Using the position of ignorance to oppose Christianity

It seems more and more these days, that people like to argue that Christians are just ignorant and close minded. That we do not see the things for how they truly are. They say that the Holy Bible is a creation of man, not the inspired word of God. That it is a book of fairy-tales and fables. That it was written by ignorant sheep herders. They like to throw out the theory of evolution, and the big bang theory as proof of this claim. People call believers backwards and lacking of the ability to think freely. They laugh and scoff, scorn and deny the deity of Jesus Christ. They say the bible is inaccurate in historical detail.

I was deceived for a short time. For it is easy to be deceived, and just try to go along with the crowd. Science and knowledge have increased at a rapid pace in the last 150 or so years. We have gone from horses and buggies, to automobiles. We built rockets to venture to space, and have airplanes to cross the globe. We have computers and televisions in almost every home in the developed world. We discovered DNA and are currently doing bioengineering on our crops and animals. There is no doubt, that we think we know how the world works. I have come full circle in my beliefs. I had doubts about the existence of God, and fell into apostasy and iniquity. I fell for all the lies. It seems that the majority of the world's population has as well.

Our world has fallen into a trap. A trap of greed and pride. It is not a coincidence that this has happened. Since the increase of knowledge, some people would like to think themselves gods. People believe whatever science is selling these days. Never mind the fact that science is made up of mostly theories, and they are continually being proven wrong. Only to be replaced by a new theory for the masses to eat up.

Nearly all of the programs of television are nothing more than indoctrination into a lifestyle of iniquity. Sin and immorality are pushed constantly in movies, sitcoms, and commercials. If you really know what morals are, you will recognize this. Why do you think this is? It wasn't that long ago, that most people would have been appalled at the things we are polluted with on a daily basis. People seem to no longer care, and most revel in the garbage we call entertainment. This makes for an easily deceived mass of people. They sit around and watch murder, rape, child molestation, and sexual immorality until they become desensitized to all immoral behaviors. They begin to have a cynical view of the world around them. Their hearts grow cold, and love eludes them. They then seek companionship from whomever they can, and see nothing wrong with it. As long as they think they are happy, all is well.

This has led to the steady decline of our once great nation. The USA was seen as a country that stood for morality and equal application of justice. We were the moral compass for the free world. Now we are seen as immoral and a land of corruption. We have had a mighty fall. What will become of this country if we continue down this path is complete destruction. We could turn the ship, and right it's course at any time. Our people are so arrogant and proud, that they no longer see themselves as wrong-doers. We hold on to the views of how our country used to be, and scoff at anyone who tries to say otherwise. The only thing that will save us, is for the people to start seeing the world around them for what it truly is. It is not too late to turn back. I pray to God, each and every day, that we do. It Is our Only Hope.

Christians are not ignorant people. We just live our lives by a moral code. Is it wrong to have morals? Why all the hate for Christians, and barely any for the multitude of other religions? If a Christian is following God's word, the Holy Bible, he/she should not be bashing our brothers and sisters. That is not what Jesus Christ taught. And you cannot use the actions of a few, to vilify all of Christianity. We are supposed to bring people to God through our actions and words, while witnessing about Jesus Christ. Christians are good people, for the most part. We are taught to love our neighbor, and do unto others, as you would have them do unto you. In our walk with Christ, we are to teach the grace of God by example. What is ignorant or wrong about that?

I believe a better title is "Using Christianity to Oppose Reality"

Reality being that if Religion was killed along with the fairy tales of bogeymen, Crusades and thus fears brought on by the Church...there would be a more peaceful Society today.

But no, look around and it's still about religion. Every person killed today is in the name of religion in some form. "I believe this, I believe that...if you are not with me, you're against me.

Religion is the downfall of humanity and the entire globe as it stands.

We can't reach for the stars if we are to believe that we need permission from whatever deity is the star of the day..

In other words, "Stand for yourselves and let no man or "God" determine your destiny" Because in the end, it's only you and your acceptance of a life lived, or squandered.

Peace

Peace

reply to post by jude11


Religion is just an excuse. People don`t kill because of that, they have greed for power and control and use that as an justificative. Just look at USSR and PR China.....

The world would not be better without religion and I`m not a Christian.

What kind of d*ckhead wonders,

"What would Jesus do?"

I have no problem with any religion. I'm all for people believing whatever they want to. Its the hypocrisy of these religions that get under my skin.

The biggest one is homosexuality. Lets say God created us, gave us free will. Cool I'm with ya, obviously something created everything we use our 5 senses to perceive, and all the things we can't emotions/time/gravity/atoms/etc. I personally don't believe in Satan or Hell. To me that sounds like an ultimatum for being good and someone could just walk a fine line and make the cut. What God would even create a possibility that any of his creations could suffer forever separated from him?

