This Baron of Mora
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?Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions.?
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Post by This Baron of Mora on Nov 1, 2012 21:31:34 GMT -5
Why don't atheists believe in God? A question I thought I knew the answer too (generally speaking) until I got put in a class everyday where (as far as I know) they outnumber Christians likely at least 2:1, probably more. They say some weird things that I would not expect!
Here's what I got for reasons: 1. It's illogical 2. Religious people are nuts 3. Religion does only harm 4. It's old-fashioned 5. I'm confused
Anyone got some to lend me? Keep in mind that these people are outspoken about.
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This Baron of Mora
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?Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions.?
Posts: 113
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Post by This Baron of Mora on Nov 1, 2012 21:35:27 GMT -5
I aught to mention that this class is Western Humanities/traditions, I find this ironic to some degree since an enormous part of their tradition is Christian based and they don't really realize it, and most of what we look at is Christianity related.
I should also say my intent is to further understand their largely foreign way of thinking so I can better counter them.
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Post by Kessie on Nov 2, 2012 0:53:59 GMT -5
Another fun one is "I'm a good moral person and I don't need a God to be moral".
One fun conversation starter is to ask, "Have you ever told a lie? Have you ever stolen anything? Have you ever taken God's name in vain?" (The answers to all these being yes.) Conclude, "So you're a lying thieving blasphemer. Do you still think you're a good person?"
The problem with atheists is that they're people, too. People have this part of our brain where if we think something is true, we automatically reject something contrary to that belief. Is 1 + 1 = 3? No. Your brain rejects that.
To an atheist, talking about God is saying 1 + 1 = 3. They reject it, not only because they disbelieve it, but because their brain physically is closed to the idea.
The way to get through that closed area is 1) be kind and not a mean Christian stereotype and 2) humor. You can go a long, long way on both of those. :-)
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Post by choosybeggar on Nov 2, 2012 5:12:05 GMT -5
Humor? I got a joke lying around here somewhere. Oh yeah.
"Wanna hear a one-word joke? Religion."
I told that one, got some laughs, and from that moment started a conversation about why "religion" and dealing with the supernatural aren't the same thing. Cool stuff, and I only got to interact so much because I used language mostly separate from the Christian culture.
That's the only advice I'll put forth here. Don't use "Christianese." Any time you're talking to atheists and whatnot, and the word(s) 'faith,' 'miracle,' 'sanctification,' 'anointing,' 'apostle,' 'born again,' 'trinity,' or any other jargon word pops into your head, just shut your mouth for a moment until you can redirect your speech patterns. Either that, or be prepared to explain the meanings of the words to your audience, which can get old really quickly.
Different people speak different languages, even if they all come under the umbrella of 'english.' To quote Kessie, if you talk about God, especially in terms that they've seldom heard, the communication is garbled. Example: 'Sin' is a very, very touchy subject, and it's overused, at least from the perspective of someone who feels insecure or just doesn't care. But how about if you just called it breaking the rules? "He who makes the Universe gets to make the rules. He made them all good, and working with them gets you ahead. But if you decide to operate outside the rules, then bad things happen to you automatically." My interpretation of life and the universe, of course.
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This Baron of Mora
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?Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions.?
Posts: 113
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Post by This Baron of Mora on Nov 2, 2012 8:03:48 GMT -5
I generally agree with your remark, however the difference in this case is that we are actually talking about Christianity as the subject matter (just read Thomas Aquinas and Anselm's arguments about why God exists, I'm sure they loved the part where Anselm said, Therefore because of this (his argument) anyone who denies God exists is stupid and foolish) so their atheism comes up a lot in condemning certain things and commending others, I must excuse their lack of knowledge, then make them think about from a different angle logically, and eventually if I succeed they then say, "Alright I can see that."
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Post by Bainespal on Nov 2, 2012 19:20:53 GMT -5
There was once a vocal atheist at my college who I would run into from time to time, until I had a class with him last semester. He seemed to know the Bible thoroughly, and he claimed to have read it twice from cover to cover. Once, before class, people were talking about one of the vampire shows on TV, and I remember him saying, "God favors vampires..." because vampires drink blood, and the life of a creature is in its blood, paraphrasing a verse from the Old Testament (Leviticus 17:11, perhaps).
I can only assume that he thought Christianity/Judaism teaches that blood is somehow magical, and that God's favor is earned by those who do whatever it takes to claim God's magic. Really, though, the concept of vampire fiction does touch on the theme of life being represented by blood, but in a much deeper and more subtle way. I think atheists actually tend to think very literally about spiritual significance, perhaps even more literally than the most ardent Fundamentalists. They can't see actions and things and symbols in the light of total reality, or they choose not to until doing so is convenient, such as in order to see the moral atrocities that religious people have committed throughout the ages.
