Drich Wrote:The best any of can do is try and redefine your understanding of God to match what the bible actually says. But it seems some of you have built arguements around hating God in a very specific way, and seem afraid to address God as the bible describes Him.

I did, that's why I asked how you can think of God as good when he is a monster worse than every human monster ever conceived. Your response was an appeal to might, which shows me that my understanding of God is correct.

The reason why the Sunday School idea of Buddy Christ is the popular interpretation is obvious: it's easy to justify believing in a loving, caring personal God when it is all but entirely certain that God does not exist. That is something you can wish for, the perfect heavenly parent, the comfort to all your worldly sorrows. I bet, even the hardest of us atheists at one point or another wish they had some kind of magical helping hand to set bad things right. Wishful thinking is powerful and gripping, which is why the belief persists.

Of course, that is not what God is. God is hateful, spiteful, jealous, cruel, and as of the New Testament, emotionally manipulative. God made men with flaws, then made rules he knew they could not hold to, and spent centuries directly slaughtering them in response to behavior he knew was coming. He is a kid who set up a sandcastle just so he could enjoy knocking it down and hearing the screams of the dying. Then, at some point, he decides to 'forgive' us for being made flawed, and demands that we thank him for that.

No sane person would willingly worship a God like that, this is why the bulk of his followers have redefined him so that he has the best of human qualities. The God which really exists in the Bible would have been relegated to obscurity long ago because you can only worship that kind of being out of fear, and that fear can no longer hold because we know that natural disasters are not God's wrath. We know now that plagues are not his punishment. We know this because there is no pattern, no correlation. Worship of the true form of God is now reserved for hateful bigots, racists, misogynists and apocalyptic lunatics like you.

Wow, look at all these posts with questions unanswered therein and statements left unanswered Douche!

Now fuck your casting pearls before swine quote, here's the quote you never seem to comprehend:

Quote:1 Peter 3:15
But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect,

Now, get off your lazy arse, and start being a Christian who is always ready to give an answer for the faith they have, and stop making up shitty little disclaimers that go against your own damn theology.

(November 28, 2012 at 12:04 pm)Drich Wrote: Some seem to thing that the theist here are avoiding questions. I can not speak for everyone, but i know I don't unless the question is an attempt to derail the topic or is just beligerantly disrespectful or blasphmous. Basically The whole "Don't throw your pearls of wisdom before swine." Command Christ issued.

Thing is, Drich, from the perspective of someone outside your bubble, a person who refuses to cast their pearls before swine is indistinguishable from one who has no pearls in the first place. Which do you think I (for one) believe you to be?

Also, minor point but from where I'm sitting in this septic isle, blasphemy is one 'crime' of which I cannot be guilty.

Three times in the last week alone I have asked one simple, straightforward question (plus one reminder) of one of your fellow xtians , with no answer other than a short burst of red herrings in martyr sauce. What else am I to conclude, other than an attempt to evade and avoid the question? If an answer to such a bog-standard question is apparently so uncomfortable, how is any meaningful dialogue ever going to be possible?

(November 28, 2012 at 12:09 pm)Vera Wrote:

(November 28, 2012 at 12:04 pm)Drich Wrote: Some seem to thing that the theist here are avoiding questions. I can not speak for everyone, but i know I don't unless the question is an attempt to derail the topic or is just beligerantly disrespectful or blasphmous. Basically The whole "Don't throw your pearls of wisdom before swine." Command Christ issued.

How do you decide what's blasphemous and what's not, though? (Because to a non-religious person concepts like sacred, blasphemous, what have you, don't mean anything).

And I don't really like pearls, so you can keep them for yourself, no worries.

Minnie can answer this one. It usally starts with F-God, or F-Jesus or F- something along those lines, and continues that pattern throughout the whole thread..

(November 28, 2012 at 4:45 pm)Drich Wrote:

(November 28, 2012 at 12:09 pm)Vera Wrote: How do you decide what's blasphemous and what's not, though? (Because to a non-religious person concepts like sacred, blasphemous, what have you, don't mean anything).

And I don't really like pearls, so you can keep them for yourself, no worries.

Minnie can answer this one. It usally starts with F-God, or F-Jesus or F- something along those lines, and continues that pattern throughout the whole thread..

But apparently F-the holy spirit doesn't count for some reason...or so I have been told (by you? I'm not sure).

(November 28, 2012 at 12:11 pm)LastPoet Wrote:

(November 28, 2012 at 12:04 pm)Drich Wrote: (...)it is because You have based your question on an incorrect belief about God.

And How exactly will you demonstrate that your god can be perceived by others?

I don't have to. 'Others demonstrate what they believe' when they write what they 'perceive about God.'

(November 28, 2012 at 4:48 pm)Drich Wrote:

(November 28, 2012 at 12:11 pm)LastPoet Wrote: And How exactly will you demonstrate that your god can be perceived by others?

I don't have to. 'Others demonstrate what they believe' when they write what they 'perceive about God.'

Is that in in quotations because they only claim to percieve something about 'god'? Few people have any basis t demonstrate that their perceptions are real, and even those few cannot ever demonstrate that it was god, or even at all likely to be.

(November 28, 2012 at 12:46 pm)Rhizomorph13 Wrote: This reminds me of a song I learned in church:

Beloved, let us love one another,
For love is of God and everyone who loveth is born of God and knoweth God,
He that loveth not, knoweth not God for God is love,
Beloved, let us love one another. First John 4:7-8

So, if God = love can love not be loving?

Love is a choice. Love can be selective. God shows boundless love to those who seek it. For those who do not, will know God's wrath.

You know how tiring it would be for me to be wrathful to everyone who doesn't seek my love...for whatever reason? Beyond just being tiring...it would be more than a little warped. What's all this bullshit about gods wrath anyway..have the sermons changed tune over the last few weeks at your church? Awhile ago I was treated to a nice peaceful separation from your knock-off deity...but now I'm rotting.,.and there's wrath.....the worm has turned Drich.

(November 28, 2012 at 12:52 pm)thesummerqueen Wrote: Pearls are artificially inflated pieces of value anyway - they're bits that oysters shit out after coating a piece of dirt enough to make the passing easier.

Take that metaphorically, if you will.

I like the new avatar..