If everything has a purpose then evil doesn't exist

[R-Farmer]

Why would that even matter?  You either bend the knee or you don't - it's that simple.  Who cares whether you can "resist sin", whatever the hell sin is, in this amoral power play formulation?

I agree. but the person I was responding to was more of the school of earning their way to heaven and or being responsible for their sin[/quote]

[R-Farmer]

Again God does not hand build/create people. He hasn't created anything/anyone since day 6 of creation.

Rather Jesus in mat 13 explains a parable how we are all seeds.. And He plants wheat seeds (sons of righteousness) and His enemy the devil plants tares/weed seeds. on the earth/field. 
36 Then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house. And His disciples came to Him, saying, “Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field.”

37 He answered and said to them: “He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man. 38 The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one. 39 The enemy who sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels. 40 Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age. 41 The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, 42 and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth. 43 Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears to hear, let him hear!

And again, that was a reply to Winterhold. I understand that you hold a different view.

sorry. my mistake.

[Aegon]

You are trying to apply a scientific standard on a promise that was introduced before science. meaning why would it meet scientific standards of proof before science was invented?

Man, that's a pretty ridiculous line of logic. Ignoring the fact that science and math had already progressed significantly before the time Christ would have been alive (see ancient Greece)... this logic is like still clinging to the geocentric model because they thought of it before modern science. That doesn't make sense. It just isn't a good reason to believe something. Unless you really just don't care what is true, and in that case I suppose you can get yourself to believe literally anything.

You know if it hadn't been for the advent of the printing press and the rulers of the world's inclination to support it, Christianity would have died long ago just like any other of the thousands of religions that have existed, right? Do you think the Epic of Gilgamesh is equally as valid of a truth as the Bible? It does include earlier versions of the exact same stories included in the Old Testament, like the Flood, despite being written thousands of years earlier. Why isn't the Epic "the Authority" instead of the Bible?

[The Grand Nudger]

It seems you have veered off topic. The question I asked was based on your comment that you wanted/preferred flexible morality over god's ridged never changing righteousness.

My question is If society makes it legal for MAPs to have sex with children would you be ok with this? because like it or not know it or not this movement is gaining traction. I'm just asking do you have a line where you say no to the continuous evolution of morality?

Again no judgement or offense intended.

Still fucking that gaypedo chicken huh?  Pervert.

You've told me that you believe morality to be relative, and that among the competing relativistic moralities you prefer your gods morality...in no small measure because it claims to offer you eternal life.  Meanwhile, I've told you that I don't agree with moral relativism, and that I prefer objective moral standards to any of the competing relativistic standards.  This includes yours and my society's - and fwiw there's alot of overlap between those two things, since the us is still mostly christian.  If you really wanted to talk about people advocating for kiddie fucking, the elephant in the room would be evangelicals trying to get legal marrying age down to menarche.

There are -obviously- many things that you people do that I can't cosign on?  It doesn't matter to me that your god commanded kiddie fucking, and it won't matter to me if my country legalizes it.  I'll still think it's trash.  It's difficult for me to fathom why you believed this to be such a worthy and probative question that you would beclown yourself by asking it, and asking it in this particularly trashy way.

Are these supposed to be the hard moral questions? For whom?

Another fun one.  Who's narrating that tale?

The garden narrative is found in

...and who's narrating it......?

[R-Farmer]

Sounds like you're a JW. Is that correct?

I'm a non denominational believer going to a baptist church.

I believe King's Cross Station in London is real, I don't think that gets me halfway to believing in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter.

I'm not convinced that Jesus was an authority on hell.

Do you believe the author of Harry Potter JK Rowling is an expert on Her books? If she says some previously unknown realm existed in her world would she not be uniquely qualified to amend HP canon? Jesus being the author of CHRISTianity is also in a similar position. He is the authority of this religion for no other reason that this religion is based on His teachings. 

You do not have to believe in Christ, to acknowledge his authority in Christian canon. Meaning even if you don't think he was real, The theology surrounding The teachings of this figure real or not are the basis for in universe christian canon. Making all who believe or even want to discuss christian canon beholden to the teachings ascribed to him real or not.

I'm not even convinced he was a real person, though I lean about 51% in that direction. You have to believe the Bible is true before any of the stories can be convincing; and I have found the Bible to be very unconvincing in the first place. I reject the idea that I should accept some promise without evidence just because it was made before fact checking was a thing.

Whether the Bible is true or not for the purpose of discerning whether or not something is apart of Christian canon or not is irrelevant. Because before you can test the validity of the claims concerning the bible, you must approach it canonically. (by the established rules and stories) If you just randomly decide to just pick a 2000 to 6000 year old story and try and make it conform to modern scrutiny then you are intentionally poisoning the well. 

I believe that if I asked and prayed hard enough for a vision of a Buddhist hell, I might get a vision of it.

