(August 29, 2015 at 11:33 pm)Salacious B. Crumb Wrote:(August 29, 2015 at 5:33 pm)deep thinker Wrote: I also appreciate your ability to respect my beliefs. I think most religious people, if they are being honest with themselves, would admit to questioning their faith during hard times in their life. I pray for our species that we will continue to evolve with our spiritual beliefs and eventually have churches that accept people of all faiths, including people that do not believe in any particular god but have a belief in the essence of the human soul. A simple belief there is a natural divide between good and evil and that it takes an incredibly strong soul to confront evil and forgive evil with acts of love and passion. I think it is natural to believe in a creator as logic tells my brain it is impossible for every atom to have been created from nothing. It would be like believing a building just naturally occurred without any input from a higher power.
But, I can absolutely respect the belief system of an atheist. With all of the tragedy in the world and the ability of our mind to grasp immensely complicated concepts, it is easy to lose faith and assume there cannot be a God if we cannot prove it through science. I guess the flip side of that logic is that we will never be able to prove a god doesn't exist. I will end with this thought. I have lived a portion of my life without a belief in God and it was an extremely depressing period in my life. Not believing in a God with modern day Christian values left me with a very sick and depressed world view. All I cared about was myself. It was a very selfish mentality. I was introduced to a very positive Christian church by a friend and it has been a wonderful influence in my life. The friendships I have built will last a lifetime and I have been able to help many other families in need. So, thank you for being able to accept my belief system. I'm not sure what is was like to attend a Christian church 50 years ago but I can say that my experience today has been 100% positive. Hearing messages of faith, hope and love is good for the human spirit. I believe we were wired to receive love and give compassion. I hope things work out between you and your father. I pray your father can become a less judgmental person. He is not perfect and sins every day of his life so he should accept everyone else for who they are as long as they aren't hurting anyone else.
Well, I’ve tried to forgive the evil acts over and over again, but since the evil doesn’t want to stop, I thought it might be time to walk away from it, because it was severely affecting my mental and physical health.
“I think it is natural to believe in a creator as logic tells my brain it is impossible for every atom to have been created from nothing” This is a logical fallacy, which is called an argument from ignorance. You don’t know how something could have occurred, therefore god. You have a right to believe this, but what does your logic tell you about how this mysterious, invisible man in the sky was created? If you think there MUST be a creator for all of this, then you must believe that there was a creator for your god. How can a god just pop into existence? Think about it; you get into an infinite regression. If you believe there is an eternal god that came out of nothing, then why would it be crazy to think that the universe is eternal? It’s a more natural explanation, when all supernatural explanations fail miserably. It seems your god fails in the evidence department, and sounds like a tall tale. I don’t see anything supernatural happening on this planet. I see more and more being explained as time progresses. I don’t see your god doing anything for this planet, in fact, he allows people to kill each other over an argument of his existence constantly. You think this god would reveal himself to the world, and actually enlighten everyone once and for all.
To me, a logical conclusion to make is a) a god exists and doesn’t care to provide a shred of evidence of his existence (which means he allows pure evil constantly) b) a god doesn’t exist.
When looking at this, I cannot worship something that probably isn’t there. Also, I see no evidence of a god that has ever done anything for me, so I can’t worship on those terms either. And, don’t make the mistake of saying a presupposition, where you assume a god exists for a fact and say, “God gave you life, you should be thankful or worship him.” I actually don’t, because he’s nowhere to be found. Simple as that.
To address your previous atheism.. I felt the feeling of emptiness (not entire meaninglessness, but a general emptiness) as well that lasted a month or two. I, then, continued to live my life as normal. The feeling passed, and I realized I still had my family, and I still had the same life whether I was going to exist after death or not. These feelings subside, and you shouldn’t believe or not believe things based on your feelings. You can still live a fulfilling life as an atheist. I’m completely back to my normal self, and could never delude/force myself to believe something that I don’t believe in, based on how it made me feel. I’m sure you have a stronger character than that, so to give you some friendly advice, don’t do that. I’m glad that you’re happy with your faith, but you really should question it big time, because it is a completely made-up religion with many logical holes in it. Even if you still believed in a higher power, I guess that’s a start for not making you depressed, but I’m not trying to convert you, but I strongly suggest you have some logical thought with yourself, and say, “I don’t really believe in hell, so why would I need a savior? Why would god need a savior? Why come 2,000 years ago and save people, when humans have been around for much longer than that?” There’s a tons of logical fun you can have with the bible, if you really open yourself up to it.
You’re one of the few theists that I’ve come across on here, that I’ve actually liked, and I could see myself carrying a conversation on with you.. I hope you stick around, and join in on some conversation, and all I can say is remain open-minded and try to be honest when defending your beliefs. Have a good day
Our discussion represents everything that is beautiful about America. Two people with different belief systems respecting our differences. Too bad this isn't more acceptable in other parts of the world.
I have had all of those thoughts you listed. I cannot believe that all matter has existed forever with no creator. I also cannot believe that all matter was magically created from nothing. Therefore, I believe there is another realm that operates with a completely different reality that our brains are not capable of comprehending, discovering or recreating. I do not understand how a God (creator) could have existed without its own creator. This is similar to an atheist not understanding or knowing how all matter would have been created from nothing or existed forever with no beginning. There is no natural observation for this that we can observe but somehow, our brains have the abstract ability to understand this doesn't make any logical sense. In this way, atheists and theists are more similar then we realize. This is my hope for humanity. People like you and I, with completely different belief systems, are very capable of respecting each other and judging each other by the character of our actions.
We are so blessed to be humans. As far as we know, we are the only species in the universe to think in the abstract. We can love on level not shared by any other species. We can hate each other on a level not shared by any other species. Humans represent the kindness acts of love and the deepest acts of hate all within the same species. We have free will like no other species. We can choose kind actions or evil actions. This is unique. How would matter evolve to such a chaotic state? I believe the bible is our creator's way of trying to explain the next realm with concepts we are able to understand in our current realm.
