Open discussion of the Christian Why We're Here thread

[robvalue]

Yeah, it’s telling god you know better than him and he should change his plan.

If you’re not asking him to change it, then you’re not doing anything. You’re just hoping the plan already includes a certain outcome.

[Abaddon_ire]

Correct, it is doing something for others and it can and is for ones self also. So what's your point, you seem to be agreeing with me. What lack of action, praying for others is an action, every day all the time. The Church does more for the poor than any other entity in the world.

GC

No, GC. When you fold your hands in prayer for others, you are doing exactly nothing to help them. The warm fuzzy it give you might make you feel better about failing to help them out, but it does fuck-all for them.

It's an interesting point. Praying for someone is by definition a selfish act. The goal is not to help the target, but to make the pray-er feel better about doing nothing.

[Amarok]

"Then everyone alive now, in the past or in the future will die hopeless meaningless death"

Wow Neoi has hit a whole new level of stupid . Despite this moronic line of reasoning being torn to shreds he still repeats it . I'll say this again THERE IS NOTHING about an after life or the existence of a assigned meaning .That will make life meaningful . And only a idiot would assume such a thing .

[The Grand Nudger]

If living isn;t meaningful, why would living even longer be meaningful?   

[Silver]

If living isn;t meaningful, why would living even longer be meaningful?   

Life after death isn't living. It's worse. Much worse. It's torture, whether you choose to call it heaven or hell.

[Edwardo Piet]

If living isn;t meaningful, why would living even longer be meaningful?   

It isn't.

http://www.academia.edu/328382/I_have_no_future

[The Grand Nudger]

-and that;s the futility of an eternal life, for a person who contends that life possesses no meaning...regardless of whether they contend this as an effect of the absence of their silly god or because they think life itself is meaningless.

That sort of christianity is a pacifier for people who harbor a deep rooted nihilism, but the goods can never be delivered, in truth, even if their god existed and provided eternity. As it;'s only providing an eternal span of what the believer already declared to be meaningless. It;s really not all that surprising that such a person would see nihilists everywhere they looked. They;re imagining that others feel as they feel. Neos conversion story, cant recall how long ago he shared it.... from when he was a nihilst atheist "like the rest of us" is instructive..just, not about atheism, or "us", lol.

[brewer]

"Then everyone alive now, in the past or in the future will die hopeless meaningless death"

Wow Neoi has hit a whole new level of stupid . Despite this moronic line of reasoning being torn to shreds he still repeats it . I'll say this again THERE IS NOTHING about an after life or the existence of a assigned meaning .That will make life meaningful . And only a idiot would assume such a thing .

You just tore up his golden ticket. He'll do you for that ya know.

[Amarok]

Wow Neoi has hit a whole new level of stupid . Despite this moronic line of reasoning being torn to shreds he still repeats it . I'll say this again THERE IS NOTHING about an after life or the existence of a assigned meaning .That will make life meaningful . And only a idiot would assume such a thing .

You just tore up his golden ticket. He'll do you for that ya know.

Well he can try 

[Angrboda]

Under a godless worldview, these things are accidental properties of humans and it makes no sense to ask "why this. Under a Christian worldview, these things are a result of being made in the image of God. The question "why this" makes sense: because God is interested in having a relationship with rational beings capable of living a full, well-lived, morally upright, capable of love, and awed by the natural beauty of the universe he made for this purpose alone. It is this distinction between the two worldviews that I am trying to point out. 

If you want to use different words, fine. You cannot escape the obvious comparison and its conclusion: There is not existential purpose/meaning to "human-ness" in a godless worldview. There is substantial existential purpose/meaning in a Christian worldview.

Jor, if you burn a book its meaning is gone regardless of any meaning it had in the past.

This is a comment about morality, but I would argue something similar applies to the question of meaning and purpose. (And specifically regarding Steve's comment, my argument presented in the Why, God? Why?! thread is particularly applicable to this line of thought.)

Christian philosopher Paul Copan writes that if we reject the existence of objective moral facts, then we "reject something fundamental about our humanness."[48] I agree that we reject something about our humanness if we condone or advocate things like rape and torture. This is because people who do such things have divorced themselves from the well-being of their fellow humans. They have shown a disregard for the wants and needs of humanity, and therefor they have literally isolated themselves from other people and rejected something about their humanness. But believing that morality is relative to the wants and needs of humans is not the same thing as divorcing yourself from the well-being of humanity. Rather, it is precisely because you are conditioning morality on the wants and needs of humans that you are embracing your humanness.

Review of The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology