Please tell me what atheist means

[Scented Nectar]

You are being very disrespectful to god,Scented Nectar,and he will verily punish you with hellfire.I'm joking,that was my impression of one of the pastors back home.I do agree that god is painted as a bad character in the bible,with so much punishment and wrath,but honestly I think that is a misinterpretation of his character.

Then maybe you are not a christian deep down inside, but a believer in a good god instead. I don't believe in any gods at all, good or bad, but at least if you do believe, it's nice that you don't think he's as bad as the christian holy book says he is. That tells me you are probably a pretty good person inside. The christian god, which is the same god that the jews and muslims believe in (they are all 3 branches from the same original religion) is for sure a bad character. There is nothing good in that book but a huge amount of harm, cruel laws, wild claims of magic miracles, and lies about our planet's history that science has disproved.

It's such a shame that simple things get turned into complicated things by people who have plans and are prepared to twist the basics.Much of the bible s lies written by men anyway,so the twisting has been there from the start.I would happily rip out most of the bible and just keep Matthew,Mark,Luke and John.

Why do you think that those 4 books have not also been written and twisted by men? The jesus parts were written by people too. Why do you trust that a magic god had anything to do with it? Why do you believe that jesus even existed when no one even wrote story books about him until about a hundred years after he was supposed to have lived?

Originally I believed because those around me did,and it's part of my culture.But I like to think that I am an independent thinker and I honestly do believe.Last year I was an atheist for about two weeks,I lost all faith,but then I thought about it and I regained it.I don't think it's bad to lose faith because believing in what you can't see is hard,and seems stupid too and I admit that.
But I also don't think it's unintelligent to have faith.I don't have any proof, and if I did it would ake faith impossible.I don't think that god is christian or muslim,I think that all religions are talking about the same god.They talk about him in different ways and say that he works in different ways so that's why I try to be careful to just keep it simple.

If you are still living in Nigeria, then Padraic has a good point that it would probably be dangerous for you to express doubts or disbelief.

Why do you think faith is required? Why does your god not provide proof, then carry on from there telling people what he wants them to do? There is no reason for him to pretend he's not there as some sort of test, especially if the failure price is eternal torture. That sounds like a very ridiculous god.

I don't believe because I fear hell.And I don't fear for you either because you probably do follow the teachings of Jesus,because they're so simple.As long as you are respectful and basically good,that's it,you're in.The rest is just theatrics and unnecessary drama.

Jesus was not such a nice person either. Don't forget that he is supposed to BE god, and even if he was supposed to be simply a prophet or something, then that still means that god is the same asshole he was in the old testament, treating people like shit for thousands of years before sending jesus down to fix things. Nothing god does works right. In genesis, he makes a bunch of things, and says 'it's good', 'it's good', 'it's very good', and then what happens? Well, it turns out he has made his own worst enemy, a snake named satan, and he's not even powerful enough to stop the snake from making the humans have bad table manners by eating an apple, much less kill him off. Even a third of god's own angels are flawed and rebel against him. Then, it turns out that god's humans are all flawed too. He realized he did a bad job making them, so he kills them all off except for a guy named Noah (and his family). But god screwed up again. The ones he saved are still no good, and they need to be sent a jesus. That didn't work either and here we are still today. What on earth is this god you believe in trying to accomplish, and why is he having such difficulties doing it?

Back to jesus though, from a site about the bible, http://www.evilbible.com/ here's one of the parts about Jesus:

What Would Jesus Do?

Advocate child abuse and murder amongst many other cruelties.

Christians are always claiming, “he’s the lamb”, “our savior”, “the king of peace”, “the embodiment of love”, amongst the many other names they associate with a loving, merciful nature. Jesus a nice guy? Not in my book. Nor in any other person’s who is capable of compassion and rationality. Let’s examine who the hell the Jesus character really is. These verses will show not only is Jesus’ “loving” nature a joke but so are the Christians who worship him. Jesus’ real mission to come to earth:

Jesus says that he has come to destroy families by making family members hate each other. He has “come not to send peace, but a sword.” Matthew 10:34

Jesus says, “Don’t imagine that I came to bring peace on earth! No, rather a sword lf you love your father, mother, sister, brother, more than me, you are not worthy of being mine. “The real beauty of this verse is that Jesus demands people truly love him more then they love their own family. I ask you how can we love someone that we can not see or interact with? Love is an emotion pertaining to physical existence not to faithful ideologies, yet God threatens you with Death just because your love for your mother maybe stronger than your love for him. Matthew 10:34

Families will be torn apart because of Jesus. “Brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death." Matthew 10:21

Jesus strongly approves of the law and the prophets. He hasn’t the slightest objection to the cruelties of the Old Testament. Matthew 5:17

Jesus advocates murder and death:

Jesus condemns entire cities to dreadful deaths and to the eternal torment of hell because they didn’t care for his preaching. Matthew 11:20

Jesus, whose clothes are dipped in blood, has a sharp sword sticking out of his mouth. Thus attired, he treads the winepress of the wrath of God. (The winepress is the actual press that humans shall be put into so that we may be ground up.) Revelations 19:13-15

The beast and the false prophet are cast alive into a lake of fire. The rest of us the unchosen will be killed with the sword of Jesus. “An all the fowls were filled with their flesh.” Revelations 19:20-21

Jesus says he is the only way to salvation yet he purposely disillusions us so that we will go to hell:

Jesus explains that the reason he speaks in parables is so that no one will understand him, “lest . . . they . . . should understand . . . and should be converted, and I should heal them.” Matthew 13:10-15

Jesus explains why he speaks in parables to confuse people so they will go to hell. Mark 4:11-12

Jesus advocates child abuse:

Jesus is criticized by the Pharisees for not washing his hands before eating. He defends himself by attacking them for not killing disobedient children according to the commandment: “He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death.” Matthew 15:4-7

Abandon your wife and children for Jesus and he’ll give your a big reward. Jesus asks that his followers abandon their children to follow him. To leave your child is abuse, it’s called neglect, pure and simple. Matthew 19:29

Jesus criticizes the Jews for not killing their disobedient children according to Old Testament law. Mark 7:9

A few other things about Jesus:

Jesus says that those who have been less fortunate in this life will have it even worse in the life to come. Mark 4:25

Jesus sends the devils into 2000 pigs, causing them to jump off a cliff and be drowned in the sea. Clearly Jesus could have simply sent the devils out, yet he chose instead to place them into pigs and kill them. This is called animal abuse. Mark 5:12-13

Jesus kills a fig tree for not bearing figs, even though it was out of season. Jesus must not be as smart as Christians would have us believe, for he was retarded enough to do something this silly. You’d think the son of god (god incarnate) would know that trees don’t bear fruit in dry season. Mark 11:13

Luke 12:47 Jesus okays beating slaves.

Actually I don't believe god feels it necessary for us to know him or believe in him,the important thing is our behaviour.That's why christianity and other religions should put more focus on that.

There is no god judging our behaviour. We judge our own and other people's behaviour. Reward and punishment does not come in the form of 2 types of magical afterlife, a happy one and a miserable one. It comes instead in what happens here on earth, how we affect ourselves and the people around us, in our influence, in the natural and societal consequences to our actions. It has nothing to do with some invisible authority figure guiding our lives or affecting us in any way. There is no god to pat your shoulder in approval, nor is there a god who disapproves of what you are doing.