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Post by newburydave on Nov 2, 2012 20:46:37 GMT -5
I was a radical atheist for about six years during my late high school and most of my college years.
The short answer for why had nothing to do with Philosophy or Theological reasoning. I grew up in a very historic but very dead formal church, where we were sort of taught the forms of Christianity without the power.
My father was the lay leader of the church while I was in High School and the church went through a nasty split and meltdown. It got very ugly and we shed about half the membership over about two years.
I saw how good, professing church people acted behind the scenes and that convinced me that it was all a scam. They didn't even try to live up to the moral aspirations and forms of Christianity in their struggle for power. This made me easy prey for the dogma of Marxism.
This disillusionment allowed me to follow my natural sinful desires and that led me to atheism. All of my reasoning to justify it were nothing but window dressing.
More later
SGD dave
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This Baron of Mora
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?Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions.?
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Post by This Baron of Mora on Nov 3, 2012 0:18:31 GMT -5
Thanks for the thoughts, I remember once in class when we had just been given a packet of Bible excerpts to read, I had read most of it and was familiar with the material (only Song of Songs I hadn't) while we were discussing it I and the only other very outspoken Christian had to kind of redirect their thought to the truth of what it was saying.
One can see their misunderstanding since their are unfamiliar with the Bible details (though they yet quote stories like Moses?) and they were only given pieces to work off of. However at one point when speaking of the creation in Genesis someone said something to the likeness of, I think they are using this power that God gave them over animals as an excuse to destroy nature.
This one was weird for me, after all the Bible wasn't written in the 50s or something like that, why would Hebrews wandering through the desert (if Moses write Genesis) care about excusing their destruction of the Earth? I pointed out at the time that the translation changed the meaning of the word, that it really meant man was caretaker of the earth.
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Post by torainfor on Nov 3, 2012 21:22:06 GMT -5
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This Baron of Mora
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?Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions.?
Posts: 113
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Post by This Baron of Mora on Nov 4, 2012 23:43:15 GMT -5
It seems to me that many of them I've meet (overall very smart people) that they seem to have the idea that Christianity/religion is illogical (which their fine intellects could never have) and that religion is harmful.
On the latter one once said when we were talking about Islam that it seemed kinder/better than the 10 Commandments I then said I was curious why since I had always thought that no one could really say they were bad, she responded that they were fine but they were 'do or die' like, I was rather surprised (obviously no one can keep them completely) and then after others' comments I said "it sounded more like they were listening to a screaming Baptist (sorry if your a Baptist I think their a good Church I meant more like those awful Westboro Baptists, who really shouldn't be called Baptists since they give them a bad name, that picket all sort of horrid things and have false beliefs I was just speaking on the fly but I wanted to be honest with the retelling), they might as well start getting their Islam from terrorist who want to destroy Israel then."
On the former I am wondering how they put a counter argument after all you can't say, "In the beginning their was nothing - and then it blew up" in the end you must have something to start creation (even if it was an explosion of sorts). Besides as some their stuff goes the chances (like the complexity of the brain) are ridiculous but I won't go into that. And most of the smartest people ever were Christians, even the people they put their science-faith in.
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Post by firestorm78583 on Nov 5, 2012 11:09:02 GMT -5
I've always wondered how someone chooses to believe that this beautiful world we live in just randomly happened after a big explosion and millions of years of "evolution". I'm curious how an athiest would react to applying the same logic to recreate the same results. (i.e. If I blow this car up, I will eventually wind up with another planet populated by living creatures.)
Right now, our Sunday night growth group is reading Classic Christianity by Bob George. I highly recomend it. The author uses some great analogies to explain the problems we face as Christians in fully understanding the Christian faith.
One thing that is pointed out in the book goes back to legalism. Trying to follow the law, when we are saved by grace. We as Christians know more about what not to do than we know what to do
I think a lot of athiests are turned off by "religion" because their exposure to it is filled with a bunch of "Don't do this", and "Don't do that". They never get the chance to understand the nescesity (sp?) of needing to restore their relationship with God.
More later,
Will
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Post by fluke on Nov 5, 2012 15:40:05 GMT -5
The fine line between legalism and libertines. One must not follow the law because we will go to hell unless we do, but out of love for God who knows what is best for us. Likewise, while all is permitted, not all is profitable. There are many things we can do but should not. I know you know this. I was just moved to repeat it.
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Post by newburydave on Nov 9, 2012 10:59:45 GMT -5
RE: Keeping His commandments & Killing athiem
God had this covered when He inspired Jeremiah with the promise that in the times of the Holy Ghost (in those days, after Messiah comes) that God would "write His truth in our minds (so we could uinderstand it) and His Law in our hearts (so we could do it by nature [our new nature in Chirst])"
We perform the Spirit of the Law because it is naturally consistent with the Christlike Love that He continually pours into our hearts.
