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All the problems with Christianity
#51
RE: All the problems with Christianity
The breeding powers of the olden days' goat fuckers were incredible, if we're to believe that kind of nonsense.
[Image: 10314461_875206779161622_3907189760171701548_n.jpg]
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#52
RE: All the problems with Christianity
(November 11, 2013 at 11:47 pm)Minimalist Wrote:
Quote: African Methodist Episcopal Zion (1)
African Orthodox Church (1)
American Baptist Churches USA (3)
Amish (16)
Anabaptist (4)
Anglican Catholic Church@
Anglican Church (126)
Antiochian Orthodox@
Armenian Evangelical Church (1)
Armenian Orthodox@
Assemblies of God (18)
Associated Gospel Churches of Canada@
Association of Vineyard Churches (5)
Baptist (140)
Baptist Bible Fellowship (2)
Branch Davidian (2)
Brethren in Christ (1)
Bruderhof Communities (10)
Byzantine Catholic Church@
Calvary Chapel (3)
Calvinist (4)
Catholic (1460)
Cell Church (12)
Celtic Orthodox@
Charismatic Episcopal Church (2)
Christadelphian (12)
Christian and Missionary Alliance (4)
Christian Churches of God (1)
Christian Identity (5)
Christian Reformed Church (4)
Christian Science (7)
Church of God (Anderson) (3)
Church of God (Cleveland) (4)
Church of God (Seventh Day) (1)
Church of God in Christ (1)
Church of God of Prophecy (1)
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (118)
Church of Scotland@
Church of South India (1)
Church of the Brethren (7)
Church of the Lutheran Brethren of America (2)
Church of the Nazarene (14)
Church of the New Jerusalem (4)
Church of the United Brethren in Christ (2)
Church Universal and Triumphant (3)
Churches of Christ (26)
Churches of God General Conference (5)
Congregational Christian Churches (3)
Coptic Orthodox@
Cumberland Presbyterian Church (1)
Disciples of Christ (12)
Episcopal Church@
Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church (4)
Evangelical Congregational Church (4)
Evangelical Covenant Church (1)
Evangelical Formosan Church (1)
Evangelical Free Church (3)
Evangelical Lutheran Church (31)
Evangelical Methodist Church (1)
Evangelical Presbyterian (1)
Family, The (aka Children of God) (8)
Fellowship of Christian Assemblies (1)
Fellowship of Grace Brethren (3)
Fellowship of Independent Evangelical Churches (1)
Free Church of Scotland (3)
Free Methodist (6)
Free Presbyterian (2)
Free Will Baptist (4)
Gnostic@
Great Commission Association of Churches (2)



Greek Orthodox@
Hutterian Brethren (2)
Independent Fundamental Churches of America (1)
Indian Orthodox@
International Church of the Foursquare Gospel (3)
International Churches of Christ (6)
Jehovah's Witnesses (22)
Living Church of God (6)
Local Church (7)
Lutheran (37)
Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod (18)
Mar Thoma Syrian Church (6)
Mennonite (23)
Messianic Judaism@
Methodist (16)
Moravian Church (3)
Nation of Yahweh (1)
New Frontiers International (1)
Old Catholic Church@
Orthodox (84)
Orthodox Church in America@
Orthodox Presbyterian (2)
Pentecostal (23)
Plymouth Brethren (4)
Presbyterian (70)
Presbyterian Church (USA) (15)
Presbyterian Church in America (7)
Primitive Baptist (3)
Protestant Reformed Church (6)
Reformed (13)
Reformed Baptist (7)
Reformed Church in America (3)
Reformed Church in the United States (1)
Reformed Churches of Australia@
Reformed Episcopal Church@
Reformed Presbyterian Church (5)
Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (4)
Revival Centres International (2)
Romanian Orthodox@
Rosicrucian@
Russian Orthodox@
Serbian Orthodox@
Seventh Day Baptist (3)
Seventh-Day Adventist (45)
Shaker (9)
Society of Friends (37)
Southern Baptist Convention (14)
Spiritist (2)
Syrian Orthodox@
True and Living Church of Jesus Christ of Saints of the Last Days (2)
Two-by-Twos (3)
Unification Church (9)
Unitarian-Universalism@
United Church of Canada@
United Church of Christ (13)
United Church of God (3)
United Free Church of Scotland@
United Methodist Church (97)
United Reformed Church (1)
Uniting Church in Australia@
Unity Church (2)
Unity Fellowship Church (1)
Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches (1)
Virtual Churches (12)
Waldensian Church (3)
Way International, The (3)
Wesleyan (9)
Wesleyan Methodist@
Worldwide Church of God

Which particular bunch did you want to address? Or, did you think yours was the only one?

