What deism has done for the world

[discipulus]

Spare me your tone and lecture, discipulus. I've heard this nonsense preached to me all of my life. And by nonsense, I mean that a Christian will say something clearly judgmental against another person, and then when that person is offended, will back track, then stating that he or she isn't judging anyone.

Your "faith" has given you a license to insult others. I've been kind to you, explaining my position and yet you subtly imply that my view is wrong and you are right, because YOU are a Christian.

This is nothing new from Christians. They are self righteous and offensive and use their faith as an excuse to judge others.

Whatever.

I am sorry you feel the way you do. I guess you were expecting me to condone sin. I do not. That does not mean I do not care for you or want only the best for you. If a brother says to his sister....hey look sis, you know...some of the things you have been doing arent good and in the long run will hurt you, he does so because he cares about his sister and does not want to see her hurt. If i just kind of glossed over these things and told you what made you feel good and all warm and fuzzy inside then I would not be acting in love.

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Premarital sex is a sin.

Right, so you've made the unjustified assumption that the sex here is premarital. So you're still operating from a basis of ignorance.

And yes saying Jesus did nothing is a truth claim and as such whoever makes such a claim has the burden of substantiating the claim. Unless that is just their opinion to which I would say you are entitled to it.

Only if you can demonstrate that Jesus existed to begin with; the claim that he did nothing is only a claim that is possibly untrue if he existed, since things that don't exist do nothing just as a matter of course. Since you haven't gotten near fulfilling your burden of proof as to Jesus' existence (and godhood, given the scope of the conversation we're having. You'd need to fulfill the burden of proof on both of those claims) then by default it cannot be accepted, and therefore no burden entails on the claim that Jesus did nothing, since his existence hasn't been established for him to be able to do anything.

So, all you'd need to do to be correct is to prove that Jesus existed, and that he was god. I'll leave you to that.

DeistPaladin stated that if Christians are right then Christ watched everything that happened and did nothing about it. So here he is assuming Jesus exists and then argues that He did nothing at all about the evil atrocities aforementioned. So in response to this I do not have to prove Jesus existed at all for He has to assume it for the argument to even make sense.

For in what way could it be said that Jesus failed to do something if He did not exist in the first place? That does not even make sense.

Since he has stated that Jesus did nothing at all then he has to substantiate the claim, or say it is just his opinion, or retract the statement altogether. He can't do the first, which leaves him with it just being his opinion to which I would say he is entitled to it. If he retracts the statement then there is no issue.

[bennyboy]

New question:

What has Deism done for us lately?

[Mister Agenda]

That's not something I contemplate often. What of it?

I think you should contemplate it and I think until you can come to the place where you can say: "Yes, I choose to believe this..." or "No, I choose not to believe that..." then you cannot justifiably denigrate the beliefs of others.

After all, maybe we don't choose what we believe. Maybe our beliefs are by-products of socio-biological evolutionary processes.

What we believe is the product of the sum total of our experience and being. We can't believe anything we want, willy-nilly. We believe in what we are convinced is true. The most we can do is try to convince ourselves that something else is true. With enough effort, one can come to believe pretty much anything.

Like your new avatar, btw.

[*Deidre*]

discipulus, as to your reply to me. While you (may) mean well, if a god exists, you are not him. If a god exists, you have not been elected to speak for him. If I talk to another theist, he will admonish me in a different way than you, and if I speak to a deist, he will have something else to say, different than the theist. I could speak to 100 different people, all speaking on behalf of their religion, all thinking they have a right to chastise me in the name of a god.

You are guessing at best as to what YOU think a god would be like.

If a god exists, you have not been elected to speak for him. Religion breeds a false sense of certainty and no offense, arrogance. Since you believe in sin, then you too are a sinner yes? Ah, a sinner telling me, another poor sinner, how to conduct my life.
That is the biggest problem of Christianity. Many people instructing others how to pull the weeds out of their own yards while their yards are overrun by them.

[Mister Agenda]

Just a couple of comments.

Pre-marital sex. At the time the rules against it were prevalent, most marriages were arranged, and the vast majority of people were married before they reached their late teens. Now most people don't get married until well into their twenties, and marrying younger is regarded as unwise. A LOT of other rules have been tossed by Christians because times have changed, why not this one?

Jefferson Bible. Way more convincing to doubters than the regular Bible, doesn't involve swallowing camels. Any particular reason Jefferson's version isn't regarded as adequate for Christianity?

[*Deidre*]

Just a couple of comments.

Pre-marital sex. At the time the rules against it were prevalent, most marriages were arranged, and the vast majority of people were married before they reached their late teens. Now most people don't get married until well into their twenties, and marrying younger is regarded as unwise. A LOT of other rules have been tossed by Christians because times have changed, why not this one?

Jefferson Bible. Way more convincing to doubters than the regular Bible, doesn't involve swallowing camels. Any particular reason Jefferson's version isn't regarded as adequate for Christianity?

Meanwhile, Christians account for the highest divorce rate currently over other religious groups and higher than atheists, as well.

Oh the irony!

They are too busy meddling in others lives, they let their own go to shit. lol

[discipulus]

discipulus, as to your reply to me. While you (may) mean well, if a god exists, you are not him. If a god exists, you have not been elected to speak for him. If I talk to another theist, he will admonish me in a different way than you, and if I speak to a deist, he will have something else to say, different than the theist. I could speak to 100 different people, all speaking on behalf of their religion, all thinking they have a right to chastise me in the name of a god.

You are guessing at best as to what YOU think a god would be like.

If a god exists, you have not been elected to speak for him. Religion breeds a false sense of certainty and no offense, arrogance. Since you believe in sin, then you too are a sinner yes? Ah, a sinner telling me, another poor sinner, how to conduct my life.
That is the biggest problem of Christianity. Many people instructing others how to pull the weeds out of their own yards while their yards are overrun by them.

Can I speak with you via PM?

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Just a couple of comments.

Pre-marital sex. At the time the rules against it were prevalent, most marriages were arranged, and the vast majority of people were married before they reached their late teens. Now most people don't get married until well into their twenties, and marrying younger is regarded as unwise. A LOT of other rules have been tossed by Christians because times have changed, why not this one?

Jefferson Bible. Way more convincing to doubters than the regular Bible, doesn't involve swallowing camels. Any particular reason Jefferson's version isn't regarded as adequate for Christianity?

It is not adequate because it excludes the accounts of the virgin birth and Christ's bodily resurrection from the grave on the Sunday morning following His crucifixion. If those two events never happened then our faith is in vain and Christianity along with the Bible can be relegated to the book shelf along with the various religious texts of the world's religions. Jefferson being a deist sought to remove all accounts of the miraculous from the New Testament essentially stripping it and watering it down. He essentially made the bible conform to his views instead of conforming his views to the bible. A grave error many have made over the centuries.

[Minimalist]

discipulus, that's the problem with Christianity; it teaches Christians to look down on those who don't practice it. And here I thought you might be different.

I can't imagine why you thought that!

[DeistPaladin]

New question:

What has Deism done for us lately?

Helps the atheist movement by underscoring that even if Christians could prove the existence of "a" god, their work would still be ahead of them.

[*Deidre*]

discipulus - with regards to PM: if you wish, okay.

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New question:

What has Deism done for us lately?

Helps the atheist movement by underscoring that even if Christians could prove the existence of "a" god, their work would still be ahead of them.

Why are Christians a Deist's main concern when confronting atheism?