(May 14, 2016 at 10:36 am)TheRocketSurgeon Wrote:

(May 13, 2016 at 1:57 pm)Godschild Wrote:  Think about it, do you really believe that those who believe that sex outside of marriage is wrong that we would actually promote the sex trade. Yes, I know there are Christians that watch porn, that have affairs, and some who abuse children, these are the exceptions and not the main stream of Christians. The Christian church works to rescue those sold into slavery and travel around the world to do so. The church works to promote education against the sex slave trade and as far as I know was the first organization to take serious action against it. Now states like mine are involved in stopping the sex slave trade, we have some of the toughest laws against it and they will pay dearly when caught practicing the sex trade. The Christian church in it's efforts to stop the sex trade has influenced others to stop it. So with this understanding who's left to promote the sex slave trade..... unbelievers are the only choice, there only two sides to this and the Christians as a whole fight against it.

GC

I haven't read the last couple of pages of this thread, so someone may have already answered this, but I feel the need to stop and respond, here.

The "sex trade" is not the same thing as "sex trafficking". And many humanist/atheist groups stand up against it, too. Indeed, many of us would argue that it is the Christian-derived approach to thinking of sex workers as "sinful" that leads to much of the potential for abuse. But the simple fact is, all people of good will, regardless of their religious beliefs (or lack thereof), are opposed to sex trafficking and slavery, and it was a scumbag move to imply what you just did.

Here's one (of several) articles from The Humanist, on the subject:

http://thehumanist.com/magazine/january-...roundswell

Here's an article by a humanist about the way your attitude toward sexual "morality" actually makes things worse:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/clay-naff/...52158.html

 Your mistake was not reading everything I posted, I said I didn't put all atheist in that category. No I wasn't defending any atheist in my statements, I was stating what Christians do. I have been waiting for an atheist to supply facts about what they do to fight against the sex slave trade, you did and I thank you. I didn't see it was my responsibility to hunt down those facts, just as the atheist here tell me they do not see it their responsibility to hunt down positive facts about Christians, if one did I would probably have a heart attack. Again thanks for the response.

GC

(May 14, 2016 at 3:20 pm)Godschild Wrote:

(May 13, 2016 at 3:42 pm)drfuzzy Wrote:

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Why don't you tell me how a person, raised Christian, baptized in a Southern Baptist Church at the age of 7, went to church 3x per week plus Sunday School and Vacation Bible School and Choir Practice, attended a Protestant Christian School, memorized the Bible daily, and prayed daily for over 40 years to feel something - anything - never experienced the "Holy Spirit" in any way?  
   C'mon.  Tell me I was never a Christian.  Tell me I read the Bible the "wrong" way.  Tell me I never learned to pray properly.  

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Okay I'll tell you, you were never saved, you were going through the motions, I have an opinion on why but I'm not going to express it at this time. You didn't read the Bible the wrong way, and you probably prayed as you were taught, but neither of those were effective because you weren't saved, Jesus only sends the Holy Spirit to convict the lost and then to teach those who are saved. Now you tell me why have I heard from the Holy Spirit on many occasions and received answers from Him that could not possibly come from myself or anyone else because I didn't know the answer nor those I asked?

drfuzzy Wrote:

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And you have still completely ignored my other question.  If the Holy Spirit provides guidance to anyone who is studying the scriptures prayerfully, why are there so many conflicting interpretations of scripture within the Protestant Church, and how can you judge any pastor who disagrees with your interpretation to be "wrong" and not hearing the Holy Spirit.  The verses either mean what they say, or they don't.  If the Holy Spirit is guiding, he's giving different information to everyone he guides.  This isn't guidance.  This is deliberate creation of anarchy and chaos.