IMHO those who rejoice in a false freedom to ignore the commandments that Jesus gave us aren't really too strongly plugged into God. He radically changes everyone that He forgives, adopts and raises to new life in Jesus. We naturally begin to establish God's true moral law by living out the reality of it as he renews us more and more to conform to the reality of Jesus' character.
One thing I notice in the Gospels and Epistles is that Jesus and the Apostles were always intensely interested in the practical specifics of life. In one sense they only wrestled with false belief when it hinders us from attaining "Christian Virtue" (the power, drive, energy to do what is right no matter what).
***********
Upon reflection I believe that the whole argument about atheism boils down to this. If God doesn't exist then humans are the measure of all things and what ever we will to do is "Morally Right". (the caring for others argument has a Deistic basis) You will notice that this is the first commandment of Satanism, Do what you Will.
My Atheism ended when God confronted me such that I knew He was not only real but sovereign, the world as I knew it changed in an instant. Actually, all He did was speak to me out of the blue. At that instant I knew.
That didn't save me, I had to be fully convinced of my sin (the vision He gave of me plummeting toward the flames of hell accomplished that); and I had to sorrow for my sins (repent, rethink my life and existence with God and his transcendent truth in view [Meta Noia -think with you higher {transcendent} mind] and come to the true conclusions about it).
Then I had to look up from my total despair and hopelessness, see Jesus as my only hope and believe that He would do what He promised.
When He touched me and said to my heart "I will be thou clean" (I didn't know that was in the Bible at the time) He changed me to match the new world He'd opened to my sight so I could live in it without shame.
But the death-knell of my Atheism was when God spoke to me and convinced me that He was real. It only figures, I had to believe he was before I could believe He would reward my search to find Him. Boy did that go differently than I expected (in my ignorance).
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IMHO the three different types of Atheist that Torainfor listed were all represented in me, in varying degrees, depending on what I was experiencing at any given time. At first my decision to reject God's reality felt liberating. As I descended into it though I found myself filled with more and more darkness and hatred (light and love only come from Jesus). All my struggles had no cause or purpose, no justification. By the end I was totally self consumed, but I didn't like myself very much.
(A preacher friend of mine had a sermon about what a godless universe really was. His title for it was "A Place Worse than Hell.")
When Jesus saved me I stepped out into the light of His Lordship and have never looked back. To touch back to the issue of living by His commandments, His Sovereignty is the air that my faith breathes to give and uphold me in His eternal life. If He isn't the ultimate Sovereign then He could not have forgiven and saved me from the awfulness of my crimes against the universe; but He did and the rest: Love, Obedience, total Commitment, Service from my Heart all follow naturally.
Once you experience the reality of His love and life-giving forgiveness you don't need a logical argument or a theological dogma to tell you to do these things and more, they just flow out of your heart. The KJV translates the justification for giving ourselves as living sacrifices to Him as "our reasonable service. [Rom.12:1]" To do otherwise is just flat unreasonable.
An old preacher once said, "Love will make you do far more than Law could ever command you to do."
Legalism is not only powerless to save or change us, it is also stupid.
Write on beloved siblings
SGD dave
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Post by Resha Caner on Dec 8, 2012 23:47:48 GMT -5
The reason I hear most often is that there is no evidence for God.
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Post by almarquardt on Dec 9, 2012 20:16:15 GMT -5
The reason I hear most often is that there is no evidence for God. Which never made sense to me. There's no evidence of me writing this post, so how do you know some bot didn't write it. Perhaps this is all a dream, even. But there is evidence, isn't there, if one chooses to look deep enough. That's the problem with many atheists using this argument: They aren't looking deep enough, or asking for "evidence" that God won't provide. It's not that he couldn't, it's that he won't, because he will not be tested in such a way. He expects us to ask to reveal himself with a sincere and seeking heart, not participate in a parlor trick. It still doesn't provide an argument that will open an atheist's heart to the possibilities of God. In truth, I don't have one except to ask God to speak through us when we find ourselves arguing with an atheist. The worst thing we can do is spout scripture at them in the form of, "The Bible says . . ." To them you may as well speak in a foreign language. Ever notice how Jesus spoke to the religious leaders differently from the common folk? That's because he knew their language and spoke in ways only they could understand. We need to do the same, and that may mean learning their language. If you find they prefer to argue without listening, however, then it's best to walk away. To answer the original post, I'm sure there are uncountable reasons people choose not to believe. It could be some trauma where a religious person or church harmed them, or a prayer that went unanswered. It could also be they find it easier to believe there's no God, because without God there's no morality, no consequences for our actions, and we are "free" to do whatever we want.
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