Would creationism count as a denomination? Because if so then it is missing.
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#53
RE: All the problems with Christianity
Creationism is a tenet all those listed adhere to, but it is not a religion by itself.
[Image: 10314461_875206779161622_3907189760171701548_n.jpg]
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#54
RE: All the problems with Christianity
Check out daddy reads Noah's ark...

(Removed)
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#55
RE: All the problems with Christianity
Quote:From the simple fact that we know how to add, no, God does not follow from that. However, in the 2nd part of my argument I explained how the ability to add cannot come from us. If it did, we would be able to add instantaneously because we would always have this ability. The way it is now, we have to think and process problems with larger numbers, essentially waiting for this ability to come to us so we can know the solution. That means the ability to add doesn't come from us, so who does it come from? Someone who is in charge of our minds and our understanding, and who knows how to add.

I have to go with no for this for the following reasons:

If I am asked: "What is 6 and 9?" I answer immediately 15 without thinking about it. This is because I have learned that sum and am merely recalling the answer. My answer is instinctive - often I will then re-do the sum in my head just to check as it does feel the answer sprang out of nowhere.

On the other hand if I am asked what is 2346 + 9456 I will have to work it out as that is not a sum I have remembered (or even possibly ever done).

These answers may come from somewhere else - but if they do that somewhere else is a different part of the Brain - not an external source.

This is true of a great many day to day interactions. Responses are instinctive as they come from immediate memory.

What is interesting is to meet people that have different abilities / brains and see how they use this facility. For example, my brother is autistic and is what is known as an Calenderical Savant. You tell him a date - he tells you the day - for about a 100 year period (around 1950 to 2050). He does this almost instantly. If you ask him how he does it he simply says he "sees it."

2 of the kids he used to live with (he lives in sheltered accommodation) used to do a similar thing with prime numbers. Apparently they could manipulate 17 digit prime numbers as easily as we do the sum 5+3.

In simple terms you are confusing brain complexity with a god.
Kuusi palaa, ja on viimeinen kerta kun annan vaimoni laittaa jouluvalot!
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#56
RE: All the problems with Christianity
(November 12, 2013 at 5:52 pm)ronedee Wrote: "Life" isn't a gift?
Do you think of your 4 year old as a gift? Or just someone you're raising?
I think this question is more complex than you are recognizing.
Since you asked it in two parts, I will answer it starting with the first. This is indeed two separate questions. Is life a gift?

This can be considered in two different ways:
1) Is it better to live than to have never lived.
2) Is it better to continue to live, rather than die.

If you are asking me, a living person, if I would rather have continued on not existing as I once did (or didn’t) before I was born, I would say no. I cannot remember what that was like, and all I’ve ever known is what it is to live. So, certainly I would prefer the only thing I know as I have no sample for any alternative.
If I never existed, I would have of course not experienced any of the hardships or pain that life brings about with it. But, I would also not have any knowledge or experience of all that is good about life. So in that since, it is bittersweet. The question becomes more difficult for someone in your position, however, when we add another side to this question.

If I am brought into existence my a conscious agent. My journey and exposure to both pain and pleasure are initiated by the agent’s decision to initiate my existence. If this agent is the Christian God, then the end of my existence too has an additional outcome. If there is a possibility that the existence and consciousness that was initiated by God could result in my consciousness being tortured for eternity, and if this outcome and experience of pain can be met by simply operating in the manner in which God created me, then I would say yes, it would be better not to live. Not only that, but if such a scenario were true, it paints a very sadistic picture of God indeed. Or, is this not something you are able to see?