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I never said they were not hearing the Holy Spirit, I told 'rob' I think it was him, that Christians to often go into the scriptures with preconceived ideas and let that override what the Holy Spirit is teaching or the adopt part of what the Holy Spirit says into their preconceived ideas

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 just to make a stronger case for themselves. I've done it before and was shown I was wrong and changed my belief because it was the right thing to do. Serving God is not about the self, unfortunately many Christians can't see this. The two underlined words above in your post are by me and they are against who God is, so it's not possible for the Holy Spirit to do such things, this is taught many places in scripture and if you have most of the Bible memorized then you know this. I wish I had that good of a memory, I'm being honest about this statement.

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drfuzzy Wrote:

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I'm expecting more judgment and insults . . . you'll say I was wrong, they were wrong, we're all stupid and deluded, then you'll stick your nose in the air and go tell your friends how you told off those stupid atheists.

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 I have told people about some conversations I've had on here and I'm sure you have also. Be sure of this this conversation want go any further than this forum. I'm not judging you you need to get over that little thing, I'm telling you what the Bible says. I'm not going to say you're stupid but I will say the evil one has deluded you, he found that your anger was the perfect place to get at you. I do not know why you're so angry at me, other Christians and God, I have an idea, something I've seen before. I will say this and let it go at that and I mean no disrespect towards you, God still loves you.
Have a good weekend and I'll read your post on Monday if you decide to answer.

GC

"you were never saved"  Ah.  You think that "once saved, always saved" means that it's not possible for any Atheist to ever have been saved.  Which is the primary reason you are here.  You are convinced that all of us ex-Christians missed the boat somehow.  You are incapable of letting yourself believe, for a moment, that a True Christian could ever reject Christ. 
     
You have convinced yourself that a Spirit is giving you direction, and nothing I say will change that opinion.  Fine.  Nothing you say will ever convince me that the Holy Spirit exists.  
But if the message that the Holy Spirit is teaching you can be over-ridden by any means, then the spirit really SUCKS at communication.  

I'm not angry at god. That seems as silly to me as saying that I'm angry at the tooth fairy.  Or sparkly vampires, or Santa Claus.  It's absurd.  I am furious at religion though, for the damage it has done to me and my family and friends.  And I'm no fan of people who disrespect my ability to study and choose my beliefs for myself, who tell me to my face that I'm deluded and misguided and need their help.  People who have the unmitigated gall to tell me that a child, crying to god and Jesus each day and night of her life, was rejected by God. Well that poor little kid.  It took her a long time to realize that nobody was listening.  She's free now, and feels a lot better.

We will just have to agree to disagree.  I have no need of your preaching.

(May 14, 2016 at 3:37 pm)Godschild Wrote:  Your mistake was not reading everything I posted, I said I didn't put all atheist in that category. No I wasn't defending any atheist in my statements, I was stating what Christians do. I have been waiting for an atheist to supply facts about what they do to fight against the sex slave trade, you did and I thank you. I didn't see it was my responsibility to hunt down those facts, just as the atheist here tell me they do not see it their responsibility to hunt down positive facts about Christians, if one did I would probably have a heart attack. Again thanks for the response.

GC

My "mistake"? You clearly said, "The Christian church in it's efforts to stop the sex trade has influenced others to stop it. So with this understanding who's left to promote the sex slave trade..... unbelievers are the only choice, there only two sides to this and the Christians as a whole fight against it."

While we grasp that you mean only unbelievers are doing the trade, and not every atheist on the planet (duuuuhhhh!), you're nevertheless implying that only atheism leads people to do such things. Even a cursory examination of the facts shows that's not the case. Now, you can call the theists who do this "sinners" or "Not True Christians™", but there is simply no evidence besides what you're pulling out of your ass that there's any correlation between nonbelief and an increased likelihood of doing that sort of horrible thing. What evidence there is seems to point to a reduced likelihood of nonbelievers doing that sort of thing, though even we admit that's probably because we generally have a higher average level of education.

What in the FUCK makes you think we don't know or acknowledge "positive facts about Christians", or that we'd have a "heart attack" if we did so?!? Many of us are married to theists, and there are innumerable posts about good actions by Christians, or of cooperation between secular groups and religious groups.

