Pope Francis defends atheists

[BettyG]

Or none... Never forget that perfectly valid option.

However, only one of those options is true. How does not believing in God make you a happier and more virtuous person than the person of faith? If there is no God, there is no life after death. How does the thought that you and all the ones you love cease to exist when they die make you feel?

Thousands keep dying for other faiths... what makes their deaths any less (or more) valid than the deaths for your faith?

Something cannot be both true and at the same time false. A person's belief is either true or false.
1 Timothy 2:4 says. "God wills the salvation of all and to come to the knowledge of truth." Also, Hebrews 5:9 says that "he [Jesus] became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him." Thus, salvation comes only through faith in Jesus. Since an all merciful God did not create billions of people just to populate hell, there must a way of salvation for those who would have believed in Him and been baptized if they had been given the opportunity to learn and be convinced. (The Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraph 846-848 explains this in detail.) (Note: Protestants under the Calvanist influence do not believe what Scripture clearly says.)

And when I spoke about the origin of a particular religion, I didn't mean the creation myth of said religion. I meant where and when in the actual world that myth arose.

Yeah... prophets... see below, in mental problems. About his son, talk to Min... he's much more knowledgeable on where that myth came from than me.
It wouldn't keep us in the dark? Would it provides us with different lights so that we'd fight over who has the right light?
Would it keep us in the dark for some 20~30 thousand years?

St. Paul explains why God waited so long to send a savior. Galatians 4:4 says, "In the fullness of time, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law..." Mankind had to be prepared culturally and through trial and error to be open to belief in Jesus. There had to be adequate language and means of communication. There had to be roads and ocean navigation so that the message could be spread throughout the world. World travel on roads was made possible by the Roman Empire. If Jesus had come out to the blue with no warning or prophets, we would not have accepted Him as being from the Father.
God did not keep us in the dark. He inspired the prophets through His Holy Spirit to teach and write so that we would know how to be in relationship with Him. He provided a way for that truth to be passed on by establishing His church, the Catholic Church, which is the original Christian church.

awesome.... the gullible then manufacture their own miracles, based on their own lack of knowledge to explain perfectly natural phenomena... awesome self-perpetuating mechanism.

It seems you have a bias against supernatural events. Can you prove they are impossible just because you have not experienced one? It is a perfectly normal for people to die. That condition is pretty unmistakable. It is also normal for dead people to decay. So how do you explain the saints who are incorrupt though they have been dead for hundreds of years?
Also, how about the woman who was cured instantaneously from Parkinson's disease after asking Pope John Paul II's intercession after his death in 2005? Parkinson's disease is also unmistakable and incurable. Yet her miraculous healing from the disease was verified by non-Christian medical specialists as having no natural explanation.
Among the 151 incorrupt bodies I have mentioned above are:
St Agatha, Virgin and Martyr, Died: 251, Badia di Sant'Agata, Catania, Sicily. The body is now preserved in different reliquaries. "The arms, legs, and breasts are preserved in a glass case in an incorrupt condition, although rather dried and dark after more than 17 centuries.
Blessed Imelda Lambertini, (1322-1333) Her incorrupt body can be seen in the Church of San Sigismondo in Bologna, Italy.
Saint James of the March, died at Naples, Italy November 28, 1476, He was entombed in the Franciscan church at Naples, where his body can still be seen in a crystal coffin, incorrupt, flexible, and emitting a fragrant perfume.
St Angela Merici, died January 27, 1540, She reposes in a side chapel of the parish church of St. Afa in Brescia, Italy.
St Bernadette Soubirous, Born 1844, reliquary at motherhouse of the Sister of Nevers, in Nevers, France.
St. Don Orione. He lived from 1872-1940. Tomb at the Sancutary of the Madonna della Guardia in Tortona, Italy.
Pope Pius X, Death: Aug. 20, 1914, entombed at St. Peter's Basilica, Rome, Italy in a glass sarcophagus in the nave.

Do tell: what miracles have you experienced?

A friend of mine used to wear a hearing aid for many years because he was nearly deaf. After prayer, he no longer needed it. That was twenty years ago and his hearing is still fine without the hearing aids.
I had a friend who had lots of back pain. I saw him being examined when it was found that one of his legs was 1/4 inch shorter than the other which was the cause of his pain. During prayer with him to lengthen his leg, I SAW and FELT his leg grow 1/4 inch. That is not something that the Vatican would bother investigating because it is so common.
I have twice personally been relieved of sore throat pain when I prayed as I received Holy Communion. I prayed that since Jesus healed people by touching them, He could heal me as He went down my throat. This does not always work, but I know what a sore throat feels like and I know what not having any pain feels like. It is unmistakable.

No... you explain why it's possible. The burden of proof for those supernatural events is on the person claiming them, not on the person who doesn't buy it.
If magic is possible, then... I'll have some of that, please!

Contact the Vatican for proof. I do not have access to the records. My understanding about miracles is that God loves us and wants to reveal Himself in tangible ways to help us believe in Him. People of every age need that because we are humans.

It's funny how the muslims say exactly the same thing about their Allah.
And I'm willing to wager most, if not all, other adherents of any other faith will claim something like that about their particular faith.
Which one is right?... If any...

One has to use reason and logic to examine the credibility of a belief. Muslims have some beliefs that are not reasonable or logical. Such as: The Koran literally came down from heaven in book form, when we know the fact that Mohammed's followers wrote it after he was dead.
Christianity makes no such claim that humans did not use ink and parchments or papyrus to compose the Bible. Islam is a mixture of Jewish, Nestorian (heretical) Christianity and the moon god beliefs of his time and place.
Another Muslim belief is that Mohammed flew to Jerusalem over night from Saudia Arabia. In the 600's AD, there is no way he could have done that. This has to have been a fabricated story. Remember that he did not claim to be God.
Pope Benedict XVI caught a lot of flack about his Regensberg address (http://www.zenit.org/en/articles/papal-a...regensburg) for pointing out that faith has to not be based on only subjectivism. Faith must also have objective reasons for credibility. Catholicism has that objectiveness, while other Protestants (as I pointed out above), Fundamentalists and Islam do not.

Oh and animism and shamanism go back more than 10 thousand years...

It is probably more accurate to say that the Judeo-Christian beliefs go back to the beginning of recorded history. In Hebrew, Adam means "man" and Eve means "woman." Older is not necessarily better. Our understanding develops over time.

Miracles of treatments of misdiagnosed illnesses are just dumb. -..-'
I want proper miracles and no discrimination: all amputees get their limbs regrown overnight! That would be a proper miracle.

If God did miracles all the time, we would think they are normal instead of supernatural. God is not our puppet who answers every one of our demands. He leaves room for us to grow out of narcissism through not getting our way. If we chose not to believe the miracles He has already done, then how would more of them help us have faith? If you don't believe H rose from the dead, what more can He do to prove He is God? Nevertheless, I think God would show you a sign if you humbly asked for some small sign that He truly exists and that He loves you. God respects the difficulty we have in coming to faith. Then again, many will not believe even if He appeared right in front of them to show them He is real.

I've got a lot to do this weekend, so I won't be in the discussion or check this forum on Saturday.