Unitarian Atheism
There is only one God that I don't believe in.

Only one God that you don't believe in? That seems a bit limiting. There is so many gods to deny, the fun doesn't stop at God.

The only reason I'm an agnostic and not an atheist is because I really really want to believe there's a God and an afterlife. I know atheists like to say that not believing in afterlife makes you appreciate the "beauty of this life" that much more, but it hasn't worked that way for me.

It just makes me terrified that this could be all there is.

Posted by White Rabbit The only reason I'm an agnostic and not an atheist is because I really really want to believe there's a God and an afterlife. I know atheists like to say that not believing in afterlife makes you appreciate the "beauty of this life" that much more, but it hasn't worked that way for me. It just makes me terrified that this could be all there is.

Ay, there's the rub! That fear is exactly the reason how organized religion has convinced so many otherwise intelligent people to believe things that there is no good reason to believe.

unfortunately, just wanting something to be true does not make it so. There is still no good reason to believe in creation myths and imaginary friends. I would love to believe that there is a diamond the size of a refridgerator in my backyard, but the bank is not going to finance my new Porsche based on faith.

You would undoubtedly be a better person (and we would all be better off) if you stopped believing that you were going to survive your own death. In fact, if people stopped believing things like that, they might just stop crashing planes into buildings.

"isn't it enough to see that the garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?" Douglas Adams

Posted by tekriter You would undoubtedly be a better person (and we would all be better off) if you stopped believing that you were going to survive your own death. In fact, if people stopped believing things like that, they might just stop crashing planes into buildings.

Why?

What is my believing in a life after death doing that's making the world a worse place? What's so wrong with my belief that I will see my grandparents again in a better place?

I get the point about the suicide bombers and the like, but my religion doesn't support that, and the people who will do such thing are the exception, not the rule in the grand scheme of things.

So tell me, I'm curious, why do you think having hope is such a terrible thing?

Again to clarify, I'm not talking about extremest things, you're saying that ANYONE who believes in Heaven and Hell would be better off not believing that.

WHY, in a regular, everyday, non extremest sense?

Posted by journeylady Why?

I think the part about airplanes into buildings answered that. Religious faith promotes human violence to an astonishing degree. Religion inspires violence in at least two senses: (1) People often kill other human beings because they believe that the creator of the universe wants them to do it (the inevitable psychopathic corollary being that the act will ensure them an eternity of happiness after death). Examples of this sort of behavior are practically innumerable, jihadist suicide bombing being the most prominent. (2) Larger numbers of people are inclined toward religious conflict simply because their religion constitutes the core of their moral identities. One of the enduring pathologies of human culture is the tendency to raise children to fear and demonize other human beings on the basis of religion. Many religious conflicts that seem driven by terrestrial concerns, therefore, are religious in origin. (Just ask the Irish.)

Posted by journeylady What is my believing in a life after death doing that's making the world a worse place?

How is believing that you will survive your own death in any way compatible with building a better world for the living? Let's also talk about the unmentioned corollary that if you (insert chosen religion) go to heaven, then the people that don't believe above dogmatic system of beliefs will go to hell.

Pluralism pretty much invalidates any pretense of brotherhood or cooperation that any religion claims. So, your incompatible ideas make life a living hell for millions of humans that are actually alive and actually suffering. See above.

Let's simplify:

Christians believe in an afterlife. (not so evil)
Christians also believe that their god cares what we do when we are naked. (a little evil)
Christian organizations obstruct real solutions for AIDS in africa on the basis of the above. (real evil)

You can't get visits with grandma in the abraham's big condo in the sky without stepping on a whole bunch of people that just happened to be unlucky enough to be born a heathen.

Posted by journeylady What's so wrong with my belief that I will see my grandparents again in a better place?

Nothing - except that you have no evidence that you will see them again. If you said you could talk to the aliens then you just might get locked up, if you dress your wierd ideas up as religion and talk about visiting with grandma then it's okay?