So rather than acknowledging that you had a prejudice, you simply assumed it to be true, based on your bias, until/unless someone could show you specific examples of the opposite (and ignoring that we have done so frequently in the years you've been here). You also didn't acknowledge the ways in which your religion's restrictive/anti-sex (Puritanical) viewpoint actually can harm the people who choose to engage in sex work, either voluntarily or out of economic pressure, which I pointed out.

You shouldn't have *had* to "hunt down" the way people like us feel about the sex trafficking industry; you should have known us as human beings by now well enough to know that we would never support anything remotely like slavery, or that harms women against their will, et cetera. But you didn't know because your prejudice is so strong, and you don't listen to us. That IS your responsibility, not as a Christian, but as a decent fucking human being.

Fail.

(May 14, 2016 at 4:09 pm)drfuzzy Wrote: I'm not angry at god. That seems as silly to me as saying that I'm angry at the tooth fairy.  Or sparkly vampires, or Santa Claus.  It's absurd.  I am furious at religion though, for the damage it has done to me and my family and friends.  And I'm no fan of people who disrespect my ability to study and choose my beliefs for myself, who tell me to my face that I'm deluded and misguided and need their help.  People who have the unmitigated gall to tell me that a child, crying to god and Jesus each day and night of her life, was rejected by God. Well that poor little kid.  It took her a long time to realize that nobody was listening.  She's free now, and feels a lot better.

To be fair, I'm pretty angry at the concept of sparkly vampires. It's at least as bad as the characteristics attributed to Yeah-way.

(May 14, 2016 at 4:09 pm)drfuzzy Wrote:

(May 14, 2016 at 3:20 pm)Godschild Wrote: Okay I'll tell you, you were never saved, you were going through the motions, I have an opinion on why but I'm not going to express it at this time. You didn't read the Bible the wrong way, and you probably prayed as you were taught, but neither of those were effective because you weren't saved, Jesus only sends the Holy Spirit to convict the lost and then to teach those who are saved. Now you tell me why have I heard from the Holy Spirit on many occasions and received answers from Him that could not possibly come from myself or anyone else because I didn't know the answer nor those I asked?


I never said they were not hearing the Holy Spirit, I told 'rob' I think it was him, that Christians to often go into the scriptures with preconceived ideas and let that override what the Holy Spirit is teaching or the adopt part of what the Holy Spirit says into their preconceived ideas

---

 just to make a stronger case for themselves. I've done it before and was shown I was wrong and changed my belief because it was the right thing to do. Serving God is not about the self, unfortunately many Christians can't see this. The two underlined words above in your post are by me and they are against who God is, so it's not possible for the Holy Spirit to do such things, this is taught many places in scripture and if you have most of the Bible memorized then you know this. I wish I had that good of a memory, I'm being honest about this statement.

---

 I have told people about some conversations I've had on here and I'm sure you have also. Be sure of this this conversation want go any further than this forum. I'm not judging you you need to get over that little thing, I'm telling you what the Bible says. I'm not going to say you're stupid but I will say the evil one has deluded you, he found that your anger was the perfect place to get at you. I do not know why you're so angry at me, other Christians and God, I have an idea, something I've seen before. I will say this and let it go at that and I mean no disrespect towards you, God still loves you.
Have a good weekend and I'll read your post on Monday if you decide to answer.

GC

"you were never saved"  Ah.  You think that "once saved, always saved" means that it's not possible for any Atheist to ever have been saved.  Which is the primary reason you are here.  You are convinced that all of us ex-Christians missed the boat somehow.  You are incapable of letting yourself believe, for a moment, that a True Christian could ever reject Christ.

