Maybe I never was a Christian?

[Creed of Heresy]

I desperately wanted it to be true. I convinced myself that it was real. I was standing in the desert pretending I was in the ocean.

So you only thought you could speak in tongues (?) because otherwise it would just be some nut speaking in gibberish to himself.

Wow, you're so close to ACTUALLY GETTING IT! C'mon, just think about it a liiiiittle bit more and you will finally understand...

[Reasonable_Jeff]

I don't think it is possible to be a devout christian or a true christian however you want to put it. To me you can only be a follower because almost nobody can live up to the expectations of the bible. Not saying there hasn't been a perfect christian (rofl). Just saying that I seriously doubt it. Especially since one can sin in thought alone.

(NOTE to moderators: I am wanting to correct a wrong belief about Christianity. My intention is not "to be preachy." Just as an atheist would want to correct a wrong belief regarding atheism.)

You are 100% correct. The Bible actually teaches that no one is perfect and no one can ever be. Only Jesus lived a perfect life.

The only way to get to heaven is by good works. The question is do you want it to be your works that are judged by, or do you want it to be Jesus works that you are judged by?

Christians believe that by placing their trust/faith in Jesus, God looks at Jesus sinless life and counts it as their own. The cross is also called the "great exchange" where Christ took the believers sin and paid the penalty for it, and believers, through faith, can have the righteous life of Christ in God's eyes.

So when judgement day comes, even though I am a sinner and no better than anyone else on this planet, God will count Jesus' righteous life as my own.

Christians get mercy instead of justice.

[jonb]

Christians get mercy instead of justice.

Count me out, I have always stood against courts which say they are administrating justice, but have an inherent bias.

[Mystic]

Genkaus, as I believe morality is linked to God and is his light, I see Atheists whom have better morals/ethics to be closer. You hold his light to be important, you just don't recognize it's from him, which is ok.

[genkaus]

Genkaus, as I believe morality is linked to God and is his light, I see Atheists whom have better morals/ethics to be closer. You hold his light to be important, you just don't recognize it's from him, which is ok.

And how do you determine which morals/ethics are "better"? And you have some way of recognizing this "light"?

[Mystic]

And how do you determine which morals/ethics are "better"?

I don't know how it's done, it's all very mysterious, morality is. Before I use to follow ethics from authority, so this thinking for yourself and realizing ethics outside of authority, is new to me. Although I questioned scholars, it was always backed up by authority of Quran when I did.
Obviously if I had 100% infallible method, I would have 100% absolute morality, which I don't believe I have. It's combination of reflection of key principles we believe in and I always believed, and applying those principles, as well in some instances, nothing but pure instinct (trusting the subconcious knowing why and sort feeling why while I don't know how to articulate it).

And you have some way of recognizing this "light"?

Yeah sure.

[genkaus]

I don't know how it's done, it's all very mysterious, morality is. Before I use to follow ethics from authority, so this thinking for yourself and realizing ethics outside of authority, is new to me. Although I questioned scholars, it was always backed up by authority of Quran when I did.
Obviously if I had 100% infallible method, I would have 100% absolute morality, which I don't believe I have. It's combination of reflection of key principles we believe in and I always believed, and applying those principles, as well in some instances, nothing but pure instinct (trusting the subconcious knowing why and sort feeling why while I don't know how to articulate it).

Try harder to think of morality outside authority and you'll realize that it's not backed up by god's authority either.

Yeah sure.

Which is?

[System of Solace]

So when judgement day comes, even though I am a sinner and no better than anyone else on this planet

What did you do? Or did you just think sinful thoughts? Correct me if I'm wrong: God prohibits even a sinful thought. This puts the Christian in a form of submission for his entire life. He/she will never be good, he/she will always be an evil sinner. He/she needs Jesus or he/she will plunge straight to eternal torture and damnation created by God for maybe 50-100 years of a "sinful" life. In fact, you could live a live only caring about the well being of others and still go to Hell. Fuck, supposedly even newborns who die from birth complications, aborted babies, and children who die at a very young age never truly "accepted" Jesus. And everybody apparently lives every second of their live in sin, so.....they are pretty fucked.