The boundless narcissism and self-deceit of the religious allows them to overlook that even innocent looking ideas come with a whole planeload of dogma that hurts real people on the real earth.

Posted by journeylady I get the point about the suicide bombers and the like, but my religion doesn't support that, and the people who will do such thing are the exception, not the rule in the grand scheme of things.

Your religion exists only through the convention of political correctness that makes it taboo criticise certain ridiculous ideas (like creation myths)and is based on fear and coercion.

That same political correctness provides cover for the fundies - christians and mulsims alike - to forward their insane (yet theologically correct) agendas.

Posted by journeylady So tell me, I'm curious, why do you think having hope is such a terrible thing?

You are mistaken. I did not say that. I hope that people will stop believing things that are divisive and have no basis in reality so that we can get on with making our world more peaceable and sustainable and learn more about our place in the universe.

False hope, however, is wrong. Tell a terminal cancer patient that he will not die if he has faith and he will still die - no better off than he was before you lied to him.

Posted by journeylady Again to clarify, I'm not talking about extremest things, you're saying that ANYONE who believes in Heaven and Hell would be better off not believing that.

What do you mean by extremeist? Like literalism? Some people equate literalism with lutheranism, and therefore fundamentalism. Either the bible is true or it is not.

As an aside, have you ever wondered about the idea that if you had been born in another place, you would have another religion?

Posted by journeylady WHY, in a regular, everyday, non extremest sense?

By Sam Harris
Newsweek
Nov. 13, 2006 issue - Despite a full century of scientific insights attesting to the antiquity of life and the greater antiquity of the Earth, more than half the American population believes that the entire cosmos was created 6,000 years ago. This is, incidentally, about a thousand years after the Sumerians invented glue. Those with the power to elect presidents and congressmen—and many who themselves get elected—believe that dinosaurs lived two by two upon Noah's Ark, that light from distant galaxies was created en route to the Earth and that the first members of our species were fashioned out of dirt and divine breath, in a garden with a talking snake, by the hand of an invisible God.

This is embarrassing. But add to this comedy of false certainties the fact that 44 percent of Americans are confident that Jesus will return to Earth sometime in the next 50 years, and you will glimpse the terrible liability of this sort of thinking. Given the most common interpretation of Biblical prophecy, it is not an exaggeration to say that nearly half the American population is eagerly anticipating the end of the world. It should be clear that this faith-based nihilism provides its adherents with absolutely no incentive to build a sustainable civilization—economically, environmentally or geopolitically. Some of these people are lunatics, of course, but they are not the lunatic fringe. We are talking about the explicit views of Christian ministers who have congregations numbering in the tens of thousands. These are some of the most influential, politically connected and well-funded people in our society.

It is, of course, taboo to criticize a person's religious beliefs. The problem, however, is that much of what people believe in the name of religion is intrinsically divisive, unreasonable and incompatible with genuine morality. One of the worst things about religion is that it tends to separate questions of right and wrong from the living reality of human and animal suffering. Consequently, religious people will devote immense energy to so-called moral problems—such as gay marriage—where no real suffering is at issue, and they will happily contribute to the surplus of human misery if it serves their religious beliefs.

A case in point: embryonic-stem-cell research is one of the most promising developments in the last century of medicine. It could offer therapeutic breakthroughs for every human ailment (for the simple reason that stem cells can become any tissue in the human body), including diabetes, Parkinson's disease, severe burns, etc. In July, President George W. Bush used his first veto to deny federal funding to this research. He did this on the basis of his religious faith. Like millions of other Americans, President Bush believes that "human life starts at the moment of conception." Specifically, he believes that there is a soul in every 3-day-old human embryo, and the interests of one soul—the soul of a little girl with burns over 75 percent of her body, for instance—cannot trump the interests of another soul, even if that soul happens to live inside a petri dish. Here, as ever, religious dogmatism impedes genuine wisdom and compassion.