Considering my son as a “gift” says nothing about the responsibility I accepted as a man to be his father. It says nothing about the decisions I’ve had to make in his best interest. It says nothing about my patience, and my acceptance. My 4 year old son, as he is now, is not a gift, he was not given to me like this, but more accurately he is the product of what I’ve put into him, in every sense- genetically, physically, mentally. As his father, however he turns out will in many ways be a reflection of me, because he is very much a product of me. A gift is something that sounds nice to say, it has a poetic softness to it, but it doesn’t at all capture what it means to parent a child that you love. My son is so much more than a gift, because my experience as his father, and our relationship is not something that was simply given to me, it was worked for.
That’s what always bothers me about the comparison of my son to people being God’s children. It’s not at all the same, and it discredits the work and direct influence I put into my son to earn his love and respect. I don’t expect him to love me, honestly, that is not my responsibility to see to it that he does. My responsibility is to mold him into a man as best I can, and I do it by being directly involved in his life. There is no version of this story that requires him to do anything for me to receive my love and guidance, and there is no version of this story when he invoke horrifying consequences for him not abiding by my “plan”. Human parents and divine creators are simply not analogous.


(November 12, 2013 at 2:00 pm)Texas Sailor Wrote: I think you need to finish that thought. Lines like this are followed with a disclaimer (Need him, obey him, trust him, love him...or else..)
This is what makes God seem like a petty egotistic maniac...


(November 12, 2013 at 5:52 pm)ronedee Wrote: Did God reveal His raunchy nature to you personally?
What first hand knowledge (from God) and evidence do you have to support your claims? You are talking for Him correct?

Or is it man's version of God you are talking about?
No, God hasn’t revealed anything to me, there is no God that I know anything about. I know nothing of God and very little of you, so I would not pretend to be able to speak for either. There is no single version of man’s God, but every version I’ve heard comes from a man. If your God does not have a hell, or in some way is incompatible to the way I’ve depicted it, then by all means, offer clarification of your position if you think it may reconcile the things I find incompatible with an allegedly loving God. Your God does not have a hell, or a devil involved in his doctrine I take it?
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#57
RE: All the problems with Christianity
(November 12, 2013 at 5:25 pm)ronedee Wrote: Well... you seem to portray the child as some kind of victim.

Not at all. The child was not really the focus of the point I was trying to make, I was using it to show how the word "faith" as defined in Hebrews 11:1 indicates that the expectation is based on some form of reasonable consideration. A child could reasonably expect (have faith) that a parent would keep a promise as simple as "I will bring home the toy I know you want." I child could be understandably suspicious (lack faith) if the parent promised to bring home a dinosaur. Faith, to me, means an expectation with reasonable thought behind it. If I step outside and it's cloudy and windy, I may grab an umbrella even though there is no rain falling; the evidence leads me to anticipate an outcome and react accordingly.

I always thought it would be awesome if god revealed himself to us unequivocally. For all of the time that I was a believer my interaction with god was one-sided. I lived my life according to his rules, and I prayed frequently to him. I interpreted events in my life as part of his plan and took those events as evidence that he was influencing or guiding my life. But I never really got any input from him, and it seemed the same for anyone else who claimed to see his hand in action. God's influence was completely based on my faith that he was having an effect on my life, and not on any tangible evidence that he was. In that sense, my faith was blind because there was no reasonable justification for it.

Or to continue my metaphor, god was the dinosaur that my parents promised to bring home as a gift. I widened that door as much as I was able, but after many years I realized that they weren't really going to bring one home.
"Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape- like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered."

-Stephen Jay Gould
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#58
RE: All the problems with Christianity
(November 12, 2013 at 6:57 pm)Rationalman Wrote: I don't know, makes me wonder why an all powerful, all knowing, universe creator would bother with a few billion large brained apes scampering around on a blue and green speck.

well...me too!

(November 12, 2013 at 6:57 pm)Rationalman Wrote: No, you don't need to see something to know it exists, you need evidence

uh...what is the difference?

(November 12, 2013 at 6:57 pm)Rationalman Wrote: No, that is not faith. That is an example of reasonable belief. She knew that you knew she had bought a car. She knew that you knew that it didn't have hubcaps. She knew that she didn't buy and put the hubcaps on her car. She knew that it is extraordinarily unlikely that someone put them there by mistake. And considering you already loaned her money to buy the car, it is not unreasonable to assume that you would spend further money on it because you love your daughter.
And unless you are an incredibly good lier, your 'surprised face' combined with your confused 'what hubcaps?' exclamation implied that you were in fact lying and knew exactly what she was talking about.

Faith is gullibility. Faith is the excuse people give for believing in something despite lack of evidence or evidence to the contrary.