No I do not believe that, I believe if one who proclaims to have been saved and then becomes an atheist was never saved. If one is truly saved they have a real relationship with Christ and in that they could never deny He exists, they could reject Him but never deny His existence. As far as missing the boat, the churches are full of people who missed the boat, they just haven't realized it yet. Most Christians I know believe they worship with some who believe they are saved but are not. It's not that we judge them it's we see nothing in them that shows they are Christians, the Bible gives tells us what a Christian should be like. Paul said that we would see false teachers (preachers) in the church, so tell me if a preacher can be a false Christian then why not others?
     

drfuzzy Wrote:You have convinced yourself that a Spirit is giving you direction, and nothing I say will change that opinion.  Fine.  Nothing you say will ever convince me that the Holy Spirit exists.  
But if the message that the Holy Spirit is teaching you can be over-ridden by any means, then the spirit really SUCKS at communication.

I know for a fact the Holy Spirit is real, I didn't have to convince myself, God did that as He promised He would once I was saved. The Holy Spirit's lessons to me aren't overridden for long, He convinces me of the truth through scripture and I accept it as it should be taken, the truth. People have free choice to decide what they want, whether it's the truth or not, the Holy Spirit shows us the truth and some misuse it but, that doesn't make His truth any less true, it does make those who misuse it foolish. 

drfuzzy Wrote:I'm not angry at god. That seems as silly to me as saying that I'm angry at the tooth fairy.  Or sparkly vampires, or Santa Claus.  It's absurd.  I am furious at religion though, for the damage it has done to me and my family and friends.  And I'm no fan of people who disrespect my ability to study and choose my beliefs for myself, who tell me to my face that I'm deluded and misguided and need their help.  People who have the unmitigated gall to tell me that a child, crying to god and Jesus each day and night of her life, was rejected by God. Well that poor little kid.  It took her a long time to realize that nobody was listening.  She's free now, and feels a lot better.

Well the Christian religion is absolutely about God so you can't be made at one without being made at the other. Since I do not know what you mean by religion damaging you, your family and friends it's hard for me to address. I can say I have a friend who sees his beliefs above all other denominations and lately he's used it in a way that has damaged our relationship but, not my relationship with God, I nor God will allow that to happen because of my love for Him. I still love my friend and wouldn't abandon him but, I'm still upset with him. 

drfuzzy Wrote:We will just have to agree to disagree.  I have no need of your preaching.

 I haven't been trying to preach to you, it's actually not allowed on this forum, maybe some day you'll have a change of heart, because you shouldn't let people come between you and God.

GC

(May 14, 2016 at 3:28 pm)Godschild Wrote:

(May 13, 2016 at 5:49 pm)ChadWooters Wrote: GC, I think you need to back away from that one. The correct biblical category for sexual slavers would be the wicked or unrighteous, not unbelievers.

 I didn't want to call them wicked and unrighteous, but that's what anyone is as you say that deals in the sex slave trade. I wasn't referring to anyone here, but you know as well as I do that a Christian can't do such a thing. I'm sure there are people who call themselves Christians that deal in the sex slave trade, but those people are also the wicked and unrighteous and that means they couldn't be Christians. If I'm not mistaken any who reject Christ are called the wicked and unrighteous.

GC

We both agree that we are all sinners in the eyes of the Lord. Of course. The distinction I'm making is between orthodoxy and orthopraxy. It is common for sincere believers to know what they should do and yet act to the contrary. Saint Paul said so himself.

A Christian can believe very strongly that adultery is a sin and yet in a moment of weakness succumb to temptation. He or she doesn't stop being a Christian. They just failed to live-up to their beliefs. In other words their will was not strong enough to conform to their beliefs. Likewise a drunk who hits bottom and gets on his knees to say the sinners' prayer is as of that moment a Christian. He understands the Truth of his sin and his need for a Savior. Even so, it may take some time for him to gain the strength to overcome. He may backslide several times. Yet he doesn't stop being a Christian.

The theoretical "Christian slaver" could be someone so deeply embedded in the slave trade that getting out of that could be immensely difficult. Even though he has come to know the Truth, he may have to go through a period of great struggle to completely sever himself from that life. The bottom line, as I see it it that, repentance isn't always instant and complete; but rather, an ongoing process of gradually opening ourselves to the Lord so we can learn to live in accordance with His Will.