A 3-day-old human embryo is a collection of 150 cells called a blastocyst. There are, for the sake of comparison, more than 100,000 cells in the brain of a fly. The embryos that are destroyed in stem-cell research do not have brains, or even neurons. Consequently, there is no reason to believe they can suffer their destruction in any way at all. The truth is that President Bush's unjustified religious beliefs about the human soul are, at this very moment, prolonging the scarcely endurable misery of tens of millions of human beings.

Given our status as a superpower, our material wealth and the continuous advancements in our technology, it seems safe to say that the president of the United States has more power and responsibility than any person in history. It is worth noting, therefore, that we have elected a president who seems to imagine that whenever he closes his eyes in the Oval Office—wondering whether to go to war or not to go to war, for instance—his intuitions have been vetted by the Creator of the universe. Speaking to a small group of supporters in 1999, Bush reportedly said, "I believe God wants me to be president." Believing that God has delivered you unto the presidency really seems to entail the belief that you cannot make any catastrophic mistakes while in office. One question we might want to collectively ponder in the future: do we really want to hand the tiller of civilization to a person who thinks this way?

Religion is the one area of our discourse in which people are systematically protected from the demand to give good evidence and valid arguments in defense of their strongly held beliefs. And yet these beliefs regularly determine what they live for, what they will die for and—all too often—what they will kill for. Consequently, we are living in a world in which millions of grown men and women can rationalize the violent sacrifice of their own children by recourse to fairy tales. We are living in a world in which millions of Muslims believe that there is nothing better than to be killed in defense of Islam. We are living in a world in which millions of Christians hope to soon be raptured into the stratosphere by Jesus so that they can safely enjoy a sacred genocide that will inaugurate the end of human history. In a world brimming with increasingly destructive technology, our infatuation with religious myths now poses a tremendous danger. And it is not a danger for which more religious faith is a remedy.

Speaking of Douglas Adams earlier, maybe we can use his idea regarding the Golgafrinchams. First, get a bunch of useless people to believe some stupid fairy tale regarding their imminent demise. Then we can just get rid of all of them, and live our happy lives without all of thier nonsense.

Posted by tekriter Ay, there's the rub! That fear is exactly the reason how organized religion has convinced so many otherwise intelligent people to believe things that there is no good reason to believe.

I don't think it's fear that keeps otherwise intelligent people religious. It probably doesn't help, but I don't think that's it.

I honestly believe being raised in a religion is a form a brainwashing (however well-intended) from which is it EXTREMELY difficult to deprogram.

Posted by tekriter How is believing that you will survive your own death in any way compatible with building a better world for the living?

Why does one preclude the other? I give to charities, I support charities that arn't even Christian based, and If a charity IS christian based, I tend to research it to make sure that there's nothing stupidly rediculous in what they're doing. I give to Lutheran World Relief, which Earned an A From a Charity Watchdog Group -The American Institute of Philanthropy (AIP), an independent nonprofit charity watchdog and information service recently gave LWR its A rating for maximizing the effectiveness of every dollar contributed.

Let's also talk about the unmentioned corollary that if you (insert chosen religion) go to heaven, then the people that don't believe above dogmatic system of beliefs will go to hell.

Not going to dispute that one, but my believing it, and your not believing it, doesn't change a THING in your day to day life. that isn't really connected to the point here. I'm asking why my personal beliefs are a bad thing in your mind. They don't effect you at all.

Pluralism pretty much invalidates any pretense of brotherhood or cooperation that any religion claims. So, your incompatible ideas make life a living hell for millions of humans that are actually alive and actually suffering. See above.

I disagree.

Let's simplify: Christians believe in an afterlife. (not so evil)

Yes, this is the big point here. It's not so evil as you yourself have said.

Christians also believe that their god cares what we do when we are naked. (a little evil)

Ok, ignoring the fact that you are HORRIBLY generalizing here, the GOVERNMENT cares what we do when we are naked... SOCIETY cares what we do when we are naked. I don't get your point here.

