My Introduction: Hello

[MyGLeonTrotsky]

Hello forum. I decided to join because I just randomly found this forum on Google. In short, I grew up in a nominally Christian household, became a conservative/creationist Christian, left right-wing religion and politics after Mitt Romney lost to Obama, became Eastern Orthodox and I had a faith crisis in October 2013 after some irreconcilable realities about the universe with my faith and some inconsistencies within Christianity that I also couldn't reconcile. I've studied the Bible in Greek and the Qur'an in Arabic, and I've studied philosophy and religion generally. The history of Christianity is also something I am well disposed to. I am also an avid reader of almost anything.

I currently hold to more misotheistic views of god, I think if he existed, I still might choose to defy him because that would be the correct ethical and moral action for me to take. I also believe that Marcion of Sinope was the best theologian who ever lived. The god who created the Universe and the god of love and goodness cannot be the same being. The god who created this universe would make the mass murderers of human history seem like saints. I also agree with Jean Paul Sartre that real meaning is derived from one's own learned experiences. Religion cannot derive true meaning in life, it only gives a meaning to you without you having done any work trying to find out the answer on your own. I am not an anti-theist though. I believe, as social animals, we human beings make up everything, religion is one of those things and that will not end. Humans will continue to make things up and tell stories, it's how we evolved. We've tried to quash religious tendencies before, in the so-called 'communist' Eastern bloc countries, and it always comes back. Always. So, being against religion in it's entirety is a futile effort I think, albeit a noble one.

Anyway, that's about it.

[robvalue]

Hello, nice to meet you

Thanks for telling us about yourself! You have an interesting perspective, and I look forward to reading more from you. I'm on board with telling celestial dictators to get bent.

[brewer]

Welcome!

[The Valkyrie]

That's quite a journey.

Welcome.

Not still a creationist, right?

*Suspicious glare*

[MyGLeonTrotsky]

That's quite a journey.

Welcome.

Not still a creationist, right?

*Suspicious glare*

lol Absolutely not. Evolution is one of the best attested scientific realities. I believed in theistic evolution when I became Eastern Orthodox. The problem I had was evolution doesn't operate in the most efficient and moral ways that you'd expect a system created by an infinitely loving god to operate. So, that was a problem I had.

[Minimalist]

Nice to meet someone who knows about Marcion.

This could be fun.  Welcome.

[Complidudaaldo]

hi'p
nice to meet you.
I am new here.

question.. what made you doubt Christianity?

second. God's goodness and love would thereby de defined by his existence, not by a naïve adolescent's judgments (nor any mortal, of the year they exist in). God can be good, as good accommodates his behaviour and the mechanics of his creation. Love accommodates his judgement, not any one else's and the arrogant way they apply the words. - where is the conflict in that theology? regardless of God's existence, it is simple to address the concept of God unbiasedly and discern clear obvious natures of the model.
More so.. God murdered with good judgment in his factual or theoretical state, while murderers are insolent pricks who can't cognitively justify their actions.

welcome. Glad to meet agnostics at all times. Make the atheists think, humble the theists. We can all play stomping on flowers here.
I think O_O... I notice that is all everyone else does.. so I thought that was our motto.

[MyGLeonTrotsky]

hi'p
nice to meet you.
I am new here.

question.. what made you doubt Christianity?

second. God's goodness and love would thereby de defined by his existence, not by a naïve adolescent's judgments (nor any mortal, of the year they exist in). God can be good, as good accommodates his behaviour and the mechanics of his creation. Love accommodates his judgement, not any one else's and the arrogant way they apply the words. - where is the conflict in that theology? regardless of God's existence, it is simply to address the concept of God unbiasedly and discern clear obvious natures of the model.
More so.. God murdered with good judgment in his factual or theoretical state, while murderers are insolent pricks who can't cognitively justify their actions.

welcome. Glad to meet agnostics at all times. Make the atheists think, humble the theists. We can all play stomping on flowers here.
I think O_O... I notice that is all everyone else does.. so I thought that was our motto.

1. A lot of things. The number of sects, most of which are completely contrary to the original Christian gospel, if there ever was such a thing to begin with, why god would allow that to occur. Why god would allow deceptive scribes and forgers to change his Scripture. Why god would need that to occur for the religion to be true, the true faith should stand on it's own merit. Why god would allow the cult -and the most obvious scam in all of history- of Islam to be created. Why god would allow the existence of two separate, but otherwise the same, Orthodox Churches (the Greek and Coptic Orthodox Churches) to remain for over one thousand years. (According to Chrysostom, schism is one of the greatest sins a Christian can commit.) Why god would allow Augustine's error to create a whole new concept within the majority of Christianity (i.e., Original Sin), why god would allow Martin Luther's heresy to be created, while it was known that he forged the word 'faith alone' into Romans 3:28. Why god would allow a forgery known as the Donatio Constantini to fool millions of people into a false religion. Why would god create the universe in such a pitiless and inefficient manner if he is a perfect mind, and an infinitely loving god? These are some things, certainly not all.

2. I define ethics according to the intentions, actions and outcomes of a moral agent. God is a moral agent, rather the moral agent. Those intentions, even if they are good, don't matter if his actions and the outcomes of those actions are horrible, especially if a perfect mind with perfect power can change those things. If you claim that is untrue, then you must claim that Stalin, Mao and Hitler had good intentions, despite their effect, and that makes them laudable in some way. I think that logic is rubbish. Murdering with good judgment is still murder. The means only justify the end if the end is justified. God hasn't justified his end. Why god would create hell in this world and an eternal paradise in the next world has not been justified. He could have just created paradise on earth, or even a decent universe, let alone a paradise. I am currently 'at war' with the Eastern Orthodox conception of god, not any per se. Although I think the Jewish, Protestant, Catholic and Islamic conceptions are equally erroneous, if not entirely immoral. Perhaps god does exist, but I have no evidence or reasons to believe he does and even if he does there is no reason why I should accept him.

[account_inactive]

Welcome aboard, comrade.

[MyGLeonTrotsky]

@Complidudaaldo

You seem to be implying that the Euthyphro dilemma is not a real thing. If god says something is okay, then it is, is that what you're implying? I think that is wrong. If god is the moral and ethical equal of Joseph Stalin, which I allege, then what he says is not okay, regardless of his power or influence. Love isn't just what you say, it's what you do. If I rape a child and say that I love him, would you find that to be morally okay? If you do, then you need to be apprehended by the police.

The "love" of the creator god is the same love that pedophiles and rapists have for their victims and Joseph Stalin had for his. Might does not make right, if god's love is not love according to my moral and ethical view, then I oppose that god.