Showing posts with label Christianity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Christianity. Show all posts

Friday, September 24, 2010

Becoming Atheist

The Bright Line... - Beliefnet:

"There are no atheists who believe they are Godlike. That means that no person indoctrinated in the belief that they are made in the image of God can be an atheist. They can only attempt to do the truly impossible for themselves that is erase the Godlikness (sic) from themselves.

A Christian or any other theist can become an atheist but only by coming to realize that they are not made in the image of God and have no wish to be because God as depicted by their faith is petty, insecure, violent, and misanthropic, that is God hates all people. They have no interest in maintaining that image of themselves and must take on the difficult but not impossible task of rejecting their childhood indoctrination. In my experience, those who accept the indoctrination as adults have a much more difficult task of discovering what the God they are supposed to be in the image of is really like. Once they do the rest is easy."

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Christian for Eternity

The Bright Line - Beliefnet:

"We atheists will die and as a result of our living a righteous and moral life according to our chosen society that society will be a little or a lot better because we lived. We get continuous feedback from that society that we are doing the righteous and moral things that improve that society so that when we die the society will be better than when we were born. We have no need to imagine what will happen when we die, we can look back as others will and see how we made our society better. I am using 'we' here not to represent all atheists, just the ones that think as I do about living and death.

I am glad you, as a Christian, believe that God will take care of you when you die. You seem to have done nothing of worth in this life but annoy strangers with your blather about God and the Hell you created for yourself in this life as a rebelling Christian. I hope God will ignore all that and reward your belief with His eternal presence. I doubt it, but hang tight to that belief. It is all you have."

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Christianity or Shinto

On replacing Christianity with Shinto - Beliefnet:

"I find the evolutionary reason behind religion is not spiritual fulfillment, but for community identity. The spiritual fulfillment is co-opted by the shamans as a community building and unifying technique.

While Shinto has some very attractive attributes, I suspect that trying to convert Christians is a lost cause. Christ gives hope to the hopeless at least after they die, and the minister makes sure they are hopeless sinners, at least in their own minds.

A more useful exercise, is to promote 'Progressive Christianity' with its emphasis on Jesus' teachings of a direct personal relationship with God and its corollary love your neighbors even if your other neighbors hate them. It is a natural progression for Christians who get tired of the hellfire and damnation bigotry of traditional Christian teachings. They get to keep their Jesus mediated afterlife, and all the spirituality. A much easier conversion process.

I find the Two Great Commandments very easy to live with as an atheist, and the personal God of the first does not bother me at all. If a person needs to believe and many do, the absence of proselytizing is welcome. They will of course be enthusiastic about sharing, but they can't really tell you how to believe in their God except have faith. Much easier to live with than Christ or Hell, take your pick. As the classic Jack Benny line goes 'I am still thinking about it'"

Monday, August 9, 2010

Christianity and The Empty Tomb

Why Was The Tomb Empty? - Beliefnet :

I think Paul's brilliance in making everything people do sinful including sex and judgement is what gave his sect a leg up on all the rest. The peroration in Romans 1 continuing on through the first lines of Romans 2 insured that everyone needed a savior. Paul touched all the bases there, and the cherry on the top was the better to marry than burn. It is no wonder that Christians think sin is pervasive. One can't do anything that isn't sinful. Then adding in the Original sin so that just breathing is sinful, made salvation an absolute necessity.

Just to set the record straighter for me. The only Christian cult was Paul's. The others were more or less Jesus cults maybe with a bit of savior God especially in John, but the synoptics celebrate the ministry of Jesus not his Godhood

As for the empty tomb, the best explanation I have heard is that the rich guy donated it only for the burial and maybe anticipating a need for it removed the body over the weekend. Or maybe he was part of the conspiracy, and since it was his tomb nobody asked any questions.

As for Jesus resurrecting and pushing the rock and leaving in the dark of the night, before anyone could check the three day prophesy, seems pretty goofy to me. It would have been much better theater to push the stone, and be sitting there and say 'Don't cry ladies, here I am again. Go see if you can find a few disciples that aren't hiding from the authorities and tell them to come and see for themselves.'"

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Christian Baggage

The Bright Line - Beliefnet:

it is 'you' that the instrument [the cross] is meant for, it is 'you' who are damaged beyond repair, it is 'you' whose every chacteristic must be 'snuffed' out of existance, and that with the greatest fanfare of pain... justice..... have you ever considered yourself such baggage upon creation?
Leight
"It is only Christians that suffer from this disability. And even they have to accept on faith the denial of their human heritage of social responsibility, innate morality, and respect for all humans that do not prove themselves unworthy of that respect. This is the heritage you give up when you are 'born again' and forsake your humanity for the baggage of sin and bigotry that is inherent in the faith you accept.

You may carry that instrument of self-hatred and work on snuffing out the human heritage of social responsibility, innate morality and respect for your fellow humans on this earth. And when you die you will be forgotten by all as another useless Christian. I doubt that even God cares, but that is your problem not mine."

Saturday, July 3, 2010

Contributions of Christianity?