Christian organizations obstruct real solutions for AIDS in africa on the basis of the above. (real evil)

Not all of them, some do, but they're there and trying to give SOME help (No I don't mean bibles!!) I mean medication, I mean food and medical attention. I mean help for orphaned children and education!

I think being there at all is better than ignoring the problem completely. This STILL doesn't tell me why believing in an afterlife is evil.

You can't get visits with grandma in the abraham's big condo in the sky without stepping on a whole bunch of people that just happened to be unlucky enough to be born a heathen.

Yes I can.

Nothing - except that you have no evidence that you will see them again. If you said you could talk to the aliens then you just might get locked up, if you dress your wierd ideas up as religion and talk about visiting with grandma then it's okay?

yep. If you say you can talk to aliens, well ok if that's what you want to believe that's fine. I believe I will see my grandparents again. I still don't see what's so dangerous about that idea.

Your religion exists only through the convention of political correctness that makes it taboo criticise certain ridiculous ideas (like creation myths)and is based on fear and coercion.

I don't believe that. if you took away the taboo about criticism. (which Is erroding faster every day) You'd still have those that are filled with the spirit, who will not stop believing just because other people don't have faith.

That same political correctness provides cover for the fundies - christians and mulsims alike - to forward their insane (yet theologically correct) agendas.

You're right. I hate that. I hate it alot. I wish there was a way to shut up the extremests. but everyone has the right to free speech. even them.

You are mistaken. I did not say that. I hope that people will stop believing things that are divisive and have no basis in reality so that we can get on with making our world more peaceable and sustainable and learn more about our place in the universe. False hope, however, is wrong. Tell a terminal cancer patient that he will not die if he has faith and he will still die - no better off than he was before you lied to him.

How can you say my hope is false? you're forcing your beliefs on me, just because you think they are more reasonable than mine are. I know you'll go back to 'I have no proof.' you're right. but that's the nature of faith.

What do you mean by extremeist? Like literalism? Some people equate literalism with lutheranism, and therefore fundamentalism. Either the bible is true or it is not.

By extremeist I mean the God hates Fags people, by extremest I mean anyone who feels they have the right to judge others and condemn them, those who think they're better than anyone else. The bible says, Judge not lest ye be judged. And yes. The Bible is true.

As an aside, have you ever wondered about the idea that if you had been born in another place, you would have another religion?

Yes I have wondered about that and I don't believe it to be true because I was born into a family that didn't go to church. I was born to a man who studied the tarot. Yes they started attending when I was young, but it doesn't change the fact that God brought me into his kingdom.

and I have friends who didn't grow up in the church and are now avid believers. I've also seen the opposite. people born and raised into this religion who have turned their backs on God, who don't believe anymore or never really did.

so I believe that had I been born in India, somehow, God would have brought me to him, because I am his child and I love him, though I don't know why.

Posted by journeylady Why does one preclude the other?

1. Believing that you will survive your own death as long as you follow the rules of long dead and very flawed men who wrote a book without the benefit of any knowledge of the universe is not conducive to building a better future where our descendants can get along in peace. You remove the consequences of having to deal with the reality that you will die and anything you accomplish must be done in your short lifespan.

2. Your belief in eternal life comes, inseparably, with dangerous, divisive ideas that cause real human suffering.

Posted by journeylady I give to charities,

So what?

Consider the suffering of the millions of unfortunate people who happen to live in sub-Saharan Africa. The wars in this part of the world are interminable. AIDS is epidemic there, killing around 3 million people each year. It is almost impossible to exaggerate how bad your luck is if you are born today in a country like Sudan. The question is, how does religion affect this problem?

Many pious Christians go to countries like Sudan to help alleviate human suffering, and such behavior is regularly put forward as a defense of Christianity. But in this case, religion gives people bad reasons for acting morally, where good reasons are actually available. We don’t have to believe that a deity wrote one of our books, or that Jesus was born of a virgin, to be moved to help people in need. In those same desperate places, one finds secular volunteers working with organizations like Doctors Without Borders and helping people for secular reasons. Helping people purely out of concern for their happiness and suffering seems rather more noble than helping them because you think the Creator of the universe wants you to do it, will reward you for doing it, or will punish you for not doing it.

