ONE question to all the atheists out there....

[Grungi]

hmmm most muslims i know use both god and allah sometimes in the same speeches, theres no difference, and again most people i know are well aware that god is god, though try telling both religions that they worship the same god thats when things go pearshaped.

the reason allah has got bad connotations for some westerners is that alot of bad things were done in the name of allah, the reason god has a bad connotation for some muslims is that alot of bad things were done in the name of god [img]tongue.gif[/img] ahhh religion is a funny old game [img]tongue.gif[/img]

[Callum Kerr]

I'm an agnostic... I need proof...

And I think that having some higher power is not all that great a thing. I think that all these rules in religion would not be what a GOOD god would command... for example... not being able to eat certain animals in the Muslim and Jewish (and probably more) religions... what kind of NICE guy would set such rules... and fasting... etc etc. Such fanaticism is too me a reason against religion... if i was to believe, then I would maybe agree to some or all of the commandments (or equivalent) as a way of living... but not to go that far... religion is meant to be a good thing to make you feel protected by a higher power or something like that... not so that you spend your life doing penance for every bad thought that you ever had... so that you can be rewarded in this life... My view is the opposite pragmatism...

Why believe and adhere to rules just tso that you will have a nice afterlife that way not exist... better to enjoy yourslef in what you KNOW exists...

Just my two cents... not meaning to offend people... I'm probably wrong or not expressing myself how i want to anyway...

[Melusine]

Originally posted by Grungi: where does it say that if you dont believe in god you dont get into heaven? way i see it even saddam hussein gets a chance [img]tongue.gif[/img] (believes in a different religion and is an evil psycho) , heaven seems to let just about anyone in so long as they repent, and if your standing outside heaven then you'd probably be pretty heartfelt in your repenting. IF there is a heaven and IF it follows what the bible says then you pretty much guaranteed to get in, unless your evil and have no care for anyone else, if you live a good life thats far more important than believing in god, if god is what hes said to be then which would he prefer? would god prefer you to live a good life and not believe or would he prefer you to lead a terrible life whilst being very religious? im 100% that i believe god would choose the former and would let you into heaven regardless of your faith.

A lot of Christians would be to differ I'm afraid. Waiting for Cerek to get to this topic... I can't speak for him, but I think he does believe that a religious person who has sinned lots and truly repents will be accepted into heaven, no matter how grave the sins were (as long as there's true repentance, mind) and a person who does acts of goodness, of selflessness, of love his/her entire life, but who is not truly religious will be barred from heaven.
There's also an Internet site of a guy called Jack Chick, that proclaims similar stuff. No matter how good you think you are, even religious, the only thing that will get you into heaven is "accepting Jesus as your saviour".

Needless to say I think this is a terrible belief (no offense of course!). Just think what heaven will look like! Any murderer who truly repents his crime and gives himself up to God can be redeemed, but not someone who gave all their earthly possessions away to the poor, who lived an exemplary life, did similar things saints did, but never really decided about God one way or the other will go to hell. Judging purely by the respective populations, I don't know whether hell is worse than heaven in this scenario.
But anyway, nuance, nuance, most Christians I know do not hold this belief.

[ 01-22-2003, 07:17 AM: Message edited by: Melusine ]

[Grungi]

callum your pointing out the difference between religion (what god would say) and culture (what people intepret it as and live) people are continually making that big mistake, fasting and all of that, doesnt help anything IMO and is a waste of time, it doesnt make people believe more. Rules and regulations were originally set out in the long distance past (allegedly) by god, anything made more recently in the last 1000 years or so is completely human in design, not eating pork for example for muslims and jews (for muslims the reason for not eating pork was pork went bad before other meats so was seen to be unclean so now its meant to be totally abhorrent to eat it, but early muslims happily ate pork) and for jews its because it has the cloven hoof, supposedly of the devil, again this is a more recent thing, the devil and cloven hooves and all that is more current folklore (by current i mean after the original sort of ten commandments time [img]tongue.gif[/img] so not all that current) with hindus at least i can understand why they dont eat cows, they held them sacred from the start of the religion, so thats more understandable, but all the other stuff wasnt from the beginning, and i hate it when muslims come into my home and open the windows etc because of the smell of my lunch (pork chops being one of my favourites [img]tongue.gif[/img] ) the strength of their reaction is amazing especially considering their ancestors happily chowed down on pig back in the day, theres just no good reason for it nowadays.

so totally agree with you callum, thats all about pragmatism & culture and not belief at all.

[Irongrinder]

Callum, I think I know what you mean and I agree, why hold on to something you don't know for sure is there.

Also, people use god as a reason to why we are here. Then what is that reason, to amuse him? I have as much fun here in my life as someone with believe, and I'm probably for the same reason here.

[Grungi]

OMG dont even mention that jack chick guy, he is a religious nutter, no offense but i read his site, its posted as a joke site on some forums, took me a while before i realised he was actually serious, (i am remembering rightly this is the one with the (not so)comic strips?)

and yeah it is a terrible belief that you can be evil as you want through your life then turn round and say oh yes i truly regretted all of it and get into heaven, just because you believe? what a load of bollax frankly [img]tongue.gif[/img] i definately say, if god has a filtering policy on heaven, hes going to let in people who are intrinsically good, not those who pray to him alot, from all i have read in the bible and elsewhere, god doesnt really care anymore if you believe in him (after jesus died not before) all your sins are taken care of, but he does want you to lead a good life if you expect to get into heaven, regardless of your faith. Thats the way i intepret things, so if i did believe in all that then id expect to get into heaven because i believe im a good person, even though i dont believe in god [img]tongue.gif[/img]

[Melusine]

Uh, that's not exactly what I meant... but it may also have something to do with the fact that your posts are just very difficult to read. A little punctuation hasn't killed anyone yet that I know of mate

Oh and yes, Chick's the one with the comics.