[Creed of Heresy]

((1))You are 100% correct. The Bible actually teaches that no one is perfect and no one can ever be. Only Jesus lived a perfect life.

((2))The only way to get to heaven is by good works. The question is do you want it to be your works that are judged by, or do you want it to be Jesus works that you are judged by?

((3))Christians believe that by placing their trust/faith in Jesus, God looks at Jesus sinless life and counts it as their own. The cross is also called the "great exchange" where Christ took the believers sin and paid the penalty for it, and believers, through faith, can have the righteous life of Christ in God's eyes.

1: He lived a perfect life, huh? Is that why we only know of about 10% of his life? Is that why there's a ~30 year gap in his life? I get the impression it's because the fiction-writers...er, sorry, the gospel-writers lacked the confidence in their own abilities to write something that could be considered objectively perfect...or maybe the Council of Nicea was not satisfied with their depictions of Christ's "perfect life" and cast them out after realizing that nobody would ever find it to be perfect. You make the claim; where's the proof? Don't claim to be correcting people when you don't even really give a valid explanation of why it's being corrected. A claim is not a correction; it's a differing of opinion, little more.

2: Basically if you "accept Jesus" then you get judged by his works, not your own. And since you can live no perfect life and god apparently only accepts those who lead perfect lives, you can only get into heaven via Jesus, ergo you can be the scummiest human being on earth as long as you accept Jesus, whereas the nicest, kindest, most selfless human being on the planet can be shoved off to burn for eternity because he didn't let his life get judged as Jesus' life, because, heh, only Jesus was perfect, right? Good sales pitch, but I'm afraid I have no use for snake-oil, sir.

3: Yes, he paid the penalty. The ultimate penalty. The penalty of death. Truly a noble sacrifice, anyone dying in the stead of someone else is definitely a death that must be taken in nobility and honor...except it kind of loses its meaning when the person didn't actually die, he just kind of lost consciousness for a few days, because as I recall you lot believe the dude was up and about three days later talking to people, apparently no worse for wear, which completely takes the whole "ultimate exchange" idea and blasts it right the fuck out of the water. He didn't die for my sins, he suffered some torture for about a week for my sins. Not quite as noble, especially when he went on to basically become the ultimate exemplar of humanity that we should all impossibly strive to be while never having a born hope ever being able to do so. Basically Jesus SUFFERED for a week for me, but his mortal life apparently was never surrendered, and hell, his mortal body went with him into the sky-heaven that we have since traversed with planes and rockets and such for the last century without ever seeing. Seriously, where IS that heaven, exactly? What about that firmament that god apparently opens to let rain and snow in? Did the Apollo missions just break through the glass and we've been flying through the break in the glass ever since? XD

Silliness. All of it.

[Reforged]

When I tell Christians that I was once a devout christian, and that I only converted to atheism when presented with the evidence, I'm often told that I was never really a true Christian, because if I was, I never would have turned from God.

I used to think of that as a cop out, as a way of a Christian declaring that you were never in the same position as them, and therefore have no grounding to argue that point. However, I'm not so sure I think that way anymore. Perhaps I never really was a Christian. After all, when I present any Christian (or person of any other faith for that matter), with the same evidence that convinced me that it was bollocks, they will quite easily shrug it off and carry on frolicking in ignorance. Why? Why is it that the same evidence that convinced me isn't enough to convince them? The only hypothesis I can come up with, is that of insanity. For example if I replace "Christian" in my first statement, with the word "insane", then the statement absolutely rings true.

When I tell insane people that I was once insane, and that I only converted to sanity when presented with the evidence, I'm often told that I was never really insane, because if I was, I would never have turned from insanity