I guess all I'm saying is that just because someone is Christian, it doesn't mean they are a good one.

(May 14, 2016 at 4:18 pm)TheRocketSurgeon Wrote:

(May 14, 2016 at 3:37 pm)Godschild Wrote:  Your mistake was not reading everything I posted, I said I didn't put all atheist in that category. No I wasn't defending any atheist in my statements, I was stating what Christians do. I have been waiting for an atheist to supply facts about what they do to fight against the sex slave trade, you did and I thank you. I didn't see it was my responsibility to hunt down those facts, just as the atheist here tell me they do not see it their responsibility to hunt down positive facts about Christians, if one did I would probably have a heart attack. Again thanks for the response.

GC

My "mistake"? You clearly said, "The Christian church in it's efforts to stop the sex trade has influenced others to stop it. So with this understanding who's left to promote the sex slave trade..... unbelievers are the only choice, there only two sides to this and the Christians as a whole fight against it."

Yes your mistake, it certainly wasn't mine because you didn't read them all to start with, I'm sure you have by now. Yes I said those things, what's wrong with the statements.

TRS Wrote:While we grasp that you mean only unbelievers are doing the trade, and not every atheist on the planet (duuuuhhhh!), you're nevertheless implying that only atheism leads people to do such things. Even a cursory examination of the facts shows that's not the case. Now, you can call the theists who do this "sinners" or "Not True Christians™", but there is simply no evidence besides what you're pulling out of your ass that there's any correlation between nonbelief and an increased likelihood of doing that sort of horrible thing. What evidence there is seems to point to a reduced likelihood of nonbelievers doing that sort of thing, though even we admit that's probably because we generally have a higher average level of education.

Paul speaks of fake Christians that are leaders in the church and identifies how we can know them, so if the leaders can be fake why can't the average person who claims to be a Christian? With that explained if there are people saying they are Christians and selling children into sexual slavery I can assure you they are not. There are atheist all over this country and world that are not very well educated, you are blinding yourself to this fact, just because they do not identify as atheist doesn't me they aren't unbelievers, there is no in between, it's one or the other. Besides what does education have to do with morals, children show they have a sense of morality before they go to school. As far as I can see the highly educated such as Hitchins and others like him have little respect for the less educated and the religious, especially Christians. Don't come back with all atheist can't be judged by a few bad apples, most atheist here compare all Christians to those who are the bad apples, so all I'm doing is keeping this on equal ground as the atheist have ordained. So I say to you unbelievers are selling children into sexual slavery because they have no standard that's absolute to base their morality on, thus can change it to suit them, I know I was there at one time, your not talking to one who doesn't know what it's like to be an unbeliever. 

TRS Wrote:So rather than acknowledging that you had a prejudice, you simply assumed it to be true, based on your bias, until/unless someone could show you specific examples of the opposite (and ignoring that we have done so frequently in the years you've been here). You also didn't acknowledge the ways in which your religion's restrictive/anti-sex (Puritanical) viewpoint actually can harm the people who choose to engage in sex work, either voluntarily or out of economic pressure, which I pointed out.

No one that I know of has posted what some atheist are doing to fight against the sex slave trade, not until you did. Engaging in sex work can be harmful whether Christians object to it or not, many of the people who have come out of this work have said that it's absolutely the worst thing and that the male domination over the women is brutal, we the Christian church never caused harm to these, the harm comes within the lifestyle of that world.

TRS Wrote:You shouldn't have *had* to "hunt down" the way people like us feel about the sex trafficking industry; you should have known us as human beings by now well enough to know that we would never support anything remotely like slavery, or that harms women against their will, et cetera. But you didn't know because your prejudice is so strong, and you don't listen to us. That IS your responsibility, not as a Christian, but as a decent fucking human being.