The Biblical Self-Destruct Clause - Beliefnet:
El Cid wrote in an otherwise worthless thread:

"Almost everything good about western societies is the result of Christians and Christianity."

Hardly. You need to learn a little history, my friend. Ancient Egypt gave us strong mathematics; ancient Greece gave us philosophy, medicine, and natural history; ancient Rome gave us the system of government we largely use to this day, law, charity, hygiene, and marvelous architecture; the Enlightenment gave us science and modern logic in SPITE of the Christians.

If we had been waiting around for the Christians (who have thought the 'end was nigh' since Paul) to do anything real for humanity, we'd have been waiting a long time. They managed to give us a working calendar, almost by accident, and not without controversy, but that's about it.
Tolerant Sis

Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Science as a Bridge to God

The blue roads of thinking: The Human Condition:
To restore to science as a whole, for mathematics as well as psychology and sociology, the sense of its origin and veritable destiny as a bridge leading toward God---not by diminishing, but by increasing precision in demonstration, verification and supposition---that would indeed be a task worth accomplishing.
Simone Weil

Religion in so far as it is a source of consolation is a hindrance to true faith; and in this sense atheism is a purification. I have to be an atheist with that part of myself which is not made for God. Among those in whom the supernatural part of themselves has not been awakened, the atheists are right and the believers wrong.
- Simone Weil, Faiths of Meditation; Contemplation of the divine
the Simone Weil Reader, edited by George A. Panichas (David McKay Co. NY 1977) p 417

J'C: So we come full circle. To restore to science its destiny as a bridge leading toward God it must be purged of that religious view of humans as God's failure to create, at the very least, a species with no need for a re-birth mediated by religion but fully capable of themselves awakening the supernatural connection to God. All scientists I know who have made this connection, and they are many as I tend to live in a science dominated world, see their mission in science not as saving their souls, but to discover the world God has created with themselves as an integral part of it along with all other humans. They have purged themselves of the need for consolation or salvation of their religion and have made that direct empowering connection to God. Most Christian scientists have done this by a return to the Synoptics and the empowering first Commandment "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind." [Emphasis mine.] There is no room in that commandment for consolation or salvation.

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Christian Spirit

Hell - Beliefnet Forums: "Christian spirit is quite bimodal these days. The followers of Paul's Christ have a rather hateful view of themselves and others that breeds a nasty, judgmental spirit. The followers of Jesus generally have a spirit inspired by the Two Great Commandments and are generally pleasant to associate with. Both groups call themselves Christian, but as Christians are wont to say by their fruits ye will know them. If hesh calls himself Christian and is a good neighbor hesh is a Jesus Christian, and if hesh spouts hate and venom hesh is a Pauline Christian."

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

On Hate speech and Christian bigotry.

Why are so many Fundamentalist Christians Obessed with Homosexuality? - Beliefnet Forums: "I am a firm believer in speech of any kind. Ignorant speech, bigoted speech, hate speech, downright vile speech. Such speech clearly indicates the character and morality of the speaker.

I am also a firm believer in verbally countering as forcefully as necessary such speech 'and the horse the speaker rode in on.' If that horse is Christianity and Christians object to my characterizing Christian tenets that I counter as ignorant, bigoted or hateful, even though they come from The Bible, it is up to the Christians to lovingly and clearly rebuke their fellow Christians for the misinterpretation of that Bible that allows the ignorance, bigotry and hate."

Thursday, August 7, 2008

Christian Heroes

What if you are wrong? - Beliefnet Forums: "Originally Posted by CaliberCadillac
Not when one remembers that this very precious treasure was a progressive revelation that started with the first man on earth, was perpetuated through the only family to survive a world wide deluge, re-initiated with Abraham, documented by Moses, and finally completed in Christ.

The character, morals, and behavior of all of these heroes of this progressive revelation and the implication that God found them to be the kind of people Hesh wanted to use as the foundation of Herm group of believers was the convincer that the God depicted was totally worthless and devoid of any qualities to inspire worship. BTW you forgot Lot."

Monday, July 21, 2008

Changing Christianity

what do you think about being homosexual and being a christian? - Beliefnet Forums: "I think the movement we see here among some Catholic Parishes and in other Christian denominations toward the Gospels and the Two Great Commandments is a necessary and sufficient condition for the revitalization of Christianity as path to God for many people. I think Christianity has moved farther than you think in this direction, but if you think about it it is almost by definition a quiet movement. Loving your neighbor and turning the other cheek doesn't generate a lot of controversy, but does make a huge difference in the feeling of the community and the acceptance of the presence of God."

Sunday, June 29, 2008

Paul's Contribution to Christian theology

Dust - Beliefnet Forums: "The good news is that in order to support Paul the council had to preserve the Gospels to give Paul the charisma of Jesus to build his Christ on. The bad news is that Paul's proscriptive top down theology appealed to the Christian priesthood, and not incidentally to Constantine, who needed a unifying religion that he could control through the same priesthood to keep order in the populace. The preservation of the Gospels is about the only good thing Christianity did theologically for over a thousand years. Opinions may vary on their political contributions."