The Reasons why "Just Following Jesus" Doesn't work

[Cyberman]

YOLO! I mean, YOLT! (You Only Live Twice.)

Or so it seems.

[Rekeisha]

I still find you are oversimplifying the facts to back up your viewpoint

Hitler being born a Roman Catholic is one thing and following the tenets of Catholicism is another thing. Also even if he followed those tenens doesn't make him a christian. Many of the Roman Catholic practices are not biblical hence the Martin Luther's 95 theses starting the protestant reformation. His behavior was contrary to what the bible calls for like "loving your neighbor as yourself". The fact that he targeted the Jews as a problem is a big issue as a christian since Jesus was Jewish. Also that link I showed you, do you even know what it was? Well I have linked the New York Times article that will explain it and also the link to it again so that you can take a look.  (Article from the New York Times The Persecution of the Christian Churches')

Yes our lungs helps us breath but are willing to ask yourself why do they work this way. Not, how this works but why does this work. Why do we work so well in our environment? If we are supposed to be evolved how long does it take a being to change enough to work like we do. You need a heart lungs and brain and we don't work right without them. We also need a male and female to create more humans but single celled organisms don't. It would seem better not to need two different sexes just split from yourself so how are we better to have two sexes. Think deeply about this. Just saying people evolved is simplistic and doesn't tackle a lot of the real issues. Why in the world do things function. Why does it seem like things are pre-programmed? What makes a thing move from nonliving to living?

Your claim that most people are christian in jail as proof that christianity is corrupt is again another simplistic argument. Have you asked what was the polers definition of Christianity? Then you have asked when did these people in jail say that they became christian? Also Christianity is for those who realize their brokenness so it is easy to come to this realization in jail. There is a place in Louisiana the Angola prison is full of christian and that is because a prison warden. When he became the warden it was one of the most dangerous prisons in the United States. Then he started to plant churches in the prison and crime and violence dramatically dropped. Here is a documentary about the prison.

Do the same that I suggested above with the statistics you find about crime being more serious in religious culture than non-religious. You have to ask yourself about their history and the values of the culture. You have to think about population density, what they think about weapons, what is the the climate like, is food plentiful? What kind of government do they have what do they think about a person's autonomy? Also, when they were doing a survey what did they define as religion? Which religion predominates the culture because not all religion teaches the same thing. Do those who claim that religion actually practice the tenets of the religion?

You keep disparaging me for following what preachers say then you admit that you follow the crowd of what the culture says about the correct moral view. I am not sure if you are realizing that making these statements are hypocritical because you are saying that when I follow people it is wrong but when you follow people it is right. 

Also since people haven't made a committee to figure out what is right and wrong then how did they find it out? Why do they even want rules? Why do people in society want order? Why do we even understand what order is? Why do things work correctly when there is order? It is as if we are pre-programmed to want structure and order.

You say that the bible can't prove it self but this is also a simplistic view. You know that it is a collection of 66 books written by 49 different writers over a span of thousands of years. The fact that that they are unified is amazing. This book was formed throughout time and they didn't just fall from the sky but have links to human culture. Your circular argument is too simplistic to actually address the way we got the bible and the content in it. There are multiple books about World War II and when someone adds in an alternate fiction about WWII we can tell it isn't true by comparing it with the other books. Same with the Bible. If they were written throughout time like there were with the changing cultures they would not back themselves up like they do. 

When you come to the Bible do you seek to disprove it? If this is true your bias makes it possible for you to be lied to. You may not look for the things that will actually back up the bible and only look for the things that support your viewpoint.

Your view of Jesus' sacrifice is still simplistic. When Jesus rose from the grave he still had a human body and when he ascended he still had a human body. Also the crucifixion is more than just physical pain but he took on the sin of the world past present and future for all who would believe in Him would have everlasting life. You don't understand the wrath of God for just one person it is destructive but Jesus took everyone's. He and his relationship with His father is perfect and close and He never had been separated from him. Yet, he pretty much took hell and separation in order that we would not. He paid for us so that we wouldn't. 