Posted by journeylady I disagree.

Of course you do. You have to. That, as you say, is the nature of faith. You are unable to question ideas that confound your beleifs because, conveniently, you chance hell and loss of eternal life just by asking why. Your answer to every real question is faith. Faith is just an excuse for not wanting to know why.

Posted by journeylady the GOVERNMENT cares what we do when we are naked... SOCIETY cares what we do when we are naked. I don't get your point here.

Society and Government care for two reasons, one good and one bad. The good reason is based on medical and sociological EVIDENCE. The bad reason is based on the idea that your imaginary friend cares what people do when they are naked, put forth by people voted for by people like you who base important democratic decisions on nothing more than blind faith in the ideas of a few men who wrote a hopelssy flawed book 2000 years ago.

Posted by journeylady I think being there at all is better than ignoring the problem completely. This STILL doesn't tell me why believing in an afterlife is evil.

Do you mean like ignoring the problem of pluralism? Call it diversity and this politically correct agreement to ignore the contradictions in religious doctrines becomes ignoring the problem.

Incompatible religious doctrines have balkanized our world into separate moral communities--Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, etc.--and these divisions have become a continuous source of human conflict. Indeed, religion is as much a living spring of violence today as it was at any time in the past. The recent conflicts in Palestine (Jews versus Muslims), the Balkans (Orthodox Serbians versus Catholic Croatians; Orthodox Serbians versus Bosnian and Albanian Muslims), Northern Ireland (Protestants versus Catholics), Kashmir (Muslims versus Hindus), Sudan (Muslims versus Christians and animists), Nigeria (Muslims versus Christians), Ethiopia and Eritrea (Muslims versus Christians), Sri Lanka (Sinhalese Buddhists versus Tamil Hindus), Indonesia (Muslims versus Timorese Christians), Iran and Iraq (Shiite versus Sunni Muslims), and the Caucasus (Orthodox Russians versus Chechen Muslims; Muslim Azerbaijanis versus Catholic and Orthodox Armenians) are merely a few cases in point. In these places religion has been the explicit cause of literally millions of deaths in the last 10 years.

Posted by journeylady Yes I can.

Oh? Tell us how. Ghandi could not do it. Martin Luther King could not do it? How then are you, a 27 year old Lutheran from Kitchener, going to solve the greatest challenge facing humanity since we descedned from the trees? How exactly do you plan to reconcile the incompatible and dangerous ideas of hundreds of different faiths? How about just islam and x-tianity?

Posted by journeylady if you took away the taboo about criticism. (which Is erroding faster every day) You'd still have those that are filled with the spirit, who will not stop believing just because other people don't have faith.

It can't erode fast enough as far as I am concerned. Faith based ideas deserve no more tolerance than any other fantasy.

Reason will destroy religion as inevitably as the elements erode mountains.

The earth was flat and then it wasn't.

In 1514 Copernicus came up with the idea that the earth rotated around the sun. One of Martin Luther's friends suggested famously that a "christian prince" should do away with copernicus. Martin Luther and his buddies were wrong about that, what else?

Your statement is useless with no proofs. Show me this spirit that fills these people? How does it get there? Do preists filled with the spirit inject it into little boys behinds? or is that wrong? why does your sky god allow that stuff?

Posted by journeylady You're right. I hate that. I hate it alot. I wish there was a way to shut up the extremests. but everyone has the right to free speech. even them.

Those extremists use you as cover. I have stood in pits in Bosnia filled with children murdered in the name of your god. The people that did it did not consider themselves extremists and they were not few either. They used the same bible as you read to justify genocide. Ideas are dangerous - particularly when you give them special status. They also believed that they were righteous, and would survive thier own deaths.