You are speculating about my daughter. You have only the evidence I gave you.

I have several kids that could've done it. My daughter is in college, with many friends there. She has 3 uncles, and two grandfathers that give her stuff all the time. Not to mention her boyfriend who is always doing stuff for her.

So, you don't know what you are talking about in this situation.

"Faith" is something. You just won't acknowledge it.

She acknowledges my commitment. Even though my competition is more thoughtful than I, she has Faith that I would do these things for her! And she reaches out to me.... I'm not trying to prove I exist. It's our relationship. And her trust & faith in me that makes it that way.

Its the same with God. When we show our Trust & Faith in Him, we are given more than we need! And He takes care of every detail. We just need to cultivate our relationship with Him.

You won't.... because you want Him to prove Himself first.

But, He wouldn't mind if you called on Him today! And you might even find a new set of wheels on your life if you did!
Quis ut Deus?
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#59
RE: All the problems with Christianity
(November 13, 2013 at 12:18 pm)ronedee Wrote:
(November 12, 2013 at 6:57 pm)Rationalman Wrote: No, you don't need to see something to know it exists, you need evidence


uh...what is the difference?

You're kidding right? What is the difference between seeing something and evidence? Where to start....
I can see my computer screen in front of me. That is enough evidence to convince me that it exists. However, our brains are notorious for mucking things up. Hallucinations, delirium, imaginary friends. Sometimes we see things that aren't there: aliens, ghosts, bigfoot etc.
And aside from that, we have some things that clearly exist but are not visible to the human eye. The most obvious being gravity, air, the wind. We know these things exist due to evidence. We would not believe they exist if all we did was look for them.
Seeing, definitely is not believing. How many people in the past have looked up at the northern lights and thought gods or magic?

(November 13, 2013 at 12:18 pm)ronedee Wrote: You are speculating about my daughter. You have only the evidence I gave you.

I have several kids that could've done it. My daughter is in college, with many friends there. She has 3 uncles, and two grandfathers that give her stuff all the time. Not to mention her boyfriend who is always doing stuff for her.

My answer, and all of this was irrelevant due to the fact that you exist and your daughter exists and she knows that you exist. You do not know god exists in the same way your daughter knows that you exist therefore calling this scenario with your daughter: an example of faith is wrong.


(November 13, 2013 at 12:18 pm)ronedee Wrote: "Faith" is something. You just won't acknowledge it.

Of course we don't acknowledge it, no atheist does. It is not a tool to knowledge or wisdom or enlightenment. Its merely the excuse people give for believing in something without evidence. Its what christians say to you once you have them cornered and they can not justify their belief in god. All their answer comes down to is: well you just gotta have faith.
You parade faith around like some kind of virtue when it clearly is not. It is a no more desirable characteristic in a person than uncontrollable rage and aggression. Believing in something without any evidence is not holy or mystical or spiritual or special. It is stupidity and gullibility and it demonstrates just how irrational the human race can be.


(November 13, 2013 at 12:18 pm)ronedee Wrote: You won't.... because you want Him to prove Himself first.

So according to your logic here. You would be absolutely willing to start a new job without any other evidence than an email from someone. You wouldn't care that you have never met them before, you wouldn't care if you searched their company on the internet and found nothing. They don't need to prove they or their company exists?
'The more I learn about people the more I like my dog'- Mark Twain

'You can have all the faith you want in spirits, and the afterlife, and heaven and hell, but when it comes to this world, don't be an idiot. Cause you can tell me you put your faith in God to put you through the day, but when it comes time to cross the road, I know you look both ways.' - Dr House

“Young earth creationism is essentially the position that all of modern science, 90% of living scientists and 98% of living biologists, all major university biology departments, every major science journal, the American Academy of Sciences, and every major science organization in the world, are all wrong regarding the origins and development of life….but one particular tribe of uneducated, bronze aged, goat herders got it exactly right.” - Chuck Easttom

"If my good friend Doctor Gasparri speaks badly of my mother, he can expect to get punched.....You cannot provoke. You cannot insult the faith of others. You cannot make fun of the faith of others. There is a limit." - Pope Francis on freedom of speech
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#60
RE: All the problems with Christianity
Quote:In simple terms you are confusing brain complexity with a god.

And the human brain evolved over millions of years with no help from any fucking god.
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