I spoke about slavery multiple time and again that is a simplistic view of what slavery is in the bible and how it was different from the culture in the area. He condemns it in both testaments in the way it was practiced in that time, the Americas and now (kidnapping people and treating them as subhuman to grow their own wealth). The slavery spoken of in the Bible had stipulations and it also ended after a certain time. People were still given dignity. In some cases it was a way to be gain shelter and protection. Some slaves could even inherit the wealth of the land owner. When you just take your cultural views of what slavery is now and don't look at what God has laid out in the Bible then you make errors like this. 

You know who does the most of that?


Theocracies.

This again is simplistic. People are liars and love to be in power. If the the way to be in power is to be a priest then they would become priest whether they even cared about God or not. Most people use religion to get them what they want not to get God. Did the people ever encounter Him? Did/do they follow God as Jesus says by being born again and living life by faith or did they just follow what the religion says.  Or did they live double lives, say they believe it in the public and then in private live another. Did they only get to be a priest because it would be a comfortable occupation?

[TheRocketSurgeon]

Horse shit. I'm from Louisiana. The Warden, being a fundamentalist Christian, attributes the drop in violence in the prison to the church services, but my family lives less than 30 miles from it, and my mom works with Christian groups who go in to the prison to work with the prisoners there... even she, an Evangelical of the fiercest type, attributes the radical drop in violence to the fact that there were few-to-no programs (education, entertainment, crafts, etc.) in the prison under the decades-long reign of the previous Warden. The violence levels under those conditions would surprise no one, nor should the drop in violence once the prisoners had things to do besides get into arguments in their tiny, caged world.

I assure you that I know A LOT MORE about prison than you do, and I know from personal experience that the more religious a prisoner claims to be, the more you should fear them, because they use religion (as do many non-prisoners) to justify their hatreds and bigotries and violence in the name of Gawd. And the question is not who has the right definition of Christianity in the polls, but who thinks they're Christian versus the number willing to state that they're agnostic or atheist. The simple fact is that atheists are very hard to find in prison, and given that we nonbelievers represent between 10% and 20% of the population (again, depending on how one defines the term), they should represent 10-20% of the prison population, as well. But they don't.

[abaris]

The simple fact is that atheists are very hard to find in prison, and given that we nonbelievers represent between 10% and 20% of the population (again, depending on how one defines the term), they should represent 10-20% of the prison population, as well. But they don't.

That's the only point I disagree upon. People from certain groups are far more likely to be imprisoned than people from other groups. For the same transgression, mind you. So, the prison population may not be an exact mirror of society at large.

Also, who's to say, someone's claiming to be religious really is? There has been that last powerplay by Ted Bundy, where he caught an evangelical pastor in his web by giving a teary pseudo confession. It was all taped and he more or less said what the pastor wanted to hear. Porn being at the root of all evil and things like that, so that the pastor went away with the conviction of Bundy being saved in the last days of his life.

[drfuzzy]

The simple fact is that atheists are very hard to find in prison, and given that we nonbelievers represent between 10% and 20% of the population (again, depending on how one defines the term), they should represent 10-20% of the prison population, as well. But they don't.

That's the only point I disagree upon. People from certain groups are far more likely to be imprisoned than people from other groups. For the same transgression, mind you. So, the prison population may not be an exact mirror of society at large.

Also, who's to say, someone's claiming to be religious really is? There has been that last powerplay by Ted Bundy, where he caught an evangelical pastor in his web by giving a teary pseudo confession. It was all taped and he more or less said what the pastor wanted to hear. Porn being at the root of all evil and things like that, so that the pastor went away with the conviction of Bundy being saved in the last days of his life.

There are books and studies coming out now that claim the religious fundamentalism is actually criminogenic.  Religious fundamentalist attitudes create crime.  
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...-book.html
Dr. Peterson-Sparks' book is a good read.  It doesn't bash religion or christianity - only the pieces that lead people to judgmental and punitive thinking.  

[Cyberman]

Anyone else see that as a huge red dick getting shoved in from the east coast?

Just me, then?

[Silver]

In psychology, one might venture to think you have dick on the brain for some reason, Stimbo.

[Cyberman]

Hey, it's not me with the dirty pictures!

[TheRocketSurgeon]

Anyone else see that as a huge red dick getting shoved in from the east coast?

Just me, then?

FFS, man. Now that you've said that, it's all I can see when I look at that map!

[Cyberman]

Sorry about that. Have the giant KFC chef instead: