RE: My former Pastor: "You're not accountable to anyone."...
September 21, 2010 at 4:25 pm
(This post was last modified: September 21, 2010 at 4:30 pm by thesummerqueen.)
"morals come from somewhere"
So before the Bible, we had no morals?
There were many societies that flourished before the alleged life of Jesus. These same societies were flourishing while the Old Testament stories were still nothing but oral traditions being passed amongst the Jews to, as Lewis Black put it, distract themselves from the fact that they had no air conditioning.
Point being that all these humans managed to build civilizations of varying degrees of success without the Bible as we know it...so I agree - morals had to come from somewhere, but it would seem to me that we all have an inborn sense of being "good" to someone in order to get what we want in return, otherwise those humans wouldn't have...I don't know...built the pyramids (Egyptian, Babylonian, and otherwise)...constructed Stonehenge... yada yada.
A good friend of mine once said "Our ancestors helped each other and advanced society, while our competitors flung crap at one another."
Of course, the reverse is true - we don't need to use "God" to hold ourselves accountable. If I'm mean to someone, I don't think "God's going to smote me!!" I actually feel bad because I was mean to a person who probably didn't deserve it and whose experiences and talents I will probably no longer be able to draw from. If I cared about that person, there's a chance they will leave me lonely. We also have a justice system that hold us accountable if we steal from another person or injure/kill them. Some like to claim that it's based on the Bible, but there were plenty of law systems set down before the bible was with similar codes. If I kill someone, the state and that person's family hold me accountable.
Although I don't understand how porn and 'living it up' relates to not being accountable. I should think if you totally 'live it up' you're suddenly accountable to yourself if you get an STD. Watching porn hurts no one except maybe your hard drive.
Also, what did he mean by "when hard times hit"? Is he suggesting that one needs Church to depend on for support if they're suddenly out of a job? Because we don't have governmental programs in place or because atheists don't give?
So before the Bible, we had no morals?
There were many societies that flourished before the alleged life of Jesus. These same societies were flourishing while the Old Testament stories were still nothing but oral traditions being passed amongst the Jews to, as Lewis Black put it, distract themselves from the fact that they had no air conditioning.
Point being that all these humans managed to build civilizations of varying degrees of success without the Bible as we know it...so I agree - morals had to come from somewhere, but it would seem to me that we all have an inborn sense of being "good" to someone in order to get what we want in return, otherwise those humans wouldn't have...I don't know...built the pyramids (Egyptian, Babylonian, and otherwise)...constructed Stonehenge... yada yada.
A good friend of mine once said "Our ancestors helped each other and advanced society, while our competitors flung crap at one another."
Of course, the reverse is true - we don't need to use "God" to hold ourselves accountable. If I'm mean to someone, I don't think "God's going to smote me!!" I actually feel bad because I was mean to a person who probably didn't deserve it and whose experiences and talents I will probably no longer be able to draw from. If I cared about that person, there's a chance they will leave me lonely. We also have a justice system that hold us accountable if we steal from another person or injure/kill them. Some like to claim that it's based on the Bible, but there were plenty of law systems set down before the bible was with similar codes. If I kill someone, the state and that person's family hold me accountable.
Although I don't understand how porn and 'living it up' relates to not being accountable. I should think if you totally 'live it up' you're suddenly accountable to yourself if you get an STD. Watching porn hurts no one except maybe your hard drive.
Also, what did he mean by "when hard times hit"? Is he suggesting that one needs Church to depend on for support if they're suddenly out of a job? Because we don't have governmental programs in place or because atheists don't give?
