a while... It's instinct to do so. Why? Because God has put a basic belief/basic knowledge of himself in all of us. I look at it this way.....people that choose not to believe in God/Jesus have the absolute right to...it's a God given priviledge. But I'll bet MOST if not ALL non-believers live a somewhat immoral life that they are happy living and don't want to think of having to answer to a higher power someday.


-Quin

[edit on 17-2-2006 by mytquin]

Originally posted by Toadmund

I personally believe that if something cannot be proven true, it shouldn't be believed at all.

...I tend to believe there may be an afterlife? I believe the Universe recycles itself, I think there may be more than one 'big bang', therefore I believe the Universe always was, and always will be.

You must suffer from cognitive dissonance.

mytquin said:

But I'll bet MOST if not ALL non-believers live a somewhat immoral life that they are happy living and don't want to think of having to answer to a higher power someday.

No, it's something called 'logic' that gets in the way.
I'm agnostic BTW.

Paul, that was pretty rude, please explain.

[edit on 17-2-2006 by Toadmund]

Originally posted by mytquin
Okay you God/Jesus bashers........don't you DARE call on God/Jesus when you have but a couple of breaths left in your pitiful selves. Statistics show that people who were "non-believers", indeed have called on God/Jesus to forgive or save them when, for whatever reason, thought they were about to look death right in the face. Chew on that for a while...

It's instinct to do so. Why? Because God has put a basic belief/basic knowledge of himself in all of us.

Instinct my ass. It's basic sociology. When you are raised in a Christian society, Christianity's values and beliefs are in your face until the day you die, whether you like it or not or disagree or eat it up.

I bet if researchers looked at how many people in Buddhist Asian countries appealed to God before death, you'd be seeing something quite different.

Same with Muslim Middle-Eastern countries.

I would cite more examples but it seems that a lot of crusaders slaughtered many hundreds of thousands of people in the past to make your religion the powerful institution that it remains today.

Originally posted by Toadmund
I believe in the Jesus teachings, I just don't think he was the son of god, assuming there is a god.
I still believe this is a mysterious world, I tend to believe there may be an afterlife? I believe the Universe recycles itself, I think there may be more than one 'big bang', therefore I believe the Universe always was, and always will be.
From no beginning, to no end.

There are a lot of people who wholeheartedly agree with Jesus's message, while disregarding all the pointless fairy tale crap that comes with it. I'm one of them too. I believe in a lot of things, like the afterlife, and the pursuit of unconditional love, but I also believe that it's important not to chain yourself down with absolute ideas that you may never change, so as to be in accord with an old book that was largely written by hostile, ignorant savages who thought that the Earth was flat, that mice were spawned magically from rags and food crumbs, and had no problem with having their children publically stoned to death for so much as a single sassy remark. Come up with all the excuses and explanations that you need to reconcile yourselves on that one; since the NT and the Church have come about, Christianity has hardly made a better name for itself when it comes to who's actually doing the loving, and who's doing the mass murdering and lying and playing with people's social vulnerabilities.

Originally posted by mytquin
Statistics show that people who were "non-believers", indeed have called on God/Jesus to forgive or save them when, for whatever reason, thought they were about to look death right in the face. Chew on that for a while...

To paraphrase Samuel Clements, there are lies, damn lies, and statistsics. He forgot the category where damn lies are presented as if they were statistics.

Originally posted by mytquin
It's instinct to do so. Why? Because God has put a basic belief/basic
knowledge of himself in all of us.

Suppose your statistical statement were not a complete fabrication. How would that possibly even suggest that such behavior proves the existence of god, or that he is the source of that behavior?

Originally posted by mytquin
But I'll bet MOST if not ALL non-believers live a somewhat immoral life that they are happy living and don't want to think of having to answer to a higher power someday.

Atheists represent 8% of the general population but only about 1% of the prison population. Are we done throwing out lies posed as statistics yet?

Originally posted by spaceman16
Think long before this world existed, long before this whole galaxy and universe existed, long before any aliens or distant univereses far far away existed, long before anything, anywhere ever existed. When all tha was out there was blankness. Nothing out here.

What makes you think there ever was a time when nothing existed. If there was such a time, then clearly time existed. But time is a meaningless concept in the absence of space and matter.

All you have done is to make a set of inconsistent assumptions and then ask a question based on them. No intelligible answer can be made to an unintelligible question.