This is a perfect example of my above point. In that, what in Buddhist canon would lead you to believe that your thought/prayer experiment would work? is there any prescribed mechanism in buddhist cannon that would lend itself to support your earnest efforts? If not then why would you think this is a valid test? Which again is why I'm suggesting to approach a given religion canonically if you are going to seriously study it.

If I went on a vision quest, I might have a vision of a talking animal. Visions seem to be very culture specific for some reason. It's almost like they come from inside the petitioner's own brain and are shaped by what they already believe.

are you dismissing vision quests outright?

Here's what I believe: a person's belief in something should be proportional to the evidence for it.

Most people believe the same. that said the interpretation of said evidence, at least concerning Spiritual matters should remain subjective in a free thinking society.

There were lots of things written before scientific standards of evidence  were formulated, and that's a terrible reason to believe them.

and it is worse reason to dismiss something just because it was written before what we deem to be modern science. why? because science is not absolute. it's just out best understanding so far.

Hearsay is terrible evidence.

I never suggested hearsay. I suggested that you go straight to the source.

Visions are terrible evidence (problem of contradictory revelations).

why would you assume all dreams and visions produce contradictory revelation? Would you considered a vision that provided a revelation completely unknown to you but completely supported by a much older source? like for instance you never read or studied the Bible, but you have a dream/vision of a principle or in this case the place of hell, that is biblically accurate, verses dogmatically accurate. (What the church supports of Hell is not the same as what the Bible says of it. So lets say you get the Bible's version without having ever read or heard it.) would this be a valid vision or is it dismissed in your mind because of the format the information was conveyed? 

It's okay that you don't have good arguments for your religious beliefs, no one else does either.

lol.. I have what is called a theologicaly sound argument. as this is a theology based question/subject. Why would you expect me to produce a scientifically sound argument on a non scientific subject?

Do you not understand that scientific methodologies do not have the tools or processes needed to study or discuss non scientific subjects? Do you try and apply science to all the other subject matters? do you look for scientific proof of Historical subjects? Do you try and disprove the validity of case law that does not lend itself to the scientific method? Then why would you demand a theological subject be held to a scientific standard, if you recognize that other fields of study have their own rules and expectations?

I don't blame you for believing what you were raised to believe that's also what the people you love believe.

Actually I was not raise Christian. my father was a humanist/spiritualist He got that from his girlfriend, and applied it to us. Up until the last year of his life. then my mother got him to switch back to Christianity. He was a christian as a boy.

That's very human. But I'll be very surprised if you have anything persuasive to anyone who doesn't already accept your premises.

Not if they demand scientific evidence for theological matters.. I would not suspect so.

[no one]

Why is this god of Abraham so stupid?

Why would anyone with a 1/1000000000000 of a brain accept the hogwash notion that there even is a god?

[R-Farmer]

what year were you invented? as the word ;invented' does not apply to what is being described.

I know this was directed at h4m4n, but: You believe it doesn't apply, but if Jesus is fictional then it does. I was born, Sherlock Holmes was invented. Not asking you to agree, just want to make sure you understand where  h4m4n is coming from. The idea was literally unthinkable to me when I was a believer.

Not to be a grammar nazi but this question it still doesn't apply. as Sherlock Holmes was never a fleshed out/real person. Currently and in the time of Christ human beings can not be created by anyone but God. Even if you were to clone someone you are not inventing a person. As it is not possible to creat or invent someone out of spare or newly forged parts.. If you wanted to ask when did Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote "a study in scarlet ." or when did he first create The character of Sherlock Homes. This will get you the information you seek.

Like wise if you want to question the validity of the existence of Jesus then ask when was Jesus supposed to have been born. If you frame your question assuming the answer then you are setting up a logical fallacy ([i]circulus in demonstrando[/i]). If you are intentionally doing that, you are disqualifying us from any effort at a honest discussion.

[R-Farmer]

And if that was always apart of the plan?

Then the plan stinks, along with the one who made it.

And if you took say, eggs and baby animals instead of full grown adults? If eggs were taken that would represent all avian reptiles and amphibians which would take up a fraction of the space and eliminate the need to feed them.

Then you would not know which is a female egg from a male egg. Also, eggs need to be incubated. And who would feed them when they hatch? When birds fall out of their nest they are dead.

again.. Not a logistical tale of how one man defied God and saved the world on his own by building a boat. God used Noah and his faith in god to save the world meaning Noah did not gather the animals eggs or alive. God sent them to him. Oh, and all one needs is a 100*F +\- heat source for about 3 to 6 weeks for most incubation cycles. Which is not a problem in the summer months. On top of that composting hay will get between 120 and 140*F in the center of the pile. it gets cooler towards the outside.

All I'm pointing out is if animals were loaded up in their baby form 90% of the space you think is needed isn't.

[arewethereyet]

Oh FFS.

[The Grand Nudger]

Magic books and magic boats, but not a shred of common sense or mundane decency.