[ 01-22-2003, 07:28 AM: Message edited by: Melusine ]

[Irongrinder]

Exactly, that is what it is all about, living your life good, without because god told you so, but because you really want to and you really are like that.

[Grungi]

exactly irongrinder, thats the way i see things, keeps it simple, and why should i be a hypocrite, when i believe that being good, showing love etc far outweighs anything religion can offer, its the tenants of religion without the paraphenalia.

punctuation? whats that then? [img]tongue.gif[/img] my posts are always straight off and typed before i think unfortunately, i could always reread them and punctuate properly and paragraph, but im lazier than an unemployed sloth [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Vaskez]

Bloody hell, this thread's escalated a bit. I've scanned all the posts, not read in great detail as there's too much.

Anyway, all the old arguments have come out. Personally I can shoot all of them down in a way to convince myself but that's not the question here.

Thing people have to realise about me, is that I'm not out to convince anybody of anything. I simply believe things that I am convinced of by a mixture of logic and inner feeling. The fact is I really don't see where some people get their beliefs. I mean I'm no genius or expert on anything but some of the arguments just seem ridiculous to me. I'm just here to learn what makes people tick that's why I'm asking these questions. Main points:

1) The idea that we are here for no particular purpose, that we are just insignificant beings floating in an uncaring world to live and to die and for no other reason just seems laughable to me. Look at EVERTHING in the world we know. EVERYTHING happens for a reason, every damn thing, even if we don't see the reason. Look at the perfect logic and pattern in nature. Scientists for thousands of years have been trying to work the world out. From biology chemistry and physics points of view. Each new discovery amazes them and how the world is built up. It all had to come from somewhere, Even scientists admit that just for the atoms to come together to form life the chance is like 10^-31 which is an unimaginably small chance. Then we haven't even spoken of where the very first matter came from. The only explanation is that it came from something that was there before it right? But where does that thing come from? Etc. Only an infinite thing BEYOND OUR COMPREHENSION can exist for ever. Therefore call it what you want. Some people say that the universe, the lifeless atoms created themselves or were always there. Bollocks. Everything except something that is infinite has an end and a beginning. Atoms are not infinite. Only something that understands infinity, i.e. has an infinite mind can create infinity. THere must be such a thing. We call it a God.

2) I'm no Bible basher. I don't even read it regularly and see most of it as symbolic, my belief that there is a God is completely seperate from the issue of whether I'm a Christian or not. People should see this as a seperate issue. Religion can only be based on past teachings and a feeling. The existance of a God can be based on logic (as in 1) that logic satisfies me) and feeling.

3) The point that religions cause war is also complete bollocks as Yorick has nicely pointed out. If the people fighting in the name of Christianity or Islam ever took notice of their own religion's teachings, they'd realise that all religions teach peace and love your neighbour. They give false reasons based on religions for their wars. Some people may THINK they are fighting in the name of their religion and their God is smiling on them but the chances are they have been misled in the name of religion. The Christian God at least never says war is good. These people I suppose can be said to be fighting because of religion but they are misled and it is not the religion itself's fault but the fault of the leader who misled them. The real cause, as Yorick said, is money etc. And the common argument that even the Bible says "eye for an eye" is invalid. People don't realise that that is in the Old Testament and the New Testament overrides and supercedes the Old Testament. The New Testament says love your neighbour. Think about that if you want to use the Bible in an argument.

4) People who believe that they are fine just by living a good moral life: this is all well and good but if you just admit the possibility that the Bible is true then it's not good enough. Like I said if you admit the possibility then you'd be stupid to just be satisfied with that. If you don't admit the possibility that the Bible is true then you I guess it's good enough for you. But then think about the point in 1) If you then admit the possibility that there is a God you must also admit the possibility that he gave his word in a book. Therefore all you have to decide is which book it is. Bible, Q'uran? Those 2 are pretty similar anyway and contain some of the same teachings. I have no argument to say that one religion is better than the other. I believe that the muslim God is the same as the Christian one, but as people have said, they are interpreted differently by different people.

5) People who share their beliefs with others do so because they believe that they are right and are happy and wish to share their happiness. They do not want to tell you their beliefs and convince you because they are arrogant and think your beliefs are stupid, rather, they love you as a brother/sister and as such want to do whatever they belive they need to to help you and make you happy. Some preachers can be bloody annoying, I admit and they are wrong to condemn everyone else, these are not the people you should listen to. The ones you should listen to are like Yorick who sees you as a friend and equal and just shows an honest will to make people happy in the way he knows best. If you do not want anyone's "help" because you are fine as you are then ok, but there's no need to be angry at nice people who think they are giving up their free time to help a brother.

6) People who have thought about this a lot and are happy in their belief that there is no God. Good for you if you are content and happy. I don't believe you are right because of logic in 1), the question that can a billion Christians be completely misled etc.? You might say they can be misled I mean, hey, they all believed that the world was flat in the middle ages. But, as so many people have said, you can make people do things but you can't make them FEEL and KNOW in their heart the presence of a God. You can't force faith. Also there is somewhat of a feeling inside me that plays a part of course, we of course you can't explain. Other aruments exist which are convincing to me: would we really have come about/been created with a need for food if there was no food? A need for sex if there was no sex? A need for God if there was no God? You might say that you don't feel a need for God. Of course, it might not be as strong as a "need" but I don't think that there is any person alive who has not by him/herself at least considered the possibility of a greater being? Why is this?

Phew that's all my thoughts I could come up with now. Hope you found them logical/helpful.

[ 01-22-2003, 09:23 AM: Message edited by: Vaskez ]