RE: Belief in God or the devil?
February 17, 2014 at 4:10 am
(This post was last modified: February 17, 2014 at 4:25 am by Alex K.)
(February 15, 2014 at 1:15 pm)itsjustintyme Wrote: I know most atheists either wrestle with the concept of a God or feel inclined to dismiss it all together and would figure this goes for demonic activity also. However I've never directly asked, do most atheists believe there is anything to demonic possession, ghosts, psychic mediums, weigi boards or the like? Or are these just psychological situations that can be explained away by science as hoaxes?.
Ok, as for myself, I grew up in milquetoast christian surroundings with my dad, officially catholic, being somewhere between deist-ish and atheist-ish depending on mood, was send to confirmation lessons, didn't find the idea convincing, like at all, so I didn't adopt the belief. As far as struggle with the concept is concerned, does head shaking and face palming count as "struggle"? If
you think you have a consistent definition of your God, be my guest.
There is a type of new-agey atheist who believes in all kinds of spirit forces, but not in a personal creator god. I think some adherents of "alternative" religions would call themselves atheists. I don't know whether some types of Buddhism don't feature supernatural stuff without there being a creator god figure.
I agree with Tonus, and I'd say that there is no clear separation from God, to Gods, to ghosts and demons, to very advanced aliens. Barring omniscience and omnipotence and authorship of the universe, which many god figures in past myths didn't have, it's really not clear where something/someone stops being a God. Catholicism for example to me appears like a type of Polytheism on par with the old Greek and Norse myths, with one of them, teh God, being particularly powerful, being the creator and all.