I watched a man have his head broken open like a melon - in allah's name. Those people, based on islamic law, and arguably your god's ideas, that they will live past their death to be rewarded for acting on these IDEAS.

And no, free speech is not an absolute right. Hate speech and literature are outlawed in Canada. Look it up.

Posted by journeylady How can you say my hope is false? you're forcing your beliefs on me, just because you think they are more reasonable than mine are. I know you'll go back to 'I have no proof.' you're right. but that's the nature of faith.

I can say your hope is false because you can demonstrate no good reason to believe that. I am not forcing you to do anything. If having this dicussion forces you to examine the roots of your long-held beliefs, I remind you that you participate willingly and I can not be blamed for asking critical question for which you have no good answer.

Posted by journeylady The Bible is true.

No. It is no. The bible is filled with wrong ideas, contradictions, hate and violence - these are not right.

Explain to me, please, if the earth is 6000 yrs old, why do we have good evidence that the sumerians invented glue 7000 yrs ago? How do you expain the dinosuars? The earliest accounts of jesus, who is most probably a myth, appear over one hundred years after his alleged death and flying trick. Women do not get pregnant without sex, or artificial insemination. Wine is not blood...

Posted by journeylady so I believe that had I been born in India, somehow, God would have brought me to him, because I am his child and I love him, though I don't know why.

Right - Hindus are wrong about the universe. You can't even imagine yourself as a disgusting heathen - but somehow they can be good and right too? Just not good enough for you.

Posted by journeylady Not going to dispute that one, but my believing it, and your not believing it, doesn't change a THING in your day to day life. that isn't really connected to the point here. I'm asking why my personal beliefs are a bad thing in your mind. They don't effect you at all.

Do you not understand that there is no such thing a personal belief? You act on the things you believe. You act in a world filled with others who are always affected by your actions.

George Bush believes that god wanted him to invade iraq. That is all the evidence he needs. How many people died because of his personal beliefs.

Religious zealots, who use your book, and in the name of your god, stop stem cell research, fight abortion on any grounds, push abstinence only programs in schools, make stupid laws, delay vaccinations, teach stupid creation myths in schools and force terminally ill people to die in agony and have covered this world with war and suffering - all based on personal beliefs.

Posted by tekriter You remove the consequences of having to deal with the reality that you will die and anything you accomplish must be done in your short lifespan.

no it doesn't. Once I'm dead and in Heaven I can do nothing more to help this earth, that doesn't change because after I die I'm with God. it just means I have something waiting for me at that point.

Helping people purely out of concern for their happiness and suffering seems rather more noble than helping them because you think the Creator of the universe wants you to do it, will reward you for doing it, or will punish you for not doing it.

Just because someone is Christian doesn't mean that they're motivated by fear of God or because God said 'do this'. A lot of Christians ARE motivated purely out of concern for their happiness and suffering.

You're generalizing again.

You are unable to question ideas that confound your beleifs because, conveniently, you chance hell and loss of eternal life just by asking why.

That's not true. I'm perfectly able to, and have! I have questioned my beliefs and come up with the fact that I'd rather believe than not.

Oh? Tell us how. Ghandi could not do it. Martin Luther King could not do it? How then are you, a 27 year old Lutheran from Kitchener, going to solve the greatest challenge facing humanity since we descedned from the trees? How exactly do you plan to reconcile the incompatible and dangerous ideas of hundreds of different faiths? How about just islam and x-tianity?

What the hell are you talking about? You said I couldn't see my grandmother in heaven I said I could.

ok I've gone and looked back and I see what you mean now. miscommunication.

Right - Hindus are wrong about the universe. You can't even imagine yourself as a disgusting heathen - but somehow they can be good and right too? Just not good enough for you.

I am a disgusting heathen. I don't think I'm any better than anyone else.

I don't know where you get some of the things you say out of what I said. It seems to me that you think you know a lot more about me than you do.