Lets say Satan exists. God created Satan, and from the sound of it is God's polar opposite, yet in some way must be part of God as all things exist through him.

If you believe in an immortal soul when you die, I can only assume the spirit transcends the use of a male and female form.

God has infinite love for all his creations, how is his love alright, yet two souls occupying physical bodies loving each other becomes an unforgivable sin? A sin which then allows followers of God the right to judge when it says in the bible, clear as day, not to judge others. That God is the only one capable of true judgement.

Where does the honor your neighbor stuff come into the mix?

Thats just one example.

Its not that I hate Christians. I just don't like the picking and choosing what is good, and what is bad out of a translation of a book interpreted by people who are no longer alive today. And that goes for any other religion's Holy Books.

The get out of jail free card if you repent all is forgiven is another one that gets me that is in a couple different religions. I can do whatever I want, and if I am truly sorry for it, I'm good?

Religion simply put cannot be the base for morality as it lacks morality, here is
a question, is it ok to take slaves? i would tell you from my non religious point
of view that no, simply put no it is not ok to take someones freedom and make
them a slave, yet if you seek answers in the bible you will find that not only does
it not flat out say no, it allows you to if you follow a set of rules.....

Now the question must be, how is it that I not taking my morality from the bible
can be more moral than the person responsible for its creation, if god created it
then we have badly misunderstood this supposed peaceful, kind being, if it
was man then well it makes sense as his morality would have been based on
the time period and not perfection....... so in simple answer, morality from religion
is the lie you have all been sold, hook, line and sinker.......

there is proof the bible is one big misunderstood work of fiction if you just bother
researching for yourself, i know i did and boy let me tell you, it gives me the
heeby jeebies when i hear someone espousing the benefit of using the bible
as a moral code of some kind.

Willful ignorance is still ignorance, if you ignore the facts because they don't line
up with what you like, its still choosing to be ignorant over looking for the actual
truth, claiming you have truth and not producing anything to verify said truth does
not equal truth at all......... as i have pointed out to many before, i could pull info
from a fiction book, claim its written by god and have the same evidence you do
for your claims......

reply to post by georgiaboy



Hi GB,

What irks most atheists is that when the religious try to offer proof of their god(s), the evidence is always a matter of, 'If not this, then that."

There is nothing good on television, so Jesus must be real. No, television panders to the majority, and the majority wants empty, meaningless garbage. It has nothing to do with Jesus.

------------------------------------------------------------
You claim that the U.S. once stood for morality. This couldn't be more false. The U.S. once stood for the total annihilation of the Native American Indian. The U.S. once stood for slavery, and treating women and children as second class citizens. Now we stand for forcing our way of life on other nations.

But, no matter the views on our country, this STILL offers no evidence or reason to believe in Jesus or any other god.

All of your evidence suggests that we need to grow the hell up and respect each other. We don't need religion for that. Quite the opposite. If the young U.S. government had endeared itself to any religion, we would still be treating women worse than cattle; we only have to look to the Middle East for proof of this.

religion and worship as defined by the majority is a very shallow idea. Most think worship is just ritualistic actions or some beautiful spoken lines that would impress God and He would in turn show favour. That is not the whole but a part.
Worship is dedication, intensity, priority.
And everyone is worshipping something!!
Ya even atheists. There are very few things worth dedicating. the whole life.
The thing thats constantly on your mind, the thing that you work intensely to seek is the object of worship.
And worshipping a wrong thing would bring wrong consequences. Even religious people thinking that they are worshipping God but in reality seeking dominance/fame/followers would obviously cause conflicts, wars.
Lastly, actions speak louder than words. so any religion would be seen and judged by the action of its followers.

Originally posted by hououinkyouma
reply to post by jude11

 

Religion is just an excuse. People don`t kill because of that, they have greed for power and control and use that as an justificative. Just look at USSR and PR China.....

The world would not be better without religion and I`m not a Christian.

I've said it before and i'll say it again. When the day comes when there is no religion what excuse will man use to justify the evil that humanity is? On that day the excuses will run out and mankind will stare directly into the abyss at what it is. On that day the excuses will end and there will be no more scapegoats and the definition of evil will become...Mankind.

On that day humanity will end, because people will have no more hope and despair will set in.

reply to post by georgiaboy

It seems more and more these days, that people like to argue that Christians are just ignorant and close minded. That we do not see the things for how they truly are. They say that the Holy Bible is a creation of man, not the inspired word of God. That it is a book of fairy-tales and fables. That it was written by ignorant sheep herders. They like to throw out the theory of evolution, and the big bang theory as proof of this claim. People call believers backwards and lacking of the ability to think freely. They laugh and scoff, scorn and deny the deity of Jesus Christ. They say the bible is inaccurate in historical detail.