Fail.

 Why, I've never seen anything about what atheist do to fight against sex trafficking. What I didn't do was accuse anyone here of that nor did I accuse anyone here that they were okay with it, you need to quit reading into my statements what you believe I say, you do it to often. I will say I've seen hints from some men here that might mean they don't mind degrading women, I hope it's not true. You can't bring up women being degrading by men in the Bible without bring up that the men of the world as a whole did so. Those things in the Bible are recorded history not God's intentions of how women were to be treated. Actually the family is to function as the Trinity functions, there are responsibilities in both that each part accepts as their own responsibility. This is the way God intended each member of the family to function, equals as the Trinity with separate but equally important responsibilities. We as humans may see them as levels, but the Trinity doesn't see that within itself, though we might see it that way with the Trinity, we are not to see levels in the Trinity nor the family. As far as accusing me of pulling things out of my butt you're wrong and you know it, I put this in a logical way and i'm sorry you can't accept it. You know I'm finished with this part of the thread, I've explained myself and see no further reason to defend my point of view. I haven't been disrespectful to anyone here about this subject and never intended to, so if anyone was it's their own false ideas about what I was saying.

GC

(May 16, 2016 at 4:14 pm)ChadWooters Wrote:

(May 14, 2016 at 3:28 pm)Godschild Wrote:  I didn't want to call them wicked and unrighteous, but that's what anyone is as you say that deals in the sex slave trade. I wasn't referring to anyone here, but you know as well as I do that a Christian can't do such a thing. I'm sure there are people who call themselves Christians that deal in the sex slave trade, but those people are also the wicked and unrighteous and that means they couldn't be Christians. If I'm not mistaken any who reject Christ are called the wicked and unrighteous.

GC

We both agree that we are all sinners in the eyes of the Lord. Of course. The distinction I'm making is between orthodoxy and orthopraxy. It is common for sincere believers to know what they should do and yet act to the contrary. Saint Paul said so himself.

A Christian can believe very strongly that adultery is a sin and yet in a moment of weakness succumb to temptation. He or she doesn't stop being a Christian. They just failed to live-up to their beliefs. In other words their will was not strong enough to conform to their beliefs. Likewise a drunk who hits bottom and gets on his knees to say the sinners' prayer is as of that moment a Christian. He understands the Truth of his sin and his need for a Savior. Even so, it may take some time for him to gain the strength to overcome. He may backslide several times. Yet he doesn't stop being a Christian.

The theoretical "Christian slaver" could be someone so deeply embedded in the slave trade that getting out of that could be immensely difficult. Even though he has come to know the Truth, he may have to go through a period of great struggle to completely sever himself from that life. The bottom line, as I see it it that, repentance isn't always instant and complete; but rather, an ongoing process of gradually opening ourselves to the Lord so we can learn to live in accordance with His Will.

I guess all I'm saying is that just because someone is  Christian, it doesn't mean they are a good one.

 I agree with all you're saying, except for one thing, I personally can't see how someone who is a Christian could traffick children, one coming to the truth out of such a life must realize that they can't treat other humans that way especially children. Jesus warned the apostles and others about keeping the little children from Him. I do not consider my self all that good of a Christian, I have a long way to go.

GC

I don't understand why one cant deny Gods existence and then be saved if they change their mind (or lack of belief) later.

Could you elaborate, GC?

(May 16, 2016 at 5:37 pm)Godschild Wrote:  I agree with all you're saying, except for one thing, I personally can't see how someone who is a Christian could traffick children, one coming to the truth out of such a life must realize that they can't treat other humans that way especially children.

I was just presenting a theoretical case, but not without precedent. After his conversion, John Newton didn't walk away from the slave trade immediately but rather initially only resolved to treat the slaves humanely. His growth into a great abolitionist took some time. While repentance happens the instant we turn our eyes to the Lord and He grants us our salvation without hesitation, the regeneration of hearts and the renewing of minds both take time.