Do you not understand that there is no such thing a personal belief? You act on the things you believe. You act in a world filled with others who are always affected by your actions. George Bush believes that god wanted him to invade iraq. That is all the evidence he needs. How many people died because of his personal beliefs. Religious zealots, who use your book, and in the name of your god, stop stem cell research, fight abortion on any grounds, push abstinence only programs in schools, make stupid laws, delay vaccinations, teach stupid creation myths in schools and force terminally ill people to die in agony and have covered this world with war and suffering - all based on personal beliefs.

all based on personal beliefs... I, personally, don't believe any of that is right. I, personally, belief that I can believe in my God and have my own faith without hurting anyone else. I, personally, do not believe I am in any way better than any one else.

It seems to be that you believe you're better than a hell of a lot of people. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't that just as bad as what you're accusing me of?

No.

Let me clarify:

I am sure you are a very good person. I disagree with your ideas, and your lack of understanding of the consequences of ideas.

I think you have been mislead, but as you say you believe because you want to.

I am not suggesting that I am better than you. I am not "selling" any beliefs or ideas. I am merely suggesting that you be just a little more critical of the things you are told to believe.

Evolution has truckloads of good scientific proof, ID has only criticism of those proofs and nothing to back up a ridiculous theory.

No society has ever fallen, and no war ever started because people asked for better evidence for ideas.

I suggest to you that I am not better than you, but that healthy scepticism trumps blind faith in any arena. The sphere I am most concerned with is this planet and all the people on it. They are better served by ideas that are supported and reasonable than by blind faith in a first century view of the world.

I have to leave now, I have a plane to catch. I hope you have a good holiday and I look forward to renewing our discussion in the new year.

Posted by tekriter No. Let me clarify: I am sure you are a very good person. I disagree with your ideas, and your lack of understanding of the consequences of ideas. I think you have been mislead, but as you say you believe because you want to. I am not suggesting that I am better than you. I am not "selling" any beliefs or ideas. I am merely suggesting that you be just a little more critical of the things you are told to believe. Evolution has truckloads of good scientific proof, ID has only criticism of those proofs and nothing to back up a ridiculous theory. No society has ever fallen, and no war ever started because people asked for better evidence for ideas. I suggest to you that I am not better than you, but that healthy scepticism trumps blind faith in any arena. The sphere I am most concerned with is this planet and all the people on it. They are better served by ideas that are supported and reasonable than by blind faith in a first century view of the world. I have to leave now, I have a plane to catch. I hope you have a good holiday and I look forward to renewing our discussion in the new year.

Sometimes you make it very difficult to separate the argument with my belief system from what I perceive as a personal attack on myself.

I can't explain the reasons I believe. I have more than blind faith and hope though. This spirit you can't see or feel, the sure knowledge that there is a God. but I can't prove them to you.

I hate the way man run religion is so screwed up in the world. I hate that you're right about a lot of your points.

I wish it were not true but a lot of it is.

But I think you're deliberately avoiding the fact that some Christians do good things for our world.

Maybe not many, but some people, despite their belief in an 'invisable sky fairy' are good people who do good things, and not just because God said they should.

That said, I hope you have a wonderful holiday, however or whatever you celebrate.

Posted by tekriter [a book]

Dude, seriously.

I've never seen or talked with anyone who enjoyed debating to this extent. Even KK is slowing down with you on this board!!

Posted by tekriter Helping people purely out of concern for their happiness and suffering seems rather more noble than helping them because you think the Creator of the universe wants you to do it, will reward you for doing it, or will punish you for not doing it.

Maybe it is more noble to do it for secular reasons. But seriously, do you really think if all those Christians were secular that they'd be doing secular good works? Come on. I really, really doubt it.

For better or worse, Christianity motivates a lot of people who otherwise wouldn't to do good deeds. And most of those people aren't the evil Christians you're describing.