I spent a good portion of my life as a Christian. If the shoe fits...

Ignorance - check - self-imposed mostly.
Closed minded - check - But you can't be one unless you become closed minded.
narrow minded - check
Bible a creation of man - check - Homers Iliad and Odyssey has some facts in it too.
Written by ignorant sheep herders? - Not likely. Intelligent men wrote the bible to be sure.
Lacking the ability to think freely - check - All thought is through biblical and doctrinal filters.
Biblical historical inaccuracies - check - But not all of it is inaccurate.

They laugh and scoff, scorn and deny the deity of Jesus Christ.

Personally, I do not find this funny at all. God, Jesus, the bible, and the "church" got almost 30 years of my life. I take that kind of deception quite seriously. As far as I'm concerned, Christianity is a cult, except that it's the largest cult in the world. And possibly the most wicked of them all.

Christianity itself is a "wolf in sheep's clothing."

reply to post by georgiaboy


To be fair OP, you've kinda proven your ignorance here. Sciences are processes, studies and methods, and they're only "limited", I guess, by our cognitive abilities. Due to our obviously limited brainpower and primitive understanding of the universe, scientists don't claim to have all the answers, nor will they ever, and they freely admit to proving themselves wrong all the time. Again, you seem to have fallen for the common misconception that the word theory is synonymous with hypothesis. It isn't. A scientific theory is an (yes, sometimes tentative) explanation for something that is already a observable fact.

On the subject of morality, it's not only Christians that have a problem with today's society. We probably agree on the fact that pop culture is over-sexualised and commercialised to the core, but that's likely for different reasons. I can tell you now that the most of the people that have fallen into the "trap" aren't usually science lovers, far from it in fact. They don't care much about anything apart from getting laid and getting paid. Anything related to a bit of intellectual rigour is a chore.

Scientists (as a group) don't consider themselves gods, and neither do the masses. There are hedonists, but don't get the two mixed up. The USA was (and I think still kinda is) a nation to respect greatly, but it was never the compass of the free world, whatever that means. At face value, I find that insulting. I don't think I've ever heard anyone in my country, young or old, ever say, "We should be more like the Americans!" or "What would Americans do in this situation?"

I think all you're seeing here is that Christianity, as a ideological power, is losing its authority. In the West, it was the bigshot, so that's why you think you're getting more flak than any other religion. To me, the other Abrahamic religions (and the Dharmic ones to an extent) can be just as much of a headache. It no longer has the moral high ground, and something's moving forward to replace it. Well, it's more of the same traditional racist, sexist and authoritarian restriction, but it's wrapped up in faux egalitarian conventions to make it seem liberating. It's another Trojan horse, but they have come to realise that reward and punishment isn't working on the whole, anymore.

Originally posted by hououinkyouma
reply to post by jude11

 

Religion is just an excuse. People don`t kill because of that, they have greed for power and control and use that as an justificative. Just look at USSR and PR China.....

The world would not be better without religion and I`m not a Christian.

Okay, now think back, WAY back, to when those greedy for power and control needed an excuse in order to rally the people to their selfish cause. What did they come up with? RELIGION!

reply to post by ihavenoaccount


Well you have mentioned the monotheist and panentheistic religions so where then do you conclude that morality should come from?

For those who mention a world without religion where would morality come from? Where do your rights come from? Without religion your rights end where my gun begins or until some governing body decides so. Humans polarize themselves anyways. Once religion is removed people would find some other idea to polarize themselves about. Like the southpark athiest war.

People who uphold scientism as the key to understanding do not realize that they are merely trading one institution for another? People wont go to some form of clergy for answers instead its a society of scientific "experts". This is the expert society that Bertrand Russel mentioned and this is a path to removing freedom and critical thinking.

Former Christians usually become disenfranchised because instead of putting faith in the Lord they are looking for men to solve their problems either through the church or some other system. Christ came partially to correct the abuses of religion and religious leaders. The legalist who twisted religion to form laws to control people.

Christ did not come and say "Establish a 501c3 in my name!". Baby out with the bath water here.

To the OP while I understand your views and concerns I have learned that this forum is not one where you will be able to change many peoples minds about anything. People want proof of Gods existence yet how can someone with no concept of God recognize God when he sees em? How can you reason a view with people who pick and choose what is right and wrong without any kind of standard?

What is it like for the people who can wake up and go, "You know what today Ive decided Ive had 15 past lives and in one of them I was Cleopatra", " My spirit guide has decided that aliens are coming to save us from ourselves" "Today even though I cant run a bath without doing a tarot reading, Ive decided to be my own God".