Incompatible religious doctrines have balkanized our world into separate moral communities--Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, etc.--and these divisions have become a continuous source of human conflict. Indeed, religion is as much a living spring of violence today as it was at any time in the past. The recent conflicts in Palestine (Jews versus Muslims), the Balkans (Orthodox Serbians versus Catholic Croatians; Orthodox Serbians versus Bosnian and Albanian Muslims), Northern Ireland (Protestants versus Catholics), Kashmir (Muslims versus Hindus), Sudan (Muslims versus Christians and animists), Nigeria (Muslims versus Christians), Ethiopia and Eritrea (Muslims versus Christians), Sri Lanka (Sinhalese Buddhists versus Tamil Hindus), Indonesia (Muslims versus Timorese Christians), Iran and Iraq (Shiite versus Sunni Muslims), and the Caucasus (Orthodox Russians versus Chechen Muslims; Muslim Azerbaijanis versus Catholic and Orthodox Armenians) are merely a few cases in point. In these places religion has been the explicit cause of literally millions of deaths in the last 10 years.

Yeah, but dude, there's been some pretty specific examples of extremely-secular (or atheist) governments doing some extremely horrific things. Almost to the point that one could argue that when the government has no religion whatsoever that it starts to look at human beings as a numbers game.

Reason will destroy religion as inevitably as the elements erode mountains.

Nope. Never happen.

Religion (hopefully) will get majorly secularized all around the world one day, I'm sure, but it'll never get wiped out. It'll always exist.

Human beings will never give up the idea of an afterlife.

Hate speech and literature are outlawed in Canada. Look it up.

And that will come around to bite us all in the ass BIG TIME. Hate is wrong, but it shouldn't be a crime. You let one idea become outlawed, you open the door for more to be.

The earliest accounts of jesus, who is most probably a myth, appear over one hundred years after his alleged death and flying trick.

I don't see how you can possibly think there wasn't an actual Jesus.

It's true that the accounts of Jesus appear that late, but some of the stories of his followers are older. Though there's almost no historical accounts of Jesus, there are many of the early Christians and their martyrs, even the apostles. We know a lot about the early Christian movement, if not Jesus.

We know for historical fact that Christianity erupted suddenly and that people started willingly dying for it.

I find it hard to believe that all that could've happened in the way it happened without there actually being a real, historical Jesus.

Whether or not he was God or the son of God is a question for the religious, but I have no doubt whatsoever that there was an actual Jesus.

George Bush believes that god wanted him to invade iraq.

Oh come on. If you think George Bush's decision to invade is shit, that's a valid argument, but he did what he believed was right.

Every Christian believes that, when they're doing something right, that it's what God wants them to do. George Bush isn't any different.

I still say you're wayyyyyyyy too hard on Christianity.

Christianity is fine, but I think there may only be a handful of true Christians in the world.

In America, we've got this pop-Christianity, with huge multi-million dollar buildings with multi-level parking decks, and the very public focus on issues which tend to be put in terms of black and white, chosen specifically to alienate and cause dissension. For the VAST majority of people who identify themselves as Christian, it means nothing to them of any personal value whatsoever, at least, not for more than a few minutes at a time.

I cannot count the number of outspoken Christians that I have known in some capacity, that have turned out to be absolutely vile human beings, while the majority of people that I know who identify themselves as atheist or agnostic tend to be intelligent, caring, moral people.

Posted by White Rabbit But seriously, do you really think if all those Christians were secular that they'd be doing secular good works?

You're agreeing with Karl Marx. You probably don't do that often. There may well always be people stuck in the very lowest stages of moral development, and if religion works to keep them in line, great, but the whole thing is just a little out of control. Hopefully, the newest religion in the world will pick up even more speed, there are already some 70,000 Jedi in Australia alone.

Days One through Six (Inclusive) Day Adventist. But only on the Seventh day.

Wow, here I thought this was a post where you declare your own belief. But like every religious discussion it has come to bitching about what other people believe in. Please cut it out and just chime in with your own belief.

I believe that you should shut the hell up, instead of just complaining about what other people have said.

...and Mutant Mandias pours on some lighter fluid...