To be fair, OP has a good point.
EVERYONE loves to point out the negatives of believers, and not the positives.
Regardless of your viewpoints on science and religion, etc, know this: We've been technologically advanced on a big degree for about 150 years. We've moved forward by leaps and bounds.
But for anyone to discredit or flat out deny the existence of a loving God is directly denying the bounds of scientific existence. To me, it's something we haven't scientifically discovered yet. There's even entire groups that have dedicated their careers to discovering "divine" evidence, and they believe it's an alternate dimension invisible to our eyes that exists parallel to us.
But honestly: what's so bad about that God? You know, the one that loves, uplifts, and supports us because he created us? The ONLY thing you have to pin against it is that people acted out of line in his service.
Boo hoo. You got mistreated by humans. Did you honestly expect anything different? People aren't perfect, and few people who actually chase God come close.
Even so, holding onto that bitterness against a church/believers/God will only hurt you, whether you're a believer or not.
I'll end with this: If you question the existence of a God, you haven't met a true disciple yet.

Religion is not the scourge. The malevolent evil pulling the heartstrings of man to commit terrible things is the true scourge.
I've seen the face of Jesus, and I've met his gaze. He's real, he's alive, and he loves you.
The question is, will you let your stupid, arrogant, and petty views against people get in the way of being in a relationship with a loving being that wants the best for you?
I dare you, let go of them and try it out. You literally have nothing to lose.

Also, for the snarky ones: No, not on drugs. Never have been, never plan to be. Healthy mind and body, no syndromes. Only thing in my family's medical history is a small risk for diabetes when I hit my 60's. Your move.

reply to post by jiggerj


They manipulated a good thing for a bad thing.
Happened before with other things, will happen again.
Hindsight is 20/20.

Islam was founded by the corrupt Catholic Church to take back Jerusalem from the protestants. So they came up with a fake prophet to summon an army of believers to kill all the heretics.
What they didn't count on was that that religion took on a mind of its own, and now we stand toe to toe because a corrupt Pope wanted Jerusalem for himself.

Science has just showed some folks what God meant for them to know. When we step down to a quantum level things get a little magical. If you have never seen the dual slit experiment or the measurement problem you should. If you were able to see evidence of God would you deny it? Would you accept it? It would seem that without an observer the universe not not exists at all.

Sorry I am a little drunk tonight! Don't let me shake your faith or don't think I am trying, just know that an engineered existence is very plausible be it a simulation or Godly! Science would actually agree with intelligent design friend you need just look around! Ask any physicist about the measurement problem and they will start to sweat!

Jesus right or wrong I don't know, but I do know faith is a very critical part of the normal human psyche. So you can't go wrong just remember WWJD?

After all who is to say how God made the world! We are all the same, it takes faith to be a Christian just the same as it takes faith to be an Atheist! Do you really think it would be a fault to not know when the truth of existence is so well hidden? None know for sure friend!

And on that note God bless you and yours!

I too have nothing against a persons religion. The main facts I disagree with it are simple, The New Testiment was written by Man a hundred years after Christ existd. I truely believe Christ was a normal human being with the gift of the gab. Satan does not exist, but in the mind of the people. Otherwise dont you think if he was that much of a threat to God that God would just blink his eye and Satan would never have been created. Many wars, and lives lost through religion, they talk bout sin and yet the pasters are all well off people who give nothing in return, money wise.
A persons belief is fine if it brings them closer to God and harmony, Religion just makes the gullible poor and miserable.

Christianity doesn't have the best track record when it comes to its own ignorance. It is impossible to debate with a Christian too because the only book they see fit to reference is the Bible and dismisses every piece of evidence or criticism the opposition presents.

There is also the issue of inconsistencies. Never have I gotten a clear answer as to why certain rules and laws of Leviticus have been done away with (mixed fibers in clothing, two different crops in the same field, cutting hair and shaving beards) but others are insisted upon still being relevant (unwavering condemnation of homosexuality).

Finally, the cavalier hypocrisy of Christians. Here you are using a computer and posting to a website your thoughts and opinions on a device possible only through thousands of years of scientific and technological advancement. When you're sick you are fine going to the doctor who uses Biology and Chemistry to cure your ailments. Trust the physics that keep a roof over your head and provide your transportation. But the moment one of these branches of science proves or calls into question something written in the Bible it must be wrong, no room for argument.

reply to post by elias

Originally posted by elias
reply to post by jiggerj

 

Islam was founded by the corrupt Catholic Church to take back Jerusalem from the protestants. So they came up with a fake prophet to summon an army of believers to kill all the heretics.

Um... you what???

Islam, if you trace it back to the Caliphs, has about 900 years on the Church of England's separation and the Reformation in Europe. The Crusades were in the Middle Ages. Have you got a source for this thing about Jerusalem?

Originally posted by georgiaboy
They say that the Holy Bible is a creation of man, not the inspired word of God. That it is a book of fairy-tales and fables. That it was written by ignorant sheep herders.

Written by those that would rule.